Late last night, @DesiringGod, the Twitter account for the ministry of preacher John Piper, posted this message against homosexuality:
The same-sex attracted who follow Jesus don’t trade love for loneliness. They trade broken love for true love.
— Desiring God (@desiringGod) June 17, 2018
It’s a short tweet, but there’s a lot to unpack.
It argues that people in same-sex relationships can’t possibly be following Jesus — not properly, anyway — even though there are plenty of Christians, churches, and organizations that would disagree with that theology.
It argues that people in same-sex relationships aren’t experiencing “true love.” Whatever they have is “broken.” Even though there are hundreds of thousands of same-sex couples in the country who know better.
(As if every straight relationship is so damn perfect.)
The Christians who follow Piper and perpetuate this vile theology don’t give a damn about the happiness of gay people in this life because they hold a belief that everything will be better in the afterlife. If that means telling gay people they should be alone and celibate, or pushing for conversion therapy, or voting against civil rights, so be it.
Let gays and lesbians be alone and miserable; they’ll thank us when they’re dead.
This sort of anti-gay Christian bigotry isn’t just wrong. It isn’t just cruel. It’s the sort of statement that drives LGBTQ people to suicide.