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Does Jesus Really Love Me?: A Gay Christian's Pilgrimage in Search of God in America - Paperback | Diverse Reads

Does Jesus Really Love Me?: A Gay Christian's Pilgrimage in Search of God in America

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Does Jesus Really Love Me?: A Gay Christian's Pilgrimage in Search of God in America is part memoir and part investigative analysis that explores the explosive and confusing intersection of faith, politics, and sexuality in Christian America.

The quest to find an answer is at the heart of Does Jesus Really Love Me?—a personal journey of belief, an investigation, and a portrait of a faith and a nation at odds by award-winning reporter Jeff Chu.

From Brooklyn to Nashville to California, from Westboro Baptist Church and their “God Hates Fags” protest signs, to the pioneering Episcopalian bishop Mary Glasspool—who proclaims a message of liberation and divine love, Chu captures spiritual snapshots of Christian America at a remarkable moment, when tensions between both sides in the culture wars have rarely been higher.

Funny and heartbreaking, perplexing and wise, Does Jesus Really Love Me? is an intellectual, emotional, and spiritual pilgrimage that reveals a nation in crisis.

ISBN-13: 9780062049742

Media Type: Paperback

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers

Publication Date: 04-15-2014

Pages: 384

Product Dimensions: 5.20(w) x 7.80(h) x 1.10(d)

Jeff Chu is co-curator of Evolving Faith, alongside Sarah Bessey, who founded the gathering with Rachel Held Evans. He is also the author of Does Jesus Really Love Me? and an editor-at-large at Travel+Leisure. He, his husband, Tristan, and their dog, Fozzie, make their home in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

What People are Saying About This

Bernadette Barton

“People struggling to reconcile homosexuality and Christianity will find much that validates their experiences in Chu’s thoughtful book. Those confused why anyone would attempt to reconcile conservative Christian and gay identities will better understand the dilemmas gay Christians face after reading Does Jesus Really Love Me.

Stephen Prothero

“Finally an examination of Christianity and homosexuality that refuses to demonize either side. A smart and deeply personal exploration of one of the great public questions of our time.”

Mark D. Jordan

“Jeff Chu is a smart and experienced guide through evangelical battles over homosexuality. . . . [He] leads us beyond the battlefields to unexpected scenes of hope. This is a sobering book, but above all a book of compassionate consolation.”

David P. Gushee

“A beautiful, courageous, heartbreaking exploration. . . . Does Jesus Really Love Me? is both a moving personal memoir and a pivotal piece of reporting on what the deadlocked Christian fight over homosexuality is costing human beings, the churches, and our culture.”

Rob Bell

“In telling these stories—chief among them his own—Jeff has done an extraordinary thing, showing us all to the God who is big enough and loving enough and true enough to meet all of us exactly where we’re at. This book is moving, inspiring, and much needed.”

Lauren Sandler

“This is a book for anyone who believes the church is unbroken, who feels they have no place in a world that disdains them, or who is looking for fellowship amongst courageous travelers striking their own path.”

Benoit Denizet-Lewis

“Jeff Chu has written a masterpiece about sexuality and spirituality in America. In this unforgettable blend of reportage and memoir, he doesn’t demonize, ridicule, or pander to an ideology. Instead, he explores—and inspires. This is the smartest, and most humane, book about Christianity and homosexuality that I’ve ever read.”

Donna Freitas

“Jeff Chu’s pilgrimage across America to discover his own place as a gay man in the Christian church as well as attitudes about being gay and Christian across denominations is at once timely, smart, poignant, disturbing, inspiring, and maddening. . . . Essential reading for everybody.”

Table of Contents

Introduction: Does Jesus Love Me? 1

Doubting

I Beginnings: In the Capital of Christian America: Nashville, Tennessee 13

II The Agnostics: New York; Bangor, Maine 32

Josh Cook: "My Christianity became a vague spiritual notion." 50

III Yes, Jesus Hates You: Westboro Baptist Church: Topeka, Kansas 56

IV The Power and the Story: The Scandal of the Harding University Queer Press: Searcy, Arkansas 74

Struggling

V Exit Strategy, Part I: Exodus International's Reorientation Ministry: Orlando, Florida; Irvine, California 99

VI Exit Strategy, Part II: A Visit to an Exodus Group: Kirkland, Washington 111

John Smid: "Things I've taught have been wounding." 127

VII Freedom to Marry: Jake and Elizabeth Buechner: A city in the northern United States 132

VIII Choosing Celibacy: Kevin Olson: St. Paul, Minnesota 148

Ted Haggard: "I am being resurrected." 162

IX The Ministry Is the Closet: Ben Dubow: Hartford, Connecticut 167

X Agreeing to Disagree: The Evangelical Covenant Church: Chicago 179

Benjamin L. Reynolds: "Brothers, I think the church needs a season of prayer." 198

XI What Price, Unity? First United Lutheran Church: San Francisco 206

Reconciling

XII New Community: The Gay Christian Network: Raleigh, North Carolina 227

David Johnson: "My answer is always the same: God loves you no matter what." 244

XIII Keeping It Together: The Schert Family: Valdosta, Georgia 250

XIV Return of the Exiles: Lianna Carrera and Jennifer Knapp: Hollywood, California; Nashville, Tennessee 262

Mary Glasspool: "God said to me: I am bigger than the church." 277

XV A House of Prayer for All People: The Metropolitan Community Church: San Francisco; Las Vegas 283

XVI Feels Like Home: Highlands Church: Denver 298

Hoping

XVII I Think God Understands: Gideon Eads Kingman, Arizona 329

Conclusion 339

Acknowledgments 351