...The problem lies in the ignorance of what homosexuality is, and in misunderstood/ mistranslated biblical passages. Sexuality is not a choice. Let me ask all heterosexuals reading this: When did you ‘choose’ to become heterosexual? I suspect the answer is ‘I always was, it was never a question’. The same is the case for homosexuals. There is no choice. The choice is to be honest and admit it – not hide it. This is the true meaning of the passage in Romans 1 ‘25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie’ (Romans 1:25). When one denies the nature that God created, when one tries to live a life that is a lie – hiding who they are, that is when they come under the punishment of God. The only choice that homosexuals make is to be honest with themselves and their God and those around them. Forcing people to live a life that is a lie is forcing people to hell. It is just as much a sin for a homosexual person to live a heterosexual life (or even deny their homosexuality), as it is for a heterosexual to live a homosexual life. When we re-translate the traditional passages that are used to condemn homosexuality in the light of cultural understanding at the time, and better understandings of the language, we find there is not a single passage in the entire Bible that even mentions homosexuality in relation to sin, let alone condemns it. The condemnation comes from the church and the church alone. There is no divine authority for it. Homosexuality is not a sin – at least not one as defined by the Bible or God.
This poses a greater problem for conservatives within the church. Such attitudes as expressed against homosexuality ALWAYS end in hatred, prejudice, violence, and murder. Christ said ‘By their fruit you will recognize them.’ (Mat. 7:16). If the fruit of such teaching ends in violence and murder, then where did the teaching come from? Did it come from the God of Love? How can hatred and violence and murder come from love? 1 John 4:7-8 “7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” Whenever a message is preached, or an attitude expressed that says something along the lines of ‘God hates.....’, you can be sure the person preaching it (at least according to scripture) does not know God, let alone preach in Gods’ name.
I know that many within The Salvation Army would condemn the violence that led to Ian Baynham’s death. Yet the very position of The Salvation Army supports it and preaches it. The Salvation Army condemns vilification of people for any reason, yet it is indeed common practice for The Salvation Army to terminate a person’s employment on the grounds that they are gay, or to deny them access to social services, or to refuse to employ someone for no other reason than the fact they are gay. In countries like Australia, they hide behind the anti-discrimination legislation, which exempts religious bodies from adhering to non-discriminatory practices.
The reality is that there is no difference between the person who says ‘love the sinner and hate the sin’ – in relation to homosexuality – and the people who murdered Ian Baynham and many others before him – still in recent memory. All such people will be held to account before Christ on the day of judgement for their deaths, for the violence perpetrated in the name of God, for the violence that was insighted by people professing a God of love.
The time is right I believe, for a new and honest discussion on the subject of homosexuality. I believe that the acts that results in so many deaths around the world will not cease until the church positively tackles the teaching within its own ranks which incites such behaviour. We are dealing with life and death. In the memory of those who have been killed standing up for what is right, let us bravely tackle this together.
Graeme RandallFormer
Australia
19 comments:
The Church revolves around two axes: a global and a historical. We may belong to a local church and we live in the 21st century, but we must always consider our connectedness with all Christians in all countries throughout all centuries.
We recently organized a global consultation on Business as Mission at Wheaton College, USA. The eclectic group was a visible reminder of the global Church and the diversity among Christians. We were theologians, bishops, priests and NGO leaders; we were business leaders leading SME’s, oil companes and Fortune 500 companies, experts from the World Bank and professors of Economics, we were lawyers and owners of a major stock exchange in Africa; we were Roman Catholics and Evangelicals, we were from all continents.
After the consultation I attended the Holy Liturgy at a church in Wheaton belonging to the Orthodox Church of America. There are approximately 3 million Orthodox Christians in USA, Mexico and Canada. The church was established by Russian Orthodox missionaries who came to Alaska in the 1820s. The profound and tradition filled liturgy, with incense and ancient songs, firmly roots you in the other axis of the church – the historical one.
I was reminded about GK Chesterton's famous quote: "Tradition means giving a vote to most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our father."
PS. The Church of Sweden, Lutheran and former state church, recently decided to introduce a gay marriage ceremony in the church, thus blatantly ignoring Christian beliefs and traditions held by the Church worldwide for 2000 years. This begs the question: Has the church of Sweden cut itself off from the two axes of the church? Has it given in to “the arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about”?
