Rebel preacher man Jay Bakker simply can't convince Joel Osteen to love the gays.
The men met last week to discuss mega-church leader Osteen's offending silence on gay rights, a cause close to Bakker's heart. Bakker, whose mother was gay icon Tammy Faye Mesner, traveled to Osteen's church in Texas last week to raise the clownish pastor's awareness of the universal gay plight.
In a surprising move, Osteen agreed to seat Bakker and activists during his Sunday sermon, but won't budge on his anti-gay take:
In the end, Bakker said, Osteen was most gracious, had chairs reserved for the LGBT community Sunday morning and made time to meet after the 11 a.m. service.During their chat, the two men agreed to disagree.
"I don't think homosexuality is a sin, and they do," Bakker said, "but it was very nice of Joel to introduce me to his family. I met Joel's wife and mother, and they were just great. … I'm really grateful."
And, in the end, Bakker still has the support of the gays, which we think is far more important than - well, just about anything in the universe.
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Just my atheist/agnostic $0.02, my mom watches Joel Osteen occasionally and from what I've seen he's at least not openly anti-gay nor have I ever heard him say anything bad about gays. He seems to preach more about togetherness and being a good neighbor, and never anything negative. I'll take him over the douchebags at 700 Club any day of the week.
I don't get the appeal of these Mega Churches at all. What's the point of them. I thought a church was supposed to be your local community members. Does Joel even have a high school diploma?
Why would LGBT's and their family give them importance by sitting in their mega churches. Seems silly to me. Mel White and other Soulforce members sat in Falwell's church every Sunday for years, and didn't convince anyone to accept them, seen as cocksuckers for christ.