Love the Sinner...

I probably should not be writing this blog, but it has been bugging me for a little while now. I really do not know where to start this blog, so it may ramble a bit, but I hope it does not because I think there is an important message here for Christians and non-Christians alike. I pray that this comes across in the right spirit and that all who read it, read it with an open mind and an open heart. If you choose not to, then there is nothing I can do, if it does not read in the right spirit, then my writing skills are to blame.

Recently, it seems like the supporters of gay marriage are in an uproar over a statement by the COO of Chik-fil-a that the company does not support gay marriage. Here's what I think is a fairly unbiased article about the statements including two of the specific comments made.

http://www.businessinsider.com/chick-fil-a-admits-its-against-gay-marriage-2012-7

What's this got to do with the title of this blog? Everything in my opinion especially as I listen to people I know declare that Chik-fil-a hates gays. As they declare boycotts against the restaurant and as mayors and others declare their allegiance to economically harm Chik-fil-a for the COO choosing to make the statements he made as well as for Chik-fil-a funnelling money into groups that actively seek to stop gay marriage from being legalized throughout this country, some of which are even being called hate groups - here's a link to an article by the Huffington Post that cites some of the foundations that Chik-fil-a supports via their charitable donations:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/02/chick-fil-a-anti-gay-group-donations-_n_1644609.html

As a disclaimer, I am not sure I would consider Huffington Post a non-biased source, but the links to the groups are there, so you can always go read about them and decide what they are doing that makes them hate groups. They may be hate groups; I did not go read all of their web-sites yet.

That should put us on the right foot for the rest of this blog, which while using Chik-fil-a as an example, but about Christian beliefs and the truth of those beliefs as the Bible defines them. I am sorry if you want to say the Bible is just a book and therefore a justification to hide behind for hate (your view by the way, not mine), but as a Christian, I can tell you that if I fail to believe the Bible is absolute truth from God, then I am not being a very good Christian, and in all probability I am not really a Christian at all, but someone who is doing exactly what you would accuse me of and hiding behind the Bible only when it suits my purposes.

So, I have given you Chik-fil-a above, but to really dive into this, I have to give you someone else, the Westboro Baptist Church. This is a hate group that claims Christianity as their basis; I do not have to look any further than the name of their web-site to prove that to myself nor should any other true Christian:

http://www.godhatesfags.com/

And their web-site continues with much more than just that; I never had to read it to know the hatred that is there though. I can completely justify that statement with Bible. I will start with the simple fact that God does not hate anyone, not a single person, living or passed on. Anyone can argue with a statement though, here is the relevant scripture which a Christian should accept as truth (and I am sorry, these will be long because I want them in context, so I include them with surrounding text as well):

"For when we were still without strength in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only by that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation." - Romans 5:6-11 NKJV.

AND

"Jesus answered and said to him, 'Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things? Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive Our witness. If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is the Son of Man who is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he Who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen that they have been done in God.' " - John 3:10-21 NKJV.

Okay, that sets everything in the right tone for me. Now, one of the verses that the Christian stance is based on; I would point out that both Chik-fil-a and Westboro Baptist Church are using this verse and others that basically say the same thing in both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible:

"Also you shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness as long as she is in her customary impurity. Moreover you shall not lie carnally with your neighbor's wife, to defile yourself with her. And you shall not let any of your descendants pass through the fire to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God: I am the Lord. You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination. Nor shall you mate with any animal, to defile yourself with it. Nor shally any woman stand before an animal to mate with it. It is perversion." - Leviticus 18:19-23 NKJV.

This statement tells every Christian that homosexuality is a sin. It should be no surprise to anyone when a company whose owner claims Christianity tells you that they do not support sin. The Bible both Old and New is full of passages telling man to abstain from sinful acts and mankind's sinful nature. Paul tells the Christians in the New Testament on several occasions to put away the flesh and its sinful desires. So, why Chik-fil-a making these statements is suddenly creating an outpouring of rage towards them is unknown to me - the company has never been open on Sunday because it believes in the Christian values of the Bible, which includes a day of rest. You can argue that it should be on Saturday (the original Hebrew Sabbath and still the Jewish Sabbath as far as I know) or some other day, but the fact is that God commanded that we should set aside one day a week for rest. Originally, it was the last day of the week, which would have been Saturday and Christians shifted it to Sunday, which is the traditionally believed day on which Christ rose from the dead. In the end, that is just all hype to move away from the actual fact that Chik-fil-a is owned by a Christian family that has never made any bones about that fact. They have even made statements that this is why they are not open on Sundays - for their employees, this has translated into a day off always every week on Sunday whether they were Christians or not, which I always thought was a good thing, but no one ever protested them over this.

