Gays in the church is not unique to the black community. Go to white churches, the music director and men in the choir are gay. Go to Latin America, the Catholic priesthood is filled with gay men. It's the same in Europe. Hell, the German Catholic Church is about to split from the Roman Catholic Church because of the fact that there are so many openly gay men in the priesthood, that they've started blessing same sex marriage and holding "queer masses" and Rome is outraged. I even hear a lot of Muslim Imams are undercover. Even before Abrahamic religions, "two spirits" were priest or priestesses, medicine men, witch doctors, etc. So gays have always been prominent in religion across all races and cultures. It is not unique to black people. It just may seem more prominent to us because black Americans are viewed as the most religious group in the country.
And DL is right. Seems like they stay in church knowing that their lifestyle is condemned by God hoping if they dedicate their lives to him, he will show mercy. Which is honestly sad. But instead of having compassion for them, we ostracize them.
And yeah, I do believe the black community is one of the most homophobic. People can say all they want about white people and making laws and killing gays yet black gays staying running into the arms of white people to get away from black people. And yet, ain't no other races of gays running into the arms of black people even though all we "supposedly" do is crack jokes. We do more than that. Besides the verbal, physical and mental abuse, we socially isolate gays. The only place gay men get to participate socially in the black community is church. And the church is dying. Outside of that, straight black men don't befriend them, don't consider them brothers, exclude them from the camaraderie found in all male spaces or friends groups, which causes them not to be able to develop the tights bonds with other men that are important to male development. So they run to white people where gays can participate socially across a wide spectrum of society and genuine friendships with straight people are not taboo. They find freedom amongst whites that they are prevented from having among black people. That's why black homophobia is so insidious, because it pushes our own people into the arms of the enemy, and then we turn around and wonder why they aid and abet white supremacy. We show them no love which is why someone like Tyler Perry, with all his wealth and after all he's done for black people, at his age still has to fake it, when his white counterpart are not. Sad existence.