LGBT. WWJD?
Week 20 of 52 Churches in 52 Weeks:
From Hate to Grace with Jay Bakker at Revolution Church in Minneapolis
One May day during my Peanut Butter Cheerios phase, I came across images of a Minneapolis church distributing Communion. This wouldn’t be a big deal, except there was a slight twist. The blessed bread to represent the body of Christ was colored in rainbow tie-dye to celebrate Minnesota legalizing same-sex marriage.
“BLASPHEMY!” I decried from my laptop, a volcano of PB Cheerios erupting from my lap as I self-appointed my shaking fist to substitute for the right hand of God. “How DARE these false prophets vandalize traditional religious sacrament to forgive sin of those who sin”, I thought (or something like that) from the moral high ground that was my love seat. I thought the world was going to hell in a Communion bread basket.
My persecution was justified by years of conservative Evangelical indoctrination towards the LGBT lifestyle. I was proud to be homophobic and professed this to my friends, both Christian and imaginary. During my Bible study days, I militarized my Bible by arming it with Post-It notes and camouflaging the pages with Sharpie highlights. Bible verses were read-off like Battleship coordinates, raining down Sodom and Gomorrah to morally obliterate the faults of those floating in sexual sin. Homosexuality was an easy target, as I would lock-and-load Scripture with heavy clips of Biblical ammunition to launch an all-out religious warpath on those who’s lifestyles would tread on the Word of God.
Long story short. I was a self-righteous dick.
Then I pulled a stuffed lion out of my pants during Bible study to be funny. No one laughed. I got a front-row seat to how cutthroat religious persecution can be in friendly fire.
My Christian “friends” stoned me with stares for my bad humor (you may agree as you read this blog). The group’s second-in-command called me the next day, probably making sure I didn’t have plans to sacrifice a lamb on someone’s coffee table for the following week’s study on Abraham. “I should really apologize” I voiced to him, which he replied, “I think it would be best to never bring it up again”.
Attendance nose-dived. Several unfriended me from Facebook (THE HUMANITY!). Some just stopped talking to me altogether. I was shunned to the point where I was expecting to be tossed 30 pieces of silver and exiled to 40 days and 40 nights of wilderness. ‘How can Christians treat me like this?’ I thought, unable to comprehend the hypocrisy of the group’s reaction to my blunder. I felt my faith was put into question. I stopped going.
Throughout my 20's, I mirrored the same judgmental stance on same-sex relationships. More and more of my friends came out of the closest as gay or lesbian, and I sensed the cultural consciousness changing. My millennial generation was growing up on history class lessons about the courageous actions of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King to confront racial injustice. I started to see a similar tone with sexual discrimination, and religious doctrine was the oppressive slave master. When I began to look at the iris in the eyes in front of me, I slowly started to adopt a realization they weren’t just choosing to live in sin. They were gay because they were gay, just as much as I get morning wood to dreams of Kate Upton.
So after 30 years, my year as a Wayfaring Stranger to visit 52 Churches in 52 Weeks has me taking a step back and taking a fresh look at such a social issue. I’m left asking the question:
‘LGBT. WWJD?’
Jay Bakker isn’t your typical pastor. His arms are sleeved with tattoos, his face a connect-the-dots of silver piercings scaffolded with black-rimmed glasses. A self-described Christian agnostic, Bakker has come out as a punk preacher who openly supports gay marriage. As a result, he has been called many radical things over the years by watchmen Christians: “apostate pastor”, “emerging false prophet”, “heretic”, the list goes on.
In the last few months, Bakker’s life experiences and social stance has attracted interviews with Larry King Live, CNN, and MSNBC, who preface him as “the son of former televangelists, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker”. His parents were a big deal back in the day, hosting a popular religious talk show and creating a Christian theme park. Eventually, his father was implicated in scandal and shipped to prison, leaving the Bakker empire to collapse in a hostile takeover. The media circus and corrupt betrayal of his religious community left Jay in a downward spiral during his teenage years that left him to question his faith.
After recovering from substance abuse, he emerged preaching grace.
Not many were as accepting.
For Week 20, I took a road trip through the urban wilderness of downtown Minneapolis to see Jay Bakker talk at Revolution Church inside a bar/restaurant/bowling alley that the locals call Bryant-Lake Bowl. It’s the same church that I cried “blasphemy” when I saw those images of Bakker breaking rainbow-colored Communion bread to celebrate same-sex marriage.
Bryant-Lake Bowl is not a setting you’d expect to hear a sermon. The glass windows display times for Happy Hour and Cheap Date Night, with chalkboard drink specials above the bar for drinks called the Madhatter, Loon Rise, and Gramma’s Candy Dish. The bathrooms were populated with graffiti, the porcelain tiles providing thought-provoking questions like, “How many midgets does it take to !@#k a waitress?” The answer apparently is 12. No one bothered to answer the “Why?” step-down question.
