A guest essay by my seminary friend Dr. Grenfell-Muir explores the root of anti-LGBTQ sentiment and applies a feminist critique to The United Methodist Church. Read on!
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My Reconciling Homophobic Church
Dr. Trelawney Grenfell-Muir
Sowing seeds upon thorny ground
This past weekend, my region of The United Methodist Church gathered to meet at its annual conference. Here in New England, our conference tends to be comparatively quite progressive on issues of same sex marriage and ordination, and I’m glad the conference has decided to dedicate more focus than usual to the issue of overcoming homophobia. I totally support their efforts. I wept with joy when I found out that our conference had voted to disobey the homophobic parts of our discipline. I cheered aloud when I read that the Desert Southwest and California Pacific conferences had followed suit. I am absolutely thrilled that large swaths of my church have taken steps to try to end homophobia forever.
It won’t work.
I’m not saying it’s wasted effort. On the contrary, we must absolutely engage in advocacy for LGBTQ equality at all levels and work to dismantle homophobia through changes in policy as well as culture. I passionately applaud the brave and beautiful prophetic work of LGBTQ persons and allies over the decades, and I believe we must all join in a multi-pronged strategy to help these efforts succeed. These latest steps are enormous accomplishments that result from decades of painful, persistent labor by courageous, inspiring saints. I am humbled and awed by their dedication.
But I’m afraid it will not be enough.
The way my church has been tackling homophobia has been almost entirely superficial and symptom based. It’s as though someone breaks her arm, which causes terrible pain in three fingers. Rather than setting and casting the broken bone, we are applying a numbing cream to the sore fingers. It’s as though a burning fuel line keeps igniting a certain house, and we keep pouring water on that house rather than battling the source fire itself. We are ignoring and perpetuating the root causes of homophobia, even as we lament and fight the violent fruits of our own diseased labor.
The ax at the root of the tree
The root of homophobia is patriarchy. Homophobia arises from toxic masculinity, the sexist idea that maleness must be superior to femaleness and must involve physical strength and domination, aggressiveness, coercion, and violence. Toxic masculinity forbids men to have traits deemed feminine – to be weak or vulnerable, to need help, or to feel their authentic emotions (other than anger and some pleasure). Within the framework of patriarchy, a male God sits at the top of the hierarchy, followed by men, women and children, animals, plants, and finally inanimate objects. For a man to be penetrated by a man upsets this hierarchy and threatens this social order in which men dominate. For a woman to choose another woman and not to be penetrated/dominated by any man defies her proper submissive place in the hierarchy. Homophobia is indeed fear: fear that these disruptions of the social order will allow chaos to destroy the community.
Until we dismantle and heal patriarchy, homophobia will always fester.
As sociologist Lisa Wade has pointed out, the recent mass slaughter in Orlando, the lenient sentence given to rapist Brock Turner, and a spate of other misogynist crimes all arise from the same toxic masculinity. I cannot be surprised by the rise of openly racist, misogynistic, chest-thumping politicians in a society such as ours – they are the natural result of a society that structures itself according to patriarchy.
Now, my progressive church hardly condones homophobic attacks, rape, or extremist politicians. We sing hymns about accepting each other, hear sermons about inclusivity, fly rainbow flags, march in Pride, ordain women, –we even have a large number of clergy and congregations who openly defy our denomination’s rules against same sex marriage. And week after week after week, we steep ourselves in the patriarchy to which we are blind.
Worshipping the golden calf
Our scriptures and hymns are full of patriarchal symbols and language – Lord, King, Master, Ruler, Governor, Kingdom, Father, He, Him, His. We are taught submission to the male Ruler: you are the potter, I am the clay, have thine own way, feudal Lord. Hymns about winning battles remind us that we have aligned ourselves with the King of kings, the biggest Goliath on the block.
The structure of our worship services promotes subservience to the King and His representative priests, as we sit down below the exalted, robed figurehead while he/she tells us what to think and what to do. Gold colored crosses and candlesticks, and sometimes other displays of incredible opulence, reinforce the palatial and regal power of the King. Magic tricks during ceremonies are only efficacious when done by royally vetted court magicians. Every movement is carefully orchestrated to express proper deference and humility to the Mighty Oz, whom we fear and laud. We worship money, status, and authority.
