Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Approves Gay Clergy

Yet another mainline Christian denomination appears headed towards allowing partnered same sex clergy. It's a triumph of modern knowledge and understanding of sexual orientation over ignorance, bigotry and mindless clinging to ancient writings that lacked such information and were aimed in part in maintaining the "otherness" of non-Jews. It will be interesting to see how many separate parishes within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) will act like the white segregationists of old and seek to break from the national church body. I'm sure many of the professional Christians will lament the change in policy as they show about as much Christian love as George Wallace did when he said "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever." I find it sad that increasingly Christianity's main attribute seems to be hate and bigotry towards others. I am pleased that LGBT Christians now have another potential church home. Here are highlights from denomination's website:

*
While the Office of the General Assembly awaits official tallies, it appears that a majority of the 173 presbyteries of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) have approved a change in PC(USA) ordination standards.
*
At its meeting on Tuesday, May 10, 2011, the Presbytery of Twin Cities Area became the 87th presbytery to approve an amendment that will remove the constitutional requirement that all ministers, elders, and deacons live in “fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness”
*
The effect of the new language also opens up the possibility that persons in same-gender relationships can be considered for ordination.
*
The 219th General Assembly (2010) of the PC(USA) approved Amendment 10-A last summer, but required a majority of presbyteries to ratify the provision for it to become part of the church’s Constitution.

The change will take effect July 10, 2011, one year after the adjournment of last summer’s assembly.
*
In response to the vote, denominational leaders issued a letter to all congregations of the PC(USA), calling the debate about ordination standards “a Presbyterian family struggle.” The letter goes on to say that Presbyterians have “sought to find that place where every congregation and every member, deacon, elder, and minister of the Word and Sacrament can share their gifts in ministry while, at the same time, the integrity of every congregation, member, deacon, elder, and minister is respected.”

Lutheran CORE - Hypocrites and Bigots by Another Name

I have written several times about the elements within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America that are having a proverbial conniption fit since the national church adopted a policy permitting partnered gay clergy a little more than a year ago. These folks have their panties in a huge knot over the Churchwide Assembly vote which they claim ignored the Bible's condemnation of homosexuality. They demand strict adherence to Biblical provisions - except for all the times when they don't. Times like when they give a wink and a nod to Gospel condemnations of divorce; ignore Gospel condemnations of Pharisee like behavior; close their eyes to Gospel admonitions of treating one's neighbors with love and forgiveness. And that's not even getting into the Old Testament provisions that are ignored wholesale. Indeed, it seems that the only time these break away Lutherans apply the Bible literally is when they seize on provisions that purportedly condemn same sex relationships. Now, these modern day Pharisee elements once affiliated with the ECLA are poised to form a new Lutheran denomination in the USA. I'm sorry, but the motivation for this development is not follow the Scriptures more faithfully. It's about following anti-gay scripture more faithfully and ignoring all those inconvenient Bible passages that interfere with doing whatever else these hypocrites want. Some will call me "mean" or "intolerant,"but when people are homophobic bigots, I believe in calling them out . The Mercury News has details on this development. Here are highlights:
*
MINNEAPOLIS—Richard Mahan and Anita Hill are both Lutheran pastors who were inside a Minneapolis convention hall last summer when delegates for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to allow non-celibate gay and lesbian pastors.
Afterward, each cried for different reasons.
*
Mahan, lead pastor at St. Timothy in Charleston, W.Va., said he cried because he realized he would likely leave the denomination in which he had invested 42 years of ministry. For Hill, the openly gay lead pastor at St. Paul-Reformation in St. Paul, they were tears of "joy and relief."
*
A year later . . . . Mahan and other critics of the decision plan to gather this week in Columbus, Ohio, for another Lutheran convention. Leaders of 18 former ELCA churches are expected to vote Friday to create a brand new Lutheran denomination that they claim will follow the Scriptures more faithfully: the North American Lutheran Church.

"The issue is departure from the word of God," Mahan said. His church has already voted twice to end its longtime identity as a ELCA church, also ending an annual *$36,000 in tithing to the denomination.
*
As of early August, 199 congregations had cleared the hurdles to leave the ELCA for good, while another 136 awaited the second vote needed to make it official. In all there are 10,239 ELCA churches with about 4.5 million members, making it still by far the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S.

