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http://www.patheos.com/blogs/freedhearts/2015/05/25/i-am-the-mother-of-a-gay-son-and-ive-taken-enough-from-you-good-people/ The Dangers of Life in a Male-Dominated System » “I am the mother of a gay son and I’ve taken enough from you good people.” May 25, 2015 by Susan Cottrell 576 Comments If you are the parent of an LGBTQ child, and would like to be part of our private secret Facebook support group, please just CLICK HERE and let us know. In 2000, Sharon Underwood, the Mom of a gay son, wrote this heartfelt, powerful letter to the editor of a local Vermont newspaper. She is responding to self-proclaimed moral people who for years caused her young gay son so much pain. We are in the middle of a crisis with LGBTQ youth. Abused, attacked, bullied, shamed, kicked out of homes and churches, they end up on the street and turn to substance abuse, gangs, forced prostitution and sometimes suicide. Fifteen years later, tragic deaths later, this letter tells the story of thousands of innocent LGBTQ youth trapped in communities where they aren’t welcome. Many letters have been sent to the Valley News concerning the homosexual menace in Vermont. I am the mother of a gay son and I’ve taken enough from you good people. I’m tired of your foolish rhetoric about the “homosexual agenda” and your allegations that accepting homosexuality is the same thing as advocating sex with children. You are cruel and ignorant. You have been robbing me of the joys of motherhood ever since my children were tiny. My firstborn son started suffering at the hands of the moral little thugs from your moral, upright families from the time he was in the first grade. He was physically and verbally abused from first grade straight through high school because he was perceived to be gay. He never professed to be gay or had any association with anything gay, but he had the misfortune not to walk or have gestures like the other boys. He was called “fag” incessantly, starting when he was 6. In high school, while your children were doing what kids that age should be doing, mine labored over a suicide note, drafting and redrafting it to be sure his family knew how much he loved them. My sobbing 17-year-old tore the heart out of me as he choked out that he just couldn’t bear to continue living any longer, that he didn’t want to be gay and that he couldn’t face a life without dignity. You have the audacity to talk about protecting families and children from the homosexual menace, while you yourselves tear apart families and drive children to despair. I don’t know why my son is gay, but I do know that God didn’t put him, and millions like him, on this Earth to give you someone to abuse. God gave you brains so that you could think, and it’s about time you started doing that. At the core of all your misguided beliefs is the belief that this could never happen to you, that there is some kind of subculture out there that people have chosen to join. The fact is that if it can happen to my family, it can happen to yours, and you won’t get to choose. Whether it is genetic or whether something occurs during a critical time of fetal development, I don’t know. I can only tell you with an absolute certainty that it is inborn. If you want to tout your own morality, you’d best come up with something more substantive than your heterosexuality. You did nothing to earn it; it was given to you. If you disagree, I would be interested in hearing your story, because my own heterosexuality was a blessing I received with no effort whatsoever on my part. It is so woven into the very soul of me that nothing could ever change it. For those of you who reduce sexual orientation to a simple choice, a character issue, a bad habit or something that can be changed by a 10-step program, I’m puzzled. Are you saying that your own sexual orientation is nothing more than something you have chosen, that you could change it at will? If that’s not the case, then why would you suggest that someone else can? A popular theme in your letters is that Vermont has been infiltrated by outsiders. Both sides of my family have lived in Vermont for generations. I am heart and soul a Vermonter, so I’ll thank you to stop saying that you are speaking for “true Vermonters.” You invoke the memory of the brave people who have fought on the battlefield for this great country, saying that they didn’t give their lives so that the “homosexual agenda” could tear down the principles they died defending. My 83-year-old father fought in some of the most horrific battles of World War II, was wounded and awarded the Purple Heart. He shakes his head in sadness at the life his grandson has had to live. He says he fought alongside homosexuals in those battles, that they did their part and bothered no one. One of his best friends in the service was gay, and he never knew it until the end, and when he did find out, it mattered not at all. That wasn’t the measure of the man. You religious folk just can’t bear the thought that as my son emerges from the hell that was his childhood he might like to find a lifelong companion and have a measure of happiness. It offends your sensibilities that he should request the right to visit that companion in the hospital, to make medical decisions for him or to benefit from tax laws governing inheritance. How dare he? you say. These outrageous requests would threaten the very existence of your family, would undermine the sanctity of marriage. You use religion to abdicate your responsibility to be thinking human beings. There are vast numbers of religious people who find your attitudes repugnant. God is not for the privileged majority, and God knows my son has committed no sin. The deep-thinking author of a letter to the April 12 Valley News who lectures about homosexual sin and tells us about “those of us who have been blessed with the benefits of a religious upbringing” asks: “What ever happened to the idea of striving . . . to be better human beings than we are?” Indeed, sir, what ever happened to that? The Dangers of Life in a Male-Dominated System » About Susan Cottrell Susan Cottrell is a national speaker, teacher, and counselor with years of Biblical study and discipleship experience. Her books include: "Mom, I'm Gay" - Loving Your LGBTQ Child Without Sacrificing Your Faith, and True Colors - Celebrating the Truth and Beauty of the Real You. Through her nonprofit organization - FreedHearts.org - Susan champions the LGBTQ community and families with her characteristic tender-heartedness, and she zealously challenges Christians who reject them with her wise insistence that "loving God and loving others" are the foundation of the rest of the scripture, just as Jesus said. She is the Vice President of PFLAG Austin, and her books have been endorsed by The Human Rights Campaign, PFLAG, The Gay Christian Network and others. She and her husband have been married nearly 30 years and have five children - two of whom are in the LGBTQ community. She lives in Austin, Tex For information on Susan’s book for parents: “Mom, I’m Gay” – Loving Your LGBTQ Child Without Sacrificing Your Faith, just CLICK HERE. For information on Susan’s book for LGBTQ: True Colors – Celebrating the Truth and Beauty of the Real You, helping LGBTQ heal from parent, family, religious and community wounds, just CLICK HERE.

I think Bravus posted a video dealing with an initiative for all SDA institutions to uses the official SDA logo on signs and in publications as a branding strategy. It seems to have worked for McDonald's and Starbucks.

I'd like to know what ADRA or any other Adventist Community Service agency is doing for the Navajo people whose water supply is much worse than that of Flint, Michigan, due to the mining industry pollution. http://thefreethoughtproject.com/navajo-water-supply-horrific-flint-cares-native-american/

FEMSTER yes maybe you need to go to doctor again just to see what he says dgrimm60

Yes, this is the son i have had troubles waking before. i think its time he went back to the doctors. although he does say he gets sleepy when reading the bible- maybe thats the cure for this stuff!!!

FEMESTER HAVE you have trouble trying to wake him before????? dgrimm60

Back when I was a student in academy I once had to quickly come up with a short devotional to offer during our next concert at the church we were traveling to by bus. As soon as the director asked me I was easily in panic mode blankly staring out the window hoping and desperately praying for some kind of divine inspiration in the short time before we would arrive at the church. As I looked up at the sold rock face of the cut for the highway that had been blasted through a hillside, I saw it. Spray painted on the rock in big letters was "Jesus Saves". And the thought quickly developed in my mind to focus on this God glorifying graffiti so fittingly painted on the solid rock. That saved the day for me!

What is the biblical response to religious violence? I would suggest at least two things. First, it is important for every follower of God to be aware of their own ignorance in spiritual matters. There are some things we can know about God, but there are also many things we don’t know for sure (Deut […] The post From Waco to ISIS: The Road Back to Sanity, Conclusion appeared first on Jon Paulien's Blog. View the full article