Different histories in moving forward.

July 18, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

A couple of weeks ago (okay, I’m slow to process everything. I have a life and a “day job.”) the Presbyterians met in the same city as the Lutherans did 11 months ago, to conduct their periodic denominational business and to change their “gatekeeping” control over their clergy—specifically their LGBT clergy.

The Presbyterians aren’t getting as much press on their decision for a variety of reasons. For one thing, the Unitarians/Universalists, United Church of Christ, Episcopal Church and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have beaten them to it, so the media become less interested. Secondly, this didn’t go as far as the Lutheran decisions, and this may not stick at all.

The action of the General Assembly is similar, in fact, to what their denomination attempted to do several years ago. On the up side 53% of the convention delegates decided to approve policy changes to permit same-gender clergy who are not abstinent—they are sexually active—to still serve as clergy.

But I’m not excited yet for my Presbyterian colleagues. This convention action doesn’t take effect unless a majority of the presbyteries (groups of local churches) agree. Two years ago, 94 of the 173 local presbyteries voted it down (54%). Weeks later, by the way, and that news was off the front page.

The other issue is that unlike the Lutheran decision, the Presbyterian one on July 9 was not connected to a thorough study and official statement about human sexuality that recognized the validity of same-sex intimate relationships. According to Associated Press, the Presbyterian delegates ” decided not to redefine marriage in their church constitution to include same-sex couples.”

Well, the Lutherans didn’t “redefine marriage” either but made some room for an understanding that gay or lesbian couples may have valid relationships. For all the years that Lutheran activists “belly-ached” about the ELCA dodging the decisions by sending out our lives for another study, the last study process actually paid off. It involved more people at more levels of the church in a sincere attempt to understand what LGBT people are about, and especially why we can be people of faith just like heterosexuals can be. In fairness, it’s important to know that many denominations, including Lutherans and Presbyterians, etc. have conducted studies of human sexuality and homosexuality. (Many of them take up chunks of drawer space in my filing cabinets because they were done before you could download them as a PDF file.) But it has been repeatedly observed that the only minds changed by sexuality studies are those who actually participated in them—usually the commission members who read, interviewed, debated and drafted the reports, not the official board which received the reports.

Although it now seems that the ELCA is more progressive than the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. or the United Methodist Church (which rejected gay marriage 15 months ago) continues to dig in its heels for similar reasons—there are thousands of country churches or small town churches that do not want to look at the sexuality issues at all), progress can be a double-edged sword. The partly-approved new Presbyterian policy would allow non-celibate (a misnomer for sexually active) individuals to be ordained and serve as clergy and presumably elders of the church. The ELCA action was more intentional in opening its gates to clergy who are either sexually abstinent or in a lifelong PALM or publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous relationship—a far cry from sexual libertinism.

In effect, the Lutheran decision means that by recognizing the validity of committed same-gender relationships the church expects gay or lesbian people to be held to an ethical standard which is identical, except for the gender of the partner, to a heterosexual marriage. The Presbyterian measure apparently doesn’t go that far because the delegates didn’t want to affirm a redefinition of marriage.

So my gay Presbyterian colleague across town, if this policy is not rejected by 87 local presbyteries who shudder and wince at the thought of a West Hollywood or San Francisco, could be “recognized” as a non-celibate pastor. Since he is single and not coupled let alone married, he would slide into a normalized status without having to cross his fingers behind his back. But my Lutheran colleague across town who is officially “single” but sexually-active in a series of short-term, no commitment, quick-but-not-deep relationships, would likely be scrutinized carefully about his sexual expression and his non-permanent boyfriends. But since I am in a publically-accountable, lifelong monogamous relationship (monogamous for 34 years; the public accountability wasn’t possible until Domestic Partnerships became legal a few years ago) ??  I have nothing to fear from such scrutiny, which doesn’t afford me any smugness. Homophobic people wouldn’t care one whit about the distinction I have raised.  

Change has its costs as well as benefits. Plainly, if LGBT people want to be treated with respectability and to be able to not keep their sexuality and their relationships in a stifling closet, they have to get used to the idea that there are other ethical standards in the community which are broader and more important than the gender of one’s “significant other.”

