Heres a look at whats to come!

 Martin Luther King Jr. - I have a dream

About our dream....
The Truth Center was founded in 1998 by our centers founder, Reverend G. Streator.   Reverend Streator's simple dream is to bring the exact truth to the world - on subjects of hate, hate crimes, victimization and so much more.    We are "world changers" but believe for the world to change, one must bring to light the very truth that holds the world in capitivity.

This Land of Liberty
By: Reverend Greg Streator

In the last several years of my life, it has become very clear to me that America is not the melting pot it claims itself to be. America, founded with the principles of accepting those who had been abused and misused, by welcoming them into her warm arms of compassion. America the home of the free and the brave. Emma Lazarus wrote in her 'The New Colossus', 'Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!' Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke in his address to the nation from Washington DC, 'I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.' Today, I have a dream of my own. A dream of a nation not divided in issue of sexuality, but united in acceptance and tolerance. A nation where being gay or straight, is no longer issue, or policy to be debated by congress, and in Presidential elections. A nation accepting of all who are a part of its own make up, and clear in the understanding that allowing gay marriages will not destroy the 'holiness of marriage' as so many have said, NO! It will create a new bond of holy marriage, allowing those who have lived together of the same sex, to enjoy the same benefits of a 'straight married couple'. However, we are not this nation spoken of in Emma Lazarus's poem; we are a nation divided by issues that should never be issue — separatism. We have separated ourselves so far from our brothers; we no longer are our brother's keepers. Courts have taken away our most basic rights to pray publicly to the God of our own belief. Now, the courts attempt to rule again in our lives telling the people what is right and what is wrong. We are a nation at war; not only with other nations, but also within our own walls as we battle the greatest battle of all time ' one of basic human rights. Truly I have heard every possible argument there is about this issue, but we dance around the real issue like it does not exist. We dance around the truth that we are still a nation that prides it self like the nation of the old south with its Negro slaves, unable to bear the thoughts of letting the slave's go free and letting a slave have the same basic rights as the rest of the nation. We still separate our nation, but with a different wall. Yes, I will recognize it is no longer a race issue, but it is an issue of separatism nonetheless. Maybe we have grown out of the days when the racist white groups would burn crosses in the front yards of newly freed slaves. But the same crimes of extremism are still being done all in the name of God, only to 'purify'. People such as Hitler attempted purification, and he slaughtered millions of Jews because of their religious beliefs ' again another crime of separatism. Hitler's crimes of extremism set him apart, because he attempted to destroy an entire population, and was then wanting to do the very same to the rest of the world. These are hate crimes, and crimes of separatism.



We have not really grown up at all. Our crimes of extremism continue. When Matthew Shepherd was murdered a few years ago, it stunned many throughout the entire country. 'How could this happen', many of us asked, but yet a young man simply because he was gay, was brutally put to death by those who where separatists. No, they did not burn a cross in his front yard, or throw rocks through his windows, or even vandalize his car. They brutalized this young man. Tied him to a fence and left him to die, only because he was openly gay. Why did this crime even have to happen' Why did we, the nation of a melting pot, not welcome that young man, and openly accept him into our warm arms' Are we that scared of 'others', that we cannot bring ourselves to a place where we can openly accept anyone for who and what they are UNCONDITIONALLY' How sad for this nation then ' because we have failed the call of Emma Lazarus, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and a thousand others like them. We have failed to be our true brothers keeper, only by being close-minded by ignorance and untruth. The issue stands before America. America has the chance to respond to it with respect and open mindedness. We must open our eyes to the diversity that is our nation, and without that diversity, we have no melting pot, or were those just words to warm us up' February 2004, Peter, Paul, and Mary, famous folk singers, released a song written by Thea Hopkins called 'Jesus is on the wire'. The song was dedicated to the death of Matthew Shephard.