Rather than setting up a critique to the nationalistic patriarchy of the state, we embrace and mimic it, in a pathetic attempt to safeguard our King’s power with state power. We put American flags in the front of sanctuaries, sing nationalistic hymns, and include militaristic holidays in our worship. It reminds me of Tolkien’s Saruman imitating Sauron’s enormous Barad-dûr with his little Orthanc tower. Far from a prophetic alternative, we reinforce patriarchal nationalism and its values of coercive power, worldly loyalty, and physical violence. We worship the neighborhood bully.
Our structures are based on disconnected power imbalances, in which strangers far away make decisions and impose their rule on communities. Legal systems have nothing to do with consensus and everything to do with coercion. Congregations can abuse their pastors with impunity or be abused by pastors or parishioners without recourse. The very nature of our system of bishops, councils, and assemblies, rather than the providing a “connectional” community, perpetuates hierarchical power imbalances and divisions.
And feminism is a dirty word, even in progressive circles. It makes sense that within a deeply patriarchal system, the naming of the root disease will cause unease. Many, many progressive pastors speak out against homophobia. (How heartening that so many congregations across the country cheered aloud at finding out about our ecclesial disobedience!) Very few clergy use only inclusive language in worship. (How many congregations would cheer if our conference voted to have gender-balanced worship liturgies? Yet, who among us would consent to hymns and prayers of “Dear White God” or “Dear Straight God”?) Still fewer clergy throw off their status as “King’s representative” and empower laity in consensus-based and egalitarian worship and church structure. It feels good for clergy to stand in front of a congregation and sense their respect. It feels good for laity to see their charismatic and powerful leaders exalted above the common folk, spreading the lofty umbrella of Kingly protection and approval. We worship the mighty Y chromosome.
Therefore do not be anxious
We are terrified of change, and we are terrified to let go of the illusion of safety we get when we dangle from the coattails of patriarchy. We want to be safe. We want our King to protect us. We want the safety of being right, being superior, and being protected from harm. But safety is an illusion. We can never be safe. We can only ever be free.
We follow a Savior who does not make us safe. Jesus went to the cross in defiance of diseased, oppressed power imbalances. We should not worship the coercive power of the crucifiers, but rather, the freedom of crucified. Only when we empty ourselves of the need to be safe, will we find the powerful freedom we need to liberate ourselves, our communities, and our world.
Our faith tradition contains many stories about how our communities got this wrong, over and over. But over and over, our stories show how our faith keeps us trying. It’s time for another try. In addition to our crucial LGBTQ advocacy, it is time we took an honest look at how our fear traps us in structures that reward imbalanced power, traps us in worship and systems that destroy community and oppress us all. It is time we allowed the last to be first, and then threw away the hierarchies altogether. It is time our leaders were our servants, and then we all were servants together. It is time to stop crucifying Jesus on our crosses of fear, and to start displaying the bold faith of Pentecost.
For all are one
Finally, we must resist the temptation to let our egos divide us up into smug factions of self-righteousness. Sure, it’s easy for most progressives to see how homophobic ideas cause incredible harm, and we must absolutely create and preserve safe spaces for oppressed groups, free from the violence of homophobia. But we all have logs in our eyes of one kind or another.
- The same fearful patriarchy that erupted in the Orlando massacre, also motivated fifty senators to vote against sensible gun control this week.
- The same egalophobia that keeps some Christians from supporting the reconciling movement prevents other Christians from supporting inclusive language or allowing young children to help design and lead weekly worship.
We will never achieve the perfect church/human community, just as we will never achieve a static state of personal perfection. The effort to find a flawless church (or secular community) is just another kind of fear-based divisiveness, an attempt to build a ladder and climb above other people.
The kin-dom is a connected kindred of all creation, wherein our illusions of separateness vanish. Whatever is done to the “least of these” is done to us all. In fact, there can be no “least of these” in the kin-dom. Let us embrace a radical redemption of our church. Let us have clergy who are neither abused nor exalted, simply trained as beloved, empowering mentors. Let us have worship that creates connectedness and egalitarian sharing of the unchained Pentecost Spirit. Let us have justice systems based on consensus and respectful community. Let us co-create the kin-dom of JustPeace in which the very idea of homophobia is simply laughable. We are all one, all equal, all beloved and blessed. We are all free. Together.
