10/03/07

By TAMARA McKENZIE, Assistant News Editor

tamara@nasguard.com

While members of the Bahamas Christian Council (BCC) continued to intensify its stance against what they term to be the "gay agenda" yesterday, a spokesperson of the Rainbow Alliance group expressed the view that homosexuality in the Bahamas has been rampant for decades and is nothing new.

"It's only lately that groups like the Bahamas Christian Council are now openly expressing their hatred towards gays," said Erin Green in an interview with The Nassau Guardian yesterday, referring to the BCC as a group of "misguided" clergymen.

Less than a week ago, members of the Council formed a select committee to address the Rainbow Alliance's call for a gay-themed channel on the Cable Bahamas line up of channels. The Committee is headed by Pastor Lyall Bethel of the Grace Community Church and some of its members include Dr. Carrington Pinder, Elder Andy Knowles, Pastor Ray Evans and Pastor Alfred Stuart.

In recent weeks, BCC President Bishop John Humes intensified his position on gays in the Bahamas, charging that the lifestyle was an "abomination" to God. He also refused to mince words as he expressed, on more than one occasion, his displeasure with the Rainbow Alliance's recent request for a gay channel. Such a move, Humes said, would set the wrong tone for youth and the entire "Christian" nation. However, Cable Bahamas has not made a decision on whether or not to include the LOGO channel in its line up.

Pastor Bethel charged yesterday that as a "church-based community" more information about homosexuality is not needed, but the truth about the gay lifestyle must be revealed. He said while the Council affirms that homosexuals should be afforded the rights offered to all citizens of The Bahamas, it does not affirm the right of any group to redefine marriage or recast homosexual behavior as the norm.

"Leviticus 18:22 states quite clearly, 'you shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination.' We are a nation that intends to be guided by Judeo-Christian values and the Bible's guidance cannot be any clearer," said Bethel at yesterday's press conference held at the Church of God auditorium on Joe Farrington Road.

"We ought to stay away from all channels dedicated to falsely glamorizing the homosexual 'death style'. The world as we know it is facing a civil war of values from this one politically-protected super minority. To them, nothing is sacred, no other will is accepted or tolerated."

An outspoken Bethel said while Greene of the Rainbow Alliance has based her request for a gay channel on the fact that Cable Bahamas has 11 channels dedicated solely to pornography, she should join the Council in condemning their availability and call for their removal. He also maintained that it seems clear that the Rainbow Alliance was representing the wider homosexual movement outside of the Bahamas and was "imposing" their demands locally.

According to Bethel, the Rainbow Alliance has taken a page out of the homosexual manifesto 'The Overhauling of Straight America' by Marshall Kirk and Erastes Pil and are using the list of stated objectives in the book as their guide, which includes the following five points: Talking about gays and gayness as loudly and often as possible, portraying gays as victims and not aggressive challengers, giving gay protectors a just cause, making gays look good and making the victimizers look bad.

Bethel further claimed that the Rainbow Alliance has been attempting to keep their arguments as theoretical concepts or "abstract social questions" rather than a set of behaviors with consequences. "But the fact of the matter is that homosexuality is a deviant lifestyle and many of its participants are prone to injury and life-threatening disease," Bethel said.

Greene, however, told The Guardian yesterday that the Council's claims were not factual and they have "misquoted" facts about homosexuality and homosexual behavior to their own liking. "What they have said at their press conference is all a big joke and it seems as if they did not investigate anything," Green said, adding that she never read a copy of the homosexual manifesto that the Council referred to and has never heard about its authors.

"All of their claims are just foolish," she said. "I've also never purported to speak on behalf of all gays in the country," Greene said. "I would say what I have been saying before and it's that I hope the Council will focus on issues in this country that really need attention."