Last month, I wrote about Venus Magazine, which catered to African-American gays and lesbians. Then, its publisher Charlene Cothran found God and supposedly stopped being gay. As a result, Cothran changed the magazine’s mission to helping those who also wanted to become straight.
Apparently, some Christian media folks are upset this didn’t receive more coverage. Kelly Boggs, the editor of the Baptist Message, said this:
Imagine a prominent conservative Christian publicly announcing that he has renounced heterosexuality and will henceforth and forever be homosexual… Try as I might, I cannot, for the life of me, imagine the mainstream press failing to report such news. Instead, there would be a media firestorm.
Dan Savage writes at length this week about why Cothran didn’t receive more coverage. Essentially, he says, it’s because she never actually made the conversion. He cites an interview she did with freelance journalist Clay Cane. The full interview is here, but here are the excerpts that Savage uses:
So, what about you now really makes you heterosexual?
Charlene: Nothing… My prayer was not fix me, repair me and make me straight—that was not my prayer. My prayer was God make me whole in every sense of the word….
Are you saying that you are not heterosexual?
Charlene: I am saying that I am celibate right now. I’m not saying there won’t ever be a man in my life. You’re asking me about where I am and that’s all I can speak to. Today I am celibate… But… there is one thing I can say and one thing I will go on record and say—I will never be entangled with the bondage of lesbianism again…
Are you physically attracted to men?
Charlene: [Pauses.] I am physically attracted to the spirit of Christ right now…
Are you still attracted to women, or is that attraction completely gone?
Charlene: I would say after 29 years of walking in the sin of lesbianism that if the devil were going to try and tempt me that he’s probably not going to send a football player, if you will, because that didn’t do it for me. You follow me?
Yes, Charlene, we follow you. If the devil is going to tempt your ass, he’d better send Halle Berry and not William “Refrigerator” Perry. Because you’re not attracted to men. Except Jesus—and you’re not even attracted to the hot body (and blood?) of Christ, just to His “spirit.”
Um, Kelly Boggs? The mainstream media is ignoring Cothran because there’s nothing much to see here. Just another silly, insecure homo undone by the zap put on her head by her family (Cothran was disowned when she came out 20 years ago) and the faith in which she was raised. The celibate Cothran hasn’t been liberated from her homosexuality, just from the possibility of an intimate adult relationship. Getting right with her fictional bogeyman of a savior didn’t make Cothran straight. She’s still a ‘mo—a slow ‘mo, but a ‘mo.
[tags]atheist, atheism, Venus Magazine, African-American, gay, lesbian, Charlene Cothran, God, Kelly Boggs, Baptist Message, Christian, homosexual, Dan Savage, Clay Cane, Christ, Halle Berry, William “Refrigerator” Perry[/tags]