So while the LGBT/Presbyterian activists may be disappointed that the marriage redefinition failed in convention, and may be further disappointed if the local presbyteries don’t support the one positive decision in Minneapolis, they may have two or more years to get used to additional levels of public accountability.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Sex, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, Doctrine, Ecumenical Issues, History, LGBT Christian, ELCA | Print | No Comments »

We are not criminals.

May 29, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

I know “criminals.” They are people who have been convicted of crimes. All of us break laws, but criminals are those who are caught.

I recently learned (where have I been?) what a RAP sheet is.  It is an acronym for Record of Arrests and Prosecutions. It is part of my continuing education about crime and justice, especially in light of our congregation’s emerging Mariposa Ministry, its outreach to prisoners and parolees. We have developed relationships with more than a dozen current and former inmates in California prisons. And this year we expect to help –spiritually and tangibly– at least three men who will be paroled in Los Angeles County.

So I know criminals. But what I also know is that many ordinary people, who break laws, are never arrested or prosecuted largely because of privilege or good luck. It is sad to admit that the world is not divided between “good” people and “bad” people, but between privileged and lucky people and under-privileged and un-lucky people.

Decades ago, when I was dating, it was still a crime for two persons of the same gender to have sexual relations. This was long before Lawrence v. Texas, and the sodomy laws in almost every state had the authority to put decent, upstanding people behind bars. I was one of the privileged and lucky ones. Knowing my gay brothers who are in prison, I realize I could have been in prison myself in the 1970s and 1980s, simply for being who I am.

But our entire world is still struggling to enlarge its understanding of human diversity and to stop using laws as a moral bludgeon to punish or destroy what it does not understand or does not want to see.

This spring, as we have watched the blunt force of African nations, specifically Uganda, trying to blame perceived social ills as a Western degradation, with a proposed death penalty for homosexual acts, I have been encouraged that sane voices have spoken up world-wide.  Thank God for the likes of Anglican Bishop and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Desmond Tutu for leading this fight in Africa (see: Desmond Tutu leads fight to halt anti-gay terror sweeping Africa.”

The battle is not over. But at least two gay men in Malawi have now been spared a near-certain death sentence (14 years of hard labor) for pledging their love to one another.  Their pardon came about, apparently, because of world moral pressure in the form of a meeting of the Malawian President Bingu wa Mutharika with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

The CNN story released today quotes the White House as saying that gay people are “not criminals and their struggle is not unique.”

We are still mid-struggle in America for LGBTQI rights, and one of the battles we fight is with other oppressed peoples (including but not limited to African-American people) who don’t want to bestow the honored label of “civil rights struggle” on our movement. All it would take, I know, for our Black brothers and sisters to stop being protective of their struggle is for more Black gay men and lesbians to come out to their families and their communities. African-American sexual minorities, who have very little to fear by way of criminal conviction in this country for their sexual orientation or gender identity, could put their faces on the world-wide struggle for dignity, purpose and freedom. I hope the example two brave gay men in Malawi, Steven Monjeza and Tiwonge Chimbalanga, will encourage them.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Ecumenical Issues, LGBT Rights, Public Affairs, Coming Out, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

Milk on the Capitol steps.

May 24, 2010 by Dan Hooper.

I am passing this on from my colleague Kerry Chaplin. I’m sorry I couldn’t be in Sacramento for this. – Dan Hooper

You honor Harvey Milk’s memory on what would have been his 80th birthday. Harvey Milk would be proud of your courage. And yes, I believe God is proud of you too.

— Pastor Wilk Miller, First Lutheran Church of San Diego

Sacramento faith leaders, Rev. Brian Baker, Rev. Jason Bense, Rev. Doretha Flournoy, and Rev. Lindi Ramsden, mark the legacy of California’s first Harvey Milk Day on the Capitol steps.

What a meaningful weekend!

Over 30 congregations, from Riverside and San Diego to Vallejo and Stockton, honored the legacy of Harvey Milk in their worship services to mark California’s first ever Harvey Milk Day.

