DC, the Catholic Church, & Gay Marriage

Now those are three things that one generally does not expect to see in a subject line. Yet here it is? Why?

Well, not so long ago DC passed a law that said that gay marriage will be allowed. Well, we've all read my previous blogs on the gay marriage subject and know that I'm a rather large proponent of it.

In fact, two of my best friends are gay. A couple, one of whom I knew before I even officially moved to DC. Wonderful, beyond wonderful men. Men that I am proud to call my family, family that takes care of me, loves me, and will always stand by my side. They are getting married some time in 2011 and, yes, I will be in the wedding.

Well, the Catholic Church in DC muttered and moaned, made threats, and the like. Threats involving taking away social services from the city.

I am appalled to have to report, should you not already have read about it, that they are, in fact, going to do so.

What are they pulling first? Foster services. Here's an article from The Washington Times. I kid you not.

I could go on and on about the disenfranchised, about children, about making really crappy threats in the first place.

But I'm stumped. I'm just blown away at the bigotry, the prejudice, the sheer hatred that this church is imposing on its congregations. They are NOT teaching forgiveness, love, and kindness. They're teaching how to share hate, how to discriminate, how to oppress.

I'm thoroughly fascinated time and again by how different sects choose to read the bible. Yes, we all know the holy book has an insane amount of discrepancies. And at the end of the day, all I can ask you to consider is this: do you want to read that book to learn and preach hatred, or do you want to read that book to learn and preach love?

At the end of the day, I don't judge. That's for the big guy upstairs. I'm going to support my fellow man, I'm going to fight for my fellow man, and I'm going to love my fellow man. And before I get ripped by my Women's Studies colleagues, my fellow woman too.

Ultimately, I will go before God. I will stand before Him with nothing but love in my heart and knowing that I did what I did, that I stood for the disenfranchised and the oppressed with full knowledge of what may come my way. Because what is Heaven if it's a place of hate? Of judgment by the people who are allowed access through the gates? If Hell is where the people who stand up and fight their fellow man go, then I will be proud to stand among them. Because there is hope for a better tomorrow when you stand. When you teach your children to stand.

There is a difference between right and wrong. And even if you think that the actions of others are wrong, then my question becomes, what's worse? Them for doing the action? Or you for judging that action to the point of perpetrating hatred, bigotry, and prejudice? I cannot control my fellow person, I can only control me.

And my control of myself is to love. To exist. To support. To find it within me to always have the strength to hope for a better tomorrow where we exist side by side in some version of harmony.

Do you have it in you to stand with me? To hold hands with me? To believe in that better tomorrow with me?

Do you believe in love?