We continue to be the big eternal hypocrites the world over.

Sex: An emotion in motion. (Mae West)
Sinner: Every one of us…We are men, not Gods. (Petronius)

Suffering: A revelation. One discovers things one never discovered
before. (Oscar Wilde)

Saint: The only difference between the saint and the sinner is that
every saint has a past and every sinner has a future.

Tragedy: In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not
Getting what one wants, and the other is getting it. (Wilde)



This "article" is about the Haggard case. You know, the evangelical in Colorado who recently has been embroiled in the sex scandal. It's such a scandal because the "affair" occurred allegedly male-male instead of male-female. This former always turns heads, raises eyebrows, what-have-you. We continue to be the big eternal hypocrites the world over. Martin L. King and JFK both were womanizers in their day yet we continue to revere them (I revere both, but especially MLK.). There are millions more such as the former French president. Remember? They were married too and had children. It would be quite different had theirs been male-male affairs. I was thinking the other day about England's Oscar Wilde. He was so intelligent and talented. One of his real crimes was his unabashed crush on Douglas, the son of the prominent and wealthy aristocrat. The young aristocrat's old man couldn't take the shame and embarrassment. Today, the story could be different, possibly. But that's life, isn't it? Wilde, who basically wasn't any worse than these heterosexuals we've just mentioned (He may have had better feelings. Who knows?), has today no such reverence or prominence as they do.
I feel for both Jones (the alleged lover) and Haggard. Haggard was looking for something he wasn't going to find. Billy Graham in Day By Day reminds us of the country song whose lyrics go "looking for love in all the wrong places." Well, one can look for love and one can look for sex. Which one were Jones and Haggard looking for? That's one question. Can Haggard's marriage survive? That's another question. The Clintons marriage has survived, it seems. There are many others that have. Didn't Eisenhower have that affair with the female jeep driver in Europe? His marriage survived. Only the two parties in the marriage can answer that question. And for marriages that don't survive, they will not be the first, that's for sure.
Is Haggard gay or bi? That’s another question. It doesn’t really matter where temptation is concerned. People have said if a gay marries a woman, he’ll always be confronted with the “other” lifestyle, or with temptation of the “other kind”. Of course that’s true . But the same goes for the “normal” marriage. If it weren’t true , there wouldn’t be so many affairs, separations and divorces. Sexual temptation is no respecter of categories or genders. Temptation is temptation like a rose is a rose, etc.
What happens in real life is that we humans are vicious one with the other. I remember the Swaggart scandal many years back. It was similar except that it was male-female, like Clinton’s. I truly felt sorry for Swaggart although I realized it was the hypocrisy that was “unforgivable”(actually, nothing is unforgivable except the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, according to the words of Christ). In my article “Daemons” at storymania.com, I talk about how we are quite cruel or vicious toward those who have weaknesses that we do not—although we have weaknesses that our victims do not! You see, it’s a vicious circle, is it not? That’s why I wrote the little poem about being sorry I had judged in my life. I was wasting my time and carrying out a function unintended for me. (Brilliance for you there!)
To start cutting here, I want to say that I’d like to see a special outcome from all this. People in Haggard’s congregation (New Life Church) have said some wonderful things about him, so, many of them must be true . He isn’t forever “lost” and he knows it. He can and will be forgiven and can then pick up the pieces and start making amends. Start out on a new course. Be better than ever, if you will. Jones, too, can be forgiven. He can change his life. He is not “inferior” in God’s eyes (the ones that really count) to Haggard just because he, Jones, has perhaps less money or prestige than Haggard. Haggard doesn’t need to feel “condescending” toward Jones. The great Charles Spurgeon writes a lot about how God needs time after time to “cut us down to size”, so to speak. I hope he, Jones, makes money off a book or some such enterprise so that he can/will have an easier opportunity to start life anew/fresh. The decision, of course, is primarily his. Let him decide at least having the opportunity to do so with certain financial pressures removed. Nothing new under the sun is what the Bible tells us. We repeatedly tend to forget that. If you have read this far, my sincere thanks and cheers.