I've mentioned that teams from our parish take part in Sunday night dinners at the Sioux Falls Salvation Army facility - these cover a gap in local food programs and feed over 200 people per seating.
Over at Stand Firm, I caught news of an attack on the Salvation Army. The source article, from San Francisco, is here.
I can understand gay/lesbian activists not supporting the Salvation Army, since it is a Christian organization with Biblical standards that impact its staffing and benefits policies.
But to try and shut it down? While there is debate about the relative affluence of the homosexual community, it is clear that it has media favor and influential access to the political process. In some cases (such as many courts)it is clear that gays & lesbians are a specially favored group for public policy decisions.
The Salvation Army, on the other hand, ministers out on the edge to some of our most marginalized neighbors.
What we see in the article is a group with social standing and power trying to defund compassionate ministry to those with no social standing or power. Those on the left frequently plead for "social justice" - but in this case they seem to defend the relatively powerful against a politically weaker group.
Certainly, gays and lesbians have been the marginal group in many places for much of history. Which should, one would think, make them more rather than less sympathetic to the homeless, the mentally ill and the working poor. And my guess is that many gay and lesbian people are sympathetic and probably drop some cash in the Salvation Army buckets without a thought to ideological issues.
But the hateful frenzy of the activists is an extra reason to fill those buckets in the run-up to Christmas. "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Romans 12:21).
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