Mats Tunehag
blog
Graeme, I respect your decision and voice, however, it would appear that you have misstated the army's position, perhaps not intentionally, in a most unfortunate way. You wrote: "The Salvation Army (will) deny them (gays) access to social services, or to refuse to employ someone for no other reason than the fact they are gay.
I'm certain many readers found your statement wrong and misleading; I know of no instance, ever, where services, social or religious were denied a gay person in the USA Western Territory, or elsewhere for that matter.
We did stand firm on employment policies. "The Salvation Army lost $3.5 million in social-service contracts with San Francisco because it refused, on religious grounds, to provide benefits to same-sex partners of its employees." It cost us dearly, but God provided the necessary resources as a reward, I believe, due our standing firm.
Former
USA WT
Graeme
While I had some sympathy and agreed somewhat with your first part of this post I find this one to be one that I find little to agree with.
Again I am not going to get into quoting Scripture and arguing the point because I do not think that will change your views nor help this discussion.
I think you are wrong in suggesting that God has created some people as homosexual. Your contention here leads one to the conculsion that homosexual sexual activity within the bounds of "marriage" is part of God's plan.
I totally disagree with you and somewhat akin to Mats comments in the first comment here I would say that your posts are suggesting that we give in to "the arrogant oligarchy of those who want to interpret Scripture to allow for them ownh personal sin to to be wrong">
John Stephenson
Canada
Thank God He is the judge, and not you or me! And one thing we do know; He is faithful, just and loving.
We, like many others could argue ... debate backwards and forwards until we are blue in the face on this issue.
All I can say is:
'Many are the things I cannot understand
All above me mystery I see
But the thing most wonderful from God's own hand
Surely is His gift of grace to me.'
God bless you!
Active UKT
We featured the below debate in our blog some months ago.
Should one be surprised that the Swedes have divorced themselves from centuries of church tradition when 97% of them only step inside the church doors for funerals and the odd wedding ceremony? The country still has more people living together outside of marriage than most other countries. The majority of people who get married today have already lived together and many of them also have children.
Anglo-Swedish rift over church gay marriage
Published: 16 Jul 09 15:51 CET
Dictionary The Church of England has condemned a proposal by the Church of Sweden to grant same-sex couples the right to religious wedding ceremonies.
In a sharply worded letter to Swedish archbishop Anders Wejryd, two high ranking bishops from the Church of England call the proposal “problematic”, adding that it risks causing “an impairment of the relationships between the churches”.
“What is now proposed appears to be a fundamental re-definition of the Christian doctrine of marriage and of basic Christian anthropology,” charge English bishops Christopher Hill and John Hind in the letter.
The critique comes following March correspondence from Archbishop Wejryd in which he informed his colleagues in England of ongoing discussions within the Lutheran Church of Sweden about allowing gay marriages in Swedish churches.
…But according to the Church of England, “it is not right either to bless same-sex sexual relationships or to ordain those who are involved in them.”
The critique, in addition to expressing concerns about the Church of Sweden’s stance on gay marriage, appears to also be a less-than subtle reference to the recent election of Eva Brunne, an openly gay woman, to be Bishop of Stockholm.
The Church of England also criticizes its Swedish counterpart’s stance on same-sex marriage as simply bowing to “a wider shift within Western culture and theology” in which “the idea of a fundamental distinction between the genders is seen as irrelevant”.
An extension of the Church of Sweden’s logic, according to the two English bishops, is that marriage is something which could be “gender neutral”.
“This position would be odds with the biblical teaching about the significant of God’s creation of human beings as male and female,” the two bishops write.
Bishops Hill and Hind also charge that the Church of Sweden, in considering religious ceremonies for same-sex couples, is failing to stand up for its fundamental beliefs.
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To read more, go to: http://www.cofe.anglican.org/info/ccu/europe/notices/replytoabsweeden.pdf
Graeme,
I feel that you are promoting sin. Let us stand up for those persecuted and hurt regardless of their choices. Let us love them and serve them and assist with social services. Let us not make them leaders in the church to promote their personal sinful agendas unless they are "formers" of the type of sin listed in I Corinthians 6:8-10. I have seen much of the sexual sin in the Army. Much of it has been permitted. That is wrong also. The problem is that the Bible is not being followed and understood. To your credit the part about love, care and understanding is overlooked. Judgement is coming. The Army has some blame here through certain leaders. You need to be responsible to the Word and God as a Christian. You are ripping apart basic and "specific" teaching about some sexual sin in the Bible that was condemned long ago. If we are to trust that the Bible is truth and that God never changes then you are dead wrong. If God has changed his mind about sexual sin and the Bible is wrong, why not dabble in a few other questionable choices also?