Trelawney Grenfell-Muir is an adjunct professor in the Department of Conflict Resolution, Human Security, and Global Governance with a specialization in Cross-Cultural Conflict at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. She holds an M.Div. from the Boston University School of Theology with a concentration in Religion and Conflict, and a Ph.D. in Conflict Studies and Religion with the University Professors Program at Boston University. She was a fellow at the Institute of Culture, Religion, and World Affairs and at the Earhart Foundation. Grenfell-Muir has conducted field research in situations of ongoing conflict in Syria, Lebanon, and Northern Ireland. Her dissertation explores the methodology, constraints, and effectiveness of clergy peacebuilders in Northern Ireland. She has been an invited speaker in community settings and at Harvard, MIT, Boston University, Tufts, and Boston College on topics of gender violence, economic injustice, and religious or ethnic conflicts and has also moderated panels on genetic engineering, cloning, and other bioethics issues.
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Thoughts?
Oh my. Run away, run away quickly from this way of thinking. May I remind Ms. Muir of what God did when his people broke their covenant?
there’s a LOOOOOOONG history of non-conformity in Protestant churches, it’s kinda our thing. The Non-Jurors of John Wesley’s family, the ordaining of bishops by Mr. Wesley and several quite irregular events, some even painful, in the grand stream of Methodism that led to the richness of Pan-Methodism today.
Steve, I just…. am done acting from a place of fear. I understand that many Bible stories teach fear. I think the Bible also shows how acting from fear is the root problem of community. I cannot run away. I run toward freedom in Christ.
Perhaps if the Church can go back to the original languages and reinstate the Holy Spirit as female, God the Mother, and recognize that God sent the feminine of God into the world to lead the world, then perhaps we can enter an age of matriarchy that embraces mutual submission to each other.
Cheryel I loved our conversation about this. It really got me thinking about how the word “Christian” means “little Christ,” and similar to ‘namaste’ we can all honor the Christ in each other, the divine in each other. There’s a lot to think about there for me, so thank you for the conversation!
This is brave, yet humble, work that must be done in our denomination and in the world. When our female Clergy continue to make less, on average, and have disproportionate representation on appointments, we have work to do. When our LGBTQ members, youth especially, feel less than simply for being who they are because they are called incompatible, we have work to do. When our church is more concerned with AWA than changing lives and serving others, we have work do.
Let us be about the work …
Carl, AMEN! I was just talking with some LGBTQ youth recently about this issue – thinking about how we can create worship spaces that celebrate and honor them. In one of my previous churches, Cambridge Welcoming Ministries, we sometimes prayed, “Dear Lesbian God…” –I’d love to see spaces open up in our churches where we can experiment with truly liberating liturgies.
“‘Dear Lesbian God'”? Jeremy, that is blasphemy. You have a responsibility as an ordained elder, owner of this site, and the one who invited Dr. Trelawney Grenfell- Muir, to address it as such.
In Christ,
The enemy hates clarity
Hi TEHC,
I’m not obligated to play doctrine police, especially in comments online. I witness to Christ though my own actions.
But to your critique, Christian theology claims that God encompasses all genders. Infinity includes finitude. Thus, We pray to Father God, Jesus refers to himself as a female bird for Jerusalem, and Methodists sing to “Mothering God who gave us birth.” Therefore, God encompasses all gender identities and sexual orientations, and we reflect them in a finite way as humans.
Even if I was intent on naming such things in Internet comments, I’m not sure what the blasphemy is in this context. Can you point me in the right direction?
It’s funny how the right wing in the UMC are so quick to police their form of political correctness against LGBTs and uppity women, but there’s nary a peep out of them when some pray to a “warrior” god, advocate “muscular” Christianity, etc. Actually this pathetic appeal to IlIegetimate authoriteh proves the writer’s point: Such bullying as this is the epitome of patriarchy and must be defied and mocked at every possible opportunity.
Thanks, Dr. Grenfell-Muir! Thanks, dear one, for speaking truth to power, for your courage to say to the Church emperors, “You have no clothes on, and neither does your system!” A blessing you are, indeed!