In San Diego, East and Downtown Los Angeles, Fresno, San Jose, San Francisco, and Sacramento, clergy inspired canvassers and activists to take Harvey’s message of hope to the streets.

In Los Angeles, Rev. Neil Thomas met with Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, emphasizing the unique role that people of faith play in our LGBT Movement.

I believe Harvey would be proud of our work. And as Rev. Miller has said, our Divine Power(s) is proud of us too.

Help us to continue to make sure LGBT seekers know that they are supported by people of faith, and to make sure Californians know that Divine Power(s) and equality for ALL people are symbiotic.

To Harvey’s Legacy,

Kerry Chaplin, Interfaith Organizing Director

Posted in Ecumenical Issues, LGBT Rights, Public Affairs, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

The Two Systems

April 16, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

Our Wednesday studies engage a wide diversity of people who are not (yet?) members of our congregation, but who find their spiritual centering in our midst. This week we were discussing this passage at the end of John 3.

31 The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks about earthly things. The one who comes from heaven is above all. ³² He testifies to what he has seen and heard, yet no one accepts his testimony. ³³ Whoever has accepted his testimony has certified this, that God is true. ³⁴ He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. ³⁵ The Father loves the Son and has placed all things in his hands. ³⁶ Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God’s wrath.

We have talked in the study many times about the overarching power of grace, and the danger of “works righteousness.” Some people “get it,” and others don’t, because they seem to have a great deal invested in their own sense of personal righteousness as dutiful, believing Christians. As I try to probe with them what it is they are “hanging on to” this explanation began to unfold itself for me.

It seems there are basically two rules or systems which may govern our relationship with God and one another. The one is the rule of rewards and punishments. The other is the rule of grace. In the Bible, of course, we find language that is descriptive of both, and so it takes enormous discernment to give weight to each of these and to decide by which rule we will live.Under the rule of rewards and punishments, we will always strive for reward and try to avoid punishment. We will measure our achievement and calculate our relationship both to God and to other human beings on the basis of how we can gain rewards and what we might lose or suffer. The bottom line is that we will expect our behavior and good works (or our abstaining from bad things) counts for something, and that in the end—the judgment day—we will receive the ultimate rewards of eternal bliss, a heavenly mansion, a heavenly banquet, a crown, etc.

But under that rule of rewards and punishments, we become more like Muslims than different from them, for they too hope to receive entrance to Paradise on the judgment day, except of course that their doctrine affords them no advance certainty that God will grant to them the eternal reward.

The rule of grace, on the other hand, cares little about rewards or punishment. We stop measuring our performance against a standard which is impossible. We simply live under grace, honest in the knowledge that we do not deserve it yet confident that we have already received it without measure. Under grace, we are not ultimately terrified about damnation, for the scripture assures us that we may draw near to the throne of grace with confidence.

Moral theology, especially under the definition of the medieval Catholic system, would attempt to marry these two rules together, but in fact that results in a tragic, upended mishmash in which grace must be subordinated to law. When Lutherans insist— relying on where St. Paul tells us that all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory, and that all are justified by God’s grace apart from the law— we do not mean that grace is merely the strength we need from beyond ourselves to perform all the required works and deeds and abstinences of moral law. Rather we mean that we are wholly and completely justified —not by any effort on our part nor by refraining from anything, nor even confessing to our sinful nature and our manifold iniquities—only and totally as a free and undeserved gift from God for Christ’s sake.

If it is not the melding of these two rules, which I think is destructive at best, here is the bottom line: It is left to each of us to choose under which rule we will order our lives—whether under the rule of rewards and punishments, or under the rule of grace. If we voluntarily choose the system of rewards and punishments, we may be caught up in a giddy hopefulness for an exclusive parcel of eternal real estate, but in this life we will be preoccupied with fear of punishment and with being given credit for each correct moral choice we make and the sum of our accomplishments.

But if we voluntarily choose the rule of grace, all those things pale before the wonder-filled knowledge of God’s generous love and forgiveness, whereby gratitude for God’s gifts of grace so overwhelms our hearts that our life itself overflows with generosity and compassion.

This topic will be more fully explored on my other web site Gay Catechism. 