And the breakaway members gathering in Ohio will face their own challenges if they vote to start another denomination at a time when attendance at mainline Protestant churches is falling and denominational distinctions appear irrelevant to a growing number of churchgoers.
*
Hill, who in her early days at the church helped found a ministry for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people, said she was disheartened by the departing churches. "There are some who feel they must leave the ELCA over that," she said. "I feel sad about that, it's unfortunate. But to feel you have to leave over the inclusion of your brothers and sisters—that diminishes who we are as the body of Christ."
*
Unlike Hill, I am not disheartened - I am disgusted and sickened by the hate and hypocrisy that are, in my view, the only reason parishes are leaving the ELCA. If they truly cared about adhering to scripture, they'd jettison divorce and a host of other things that they readily accept. One can only hope that come Judgment Day, these bigots will find that God is a black lesbian.

Evangelical Lutheran Church Reinstates Gay Clergy

In a move that will drive the Southern Baptist want to be Missouri Synod Lutherans to apoplexy, The larger and modernity embracing Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has reinstated six gay clergy who had previously been removed from the ranks of rostered clergy because they were in committed same sex relationships. More reinstatements are to follow. In my view, this is a wonderful occurrence and I hope more previously demonized gay clergy will find themselves reinstated within the ELCA. The irony in the whole partnered gay clergy issue is that evangelical Christians who are typically the most homophobic also have the highest divorce rate - they personify those who wear their religion on their sleeves, seek to inflict their religious beliefs on all, and then are utter hypocrites when it comes to their very selective application of Bible passages. Here are some highlights from the Plain Dealer:
*
Seven pastors who work in the San Francisco Bay area and were barred from serving in the nation's largest Lutheran group because of a policy that required gay clergy to be celibate are being welcomed into the denomination.
*
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America will add six of the pastors to its clergy roster at a service at St. Mark's Lutheran Church in San Francisco on Sunday. Another pastor who was expelled from the church, but was later reinstated, will participate in the service.
*
The group is among the first gay, bisexual or transgender Lutheran pastors to be reinstated or added to the rolls of the ELCA since the organization voted last year to lift the policy requiring celibacy.
*
Megan Rohrer, one of the pastors who will participate in Sunday's rite of reception service, grew up in South Dakota and attended a Lutheran college where she said students tried to exorcise her "gay demons" by throwing holy water on her. Some of those people are now Lutheran pastors in South Dakota, she said.
*
Rohrer, who is transgender and a lesbian, was ordained by four congregations in San Francisco in 2006, but could not join the ELCA roster until the denomination's national assembly approved the new policy in August.
*
Jeff Johnson, another one of the pastors who will be added to the roster, said the ELCA's position for years of not accepting the choice of some congregations to ordain gay clergy was painful and disappointing. "The actions the church is taking on Sunday affirms the decisions of those congregations," Johnson, pastor of the University Lutheran Chapel in Berkeley, said. "The church is respecting our family, our partners, the choices we're making."
*
The special rite of reception that will be used for the first time on Sunday was developed specifically to welcome gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender pastors, said Melissa Ramirez Cooper, a spokeswoman for the ELCA.
*
Two more rite of reception services are scheduled for September in the St. Paul-Minneapolis area and another will follow in Chicago, Cooper said.

Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Approves Partnered Gay Clergy

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has tentatively joined the Episcopal Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church, the United Church of Christ and the Unitarian Church in allowing partnered gay and lesbian clergy. Like the ELCA and the Episcopal Church, the Presbyterians have so far, however, reserved the term "marriage" for heterosexual couples only. As a result, the religious based anti-gay laws in the USA are increasingly giving special rights and privileges to one particular form of Christianity - the Southern Baptists and Fundamentalists - in a more and more glaring contradiction to the nations supposed guarantee of religious freedom and separation of church and state. One has to wonder when these enlightened - and general far better educated - religious denominations are going to begin to object to the legal discrimination inflicted upon their members. Frankly, it is way beyond time that religious leaders other than the gay-haters start speaking out loudly and demanding that the media present their side of the issue and not just that of the professional Christians who are Christian in name only. Here are highlights from the Kansas City Star:
*
Hours after giving their blessing to ordaining noncelibate gays and lesbians, leaders of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) declined late Thursday to change the church's definition of marriage, in effect refusing to allow same-sex marriages within their denomination.
*
The gay ordination proposal, which did pass, still must be approved by the majority of the church's 173 local "presbyteries," or district governing bodies, within the next year before it can take effect.
*
Only a few mainstream Christian denominations now conduct same-sex marriages, but many, like the Presbyterians, are debating the issue as uncertainty grows over churches' role in such marriages, now the law of the land in five states and Washington, D.C.
*
Legalized gay marriage "puts pastors in a bind," Bolbach said. "Let's say you have gay or lesbian members of your congregation who want to get married. The law allows it. What are they supposed to do?" The Presbyterians' discussion was "a reflection of what's going on in the secular world," she said.

