Peace activist William Sloane Coffin compared homophobia to the anti-Communist "Red Scare" of the 1950s in a speech to an overflow crowd in Carpenter Hall yesterday afternoon.
Coffin -- the former senior chaplain of Yale University -- also called the religious right's demonization of homosexuals hypocritical in his speech titled, "Homophobia: The Last Respectable Prejudice." Coffin is on campus as a Montgomery fellow.
Coffin said historically the Church has given support to other oppressed minorities -- but this has not been the case with homosexuals.
Some Christians cite sections of Old Testament law that seem to prohibit homosexuality, while selectively ignoring the passages that prohibit eating certain types of foods, Coffin said. He drew laughter from the audience with his description of hypocritical Christians "eating non-kosher foods and watching Monday Night Football."
Football used to be played with a ball made from pigskin, which is prohibited in the Old Testament.
The real sins of Sodom and Gomorrah were the disparity between social classes, violence and fraud, and, chiefly, gluttony and self-indulgence, which Fundamentalists have misconstrued as homosexual behavior, Coffin said.
He referred to passages in the biblical book of Leviticus and highlighted the lack of specific references to homosexuality and the apparent disapproval of non-loving relationships -- heterosexual or otherwise -- found within.
Coffin said Fundamentalists use the Bible literally only when it suits their causes, but not for all things -- which he said he sees as the main flaw in their arguments.
"If you take the Bible seriously, you cannot take it literally," Coffin said.
Coffin said he viewed the Bible as a source of love, but it is often misused by Fundamentalists as justification for hatred.
"Everything Biblical is not Christ-like," he said.
Coffin drew words from writer Ann Hutchison, who was herself persecuted for her "radical" religious beliefs.
"It is better to be cast out of the Church than to cast away Jesus Christ," he quoted.
Coffin said diversity is "the hardest thing for society to live with and the hardest thing to live without."
The hate within racism, sexism and homophobia stem from common roots -- intolerance, Coffin said. All of these have no "middle ground" -- you are either for or against it, he said.
He said the challenge of the world is to establish community while maintaining individual differentiation.
Coffin responded to audience questions and speculated that the next rift, which will divide his grandchildren's generation, will be one between loving "monogamous" relationships -- straight and gay -- versus more "promiscuous" gay and straight relationships.
