I do not wish to get into a never-ending battle of proof texts with Pastor Leskovar whereby we beat each other’s theological brains out with dueling Bible verses (though when was the last time he ate shellfish or pork, wore mixed fabrics, allowed leadership to a person with a disability - all condemned in Leviticus, encouraged slaves to obey their masters - Ephesians, or sent a run away slave back to his master - Philemon).

I wish I could say that his views and actions are unchristian, but the Christian church has been killing, oppressing, hating people in God’s name for centuries - the persecution of so-called heretics, the crusades, hanging and burning people because of their religious views and convictions - the inquisition, reformation, and our beloved Puritans, the killing of Jews under the misreading of scripture that they are Christ killers, arguing for slavery in the 19th Century, arguing that it is against God’s law that people of different races be married or even use the same washrooms or have the same civil rights as whites. I unfortunately could go on.

But there is another way and that is the way of following and living the way of Jesus - what he said (not a word, by the way, about homosexuality) and what he did. He sided with the marginalized - those ostracized by the dominant culture, he ate and talked and lived with people the religious authorities thought he shouldn’t. And most of all he lived love and commanded his followers over and over to love God and neighbor and he included all in his idea of neighbor. Jesus got angry when people used religion to exclude or hate or exploit or oppress.

I find myself called as a follower of Jesus to speak out for those who have no voice, for those who are denied basic rights by a dominant culture. All citizens have a right to the same civil liberties and the same responsibilities under those rights. There are roughly 1,100 things granted to married couples under the law that are denied to folks who live together but are not married through no fault of their own but the state’s.

It wasn’t long ago that people of different races were legally prohibited from marrying because they would produce a mongrel race. The state has no right to discriminate between its citizens. What churches choose to do in solemnizing marriages is up to the churches and would not be affected by state laws.

Children have a right to a loving home whether that is with one parent, a mom and a dad, two moms or two dads. The morality of a relationship is in whether it is loving and caring and builds the other up, encourages them to be the best they can be regardless if it is between a man and a woman, two men or two women.

An immoral relationship is one that is exploitative, hurtful, oppressive, tears the other down regardless of whether it is between a man and a woman, two women or two men.

God created us all and called creation good. We have been created with the capacity for good and evil and it is our free will, a free will given by God at our creation, that determines what we choose. Let us choose to live lives of justice and love - love for God and all God’s people.

Let us put our considerable energies into eradicating true sins of war and poverty and hunger and homelessness and torture and oppression and injustice and discrimination.

Rev. Dr. Joanne Carlson Brown
Tibbetts United Methodist Church