Annie!!!! Thank you as well – you are a blessing to me for decades now, and I am grateful to have you in my life! Together, I pray we can find paths of healing and liberation. <3 <3
Beautifully and powerfully said. Thank you for bearing witness to a difficult truth.
Thank you very much, and many blessings on your journey. I hope together we can face these truths with Grace.
This was so well said. Thank you. I will use this as an educational tool.
Thank you, Denise – blessings on your work and your journey. Together, may we find ways forward that can bring us to a better place.
I know that Dr. Grenfell-Muir has thrown a lot of words at the idea that the root of homophobia is patriarchy, but frankly I fail to be convinced by her logic. No one I know in our denomination would condone an attack on anyone based on homophobia. I still think the issue, the self-avowed practicing kind, is more rooted in the plain sense interpretation of Scripture (the primary source and criterion for Christian doctrine) along with at least Wesley’s Sermons and Notes.
If you look at just one passage, Romans 1:18-32, it is not difficult to see that St. Paul describes with restraint what Virgil, Tacitus, Suetonius, Propertius, Seneca, Livy, and Juvenal had all documented: namely, a moral decadence almost without parallel in the Western world. It is difficult to set those verses aside and pretend that they don’t mean what they say.
Wesley, in his Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament writes nothing to attenuate, diminish, or exculpate the plain meaning of the words, but says in essence, here is documentation of what happens when man (or “people” for Dr. Grenfell-Muir) abandons the worship of God as God. What is interesting though is that Wesley sees the sins listed in vv. 25-27 to be higher degrees of sin than that which is listed in vv. 21-24. But, to be fair, and to not accuse him of being a homophobe, he also says that the sins in verses 28 following were even worse than those listed in vv. 25-27. That’s enough for us all to smoke on.
For my own reckoning, I suspect the group of supposed homosexual sins from a casuistry point of view, probably falls into the same class as pre-marital sexual sins—something that the heterosexual community tends to wink at, gloss over, and not give much traction to, but boy how we love to take those homosexuals to task! Rather than patriarchy being the root, I think homophobia (fear of homosexuals? really?) is our anxiety sink de jure.
Interesting thoughts, Allison. Of course, Wesley and Paul, and the rest of the formative writers of our tradition, were (as we are) so steeped in patriarchy that they were blind to it. Patriarchy shaped all of their opinions. Without patriarchy, there would be no logical reason to fear (disgust is another form of fear) same-sex relationships, etc.
The entirety of the litany of supposed sins included in the Romans 1 passage includes things you have done, that I have done, and that everyone has done. To isolate certain single items therein and claim it “mean[s] what it say[s]” is to engage in wishful thinking at best. Much has been said of the alleged “decadence” of the Roman Empire, most especially by Protestant pecksniffs and wowsers, but except for such things as the codification of the right of fathers to kill their children or to sell them as slaves, it’s little different from at any other period. As Thomas Hobbes noted in “Leviathan,” the lives of the great mass of men [and women and children] are nasty, brutish, and short. So it remains today. The whining about the changes in society wrought by The Sexual Revolution and the technology to separate coitus and childbearing are an exercise in selective and strategic outrage. Where are the similar lamentations about the glorification of war, the acquisition of wealth, the rape of the environment, and the class war exercised by the powerful against the powerless. Not one word regarding these is ever uttered by the professional religious right agitators, either in the larger society or the extremist caucus of the UMC.
George, that’s so well said, and what a diseased world, indeed.
Amen, sister! Thank you for this. Your words are true and beautiful. They call forth a new divine reality – may it be so!
Thank you, Xochitl!! Bless your powerful and beautiful witness to the new reality!
I’ve never commented on any Hacking Christianity post until now, but I’ve learned a lot reading this blog over the last year or so. It doesn’t always reinforce my own personal views, but I believe challenging my own assumptions is critical for intellectual and spiritual growth, even when it makes me squirm a little.
Just for context: I’m a Caucasian, cisgender, middle class male, a citizen of the United States, and a southerner. I’m very much aware of my “privilege” but I ask you not to summarily dismiss me; I don’t rank among the oppressed, but I hope I may gain a few points of credibility for being born out of wedlock to a single mother, growing up in a relatively impoverished rural community, and by being one of the Gs floating in the LGBTQIA alphabet soup.
