To be specific… “The data showed 85 people were assaulted in places of worship, compared to 66 at an adult entertainment premises… Places of worship also took the lead in sexual offences (16), theft from motor vehicles (33), resisting arrest (7) and liquor offences (10). Harassment and threatening behaviour at places of worship (30) was over 50 percent more than at places of adult entertainment (13).” That’s right, there’s more sex crime in churches than in sex clubs.

None of that should be all that surprising. How many wars have been fought in the name of religion? How many millions of people have been killed in the name of religion? The Spanish Inquisition? Fatwas? On the other hand I’m having a hard time thinking of a war fought to defend “adult activities”. Hitler put gay men in the death camps - but that sorta proves my point - the person doing the “deviant act” wasn’t the one doing the killing.

The other aspect is that churches tell you there’s something wrong with you and you need to change. That means people wind up repressing their urges. The problem with Catholic pedophile priests shows what happen when you take that approach. In contrast, sex businesses accept you for who you are (for the most part) and you give a legal outlet for your urges.

If you need even more evidence check out Joe.My.God.’s “This Week In Holy Crimes” series of blog posts. It’s truly amazing how screwed up some religious leaders are.

That said, religion done right can be a good thing. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a brothel or a sex shop or a massage parlor be a community center, or do social work, or pressure politicians on behalf of their community, yet I’ve seen churches do all of those things. But all of those things are also done by non-religious community organizations. So while I wouldn’t advocate replacing churches with strip clubs, I do wonder if we wouldn’t be better off replacing them with community centers.

Take a listen…

It all started when my roommate for the summer, Nial Gaffney, an astrony major, said to me that when he looked into the stars he saw the handiwork of a god that was bigger than the god of the bible. It took me a little while to digest that, but I knew it was true. The bible puts god in a box and makes god in the image of man. The truth of the matter is that our creator is so far above us that it’s impossible to understand him/her/it. We are no more significant to our creator than grains of sand are to us.

That lead me to being a Deist. There’s actually a great deal of Deist history in the US - many of our founding fathers were Deists - Thomas Jefferson being the most notable. But that was just an accident of history since our country was founded at a time that was Deism’s zenith and that was simply because society was moving from a culture where non-believers were killed to one where they were tolerated and Deism was simply the step before atheism. When our country was founded you could be respectable and be a Deist, but you could lose everything (including your life) if you were an Atheist, so the Atheists of their day called themselves Deists.

Other changes in my belief system happened pretty quickly. If the bible wasn’t absolute truth then everything was up for reconsideration. At my heart I knew I was gay and so a year after rejecting Christiantity, I accepted myself and came out.

The process had actually started earlier - when I was in high school. The school I went to in Baltimore (Arlington Baptist School) had whole chapel services about the evils of rock music - including listening to it backwards and hearing things that praised Satan (lol). When I was in Lynchburg (at Jerry Falwell’s high school, Lynchburg Christian Academy) I had to drive with these guys from school to get to driver’s ed. They used to play Chaka Khan on the way almost every day. I got to love “I’m Every Woman” and it struck me - how could something so happy and joyous be evil? Listen to it and you’ll see what I mean…

Like almost no other song that one just puts a huge smile on your face and makes you feel like you’re having a great day. And that was supposed to be evil… Right… At that point I decided to make up my own mind as to what was good and bad, and Chaka Khan was not bad - not in the least.

So deciding that god was bigger than the god of the bible wasn’t really that hard. Deciding that my being gay wasn’t evil wasn’t all that hard either.

The question became what do I do with the conservative elements in my family? For years after I came out to my parents I hoped they’d accept me. But that never happened. When my lover died of AIDS in January of ‘95 Mom made a comment about how her mother had been there for her when her first husband died in World War II and I thought she got it, but that was quickly dispelled in our next conversation.

The bottom line was that it was bad for me to weigh myself down with my parents. It’s not good to be around people that tell you there’s something wrong with you - especially when they’re your parents (who are supposed to love you unconditionally) and they can’t just ignore the issue and interact with you without it getting brought up. Their lives revolved around Jerry Falwell’s church and that meant that their lives revolved around fighting liberalism including gay rights. I was the enemy and there was no way for me to be comfortable in their world.

