FRC's Poisonous Message in the North Carolina Marriage Equality Battle

The Virginia/North Carolina border lies a little than 30 miles from the Peninsula area of Hampton Roads where the boyfriend and I live and it is literally next door for a number of cities in the southside of Hampton Roads. Thus, what happens immediately across the border impacts this region and that is why the efforts of anti-gay Christianists and the North Carolina GOP is noteworthy even though the local media is doing little to cover the message of hate and religious extremism that is being disseminated by many of the usual suspects within the professional Christian ranks. Matt Comer of InterstateQ captured some of the bathshitery and hate being spewed by Tony Perkins of Family Research Council, a registered hate group, at a gathering First Baptist Church of Charlotte, the church headed up by Mark Harris, the president of the North Carolina Baptist Convention. As is always the case with Perkins, his message was one of hate, bigotry and special rights for Christianists. And yes, all too typically, Perkins equates homosexuality with adultery and promiscuity. Here are some highlights from Matt's piece and Perkis' remarks:

You gotta hand it to Southern Baptists. They know how to put on a show. Blaring trumpets, waving flags and soaring patriotic melodies blended together with a little bit of soul and spirit in calls for defending “God and Country.”

After more than an hour of First Baptist worship, the reason became clear.

“Tony Perkins…has been willing to step up and speak out,” Harris told his congregants, affirming that Harris’ brand of Christianity is just as hate-filled and exclusive as Perkins’.

Marriage and the church are under attack, First Baptist Church-Charlotte Pastor and N.C. Baptist Convention President Mark Harris and Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said on Sunday. And, it is up to the faithful to defend against the attacks of Satan. For any keen observer — and, no doubt, to any of the few LGBT young people in the audience (of which I am sure there are quite a few, given how large a congregation First Baptist is) — it’s clear who Harris and Perkins think are on the satanic side of the LGBT equality debate.

For all their whimpering over faith and freedom, what they really wish to create is a heterosexuals-only, exclusive country club.

[O]ne can’t help but find it ridiculously funny that Harris, Perkins and Co. believe they are the ones whose rights are under attack. I see no proposed constitutional amendments seeking to limit their rights. I see no organized movement to send Christians to “ex-Christian” camps. I see no state legislatures taking up “Don’t say Christian” bills. I see no school principals or school boards in mass denying the formation of Christian school groups or expelling heterosexual students and their boyfriends or girlfriends.

It’s a topsy-turvy world Harris and Perkins live in. The whole weight of a discriminatory body of law weighs down on the lives of LGBT people, yet it’s the WASP-y Christians who are oppressed? Talk about delusional.

PERKINS: God defined marriage. It is not for us to redefine. Even when we go into the voting booth and we cast a vote on the marriage amendment number one here in North Carolina, we are not defining marriage. God already defined it. Who are we to think that we can redefine it?

We are to love everyone. We are to love those who are bound up in lifestyle choices whether it be homosexuality, whether it be adultery, whatever, promiscuity. But, loving people is oftentimes telling them that they have chosen a pathway that is destructive.

Today, we hear it as the separation of church and state. That’s not what we’re talking about here. When they talk about the separation of church and state, they’re talking about the separation of morality and truth from the public space, about the education of our children, about what our universities are teaching…

And, Sodom was not destroyed because they were inhospitable as some would claim today. As Jude pointed out, it was because of sexual immorality and pursuing that which was unnatural. . . . women and women, you ought not be doing that either because that’s an abomination. And, men and men, we don’t even want to talk about it.

But what is most chilling, for me, and what struck me the hardest on March 4, was simply knowing that Perkins’ words and Harris’ “leadership” were having disastrous effects right then and right there in the hearts and minds of the young people scattered among the congregation.

A church as big as First Baptist surely has LGBT young people there. I bet there are more than a simple handful. I remember well the days when I’d go to church simply fearing what might next come out of my pastor’s mouth. These young people, held captive in their seats by their parents and church family, are in those very moments being tortured spiritually, emotionally and psychologically. Such abuse is unacceptable. And, it’s part of what ultimately leads to tragedies like wasted lives, drug and alcohol abuse and, God forbid, suicide.