Gratitude: Accepting People for Who They Are

Today I am grateful for:

The growing acceptance in our culture of people for who they are. Polls are showing that approval of marriage contracts among non-traditional groups is more than 50 percent now, up dramatically in just a few years. Many are battling hard to avoid reversion to the discrimination of darker times in our history against women, people of color, gays.

I had a brisk discussion with a woman who termed herself a "Christian" very recently about what the Bible says about homosexuality. She was absolutely convinced that the book is filled condemnation of this "sin," but a little research reveals that the Bible has 31,173 verses and homosexuality is mentioned in but six (two in the same passage of Leviticus, which also finds it "an abomination" to cut your hair, plant more than one variety of grass, eat shellfish, play football--"touch the skin of a dead pig"). Jesus never mentioned it. He was more concerned with whom we should love than who to hate.

Consistently mentioned Biblically are themes I can adopt, though I am not a Christian:  "Clothe yourselves with compassion," "Love thy neighbor as thyself," "Judge not, lest ye be judged," "Take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye."

And there's this: "You strain out a gnat and swallow a camel." I like that we're slowly straining out the bigotry and embracing humanity.