Groups Within UMC Confront Denomination's Scripture-Affirming Rulings
With all do respect to my Methodist brothers and sisters who are true to God's Word, do these groups within your fellowship know what a Bible is and how to read it? I have to suspect not...
I recommend reading the book of Leviticus and then hope over to 1 Corinthians. It's pretty clear what God thinks about homosexuality.
(AgapePress) - A coalition of groups related to the United Methodist Church is calling on the denomination to reverse rulings by its highest court that went against homosexuals.
The "Here We Stand" coalition has issued a statement urging the UMC to "embody God's love" by reversing a Judicial Council decision that allowed a Virginia pastor to deny church membership to an unrepentant homosexual man. One of the signatories, retired clergyman Gilbert Caldwell with the group "United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church," likens "discrimination" against homosexuals in the United Methodist Church to racial prejudice blacks encountered during the civil rights era.
"One justifies prejudice or exclusion because one bases one's exclusion on a negative stereotype," says Caldwell, "whether we're talking about women, whether we're talking about blacks, whether we're talking about gay persons."
Caldwell, author of the new book What Mean These Stones, equates the UMC's ban on homosexual clerty to "the Republican Party's southern political strategy of an earlier time."
He asserts that within the UMC "the ban against gays in the clergy, the hesitation about gay persons in some churches, represents a political strategy that sort of plays on the emotions of people." In fact, he adds, he believes it "denigrates and minimizes the depth of our faith in who we say we are as a people called United Methodists."
But such assertions are "absurd," says Mark Tooley, a Methodist activist with the Institute on Religion and Democracy. "Those who are attempting to overthrow the Church's standards on Christian sexual teachings," he contends, "have responded to these rulings with great hyperbole and exaggeration and a lot of apocalyptic rhetoric."
Tooley maintains that recent Judicial Council rulings simply affirm scriptural and church teaching that sex is reserved for heterosexual marriage.
posted by Steve | 12/22/2005 10:12:00 AM
6 Comments:
Uh, I dont believe there is a comparison to blacks and homosexuals. They are black by birth - that is their heritage. Homosexuals are not homosexual by birth, but by choice. Any church that would approve membership to a homosexual is a church that I do not want to be affiliated with and neither should any other Bible-believing Christian. What is wrong with those people? Maybe they should move to Canada.
I should clarify that I believe you should love the sinner but hate the sin - I just cannot comprehend a church (any denomination) that would approve membership to a practicing homosexual. They need to take a long look at the handbook (the Bible) and see what God has to say about homosexuals. I believe that there is no way they could find justification for their actions.
I totally agree. The Bible just is not up to interpetation.
And yes you are right. Despite the strong words I use here on the blog, I do love these people as a Christian and hope they are willing to put aside their sinfull ways and accept what the Bible says.
Actually, everyone "interprets" the Bible (meaning no one takes everything literally), no matter what side of a given debate you come out on. If you read and believe all of Leviticus, you should not eat shrimp or cheeseburgers or wear polyester-cotton clothing. A child who disobeys his or her parents can (and should) be stoned, and a couple who has sex when the woman has her period should be cast out from the people. The Bible was long interpreted as supporting slavery. Divorce was permitted in Jesus' day, but he evidently opposed it.
Homosexuality is not a choice, any more than heterosexuality is. And the Bible does not say anything about homosexual orientation - it is only in the past couple centuries that society has recognized that a certain percentage of the population tend to fall in love with and be attracted to people of the same sex, not the opposite sex.
Today we have different understandings of cleanliness and disease, of social relations and economics, of biology, sociology, and psychology, from when the Bible was written. I do not expect you to change your mind about anything just from reading my thoughts, but I hope you will at least acknowledge that "Bible-believing Christians" may disagree with one another without one group needing to move to Canada. (Which, by the way, says a lot about your identification with American culture over a non-nationalistic faith in Jesus Christ.)
Hi Kerry!! Thank you for commenting on my Blog. Glad to have you stop by and I hope you will do so often.
I agree that homosexuals should not need to move to Canada and I hope they will stay here in the U.S. because we need to witness to them. The comment that Beth made and I agreed with was more of a stab at the recently relaxed “sex in public places” laws that Canada just ruled on. Also, keep in mind that a “consenting adult” in Canada only has to be 14. I do not believe that any 14-year-old has the maturity to deal with sexual desire, let alone get entrance to a club for a bout of group sex. Our frustration with Canada was showing through that day. My apologies for that.
I do disagree with several of your points, and as with you, I do not expect to change your mind with what you read here.
You said:
“Homosexuality is not a choice, any more than heterosexuality is. And the Bible does not say anything about homosexual orientation - it is only in the past couple centuries that society has recognized that a certain percentage of the population tend to fall in love with and be attracted to people of the same sex, not the opposite sex.”
Study after study has shown that there is no correlation between sexual preference and some gene or chemical makeup. In 1993, Dean Hamer of the National Cancer Institute claimed to have found a genetic link to homosexuality. Yet in 1999, the results of an intensive study by the University of Western Ontario found that Hamer was in error. The fact is that after all the attempts to show a genetic cause for homosexuality, no such genetic cause has been found. A British psychologist has had enormous success in providing “reorientation” therapy to homosexuals who want to change. This is not a surgery or a medical treatment, but it is effective. How could it be effective if the cause of homosexuality is physical? Well, it couldn’t be. Homosexuality is a choice, not a genetic predisposition.
In regards to your interpretation argument, you pointed out that the Old Testament permitted divorce and that Jesus was against it. Let’s look at it in context from Mark Chapter 10:
1 Jesus then left that place and went into the region of Judea and across the Jordan. Again crowds of people came to him, and as was his custom, he taught them.
2 Some Pharisees came and tested him by asking, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?"
3 "What did Moses command you?" he replied.
4 They said, "Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away."
5 "It was because your hearts were hard that Moses wrote you this law," Jesus replied. 6 "But at the beginning of creation God 'made them male and female.’ 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife,8and the two will become one flesh.' So they are no longer two, but one. 9 Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."
10 When they were in the house again, the disciples asked Jesus about this. 11 He answered, "Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. 12 And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery."
I think your argument is that some things in the Old Testament were negated by Jesus’ messages of hope and love in the New Testament. If this is so, can you tell me where in the New Testament homosexuality is directly ‘negated’ by Jesus’ teachings? I don’t think it’s in there. As a matter of fact, it seems to me that quite the opposite is true.
In Romans 1:26-27 The Apostle Paul is very specific:
“For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet.”
He went on to write in 1 Corinthians 6:9, “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind.” The Greek word from which the King James Bible gets the word “effeminate” is malakos, which literally means something soft to the touch, but is used as a negative metaphor to refer to a boy kept for homosexual relations with a man. The “abusers of themselves with mankind” are those men who engage in unnatural sexual relations with other men – homosexuals. That is also how the NASB, the NKJV, and the NIV translate that verse.
Also in the New Testament is Jude 1:5-7. It says:
5 Though you already know all this, I want to remind you that the Lord delivered his people out of Egypt, but later destroyed those who did not believe. 6 And the angels who did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their own home—these he has kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgment on the great Day. 7 In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire.
The bottom line for me is this:
The Bible is God’s perfect Word to His People and is NOT open for interpretation. It is true in every sense. Even if it is hard to believe, there is no doubt in my mind that every word of it is true. If that makes me a Bible thumper, a religious fanatic, intolerant, politically incorrect, then I say “GOOD!!” , because that means I’m adhering to the Perfect Word of God.
God Bless You Kerry!!
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