Any claim that the homosexual lobby seeks merely society’s tolerance has been laid bare as the lie that it is by two recent developments in which private Christian colleges and a Christian teacher at a Miami public high school have come under intense criticism for merely contending for the clear teaching of Scripture regarding the immorality of homosexuality.

These incidents are part of a growing pattern of aggressive opposition by homosexual activists against Christians who are simply attempting to be true to Scripture in the conduct of their own personal lives. The unrelenting campaign to make homosexuality mainstream and to marginalize those who hold moral objections to this lifestyle will eventually touch every Christian institution – including local churches – which refuse to back down from their biblical convictions.

Are Christians ready for this inevitable conflict?

Equality Ride

The so-called Equality Ride sponsored by Soulforce is currently in the midst of a 20-city tour visiting universities with policies against homosexual conduct. Most of the schools are Christian, including four Baptist universities.

The Equality Ride includes about 30 young adults who are showing up uninvited on the campuses seeking publicity for its cause. Some schools are barring access to their private property, while others are welcoming the protesters with open arms – even providing a public forum on campus for discussion and debate about the homosexual lifestyle.

The absurdity of Christian institutions permitting a discussion about homosexuality featuring homosexual advocates can be seen by simply replacing homosexuality with any other immoral practice condemned by Scripture – perhaps schools should host a discussion of race with the Klu Klux Klan, or pornography with the publishers of Playboy, or adultery with a notoriously unfaithful Hollywood celebrity. Such is the extent of the homosexual lobby’s success that otherwise right-thinking leaders would entertain those who blatantly flaunt their immorality.

Equality Ride arrived on the first day of Spring Break March 18 at Union University, which is affiliated with the Tennessee Baptist Convention, for a one-hour rally “mostly made up of the media and about seven Union students,” according to The Jackson (Tenn.) Sun.

Two former Union students who now live as a lesbian “couple” in Knoxville were featured at the gathering. “I am not sick, and I am not a sinner,” said Dawn Davridge.

Showing the group’s anti-biblical posture as well as it’s unrelenting intention to force its distorted interpretations on all Christians, Davridge writes on Soulforce’s Web site: “[W]hat I want to accomplish during this ride is to set students free from the ‘unquestionable power’ of the conservative church and to show them the way to the true Jesus of the scriptures, the Jesus who loved and accepted all unconditionally, the Jesus who believed in justice for all humans, the Jesus who challenged the prejudices and supposed ‘powers’ of the religion of his day and said all people belong to God and the church has no right to limit God’s love and acceptance or to put words in God’s mouth because God was perfectly able to speak for God’s self and say, ‘I love EVERYONE.’”

Jacob Reitan, a leader of the Equality Ride, told Christianity Today: “When Paul was writing in the New Testament, he didn’t have an understanding of homosexuality as we know it today. We believe that Christ is our best defense, because the message of Christ was always to embrace people and love them.”

It appears both Reitan and Davridge need an entry-level course in the doctrine of the Bible, which holds: “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16) – meaning that the writings of Paul and the teachings of Jesus are equally inspired by the Holy Spirit and cannot be set against one another, especially since they are not in conflict.

Union University President David S. Dockery winsomely prepared the campus for the uninvited visit in a March 1 letter to students and friends of the school.

“At Union University we believe that human sexuality is God’s gift to human beings, which is rightly expressed only within the lifelong covenant commitment of marriage between one man and one woman. We reject homosexual practice, believing it to be contrary to biblical teaching and can accept no place for it within the Union community. … At the same time, we strongly renounce any unjust reprisal or harm against homosexual persons that would violate the common rights enjoyed by all American. We do, however, reject the notion of special rights for such persons whether they be attempts to make same-sex couples legally married or to appoint gay men as bishops.”

Dockery added: “The issue of homosexuality is not an issue that we have chosen to highlight, nor would we have chosen this issue. But the Soulforce Equality Ride to Union University later this month has pushed this issue to the forefront ….”

Soulforce is not new to Southern Baptists. The homosexual activist group has in recent years repeatedly protested at the annual meetings of the Southern Baptist Convention, including a very public attempt to disrupt the 2002 annual meeting during the president’s address, resulting in the arrest of 50 protestors.

Miami teacher persecuted

Meanwhile in Miami, a public school teacher is being persecuted because she had the temerity to offer her personal, biblical convictions that homosexuality is immoral.

Here’s how The Miami Herald reported it March 10:

“On the first day, a few students talked about supporting gay rights, and no one paid much attention.

“On the second day, a school counselor talked about respecting each other, and no one paid much attention.

“On the third day, a few students spoke against homosexuality and a teacher said it is ‘wrong according to the Bible’ – and people noticed very much.”

Miami Sunset Senior High School business technology teacher Donna Reddick offered those politically incorrect views in a student television project which was broadcast to the entire student body. As a result, she has been the subject of unwelcome media attention – including stories on at least two South Florida television newscasts, an appallingly unfair bashing by a Herald columnist, and letters to the editor calling for “severe disciplinary action” – and she is now under professional scrutiny by her principal and district officials investigating whether she violated School Board policies.

Sunset Principal Lucia Cox told the Herald that Reddick’s views may be contrary to two rules because “We separate church and state” and “We don’t discriminate against sexual preference.”

The television project students told Reddick they were seeking “the non-Christian view of homosexuality versus the Christian view of homosexuality,” and the teacher may not have been told that her comments would be aired to the entire student body, according to Cox.

“Clearly there was a failure to appropriately and completely supervise this assignment, and the consequence for gay students to feel perhaps threatened and/or that the broadcast has encouraged a hostile school environment,” fretted Art Teitelbaum, southern area director for the Anti-Defamation League.

For homosexual activists and their sympathizers, the student project would have been completely unremarkable had it stopped after day two. It’s apparently not a problem for Christian students to “feel perhaps threatened” or to engender a “hostile school environment” toward those who oppose homosexuality, but it’s absolutely unacceptable when homosexual students may hear views opposing their immoral practice.

Unremittingly political lifestyle

Both the Equality Ride and the Miami school incident vividly demonstrate that the homosexual lobby will not rest until all of society – including private Christian institutions and individuals – give approbation to its decadent lifestyle.

A pastor or church does not have to be publicly engaged in advocacy against homosexual marriage or opposing special civil rights protections for homosexuals to become the object of attention by homosexual activists. The homosexual lobby regards merely the preaching of the clear biblical admonitions against this lifestyle – even solely within the private confines of a local church – to be subject to its pressure tactics.

Just as Union University did not choose to highlight the issue of homosexuality, local churches and pastors who are true to Scripture eventually, inevitably will bring opposition because homosexuality is an unremittingly political lifestyle that insists on its validation, acceptance and even celebration.

Biblical Christians (which, by the way, ought to be a redundant descriptor but is tragically not) have no choice but to speak where the Word of God speaks, even when such teaching is rejected by the world. May God help us to preach unapologetically, yet winsomely His truth in an increasingly antagonistic age.

As Union President Dockery told his community: “It is our goal always to be firm in our convictions while still reflecting the love of Christ to people who might disagree with us. We recognize God’s great love to us while we were estranged from Him, and we want to extend that love to others.”