"Love the sinner, hate the sin" and other myths of the anti-gay campaigns

A few days ago, USA Today's opinion page printed a piece by a Lutheran about the problem of gay clergy in modern Protestant churches. America's Evangelical Lutheran church recently expelled a gay minister who wished to marry his partner. The Episcopal church in America has confirmed an openly gay bishop, and the worldwide Anglican church responded with an ultimatum: defrock him, or the Episcopals would no longer be an arm of the Anglican church.

Today, several letters appeared on the opinion page in response to the piece. Two were lengthy pieces condemning the writer as theologically misguided, and one was a shorter piece in support. To be empirical, my version of Microsoft Word informs me there were exactly 607 words in the letters against the article, and 96 words in the letter in favor.

USA Today's editorial choice here is curious. Were they trying to proportionally reflect the volume of mail received on each side of the debate, or are they expressing tacit agreement with the dissenters? Either way, one sentence in one of the condemning letters caught my eye: "Luther would condemn the behavior of gays while still loving them. He'd love the sinner and hate the sin."

The problem is that in the case of gay rights, I'm not convinced this cute little sentence makes any sense. "Love the sinner and hate the sin" sounds nice, but what exactly does it mean? Is it possible to love gay people while denying them legislation to protect them from hate crimes? At what point does love include the provision of basic rights?

It has always been my opinion that professions of love are worthless without actions to back them up, but many of today's Christians seem unwilling to take any actions that might show love for the queer community as people, by giving them rights that are afforded to other groups as a matter of course. It's hypocrisy that Christians believe people practicing other religions are living in sin, but jump to embrace hate crimes legislation that protects religious beliefs, even the 'sinful' ones. If one group of 'sinners' deserves protection (even if it's for the selfish reason that Christians are protected from religiously motivated persecution under those same laws), then why not this other group of 'sinners'? Christians defend legislation that allows other religions to practice in peace, because they feel such legislation might one day protect them. They don't feel the same threat in relation to the queer cause (naturally, what good Christian needs to worry their personal rights might get trampled if they decide they're gay? Good Christians just aren't gay, so of course the possibility is remote. It's a likelihood that seems more distant than religious persecution). The worst kind of "not my backyard, so it's not my problem" mentality prevents queers from being afforded the same rights as all other people.

'Love' is a soundbyte that packs a punch with many people. The problem is that for love to have teeth, it also must pack a set of obligations. Morality in action is a system of duties attached to beliefs, and the belief of love comes with certain duties to insure the well-being of the loved as much as possible. One cannot claim to love while depriving someone of basic safety and self-respect, or willingly permitting others to do likewise. It seems natural to me that in order to truly claim to love someone, you should as a matter of course desire for them a better quality of life, and hope they are afforded all the same rights and privileges that you yourself are afforded. In the case of gay people, it's hypocritical to claim to love them on one hand while withdrawing basic protections and liberties on the other.

Many Christians grew up with pastors feeding them the soundbyte of "love the sinner, hate the sin". The problem is that in the case of gay rights, it's not clear the two are distinct, and the modern church all-too-often errs on the side of hate.