—Pastor Dan Hooper, Los Angeles

Posted in Doctrine, Gay Catechism, Bible & Interpretation, Ecumenical Issues, Living by Grace, Fundamentalism, Spirituality | Print | No Comments »

A sign of genuine progress.

March 26, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

This story would have been much more welcome news if it had come in 1985 or even 1995 or 2000. But the full story is encouraging because it moves away from blame to compassion, and from asking “who sinned?” toward “how can we show compassion?” – D.H.

Religious groups pledge to end AIDS stigma

By The Associated Press
03.25.2010 1:00pm EDT(The Hague, Netherlands) Religious groups from around the globe pledged Tuesday to prevent the stigmatization of people living with HIV and AIDS, in a joint statement welcomed by a senior U.N. official as a sea change in attitudes.Representatives of some 40 religions and faith groups including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism ended a two-day retreat in the Netherlands by signing a “personal commitment to action” in which they vowed to “be clear in my words and actions that stigma and discrimination towards people living with or affected by HIV is unacceptable.”  Read entire story here.

Posted in HIV and AIDS, Ecumenical Issues, Public Affairs | Print | No Comments »

Prayer in the heart of Hollywood.

March 25, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

The music of Taizé has been around for a generation or more, but continues to grow in popularity, in part because of those who come from around the world to pray in this southern French town are met with simple and direct piety in an amazing blend of experiences.

Taizé was founded by Brother Roger during World War II, quickly became a refuge for Jews escaping the Nazi slaughter, and today draws as many as 7,000 visitors per week.

We have begun to pattern our prayer life on the piety and music of Taizé here in Hollywood. It has begun as a Lenten experiment, will continue on Maundy Thursday next week, and hopefully in the weeks after Easter.

There is no doubt that the experience is monastic — it provides a temporary retreat from the world into pure contemplation. There a re few words, time for silence and easily repetitive prayer. But when monasticism gently opens its arms to the outside world, it is grace.

Better yet, the brothers of Taizé welcome imitation all over the world. Their simple ecumenism fits our emerging church sensibility that the only way to be post-denominational as Christians is to start living like Christians with no prefixes or suffixes.

Even more amazing, doctrine and official dogma clearly are in the back seat or not present at all. The texts give voice to the words of Scripture alone, and interpretation is simply left to the Spirit to bring to each heart. The worship style of Taizé takes seriously the prophetic words of Jeremiah 31, “This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the LORD.”

In our experience, the role of the leader is unimportant, and formality is forgotten. Some sit on the floor or on cushions. Different people simply rise to read or to offer pray from the heart.

What is gratifying to many is that this kind of faith and spiritual expression is attracting young people. The music is singable, not complex, not packed with theology, and the mood enhanced by things as un-high tech as candles allows each person to bring what she or he has to offer and place it before God with honesty and simplicity. In our house of worship, each week different people have been close to tears. I hope we can continue this in the future to welcome people who don’t feel they belong in a church on a Sunday morning.

—Pastor Dan Hooper, Los Angeles

Posted in Doctrine, Catholic matters, Bible & Interpretation, Ecumenical Issues, PRAYERS, Faith, Spirituality | Print | No Comments »

Three cheers for change.

February 20, 2010 by Dan Hooper.

I got an e-mail a few days ago, a “Special Edition” from the interfaith Religious Institute based in Westport, Connecticut. Yes, we’ve been saying that human sexuality and homosexuality have been balkanizing America and preoccupying both religious and secular organizations and institutions. At least this crowd has decided not to be reactive but proactive in pressing for sexual health and sexual justice.

The e-mail announces the release of a new report, Sexuality and Religion 2020: Goals for the Next Decade, in an audio press conference. Rev. Debra Hafner was joined at this audio news conference by “the esteemed religious historian, Dr. Martin Marty; the director of women’s ministry for the National Council of Churches, the Rev. Ann Tiemeyer; and the president of the National Council of Jewish Women, Nancy Ratzan (left to right below).

 

(Dr. Marty’s presence is notable to me because I can remember less than a few decades ago when he was saying some pretty homophobic things and wishing that “the love that dare not speak its name” would just learn to be quiet. No, I can’t find that actual quote — I think I have it in paper files somewhere, because it was uttered by Marty before everything in the cosmos was on line. But the homophobia and the name of Martin Marty stuck in my consciousness. Thank God he has grown on this issue like millions of others.)