ELCA Reinstating Two Gay Ministers

While the U.S. military and the Catholic Church continue their witch hunts against gays, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ("ELCA") is reinstating two ministers who had been removed from the list of rostered clergy prior to the vote of the ELCA Churchwide Assembly last August to allow partnered gay clergy. One pastor had remained at his parish as it defied the previous ELCA policy that permitted only celibate gay clergy. As I have noted before, in my opinion, the ELCA offers a wonderful opportunity for LGBT individuals who were raised Catholic to find a church home that mirrors the liturgy of the church they were raised in without being subjected to all of the anti-gay bile that is constantly disseminated by the Catholic Church hierarchy. Here are highlights from the Washington Post:
*
ATLANTA -- A gay Atlanta pastor and his partner who have been at the center of a battle over the treatment of gay clergy by the nation's largest Lutheran denomination are being reinstated to the denomination's clergy roster, church officials announced Tuesday.
*
The Rev. Bradley Schmeling and his partner, the Rev. Darin Easler, have been approved for reinstatement, the Chicago-based Evangelical Lutheran Church in America said in a news release. The approval came roughly eight months after the denomination voted to allow gays and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as clergy, and just weeks after the ELCA's church council officially revised the church's policy on gay ministers.
*
"I'm grateful that this journey has come full circle and that the church has changed its policy," Schmeling said Tuesday. "I think the church saw the gifts and the abilities of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people and saw that the spirit was calling them into ministry and wanted to create a way for people to serve," he said.
*
Even though Schmeling had been removed from the ELCA clergy roster, he remained pastor at St. John's, putting the church in violation of ELCA guidelines, said the Rev. H. Julian Gordy, bishop of the ELCA Southeastern Synod. "There are people in our church that believe that pastors in publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships should not serve as pastors in this church," Gordy said in the church statement. "But the assembly said that while we were not in agreement on this, congregations could call persons in such relationship to serve as pastors, and St. John has chosen to do this." Despite the opposition from some to the change in church policy, "I believe that we will learn to live in this new reality," Gordy said.
*
Schmeling said the reinstatement is good news for others as well. "I'm happy for the many people who always hoped to be ordained as pastors now have an open pathway before them," he said.

Straight Pastors Do Not Know the Suffering of LGBT Lutherans

I have been a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ("ELCA") for over seven years after leaving the Roman Catholic Church in which I was raised because its hierarchy still describes LGBT individuals as "inherently disordered" - talk about the pot calling the kettle black - and accepts us in the Church only so long as we condemn ourselves to a lifetime of celibacy - in short, a cruel life sentence without love and physical intimacy. Two weeks ago the ELCA's Churchwide Assembly took the major step of allowing partnered gay clergy, thereby bringing the ELCA in line with modern medical and mental health knowledge on the immutability of sexual orientation. I have discussed this issue a great deal and now Queerity has several relevant follow up posts that look at the split between homophobic elements in the ELCA who selectively apply a literal application of a few passages in the Bible (while utterly ignoring many others) and progressives and gays within the Church. One post is by a straight pastor who makes a stab at what this change means for LGBT Lutherans and he does a pretty good job:

*

It's easier to hate people when you don't have to look across the table and say “pass the salt” to them. But the witness of the Gospel of Jesus (when we are getting it right) is that everyone means everyone, all are welcome at the table—and that means anti-gay folks as much as gay folks, as hard as that may be. What the “magical homo” did was a very difficult act of justice, kindness, and humble walking with God, when nobody would have been surprised if he were to have acted in vengeance instead (as one queerty.com commentator said: “kick some ass”) and many would have cheered him on. And what I saw again and again on that assembly floor was that gay and lesbian people and their allies (including me) were surprised by the feeling of pain and compassion they experienced when the thing they had longed for finally was reality.

