The girl traveling through Italy in March 2016 was a devote Christian. She was in denial about her sexuality and her distancing relationship with God. Because she only knew the God she was told about, she was unsure about her future and fate in God’s hands. That’s no longer the case.
Matthew 22:35-40
To the man standing on the corner holding the sign that says “God Hates Faggots”
I’ve never seen exactly who it is that you paperclip your knees, meld your hands together and pray to.
But I think I know what he looks like.
I bet your God is about 5’11”.
I bet he weighs 185.
Probably stands the way a high school diploma does when it’s next to a GED.
I bet your God has a mullet.
I bet he wears flannel shirts with no sleeves, a fanny pack, and says things like “getrdun.”
I bet your God,
I bet your God,
I bet your God watches FOX News,
Dog the Bounty Hunter, and loves Bill O’Reilly.
I bet your God lives in Arizona.
I bet his high school serves racism in the cafeteria
And offers “hate speech” as a second language.
I bet he has a swastika inside of his throat
And racial slurs tattooed to his tongue
Just to make intolerance more comfortable in his mouth.
I bet he has a burning cross as a middle finger and Jim Crow underneath his nails.
Your God is a confederate flag’s wet dream
conceived on a day when the sky decided to slice her own wrists,
I bet your God has a drinking problem.
I bet he sees the bottom of a shot glass more than his own children.
I bet he pours whiskey on his dreams until they taste like good ideas.
Probably cusses like an electric guitar with Tourette’s plugged into an ocean.
I bet he yells like a schizophrenic nail gun, damaging all things that care about him enough to get close.
I bet there are angels in Heaven with black eyes and broken halos claiming they fell down the stairs.
I bet your God would’ve made Eve without a mouth and taught her to spread her legs like a magazine that she will never ever be pretty enough to be in.
Sooner or later, you will realize that you are praying to your own shadow,
That you are standing in front of mirrors and worshiping your reflection.
Your God stole My God’s identity.
So next time that you bend your knees,
next time you bow your head,
I want you to tell your God
That my God is looking for him.
My God is looking for you too.
And he will find you at the golden gates after a long life.
He will take you in his arms with love.
With pity.
With disappointment.
He will say things to you like “I know you tried your best.”
Like “I know you thought you were doing right.”
Like “Why must you pay so much attention to one verse in my book? Why not live by the hundreds of pages where I talked of love and kindness?”
My God is the one who preaches love and kindness about all things and to all people. To people who are as black as the scoffs on the tile floor from my gramma’s church heels to the people who are as white as bread broken at the altar and every single person in between. To the people who love other people, no matter who they love. To the people, to people, to you, but you aren’t listening to my God. You seem to justify your feelings with my Bible; since you seem to love to quote the Holy Bible so much, here is a verse for you.
“Then one of them asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
That is it. Love thy neighbour as thyself. No exceptions, no loopholes, no “unless’s” or “however’s.” No differentiating between sin and sinner. Just love. Simply, Love thy neighbour as thyself.
And since it looks like you love yourself so damn much, then you must have so much love to give to your neighbor. As my God says, as your God pretends, love.