Here is an excerpt of the e-mail announcing the 51-page Report:

The report opens with a new vision: By the year 2020, all faith communities will be sexually healthy, just and prophetic. It goes on to outline 10 goals for the next 10 years that will help to achieve that vision. The goals, listed below, are fully articulated in the report. They call on religious leaders and institutions to

• break the silence around sexuality in congregations and faith communities;
• improve ministerial training in sexuality issues;
• provide better pastoral care on sexuality-related issues and sexuality education for youth and adults;
• forge multifaith coalitions to promote sexual health and justice;
• become more effective advocates for sexuality education, sexual and reproductive health, and the full inclusion of women and LGBT persons;
• include sexuality in movements addressing poverty, the environment and other social justice concerns; and
• mobilize people of faith to advocate for an increased commitment to sexual health, education and justice in religious communities.

Whether the goals are even slightly realistic and attainable is anyone’s guess. But remember that ten years ago Bill Clinton was President, there were twin towers in New York City, gay marriage wasn’t legal anywhere in the United States, Proposition 22 was not yet on the books in California, and Lawrence v. Texas had not reached the Supreme Court (Bowers v. Hardwick was still the supreme sexual law of the land concerning same-gender consensual acts). In 2000, the Roman Catholic Church and its insurance underwriters were still billions of dollars ahead, before the onslaught of lawsuits and settlements of priestly sexual abuse. So in terms of the movement we’re a part of, a decade may see a lifetime of change.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Sex, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, HIV and AIDS, Ecumenical Issues, Public Affairs, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

The bridge between faith and rights.

February 5, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

Full disclosure: this column is not about Sarah Palin or any other bridge to nowhere that politicians may have built.

Some of us who have been active in the LGBT rights movement for a long time can remember when activist organizations competed viciously against one another, or were torn apart internally because of strident competition between gay men and lesbians. Worse still, there seemed to be this unbridgeable chasm between civil and political activism and the world of faith and religion. No one built a bridge nor even wanted a bridge between them.

I have lived a significant period of my life with a split personality — keeping the “Christian self” apart from the “gay self”; I avoided situations where I would have to come out as gay to a Christian community or as Christian in the LGBT communities. There was something unspoken in me–in many of us–that believed these two distinct selves would never communicate.

It was not altogether accurate, however, and also not true to my faith to suppose that I could not be honest in both communities. As I have matured in faith, I am far less insecure in telling other LGBT people that I am not only a Christian, but a pastor of a Christian congregation.

In recent years we’ve begun to see much more cross-over between LGBT activism in the public/civil/political realm and the faith/spirituality/religion realm. It has probably come about because of another “tipping point” in social change when both camps realized how much we need one another. Case in point, the outcry from the religious communities of America against the evil and draconian legislation proposed in Uganda to annihilate all homosexuals. (For Christ’s sake, even our traditional enemies at Focus on the Family have spoken against it!)

Both the Human Rights Campaign and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force have reached out especially to the LGBT/Christian movement for one clear and compelling reason: it is obvious that Christian extremism on the right (the Religious Reich) is the biggest single obstacle in America to LGBT people achieving the full and equal rights and benefits of a democratic society.

From the HRC Religion & Faith web site: “The Human Rights Campaign Religion and Faith Program mobilizes people of faith to advocate for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Learn more about HRC’s Religion and Faith Program and about the members of its Religion Council.” the site includes news, articles and resources.

The Revs. Eger, Robinson, Russell and Voelkel

HRC’s Religion Council of 13 significant faith leaders include two from the Los Angeles area: Rabbi Denise Eger, who for 18 years has served as the Rabbi of Congregation Kol Ami in West Hollywood, and Rev. Canon Susan Russell, who is Senior Associate for Pastoral Life at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. Both are extremely strong leaders in our environment; both continue to play important roles nationwide, as does Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire.

