Reply #1: I am glad you are speaking up.

[murielm99]

Some other LGBT people here are doing the same.

Some of the straight people here have been accused of homophobia. Either that is true of them, or they are horribly insensitive. On the Internet, it is not always easy to tell. Tone of voice and nuance are lost. And some people think their anonymity will protect anything they say. They would never say some of those outrageous things face to face.

If I am insensitive, tell me. My heart hurts when I see some of the things that have been said here.

Southern Baptists weren't always so bad. I think of Jimmy Carter. He knows gay people are are God's people, just like anyone else.

My first boss out of college was a Southern Baptist. She was very devout, and a liberal Democrat. Her husband had been a pastor in all sorts of places, and at that time, taught in a Baptist seminary. They were very accepting of gays, even in the 1970's. She was vocal about it, because her daughter lived in an apartment complex that seemed to have a lot of gay men. A group of them came to that girl's wedding.

I seem to remember that some of the people around my former boss had worked in the early civil rights movement, too.

She and her husband were easygoing and accepting of all sorts of people. I wish I could figure out what happened to that church. They don't have that type of leadership today.