I Wish He Was Wrong Too.

The Huffington Post yesterday posted an opinion piece by Bryan Tannehill, entitled "Is Affirming Christianity Still Relevant?" (click to on the title to read). This post is the beginning of a response.

Tannehill's thesis is that "affirming Christianity as a cultural influencer is more or less dead." His evidence is that affirming churches are declining in numbers, while all the "Christian" messages we see in the media are from homophobic churches and church leaders. "While affirming churches are trying to get their message out, it is no longer being received by the public or decision makers."

When he came to this conclusion, Tannehill "reached out to a number of deeply religious LGBT individuals I knew, hoping somehow that one of them would tell me I was missing something . . . They couldn't . . . and one of them wrote back to me, 'I wish you were wrong.'"

I wish he was wrong too. I wish the "liberal" media presented liberal or affirming Christian voices on the news as often as they feature or discuss hateful, homophobic ones. But even MSNBC, that bastion of the "liberal media," rarely does. This leaves most people with the idea that this is what it means to be a Christian -- to spread hate, hurt, and homophobia.

And many people, faced with this, say to themselves, "If that is what Christianity is about, I want no part of it." Even many people raised in the church say, "If that is what it means to be a Christian, then I guess I'm not a Christian."

But this is not a new phenomena. It was the 80s. I was raised in the church, but from college onward the church, and the religion taught me in my youth, had no obvious relevance to my life. Asked at the time about my religious background, I would label myself an "agnostic." Or to use several current terms: I was "unchurched," a "none."

I was upheld in this position by the media images I saw of Christianity. Anytime Christians were interviewed, or talked about, or shown, or portrayed, at worst they were spouting hate or intolerance, at best they were simple minded objects of derision. I particularly remember seeing good God-fearing church people picketing the Martin Scorsese movie, "The Last Temptation of Christ."

I saw the picketers myself, outside my local theater in Tallahassee. I also saw them on TV, and I remember one reporter asking one of those with signs if they had seen the film, and was told, "No, of course not. I wouldn't watch such heretical filth."

And I thought to myself, "If that is what Christians are like, if that is what it means to be a Christian, I guess I am not a Christian, because I want no part of that."

Then, just because these folks told me I shouldn't go, I went to see the move -- even though I'm not a Martin Scorsese fan. I have issues with it (like it's too long and needed a firmer hand in the editing room), but certain scenes from it stay with me to this day. It continues to be one of the deepest, most personal, expressions of Christian faith, and the experience of faith, that I have ever seen on film.

But my stand on my religion, or lack of same, and my response to Christianity, remained unchanged for years.

It is often difficult to see God at work in the present. It is only when we look back that we see God's footprints in our lives. And so when I look back at my life, I can see the Holy Spirit at work. A nudge here, a crazy idea there. Things I thought I was doing for one reason, only to understand much later that it was really for a completely different reason; it was for me -- part of my own spiritual journey. It was a slow process, an unfolding, that completely changed my life. Much to my surprise, I ended up in seminary, and well -- here I am.

And when I returned to the church, it was to an open and affirming congregation. I remember the Associate Pastor there, who coincidentally had been my youth pastor at a different church, telling me, "There are others who would say I am not a Christian. But I know I'm a Christian. That's what matters."

All of this is to say that while I wish Tannehill was wrong, while I wish the liberal, affirming church's voice was being heard by more people, or even just being made available by the media so more people could hear it, I am less pessimistic than he is. Because of my experience of how the Spirit works.

Throughout history, Christianity has had been at it's worst when it was allied with the dominant power structure -- think the Crusades, think the Inquisition, think the religious wars of Europe, the atrocities committed by missionaries on native peoples, the Salem witch hunts, think of the white churches who supported slavery and later segregation in the American South.

But through it all, there have always been some quieter, more tolerant, Christian voices. Speaking words of God's healing and love and hope. Speaking truth to power -- often with fatal consequences. And gradually, things changed. It wasn't a quick process, it took time. It was an unfolding, a gradual opening of eyes and hearts and minds that led to change. And it is only looking back, with eyes tuned to the Spirit, that we can see God at work in that process.

It is, after all, the model we have in the story of Jesus. It is the foundational story of our religious faith. Jesus had many followers, but they weren't the mainstream -- even within his own tradition. Jesus spoke of love and hope and grace, and practiced an extravagant welcome to all, but even his own disciples often didn't get it. From the margins, Jesus spoke truth to power -- and it got him killed. But that wasn't the end of the story -- the story, and the struggle, continues.

And so it is again. The voices of those in the affirming churches may not be as loud, or given much air time in the public LGBT debate. We may be viewed as the "lunatic fringe" of Christianity, rather than the mainstream, by the media and decision makers. But things are changing -- and they are changing our way. Indeed, after many years of struggling, change is beginning to happen fast. 2013 has been an amazing year -- I mean -- UTAH?

It will be easy to explain all this in reasonable, rational terms that have nothing to do with God, with religion; easy to say these victories happened in spite of religion, not because of it. But me -- I see the Spirit at work in our world. And I wouldn't be at all surprised if, in the future, when we look back at this time in our history with eyes tuned to the Sprit, we can see God's footprints all over it.

So even if Tannehill is right that "affirming Christianity as a cultural influencer is more of less dead," don't count it out. After all, ours is a resurrection faith. Death is never the last word.