Under the leadership of Harry Knox, HRC’s Religion and Faith Program has been issuing weekly preaching helps for ministers of welcoming Christian churches to proclaim the full breadth of each week’s Common Lectionary readings.

The Task Force keeps a “Faith” tab on its web menu, and hosts the Institute for Welcoming Resources and the interfaith National Religious Leadership Roundtable. I especially commend the brief “article of faith” by Rev. Rebecca Voelkel, “Why the pro-LGBT movement should welcome religion“, which this blog entry echoes:

“As LGBT religious folks, we often find ourselves in the midst of a squeeze-play between our religious communities and our colleagues in the secular LGBT movement. But, I believe that we, as LGBT religious folks, have a unique and powerful role to play.”In particular, our movement, as it engages our opponents who are overwhelmingly religious, must claim the theological and moral authority of our pro-LGBT voice….”Voelkel, an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, is also on the HRC’s Religion Council and serves as Director of the Task Force’s Institute for Welcoming Resources, representing the open/welcoming/affirming/reconciling religious caucuses and movements in faith traditions. There is a wealth of resources on this site.This blog often keeps watch on the weirdos, but we need to keep watch with those strong people of faith who are moving us forward. I hope you will explore these links and plug in wherever is appropriate for you.—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in LGBT Christian, Ecumenical Issues, "The Closet", Faith, History, Coming Out, Public Affairs, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

Lack of credentials, lack of accountability.

February 2, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

Dan Neil’s column in the Los Angeles Times this morning, “No Coming Out Party for Super Bowl” was amusing, about the application of a new gay dating service (”Man Crunch” dot com) to get their video aired during the Super Bowl, which was rejected by CBS even while Tim Tebow’s Focus on the Family anti-abortion ad will apparently get the green light to run. Neil rightly cries about this being a double standard in the part of CBS.

That’s not surprising. Double standards are just one weapon in the culture wars we are living through.

But what caught my eye was Neil’s perhaps-innocent error in referring to “The Rev. James Dobson” as “well-known as an All-Pro gay hater.”

Can it be that any journalist worth his keyboard doesn’t know that Dobson is not and never has been an ordained minister of any church? Check his biography here.

I sent Mr. Neil the following e-mail:

As amusing as your column was in this morning’s Times, it contained a serious error. Dr. James Dobson is not and never has been an ordained minister. Please see, for example, this article: “Attention journalists everywhere: James Dobson is not a minister” on the www.regrettheerror.com web site. And for future reference, Pat Robertson is no longer a minister either.

The article at Regret the Error is thorough and cites erroneous articles going back several years with 22 retractions that had to be printed in respectable newspapers and news magazines about Dobson. This is my opinion, unsubstantiated, but I can’t help wondering if Dr. Dobson enjoys the free credibility he gets by being mistakenly respected as an ordained minister.

This little cyclone-in-a-coffee-cup (okay, “tempest in a tea pot”, but who remembers that cliché?) illustrates a major problem in both reporting and blogging: we all tend to write about people we’ve not actually interviewed and probably haven’t even met. That is probably unavoidable, but it simply increases the pressure on us to check our facts, not overstretch our points or be too quick to rush to publish.

It illustrates a deeper and more disturbing issue, of course. What are the credentials of the Religious Reich figures who have plagued America’s otherwise open-hearted compassion and generosity of spirit? Pat Robertson is not an ordained anything, either, having resigned from the ranks of the Southern Baptist clergy when he decided to run for the Republican nomination for President of the United States in 1988. (You may roll your eyes now. What, after all, were his credentials to be a candidate for the nation’s top office?)

But what are the credentials of Christian ministers, period? Many well-known preachers have run through Bible colleges while others have advanced degrees. The procedure by which any particular local church, or national denomination, certifies one to be competent to lead Christian churches and to speak for God, are vastly different form place to place, denomination to denomination. The lack of a uniform high standard doesn’t merely allow the wing nuts to use the title “Reverend” with their name. It has also allowed unqualified people who are also sexual predators to gain access to the vulnerabilities of innocent people, and who are manipulators and thieves to help themselves to huge sums of money.

