It’s Your Favorite Son

Samaritan Purse rejecting LGBTQ volunteers is one instance in Franklin Graham’s extensive track record of homophobic discrimination.

Valentine Wiggin

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Homosexuality is still being compared to sexual harassment, drug addiction, and alcoholism. These comparisons were made by Franklin Graham, owner of the charity Samaritan’s Purse. Volunteers were required to sign a statement of faith that includes this statement:

9. We believe God’s plan for human sexuality is to be expressed only within the context of marriage, that God created man and woman as unique biological persons made to complete each other. God instituted monogamous marriage between male and female as the foundation of the family and the basic structure of human society. For this reason, we believe that marriage is exclusively the union of one genetic male and one genetic female.
Genesis 2:24; Matthew 19:5–6; Mark 10:6–9; Romans 1:26–27; 1 Corinthians 6:9.

Mayor Bill de Blasio has planned to monitor the charity for discrimination against the ill, but not for discrimination against volunteers. Since volunteers are not covered by anti-discrimination laws, and even if they were, they might not be covered due to religious exemption. Franklin Graham has a history of discrimination from supporting HB2, a bill that would ban transgender people from using their bathroom of choice, to praising Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, for creating anti-LGBTQ laws. This track record includes suggesting that same-sex couples adopting children was a way to “recruit” children into a “cause”.

Graham called the pandemic the result of a “fallen world” according to the concept of inherited original sin from Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. He believes that variations in sexual orientation and gender identity are also products of original sin and, by extension, that his homophobic statements are a form of “love speech” due to his efforts to save people from hell. However, when 89.2% of LGBTQ Mormons and ex-Mormons meet diagnostic criteria for PTSD because of the religion’s anti-LGBTQ teachings, one must ask themselves if love justifies doing unnecessary harm.

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Valentine Wiggin

Death-positive, sex-positive, and LGBTQ-affirming Christian. Gen Z. I hate onions. She/her