An Open Letter of Apology
Written Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 2004 by Michael, a Christian and new creation who struugled with SSA and homomsexuality.
Dear gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities,
It only seems appropriate that this letter gets written on the day that our forefathers established to give thanks for arriving safely in their new homeland and surviving the journey from their motherland, leaving behind oppressive rulers and regulations that prevented them from practicing their faith in a way that was authentic and real. How far we have come since then and yet how far we still have to go. As a community you have had and in many ways and still have a never-ending onslaught from the Christian community of oppressive, hateful and ungodly behavior; behavior that in our opinion has nothing to do with Christ and nothing to do with Christianity.
How regrettably hypocritical we have become in pursuit of sharing the gospel message of salvation through Jesus Christ. We have picketed your funerals when you were grieving over a loved one’s loss. We have tirelessly told you that God hates you because you are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, we have persecuted you, alienated you and have been hostile toward you. We have marginalized the pain and anger you have felt as a result of our behavior and we have hurled tokenism and railing condemnations toward you with bull’s eye precision. Is it any wonder why you want nothing to do with Christians and nothing to do with what Christianity is all about?
It is as a result of our shameful behavior that we come to you with our heads bowed down, humbly and woefully admitting our role in alienating you from the same God that loves you and from the opportunity to know the greatest love you would ever know --- the love of Christ. We have taken the love of Christ and substituted the love of Church and ritual, created a system of dogmatic oppression within the church, and then set a condition upon you receiving such love only if you adhere to our demands.
Please, please, please, forgive us and accept our deepest and most humbled apologies for the burdens we have placed on you; burdens that we as Christians could never or would ever want to shoulder, that is why we place our faith in Christ's righteousness, and not in what we think we have done to deserve salvation. Lord, forgive us for the times that we, as believers in Jesus Christ your Son, have failed to deliver your message to the GLBT community with the same love and sincerity that Jesus would have delivered it. Lord let us be with open arms and loving hearts as we share the salvation message to gays and lesbians that are searching for truth and let us shed hypocrisy and mean spiritedness and replace them with Your grace and mercy.
Jesus died and took on the sins of the world in his death as payment for us. We hope that you will look upon us as we accept the responsibility for all the actions the Christian church has taken against you with a heart of forgiveness so true relationship can be established between our community and yours in the days, months, weeks, and years to come. When you can look on Christians and say that we are people of virtue and abounding in love and grace, then we will have an even deeper reason to thank God for a day of true Thanksgiving.
Respectfully yours,
Michael and the Board of Directors of NewHeart Expressions
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