Last Thursday I posted about the Reverend Ed Bacon’s appearance on Oprah during her Best Life Week’s spirituality episode, on which Bacon told a gay male viewer that “being gay is a gift from God.”

Bacon’s remarks lit up the forums on Oprah’s site with hundreds of anti-gay messages from so-called Christians.

Bacon clarified his remarks on the show via satellite:

“After hearing from Sedrick, who says he had a tough adolescence growing up as a gay teen in rural Alabama, the Rev. Bacon said something Oprah says she has never heard a minister say. ‘Being gay is a gift from God,’ the Rev. Bacon said. ‘But our culture doesn’t understand that. And consequently, the culture sends messages that you ought to isolate. And isolation is the antithesis of what all of us need.’ To further explain his comment, the Rev. Bacon joins Oprah via satellite. ‘I meant exactly what I said,’ he says. ‘It is so important for every human being to understand that he or she is a gift from God.’ Just as the Oprah.com message boards were buzzing, the Rev. Bacon says he has been receiving plenty of feedback. The majority of it, he says, is positive. ‘My e-mail was full of comments, and what I gather is that it simply unleashed a flood of healing throughout the country and Australia and Great Britain, across the continent. It was amazing.'”

Previously
Rev. Ed Bacon to Oprah Viewer: Being Gay is a Gift from God [tr]