*

Leading up to the vote I wrote all of the voting members attending from the Virginia Synod trying to explain the spiritual harm the denial of full membership in the Church did to its LGBT members. I refer to it as a form of spiritual murder since the message is that if one is gay, you can never, ever be good enough. Thankfully, a majority at the Assembly figured that out. One voting member sent me the following note:

*

Thank you for the communications you provided over the past several weeks. You should know that testimonies like yours were offered throughout the assembly. You should also know that the work on the floor of the assembly was accompanied by many people who sat in the adjacent halls praying for the work of this church. I do not underestimate the power this prayer had in achieving the results of last week. Our work as voting members was only part of the story (albeit the only part reported by the press).

*

The most recent Queerity post on the ELCA is from the perspective of a lesbian pastor from Houston, Texas. She does a great job of holding the Church - that's all Christian churches - for the harm done to LGBT individuals over the centuries. Hopefully, pastors like this one will get the message across to those who would prefer to cling to a few Bible passages and continue to inflict spiritual and psychological harm on other human beings. Here are some highlights:

*

The church, including the Evangelical Church of America, has done great harm to people who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender. Not only has it denied our callings and refused to bless our relationships, it has provided a theological framework for homophobia. This is more than causing pain to us; this is participating in our discrimination.

*

Homosexuality is not wrong, sinful, or deviant. But homophobia is deviant. Heterosexism is sinful. Remaining silent in the face of discrimination is wrong. Homophobia, Heterosexism, and silence have caused many of us to lose our livelihoods, our families, our safety, and even our lives. By providing theological reasons for these sins, the church has participated in this discrimination.

*

The church has also tried to teach us that the love at the center of our beings is sinful, that our sexualities are not created by God, and that the church’s acceptance of us is conditional. The harm caused to our relationships with God is even more violent than the beatings, the murders, some of us have endured. I won’t pretend to know what Pastor Ryan Mills feels [a pastor contemplating leaving the ELCA due to the vote]. But to equivocate the suffering he, and other like him, may be feeling to the queer experience is false and perpetuates discrimination.

*

Mills . . . does now know the pain of having his church profoundly disagree with him on the issue of sexual orientation, and perhaps he knows the pain of wondering whether to go or stay. . . . But to equate those two experiences to the discrimination that LGBT people face is to show that you cannot understand the depth of queer experience.

*

Because we need to truthfully, lovingly, tell those anti-gay sisters and brothers not only that they are wrong, but that they are sinful. I expect my straight allies to take up this work, not ask to be congratulated for the small steps we have taken. And I don’t expect non-Lutheran queer people to celebrate when we reach a compromise that still falls short of the church apologizing for the sin of homophobia, heterosexism, and silence.

*

Personally, I cannot understand anti-gay pastors. Accepting gays - and modern knowledge - costs them nothing other than perhaps taking away the ease with which they have been allowed to feel privileged and felt free to look down on others. In contrast, LGBT Lutherans have been told after years of pain that they are after all fully human. I hope and pray that in time the homophobic elements will come to realize these horrific harm they have done to others and cast aside their anti-gay crutch. Also, with younger generations increasingly rejecting homophobia, these pastors need to realize that their message of exclusion may in time jeopardize the continued existence of their parishes.

Virginia's ELCA Bishop Urges Calm

In the wake of last week's vote by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ("ELCA") to allow rostered clergy in committed same sex relationships, some of the Neanderthal elements within the ELCA have been talking of breaking with the the denomination - all the while ignoring, of course, the fact that they generally do not apply a literal reading of other passages in the Bible. Indeed, they demand a literal application only when it comes to anti-gay passages. I can only assume that it's easy to demand a literal application when it's not you or your loved ones being harmed by such selective interpretations.