I find myself asking a question when it pertains to my wants , my desires and my lifestle. What would Jesus do? As human beings, God will let us choose.He will give us up to a reprobate mind if we continue to go deeper into sin and reject His will for our lives.
I appreciate your openness and opinion. I think that you are twisting the teaching of God's truth and you need to be aware of that danger.
It begins in a very subtle way until you are overtaken and lose all feeling for God's voice.
Disagrement on this topic will continue. As Christians we do have a standard and a "rule" of measurement to follow. We must check our hearts and let the Lord speak to us. Is He telling us to hate gays ? Is He telling two men to have sex with one another? I would have to say no to both questions.
Blessings
USA East former
Graeme, you and others who support a gay lifestyle, AND defend it through 'cut and paste' theology are on a slippery slope... you're already sliding beyond the Bible's complete truths. Situational ethics at its best.
"He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God." (Micah 6:8) Help us to receive the Word in our hearts today.
Former
UKT
Graeme, opposition to same-sex intercourse or other same sex practice, gay or lesbian, is not a "sexual prejudice". A "prejudice" is "a judgment or opinion formed without knowing the facts or in spite of the facts" (Webster).
In this case, knowing what Scripture says and why it says it decidedly favours those who lovingly and humbly hold to an "other-sexual" (heterosexual) prerequisite for acceptable sexual behavior. The real "sexual prejudice" is the insistence that such a prerequisite is inconsequential to Scripture and inconsequential to Jesus. Conforming oneself to homoerotic desires, like conformity to any sexual impulses that God deems immoral, is "conformity to this world" and the opposite of "transformation by the renewal of the mind" (Rom 12:2). At least this is what Paul, Jesus, and the whole of Scripture tell us.
Former
Residing in the UK
One of the things that I have found to be a blessing and a struggle as a former officer its the freedom to not tow the party line.
I think the article hits not only at the question of homosexuality but to the far reaching topic of Biblical authority and interpretation.
I have come to appreciate that our faith tradition holds experience, tradition, reason and Scripture to be the tools that God has given us as we live the Kingdom life here and now. I also, to quote Borg, take the Bible seriously while not always taking it literally.
Interpretion of Scripture is by nature subjective. There is a joke that a heretic is the label for someone who does not believe as you do. In essence, the debate is not about whether or not Scripture is authoritative, it is whose interpretation of Scripture is more authoritative.
God has called us to live out the Gospel message of his Kingdom here and now- to live a life of love today. For myself, I see my "job" as being the best representative of that kingdom message to whomever I meet- to be a bearer of Good News. I am a more reserved person- I livein my head. But the call, as I have experienced is to become a better lover (not necessarily in the romantic sense).
My job is not to judge, preach against or propogate hate. I can't set myself up as Judge- i am not God. And I can see such a lack of love in my own life- times when i am impatient, selfish, stubborn. Those are real crimes or sins- when I forget that I am on this love journey.
As a Christian, my aim is to love others the way that I am loved- without limits, conditions, provisos (and forgive me, but love the sinner, hate the sin- is a condition).
I firmly believe that on that Day, God will not care if i have correct doctrine, or correct belief or correct interpretation of Scripture. God will ask if I have loved others as He has loved me. Because that is the only distinguishing mark to show to whom I belong. We will be known by our love.
Those in the LGBT community do not need our condemnation or judgment- but they do need our love and friendship.
We were having a discussion with our older children on this subject. And my daughter who is 12 now said something that struck me. She said she didn't think God really cared so much about who we loved. She said she thought God would be glad that someone was loved and loved others. And she thought it was peculiar that there was such hatred (her words) towards gays from the church- because weren't we supposed to love everyone?
I know people will brush off my comments and disagree with me. That is okay. Perhaps even call me a heretic- but that is okay too (i will be in good company).
I think we should leave the judging to God (he's far more qualified) and instead of preaching against anything, make sure our lives are a living sermon or representation to the "more excellent way" of the Good News of Jesus.
many blessings
Tina Paddock
Former, Canada
Anglicans snub Swedish lesbian bishop
Published: 4 Nov 09 15:10 CET
Anglican bishops from England and Northern Ireland have rebuffed invitations to attend the ordination of the openly gay Eva Brunne to be the next Bishop of Stockholm.
