Love Letter To You, Dear Homophobe

My Friend,

You are a lovely soul. You pour out the love of Jesus to strangers and those in pain. The sweet aura of God surrounds you, and it inspires hope in the hopeless.

But your goodness is threatened by your prejudice. Yes, I’m talking about your repulsion for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. That prejudice that doesn’t suit you, that doesn’t fit the compassion you otherwise exude – compassion that comes from the pit of pain and despair.

You helped teach me not to judge others, saying, “We have not walked in their shoes.” You should know, having walked the lonely road yourself, kicked at, condemned and treated harshly. Have you forgotten that? Has some mental ailment erased that past and the empathy you earned yourself for it? Why do you now sit at the judge’s bench?

Your repugnance to gay people goes against the very nature of Jesus so present in you in many other ways. It is a darkness that overshadows the love you have lived from. It is a rasp in your voice as you talk about “those people,” a virus you’ve picked up from your pastors, those seemingly more concerned with their bank account than the love of God that’s always motivated you. Your aversion to these people you’ve never met adds sad lines to your face, erasing your joy. Your meanness when you talk about them is a little frightening. Your coldness when you think about them belies something deep-rooted and unresolved. Something ugly. None of this suits the creation of God that you are. None of this suits the life of Jesus you claim to follow. You may justify your prejudice with words like “sin”, “unnatural” and “against God’s design.” But none of that speaks to the truth of your hate.

Yes, hate. I know this word makes you recoil because you do not fathom yourself a habitat for such ugliness. But you do indeed hate. Every time you open your mouth to cast aspersions on gay people, you hate. You are harsh. You are judgmental. You close off the flow of God’s love for those you don’t deem worthy. As if you are on God’s selection committee, to decide who has received God’s love grant and who has missed the opportunity this year but may apply again next year, if by then they demonstrate the necessary qualifications.

Do you not see what you are doing? Do you not see what you have become? I am greatly concerned for you. The person you are is unlike the you I have known for years.

You need to see how you have changed. You have to see how you’re not the man you always fancied yourself to be. This cancer that is your hate is overtaking you. Your judgment is displacing kindness and crowding out love. Left on its own, this malignancy will fill more and more of your life.

But you can choose to change. You can choose to love. Because I miss you – I miss the way you used to live, the way you used to love.

Sincerely Yours

Your Friend

Written by Dreq