Bishop TD Jakes take on Christian gays & bisexuals

On Tuesday, Bishop TD Jakes sat down on HuffPost Live with host and Morehouse College Professor Marc Lamont Hill to talk about his new book Destiny. Step Into Your Purpose.
A viewer online sent in the following question: Do you think the LGBT community and the black church can co-exist?
Bishop Jakes replied: "Absolutely... I think it is going to be diverse from church to church. Every church has a different opinion on the issue and every gay person is different.... to think [each] are all the same is totally not true."
Marc Lamont Hill pushed Bishop Jakes a bit further, asking "Has your thinking evolved on this?"
Bishop Jakes revealed: "Evolved and evolving... where I am is to better understand. We (the church) bought... into the myth that this is a Christian nation... We no longer look to public policy to reflect Biblical ethics."
Hill kept up the line of questioning, bringing Bishop Jakes back to the conversation in the pews and in church Bible studies across the country:

So, that covers what happens outside the church. Inside the church, has your thinking Biblically, scripturally, hermeneutically shifted at all? Is there a way to approach Christian tradition [and] Christian scripture in light of a new understanding on LGBT? For example, [in the] 18th century, there might have been a particular understanding of what slavery meant -- in relation to Paul, to the New Testament, et cetera. That has shifted to the point that... irrespective of what text says literally, we don't support slavery as a body... Similarly, is there room for that same kind of shift?

Bishop Jakes responded: "I think that shift has to go on behind the closed doors of the church because I think in the mainstream America, we have a derogatory name to call you and I think it oversimplifies the complexity of the texts..."

"LGBT's of different types and sorts have to find a place of worship that reflects what your views are and what you believe like anyone else," he said. "And the church should have it's own convictions and values."

Jakes also reaffirmed that members of the LGBT community, like all american citizens, deserve equal protection under the law.

"Once you begin to understand that democracy, that a republic actually, is designed to be an overarching system to protect our unique nuances then we no longer look to public policy to reflect biblical ethics," Jakes said. - See more at: http://www.lailasblog.com/2015/08/see-what-bishop-t-d-jakes-has-to-say.html#more