This image floated across my Social Media, and it’s so dang funny that it has brought on a story for the weekend.

As a once-pastor of several differing Christian churches, the most common question I received was:

“Does God really hate gay people? Because it’s in the Bible.”

I would answer, “Where did you hear that God hated gay people?”

The usual answer was “Well God said ‘love the sinner, hate the sin’, but then God said ‘if your brother stumbles, leave him to stumble and keep going on your righteous journey’. Plus God said being gay was an abomination.”

This was such an out-of-context word salad that I would clarify with, “Is this something you’ve put together? From reading the Bible?”

They would answer, always—“Oh, no. It’s what my pastor at [any name] Church said in a sermon.”

“What denomination was your church?” I’d ask.

And they would come back with “Evangelical”, “Four Square”, “Vineyard”, “Assemby of God”, “Baptist”.

I would then go on to explain that in fact, God did NOT say those things in the Bible. They would always respond, “Yes, God said to love the sinner, hate the sin.”

“Actually, no,” I’d say. “That’s not in the Bible. Anywhere. That’s a catchy phrase pastors made up that combines many, many allegories in the Old Testament, about not judging others. And it still came out judgy.”

This would stump them, and they’d say, “Well, Paul said to leave your brother on the ground after he stumbles.”

I’d point out that what they were citing wasn’t in the Bible, either, and that it was Jesus, not Paul, in Matthew 18 that said “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over.”

And I’d explain that Jesus goes on to say that if that sinny person then blows off the guy that’s trying to help them, go back and get a group to address the issue — an intervention of sorts— and if that doesn’t work, talk to the church, and if that doesn’t work, just leave them to their own choices and ignore the behavior you don’t like and go on about your life.

I would always say, “He says nothing about ‘leaving them on the ground’, but that’s certainly a dramatic flair.”

By then the person was usually a little lost and upset, and they’d counter with, “Well, God said being gay is an abomination.”

“Ah, yes,” I’d muse, “good ol’ Leviticus 20. Did you know that the book of Leviticus was originally a handbook for the Rabbis? Like an employee manual. These were standards the Rabbis were to adhere to. There were lots and lots of ‘abominations’ in there.”

I’d explain that in fact, a few sentences down from the same-sex mention, it was “An abomination” to wear a cloth of two different kinds of weaves on the Sabbath. So pretty much, anyone going to church in a poly-cotton dress was in the same abomination-level as men having sex with one another.

According to Leviticus.

That got the furrowed brow from the person that meant “well that’s ridiculous,” but there were never any words that followed.

By now, the person is utterly spun-out. Everything their pastor had said, or whatever they heard, just isn’t accurate. And they are usually reaching for something to believe, at this point. So they punt with, “Well Paul said it’s a sin for men to have sex with men. So since God said we’re supposed to hate the sin, wouldn’t that mean God hated gay people?”

I would explain AGAIN that “Love the sinner, hate the sin” is NOT in the Bible.

People made it up. I usually get glazed eyes of disbelief at that one.

I would also detail the fact that the word “hate” WAS NOT used in the high Greek of the New Testament, or in the Hebrew of The Old Testament (which is a bad rip-off and bastardization of the Jewish Torah). The word “hate” was a later, more modern interpretative addition to the Bible by King James and others. The translation for the words that “hate” was substituted for most closely came to “ignore” and “be indifferent towards”.

Big difference.

This was always met with, “Well, Paul said it was wrong.”

I would clarify with the person that it was their pastor that told them this, about Paul. “Of course! Where else would I hear it?” They’d spark at me, losing patience.

“You may be interested to know that the passage your pastor is referring to is in Paul’s letter to the Romans 1:26-27. Paul never say it was ‘wrong’. He said ‘Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones.’ If you look up the High Greek the letter was written in, ‘natural’ translates to ‘for procreation purposes’. Paul said women were having sex with women just to have sex, and weren’t having babies, which was incomprehensible to him at the time. That women’s sexuality would expand past procreation.”

There was usually some “frustration red” in the face of the person at this point, and they’d blurt, “Paul said it about men, too.”

“True, yet the word he used was still ‘unnatural’. Same translation. A lot of newer translations of the Bible have substituted ‘shameful’ for ‘unnatural’, which is even more off-base to the translation, as the translator is assuming Paul’s emotional response rather than sticking to the context of the word.”

“Well,” they’d usually pivot, “Paul was an apostle of Jesus, so I trust that he knows what Jesus would want.”

And there it is.

The biggest, most erroneous, most RIDICULOUS fan-fiction plot twist of all the Evangelical kingdom.

“Actually,” I’d say, “Paul who wrote all those books in the Bible, was NOT an apostle of Jesus.”

I’d explain that Paul, who was originally Saul, a Jewish attorney who was struck off his horse by God and made blind for a minute while God reamed him out about Saul’s persecution of the followers of Jesus (then God told him to go write awesome things about Jesus instead, and by the way, his new name was now Paul)—never knew Jesus. Because he wrote about him nearly 100 years after his death.

