First read about this here. Basically, a bunch of christians went to a gay pride parade with signs apologizing for how the christian church had treated them. "I'm sorry for how the church treated you", "I used to be a bible bashing homophobe, Sorry!". Sounds like an awesome idea, and it was received well by people at the parade.
But, as friendly atheist writes, "I'm sorry" is not enough - they still consider homosexuality to be a sin. It's great that they're wanting to apologize for mistreatment the LBGT community has received from the church, but at the end of the day they still believe homosexuality is a sin. In fact, from what I gather, a good part of the reason for doing this is so they can witness to the LBGT community, and prevent people from being gay. Doesn't sound so accepting anymore.
In fact, it makes it seem deceptive - from the article I got the feeling that they believe in LBGT rights, and was stoked, but I read a bit more, and came across their website's FAQ, where I see that they are being very political, refusing to give a straight answer on whether or not they believe it is wrong. This makes me a little sad for the all the people who were overjoyed to see them at the parade; I imagine most of those were happy because they thought the christians believed their lifestyle was acceptable, which is entirely untrue, I imagine they would be disappointed at this subtle deception.
So there you have it. It's great that they're not holding 'God hates Fags' signs, and it's great that they're attempting to be compassionate. I'd just like a bit more transparency. And from Christians in general, I'd like to see a bit less of rejecting a people group on the basis of 6 (mostly out of context) verses. Is that too much to ask for?
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Vegans believe that eating animals is wrong, but so long as they're not forcing that on others, it's fine and everyone gets along. Isn't this the same? I don't think Christians & the gay community need to see eye to eye on everything - what matters is that they accept each other.
ReplyDeleteMaybe it comes down to whether their motive was to convert or just to send a message?
I guess the problem with that parallel is that you don't find people being born into veganism, and discovering they actually like meat, and thinking of themselves as fundamentally different to their community, thinking of their orientation as an abomination. You don't see non-vegans being ostracized from the community, you don't see them hating themselves because they're different, you don't see meat eaters brought to the brink of suicide because they can't help but be what they believe is wrong. Unfortunately the same can not be said for homosexuality and Christianity.
ReplyDeleteIt'd be nice if both communities could just accept each other no matter what they think, but I don't know if it's going to be that easy. If it were a choice thing, if it were about giving up sex as part of some acetic thing, it would be ok, but as it stands, it's a judgement thing, it's about right and wrong, it's about people (most of whom haven't had to personally deal with homosexual feelings :S) saying that something is wrong. And that makes it really hard for an accepting relationship.
Nathan, I can see both sides on this. I think credit should be given where credit is due. Congrats to these Christians who had the humility to acknowledge their mistreatment of the GLBT community. It's a step toward greater dialogue. Regarding the issue of them still beleiving it's sin, I think they've got some growth to do on this issue. Let's face it: the church doesn't have the greatest track record on the issue of sex in general, so it's hard to imagine what I'm going to say, but then again, we may have said the same about slavery at one point too. I think Christians need to get to a point where they see this as an issue of individual conscience (Romans 14). I know how difficult this would be for Christians to be neutral and respectful of personal conscience on a sexual issue. It won't happen until, as you pointed out, they start to realize how easy it is to interpret those big 6 verses in different ways. In other words, until the present show of humility deepens and matures, we won't likely see the next step. Do you agree with me that if they made it an issue of personal conscience such as the issue of gambling or joining the military, for examples, do you think that would remedy the problem of the "they believe it's sin" issue? I'd like to hear your thoughts.
ReplyDeleteYou make a good point. If it were an issue of conscience, as opposed to an issue of judgment, a matter of personal choice, that would be one way forward, then it might be possible to move towards a situation suggested by greg, like we have with vegans. It would also acknowledge the fact that many christians don't personally deal with homosexuality. "I don't have feelings towards the same gender, so I don't really know", is an ok response to the issue.
ReplyDeleteBut at the same time, I don't know that this is going to be enough? Because the way things currently are for a lot of christian culture is that homosexuality is the unforgivable sin, and the LBGT are marginalised. So even if individuals accept it as a conscience issue, I think there still needs to be some positive advocacy for them, just like christians should advocate for any group that are being marginalised.
I agree! The advocacy will be important and I think more people within conservative churches that start challenging their own with thoughts such as, "What exactly is the damage we think is taking place and do we have any actual hard evidence that this is the case" will go along way. It will, sadly, take a generational change for this to occur, much as it took a generational change for the issue of segregation to make an impact on the church. Polls show that younger evangelicals could care less about this issue and I predict that in twenty years even most evangelical churches will change their position and be open and affirming. The tide is turning (DADT was struck down as unconstitutional yesterday) and the conservative leaders are not stupid. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), a lot of them run churches like businesses, so they are not going to want to get too far behind the curve on this one if they want to save their fat paychecks. As usual, money has the last say a lot of times. By the way, I sent you an email like you requested. Did you receive it?
ReplyDeleteStoked to hear about DADT passing yesterday! Haven't been following it, possibly because the Media in New Zealand has been distracted by the quake in Christchurch. Yeah, I got your e-mail, but have had a rather hectic week, so hadn't gotten round to replying! Will get round to it soon!
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