Five bishops from various levels within the Anglican Church, including Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, have decided not to attend the November 8th ceremony, the Dagen newspaper reports.
“The Anglican Church has a moratorium right now concerning the ordination of bishops who live together with someone of the same sex,” Alan Harper, a bishop from Armagh in Northern Ireland, told the newspaper.
Coming just three weeks after Sweden granted same-sex marriages the same legal status as those between heterosexual couples, Brunne’s appointment in May 2009 to be the next bishop of the Church of Sweden’ Stockholm Diocese raised eyebrows in Sweden and abroad.
As the Church of Sweden has taken a more welcoming stance toward homosexuality, exemplified most recently in the October 22nd decision to allow church weddings for gay couples, its relations with the Church of England have become increasingly strained.
Brunne, who lives with Church of Sweden pastor Gunilla Lindén, was first ordained as a pastor in 1978 in Lund in southern Sweden, before moving to Stockholm in 2006.
She is set to be ordained as a bishop in Uppsala in eastern Sweden alongside another female pastor, Tuulikki Koivunen Bylund, who will take over as Bishop of Härnösand in northern Sweden.
Swedish Archbishop Anders Wejryd, who will conduct the ordination of Brunne and Koivunen Bylund, disputed the claim that the Church of England was somehow boycotting the ceremony.
“That’s not true at all,” he told the Kyrkans Tidning (The Church Times) newspaper.
“We send invitations to those with the highest rank. That’s why the Archbishop of Canterbury received an invitation, but no one expected him to say yes.”
In addition to some bishops from the Churches of England and Ireland, the churches of Iceland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as the World Lutheran Federation have also elected to skip the ordination, although without providing any specific reason.
David Landes, Sweden
I'm still hanging in there with you Graeme. I fully support your stance and as one of the blog resident heretics am glad to see someone else take up for the non tradional stances. I believe the church history shows it has made many mistakes in the past and time will prove this (anti gay) to be just one more.
I often wonder about the push of the gay lifestyle. I have seen tons of money donated toward the cause of gay rights and passions. Pepsi-Frito Lay Corporation not only supports this agenda but pushes it down the throats of it's employees. For the freedom of a few , the rights and freedom of others is now and in the future to be denied. I see many dangers ahead. You see often agendas come in package deals.Feelers are put out. What is next?
Here are some areas that are mentioned to defend a lifestyle that the Bible condemns.
"We should never judge", "The Bible is outdated", "The Bible is not interpreted correctly" , "You are close minded","You are mean spirited", "Jesus would not rebuke a gay person because He loves them", "The Old Testament or New Testament is outdated", " That is not what God meant", On and On it goes. Oh yes,"There is no right or wrong", "It is all relative"
Church discipline and teaching will eventually be out the door. We are (and have been for some time) living in an age of do what you want and let everyone else pay for the consequences.
In the future, The Bible , The Ten Commandments and most anything Christian will be condemned.
Like it or not, The United States was founded by godly men. Many were Christians. Many of them stated that for a democracy to be effective and for leaders to make good decisions they needed reliance upon God as well as the people at large. Mention of the Bible was frequent but warnings were mentioned of having a state sanctioned "religion" or church or denomination. God and His word is thrown out because of a few these days and it will only get worse. Christians are to be like salt and share His love and His ways but those freedoms will be lost one day.
It is not adultery that keeps a person out of the kingdom of God. It is not being a killer, thief, child-molester , wife-beater , sex outside of marriage, or lying. It is when people reject the regeneration through the Spirit of God that one is denied entrance to the kingdom of God. When that happens an individual will want to please God and leave selfish desires behind so that they may minister to the addict, adulterer , lesbian, killer, gay-bashers. God is our Judge and He uses "Standards" , His word, to judge because he knows all and has grace and mercy and holiness surpass our understanding.His grace does not go beyond the grave! If someone dies
attempting to defend their rights to sin and attempts to reason with God to just look the other way, I shudder to think what is next.
The Apostle Paul stated that "It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the Living God"
I wonder,why the push for the gay lifestyle?
Could there be something much deeper going on these days? Is satan pushing issues upon us in these last days? Twist the truth. Make people battle one another. Push hate. Be permmisive. Anything goes.Don't mention Jesus.What I do is my business. On and On it goes. Where it stops...nobody knows. Some people are playing with life and death.What would Jesus do?
