J. K. Rowling revealed last night the character Albus Dumbledore was homosexual. Here is the article reporting on this revelation for you full reading pleasure. My quick summary of Dumbledore's life (integrating this new information) is as follows:

Dumbledore's family suffered great tragedy early in his life with the abuse of younger sister Ariana and the loss of Dumbledore Senior, who delivered up a little vigilante justice on his daughter's abusers and was subsequently sent to Azkaban for life-term. Later, his sister (never fully recovered from her attack) inadvertently kills Mrs. Dumbledore (Dumbledore's mother), leaving Albus to care for his two younger siblings. Albus Dumbledore, brilliant, gifted and yet stuck out in the boonies of Godric's Hollow, meets equally brilliant Gellert Grindelwald during Grindlewald's short two month vacation with his Aunt Bathilda. During these two months, Dumbledore finds in Grindlewald companionship and commadary and apparently becomes quite smitten with him. His love for Grindlewald blinds him to the growing evil in the schemes of these two geniuses - schemes which will eventually plunge the wizarding world in to a great and terrible war. Enter Albeforth Dumbledore, Albus Dumbledore's youger brother, who confronts Dumbledore on the very practical "sin" of ignoring his care-giver duties to disturbed sister Ariana - thus instigating a little wizarding duel between Albeforth, Grindlewald and Albus. When the smoke clears, it is sister Ariana lying dead on the floor. Grindlewald flees; Dumbledore mourns, Albeforth punches Dumbledore in the nose. End of chapter.

Fast-forward a few years: Grindlewald has begun to take over the wizarding world on the European Continent while Dumbledore in England advances in his career and begins to come under pressure to stop Grindlewald. He avoids it as long as he can and then finally is forced to conclude the he alone can stop Grindlewald - which he does in one of the most famous duels of the wizard world. Grindlwald is sent to prison. Dumbledore goes on with his life. Enter Harry Potter and from their the books tell the story sequentially.

That is what Rowling revealed, placed within the context of the books.

Now, you want to know what I think?

Sure you do.

My first thought was "I really hope ________ doesn't read this cause it would probably really hurt him/her."

My second thought? Boy, is it ever fixin' to get hot in here...

So here we go. First, let's point out that on Monday of these week, Rowling revealed that Christianity inspired the Potter books. There was essentially NO media coverage of this. Google listed FOUR news reports - one short blurb and then the same article repeated over and over again. Christians didn't respond - "Oh, sorry we called you a she-devil" - and the media didn't say "What does it say that the most popular book series of all times was inspired by Christianity?" Both of these positions would seem to be responsible positions - interesting and relevant, but alas... However, there is no end in sight to the articles (all different!) concerning the sexual orientation of Dumbledore!

So let's state the obvious fact - sexuality is a more relevant topic than Christianity to most Americans.

This should come as no great shock to any astute observer, but it does beg the question of "saltiness"...

Second, I'm not sure that Rowling, as a British citizen and a member of the Church of Scotland, knew the can of cultural worms she was opening when she said this. According to reports, she seemed "astonished" by the response she received after making this comment (a standing ovation in Carnegie Hall), replying that if she would have known how happy this would make us, she would have told us sooner. For some, this will throw into doubt Rowling's self-proclaimed faith, but as the late Rich Mullins pointed out, everywhere you travel on the globe, you come in contact with Christians who emphasize various aspects of the Gospel (and, according to him, if you put it all together, you'd probably get a pretty good picture of it). Here, many Christians have problems with homosexuality. In Europe? Not so much (from what I've experienced). But the bottom line is this - a cultural clash has started. I would hope that American Christians would be wise to the cultural variations of their religion and handle this with wisdom and grace - but they probably won't. Furthermore, Rowling probably should have been a little more culturally sensitive herself. She did say this to a crowd of American children - and we're pretty picky about who gets to talk to our children about sexuality.

But, this might spark a move toward "Cross-Cultural Christianity" - which is something we sorely need - without it, we become blind to our own home-grown interpretations of religion and begin to worship culture instead of God.

Third, a somewhat disconcerting result of Rowling's "outing" of Dumbledore, is the already present (some few hours later) suggestion that Dumbledore was some type of sick child molester. And the really bizarre thing is that it isn't the anti-Harry Potter people saying this - it is those who support gay rights. But it's true - there are already articles out there suggesting that Dumbledore's interest in Harry (and Tom Riddle) was anything but altruistic, but instead the works of a "dirty old (gay) man." I would guess that Rowling would be disturbed by this, but again, I don't think she understood the present American climate concerning homosexuality.

Fourth, already there are those who are celebrating Dumbledore's sexuality and those who are demanding that it be made explicit in the story. My advice to both? Proceed cautiously. Dumbledore might have had homosexual tendencies, but his one (known) experience with it was, in Rowling's words, "unrequited" and "the greatest tragedy of his life" resulting in his blindness to the evil plans of Grindlewald and the resulting death of his sister, bad feelings between he and his brother, the partial implementation of his naive co-conspiring to take over the world, and his eventual duty of dueling Grindlwald and sending him off to a life-term in prison - not really the happy ending you'd expect. I'm not saying she's secretly opposed to it, but I am saying that it certainly isn't "sugar-coated".

Fifth, and most interestingly, the resulting questions of morality: Is homosexuality a sin? To give my answer in a phrase - yes, I think so. But so is the "sin" or perversion of men who seek out wives to be their mothers and girls who search for "father-figures" in the their husbands. Furthermore, it is long since time that our simplistic view of "moral sex" goes out the window. Sex before marriage = bad. Married sex = good. Married sex is - I'm sure - full of perversions and I find it appalling that we do not talk about these secret bedroom sins - of lust in the marriage bed, hidden rage, domination, loss of dignity, etc... So yes, I'm still inclined to consider homosexuality a "miss of the mark", but I hope that the work and imagination of Rowling, a self-proclaimed believer, will push us to consider sex in a more complex morality, as well as considering the really pressing need for "Cross-Cultural Christianity".

And, if you are still not comforted, remember that Rowling said long ago that Dumbledore "was not Jesus" but instead just another screwed up person like you and me.