Pride Is Teaching Me To Love My Enemies

This Pride Month, I’ve been thinking a lot about the fullness of love. Recent polling from Gallup found that support for same-sex marriage has fallen noticeably since its previous height in 2022-23. This shift is largely due to Republicans, whose support for same-sex relationships fell from 55% to 37% in just a matter of years. While I find these numbers upsetting, I don’t find them surprising. After all, Pride itself didn’t begin as a celebration of love but as a protest against those determined to push that love back in the closet.

Love is at the heart of the gospel as well. Jesus taught that the greatest commandments were to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself (Mark 12:30-31). All of Christianity can be condensed into these commandments (Matthew 22:38-40). However, Jesus also gave a third commandment regarding love, and it’s been weighing on my mind for some time now. Christians aren’t just called to love God and love our neighbors; we are also called to love our enemies (Luke 6:27-36).

I’ve written before about how Pride Month is a time when non-affirming Christians become extra hostile toward LGBTQ+ people. Although they may deny it, I believe these Christians consider me and those like me to be their enemy. At the very least, they view our existence as a threat to religious liberty, children, the institution of marriage, and countless other values they allegedly cherish. 

Given their relentless attacks on the dignity of queer people, not to mention the moral hypocrisy they’ve demonstrated by empowering the current administration, the last thing I’m inclined to feel toward non-affirming Christians this month is love.

Christ doesn’t allow us to opt out of love, though, no matter how angry or exhausted we feel. So, the question I’ve been asking myself this Pride is not whether to extend love to those who scorn us but how to do it. I won’t pretend this will be easy or pleasant. Given the current challenges facing queer people—particularly transgender individuals—I’m sure this is the last message the LGBTQ+ community wants to hear. Still, in a culture that celebrates cruelty and views empathy as a sin, the decision to love is not just a means of resistance but an act of holy courage.

Christ doesn’t allow us to opt out of love, though, no matter how angry or exhausted we feel. So, the question I’ve been asking myself this Pride is not whether to extend love to those who scorn us but how to do it.

We can pray for them

Praying for our enemies may seem like a simple place to begin, but in practice, it can be incredibly difficult. For starters, it requires that we turn our feelings of pain and anger away from retaliation and toward forgiveness, even when the former is justified. Extending compassion to someone who hurt you is hard enough. But then, when we push past that barrier, a second obstacle remains: our selfishness. I’ve often found that my prayers for enemies become some variation of: “Please make this person realize that they are wrong. Make them believe as I believe, and live as I want them to live.” This isn’t blessing my enemy as scripture teaches; it’s blessing myself.

In order to pray for our enemies as Christ commands, we must first surrender our fear, our bitterness, and our desire to triumph over them. We must try to see them as Jesus sees them: beautiful, broken, and beloved. In his book Following Jesus, the Dutch priest Henri Nouwen gave this advice to those who struggled to view their enemies this way:

“We know that God loves this person as much as God loves us. Let’s remind ourselves of that truth, that true revelation. This is where loving our enemy starts. Loving our enemies starts with small, concrete, particular actions in the direction of our knowledge. It does not start in the direction of our feelings. We can act according to what we know.”

We can certainly hope that our adversaries have a change of heart and come to affirm LGBTQ+ people, but this should not be the primary object of our prayers. Instead, we should ask God to guide and protect them, to forgive their sins, and to open their hearts to the movement of the Holy Spirit. Praying for our enemies is not about changing them to think like us. It’s about surrendering them to God’s wisdom and purpose.

We can practice humility

I wasn’t always an LGBTQ+ affirming Christian. Like many believers, my faith changed over time as it was shaped by my relationships and lived experiences. Before I changed, I said and did things that I know hurt people. For example, during my sophomore year of college, I published a short story in the university’s literary journal that contained every horrible queer stereotype and shallow religious argument in existence. I was wrestling with my sexuality at the time, and it definitely showed in my writing. To this day, the very thought of that story makes me cringe with shame, but it also serves as a valuable reminder of who I used to be.

In Matthew 18, Jesus tells the parable of the unmerciful servant, in which a man forgiven a great debt refuses to show the same grace to a fellow servant. It’s remarkably easy to fall into the same mindset and accept forgiveness for ourselves while denying it to others. However, part of loving our enemies means recognizing that we too were once the enemy, and this recognition should humble us. Humility is what allows us to see ourselves reflected in the faces of those who persecute us.

While it does not excuse the harm inflicted on LGBTQ+ people, we can take heart in knowing the same grace that redeemed us is also capable of redeeming our enemies.

We can repay evil with good

In a recent article for Sojourners, Tyler Huckabee examined the political rise of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and his emergence as a frontrunner in the 2028 presidential election. Much of Newsom’s success can be attributed to his campaign adopting the worst tactics of the Trump administration: mockery, smugness, and contempt for his political adversaries. As Huckabee argues, a movement built on hate will only produce more hate, and people who behave like bullies do not suddenly pivot into building a better world. Followers of Jesus are obligated to choose a better way.

READ: How Can Gay Christians Have Safe Relationships With Non-Affirming Family?

As a gay man, the temptation to use the tools of my enemy is very strong. Rarely does a day go by that I don’t encounter a homophobic screed on social media, a political attack on my character, or an evangelical profiting from my vilification. But as Huckabee argues, how we respond to evil can either transform us or ruin us. So, when you see a cruel post or hear a sneering remark this Pride Month, consider giving to an LGBTQ+ charity. Volunteer for a politician who advocates for LGBTQ+ rights, support an LGBTQ+ business, or write a note to a queer friend and let them know how much you appreciate them. Let the decay of hate become a catalyst for even greater hope and joy.

We can find beauty amidst the tension

Jeff Chu is a writer, speaker, and ordained minister in the Reformed Church in America. He is also a married gay man. Throughout his work, Chu has shared candidly about the tension that exists between himself and his conservative, non-affirming family. Yet while some would view their rejection of his marriage as grounds for separation, Chu has chosen to remain and find moments of beauty within the tension. In an excerpt from his 2025 book, Good Soil, Chu reflects on the many ways his mother continues to demonstrate her love for him despite their differences in belief:

“My mom’s example reminds me that I believe in a difficult love. This kind of love doesn’t shy away from discomfort, and it doesn’t mistake discomfort for danger. It subordinates our theological disagreements to the clear call to feed the hungry and clothe the needy. It shows up, as courageously as it can, even in the midst of confusion.”

Chu is clear that his decision to maintain these familial bonds is a personal one, and for many queer individuals, the severing of non-affirming relationships may be necessary for their own protection and well-being. Still, his story is a hopeful illustration of how the distance between our non-affirming loved ones and us is not always as great as it may seem.

Love is love

With so much injustice taking place in our world today, it would be easy to spend this Pride Month channeling the righteous fury of the original Stonewall riots. While I certainly think there’s a place for that in our current struggle, I also believe it is no substitute for divine grace.

“Love is love” became the rallying cry for queer rights because it affirmed what many people already knew deep in their hearts: that love “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:7).

Difficult days still lie ahead, but this Pride Month, I pray that Christians of all backgrounds hold fast to the truth that victory in Christ does not come through the destruction of our enemies. Instead, our assurance is found in gathering together at the table of God.