The U.S. House of Representatives has just passed an historic hate crimes bill that extends coverage to people victimized because of their sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.
From a religious perspective, normally it is considered a moral imperative to protect people from violence motivated by hate and I and many religious leaders have celebrated this important vote. In addition, the vast majority of the American people (77%, Gallup poll, 2000) favor including gay people in hate crimes legislation.
Yet, the loudest opposition has come from from a coalition of evangelical and fundamentalist Christian leaders.
It takes some theological gymnastics for Christian leaders to argue that the “values” position is to withhold federal resources from local law enforcement when they investigate a crime where they suspect that the victim was attacked because of his or her sexual orientation. Jesus never said “hate those who are different from you and be sure to persecute them.” In fact, of course, Jesus said exactly the opposite, that we should love even our enemies and bless those who persecute us. How can you possibly argue, from a faith perspective, that it is appropriate to deny federal funds to investigate crimes against people who are manifestly persecuted?
And so we find that those conservative Christians who oppose extending hate crimes legislation to cover gay people don’t argue their position from the Bible or theology. The common thread in opposition to extending hate crimes legislation to gay people is that it would intrude on freedom of speech, i.e. “If an individual’s sexual orientation is a federally protected civil right, the logical conclusion is the moral, religious,or personal beliefs about certain behaviors would be criminalized.” The scare tactic is that those who wish to preach hatred about gay men, lesbians, bisexuals and trans-gendered people could be criminalized. One in seven hate crimes in the U.S. target gay men, lesbians, bisexual or trans-gendered people.
The idea that this new hate crimes bill amounts to efforts at “thought control” is a gross distortion of this legislation as it is directly only at support for law enforcement after a crime has been committed. The First Amendment of the Constitution protects those who wish to preach hatred. As Senator Chuck Robb (D-VA) has commented: "This legislation does not allow individuals to be prosecuted for their hateful thoughts, rather it allows them to be punished for their hateful acts. Willfully inflicting harm on another human being based on hate is not protected free speech."
Republicans and Democrats alike understand the purpose of the legislation is to aid law enforcement in the prosecution of hate-based crime. To quote Republican Senator Gordon Smith, "Unless they [the religiously based right-wing opponents of the bill] believe part of their religion is the practice of violence against others, they should not be affected by this bill."
Well, it does come down to that then doesn’t? When the rest of the country is moving away from hate-based, wedge politics, these self-appointed “Christian” leaders are going the other way. Americans will tolerate a wide variety of opinions in speech, but we are overwhelmingly in favor of drawing the line at hate-based violence.
Is it too much to ask that “Christian leaders” also draw the line at supporting hate-based violence against anyone? Truly I am very tired of the Christian religion being used as a shill for right-wing politics.
"On Faith" panelist Susan Brooks Thistlewaite is president of Chicago Theological Seminary. She has been a professor of theology at the seminary for 20 years and director of its graduate degree center for five years. Her area of expertise is contextual theologies of liberation, specializing in issues of violence and violation.
