Time for another comment-turned-blog-post

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Over at Bobbi's blog, she opines that some good old fashioned protesting doesn't exactly show the best of either side.  She is right, of course, though I think that her conclusion in comments that "they are keeping one another out of worse trouble, and the First Amendment from getting rusty" is probably the more proper one.

Of course I have to note that being told, ad infinitum, that you're going to hell (even if it's not in so many words) actually is a serious issue to some people.  I don't know how things are for Indiana's gays, but it may be that literal gay bashing isn't so much of a problem there anymore and they're now freed up to fight philosophical issues.  Anything's possible.

Anyhow, this blog post is prompted by this comment, which in part says:

Haven't seen the figures on how many LGBT* food banks or missions helping the poor that exist, but I am confident they've got a ways to go to catch up with churches in that regard.

Now, this is a bit of a silly argument to my way of thinking.  I started to write a rebuttal, but it became long-winded so I'll put it here instead.

There is a community church with a mostly gay parish here which is active in all the usual sort of churchy social work stuff, and also is very active in the HIV/AIDS-afflicted community.  The organized pagan folks in the community do the same, and the gay pagans I know who wish to be involved in community service are.  As it happens, we also have no shortage of gay-owned businesses whose owners are active in the sort of thing LabRat mentioned, and again in providing services to those in the community affected by HIV/AIDS.  In point of fact, WEBB Party is an official Fiesta event, and like all such it benefits charity--in this case the San Antonio AIDS Foundation.

So while there aren't any gay food banks that I know of, that's simply because there isn't really a need.  Gays can and do work with what's already in place; even those who are politically active in regard to gay rights are willing and able to work with what's already in place.  It's as silly to assume that gay by definition means non-Christian as it is to assume that gay by definition means Democrat.  There are a few gay (that I know of) people who go to my church--why on Earth would they not support the church's charitable activities simply because they're not stamped LGBTQ?  Ditto with the other churches that are gay-friendly (I'm pretty sure we have Unitarian Universalists somewhere in this city).

"There are no gay food banks or missions!" is just a silly argument.  There are charities run by gay groups, and gay charitable organizations which give to nonprofits that aren't specifically gay (SAAF is not).

It's dangerous, and probably wrong, to think you know what someone does Monday through Saturday just because you know what they do on Sunday.