And They'll Know We Are Christians By Our Love

I like to think that I have a well-honed gaydar for a middle-aged soccer mom. It came from years of having primarily gay male friends, me being a fruit fly and all.

So when I first saw James Loney talk, I immediately thought, "He's a friend of Dorothy's! Wow, that could have jeopardized his safety and the amount of well wishes that came his way."

Sure enough, the local daily here ran a front page article confirming my suspicions about the Canadian who was held hostage in Iraq. The article went on about how the media didn't mention that Loney was gay and has a long-term partner. His family and friends feared that if his sexual orientation were made known to his captors, they would kill him for sure because homosexuality is punishable by death in Iraq.

Now I'm expecting letters to the editor about how people wasted their prayers on a sinner.

When the gay marriage legislation was brought up in Parliament, letters against it and homosexuality in general were printed every day for about two months around here. Of course, all I thought was how unchristian their attitudes were. Oh, they hid behind their bibles and all but, in this case, it will probably be so boldly redneck to say something disparaging now after local churches had prayer services for the guy who they were praising as a fine example of Christian humanity.