Everyone, the Vice President is offended.
In the wake of the response to the news that his wife Karen, is working for a school that excludes both LGBTQ students and staff members, Mike Pence let us all know, with characteristic detached, tongue clicking condescension—that he is disappointed and disturbed by it all.
“Major news organizations attacking Christian education is deeply offensive to us.” he chided.
Is it?
As a Christian and a pastor, I find Mike Pence offensive.
His position as fully complicit right-hand man to an unrepentant serial predator, offends me.
His complete silence on a litany of human rights atrocities overseen by this Presidency offends me.
His feet of clay in the presence of the legislated assaults on migrant families and uninsured people and sexual assault victims, offends me.
His manufactured persecution complex, while speaking from the place of greatest privilege, offends me.
His lifelong obsession with demonizing the LGBTQ community, offends me.
His support of conversion therapy, that tells LGBTQ people they can pray away the most inherent truths about who they are and how they love, offends me.
His reckless and continual weaponizing of Jesus, offends me.
His Olympic level hypocrisy, that claims any moral high ground while working for a bottom feeder like this President, offends me.
It is offensive to me, that LGBTQ teenagers have massively higher rates of depression and suicide attempts.
It is offensive to me, that millions of loving, compassionate, intelligent, kind, creative people walk away from faith, because professed religious people regularly expose them to the greatest violence.
It is offensive to me that LGBTQ people find inside the Church, their greatest threats and most persistent bullies.
It is offensive to me that people like Mike and Karen Pence hide behind religious liberty, while they wound people they believe are worth less than they are.
It is offensive to me that frauds like the Pences loudly parade their “pro-life” virtue to the world, while showing complete contempt for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender lives—and the lives of women, Muslims, migrants, and sick people.
Their profession of a Christian faith lacking any resemblance to Jesus—offends me deeply.
Jesus’ life was spent on the periphery, living with and advocating for the vulnerable and disregarded. Karen Pence partnering with an organization that is choosing to further marginalize human beings based on an inherent part of who they are, is the antithesis of the message of Christ. It is to pile burdens on already burdened people, it is to marginalize those already at the margins. It is to abandon the compassionate heart of Jesus and to trade it in for power-wielding malice.
Karen Pence and her husband and those like them, would have us believe that she is exercising religious freedom in aligning with an organization that would withhold education, opportunity, and simple joy from LGBTQ human beings—when in reality, they are passing the buck of their prejudices to a God who simply does not consent to them.
There is nothing in the Biblical account of the life and ministry of Jesus that blesses excluding people based on their gender identity or sexual orientation; no Scriptural grounds for the institutional cruelty we’re seeing, nor any justification for the discrimination Mike and Karen Pence seem so burdened to perpetuate.
And the fact that people like him and his wife, given their platform and influence, are using these things to intentionally place people in harm’s way while using Jesus like a hammer—really offends me.
It’s a sin.
Get John’s book ‘HOPE AND OTHER SUPERPOWERS” here!
Me too. Peace and Love,
Come now, pastor, we all know why Mike Pence hates the gays so much. Without that hate, he might actually have to turn his gaze inward and come to terms that the person he sees isn’t what he thinks that his upbringing made him into. His wife is an all-too willing enabler in this farce. If you want to see who a conservative politician really is, look to the cause that they are crusading the hardest against. How often do we find out that the man who crusades against gay rights is the one in the airport mens room with the ‘wide stance’. They think they’re fooling the world, but they’re only fooling themselves.
LGBTQ&Proud!
Exactly. “Unconditional love” shouldn’t leave its recipients jobless, homeless, unprotected, dead, dying or in suicidal despair.
Don’t feel bad. Pence and his ilk are just the modern-day incarnation of the Pharisees. Jesus wasn’t too fond of them either.
Pingback: For God so loved the world that he gave it to faux Christians like Mike and Karen Pence – WhatWouldJackDo
You are making judgements, slanders and lies made about some good people just because you disagree with them. Hypocrisy, the pot calling the kettle black! So much to unpack here that is untrue and it so breaks the heart of God! You and those who believe as you do are in a very dangerous place. For your and the sake of the church please seek what God loves not what the wirld loves.!