*

The irony to me in all of this is the fact that unlike the feudal structure of the Roman Catholic Church where bishops assign pastors and priests with no input from parishes, in the ELCA each parish gets to choose who it wants as senior pastor, with the senior pastor thereafter making selections of the more junior clergy. Therefore, no parish will have partnered gay clergy forced upon them if they suffer from homophobia and selective inerrancy of passages from the Bible. Fortunately, Virginia's bishop, James F. Mauney (pictured above), is trying to calm hysteria and is asking that Virginia Lutherans proceed calmly and with patience for one another as the new policy is implemented. Bishop Mauney is the son of the pastor emeritus of my parish and my subtenant - his staff for his eastern office interact with me and my staff daily. I hope he is successful in calming needless knee jerk reactions and can counsel synod members to act logically. Here are highlights from a Virginian Pilot story:

*

The bishop of Virginia's Evangelical Lutheran Church in America synod counseled patience and respectful listening Monday in response to the denomination's approval of ordination for non celibate gays and lesbians. "The span of reaction will be from rejoicing to grieving, from actively speaking to being unable to speak," Bishop James F. Mauney said Monday in a posting on the synod's Web site, www.vasynod.org.

*

Congregations already have a say in who they hire and will not be forced into receiving a gay or lesbian minister, said Mauney's assistant, the Rev. Jean Bozeman, who represents him in eastern Virginia. "A congregation makes the ultimate decision; this is not a threat to any congregation that they've got to change," Bozeman said Monday in an interview from Minnesota, where the assembly was held.

*

He said procedures for gay ordination "will still be months in considering and developing." Bozeman said that reactions include gloom and happiness, but "there is a large, large group in the middle who still say, 'This is my church and we're going to go right on with the ministry of Jesus Christ.' "

*

Jean Bozeman is a sweetheart and I hope that other Virginia members of the ELCA will take a deep breath and then move forward focusing on being true to Christ's Gospel message rather than a few passages of varied interpretations.

Lutheran Gay Clergy Vote Tests Mainline Churches

As I have previously noted, I am very happy with the vote by the ELCA to adopt both the social statement on human sexuality and the resolution allowing partnered clergy in same sex relationships because at last I feel that I am fully welcomed and part of the church. I will certainly encourage friends who lack church homes because of the sexual orientation to check out the ELCA. But I am also happy with the vote for another reason - it will challenge other churches to accept modern knowledge on sexual orientation and move into the 21st century or remain among the ignorant backward denominations that in time will become increasingly marginalized in time by the younger generations that favor gay marriage. If a denomination wants to become the stronghold for the old and uneducated so be it, but there will ultimately be a cost to be paid. My own children have stated that they will not go to a church that is not gay friendly and up until now have had limited options. A column in the Washington Post looks at the challenge the ELCA has laid down:

*

In breaking down barriers restricting gays and lesbians from the pulpit, the nation's largest Lutheran denomination has laid down a new marker in a debate over the direction of mainline Protestant Christianity, a tradition that once dominated American religious life.

*
By voting Friday to allow gays and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as clergy, the 4.7-million member Evangelical Lutheran Church in America will either show how a church can stand together amid differences, or become another casualty of division over sexual morality and the Bible, observers say. "We're going to be living in tension and ambiguity for a longer time, partly because the culture has shifted," said David Steinmetz, a Duke Divinity School professor of Christian history.

*

The ELCA - the nation's seventh largest Christian church - reached its conclusion after eight years of study and deliberation. That culminated Friday when the church's national assembly in Minneapolis struck down a policy that required any gay and lesbian clergy to remain celibate.

*
The assembly also signed off on finding ways for willing congregations to "recognize, support and hold publicly accountable lifelong, monogamous, same gender relationships." The church fell short of calling that gay marriage, but conservatives see that as the next step. While congregations will not be forced to hire gay clergy, conservative ELCA members decried the decisions as straying from clear Scriptural direction and warned that defections are likely.

*

The ELCA's move is especially jarring and significant because "it is viewed by all of us as one of the more Reformation-rooted, broadly orthodox denominations" and takes its theology seriously, said Richard Mouw, president of the multi-denominational and evangelical Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif.

*

Barbara Wheeler, a former president of Auburn Theological Seminary in New York who is now director of the school's Center for the Study of Theological Education, praised the ELCA for laying a theological foundation for Friday's vote by first approving a broad social statement on sexuality. . . . "What you're seeing is two things: The society is in the process of changing its collective mind about the moral status of same-sex relationships, and there's a parallel theological movement."