Now, I am going to tell you that I am a Christian just in case you did not already know that. I am also going to tell you that I have sinned and I will sin in the future. I am no better or worse than any person who professes homosexuality - not because they are not sinners, but because being a homosexual in and of itself does not make anyone a sinner. We are all sinners, and we have been since the fall of Adam and Eve - if you are a Christian, you know this. The Bible tells us this, and it even states there is only one that is good and that is God, so why any group would think they have the right to say that God hates gays, lesbians, transgenders, etcetra is beyond me. God does not hate sinners, God loves us all. God does hate sin. He wants to see us live without it, but He came to earth as Jesus, the Messiah (the Christ) or any of dozens of other titles that belong to Him to save us from our sin. Nothing else does that. If you choose not to believe that, you have that right because He also gave us all the choice, and we have always had that choice.

Further, I have heard many people say that homosexuality is a greater sin because God called it an abomination. Really? Have you read the rest of your Bible? Proverbs 20:23 states, "Diverse weights are an abomination to the Lord, and dishonest scales are not good." So, a man who deals unethically when weighing out goods for sale is obviously just as wrong as any homosexual according to the Bible. This is a fact, sin is sin to God. No sin is greater than any other when you stand before God for judgement. You will either stand before God and say that you are saved by the Blood of Christ (there is more to it than standing there and saying it as any Christian knows) or you will be told by God that He does not know you and be cast into the Lake of Fire with the enemy of all mankind on the day of judgement. This is not me trying to convert anyone, so that is probably all I am going to say about that today; that is something I would do only face to face in order to truly share my heart and why I am a Christian with you.

On to the issue of hate because Chik-fil-a says they support the traditional concept of marriage between a man and a woman and not between gay men/women. If you read the statements earlier, I would like to know where you see that they have singled out gays specifically in their stance.  The first quote from the COO, states that they believe in the traditional concept of marriage as defined by the Bible, not just that they are against gay marriage - they also think divorce is wrong (I am divorced and remarried, so they are not in favor of the laws that allowed me to do what I did), they believe cheating on your spouse is wrong (something I think even people in a gay marriage would agree with), the list could go on for a while. The point is they support the Biblical concept of marriage as God defined it - and do not get confused by the lack of contextual reference showing that God support multiple wives, etc. God says one thing about marriage ever in the Bible as far as I know other than when He talks about divorce to Moses or when He talks about divorce when questioned about it as Christ and that is this, "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh." - Genesis 2:24 NKJV. This is expanded by Christ, "Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate." - Mark 10:9 NKJV, which is the prohibition against divorce. I know many Christians who have been divorced, and not always for the singular reason that has ever been given for it to be okay in the Bible which is sexual infidelity. Chik-fil-a is no more saying they hate gay people than they are saying they hate divorcees; they are standing to their conviction that they will not support gay marriage monetarily or morally. This does not make them perfect nor does it make them a hate group, and, in reality, it does not mean they hate gay people. If they are true Christians, as the evidence would indicate so far, they do not hate anyone, they are simply standing up for their Christian beliefs - something more Christians probably need to be doing instead of allowing the Word of God to be watered down to cater to the whims of man, which is actually moving us in the direction of false prophets and the end of days as spoken of in Revelation (if you do not believe me, you have never read the last book of the Bible).

Now, if you want to see what a hate group that claims Christianity, but all indicators point to the opposite, go back and read Westboro Baptist Church's web-site title again or go further and read some of the articles on that web page. The name of their web-site alone in the way I read it is blasphemy, since God hates no one - the Bible tells us that, I gave you the passage earlier where it stated that God loved us all even while we were/are sinners. God cannot abide sin, the Bible tells us this over and over again, but on many occasions did Christ (God manifest in flesh) show his love towards sinners - the four gospels are full of these examples. The Bible also tells us we should not blaspheme the name of the Lord or take His name in vain - if attributing something to God that is clearly the opposite of all that the Bible says about Him is not doing that, then I do not know what is.

So, in closing, I will state this. I am a sinner, I have gay friends who are sinners - not because they are gay, but because they are human like me. God loves us all. God wants us all to repent and be saved and enter into His glory. If you want to do that, then seek out someone you know to be a true believe in Christ, they will be happy to share with you the way to do it. If you are happy with your life and your lifestyle, whatever your lifestyle may be, then stay there; on the day each of us dies, we will all know the truth. I have no doubt in my heart what that truth is, and I have no doubt that my atheist friends have no doubt in their hearts either even though we disagree. None of us hate the other as far as I know, and I think everyone who knows me knows that I have no hate for gays or anyone else as a group.