Lol no one cares if you’re offended, fggt.
No. Wrong. You are not offended, you just think you and your view is superior. You call people marginalized and victims when they are neither until your condescending attitude labels them thus.
They are not victims of the Pence’s. The Pence’s and the Christian school, they do not judge, they choose to value the power and importance of sex to create life and bond two people who start a family which is vital to society and human flourishing. So, they live in a free country where they can establish private and religious schools and enterprises that support and promote their values WITHOUT government interference. They don’t judge you but you claim they do judge and that judging others is wrong, while you judge them. Focus on what you do want not what you don’t want. You follow Christianity your way and they are free to follow it their way. Remember Europe’s religious wars about Christianity? Take care of your own house.
I am praying that when Mueller hauls in the big net Mike Pence is in it along Trump and family
I too am a Christian offended by Mike Pence and frankly the entire Trump administration. What is right and what is wrong in regards to sexual orientation or gender identity confuses me a bit. BUT what doesn’t confuse me at all is that Jesus called us to love, and therefore I don’t need to know the answers to my questions in order to love others. As a white, straight woman I recognize that I am privileged in many ways- I would rather use that privilege to exemplify Jesus than the hate the Pence’s so proudly display.
I enjoy your writing tho many will say you are a screaming liberal, I see Jesus standing right beside you encouraging you!! You are a voice in the wilderness crying. “People wake up!”
Sharon
Thank you for your words. I’ve been living in Indiana for 23 years and as the mother of a gay son and an active PFLAG member, I’ve seen first-hand the damage that Mike Pence has caused LGBTQ Hoosiers. As a result, I joined the PENCE MUST GO campaign to make people aware of Pence’s hateful and harmful words and actions. I also helped organize the Anti-RFRA Rally after Pence signed this bill that would allow Indiana businesses to discriminate against LGBTQ customers. As far as I can see, Pence does not live a faithful and compassionate life.
Theocracy Pete and his husband, Karl are hypocritical.
I’m not sure that you’ll even be reading this ( John) My name is Yael. I signed into Facebook only soon after the 2016 election . I had no interest in sharing my private life with the world or the contents of my last meal or the last entertaining movie. I simply needed to DO something after nearly a week of what felt like mourning . I signed up to Facebook to share articles and disseminate that which I felt became soiled by the election . I also booked tickets to go to Washington for the first woman’s march with my two sons. It was either this or curling up in the corner somewhere . I am not a curling up and take it kinda person . I started reading your posts soon after , admittedly reluctantly at first . You are a Christian pastor . Unfortunately , I have developed a distaste for the classification that you come from . I was born in Israel, immigrated to the States in grade school , raised Secular Jewish and became somewhere between an agnostic and an atheist along the way . I was put off my neighbors, school and community’s narrow understanding of the existence of religions other than Christianity . By their long held belief of their superiority in morality , ethics and sheer numbers . I chaffed at comments such as ‘I feel so sorry for you because you don’t celebrate Christmas’ and ‘I will pray for your soul because surely a kind God will overlook the fact that you are not Christian and admit a good person like you to heaven ‘. I developed a distaste for the self riteous ministers , priests , and clergy that seemed to lead their flock to believe that they are so much better than the Jews , the Muslims , the Buddhists, the Hindus and certainly the agnostics and atheists . Their words of moral superiority we’re hollow when placed with their actions . You are most definitely of a different breed . You do not seek to convert . You preach of true acceptance and a kinder humanity . Thank you !
and how do you feel, as a Christian, about these new late-term abortion laws that seem to be gaining popularity? i could not possibly vote for any democrat that supports abortion. Trump/Pence aren’t perfect but sometimes God uses imperfect people to carry out his will.
Beautifully and clearly stated. Thank you for being a shining light in this deplorable administration and dark time in the white Evangelical Church. May God bless you and keep you safe.
This page truly has all of the information I needed concerning this subject and didn’t know who to ask.
Thank you I’m one mom in a two mom family. My 10 year old twins eyes fill with tears when they hear the stories or the heartbreaking comments. Some days are harder then some others. But it makes my heart warm to read your writings and feel God stand up for us. I miss church
AMEN!! Thank you.