*

Conservative ELCA members have warned of damaged relationships with Lutherans in other countries. While Lutherans in Europe and Scandinavia are to the left of the ELCA on homosexuality, African and Asian Lutherans have been taught a more conservative line by missionaries and theologians, said the Rev. Conrad Braaten, senior pastor of Church of the Reformation, an ELCA congregation in Washington, D.C. Braaten is optimistic the ELCA can hold together through the sexuality tensions.

*

Braaten is optimistic the ELCA can hold together through the sexuality tensions. "This particular discussion has been going on with a lot of deep feelings in the Lutheran church, but not a lot of acrimony and not a lot of bridges being burnt," he said. "I think that's going to make a difference."

*

For readers in search of a church home, please consider the ELCA - I would love to have the church expand because of this bold decision and further pressure other denominations to move into the 21st century or run the risk of dying out.

ELCA Assembly Opens Ministry to Partnered Gays and Lesbians

Wow!!!! I am happy and amazed that all four resolutions passed and that now gay and lesbian Lutherans will be truly full members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ("ECLA") which has followed the ranks of a number of its sister churches in granting gays and lesbians full membership in the Church, including as rostered clergy. Frankly, I was very afraid that the conservative elements would prevail and torpedo the effort to be inclusive of partnered gay clergy. I only hope that the Church will not see the hate and division experienced by the Episcopal Church based on outdated knowledge and bigotry of parishes aligning themselves under ractionary African Bishops. I can just image the foaming at the mouth and flying spittle that will be coming forth among the anti-gay professional Christian set. Here are some highlights from the ELCA website:

*

The 2009 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) voted today to open the ministry of the church to gay and lesbian pastors and other professional workers living in committed relationships. The action came by a vote of 559-451 at the highest legislative body of the 4.6 million member denomination. Earlier the assembly also approved a resolution committing the church to find ways for congregations that choose to do so to "recognize, support and hold publicly accountable life-long, monogamous, same gender relationships," though the resolution did not use the word "marriage." The actions here change the church's policy, which previously allowed gays and lesbians into the ordained ministry only if they remained celibate.

*

But others said a greater acceptance of people who are gay and lesbian in the church was consistent with the Bible. Bishop Gary Wollersheim of the ELCA Northern Illinois Synod said, "It's a matter of justice, a matter of hospitality, it's what Jesus would have us do." Wollersheim said he had been strongly influenced by meetings with youth at youth leadership events in his synod, a regional unit of the ELCA. Some speakers contend that the actions taken here will alienate ELCA members and cause a drop in membership. But Allison Guttu of the ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod said, "I have seen congregations flourish while engaging these issues; I have seen congregations grow recognizing the gifts of gay and lesbian pastors."

*

What I find of interest is that as I posted a while back, it is the denominations with the highest average level of education - i.e., the Episcopal Church and the ELCA - are the most gay accepting while those with the lowest levels of education - i.e., evangelical and Pentecostal denominations - are the most homophobic. This certainly suggests that homophobia and intellectually ignorance go hand in hand. I am very, very proud of the ELCA's bold and correct action.

ELCA Churchwide Assembly - 1st Update

In what appears to be a positive move for gay-friendly issues that will come before the Assembly, an effort to require a super majority vote for changing policies on partnered same sex clergy was defeated. Therefore, a vote to change the current policy which bars same sex clergy in committed relationships will only require a simple majority vote for approval; Here are highlights from the ELCA news service:

*

MINNEAPOLIS (ELCA) -- Voting members of the biennial assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America turned back a motion that would have required a two-thirds majority for changes in policies relating to the rostering of clergy, associates in ministry, diaconal ministers and deaconesses. The vote, with 57 percent in opposition, came late in the evening of the first day of the gathering. A vote to allow people living in committed same-gender relationships to be on the professional rosters of the ELCA is scheduled for Friday, Aug. 21. The action leaves in place a recommendation that a simple majority vote be sufficient for the proposed policy changes.

*

No doubt the reactionary elements within the ELCA will not be pleased by this situation. I will continue to hope that the ELCA accepts modern knowledge on sexual orientation and the fact that snake oil ex-gay therapies do NOT work as recently recognized by the American Psychological Association.

