They just don’t get it. Joe tips us off to this piece by Concerned Man Mario Diaz of the Concerned Women for America, where he tries desperately to find the balance between condemning gays to a fiery damned hell with a plastic fundamentalist smile on his face and, you know, actual hate. I never know how Fundamentalists actually define “hate” if they can’t see it in themselves. Let’s go through his piece and see what we find:

Some who fight for homosexual “rights” accuse Christians of being hateful because of their support for the traditional definition of marriage.

Some who fight for the “rights” of black people to be free accuse slaveowners of being “hateful” because of their support for the traditional definition of “slavery.” (See what I did there? I see what I did there. They’re the SAME ARGUMENT.)

But there is a fundamental problem with that equation. A Christian, by definition, cannot hate homosexuals.

Oh my goodness, what definitions and equations is Mario using here? Because his fundamentalist cohort show on a daily basis that, yes, indeed, they can hate homosexuals, and moreover, they’re quite good at it!

Christians follow the teachings of Christ. And Christ summarized all the law with two simple rules: (1) “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind,” and (2) “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Well, in theory…but we still haven’t talked about the Concerned Women for America/hate group-y kind of Christian. They don’t follow Christ’s teachings at all.

The truth is that if anyone hates homosexuals then they cannot call themselves a Christian. Hate towards neighbors and Christianity are mutually exclusive.

Ha, well then. Porno Pete, Linda Harvey, Tony Perkins, Peter Sprigg, Greg Quinlan, DL Foster, Bryan Fischer, Laurie Higgins, and all the rest of you, come on down! Mario of the Concerned Women has summarily excommunicated you all. Please return your Christian name-tags on the way out and be off.

It is true that Scripture even calls us to “love our enemies.” Yet, I am hesitant to use that passage in this context, because I do not want to suggest that homosexuals are somehow our enemies. They are not.

Is CWA going liberal? I’m still waiting for Mario to start twisting language and throwing Get Out Of Jail Free cards.

Now, that’s all well and good in theory

In theory. Did I not say “in theory,” just above? I did. I promise I didn’t read the article before I started writing. Here comes the justification for a special supposedly Biblical sort of hate:

but how does this look in practice? Well, I can say that I have in my life, just like most of the readers, close friends and family members who describe themselves as homosexuals. And I love them.

They “describe themselves as homosexuals.” And he loves them. Warm fuzzies. Go on?

They know where I stand on the issue of marriage and homosexuality. They know I believe that government should not promote their lifestyle. I have shared what I believe God’s grace can do in their lives. That they are not slaves to their desires.

Aha, so he “loves them,” therefore he’s foisted his weird, unfortunate, disproven beliefs about sexuality on them, sharing the Good News about how, if they really loved God, they’d live out their lives all alone, never experience romantic love, etc. There’s that Fundamentalist Christian “Love” I’m so used to. I love you, you’re perfect, now change, or you’re going to burn in hell with all the other unsaved heathens! Warm fuzzies getting warmer.

We’ve talked about it privately, and I write about it publicly. Some have even gotten mad at me because of something I have said or written.

Yeah, and they probably talk behind your back about how unfortunate that it is that you’re a bigot.

But our friendship goes on, because it goes beyond homosexuality. They are much more than that.

I am committed to pray for them, and not only about salvation, as some seem to think. They have many worries in life (as we all do) and I pray for those, especially when they ask me to.

Even gays have other worries in life beyond whether we’re going to hell? Tell me more, Mario!

I won’t lie and say my heart doesn’t hurt for them. They truth is that many of their struggles are centered on their lifestyle. And the great majority carry enormous hurt from their past.

That’s my favorite kind of loving friend: the one that publicly writes about how much they pity me. Warm fuzzies now warmest! Let me guess: the enormous hurt from their pasts was inflicted by, for the most part, rejection from the Fundamentalists they were erroneously trained to trust?

So I pray for peace, joy, and mercy in their lives. That’s the Christian approach. That is, at least, for those who follow the teachings of Christ.

Hate who they are, pray for them and tell them to change, while waxing poetic about “love.” Sounds about right.

The bottom line is a Christian must behave like a Christian. Or he or she is not a Christian at all. We stand for God’s model for marriage and the family alone, and we love our homosexual neighbors. There is nothing incongruent about that.

Especially when “love” is a euphemism for something else entirely.