Although I was raised in a rural Methodist church, I never took the God thing seriously, checking out of the church at the age of 18, and not returning until a couple of years ago, at the age of 44. I returned to Christianity not because of repressed guilt or confusion over my sexual orientation (I spent two weeks agonizing over this when I was 17, then shrugged my shoulders, accepted it and moved on), or due to cultural pressure (conversely, most of my close friends and some of my family think I’ve lost my mind for calling myself a Christian now), or because I’m just “trying it out” (I’m usually a pragmatic person, and I’ve never had time to “dabble” in spiritual matters.) Instead, God reached out and grabbed me – not the other way around – awakening my soul and taking my breath away. It didn’t happen in church, and no one else was around at the time. It was an experience that lasted several days in 2014, and I simply can’t explain it. The phrase “born again” carries a lot of baggage, but it’s a fitting description. I turned to Christianity, scripture, and the UMC to help me figure out this newfound conviction, this sudden understanding of the reality of the numinous. Scripture has been helpful, but quite frankly the UMC hasn’t…
Please forgive all this personal disclosure, but I think it’s relevant. You see, I don’t watch Fox News. I’m registered as a (D), not an (R), although I can’t align myself with either party. I’ve also never set foot in a seminary, and I’m not an academic, so I can’t debate on that rarefied level. On my spiritual path I feel like a toddler who’s just learning to walk, still stumbling around and knocking into things. But here’s one basic thing I’ve learned: It’s not all about me, it’s all about God. Ultimately, my identity is not defined by all the facts I listed above; these human categories have helped shape me, but they don’t define me. Instead my identity is that of a child of God, and everything else is secondary. None of us is above any other, but we live in a depressingly imperfect, unfair, and (indeed) fallen world, and the love of God is our only hope. Also, I think of God as a “he,” and I feel great comfort knowing him as my heavenly father, at least partly because I’ve never known my earthly father… and yes, I love my mother dearly. And I certainly understand not everyone associates the role of “father” with anything good.
At the same time, I believe God is far beyond gender (and beyond time, place, and form), and in my very humble opinion the overarching, “big picture” narrative of scripture does not contradict this belief, in spite of the pronouns and patriarchy.
I totally understand the cognitive dissonance in that statement (believe me, I’ve become intimately familiar with cognitive dissonance…), and I know the following question has been asked a million times, but I haven’t found a convincing affirmative answer: Can Christianity exist if all things offensive to progressive modern sensibilities are purged from it? No blood of Jesus, no God as Father, no spiritual warfare, no such thing as sin? Take it several steps farther, and consider no need for atonement, no authority higher than our own conscience, perhaps nothing beyond our biology and humanity? I suppose that a faith like this can still be called faith, but it seems to me it’s not Christianity per se. But then again, I’ve never been to seminary…
Thanks for the thoughtful comment, Chris! I think it is great that you are pondering these ideas with such intentional faith.
For myself, I actually see all of this as symbolic. As in, I personally view God/ess less as a separate being and more as the focal nexus of the force of Life-Love that creates and comprises creation. So There I have unitarian symbols (nexus, all creation) and a dual symbol (life-love). I am happy to throw in trinitarian symbols as well, such as Source-Guide-Breath, and Creator-Healer-Sustainer, and Child-Matron-Crone (aka Maiden/Mother/Crone), and Earth-Sea-Sky… Trinitarian symbols are great. They just can never capture the infinite divine, which is beyond our finite capability to capture in any one symbol or in our understanding as we are currently within the finite space-time continuum and have only limited ability to understand and express anything that can’t be contained in finite terms. But we need symbols as a way to engage with the infinite, precisely because we cannot do so directly. Being incarnate is a blessing, but it has limitations. Those limitations are opportunities for growth in love and wisdom. So if we can find symbols that help us grow in love and wisdom, great! Trinitarian symbols can do that for many people. In terms of justice, some people love the trinity since it is so inherently relational. It implies that the divine is inherently a relational web rather than a separate entity, which means that justice is inherent in the divine, it is an inherent part of realizing our divine potential/nature. John Wesley is great on this stuff.
