Posted on 11/19/2001 8:16:31 AM PST by SocialMeltdown
KEY WEST -- On a breezy Sunday afternoon last week, 150 people of various denominations took inspiration from a Bible verse uttered centuries before by another religious renegade.
``If God be for us, who can be against us?'' asked Martin Luther. That resolve was reproduced on the cover of a nine-page program commemorating the installation of Arlo David Peterson as pastor of Key West's Holy Trinity Lutheran Church.
With those words, Holy Trinity's parishioners made history -- defying church hierarchy to become the first Lutheran congregation in Florida to install a noncelibate, gay pastor.
That action has placed Holy Trinity at the forefront of a national battle across the Protestant spectrum over policies restricting the ordination of sexually active gay men and lesbians as pastors or ministers.
A number of U.S. mainline Protestant denominations, including Lutherans, Methodists and Presbyterians, have been debating the role of gay men and lesbians in the church. Can they be ordained? Should same-sex couples be joined in ``commitment ceremonies''? Is homosexuality compatible with church teachings?
In August, Lutheran leaders ordered a study on these topics to be completed by 2005.
``I would say it's definitely an issue,'' said John Brooks, spokesman for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), which counts 5.1 million members in the United States and Bahamas. ``But while we have a mandate to study the issue of homosexuality, it is not the sole focus of the church.''
VOW OF CELIBACY
Heterosexuals are allowed to be married and serve as pastors, while unmarried people -- including gay men and lesbians -- are permitted to be pastors in the Lutheran church only if they vow to be celibate.
For about a dozen years, Peterson has been in a committed relationship with a man whom he now lives with, but they aren't allowed under church rules to be married.
Even before his Key West installation on Nov. 11, news of the impending ceremony provoked a sharp rebuke from the Tampa-based Florida-Bahamas Synod, the regional governing body of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The warning: Peterson's installation was not ``sanctioned, supported, or condoned'' and disciplinary action would likely follow.
His installation is expected to result in a public censure by the synod, and penalties could range from a reprimand to Holy Trinity's removal from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
Though they have broken with church rules, parishioners say their action flowed from a desire to choose the best person for the job.
``We didn't do it out of defiance; we just picked the person we thought was right for our congregation,'' said Carol Snider, president of the 40-member congregation. ``I think they (the church hierarchy) are going to have to lighten up and get out of the Dark Ages, and accept what the real world is about.''
In Monroe County, which the 2000 U.S. Census found had the highest percentage of households in Florida headed by unmarried partners -- many of them gay or lesbian -- that means sexual orientation is rarely a sticking point.
NOT A BIG DEAL
``I've lived in the closet most of my life, but I came to Key West for the sake of my relationship,'' says Peterson, 54. ``Being gay is not an issue here.''
Peterson arrived in the Keys in 1994, after serving more than two decades as a Lutheran pastor in New York state. Recently divorced, he worked for an AIDS organization before Holy Trinity's congregation tapped him as an adjunct pastor in August 1999. The church did not object.
At the time, Peterson was ``on leave from call,'' meaning he was not serving as a pastor but was still certified through a New York regional synod. Peterson said he asked the New York synod to transfer him to Florida, but never received a response.
Nearly two years later, in April, Holy Trinity's congregation voted to appoint Peterson as full-time pastor in a November ceremony. At about the same time, the Florida-Bahamas Synod notified the congregation that Peterson wasn't eligible to be a pastor.
Peterson, according to a letter from the Florida synod, had been plucked from the active clergy ``roster'' back in October 1999 and would need to be reinstated.
What church representatives didn't say: An openly gay man in a relationship can't be reinstated.
While they are still trying to sort out how Peterson's roster status changed, regional church administrators maintain that his removal from the active roster is nonetheless the primary reason he's not an official pastor.
THE CONSTITUTION
``My decision has to be made first and foremost on the constitution of our church, which requires any congregation to call a properly rostered member of the ELCA, and that is not the case in this situation,'' Edward R. Benoway, who is scheduled to be installed today in Orlando as the new Bishop of the Florida-Bahamas Synod said.
Peterson believes he was booted -- retroactively -- because he loves a man.
``They claim the church is open to gays and lesbians -- unless they are clergy,'' Peterson says. ``Oh yes, gays and lesbians are welcome; we just won't allow one of `your kind' to become pastor. They won't use the word gay; they will say it's because I'm not rostered.''
As Benoway prepares for his own installation ceremony, he's fielding questions about Peterson.
