National Coming Out for Equality Day

“He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness,and to walk humbly with your God?” Micah 6:8

Today, Oct. 11, is National Coming Out Day.  The fact that we even have to have this day is a sad statement about how committed we are as the Body of Christ to justice and to equality.  It is also a sad statement about the hate and fear-mongering that continues throughout The Church.  There are still untold numbers of people who must pass for someone they are not, out of fear for how they will be treated.

Yes, we live in a nation where, for some people, being the people God created them to be must be feared and hidden… “In God we trust,” indeed. 

Justice is blind?  From what I’ve seen, it is not nearly blind enough.

In terms of seeking equal rights for our gay brothers and sisters, we have been traveling in the right direction for some time now, but we have been traveling too slowly, to begrudgingly and by asking too many to hide too much of the reflection of God that is uniquely revealed in them.  

Justice delayed, certainly is justice denied.  

And as Dr. King reminded us, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”

Today I ask my minister friends and my straight friends to stand with me on this National Coming Out Day.  Stand with me and our LGBT brothers and sisters who were made equally in the image of God and should be treated equal in this great nation of ours.  I ask you to come out for equality.

Fear can be overcome with knowledge.  So let’s let those who have had to pretend to be someone they are not for so long know that not only does God love them, but we love them – that not only does God stand with them, but we stand with them.

Equality is not up for biblical questioning my friends. 

We are all created equally in God’s image.  “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

So I ask you to step up and speak out.  Share the HRC logo on your FB page, on your Twitter page.   Post quotes about equality, loudly claim your love for all of God’s children and demand that they ALL be treated with the same grace, dignity, respect and rights that are afforded to you.

“There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.” -Elie Wiesel