I’m christian universalist – my faith accesses God/ess primarily through christian symbols.
my own theology is absolutely pluralist, in that it believes in the equal value of all religions, so long as they produce human flourishing (well being in members and in how members affect the wider world), so i’m never going to convert anyone or try to say being christian is in any way superior to other religions. my theology is based on the philosopher pierce’s semiology – symbol theory, as adapted by robert neville, a philosopher/metaphysician who also does theology; his system holds that true symbols are indexical – they point you to a truth beyond themselves, reveal transcendent truth. symbols are salvific – they “save” if they are “true” – if they reveal truth. you can tell if they’re “true” by whether they produce wellness within and around the person using them. no one symbol can encompass all of divine truth. there are an infinite number of possible symbols. (thus, we really access truth through many symbols that each show us part of the whole) i grew up using christian symbols, so they are my primary way of accessing divine truth. some symbols i find more salvific than others, and i like incorporating non-christian symbols. but for me, regardless of the questionable historicity of much of the bible, the symbols of christmas, lent, holy week, easter, pentecost, and advent are very salvific. living with and in those symbols produces much flourishing in my life and my world. if you use any one symbol exclusively or too much, it can become idolatrous, where you replace God/ess or Divine Truth with that one symbol. so i like using feminine God/ess-images because i feel that male God images have become idolatrous, and that it isn’t salvific – it doesn’t produce human flourishing – for women to feel they are less like God/ess than men. but i do believe in God/ess, a relational God/ess, with whom we can be in relationship, pray, who gives and receives love as her primary way of relating to us.
So I like symbols of Jesus as the Great Physician – a healer. Wesley talks about sin as disease and Grace as healing. I like symbols of Jesus as a prophet, teacher, and as a very compassionate, gentle, healthy masculine divine figure. I like symbols of Christ as eternal wisdom, so I say Sophia-Christ using the hebrew bible symbol as well as the christian scriptures adoption of Sophia-Wisdom into “Word-Logos”. There are some great books on these ideas if you are interested. Quest on!
Thank you for taking the time to respond, Trelawney. Your response certainly helps me understand your viewpoint. I wish there were more opportunities for this kind of civil discourse! I’m finding there’s little room for subtlety or shades of gray in discussions on faith and religion; it’s almost as nasty as politics…
Chris, thank you as well. I hope you can find places to discuss these topics – there are some good facebook groups I can point you to if you are interested. Bless your journey.
Trelawney,
Thank you for your thoughtful reflection. I am a queer clergy in hiding(as of now) because I live in fear, but it’s changing. Yes, my conference overwhelmingly supports all queer persons. However, I still don’t feel safe in the “connectional system.” Why? Well, I wonder if it is this patriarchal attitude that under girds a sense of need to be in power. I have been hurt by clergy in my conference and have sought therapy for healing. I have had two District Superintendents share with me judgmental opinions (and items that were of an HR nature) about other clergy in the conference. This information was personal and unnecessary for me to know. I tried to change the conversation, it didn’t work. Without going into detail, I have also had numerous other clergy say harmful things about other clergy as well. It makes me wonder what they are saying about me. As a young clergy in provisional status, I have been scared to challenge my colleagues in fear of retaliation. I did it once, and it cost me. Once I was verbally attacked by a clergy supervisor in front of members of my congregation and my integrity was questioned. I tried to resolve in a private meeting, but then the clergy started verbally attacking me and I told this person I didn’t feel safe being with them. This person told me to leave immediately and never bring up this situation again. I have had some good experiences with other clergy, but I’m cautious. I don’t have the energy or desire to talk badly about others. Have I engaged in this clergy power-put down disease? Yes, and I am so sad about this and I beg for forgiveness. Living in fear is killing my call to serve as a pastor. Today, I have been meditating on your writing, “safety is an illusion. We can never be safe. We can only ever be free.” I can’t tell you enough of the peace I have found with these words. I’m a progressive Christ Follower who really does want to follow the Jesus message. I can’t do this in fear. I commit to be authentic to myself, to my clergy colleagues, and to God. I commit to be free. Thanks for your writing, thanks for letting me share my journey of fear and now my journey to live in freedom.
