To Stay Home Election Day?

I recently read an article about several Black pastors who have been advising their parishioners not to vote in this year’s election.

My friends, these men and women who call themselves pastors, are not only being treasonous to our country, but they are betraying the legacy of those who risked life and limb for the right to cast a single vote AND they are demonstrating what the Bible describes as false teachers.

Although I'm staunchly behind the idea of the separation of church and state, the Black Church has a unique place in American society when it comes to social justice. Nonetheless, leadership in some congregations seems to be offended by the issue of marriage equality for people within the LGBT community. When the president stated that he supported the right for gay people to marry, many of these people decided that they would not vote for him since he supported "sin." However, they failed to realize that in these Divided States of America, marriage is a civil right with legal and financial consequences. Therefore, whom people choose to love is their business and is an issue outside the realm of religion.

Yes, religion CAN be a factor, but religion does not necessarily HAVE TO BE a factor in order to have a legal marriage in the United States.

Therefore, these pastors are out of line on several fronts in telling their members to stay home and not vote.

First, it is simply none of their business that consenting adults of legal age, in a loving relationship, choose to marry. The U.S.A, (also known as the Divided States of America), is a democracy, not a theocracy. It is a land of laws based on the Constitution...not the Bible.

Second, it would be wonderful if some of these pastors really studied and appreciated the history of the civil rights movement in this country. If they did, they would come across the name of Bayard Rustin, an openly gay man who was an influential adviser to many civil rights leaders, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

It was Rustin, who played a key role in organizing the March On Washington where Dr. King gave his "I Have A Dream" speech.

Third, do these pastors take note of some of the men who sing in their choirs? I've seen and heard more gay men singing and leading the flock in more black churches than I can count.

Lastly, it's simply time that these pastors get off their high self-righteous horses, stop the hypocrisy and get over it. People died for the right to vote, and to tell parishioners NOT to vote is foolish, hypocritical and an affront to real issues affecting the black community and this nation. This is not meek and humble/ This is ARROGANT.  It would be hard for me to imagine Jesus Christ telling people not to exercise their rights to vote with the possibility to make a world a better place for the least of these.

Until next Monday…