Wikipedia conveniently lists the dirt on 27 public evangelists involved in scandals of one sort or another, including Aimee Semple McPherson, Jim Bakker, Paul Crouch, Jimmy Swaggart, Ted Haggard and Tony Alamo.

The Southern Baptist Convention’s official website has this on its Frequently Asked Questions page:

2. “What is the procedure for ordination in the SBC?

“Actually, there is no standard process or policy concerning ordination in the SBC. In fact, the SBC cannot ordain anyone. The matter of ordination is addressed strictly on a local church level. Every Southern Baptist church is autonomous and decides individually whether or not to ordain, or whether to require ordination of its pastor. When a church senses that God has led a person into pastoral ministry, it is a common practice to have a council (usually of pastors) review his testimony of salvation, his pastoral calling from the Lord, and his qualifications (including theological preparation and scriptural qualifications according to 1 Timothy 3:1-7 and Titus 1:7-9) for pastoral ministry. Based upon that interview the church typically decides whether or not ordination would be appropriate.

“Some SBC churches require seminary training from an SBC seminary, while others may not, such a requirement is entirely up to the church.

“Of course, every SBC church is free to approach ordination in the manner it deems best.”

This underlines an issue for evangelical churches across the land, with their emphasis on feel-good enthusiasm and direct inspiration form God: lack of accountability. It is in the accountability area where a thread of relationship is woven into recent Roman Catholic sex scandals as well. Predatory priests have evaded accountability and so have the bishops who have place and replaced them time after time to protect both the priest and the privilege of holy orders.

But Jesus set the standard for those who would be ministers by washing his disciples’ feet. To minister means to serve, not to be served. The scramble for larger-than-life credibility and power in our society has led too many so-called Christians to ditch all standards in the effort to have public authority.  Academic credentials are harder to fake (although not impossible; I get spam e-mails all the time advertising the degrees for sale that I never tried to earn in school). Being elected to office requires cesspools of money if not mountains of integrity. But to become a “reverend” seems to be easy enough to attract wing nuts of all kinds.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Violence, Go figure!, Sex, Ecumenical Issues, Public Affairs, Fundamentalism, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

More weight tipping the scale.

January 12, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

On the heels of the no vote in New Jersey (where they only needed 4 or 5 more votes in the Senate), little by little, the objections to same-gender legal marriage continue to wither in other countries. This past week, the Parliament of Portugal voted to permit gay marriage, according to an Associated Press story.

This unites the Iberian peninsula, because Spain already did this five years ago. Although both are heavily Roman Catholic countries, they have not fallen off into the Atlantic for their left-leaning liberalism! At what point will the international change reach a tipping point for the United States too? Why are we so, well, anal?

Last summer, according to the Huffington Post, Portugal’s highest Constitutional Court upheld a ban on same-sex marriage and rejected a suit by two lesbians, Teresa Pires and Helena Paixao. the high court considered the appeal brought from a lower court, and “the Constitutional Court said in a statement posted on its Web site that the constitution does not state that same-sex marriages must be permitted.”

But catch the prophetic outlook of one of the plaintiffs, which seems to anticipate this week’s shift:

The court said the question before it was not whether the constitution allows same-sex marriages, but whether the constitution compels them to be accepted, which it does not.       Paixao told The Associated Press by telephone she regarded the decision as “a victory” because the split decision demonstrated that attitudes are changing in Portugal. “It shows there’s a change coming. Bit by bit people will come around” and accept gay marriage, she said.www.Change.Org carries Michael Jones’ commentary from last Wednesday, “Portugal, Gay Marriage, and a Visit By Pope Benedict XVI“: Prime Minister Socrates made legalizing gay marriage a big component of his re-election campaign last year. When he won, in September, gay marriage activists saw the marriage equality writing on the wall. By the end of this week, the writing may be all over the country’s laws.       Meanwhile, even the Catholic Church is Portugal is sounding a bit conciliatory. Lisbon’s Catholic Cardinal Patriarch Jose Policarpo weighed in and said that same-sex marriage was “parliament’s responsibility,” and not something that Portugal’s Catholic Church should focus on. Ah, would that this philosophy spill over to the U.S. Catholic Church. Instead of leaving marriage up to state legislators, the U.S. Catholic Church gets involved regularly (hello Maine, hello California, hello New Jersey) in the same-sex marriage debate.