Dear QUMCC: I can’t tell you how glad it makes me to hear that you have found some comfort and peace. You deserve to feel that way, and you deserve to have a supportive community to help you on this courageous path. I sincerely hope we can help you find the support you need – we are all in this together, and your critiques are very, very important. They reflect a fear-based and ego-based sickness — why else would anyone bash others? We all need healing from our fear, and we can only find it together, with authentic community and trust. Bless you and your brave, faithful soul. Peace, Trelawney
7-11 September, 2015, we the Bishops of the Central Conferences of Africa at the Elephant Hills Resort, Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe part of our Annual business meeting, “Over the past four decades, from 1972 until the present, we have watched with shock and dismay the rapid drift of our denomination from this Holy call to a warm embrace of practices that have become sources of conflict that now threatens to rip the Church apart and distract her from the mission of leading persons to faith and making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. One of such practices is the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender).
We are deeply saddened that the Holy Bible, our primary authority for faith and the practice of Christian living, and our Book of Discipline are being grossly ignored by some members and leaders of our Church in favor of social and cultural practices that have no scriptural basis for acceptance in Christian worship and conduct. Yet they continue to attempt to persuade members of the Church to incorporate these practices as an accepted code of conduct within global United Methodism.
As leaders of the church in Africa, we call upon all United Methodists, Bishops, clergy and Laity to an unreserved commitment to the Holy Bible as the primary authority for faith and practice in the church. We call upon all members throughout the connection to adopt practices consistent with the teachings of the Holy Scriptures. We submit to the teachings of Scripture that God designed marriage to be between man and woman, and the procreation of children is a blessing from God (Gen. 2:24-25; Psalm 127:3-5). Scripture also teaches that all persons are sexual beings, whether or not they are married. However, sexual relations are affirmed only within the covenant bond of a faithful monogamous, heterosexual marriage, and not within same-sex unions or polygamy. The Christian marriage covenant is holy, sacred, and consecrated by God and is expressed in shared fidelity between one man and one woman for life. In this vein, we denounce all forms of sexual exploitation, including fornication, adultery, sexual commercialization, slavery, abuse, polygamy, etc.
As shepherds of God’s flock, we covenant to be in ministry with those of our members who adopt practices that are inconsistent with the teachings of the Holy Scriptures
One of the functions of the Bishops of the church is to “maintain the unity of the church”. As leaders of the church, we believe that there are far more important issues that unite us than issues of sexual orientation. As a church, we are called to be in solidarity with people who suffer as a result of unjust political systems, wars, famine, poverty, natural disasters, diseases, illiteracy etc. etc. We believe that we can be united around these issues rather than allow ourselves to be ripped apart by issues of sexual orientation.”
There can be no middle ground.
Like England we have two years to reach agreement or a lot of ¶ 363 Complaint Procedures through 2019 and then in 2020 a hard break based on a church wide accountability alliance between African members and allies is possible.
This would allow LGTBQi in the UMC to be United in their own church and the UMC to continue to expand as a global church confronting those who would destroy the teaching of the salvation through the Christ in Africa.
Oh, my heart breaks for the LGBTQ folks, both here and in Africa. One reason I have not supported a split is that I know that most of the money for charitable mission works in Africa comes from the US, and I would not want that to dry up. Another reason is that LGBTQ Methodists from Africa have begged and pleaded me and my colleagues not to split, because we are the only voices in their church that do not crush their souls with cruelty and violent condemnation. I will never betray the trust of the children in my church, here and around the world, who must grow up knowing that there are faithful Christians who believe they are worthy of love, just exactly as God/ess made them.
disgusting. Vile. .. people who claim their sexual sins define them and they need not to repent becasue its “who they are”, are obivously living in the flesh, as is its supporters.. Think about all the sexual temptations out there. They all must be valid in being able to define a person, or else you might hurt their feelings. The problem with Gays, is they are willing to change Gods clear words to fit their lifestyle. God would be able to supplant the spirit of same sex attraction. If not. your not with God, period. But that goes hand in hand with Gay marriage as a secular right.
Thanks for the excellent article, Dr. Grenfell-Muir. And thanks also for directing me to it.