An overhead sign pointed me towards the theater which could have been mistaken for an emergency exit. After passing a framed picture of a bowling ball complemented with a middle finger, I walked inside to see Jay Bakker sitting on a barstool sipping Starbucks. Just earlier in the week on his website, he posted pictures from his interview with Barbara Walters. Days later, here he was in front of 5 introverts, and a podcast that reaches a Facebook following of over 13,000.
With bowling pins crashing from the distance, Bakker’s talk for this day was Galatians Again, Part Seven (referencing Galatians 2:17–21). Never before have I heard a sermon that mixes Christianity with ComicCon. Bakker was like a bartender with his words, mixing Paul’s message to the Galatians and stirring in references to Star Wars, The Dark Knight, and The Walking Dead.
The transformation of Paul reminded him of Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back. Darth Vader had destroyed planets and killed Jedi babies. Yet after he dies, 10 minutes later, The Force showed him grace by allowing his ghost spirit to be BFFs with Obi-Wan and Yoda. Likewise, Paul had done heinous things as Saul, yet God showed him grace and gave him new life. Most would look at both examples and say, “hey, wait a minute”. Although consequences persist from those sins, the past is the past. That’s the power of grace and forgiveness through God, as we are made new as part of Christ. Cue harp music.
Bakker called out the church’s “rigid rules and regulations” that ostracize many Christians into post-Christians, quoting Two-Face from The Dark Knight, “You either die a hero or see yourself long enough to be the bad guy”. As a result, many post-Christians will retaliate against Christians with the same judgmental attitude. He referenced an old saying he heard when he was little, “Church was the only army that shot it’s wounded.” Bakker would take it one step further by describing the wounded post-Christians are almost like zombies who get back up, and start attacking the Christians they previously were alive with.
Bakker admitted several challenges he’s gone through as he tries to practice grace in the face of those who openly persecute, not necessarily for him, but the friends he cares about. The persecution of the church has led to a lot of doubt, even agnosticism for him, no thanks to religion’s lack of progress in accepting Christians who live alternative lifestyles.
“There’s times I have a lot of doubt… My faith kinda comes and goes, I always tell people I’m kind of like a Christian agnostic, constantly wrestling and struggling with my faith… And it’s not often my studies as much as it is the church and other people. ‘Oh Jay, you’re so angry at the church.’ I’m not really angry at the church, I’m more disappointed. I’m not angry for everything that happened to my parents, I think it was a bad thing, but I moved on. But I’m disappointed that I see the same shit happening 30 years later. We’re justified by kicking and destroying the wounded, and killing our wounded. And we’re still justified by not marrying people because they lived with each other, or they’re gay or lesbian, the church to me still does a lot crappy things… So I wondered. If I ever lost my faith, what would I take with me? I’m taking grace with me.”
The principle of grace is the answer to forgive. For Bakker, he wants to see grace in people’s lives and make the world a better place. Not only that, but he hopes to see his enemies transform as well. He did that for me.
“To me, that’s what my faith is about.”
Two years ago, I drew a line in the sand when Revolution Church used Communion bread to celebrate same-sex equality. I was narcissistic in my prejudices towards LGBT being included in sacred rituals like marriage and communion. Now as I progress in my own spiritual transformation, why would a Christian want to spare someone from heaven over the color of Bakker’s yeast?
I’m still wrestling over the issue. One hand, anything that doesn’t preach “God is love” is missing the point to Christianity entirely. On the other hand, procreation was only designed for a man and a woman. But regardless, I’m saying grace as a LGBT apologist. I was wrong. It’s weird to type that.
As I conceptualize Jesus and separate from religious doctrine that was spoon-fed to me since Gerber was my dinner, I’m trying to rid myself of dysfunctional hatefulness that can stem from man-made church. What I witnessed was Bakker preaching with brutal honesty. He was leaving himself transparent, admitting his struggles due to the lack of social progress happening due to B.C. thinking.
As I think about this LGBT debate within church, the problem isn’t about sexuality. The problem is we’re human. Jesus set the bar to show the power of grace in the face of persecution. Jesus wasn’t logging all his time in temples. Jesus himself was the most revolutionary figure in history. He was getting his hands in the dirt, warmly embracing people and accepting them for who they were. Prostitutes, Pharisees, tax collectors. To me, grace says, “I value you too much, I love you, I find you valuable and care for your welfare. I’m not going to leave you to waste.” That’s what exemplified Jesus, and I sense Bakker understands the same framework.
So while several will cast stones at Bakker’s stance and call him a heretic, false prophet, blasphemer, etc.… I came away with the impression that Bakker is courageous in his faith to stand-up to hateful religious persecution to rescue the people he cares about. No matter the sexual orientation, every Sunday he extends his hand to reach people who have been pushed far from God.
There’s not many friends who would do the same.
So. What Would Jesus Do?
My faith says He would choose grace.
