Oh, sweet fancy Moses.
Celebrity pastor Mark Driscoll (Mars Hill Church, Seattle WA) strikes again. I seriously wanna thunk that guy so bad.
Brace yourselves, pippa. Here we go:
“First, masturbation can be a form of homosexuality because it is a sexual act that does not involve a woman. If a man were to masturbate while engaged in other forms of sexual intimacy with his wife then he would not be doing so in a homosexual way. However, any man who does so without his wife in the room is bordering on homosexual activity.”
Hm. You know, I didn’t know homosexuality was defined by who is watching your various sexual activities. This is news to me. Then again, it’s fashionable these days to change the common understanding of words and terms to something newer and better, I guess, so maybe I’m just not up on the latest definition of homosexuality because I’m not as cool or hip as Driscoll and I don’t wear my t-shirts with a vest or my Converse with a suit.
I just wear ’em with jeans. I’m a goober.
So following Driscoll’s logic here, if two men are having sex but a woman is watching them, that means they’re both straight then, right?
Or if one of the men is married to the woman, then he’s straight, but the other dude is gay?
Or, wait, if both of them are married and both of their wives are watching – something all women love to do, of course — then both of the men are straight. Do I have that right?
If Driscoll’s comment is true, then every man since the dawn of time is gay and every woman who is with a man is with a gay man and no one is paying attention to the t-shirt.
Bummer.
He’s got the Venn diagram backwards.
And he’s missing nine-tenths of it.
What??? Those statements probably come from the same playbook that “concerned” people at my ultraconservative college used to get me not to listen to Enya or my self-hypnosis tape–because they were “occult.” (Funny how the tape disappeared when my things were moved into my new roommate’s dorm while I was at home. . .)
Stuff like this insults people’s intelligence, doesn’t it?
Enya is occult?
She sings folk tunes with a synthesizer.
Is it because they play her in “holistic wellness”-type stores?
(I think I may have masturbated while listening to Enya. Ooops!)
(I couldn’t help it– she’s really soothing to listen to…)
(I will shut up now. 😉 )
That was so wrong but so funny, Roo!
The only reason I know about this creepy Mickey Mouse T shirt “I see things” guy is because of you, Tracey (and thank you!), and I have lost hours of my life watching his sermons on Youtube. I’ve been following events at his church. He’s despicable, sure, but more than that: I think he is quite damaged, and he is in a position of power. That house of cards is gonna fall.
I’m crazy. Like I don’t have enough to do in my life without stalking a church in the Pacific Northwest, monitoring the ongoing situation.
I’m trying to figure out how to fit all of this information on a T-shirt.
With some judicious editing, I think I’ve got it: giant sweaty handprint – check. CHRISTIANS in red block print – check. the rest of the copy is where it gets dodgy. How about:
“don’t masturbate, because it’s lustful, which is the same as doing it, which you must not do, unless you’re married to a lady, and then you may do, because then that icky icky ESS-EEE-ECKS stuff becomes a holy sacrifice to God, so then it becomes OK, but you can’t do it alone, because then it’s GAAAAAAAAAAAAAY.”
And on the back: “PS – no I don’t have issues.
Downside: every single T-shirt will need to be at least XXL, which will really cut down on the youth market. Maybe if we use fewer A’s in GAAAAAAAAAAAY we can squeeze it on an XL.
We were walking in downtown Portland the other night and a guy in front of us had a t-shirt on that had three hand prints on the back of his shirt. I don’t know what the shirt said, I was just fixated on the hand prints. I could only think, that must be one busy guy.
Roo masturbated to Enya. Whoooops. Hahahahahahahaha.
You know, I think Driscoll’s thing here is a scare tactic on Christian men. If he can’t guilt Christian men about masturbation, he’ll scare them into thinking it makes them gay.
sheila — I’ve lost hours as well. HOURS.
Have you ever watched the Q & A sessions he does with his wife Grace after the sermons? She seems very pleasant and also very …. cowed. She comes out onstage to join him at the end and they sit together on a bench answering questions texted in during the sermon. He’s very “sweetie baby pookums” and solicitous of her, but something about it all just clangs for me.
I’m afraid I’m going to have to cave and purchase their book “Real Marriage” just to see it all for myself.
Tracey – yes, I have watched their joint interviews, as well as their interviews for their recent book tour. She has completely taken his point of view which is: that she was wrong/frigid/uptight and needed to change. That’s his whole deal. Men rule/master/colonize – men need sex- women need to submit – blah blah.
He is absolutely heinous and I see damage (ie: former abuse) written all over him. he’s got major skeletons, I’m sure of it. Not that there is any crime in that – it’s actually quite sad – but what I object to is how he is manipulating/hurting/cowing others, while putting up this front of “Hey, I’ve got it all figured out.”
No, Mark. No, you don’t.
I was going to say something about feeling the “Orinoco Flow,” but…
You know, I read this again, and got to thinking…
I feel like this is a topic that is not really the sort of thing that should be addressed in public, from the pulpit. When you’re up there preaching, whether you know it or not, you’ve got a darn lot of power and authority. Driscoll clearly knows that, which is probably why he says a lot of the things he says.
Now, Driscoll, in my limited experience with his, uh, “theology”, employs a fair amount of pretty strange logic, which is, I suppose, his prerogative. But this sort of topic has the potential to be heard by people who have a LOT of personal, pastoral issues at stake. What about the person (man or woman) sitting there fighting a porn addiction? Or the person who is struggling with same-sex attraction? Or the spouse of one of those people?
Guaranteed, now they just feel shamed and unloved. It’s not unlikely that they already felt that way before, and now he just went and made it worse. (Which, hey, is the opposite of what Jesus does, just sayin’.) They’re not going to be calling the pastor for help anytime soon.
As a pastor, it is most certainly NOT his prerogative to screw people up and fail to offer them grace and kindness and the love of Jesus.
Ugh.
Now I have to google more of him. I too loved the Mickey Mouse shirt and hoodie. Too bad he wasn’t in George Zimmerman’s neighborhood!!! (cracking myself up if no one else!!)