Challenges

I love God, because She is so deliciously sneaky.

I was listening to Morning Edition on NPR a couple of weeks ago, as I do most mornings while getting ready for work. On the previous day, in a state of mental and emotional fatigue I had thought it best to give up the fight to keep the Episcopal Church in the Anglican Communion. As I was stepping into the shower, I heard the Morning Edition anchor introduce an interview with Jerry Falwell. Great, I thought, just what I need to hear -- an interview with perhaps the most repulsive Christian minister I know.

As part of the story, NPR interviewed Mel White, the founder of Soulforce. Mel White was a confidant of Jerry Falwell's, and the ghostwriter of Falwell's autobiography. Mel White eventually came out as a gay man and founded Soulforce to work for the full inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons in the Christian church. When not leading spiritual protests around the country, he lives in Lynchburg and regularly attends services at the Thomas Road Baptist Church, which Falwell founded and still leads.
Whenever the sermon/rhetoric turns homophobic, Mel White stands up in silent protest of the denigration heaped upon his GLBT brothers and sisters.

When I thought about Mel White, I realized I was being a great big wuss.

The whole GLBT issue isn't going away because the GLBT community in the Episcopal Church isn't going away. I have to remember that God has a plan -- undoubtedly part of His plan was my hearing that interview. Wrangling with the global Anglican Communion is also part of that plan. In all of this brouhaha, it is important to remember that the ultimate goal is not -- and must never be -- the unity of the Anglican Communion. Instead the ultimate goal must always be proclaiming the gospel and pursuing justice for all of God's people.