Posted on 02/15/2017 2:05:34 AM PST by BlessedBeGod
(RNS) Lighten up, Ash Wednesday.
A New York-based advocacy group called Parity is asking Christians who favor LGBT equality — “queer positive Christians,” in their parlance — to show their support by wearing “glitter ash” on their foreheads to mark Ash Wednesday (March 1).
Ash Wednesday kicks off the six-week somber season called Lent that leads to Easter, and is usually marked in churches with the color purple. Traditionally, plain gray ashes, blessed by a minister or priest, are smeared on the foreheads of Christians to symbolize repentance.
“This is a way for queer Christians and queer-positive persons of faith to say ‘We are here,'” said Marian Edmonds-Allen, Parity’s executive director. “It is also a way for other people to be a witness to that and be in solidarity with them.”
Not all Christian denominations welcome openly LGBT people. The Episcopal Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, The Presbyterian Church (USA), the United Church of Christ and Metropolitan Community Church all ordain LGBT clergy, and every mainline Protestant and Catholic denomination has some organization that supports openly gay members, though those organizations are not officially sponsored by the denomination.
Edmonds-Allen hopes “Glitter Ash Wednesday” will make support for those groups visible in a way usually reserved for princesses and unicorns.
“For some traditions, it is true” that Christians are not supposed to draw attention to their piety, Edmonds-Allen said. “The ashes go on and the ashes go off — it is a private thing. But glitter ashes are still appropriate. It is a recognition of the reality of queer Christians in the world and the beauty LGBTQ Christians bring to faith.”
Traditionally, Ash Wednesday ashes are made by burning the palm fronds used in the previous year’s Palm Sunday service to re-enact the day Christians believe Jesus triumphantly entered Jerusalem. Some churches make their own, while others buy them from church supply companies.
Parity is mixing professional makeup-grade purple glitter with traditional ashes. The organization will send glitter ashes at no cost — though a donation is suggested — to any congregation or individual that requests them.
The plan is to have glitter ashes available in churches for the asking. Regular ashes will also be available.
So far, Parity has had requests for glitter ash from churches in multiple states, including California, Missouri, Massachusetts, Alabama and Georgia. The Metropolitan Community Church has committed to using glitter ashes at all of its churches.
Methinks they are missing the point.
Yes, it’s all about YOU and not God.
sigh
I don’t know what God is waiting for, I just hope I’m long gone when He finally gives them their just reward.
The point is that when you decide to forsake Torah, this is what you end up with: the ongoing erosion of Righteousness until the entire structure collapses. Return to the Torah of Messiah and save yourselves and your families.
"For the sin we are about to commit, oh Lord, we thank thee." /sarc>
Ashes are a sign of *repentance* not celebration.
Sick! Sick! Sick! Don’t think about Lent, think about sodomy. It would be more honest for these sorts to smear feces on their faces
Better to go to the foot of the Cross in repentance.
Satanism loves mocking God. This is a good example.
Just one more way they seek to pervert the word of God. How sad.
What exactly do they want? They have been given the “right” to marry by Anthony Kennedy. What do they want everyone else to do? Why can’t they do what they do privately rather than forcing all of us to witness? Are they that desperate to rationalize their behavior and to be accepted? Or are they trying to destroy the faith traditions that question them? Why don’t they try this with Muslim prayer rugs in the rainbow colors in a mosque?
“It is a recognition of the reality of queer Christians in the world and the beauty LGBTQ Christians bring to faith.”
What? BS. It’s not just “recognition.” Come on, we all know there are gays and lesbians in our midst. It is the acceptance/condoning of an unbiblical lifestyle. What’s next, handing out adultery-recognition T-shirts? Wearing beads to celebrate being a fornicator? What has happened to the church?
“From glitter you came
To glitter you shall return”
Yeah no
smear feces on their faces
Me thinks some already has
“queer positive Christians,”
Is that anything like a Rapist positive Christian
A Murderer positive Christian?
A Pedophile positive Christian?
An Adultery positive Christian?
Yes all are sinners. The difference being that Christians want to repent their sins.
These people are demanding their sins be accepted and celebrated.
If I see somebody with glitter on their forehead on Ash Wednesday I’m telling them that they worship their genitalia rather than God.
They want to pervert your sons and daughters and have laws in place that put you in jail when you resist.
Can adulterers proudly wear a red A on their foreheads that day?
They want to Smash The State, Smash The Patriarchy.
They don’t want “rights to”. They want celebration of their lifestyle CHOICE which is counter to productive society.
Awesome idea.
LGBQTWhatever need to organize and take rainbow colored prayer rugs to a mosque and protest.
But Soros wouldn’t fund that.
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