There is a vast difference between a Political Right and a Civil Right. This is something that our History textbooks have been remiss in explaining, and something that many anti-LGBT groups exploit for their own gains. A day after trying to erase the legacy of slavery, brutality and segregation against Blacks in the United States by electing a Black president, the Southern Baptists decided it was time to piss on the rights of LGBT Americans…again.

The thousands of delegates at the denomination’s meeting in New Orleans voiced near unanimous support for a resolution stating that “marriage is ‘the exclusive union of one man and one woman’ and that ‘all sexual behavior outside of marriage is sinful.’” While they acknowledge that lesbians and gays can experience “unique struggles”, they declared that LGBT Americans lack the “distinguishing features of classes entitled to special protections. It is regrettable that homosexual rights activists and those who are promoting the recognition of ’same-sex marriage’ have misappropriated the rhetoric of the Civil Rights Movement.”

Ironically, this is language rather similar to the kind used by the Southern Baptists back between 1950 and 1970 to declare that Blacks had no special rights and that interracial marriage was an abomination in the eyes of God.

They also passed another resolution calling upon President Obama and the US Justice Department to stop trying to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act and ‘ensure that military personnel and chaplains can freely express their religious convictions about homosexuality.’

EdgeontheNet noted that:

The Rev. Dwight McKissic, pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church in Arlington, Texas, was one of the authors of the gay marriage resolution.

“It’s important to sound the alarm again, because the culture is changing,” he said in an interview after the vote.

McKissic, who is black, said it was “an unfair comparison” for gays to equate same-sex marriage with civil rights because there is not incontrovertible scientific evidence that homosexuality is an innate characteristic, like skin color.

“They’re equating their sin with my skin,” he said.

There are, of course, two problems with McKissic’s statement. The first is that there is a vast amount of evidence that homosexuality is innate and genetic. Recent studies and research have shown that homosexuality in men is almost exclusively genetic. The second is that he is demanding protections for what is, basically, a behavior- his religious beliefs.

The Edge also noted:

David W. Key Sr., director of Baptist Studies at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, said that as gays and lesbians become accepted in the larger American society, the Southern Baptist Convention is trying to separate itself from some of the more hateful rhetoric while still staying true to its beliefs.

The resolution includes a statement that the SBC stands against “any form or gay-bashing, whether disrespectful attitudes, hateful rhetoric, or hate-incited actions.”

When you reject that homosexuality is innate and unchangeable for the sake of trying to shore up your own religious beliefs, in the end, it doesn’t matter how many disclaimers you put in or condemnations of gay bashing or hate incitement, all you do is incite hatred and cause pain.