I think that those who are lashing out at Chik-fil-a because of their Christian beliefs are treading a thin line between standing up for something and hating a group of people for what they are. If you support gay marriage, then support their advocacy groups, do not hate a Christian because s/he does not support your belief and supports advocacy groups that support traditional marriage in opposition to gay marriage - Christians are called to oppose what the Bible defines as sin, including that in their own lives. I struggle with this every day as do many other Christians that I know, when we are asked our opinion about something though, we should state our beliefs whether they agree with popular opinion or not, anything else would be to lie. I would hope that even supporters of gay marriage could understand that and support other people's rights to their beliefs.

If you choose not to buy Chik-fil-a anymore because they support traditional marriage above gay marriage, you have the right to do so. You also have the right to use the language of hate that I have seen used in reference to Chik-fil-a since this "news" was announced, just remember that you may be guilty of exactly what you accuse Chik-fil-a.

In closing, I will say this, almost 400 years ago, the first Pilgrims and Puritans came to America seeking freedom from persecution because their Christian beliefs were too much for Europe. Their desire for freedom to practice their Christian beliefs is what led to our own American belief in freedom of religion and the separation of state and church (organized religion - or religious organizations). History may repeat itself today except instead of organized religions supported by the state persecuting the Puritans, it will be organized anti-religion supported by the state persecuting all Christians who speak out. That day will come, but I had hoped it was not going to start today, and I would hope it would not start over a single Christian based company exercising their right to do what they want with their monies.

Thanks for reading this, and I do apologize to anyone this may have offended, that was not my intention. My intention was to point out that if you read the statements by Chik-fil-a's COO nothing about it says hate - he even adds that he would pray for God's mercy on those he believes are on the wrong path - that does not sound like hate to me, that sounds more like love. Again I would point to the other group who is thankful for dead American soldiers and calls them damned with no knowledge of whether they are Christians or not as what hate sounds like.

I should also say that I do moderate comments to my blog. I will allow opposing viewpoints to be posted and I will not respond to any of them or to supporting comments for that matter. I have said what I had to say, and I have nothing more to add. I will not allow anything with words of hate or hatefulness to be posted though. I would actually appreciate people being civil if they choose to comment no matter what side of any of this they fall on; I know this is the internet though, and that is asking a lot. Also, while not hateful in and of itself, calls to boycott or patronize Chik-fil-a will also be disallowed.

The Culling (New 52 Crossover in the Young Justice titles)

The Culling is a crossover event in what DC refers to as its Young Justice titles. Yes, again, this review is a bit behind schedule. I am still catching up, and I have about a month's worth of comics to go. Note that there are spoilers in this review because it is so late.

The Young Justice titles include the following titles: Superboy, Legion Lost, and Teen Titans. I am not sure why Blue Beetle does not fall into the category as well, maybe he does and they just chose not to use him for this crossover. The cross over is preluded in Superboy 8, Legion Lost 8, and Teen Titans 8. The main story takes place in sequential order in Teen Titans Annual 1, Superboy 9, Legion Lost 9, and Teen Titans 9. There is an epilogue in the new title, Ravagers (1).

This event has been building in Teen Titans and Superboy since the beginning of the New 52. An "evil" organization known as N.O.W.H.E.R.E. has been kidnapping teenaged meta-humans (superheroes in the DCU) for some unknown reason. Superboy is an experiment from one of N.O.W.H.E.R.E.'s labs as a part of this scheme. The story finally culminates in the three prologue comics when the Teen Titans, Superboy, and our lost Legionnaires from Legion Lost are captured by N.O.W.H.E.R.E.

During the course of the story we get a full introduction to the man (monster) behind N.O.W.H.E.R.E., Harvest. He claims that his motives are altruistic in nature. That he is trying to prepare this generation of meta-humans to stop a great threat that is coming in the future. His story might be believable by the heroes if he weren't experimenting on some of the youth, and forcing all of them to live in an underground ghetto of his creation where they are forced to fight for survival against one another until he decides to have a culling (the point of this whole story).

The Culling is a point in time where Harvest has one of his loyal Ravagers (those meta-humans who have survived past cullings and thus been recruited by Harvest to help him in his plan) incite all of the other meta-humans into a state of aggression where all they wish to do is fight. Harvest then dumps all of the meta-humans into an arena dubbed the Crucible for a battle to the death. Those who survive are offered positions as one of Harvest's Ravagers. Why not just train them and prepare the youth for the coming threat instead of this way is the question by the reader and the heroes involved.

