Church Relations

June is LBGTQ+ Pride Month. With any luck, this year’s celebration will be much more festive than last year’s (pandemic, remember?).

A search of the Bible for the word “pride” generally yields negative results. Pride is not a value usually extolled among God’s people. Humility yes, pride no.

But Jesus had this memorable exchange with the teachers of the law about which commandment was most important: “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this… ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:29-31).

To love others as ourselves means that we must first appreciate the fact that we are all created in God’s image, that God loves us with an everlasting love, and that we embrace those two realities by first loving ourselves then loving others.

Some of us have known rejection and been misunderstood and marginalized. That’s part of our history that we can’t undo. But the Bible—and Pride Month—reminds us that not only do we contribute value to our communities, but we have this promise: “[Nothing] will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39).

Happy Pride!

Stephen Chavez, Director of Church Relations