Love is an Orientation: Tension

In 1963 Martin Luther King, Jr. was locked up in a jail in Birmingham, Alabama.  In a letter addressed to his fellow clergymen, King reflected on his life’s work to that point and said “I must confess that I am not afraid of the word tension.  I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth.”    The Christian community has been running from that constructive, nonviolent tension for too long when it comes to gays and lesbians.  The productive growth Martin Luther King, Jr. was talking about only comes retrospectively, after much time has been spent immersed in tension-filled areas with what we are most uneasy about.

–p27   Love is an Orientation, Andrew Marin

What does it mean for you today to enter into spaces of constructive, nonviolent tension with those who think or believe differently from you?