``As far as our ministry is concerned, at this point and time, you must be celibate if you are going to be an ordained minister'' and are not married, Benoway said. ``A single pastor cannot have an affair, either. Our church is in conversation about this whole issue, but we haven't arrived there. Until we do, if we do, we have to abide by our present policies, constitution and guidelines for ministry.''
The new bishop's opinion on the policy prohibition? ``Presently, it would be difficult for me to state my position. I am trying to be open-minded about where our church is today, where our society is today, where the scriptures would lead us,'' he said. ``There is a lot of tension there.''
SWELLING RANKS [No Pun Intended]
Last week, Peterson joined more than a dozen gay or lesbian Lutheran pastors nationwide who are serving in defiance of church rules, said Greg Egertson, a board member of the Lutheran Lesbian and Gay Ministry, a national group that helps recruit, place and independently certify gay and lesbian pastors.
``We are pushing them by finding congregations willing to disobey, and every time we do that, we are chipping away,'' Egertson said.
Lutheran churches in California, Kansas City, Iowa and Minnesota have installed sexually active gay pastors in recent years despite ELCA warnings.
Paul A. Kruger, a married former pastor at Holy Trinity, believes excluding gay pastors flies in the face of the church's mission.
``If people had walked in my shoes, they would have a whole different outlook,'' Kruger said. ``There's no way to describe the feeling of standing over a hospital bed or a bed at home with a gay man dying of AIDS with his partner there and the three of us holding hands and praying. All of a sudden, people's sexual orientation is not important. This is about human beings and human life.''
Wonder how he got AIDS in the first place........
For an If/then to result as they want, both the argument must be correct, and the "If" qualification must be satisfied.
Well, if he wasn't a fag he probably wouldn't be dying in the first place. How's that for relavence?
That's special. They must not be terribly familiar with what Christ is about or about what submitting to the "world" means. Ah, to be able to serve two masters.
No debate is needed, and only Satan proclaims the need for a debate here. Their role is simple: Repent from their sin, leave the homosexual lifestyle and be forgiven.
OR, keep on with your New Butt Order® (NBO) ways and face the consequences. One of which ought to be banishment from folks who "choose" the correct path of living.
Unfortunately, it appears that He isn't:
Romans 1:24-27 (NKJV)
24 Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, 25 who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. 27 Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11 (NKJV)
9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.
Jude 7 (NKJV)
7 as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Serving God is not about disobeying but about obeying.
This is just more apostasy.
Galatians 6:7 Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap.
Reference: The Overhauling of Straight America:
"...While public opinion is one primary source of mainstream values, religious authority is the other. When conservative churches condemn gays, there are only two things we can do to confound the homophobia of true believers. First, we can use talk to muddy the moral waters. This means publicizing support for gays by more moderate churches, raising theological objections of our own about conservative interpretations of biblical teachings, and exposing hatred and inconsistency. Second, we can undermine the moral authority of homophobic churches by portraying them as antiquated backwaters, badly out of step with the times and with the latest findings of psychology. Against the mighty pull of institutional Religion one must set the mightier draw of Science and Public Opinion (the shield and word of that accursed “secular humanism”). Such an unholy alliance has worked well against churches before, on such topics as divorce and abortion. With enough open talk about the prevalence and acceptability of homosexuality, that alliance can work again here..." [Emphasis added]
*Homosexual Agenda bump... (Free Republic Bump List Register)
patent
Odd, I thought the "old-catholics" tended to be the ones who broke away declaring Vatican II to be too liberal. I can only assume they failed to copyright the term and now anyone can use it.
Sounds as if they're taking Sola Scriptura to its natural conclusions. Bet they can quote a ton of Scripture, stripped of all traditional meaning and intent, to support their position (no pun intended).
Initially they broke away in protest of Papal infallibility. They also added a claim to be a return to Catholic Tradition. All of our schismatics claim that though. They very quickly deviated substantially from that tradition, and today are quite the odd collection, to the extent they still exist. As to copyrighting terms, they actually try very hard to portray themselves as being simply Catholic, and frequently wind up deceiving people into believing that they are in union with the Pope. We have that problem quite a bit today too....an ex-Catholic woman was ordained a "priest" by a schismatic group of so called "old-catholics."Odd, I thought the "old-catholics" tended to be the ones who broke away declaring Vatican II to be too liberal. I can only assume they failed to copyright the term and now anyone can use it.
patent +AMDG
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