In the most recent Christian headlines it would seem Jenninfer Knapp has come out of the closet. According to Christianity Today, the singer/songwriter has been in a relationship with her partner for “almost eight years” and cites her lifestyle choice as one of the many straws that drove her away from full time songwriting for seven years.  It’s a good article but the following words from Jennifer were the ones I found most profound:

During my college years, I received some admonishment about some relationships I’d had with women. Some people said, “You might want to renegotiate that,” even though those relationships weren’t sexual. Hindsight being 20/20, I guess it makes sense. But if you remove the social problem that homosexuality brings to the church—and the debate as to whether or not it should be called a “struggle,” because there are proponents on both sides—you remove the notion that I am living my life with a great deal of joy. It never occurred to me that I was in something that should be labeled as a “struggle.” The struggle I’ve had has been with the church, acknowledging me as a human being, trying to live the spiritual life that I’ve been called to, in whatever ramshackled, broken, frustrated way that I’ve always approached my faith. I still consider my hope to be a whole human being, to be a person of love and grace. So it’s difficult for me to say that I’ve struggled within myself, because I haven’t. I’ve struggled with other people. I’ve struggled with what that means in my own faith. I have struggled with how that perception of me will affect the way I feel about myself.

Knapp always been one of my (few) favorite “Christian” singer/songwriters and I’m looking forward to her latest.