We've got to deal with the fact that the church has been violently prejudiced against gay people. We've murdered them; we've burned them at the stake; we've run them out of town for something over which they have no control. And that's immoral.
Interpretation
The quote addresses the historical and ongoing injustices faced by the LGBTQ+ community due to church-sanctioned prejudice.
John Shelby Spong's quote confronts the moral failings of religious institutions that have persecuted gay individuals throughout history. By acknowledging that these acts of violence and discrimination occur over an inherent characteristic—sexual orientation—the quote urges society to recognize the immorality of such prejudice and highlights the need for compassion and acceptance.
In practice
You can use this quote to spark a discussion about tolerance in a social justice seminar.
When I grew up in the South, I was taught that segregation was the will of God, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. I was taught that women were by nature in inferior to men, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. I was taught that it was okay to hate other religions, and especially the Jews, and the Bible was quoted to prove it.
The church is like a swimming pool. Most of the noise comes from the shallow end.
Christianity is not about the divine becoming human so much as it is about the human becoming divine. That is a paradigm shift of the first order.
I would like the church to be a place where the questions of people are honored rather than a place where we have all the answers. The church has to get out of propaganda. The future will involve us in more interfaith dialogue. ... We cannot say we have the only truth.
It appears to be in the nature of religion itself to be prejudiced against those who are different.
The cross reveals that we're called to a deeper, fuller experience of what it means to be alive and open to new dimensions of life which our religious boundaries - creeds, atonement theologies - have kept us from experiencing.
With all of the history of war, and the human race's history unfortunately has been a good deal more war than peace, with nuclear weapons distributed all through the world, and available, and the strong reluctance of any people to accept defeat, I see the possibility in the 1970's of the President of the United States having to face a world in which 15 or 20 or 25 nations may have these weapons.
It is good to be a cynic - it is better to be a contented cat - and it is best not to exist at all.
Making matters worse is people's natural inclination to be easy on themselves, judging themselves according to their good intentions-while holding others to a higher standard and judging them by their worst actions.
Every one of the world's "great" religions utterly trivializes the immensity and beauty of the cosmos. Books like the Bible and the Koran get almost every significant fact about us and our world wrong. Every scientific domain -- from cosmology to psychology to economics -- has superseded and surpassed the wisdom of Scripture. Everything of value that people get from religion can be had more honestly, without presuming anything on insufficient evidence. The rest is self-deception, set to music.
Duty and dereliction guide thee back to solitude.
The law has no claim to human respect. It has no civilizing mission; its only purpose is to protect exploitation.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.