{"id":22364,"date":"2014-05-14T05:18:57","date_gmt":"2014-05-14T09:18:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=22364"},"modified":"2014-05-14T05:18:57","modified_gmt":"2014-05-14T09:18:57","slug":"god-and-the-gay-christian-live-webchat-today-at-noon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2014\/05\/14\/god-and-the-gay-christian-live-webchat-today-at-noon\/","title":{"rendered":"‘God and the Gay Christian’ — live webchat today at noon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Matthew Vines is speaking truth to power and so, naturally, tribal gatekeepers are responding by speaking power to truth.<\/p>\n

You may remember Vines from a viral video posted to YouTube in 2012<\/a>. That video has been viewed more than 700,000 times \u2014 which is astonishing when you realize that, unlike most viral videos, it\u2019s more than an hour long and consists entirely of a lecture on biblical exegesis. It\u2019s not flashy, or (for the most part) funny. It\u2019s just an earnest, whip-smart young man who\u2019s done his homework sharing his personal testimony and the substance of his extensive study. Yes, that\u2019s right, Matthew Vines made substance<\/em> go viral.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s part of why the gatekeepers are puckering from head to toe. And now, to make matters worse, Vines has expanded on the substance of this lecture in a new book, God and the Gay Christian<\/a>.<\/em> Even the title of that book is a frightening challenge to those whose self-proclaimed authority is based on denying that there is any such thing as a gay Christian. Vines didn\u2019t have to write a book to disprove that ridiculous claim, of course, all he had to do to disprove that was to show up, because Matthew Vines \u2014 like millions of others \u2014 is, in fact, a gay Christian.<\/p>\n

More than that, Vines is a gay evangelical<\/em> Christian \u2014 one who approaches the Bible as an evangelical does (albeit with more care than is typical of many evangelicals). That is why, James McGrath says<\/a>, Vines\u2019 book is \u201cabsolute dynamite\u201d:<\/p>\n

That is why Vines\u2019 book is so important. It is written by a conservative Christian who is gay. It accepts the authority of Scripture. And it makes a convincing case within that framework that what the Bible says does not provide a basis for disapproving of same-sex marriage. Although Vines is not a scholar, by drawing on scholarship and carefully investigating the subject, he comes up with interpretations of the relevant Biblical texts, against the backdrop of their cultural setting, that are thoroughly persuasive.<\/p>\n

It is a remarkable achievement. I can well imagine that a century from now, people may look back to this book as the one that decisively turned the tide regarding conservative Christians views on homosexuality.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I\u2019m less optimistic than McGrath. Vines may win the exegetical argument over each of the infamous clobber texts, but a text-by-text exegetical argument won\u2019t likely turn the tide. Just look at the work of Christians for Biblical Equality<\/a> over the past several decades. CBE has never lost an exegetical debate over any of the clobber-texts used to deny women full equality in the church, but that undefeated record still hasn\u2019t turned the tide because the problem isn\u2019t the exegesis of specific texts but the larger hermeneutic that singled out, isolated and elevated such clobber-texts in the first place.<\/p>\n

Vines\u2019 project \u2014 engaging all of those clobber-texts head-on \u2014 is worthy, valuable and necessary, but I don\u2019t think it can be sufficient.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Still though, Vines is compelling and persuasive. The substance and affect of his argument is attested to not just by the praise he\u2019s receiving from people like James McGrath, Rachel Held Evans and James Brownson, but also from the vehemence with which he and his publisher are being attacked by those on the losing side of this argument.<\/p>\n

The Southern Gothic Presbyterian World<\/em> magazine tag-teamed with Southern Baptist spokesman Russell Moore<\/a> to try to withdraw the tribal imprimatur for Vines\u2019 publisher, Convergent Books, and for all the other Chrsitian imprints of that publishing house. They don\u2019t engage Vines or his argument, instead misrepresenting it and dismissing it as an unacceptable \u201cstance.\u201d But they\u2019re not really interested in the substance of their disagreement with Vines. What they\u2019re really doing is exerting their power \u2014 trying to threaten the publisher with financial punishment for daring to challenge their authority as gatekeepers.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not how people respond when they believe their side of the argument is defensible on its merits.<\/p>\n

Al Mohler raced to pre-empt Vines\u2019 book with an insta-e-book of his own<\/a>. Mohler edited the book and contributed a chapter, filing the rest with chapters from his Mohleretttes. That format isn\u2019t well-suited to the culture of Southern Baptist Seminary, though. When the authoritarian head of an institution that requires complete uniformity of opinion edits a collection written by his loyal acolytes you don\u2019t wind up with a book so much as a single chapter repeated several times over with very slight variations in word order. The effect is like holding open auditions for a community theater production of Annie<\/em>. \u201cMy name is Al and I\u2019ll be singing \u2018Tomorrow.\u201d \u201cMy name is Russell, and I\u2019ll be singing \u2018Tomorrow.'\u201d \u201cMy name is Owen, and I\u2019ll be singing \u2018Tomorrow.'\u201d \u201cMy name is Denny, and \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

In this case, such repetition is a feature, not a bug. When all you\u2019ve got is raw assertion \u2014 you can\u2019t be<\/em> a gay Christian \u2014 then repetition ad nauseum<\/em> is your best bet for making it sound persuasive.<\/p>\n

Matthew Paul Turner says<\/a> the book from Mohler and the Mohlitos is an attempt to \u201csabotage not only the success of Vines\u2019s book \u00a0\u2026\u00a0but also the conversation he\u2019s hoping to spark.\u201d That\u2019s not entirely fair. I think Mohler also genuinely, sincerely is hoping to cash in<\/em> on the success of Vines\u2019 book and the conversation he\u2019s generating. Do you remember how many e-books on Hell were rushed into print in \u201cresponse\u201d to Rob Bell\u2019s Love Wins?<\/em> Some of those folks did pretty well for themselves.<\/p>\n

Want to see what all the fuss is about and what has Mohler and all these other tribal gatekeepers so afraid? Check out Vimes\u2019 original lecture on YouTube<\/a>. And today, at noon EDT, Patheos is hosting a live webchat with Vimes<\/a>, joined by Tony Jones, Rachel Held Evans and Jay Bakker<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"'God and the Gay Christian' -- live webchat today at noon","description":"Matthew Vines is speaking truth to power and so, naturally, tribal gatekeepers are responding by speaking power to truth. You may remember Vines from a viral video posted to YouTube in 2012. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. 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