USA Eastern Territory former
Maine Voters Reject Gay Marriage
by SUSAN SHARON
November 4, 2009 from MPBN
Same-sex marriage advocates put together a massive campaign war chest, outspending opponents by a wide margin. They pounded the pavement and hit the airwaves and the blogosphere with a message of fairness and equality.
But the message did not connect with a majority of Maine voters. And that was a profound disappointment for a crowd of several hundred who showed up at a hoped-for victory party in a Portland hotel ballroom Tuesday night.
Marc Mutty, campaign chairman of Stand for Marriage Maine said: "Let's be clear. What the people of Maine had to say was that marriage matters, and it's between a man and a woman. This has never been about hating anyone, hating gays or anything. This has been about marriage, and only about marriage and preserving it."
...
Of the five states that have legalized same-sex marriage, four are in New England; 31 states have now rejected same-sex marriage by referendum.
Active US East
What more could you want Deb's? Sounds pretty good to me and if necessary I am sure God will help you sort the other things out once you reach heaven. However, I rather think they will pale into insignificance there and will no longer matter.
GBY real good!
I am so thankful that we can have open, safe, loving dialogue on the issues that concern us both personally as well as corporately.
Perhaps in process we may want to be reminded that not everyone in the church has a "hate the sinner" theology, I believe they are a vocal minority. I would argue that the majority of us love without condemnation in an attempt to understand and walk alongside every child of God while believing what we believe.
An opposing view does not denote hate or intolerance, rather simply an opposing view.
Humbly I would ask to keep in mind when we lump every person who believes certain things as "haters" this can be hurtful to those of us who have determined and spent our entire lives and ministries to be "lovers"
Former USA East
Love you GBY real good! Always a word to tie it all up and make me smile.
as this is such a painful issue, can anyone point me/us to solid study on the topic?
JoAnn
USEast, active
JoAnn and colleagues, Wesleyan inspired scholar, Brian Dodd, concludes his stance as follows: (as an active salvationist I concur with him and believe he represents our army's view)
---------------------------
Even though it is clear that Paul, like Judaism before him, identifies homoeroticism as another instance of sexual immorality, its inclusion in this vice list is incidental to the heterosexual immoral practices that he must treat in an extended way in this section of 1 Corinthians. This does not reduce the relevance of 1 Cor 6:9-1 1 as support for the traditional Christian stance, but it does point out a log-in-the-eye syndrome that currently plagues those who are rightly convinced of the biblical foundation for maintaining “fidelity in marriage and celibacy in singleness.” Recent statistics, in addition to the balance of Paul’s text, suggest that pastoral stress needs to fall upon heterosexual indifference to the biblical teaching about the appropriate expression of sexuality. By the mid-1980s one-half of all couples getting married had cohabited. In 1990 there were 2.9 million households in America where the partners were not married, and a third of those had children under fifteen living with them (L.F. Bouvier and C.J. DeVita, “The Baby Boom—Entering Midlife,” Population Bulletin 46.3 [Population Reference Bureau, 1991]), and this is to say nothing about the predominant ethos of a sex-crazed society characterized by promiscuity. Homosexuality is a small issue by comparison, comprising less than 10 per cent of the population (a recent survey funded by the Wellcome Trust suggests that 2 per cent of the population has had at least one homosexual partner in the last five years [A. Johnson et aI., Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (Blackwell Scientific Publications, 1994) ch. 7]). In our quest to understand and embody scriptural holiness we must be evenhanded in our application of Scripture with the full conviction that the moral change Christ brings affects all people alike: “fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, those who practice homosexuality, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers” (1 Cor 6:9-10). These things we were, but baptism into Christ yields a cleansing and conversion through the power of the Spirit to live in holy obedience to God (1 Cor 6:11).
USA
I would agree that at times there is an imbalance of focusing on specific sexual sin and issues and not other sin mentioned in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11.It is difficult to state which sin is worse. That is where the Judge of us all comes into the picture.All sin is emnity before God, even stretching the truth or the sin of ommission.What is worse ?A drunk that beats his wife or a gay couple that support raising a child that no one else will love and take into their home? We face many challenges. I would much rather beat on and bash the drunk then any gay person, but that is not right either. When we feel any tendency to do evil and act selfishly we do need to seek the power of the Holy Spirit. God can give us liberty and the will to choose wisely.
USA East Former
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