At this point, the person in front of me is silent, weirded out, frustrated, and usually kind of lost. “Why would my pastor say all that if it isn’t true?”

I always try and give folks the benefit of the doubt, because I truly do not believe people WANT to hate others. (I believe hate is a group-think fear response, in wishing to desperately ‘belong’ to something, and negativity is low-hanging fruit to build a shared-ideology upon.)

But anyway, my usual answer was something along the lines of, “Perhaps they thought it was true. Perhaps someone they trusted told them those things, and they never researched it. Perhaps they don’t like gay people. However, none of it is in the Bible.”

The best part, for me, is getting to explain what IS in the Christian Bible. “Did you know that the concept of ‘loving your neighbor’ is mentioned in the Bible directly, 8 times? Did you know that NOT judging others is mentioned in the Bible quite a bit, 37 times come to mind. Did you know that the word LOVE appears in the Bible 310-898 times, depending on the translation? And did you know there are 4 different kinds of love the Bible talks about?”

It’s all true. I explain that if folks choose to follow Christ, they’re being spiritually taught to be temperate, loving, compassionate, patient, non-judging, non-exclusive, to mind their own business, to stand up for people who have no voice even if it’s hard, and that good wine is the most important. The last part at least would make them laugh.

I also explain that a lot of Evangelical Churches Teach out of the books that Paul (Saul) wrote, rather than the teachings of Jesus that were recounted, due to Paul’s black-and-white way of lining out an argument. Once again, Paul/Saul was an attorney by trade.

This, with the base reference of many sermons and teachings on the the books of Paul, spinning his particular “argument” for God, make many Evangelical churches “Paulian” churches, not “Christian” churches.

Paul was a little rigid. Jesus was not. Paul was human. Jesus was a human who was sharing a connection to a Divine Consciousness, as well as his own. Jesus had a bit of a different perspective on things, all around. Not that Paul didn’t have good points a lot of the time.

But he wasn’t Jesus. And many Evangelical churches teach from his writings, as if he was.

It MATTERS, what pastors teach their congregations who trust them.

And many Christian churches have taken off with the character of Jesus, identity-thefted this spiritual teacher, applied some written opinions of attorney Paul to their own emotional objectives and narrow lenses of sin-not-sin (by the way, the word “sin” is a Roman archery term that means “to miss the mark”. It does not mean “big fat loser to be crushed under the boot heal of God, who also deserves to be cast out like a rotten salad”), and created a narrative that quite literally —

—has created a false god, worshipped by millions, who is forged in the image of its fear-based human creators. A fickle and judgmental idol wearing the face of a white-skinned, blonde fan-sketched Jesus, and the clean white satin cloaks of an English court.

Not the dark-skinned, dark-haired homeless, penniless, middle eastern man that wore knee-length tunics made of course natural color fibers, as was custom for a working Jewish carpenter, that Jesus truly was.

This is idolatry in its most potent form.

Those attracted to this false god, this excluder, this champion for judgement —they seek justification for their own fear, condoning for their cowardice when faced with spiritual and emotional growth. They do not seek a God who is larger than themselves, who will challenge them to view others through a lens of their own humility, their own personal shortcomings, to stretch and grow and evolve.

They seek a god who is as small as they are. They seek a mirror of themselves.

This is narcissism in its most perfect and literal form, as Narcissus, the mythological Greek figure looked into the pond and fell in love with his own reflection.

It’s a poignant and frightening type of narcissism, to create a god in one’s own worse image, and to teach that to others, to appeal to their lowest nature.

This very scenario, this very action of creating a false god and teaching it to the many, who then adopt this judging and vengeful and excluding being as “Christ”, is actually very detailed in the Christian Bible.

In Revelations, in fact. Pretty much the whole thing.

Throughout the entire Book of Revelations, it talks of a “false Christ” rising up and being lauded as the real savior, only to make way for an even worse false Christ. This fake being which is lifted up by the masses in a frenzy, to the point of being considered “anointed by god”, is seen as god by some, and bamboozles people with charisma, “signs and wonders”, flashy displays, survives some kind of “wound” on its “head” (a blow to authority), and is allowed to do whatever it wants for 42 months without recourse.

Then it gives way to another even worse version of itself.

Sound familiar?

Anyway. Poor Jesus. Can you believe he died for all this? That’s a guy with a vision and a plan.

And that plan never included “hating anyone”. Ever. For any reason.

If you’re someone who is involved in a church congregation that teaches unresearched or disinformed biblical doctrine, you may consider either seeking another church or spiritual center that details the living, inclusive, heart-felt and loving teachings of that great traveling-hippie-guy known as Jesus Christ, or, simply owning the fact that the false/disinformed biblical doctrine is a new belief system to which you feel is just and correct, and to which you adhere.

Both are honest. Both are heartfelt.

Yet one means you are not a Christian.

May each one of you, no matter where you land in the recognition of a higher power (or not), be steeped in love and blessed with peace, contentment, and abundance.

For these things are the true birthright of the human spirit, which is a little pinch of an All-Loving God.

In short—

Rock the love, with your bad-assed selves.