Matthew 5:13-16 (NRSV)
Jesus said, "You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.
"You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."
If only all of us could grasp with our minds and hearts the idea that God loves us, what a different world we would be living in. Susan Russell said in her recording: "It Get's Better" "God who doesn’t just want your life to get better – God wants your life to get fabulous."
Many of us have a problem with that don't we? Our Christian Church has folks who have unfortunately taken hold of teachings and philosophies that are erroneous. Particularly about lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning and queer people. Even without the issue of bias towards being straight and single gender minded vs. being LGBTQ, life is harsh. The economy right now is really bad. Our politicians and those who have promised through their campaigns to support the middle class are letting the middle class down again and again. For the LGBTQ communities the news that President Obama is going to appeal the order to end Don't Ask, Don't Tell immediately feels like such a betrayal. How can so many of us think, write or pray with the attitude of "God wants our lives to be fabulous"? As one responder on Facebook wrote: "What if their lives do not get fabulous?"
We tend as a society and a Church to base the value of our accomplishments and/or how or whether we are loved by God on whether we succeed at something or fail. Failure eats at our personal pride. In the Book of Common Prayer on page 836 we pray: "We also thank you for those disappointments and failures that lead us to acknowledge our dependence on you alone." I personally thank Dean Spenser Simrill of St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in Minneapolis for bringing that to my attention. When we as a Church who claim to be believers in Jesus Christ take on a spirituality that suggests that we see ourselves as loved by God if we succeed, but hated by God if we fail, we are deceiving ourselves and the world around us. When any Christianist group: Focus on the Family, The Family Research Council, the American Family Council, the National Organization for Marriage and other such groups, including the hierarchy of the Catholic church, suggest that God sees LGBTQ people as "intrinsically disordered" or "only loved if we change," they are deceiving Christians and the world around us.
The Gospel reading for today's commemoration of St. Teresa of Avila tells us that we are the light of the world and the salt of the earth. I don't know about you, but when I hear Christianists and arch-conservative Catholics suggesting that LGBTQ people cannot have a vibrant relationship with Jesus Christ unless we submit to an ex-gay ministry or agree to change, I think they wants us to be that dim light that cannot shine too brightly. Or perhaps they want LGBTQ people to be regarded as salt that has lost it's flavor. Salt may be considered a seasoning, but last I heard variety is the spice of life. There is granulated salt, sea salt and kosher salt. All unique, but each adds a flavor that brings delight to those who taste them. LGBTQ people are a "brand" of salt that adds joy to God's heart when through our sexual orientation and/or gender identity/expression we others around us. When we call the Church and society to justice, equality and a change of heart and behavior towards sexual and gender diversity, we bring joy to the heart of God. When we unite our cause to those of other races, religions, and other sexual orientations such as asexual people, pan sexual and other forms, languages, abilities, challenges physical, mental or psychological, rich or poor we delight God.
We are reaching the end of National Coming Out Week 2010. If there is one thing I could say about coming out, justice, equality for sexual orientations and gender diversity/expression/identity, is that we need to come out, so that we can be the persons God made us to be. We need to learn to bask in the Son Light of Jesus Christ. Coming out is taking hold of the opportunity to learn to see ourselves through God's eyes and not those of the anti-LGBTQ rhetoric that is used towards us. Even if our coming out results in a lot of pain for a lot of people around us and it does, I have been there too, it is an opportunity to grow closer to God through it and realize that there is nothing about us that God does not know or love. In Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven, we are redeemed and are given to new life through his Name. We have nothing to be ashamed of, embarrassed about and there is no reason we cannot also be the salt of the earth and the light of the world.
Lord, we pray that your grace may always precede and follow us, that we may continually be given to good works; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (Proper 23, Book of Common Prayer, page 234-235).
O God, by your Holy Spirit you moved Teresa of Avila to manifest to your Church the way of perfection: Grant us, we pray, to be nourished by her excellent teaching, and enkindle within us a keen and unquenchable longing for true holiness; through Jesus Christ, the joy of loving hearts, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. (Collect for Teresa of Avila, Holy Women, Holy Men, Celebrating the Saints, page 639).
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