Kim Davis Has Nice Hair

"Not my circus, not my monkeys."  Old Polish Saying 



For the past several days I have been trying to write about Kim Davis and Pope Francis.  This is at least my third attempt.

I've read a lot of news articles, commented on a lot of Facebook posts, and laughed at a lot of Kim Davis jokes. 

I finally decided that the Pope is very charming and charismatic and is probably a very nice man with a very hard job, who is tying very hard to do the very best he can.  Unfortunately, he is the  head of an organization that considers homosexuality a sin, denies women reproductive freedom and refuses to ordain women.

As the saying goes, that is not my circus.  And even though in attempting to follow the teachings of Jesus, I try to love the Pope as I am supposed to love everybody (And I will even pray for him as he has asked everyone to do.), he is not my monkey.

After Pope Francis was criticized for meeting with Ms. Davis, the Vatican issued the statement that “The pope did not enter into the details of the situation of Mrs. Davis, and his meeting with her should not be considered a form of support of her position in all of its particular and complex aspects."  (The Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, in a statement released on Friday morning.)

 

But the thing of it is that he does support her position, at least officially.  By their standards, the Vatican does not need to defend him.  But doing so supposedly makes the Church look a little better. And it makes Ms. Davis look much worse, which should make her critics happy. And besides providing the spectacle of Ms. Davis being crushed by the bus she was thrown under, it also dazzles the public with so much rhetoric that we will say, "Yeah, whatever," and get on with our lives, which is what I intend to do.

But first, I'd like to mention something that seems to have been overlooked:  Kim Davis has a story. I haven't seen it;  I guess People Magazine isn't interested.  But I have several questions. 

 What was her life like before she became a Christian?   What kind of childhood did she have?

How did her marital history, which so many liberal people have taken such glee in reciting, affect her? (It is interesting that many of these people have called her fat and homely.  But she has had four weddings and three husbands and is still married to the last one; she must have something.)

What did the Pentecostal church offer her and why did she need it?

Did she ever have dreams of getting out of Rowan County, Kentucky?  And what is Rowan County like, anyway?

Liberal Christians find it hard to have any sympathy for her, let alone love her as we are taught to.  Actually few liberals have any sympathy for her, but the Christians are the only ones who feel they should, 

Maybe if we knew her story, we could see her as a beloved child of God -- like us and the tax collectors and prostitutes Jesus ate with.

Ms. Davis is very wrong about a lot of things. But seeing her as God's child and our sister does not make us disloyal to our LGBTQ friends, Ellen DeGeneres, Elton John, Bishop Gene Robinson, and the entire LGBTQ community, or, if we are members of that community, self-hating to ourselves.

I'm hoping that I got this right this time.  Now I'm going to post if before a new scandal comes along and Kim Davis is "so fifteen minutes ago."

Then I'm going to get on with my life.

BUT I LOVE YOU ANYWAY.