A new team of Ravagers is born from the end of the Cullling, but they are not loyal to Harvest. They are actually escapees from the complex. They are led by the scientist Caitlin Fairchild from Superboy for now, and her goal for them is to teach them how to survive with their powers and as heroic individuals or at least not as villains.

Together with this new team, we also get "new" characters from DC's old universe and the Wildstorm universe introduced to the new DC universe. Warblade from WildCATs is here. Grunge from Gen13 is here. Beast Boy, Terra, Thunder, and Lightning from DC are all here as well. They all have interesting new looks and in Grunge's case even had a temporary upgrade to his powers, which I am sure will get reinstituted if he returns after this crossover.

The whole crossover is well done for the first major event. The lead ups brought the reader to where he needed to be for the event and even the prologues properly set the final stage for the Culling. There are still plot threads that have ran out of the crossover for all of the individual series, while still leaving the major threat of Harvest and/or his upcoming threat intact. The story as a crossover even added to the events for each of the individual titles. Superboy grows more towards his heroic destiny. The Teen Titans finally start bonding together as a true team. And Legion Lost learns that there is more to what's going on for them here and in the future then they all knew, which will no doubt have many repercussions for them in the future.

If you did not pick up the serial comics, I recommend the trade paperback when it is released (as I am sure it will be eventually) or even going out and picking up the crossover issues and reading the event straight through as I did. Even if you have not been reading the three separate series, the event from the prologue to the epilogue can be enjoyed on its own.

Thanks again for reading.

Scarlet Spider 5, Grifter 9, and Deathstroke 9

Okay, it's been a while. Sorry, life happens. I moved back home to Louisiana in December 2011 and it's been one thing after another since I've gotten here trying to get resettled. Because of that I'm way behind on reading my weekly supply of comics, but I read three today that I really wanted to share my opinions about; they're from May 9, so spoilers will be present, but it should not matter to most of you. One is a Marvel title and the other two are from DC (part of the almost one year old New 52).

The Marvel title is Scarlet Spider, written by Chris Yost with pencils by Neil Edwards, inks by Karl Kesel, and colors by Edgar Delgado. This book is still in its infancy, and I am loving it so far. The premise of the series stems from the Spiderman clone saga of years gone by. From that story ultimately came a failed clone of Peter Parker who somehow survived the degenerative effects that all the other clones had. This clone took the name Kaine, and, for a time, he hated Spidey and wanted to kill him. Something happened in recent Amazing Spiderman stories though and things have somewhat changed I guess (I stopped reading Spidey about a year and a half ago - the stories just weren't the same to me with the changes from the One More Day storyline). Anyway, Kaine was leaving New York and running from his past to Mexico when an unexpected stop in Houston went all the wrong way for Kaine. Now, he's a superhero (though you should not tell him that; he does not like the idea much) with the press dubbed moniker of Scarlet Spider.
This Spider is billed as having all of the power and none of the responsibility and Yost writes the serial in a way that brings that out regularly. Kaine is a man with a bloody past. In this most recent issue (#5), he's trying to help a friend(? I am not sure Kaine has friends yet) on the Houston Police Department stop a dirty bomb from going off. His methods do not include asking nicely; instead he prefers torturing the perps and threatening to kill their whole families to get answers to where the bomb is. In the last issue of this series (#4), we actually learned of a prior problem Kaine ran into with the Assassin's Guild of New Orleans (ran by the X-Man Gambit's ex-wife, Belladonna) which led him to make a deal to do one job for the Assassin's Guild if they would leave him alone from this point on - I'm looking forward to when that tale gets told. Kaine is definitely doing good as you can see if you read the series, but Yost does not let you forget that Kaine used to be a deadly killer and that past is still there as well as at least a hint of his former hatred for Spidey.
The penciles by Neil Edwards in this issue bring out the franticness of the situation as much as anything without detracting. His pencils capture the essence of the story being told and although I have not seen a lot of his work yet, I like it already. When the shadows are added by Kesel with the inks and the colors applied to make the images complete by Delgado, the images stand out to relay the story that Yost wants told. This is a fun book for anyone who remembers the anti-heroes of the nineties and wants to see a new one in action. I recommend it highly even if you have never been a Spiderman fan.

