Ted Dekker's 'gay' challenge Print
Written by Staff   
Wednesday, 21 January 2009 12:09 PM America/New_York
Known for his edgy fiction, Ted Dekker also has a way of pushing the envelope in his blog postings, most recently addressing “The Challenge of Being Gay” (http://www.teddekker.typepad.com/, Jan. 8).

Having grabbed people's attention, he goes on to declare
himself “happily heterosexual,” using the example of how the word “gay” used to mean happy and content, to discuss changing definitions of Christian fiction.

With his first “truly 'mainstream'” novel, Boneman's Daughter, out soon, and “not specifically labeled as being a story solely for Christians any more than Jesus’ parables were labeled as such,” Dekker contends that the term “evangelical” is “fast becoming a measure of one's fanaticism and dedication to particular political and social agendas rather than a term that denotes doctrinal convictions or affiliations.”

In that context, he asserts he has “never written 'evangelical Christian' novels,”and wonders whether that definition needs changing. “This is an issue that is facing us all,” he says, “including our good friends in CBA bookstores.”