Sometimes people just have to be given their due
Like this pastor in South Africa who gave a sermon entitled ‘Jesus had AIDS’
This is part of what he said afterwards (with the dust not settling at all),
A pastor has angered Christians in South Africa by preaching a sermon entitled “Jesus was HIV-positive” in an attempt to break what he regards as a conspiracy of silence by the South African church.
Xola Skosana said that HIV is stigmatised as evil and a sin in the country that has the world’s biggest caseload.
Skosana, 43, underwent a HIV test in front of his congregation last Sunday at the non-denominational Way of Life church in Khayelitsha , Cape Town. The test was also taken by 100 young people from the impoverished township.
The pastor said he chose the title for his three-part sermon to draw attention to “a very serious issue”.
“In many parts of the Bible, God put himself in the position of the destitute, the sick, the marginalised,” he said. “When we attend to those who are sick, we are attending to him. When we ignore people who are sick, we are ignoring him.”
Skosana cited a passage in the Bible where Jesus says: “I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.” But he has had a hostile reaction in some quarters.
Really? What can we say except that he deserves some kind of medal, and won’t get one…?
Read the rest here
And then there’s the Catholic father of a gay son who wrote this to the US DADT commission:
August 26, 2025
Commanding General, U.S. Army Europe, Co-Chair, Comprehensive Review Working Group
Dear Mr. Johnson and General Ham:
I am a heavy machinery truck driver; I have been all of my life. A blue collar American who raised my son, Joseph Rocha, in a Roman Catholic home with strong Spanish values, after his mother lost custody for drug abuse. Throughout school Joseph turned out to be an awarded scholar, athlete and leader. I did my best to provide a good home for him. But, I wasn’t prepared for my only boy to turn out gay.
Early on in his senior year, at 17, he left the house on one condition: that he never return.
I learned through my wife that he was excelling quickly in the military. He was promoted twice in his first year and was hand-picked for explosive detection school. We had no idea that during his 28 months in the Middle East, he was being abused by his superiors because he wouldn’t tell them if he was gay or not. He only ever called home to tell my wife he loved working with the dogs and about his aspirations of becoming an officer.
He sent gifts to his kid siblings for every single holiday and called them religiously. He was a hero to my girls. I struggled through our silence knowing that I was missing out on my son. As it sank in that Joseph might be injured or killed in the service, it became clear how irrelevant who he wants to love is. On a phone call home to congratulate me for my birthday, I told my son for the first time that I was truly proud of him and asked him to live his life for himself, not for me or anyone else.
What can you say, except that it must have taken astonishing courage to write that letter, but that it took far more courage to live it. I’m not much in favour of the Iraq war (for which read, it’s an abomination and Blair/Bush should be jailed for life) but that doesn’t mean that the men and women who are paid to become murderers in uniform don’t deserve our compassion and our passion. Until we find a way to live in a world without war, their lives are our touchstones.
Read the rest of that story here
And then there’s the woman who should just shut up and go home - and she’s Martin Luther King’s niece, you’d think she might know better than to say this:
Alveda King, a niece of Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke at a rally for the antigay National Organization for Marriage and said marriage equality would lead to “extinction” and called it “genocide.”
King, who heads King for America, addressed a rally Saturday in Atlanta whose attendees were outnumbered by counterprotesters, according to theGeorgia Voice.
“King also spoke of her family’s commitment to strong marriages, including her uncle and ‘his lovely wife,’” reported the Voice. “She did not mention that Coretta Scott King, Martin Luther King Jr.’s wife, spoke out in favor of gay marriage on several occasions and was a speaker at Atlanta’s Gay Pride festival in 1996.”
‘Extinction’ and ‘genocide’?
If I were a survivor of 39-45, or the genocide in Rwanda, or even what the Chinese are trying to do in Tibet… I might have reason to speak of extinction and genocide. The lady needs some history lessons, soonest. And a zip.
Read the rest of this sorriness here
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Where do you find these exerpts? so interesting!
cruising in strange places…
mostly on the web sites on my blog roll - linking through links.
Manda, where do you find the time to blog all this? :p
I like the story about the man realising his son was still his son. I wonder how often acceptance takes place like that?
Not so pleased about Ms King’s stance. It’s the bloody 21st century, you’d think people would be over it by now! But no, the majority are still all fearful of people living their own lives the way they are and the way they see fit and these morons have to interfere at every turn. One of my good friends is gay and when we worked together, we’d go and have lunch together, so OBVIOUSLY we were romantically involved hahaha. ‘Twas fun to keep people wondering, especially when it’s none of their business. My boss is also gay and very well liked at work, she’s hilarious and the best person I’ve ever worked for. So bring it on, I say! I’m just glad I don’t live in America.
Bits of America are wonderful, and the good people are so very much more emotionally literate than a lot of Brits, but then the idiots are so very much more idiotic
as to time…? I’m line-editing. It’s not what you’d call hard work. And this is ‘networking’ which is vital to promoting the books. Or something. It’ll be less when I’m fully into the next book.