A Letter to the ELCA

In August of this year the Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ("ELCA") will be taking up two action items that - if approved - could make the ELCA one of the most gay affirming mainline denominations. One item is a social statement on human sexuality that would recognize gay relationships even if not granting the title :marriage." The second issue is that of allowing partnered gays to be rostered clergy. The committees formulating the two policy changes recommend them for approval, but there's no telling how voting members at the Assembly will vote. Since I am sure that the opponents of gay rights within the ELCA will be vocal in their opposition, I wrote a letter to the voting members who will be attending from the Virginia Synod. I hope others in the ELCA who seek full membership for LGBT members will do likewise. Here is the text of my letter:

*

I am writing you because it is my understanding that you will be a voting member at the August, 2009, Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (“ELCA”) where two of the action items have special significance to me. One concerns the proposed modification of Ministry Policies and would allow partnered gays to be rostered clergy. The other deals with approval of the social statement “Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust.” As a gay member of First Lutheran Church Norfolk I want to share my prospective on why approval of both action items is so very important. Indeed, I believe that approval of these items is a tremendously necessary step toward ending what I see as the spiritual murder of gays and lesbians by Christian denominations.

*
Words cannot adequately express the fear and often terrible self-hatred that one experiences growing up and coming to the realization that you are homosexual in our sexual orientation. For years I wondered why God has cursed me so and I tried prayer and other means to “change” myself to no avail. Yes, you can try to repress and deny the reality – and I did this for literally decades – but the truth is that one cannot change one’s sexual orientation, a fact now recognized by all of the legitimate medical and mental health associations in the United States but still ignored by the majority of Christian denominations. To be told that you are sinful and until recently criminalized takes a tremendous toll on one’s life and can lead to a life filled with unhappiness. In fact, I know of several gay men personally who committed suicide because they could not “change” and live in accord with what their churches taught them. One was a Lutheran. Then there are others I know who have been enrolled in bogus “ex-gay ministries” – often by their families - and come out still gay, but severely emotionally damaged. A few I know have become alcoholics as a result and others have felt no recourse but to walk away from a faith tradition that only condemns them.

*
In my own case, I married a woman and fathered three wonderful children. However, in the process I always maintained a “glass wall” between myself and my former wife, my children, and virtually everyone in my live. I lived as an actor on perpetual stage so than no one would learn of my terrible secret. The result was that I wasn’t the husband and father I should have been and I lived a life of constant fear of discovery and emotional isolation and self hate. Eventually I reached a point where I had to either face who/what I really was or end my life (something I have tried to do on two occasions, once almost succeeding). At this point in my life, I have (i) ended my marriage in a horrific divorce where I was treated exceedingly harshly due to my sexual orientation and (ii) finally come to terms with and accepted my sexual orientation. I am now in a committed loving relationship with a wonderful man who is one of the kindest, most compassionate, and most Christian acting in his actions towards others people I have ever met. I truly do not believe that God looks harshly on our love and relationship.
*

By approving the new social statement on human sexuality and the revision of the Ministry Policies, the ELCA will be sending a long overdue message to gay Lutherans and other gay Christians that they are not cursed by God and that they are children of God as well. Selective parsing of the Bible or fear of change should not be used to perpetuate a message of shame and hate against gays and lesbians and the transgendered. Unless and until partnered gay clergy are allowed by the ELCA, the continued message to gay/lesbian members will be that they are not truly welcomed or considered as equal members of the Church. You can help stop the spiritual murder of so many.

*

I urge you from the bottom of my heart to vote for approval of both of these measures.

North Dakota Lutheran Synod Votes No on Gay Clergy

I and many other gay ELCA Lutherans will be watching to see the out come of the Churchwide Assembly in Minneapolis in August, 2009, when the ELCA will vote on giving parishes the option to roster partnered gay clergy. Sadly, the reactionary forces prevailed in a vote in the Eastern North Dakota Synod. I intend to write to each of the voting delegates from the Virginia Synod who will be attending the Churchwide Assembly in the hope of conveying to them the message that a "no" vote sends to gay Lutherans, not to mention the younger generations that favor the recognition of gay unions. A denomination can say all it wants about treating gays with dignity, etc., but if it will not recognize our committed relationships, the true message is that we are not welcome and/or that we are less than full members. The Advocate as a story on the unfortunate vote in the East North Dakota synod. Here are some highlights:

*

Delegates at the annual assembly of the Eastern North Dakota Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted 187 to 167 on Sunday to reject a proposal to allow gay clergy members to be in same-sex relationships, reports the Associated Press. Congregations in the 4.7 million–member ELCA currently are voting on whether to allow openly gay clergy members to be in monogamous same-sex relationships. The present policy allows clergy members to be openly gay, but requires them to be celibate. Input from the 65 individual synods will be considered when the national ELCA votes on the issue at its Churchwide Assembly in Minneapolis in August.

