I get most of my news from talk radio and The New York Times online. This I found at the New York times. I've been making it a point to try and really get up on world news so I know what's going on, what people are facing in other places, and to put faces to the war, to the world, and more. I've felt sort of isolated and safe here in my suburban townhome and I'm not sure that's always a good way to feel.
So today I saw this. It was the first article on the Africa page - if you are unfamiliar with the "world" section of the NY Times they have things divided by continents and you can click on the region of the world about which you are interested in reading.
The entire thing really disturbed me. Not only because it's the whole Evangelical Christian bad rap deal rearing it's ugly head once again, but also because of how horrifying the laws are, how horrifying the responses are, how horrifying it all is. Period. How helpless I feel. I'm here behind my safe little computer writing my safe little blog to a lot of safe people sitting in their suburban houses reading about what is going on in a place halfway around the world and I weep for it and can't help and can't touch it and can't heal it and it makes me insane.
I have friends who are adopting a boy from Uganda. Things have been hard for them, just trying to get him here. I've been thinking about and praying for them a lot. This article hit home double for me when I thought of them and of their son who is stuck there, in a place like this. In a place where Christianity has been blasphemed as something that is not love, but is rather hate and wickedness and deceit.
My views as to whether homosexuality is right or wrong has no place here and now. It's about how you care about people. How you look at them as Christ's blood and body when you look into their eyes. I am just...so...ANGRY.
Gay friends of mine are commenting on my link from my facebook page and saying that it really scares them, that these things exist in the world - that these things are possible. And why people who call themselves Christians?!?! WHY?
This is the reason that I am a part of Butterfly. It shouldn't matter what a person does or is or says - we are bound to love them. Period. Paul, in Corinthians talks about how we cannot judge those outside the church, we cannot judge those who do not know Jesus, we cannot...
I'm not saying that someone who is gay is outside the church. I'm just saying that those people who went there - they got it ALL WRONG. And now there are people who think that this is what Christianity means.
The part that got me the most fired up was the "correctional rape" section. I understand that maybe the people in Uganda don't know as much as we do when it comes to psychology but anyone who thinks that RAPE by a man is going to make a woman interested in sex with other men is a complete lunatic. I am so tired of how women are treated. I am so tired of how brothers and sisters are treated. I am so tired of how we hurt each other and hate one another and fail to love or even SEE the person standing in front of us.
The fact is that the woman being a lesbian was an excuse for a man to rape her. Plain and simple. "Correctional rape". The phrase should be struck from existence. Disgusting and vulgar. Perhaps there is nothing more vulgar that could be said. Excuses for violence, for pain, for suffering, for mental anguish.
God save us all.
7 comments:
100% Completely Agreed Miss
I do want to say that I understand that this is a media portrayal of events - and so it may be twisted and exaggerated and I admit that the article in it's entirety sheds an unfavorable light on Christianity. This scares me as far as what the public response will be - outrage at the Ugandan government (re: such laws) or outrage at Christianity. I hope that it will be the latter. I hope that people will see through this article to the truth about all of it.
I think what really hurts my heart is this:
Stosh Mugisha, a gay rights activist who said she was pinned down in a guava orchard and raped by a farmhand who wanted to cure her of her attraction to girls. She said that she was impregnated and infected with H.I.V., but that her grandmother’s reaction was simply, “ ‘You are too stubborn.’
Incredible. Not only has this girl been brutally raped and infected with a death sentence (because no matter how you slice it, living with HIV in Uganda is NOTHING like living with HIV/AIDS in the US... she will suffer and die from the virus), but her own grandmother turned away from her, implying that she brought it on herself.
My heart aches hard for her.
They've gone from proposing the ban of miniskirts to stringing homosexuals up by their necks. What will they think of next? It's really frightening.
It's funny to me though, as a basically non-religious person (for those reading that don't know me, I was raised Catholic and don't go to church anymore. I think of, and pray to, God, but I don't need the dogma that goes with it to feel fulfilled) I don't take the entire article as an attack on Christianity. I think that the article paints the three speakers as crazy and overzealous, but overall, I think it's more of an attack on the Ugandan government, not on Christianity as a whole.
Just my humble opinion though....
I agree with you though, Missy... the entire thing is terrifying and difficult to imagine from the comfort and security of home.
Jackie,
Much appreciated.
Well put, Missy. There's so much dogma floating around that people are always forgetting the greatest two commandments (Love the Lord your God...AND love your neighbor as yourself). That "love your neighbor" command stands even if your neighbor's lifestyle and/or activities disagree dramatically with your beliefs.
About News Sources:
You might consider taking a peek at http://news.bbc.co.uk/ for another good source for world events. The style is usually more report/fact and much less bias/opinion. They break things down by continents, too.
Cool, thanks, Pete, I'll definitely check it out.
Checked out the story on the BBC - no mention of the Christianity bit, but the Ugandan law was proposed. It was turned down, however, and they are now simply keeping their 14 year prison sentence for anyone practicing homosexuality. And to be clear, the death penalty would have been for anyone practicing homosexuality who was HIV positive, or who was a rapist, or who was a "repeat offended" of homosexual acts.
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