At a point I just had to tell myself that they died and I needed to move on, which is what I did. There’s a song/video out lately, “Fuck You Very Much”…

In a way it resounds with my decision to separate from my parents, but it also trivializes the decision. It’s easy to say “fuck you very much, we hate what you stand for, please don’t stay in touch” to a stranger. It’s a more complicated process when it’s your parents.

When I was growing up our parents were sort of the glue that held our family together. I remember big phone bills calling all my sisters every week. That doesn’t happen any more. I didn’t really get those phone calls even before I had issues with them - not sure why. And now that I’m not really wanting to have much to do with them it’s a bit of a wedge in an already weak relationship with some of my sisters. It’s unfortunate really, but it is what it is…

Of course lately the issue is marriage. Let me put this bluntly - separate but equal is always separate, but never equal. Civil unions will not work - nothing but marriage will work, because only marriage has the full rights. Only with marriage can I finally give Dan citizenship…

But of course the fundamentalists, like my parents, want to tell gay folk like me what marriage means. Somehow they’ve forgotten that there’s a marriage contract involved that requires going down to your local government office. They equate marriage with the wedding ceremony - forgetting that Atheists get married all the time without any religious ceremony. So since I’m on a YouTube kick, let’s remind ourselves what “traditional, biblical marriage” really means…

Yes, biblical marriage really is that messy, and the fact that Christians think it’s some solid, honorable standard is laughable. For a moment let’s consider what it would be like if “traditional marriage” were actually enforced…

That’s right - no divorce, no blacks marrying whites, no women who weren’t virgins on their wedding night… Funny how Christians forget all those bits about “traditional marriage”…

The bottom line is Chaka Khan isn’t evil and neither are gay men and lesbians. Take a deep breath, sit down, and just accept it…

According to CNN the more someone goes to church the more likely they are go support torture. Joe.My.God. put it bluntly by asking “Who would Jesus waterboard?” Then answer is NOONE - Jesus was a pasivist. Let me put this bluntly - If you support torture, if you start wars, if you can’t stand to be in the same room as a gay guy, a lesbian or a transsexual - then you’re not Christ-like.

The one time Jesus was somewhat violent was when he threw the money changers out of the temple. Those of you who are Christ-like Christians have a responsibility to throw the modern money changers “out of the temple”. It’s time you stood up and strongly and forcefully renonuce people who are ruining your religion. Get on CNN and tell them point blank that they are not welcome to call themselves Christians - that they need to change their ways or “get out of the temple”.

This is one area where I have a big problem with John Kerry. In the debates he let George W. Bush take the moral high ground. If Kerry had been a real Christian he would have looked Bush straight in the face and said “Jesus would never have started an offensive war in Iraq” and then he would have read the beatitudes to Bush and constrasted the teachings of Christ with Bush’s actions.

I no longer consider myself a Christian - I’m a Diest, but after so many years of religious training I understand what Christ stood for and 9 out of 10 Christians I see on the news are not Christ-like. Would the real Christians PLEASE stand up? Please?

Over the last seven days…..

Missouri: Pastor Robert M. Black busted in internet underage sex sting.
California: Sunday school teacher Melissa Huckaby arrested for murdering 8 year-old girl.
Texas: Pastor Robert Baker charged with murdering wife.
Virginia: Pastor Ana Paula Almeida charged with rape of 14 year-old.
Tennessee: Church youth volunteer Matthew Jernigan charged with two counts of child rape.
Georgia: Pastor Otis Ray Hope charged in $1.75M bank fraud.
California: Pastor John Bonine pleads guilty 16 counts of child molestation. He was charged with 107 counts.
New York: Pastor Merton Parks charged with possessing child pornography.
North Carolina: Pastor Richard Dent confesses to swindling elderly sisters of $60,000.
Texas: Father Thomas Teczar convicted of molesting 11 year-old boy.
New York: Staten Island Episcopal Rev. William Blasingame charged with embezzling $85,000 from his parish. He used the money for Botox injections, plastic surgery, prescription drugs, and designer clothes.

…And they say we’re the problem. Ironic.

[Source: Joe.My.God.]