During their recent “Stand in the Gap” broadcasts, a group called the American Pastors Network repeatedly denounced last week’s Supreme Court decision saying laws that prohibit sex discrimination also apply to gay and transgender people.
Instead of parsing the legal arguments, though, the group said the ruling would invite God’s judgment… or at least hurt children.
“This is a very, very bad case,” said attorney David New, a guest on the June 18 broadcast. “It’s very bad for the American family. It’s very bad for children. Whenever the gay-lesbian agenda is promoted and encouraged and supported, you basically damage American families, and it really damages children.”
…
He said [Justice Neil] Gorsuch was applying the word “sex” to “gay sex, and lesbianism, and boys who like to shave their legs, and all that kind of stuff, and girls who want to wear pants and think they’re butches.”
It’s not difficult to explain homosexuality to children. (“Some boys like girls. Others like boys. Now go clean your room.”) What actually hurts children is when they are rejected or forced into therapy to be “cured” from being LGBTQ. It’s also damaging when LGBTQ adults lose their jobs over their orientation or identity, preventing them from being able to provide for themselves or their children.
For New to dismiss all that because he really wants to cling to outdated stereotypes is both heartless and depressing.
He went on to say:
“The only thing worse than this ruling is when they first decriminalized homosexuality and when they made homosexuality marriage a protected right under the 14th Amendment,” New said. He called the ruling “an attack upon Christianity” and “an attack upon Christian values and morals that this country was founded upon.”
Christianity is doing just fine. I know that because [gestures wildly in all directions].
It wasn’t just New. Other hosts Sam Rohrer and Gary Dull made similar arguments in other episodes.
Rohrer denounced the “horrendous” Supreme Court ruling that he said “redefined the biblical definition of the word sex to include a host of interpretations of gay sex, LGBTQ sexual preferences.” He said the court had not only violated the Constitution but “in effect almost kind of like raised their fist to God above in arrogance.” Dull said that the Court was “forgetting the law of God” and that the nation is on its way to experiencing greater judgment from God.
Your Christianity may be broken if a ruling meant to protect LGBTQ citizens somehow makes God angry. Somehow, systemic racism and rampant poverty and refugee kids in cages didn’t inspire righteous anger from above, but job protection for trans people did the trick…
The ruling was a good one. If anything, it didn’t go far enough since there may still be loopholes for business owners who cite their faith when firing an employee. But some Christians aren’t satisfied unless they can inflict cruelty upon people who don’t fit their gender molds.
(via Right Wing Watch. Screenshot via YouTube)