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Loading ...Lutheran council thwarts move to toughen gay clergy vote
04.01.2009 12:33pm EDT
(New York City) The highest body in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has rejected a bid by conservative clergy to make it tougher to gain approval for LGBT clergy.
The denomination will vote in August on a recommendation to allow individual congregations to decide whether to allow gays and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as clergy.Gays and lesbians can now serve as clergy in the ELCA if they remain celibate, although some congregations have challenged the system and hired pastors in gay relationships. Heterosexual clergy and professional lay workers are to abstain from sex outside marriage.
The proposed change would cover those in “lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships.”
A Lutheran group of clergy, calling itself CORE, opposed to opening up their ranks asked the council to impose rule that the motion be adopted only by a two-thirds majority.
At a meeting this week the council voted 21-10 with two abstentions to allow for a simple majority.
“Sad to say, we saw this coming,” the Rev. W. Stevens Shipman, a CORE spokesperson told the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
Shipman said his group would try to revive the issue at the denomination’s convention when it meets in Minneapolis from August 17 – 23. The gay clergy motion is on the agenda for the convention and Shipman said he hopes the voting rule can be tightened before the issue is decided.
“We think a decision of this importance needs to be approved by two-thirds of the membership, and we will try to get the synods that agree with that to address the issue with the assembly,” he told The Star Tribune.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has about 4.7 million members.
This action by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is proof that there are many Christians who do not follow the extreme lines taken by homophobic bigots here or around the world. LGBT people can be Christian and Christian ranks include LGBT people.
It might be nice to see that not all religious groups are totally anti-gay and hateful. Some are quite accepting (United Church of Christ, Lutherans, Unitarian Universalism, Reformed Jews, and others).
However, I personally feel that there are two sides of the coin of religious freedom. Freedom OF religion, and the Freedom FROM religion. Thomas Jefferson’s wall of separation between churches and the state works best when governments interfere with public life (especially the government and laws) and the government does not tell religious groups what to do.
Religious groups should marry whomever the wish and not marry whomever they do not. However, legal marriage as determined by the law must be open to everyone equally on a non-discriminatory bases. For example, let the Catholics, Mormons, etc. refuse to marry divorced people, same sex couples, their own clergy and whomever else they don’t want to. But, also insist that the government allow marriage and divorce for all on a non-discriminatory basis.
People need to really meditate on the freedom of religion, especially negative religious freedom (freedom from the religious demands of others). The separation of church and state has been forgotten.
They are going to vote on whether or not to keep let individual gays into the clergy? Not perfect, but a step in the right direction.
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