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Save Me

Chad Allen, Robert Gant, Judith Light, Stephen Lang

Question: How many Republican politicians can you fit in the closet?
Answer: Evidently, all of them.

            There is an old saying that has been attributed to Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain, or Goethe, but more than likely came from the home spun wisdom of Will Rogers, that goes, "God must love poor people... He sure made a lot of them."  To paraphrase the great cowboy humorist, “God must love homosexuals… He sure made a lot of them.”  Now, I don’t know if you pay attention to the news, but I have been paying attention to all the gay couples that have been getting married in California, those couples that the far right is getting all bent out of shape about.  Watching this unfold, I was extremely disappointed, because what I discovered was a lot of doughy, ugly, boring couples with stretch marks that resemble a highway map and more cellulite than an elephant orgy.  In other words, these people look like you and me. If this coupling is supposed to be the apex of evil, I expected a little more. I’m not asking for horns or sulfur burning behind them, but just a little more flair, maybe some feathered boas, some leather, and a wedding party that resembles the Village People on speed, something more than the Skipper and Gilligan. 

            All I could think watching these scenes unfold is, “God is supposed to be getting all worked up about this.” Now, I get bent out of shape if the puppy has an accident on the kitchen floor, but I expect a little more from the Almighty.  I picture the Holy of Holies sitting on His heavenly throne surrounded by divine, hi-def, big screen televisions, showing Him everything that is going on in the world.  On one of these TVs are scenes of the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis that have died needlessly.  Another shows a child going to bed hungry.  Still another shows a cancer patient leaving this world needlessly because they don’t have insurance and another with a husband beating the snot out of his wife.  Television after television shows modern Lazaruses mired in their poverty.  In the corner are the episodes that are so freaky and repulsive that even the Alpha and Omega  does not like to look in that direction.  As God is about to flip the channel to see what Favor Flav is up to, he notices a couple of these pasty Adam and Steves kissing.  Jumping up, He flies into a rage, yelling at the seraphim and cherubim to make ready the floods, earthquakes, and tornados.  Greed, materialism, abuse, rape, racism, treating the earth as a piece of toilet paper is one thing, but these two middle aged members of Wham showing their love and commitment towards each other is something else. 

            “But Trevor, the Bible clearly spells out that homosexuality is wrong.” The Bible also claims a lot of other things are sinful, like the capitalist system, wearing shirts made of two different materials, and pretty much everything the Bush administration has done, and Christians act like a mother who has just walked in on her teenage boy treating his body like an amusement park, like we don’t see a thing.  If you remove all the texts in that holy book that we ignore in order to enjoy the American dream, a person is left with something about the size of the pamphlet you get with your DVD player. Hate to tell you this, but a person cannot treat Scripture like a bowl of jelly beans from which you can pick and choose what rules you want to follow.  If you are going to eat the cherry flavored ones, you also have to throw back some of the white ones that are supposed to be coconut, but taste like someone’s backside. Until there is a rash of thunder bolts hitting Pottery Barns throughout this land, I think Our Lord and Savior has bigger things to be concerned about.   “But Trevor, God showed his displeasure with homosexuality by wiping out New Orleans.  You know, they were supposed to have a gay parade the Monday the hurricane hit.” No, no, no, the Big Easy went under because, in order to keep giving the rich their tax cuts, we skipped on things like levee maintenance. Under the same logic, Iowa went under this spring because they favored Mike Huckabee in the Republican primary.  “But Trevor, allowing gays to marry and be open and happy will cheapen my marriage.” Please, Rush Limbaugh, John McCain, Newt Gingrich, Ronald Reagan, and Bob Barr changed wives like they were a pair of pants. I think your marriage will survive Jack Be Nimble and Jack Be Quick being monogamous as they jump over the candlestick.  

            What I don’t understand, truly understand, is why this issue is tearing apart the church and America. Seriously.  If it is a sin, and I am not saying it is, it seems like a pretty minor one to me, up there with spitting on the sidewalk and wearing white after Labor Day. Having grown up with a gay friend, it was pretty clear he was gay from birth and, of all my friends, he was the one who could be found in the chorus at church every Sunday.  There is no recruiting to join that club, at least for males. Bad parenting? Cowards, like James Dobson, make that claim, but I have noticed he has never mentioned who is at fault, Dick Cheney or his wife, for their lesbian daughter, Alan Keyes or his wife for his daughter, or Randall Terry or his wife for his gay son. If you are going to make a claim like that you better be willing to hurl that rock at friends and foes alike and hope that a stone is not going to come flinging back at you at any moment.

            So what is the answer to homosexuality among fundamentalist Christianity?   Conversion therapy.  That is as long as a person does not pay attention to the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, or the American Counseling Association who all have expressed concerns about the safety, effectiveness and prejudice involved in such efforts, but what do they know. Also, one needs to overlook that a large majority of those who have been the public face of the success of such therapy have fallen backward into a pile of daddy parts. Success stories like Exodus International’s co-founder Michael Bussee, John Paulk a bigwig in Focus on the Family, Colin Cook, founder of Homosexuals Anonymous, and of course, a close personal friend of George W. Bush, Rev. Teddy “I'm steady with my wife” Haggard.

            Still, the only thing worse than a sermon from the right is when liberals get up in the pulpit to preach their own message, and they are not very good at it.  Save Me is one of those movies you might find playing on the WE channel at 2 a.m. Chad Allen, most famous for playing Matthew Cooper in the wholesome “Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman” and as the autistic Tommy Westfall in “St. Elsewhere,” also one of the first actors publicly outed, way back in 1996, has clearly made an advocacy movie.  His point, conversion therapy does not work.  Now, I personally cannot wait to spend a Hamilton or two in order to watch a movie of the week, but the material might better have been treated in a comedic light, along the lines of what “South Park” did when Butters went through conversion therapy or the black comedy, But I’m a Cheerleader.   Allen is Mark, a young, suicidal drug addict, who has agreed to go through the “cure” in a Christian ministry run by Gayle (Judith Light –Angela from “Who’s The Boss.” What would Tony say?) and Ted (Stephen Lang). Okay, we got all the ducks in a row – the gay young man, the do-gooder couple, and I want to hit the snack bar and we are not even 30 minutes into the film.  While hostile to his lifestyle, Gayle is a loving presence in his life, reading Scripture with him, but there is another handsome young man in the rehab, hit the harp music, fellow himbo, Scott (Robert Gant).  The problem with this film is it violates the only cardinal sin of movie making. It is boring.  I don’t care if two boring, gay guys hook up.  About a hour into the film, I am wondering what is playing next door.  Kind of like God, I guess.

Verdict: A Movie Of The Week