Yet some misguided people open their Bibles to justify their narrow minded bigotry as we have recently seen printed in these pages. The Bible declares that Satan knows the scripture and uses it to deceive (Matthew 4:1-11). The Bible also tells us how to identify who is true and who might be a false prophet. In Matthew 7:16 the bible says you will know them by their fruit.

And oh and what a strange and wicked fruit is the bigotry of those who use the Bible to persecute people of the LGBTQ community. Who are these people who think they are so righteous as to cast the first stone?

In contrast, Galatians 5:22-23 defines the fruit of the spirit as love, joy, peace, long suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.

The Bible tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves (Leviticus 19:18) and even to love our enemies (Luke 6:27-28). We are told that we must forgive those who wrong us (Ephesians 4:32).

So let us refrain from judgment of others (Luke 6:37) and instead work to become better neighbors (Ephesians 4:25-26) for whatever the shortcomings of others are, we must first see to the beam in our own eyes before we attempt to remove mote from the eye of another (Matthew 7:3-5).