'Run down church Red clay River covered In a smoky haze
Sunday morning The fire is out Sunday morning No one about
The earth is soft This time of year Boots get caked From there to here
Down the road Route 25 They found this boy He was barely alive
Jesus is on the wire So far away, higher and higher Jesus is on the wire
They took him down Off the fence Cold as ice Almost dead They said that he That he slept with guys They said that he Deserved to die. Jesus is on the wire So far away, higher and higher Jesus is on the wire'

Matthew Shepherd was killed because in the eyes of his killers he had committed a crime. His crime was extremism. Christ was crucified for the very same crime. In the eyes of his killers, Christ was too much of a problem, to open about who he was. He made to many other people uncomfortable when he was around. In the end, Christ, like Matthew Shepherd was killed for the crimes of extremism

'Was not Jesus an extremist for love: 'Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you.' Was not Amos an extremist for justice: 'Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like and ever-flowing stream.' Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian Gospel: 'I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.' Was not Martin Luther an extremist: 'Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God.' And John Bunyan: 'I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.' And Abraham Lincoln: 'This nation cannot survive half slave and half free.' And Thomas Jefferson: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal'.'

So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love' Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice, or for the extension of justice' In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill, three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime-the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists'

Martin Luther King Jr. ' 'Letter from Birmingham Jail'

The problem is very simple. The 'straight traditional, going to Sunday Church folks', cannot bear the idea of a gay man or woman having the same basic rights as they do. Now mind you, the rights we are speaking of here are only to be with the one they love when they are at death's bed. To legally have the right to be considered ones partner, to have the same basic rights as every other married couple enjoys in the United States of America, the home of the free and the brave, the home of the melting pot. It's easier for them to have the gay community 'sit in its own dinning room' and 'use is own restrooms', and 'sit at the back of the bus, or 'even take their own'. We stopped with the oppression of the black community, and we grew as nation from that. We as a nation I believe are stronger, wiser and richer because we have opened our hearts and minds and stopped the ignorant oppression of slavery, and separation, solely based on ones color of skin. But now, as a nation, we stand at the threshold of yet another place to grow, and we stand stagnant in our old ideas of hate and separation, this time solely based on one's sexual identity, and sexual preference.
'This land is your land, this land is my land, From California, to the New York Island, From the Redwood Forest, to the Gulf Stream Waters, This land was made for you and me.'
(Peter Paul, and Mary ' This Land is your land)

Maybe I am too much of an idealist. Maybe the world should take a day and look through my glasses and view it as I have seen it over the past thirty-one years of my life. We have a world of potential love, and we fill it with definite hate and separation and walls. We are the only nation in the world that builds walls faster between our neighbors, only to keep 'them' out of our lives. I have spent allot of my life attempting to understand why even Christ came to earth, and gave his life as he did. Many believe Christ was a prophet, many believe he was the Messiah. Prophet, Messiah, does it really matter' He did something out of LOVE for a world and people he did not know. He gave his life for a world that he never saw in its totality. He gave his life for a race of people that had only begun its journey here on this planet, but the point is ' HE DID DO SOMETHING out of LOVE.

So here is my challenge to the nation, to those that see this as a threat. I know you see my very words as a threat to the very fabric of your being. I know you see me now as an extremist, and have labeled me as such. But take my glasses just for a moment and look through them. If you look closely, you will find, that I, and many others, look at those in the world as being full of possibility. And possibility to us means that each person, each dream has the chance at becoming reality. It is no longer right to censor the dreams, and rights of others just because it makes you uncomfortable. If that is the case- its time to get uncomfortable, because here we come!

It is always best to remember; the Romans did attempt to silence the voice of Jesus Christ by crucifying him on a cross with two other criminals. We must always keep in mind that the instant Jesus died and became the ascended Christ; he became a martyr to an entire nation, and the entire future of the world. So in the same thought, keep in mind that the more you attempt to silence this voice that rises up, in silencing it, you will only make this voice stronger and louder. But, instead of even considering such acts, let us consider an act of kindness, love and compassion such as Christ does show us, and calls unto us to show others. So silence me if you must, but my words will live on, for that is something no one can silence.

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