*

In February, a task force of the ELCA recommended that the church allow gays and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as clergy. The task force also asked that the church respect congregations that disagree. It proposed a social statement, “Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust,” that recognizes marriage as a covenant between a man and a woman, but also acknowledges same-sex couples.

*

I sincerely hope that a majority of the voting attendees at the Churchwide Assembly will vote yes and save the denomination from being viewed in the future as akin to denominations that voted in the past to support slavery and other deprivations of civil rights to their fellow man.

Partnered Gay Selected as Pastor of Lutheran Church

Come August of this year, a vote will be before the Church Wide Meeting of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ("ELCA") as to whether or not gay pastors in committed same-sex relationships should be permitted as rostered clergy. There are definitely reactionary elements within the ELCA that are as anti-gay as some of the professional Christians and as self-righteous and sanctimonious as the Pharisees of the Bible. Fortunately, their cause to block gay clergy suffered at least a temporary blow when a leadership board of rejected a proposal to require a two-thirds vote on the question of allowing gay pastors. Now, approval of the measure - which would permit gay clergy in the church, but leave it up to individual synods and congregations whether to appoint gay pastors - will require only a simple majority vote. Something that may well be achievable. Meanwhile, however, some parishes are forging ahead without waiting for the larger Church to catch up with the social changes that have swept through society. One such parish is Calvary Lutheran in Minnesota. Here are some highlights on that parish's actions from Yahoo News:

*

Brad Froslee was installed as pastor of Calvary Lutheran Church at a special Sunday service attended by dozens of his fellow pastors, as well as Froslee's proud parents and grandmother, all devoted lifelong Lutherans.

*

But the Minneapolis Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America officially lists Calvary's ministry as vacant. That's because, sitting with Froslee's family at his installation ceremony in February, was his male partner of 5 1/2 years — living proof that Froslee has flouted the ELCA's prohibition on non-celibate gay pastors.

*

Froslee and the church and synod leaders are operating on what church council member Brian Aust called "the margins of the ELCA." It's an arrangement that could be formalized this August, when leaders of the ELCA — the nation's largest Lutheran denomination with 4.7 million members — meet for their biannual convention in Minneapolis.

*

But the approach envisioned by the task force is already in practice at Calvary Lutheran, a modest 70-year-old brown brick church in a racially diverse neighborhood four miles south of downtown Minneapolis. The 120-member congregation is a mix of young families and single people, middle-aged couples and older established members, and is mostly white despite the surrounding neighborhood.

*

Before joining Calvary, Froslee served as pastor at a Presbyterian church in Minnetonka through a pact between the two denominations. He's also been an activist on issues of homosexuality and Christianity, co-founding a summer camp for gay, Christian youth. And even after meeting his partner, he stayed on the ELCA's roster of pastors eligible to serve in Lutheran congregations — which got his name in front of the Calvary committee looking for the new pastor.

*

Aust, an attorney who chaired that committee, said Calvary wasn't looking for trouble. "Our simple motivation was find the best person, gay or straight. It wasn't about labels," he said. The Minneapolis Synod of the ELCA signed off on the arrangement, but lists Calvary's ministry as vacant. "We viewed it as a decision for the congregation to make," said Minneapolis Synod Bishop Craig Johnson.

*

Rev. Peter Strommen, a pastor from Prior Lake, Minn., who led the task force that proposed the policy change, said it's an attempt to officially recognize the lack of consensus across the ELCA.
With rapid social change on gay rights even in recent weeks, including the sudden legalization of gay marriage in Vermont and Iowa, he said the Lutheran church must find a way to proceed amid strongly divergent viewpoints.

*

While hardly perfect, I have found the ELCA to be light years ahead of the Roman Catholic Church and recommend that gay Catholics who are tired of being maligned in their parishes or who have ceased going to church to give the ELCA a look. You might be well pleased with what you find.