Mother Teresa: Don't say homosexuals, say 'friends-of-Jesus'

I just found this out, when some reporters asked Mother Teresa about the homosexuals in Calcutta, she said she didn't like the word 'homosexuals' and went on to insist that they use the term 'friends of Jesus' instead.

I just love this! Imagine if this term became more widely adopted. Some guy coming out to his parents at Thanksgiving dinner: "Mom, Dad, I'm a friend-of-Jesus." In some families there would be this moment of horror before the parents realized with relief their kid was only Gay and not about to join some socially unacceptable conservative church.

And when some people wanted to say 'Gay people just creep me out' they'd have to say 'Friends-of-Jesus just creep me out'. When someone wanted to say 'No Gay person will ever be allowed to join our church because if they were real Christians they'd be cured', they would have to start out 'No friend-of-Jesus will ever be allowed to join our church....' which sounds about right, actually.

And when some Gay activist says 'All Gay people must leave the Christian church and fight to destroy it because they won't accept same-sex marriage', they'd have to say 'All friends-of-Jesus must leave the Christian church....' which would sure as hell wake people up to the fact that the Gay activists DON'T have the authority to speak for all 'friends-of-Jesus'.

The best part of the phrase 'friends-of-Jesus' is that since all Christians are friends of Jesus, it is a reminder to faithful Christians that friends-of-Jesus are not a 'them' but part of 'us'.

Recently I watched an episode of Johnette Benkovic's show which made me feel like I'd turned into a 'them'. It was on the topic of friends-of-Jesus, excuse me, homosexuality, which she said, we might need to know about because we might have friends or family members who are dealing with the issue.

She went on to give out all the grim statistics about Gay couples not being faithful to one another, breaking up with one another, and so on. And then she said she was 'speaking the truth in love'. I detected some missing truths and a lack of love.

I do get it. Christians are fighting the battle against acceptance of Gay sexual sin and Gay marriage, most of the friends-of-Jesus they encounter are on the other side and are actively hateful toward faithful Christians. They're kind of burned out. I'm willing to forgive, but I expect some learning to take place.

Question: would it make sense for us as Christians to marginalize those straight people who are living a chaste life, just because sex immorality and cohabitation are so common? Of course not! Then why are Christians marginalizing Gay people who are living according to God's chastity laws? Such people are the best advocates for the Christian position on these things. It's a lot harder for a left-wing straight politician to justify his pro-gay marriage vote when it's a chaste Gay person voicing the Christian position. Imagine the bumper sticker: 'I'm here! I'm chaste and Queer! Get used to it!'

Homework: find a way to spread the use of the friends-of-Jesus phrase on your blog, facebook page or wherever, and encourage friends to do likewise. So we can find out how many obsessively blogging eccentrics it takes to change the world, or at least a tiny piece of it.