Grifter has been a part of the New 52 since DC's relaunch of the DC Universe. I've been a fan of Grifter since the Image days with the original limited series of WildC.A.T.s - I still have that series somewhere in my collection. Anyway, this issue (#9) changes the team on the book and we get a writer that I am not a fan of by any stretch of the imagination (in fact, I am kind of disheartened by the fact that Jim Lee and Geoff Johns are putting this guy on any titles, but I guess it is just business at the end of the day and the guy has a few fans somewhere, although I have never met them). Grifter is now being written by Rob Liefeld. Pencils are by Scott Clark with inks by Dave Beaty and colors by Andrew Dalhouse. While the story is by Liefeld, the dialogue is being done by Frank Tieri, which may change the way I feel about this whole thing, since I did actually like this issue of Grifter still.
In this issue, Grifter is on the one from the Daemonites still (the aliens who are possessing humans here on Earth as a precursor to invasion - you can see them lurking about in a few other New 52 titles as well - Voodoo, The Authority, and recently Superman. Grifter is joined during the new issue by a new character, Nico, who seems to swing a sword pretty well in order to help Grifter get rid of a few of his Daemonite friends - I thought we might be seeing the new version of Zealot at first, but no luck in this series. At the end of the issue though, we do get another Wildstorm character introduced into the new DCU as Deathblow shows up as a member of the resistance against the Daemonites that Grifter has just been recruited into. That puts us 2/7 of the way to Team 7 being present in the New DCU.
The story itself is not badly written. I think Liefeld did a good job of framing the story and moving it in a way that maintains the groundwork that had already been laid in this series. If this is what he's capable of, I might be able to continue with this series. This was mostly a fight issue though with brief introductions - no real character building though, so I am still not sure that Liefeld is a good choice on any book as a writer. Given that Hawk and Dove was probably the worst of the New 52 series, we will see how this plays out before I change many of my opinions on Liefeld. Tieri's dialogue seemed to be spot on for how the one existing character appearing in this issue, Grifter, should behave and the few lines we get from Deathblow at the end definitely show it to be the same Deathblow attitude and character from the Image/Wildstorm days. Clark's pencils seem to be hit or miss to me - there are panels where the detail and lines are great, while there are others where it seems like he has gotten lazy and just gone for a broad brush. Maybe this is intentional, but I did not appreciate it. The inking is fabulously done and does a wonderful job of bringing out the darker edginess of this title with the colors being toned down just enough to show that this is not a book about the lighter side of the DCU.
I will probably follow for a bit and see how the Liefeld work goes. I like Grifter and Deathblow, but I do not see Liefeld writing these characters in a way that keeps me coming back for any long term period of time.

Deathstroke is the final title of this trio. I was already losing interest in the title before this issue, and the change in writer and penciller to Rob Liefeld has all but killed my interest. Deathstroke was a title I really enjoyed back in the nineties, but the stories so far have been fairly lackluster and would have worked just as well as backstories in a Titans book (although I guess there is no Titans book where Deathstroke really belongs right now). I am sure fans of Deathstroke have liked this stories; for me it has pretty much been one mercenary assassination after another and Deathstroke seeking to prove he is the best there is in the mercenary world of the new DCU - even the fight with his son that finished out the issue before last (#7) was anti-climactic when coupled with the issue before this one (#8).
The arc starting in this issue (#9) has some promise only because Deathstroke has been hired to hunt down the last Czarnian (and we all know Lobo is the main man and not to be trifled with by anyone short of Superman). This story may be well suited to Liefeld's storytelling and art styles in that this stands out as the type of arc that will be mostly fight scene after fight scene with very little character development taking place - something I have always found lacking in past Liefeld works. This is Lobo's introduction to the new DCU, and I am interested to see how that develops. Also, on the Image/Wildstorm front for characters here, we do see Zealot finally introduced to the new DCU in this issue of Deathstroke. Her look is the same, her attitude seems familiar although not exact so far, and I would like to see how they will develop her from here.
The artwork in the book is typical Liefeld. His style has not really changed since the ninteties, which makes it well suited for this story - big guns, big fights, big muscles on his men. I did not like the way he drew Zealot at all - it was almost like he did not want to draw her and someone made him include her. Also, as always with Liefeld, the shoulder pads have been added to Deathstroke, and they just make no sense. The inking by Adelso Corona and Jacob Bear was fine as were the colors by Travis Lanham, but I still had a hard time getting past Liefeld's style (as I said, I am not a fan). I really do not recommend the book past this point unless you are a huge fan of Lobo, Deathstroke, or Liefeld. If you are a fan of Zealot, I would still not recommend the book for you as I do not think this is going to be the Zealot you want to read.

Well, thanks for reading again, especially if you're still sticking with me or looking for these after my hiatus. Hopefully, I will get the next 5 weeks of comics read soon and start posting regularly again as well as talking about more up to date issues...