Friend of Sinners

As followers of Jesus we seek to be like the one who was known as a "Friend of Sinners" but to often we fall into to ditch of "sinner's aren't my friend" on one side of "my friends aren't sinners" on the other. Perhaps this is the simplest description of the difference between conservative and liberal Christians as well as one of the key problems with each. God help us to stay on the road of being friends of sinners both inside and outside the church.

On an only vaguely related point I attended the Pride week lecture on human rights and hate speech yesterday presented by Mr. Kevin Kindred, he is the president of the Nova Scotia Rainbow Action Program (SNRAP) which means he is basically the king of Gay rights activism in Nova Scotia. His presentation was thoughtful, insightful, and frankly I agreed with pretty much every point he made. His basic point is that if we are all going to be allowed to express our views that we all have to learn to be ok with being offended by the people who disagree. He cited some of the most high profile "Christians being anti-gay" cases to go before the human rights commission and basically said that even though he found some of them profoundly offensive he thought they should be dismissed and "christians" should be allowed to express those views. So if you have spent to much time listening to the Dobson-esque conspiracy theorists out there you can, at least in Nova Scotia, take a deep breath. I wish I had a recording of his presentation. What are the odds I could get him invited to the Atlantic District Ministerial to bring us up to speed on these Human Rights / Hate Speech issues?