Hugh's Views

If Felix could do this, I would make him start wearing pants.

My last blog post garnered some reaction, both on the Twitter and in real life.

Most of the criticism went along the lines of ‘God loves wealthy people too”. I noticed this was always said by people in a position of relative wealth. In other words, they thought I was picking on them.

Maybe I was. Or maybe I was not talking to them.

My particular calling – or role, if you will – in life is nothing less than demonstrating the love of Jesus to the marginalized and enabling other followers of Jesus to do the same. All of my writing, all of my speaking and all of my public efforts are geared to those two ends.

This is a blog. Here, I write for a) those who are marginalized and b) those who do the marginalizing. I am not writing systematic theology. I am not trying to write The Definitive Guide to Religion, or How to Understand God in 5 Easy Steps. I am writing to let people who have only seen God used as a weapon against them know that God loves them. And to tell those who are using God as a weapon to stop.

Over 1/3 of our funds to do this work come from those who profess no faith at all. Nearly half of our donors are agnostic, atheist and/or gay – and yet they believe in our mission of loving without preconditions. People who shudder at the very name of Christians tell me that if they did believe in a God, it would be the one I believe in.

I recently announced on Twitter and Facebook that I was considering getting a Masters Degree in Theology. I only received two affirmations. One was from a dear friend who is gay. The other was a different friend who is an atheist. If the only people encouraging me to get better at this preaching Jesus thing are gays and atheists, maybe, just maybe I am doing something right.

Several weeks ago, I spoke at the local TEDx event. I had a long talk with an atheist gay man who could not believe that a Christian would even talk to him, let alone listen to how he had been hurt by the church. Another came up to me and wondered how I could be Christian and help gay people, because he thought those two things were mutually exclusive.

Those are the people I am speaking for.  Those are my people – and those are the ones I speak to and fight for.

Yes, I know Jesus loves privileged people. But it is because they are people, not because they are privileged. And they don’t need me to tell them Jesus loves them – the entire American culture tells them that, day after day.

So, if you are upset that my particular ministry and work does not tell you how to Live Your Best Life Now, or how you can have a Godly marriage (whatever that means) ¹ or you think I don’t stand up for Biblical Values², well, there are all sorts of people out there who will tell you all that and take your money. But none of those people will be me.

¹ I have no idea what this term means. Did Abraham have a Godly marriage when he pimped out his wife to save his life?  God told Hosea to marry a whore… is that what you mean? Or having six wives, like did David, a “Man after God’s own heart”?
² Biblical Values is another phrase I have no idea what is meant by people who use it. Jacob steals the birthright from Esau, Abraham sleeps with the chambermaid, David kills his mistress’ husband, Solomon has 700 wives and enslaves people. If I emulated any of those people, folks would think I was a congressman or something.

I love to read. I have always loved to read. In fact, I cannot remember a time that I was not reading. My parents have stories of me reading the newspaper out loud to their friends when I was five. When I would go grocery shopping with my mom, I would often run into people, as I was walking around the the store while reading the back of cereal boxes.

Anyway, I love to read. Most weeks, I read 2-3 books. If I am on vacation or traveling, that count skyrockets.

2-3 books a week?

Yup. Before you ask how I do that, you may be interested to know I have never seen an episode of Lost or 24 and I have zero idea who is on American Idol this year. To say I don’t watch TV is an understatement. The last thing I sat down and watched on television was the Presidential Inauguration.

So I love to read, and I read a lot. Which leads us to the inevitable question:

What do you like to read?

I used to say everything, but that is not really true. My reading is all over the map, though. Some good fiction, some theology, some biographies, some short stories, some history and so on…

Because I get asked a lot of questions about books – what are you reading, what do you recommend, etc. – I have decided to start mentioning some of the things I read here on my blog. This is nowhere near book reviews. I mean, I have nothing against book reviews, and have done many of them, but I get paid money for those. No, these will be short, 1-3 paragraph mentions of books that I have read and enjoyed, and think you may find enjoyable too.

This wont be every book I read, or even close to that. But I probably have 50 books a year that really stand out. And I want to mention them to you, with the hope that you may enjoy them too.