The popular Hillsong pastor Carl Lentz has said that it is in his heart at present to 'call out the sin that is racism' along with 'police brutality', and has spoken out against the liberal gun laws in the US.
In an interview with World Religion News, Lentz, who is a close friend of the Christian pop singer Justin Bieber, said that 'my heart has been right now to call out the sin that is racism. That has been a priority for me and I am OK with that. I think we are allowed to do that.'
The lead pastor of Hillsong New York, who has just released a new book, Own the Moment, continued: 'I am going right at this [racism]. We are in New York so when it comes to Black Lives Matter, when it comes to Eric Garner, who was killed on our streets not that far from where a lot of our people live. When it comes to police brutality stuff and the NYPD. By the way, I am not disparaging them. Often when you hear about these cases, New York is in the spotlight. I felt I have to speak to this right now.'
Garner died in Staten Island, New York City on July 17, 2014 after a NYPD officer put him in what has been described as a 'chokehold'.
On guns, Lentz said that 'if you look at gun control, common logic would say that fewer guns equal less violence'. He went on: 'More challenge to get guns equals more safety. It is common sense stuff like this. The way our country looks we have to fight for common sense.
'We have people, 20 minutes after a shooting, will begin to promote their views about how they are going to say this has nothing to do with what it exactly has to do with. People saying, "This has nothing to do with gun laws". Are you sure? Because I don't see any other country on earth dealing with what we deal with.'
And in a passage that appears to be aimed at Donald Trump, Lentz said in the context of guns: 'I think most Americans just want a politician that will just be logical. Forget about theological, forget about doctrine, just do the right thing once in a while. That is my passion, just to be completely honest. Let's just be honest. Let's disagree about something that is real.'
In the same interview the 39-year-old pastor, who famously has a number of tattoos, said that 'if I don't believe these tattoos devalue the temple that is the Holy Spirit, my body, I am doing it'.
On his trendy look and the subject of appearance more generally, he referred to Jesus, who he described as 'the most unorthodox messiah that ever lived'.
Lentz said: 'My thing is that Christians are supposed to be the most open and the most not impressed by an image and sometimes we become the very thing we are trying to rage against. Jesus was the most unorthodox messiah that ever lived. He was a carpenter on a donkey where everyone went to the king on a stallion. It's always amazing to me that we look at me or another pastor wears, which is apparently not what everyone is supposed to wear. I say, "Please show me what a pastor should wear."'
