A Good News Story About Religious Freedom

it does exist!

Hey everyone, I’m taking a few days off to get my kids ready for the start of 4th and 7th grades (finally!) But I wanted to pop into your feeds to share a good news story about religious freedom.

As I wrote last week, most of the time this argument has been used in recent decades it’s in service of discrimination, but I was pleased to see this article in The Seattle Times about a local church challenging city ordinances to offer space to displaced homeless people. I still contend this kind of usage of “religious freedom” is more the exception than the rule, but let’s give credit where credit is due: some Christians do take Jesus’ instructions to care for the poor seriously.

For reference, Jesus mentions caring for the poor dozens of times, while he references “homosexuality” exactly 0 times—but many Christians, distracted from the gospel by a pointless culture war, would rather argue over children’s books about gay penguins and what bathrooms people are using.

I can’t personally vouch for the church in question, Oasis Church, but from perusing their website, I don’t get that they’re in the business of being intentionally provocative (*cough* Sean Feucht *cough*) I do see they’re affiliated with the Free Methodist Church—a church which split from mainline Methodism over their refusal to support abolitionism (yay!) but isn’t LGBT-affirming (boo!) Even given all that, I do think it’s important to call out good news when we see it.

May their good work inspire wider action in our region.

Have you seen any good news lately? Share it in the comments! Also, any tips for removing tweens from the sofa? HELP.

BONUS MATERIALS:

• did you know there’s a bunch of sites now that can tell you whether a church is queer affirming? Church Clarity is one of my favs

• Have you guys seen this trend about Minion Jesus? There are no words…