Meanwhile, Australian Catholic Cath News notes that the parliament rejects allowing gay couples to adopt children. And further meanwhile, Aljazeera (!) notes that it was as recently as 1982 that homosexuality was a crime in Portugal. Is there any doubt that we are clamoring to a tipping point when (a) decriminalization to legal marriage is only 28 years apart; (b) Aljezeera news carries an objective news story on this without calling for death to the “infidels”?

— Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Catholic matters, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, Ecumenical Issues, Public Affairs, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

Good news, religious lunacy.

November 30, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

The web newscaster www.365gay.com does a cool job of monitoring AP news releases as well as publishing its own reports. One AP post recently (which I’d missed) is probably the best little tidbit of news I’ve seen in awhile, indicating that there is no smoking gun of gay priests behind the widespread Catholic sex abuse scandal.  Read the story:

Report: Homosexuality no factor in abusive priests 

by The Associated Press • 11.18.2009 9:22am EST

The report, commissioned and financed by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to the tune of $2 million, did not find that the homosexual orientation of priests was any predictor of who would be involved in sexual abuse. In spite of a policy coming from the Vatican itself a year or so ago to essentially “weed out” homosexually-oriented candidates for the Catholic priesthood, the behavioralists and criminologists who have extensively studied sexual predation and pedophilia do not find a gay = child molester link.

According to the AP report, Margaret Smith of John Jay College of Criminal Justice reported to the Bishops meeting in Baltimore: “If that [Vatican anti-gay] exclusion were based on the fact that [a gay person] person would be more probable than any other candidate to abuse, we do not find that at this time.”

Also another finding from other reports, that I see as good news, is that clergy sexual abuse cases are on the decline ever since the 1980s. Most of the cases still shaming churches and emptying their coffers stem from abusive behavior in the 1960s and 1970s. Perhaps the “transparency” and media attention of more recent times is telling pedophiles and sexual opportunists that they won’t be able to hide their behavior as well as they once did.

On the down side, there is nothing on the horizon to suggest that the Roman Catholic Church will any time soon become more realistic about human sexuality in its moral theology. Its rule of celibacy (a rule of the Church, not a Christian doctrine) for clergy and its iniquitizing of any sexual activity outside of a heterosexual-and-procreative context continues to make its moral teaching seem ridiculous in the larger world and puts many Catholic faithful into a hypocritical bind.

Most ridiculous of all (another rule, not dogma) is to continue to ban women from the priesthood while male priests are deserting the ranks of the clergy if not bankrupting the Church. It has been reported that one-fourth of all Catholic parishes world wide have no priest. The numbers who have quit the priesthood to get (heterosexually) married continues to climb. And the molesters, guilty of some 14,000 sexual abuse cases since 1950, have cost the Church an estimated $2.3 billion in the same time period, according to the AP story.

I know that many of the rank-and-file are outraged at by all of this. The expenditure of money alone (yes, a lot of it paid by insurance companies) is appalling and disgusting. You would think the Church would be broke, but somehow it still finds the funds to fight against civil rights for gay and lesbian couples in California and Maine, too. What else can we do but shake our heads in astonishment and resignation to this religious lunacy. — Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Sex, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, Catholic matters, Go figure!, Doctrine, Ecumenical Issues, Public Affairs, LGBT Rights, LGBT Christian, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

We’re here. We’re Christian. Get used to it.

November 23, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

The year 2009 has already been momentous enough in the world of faith, what with both the Episcopal Church and the Lutheran Church taking decisive left turns on sexuality issues. The Episcopal Church essentially ended its self-imposed moratorium of electing a lesbian/gay bishop, after the existence of out gay Bishop Gene Robinson set the world’s conservative Anglican into a firestorm of indignation.

Then a month later the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America did something almost unthinkable for a mid-America-dominated outfit of good decent folks: it lifted the 20 year old ban on the ordination of partnered lesbian and gay people into the Lutheran ministry. Since that momentous day in August, everybody seemed to threaten to stop talking to the Lutherans, including other Lutherans, Catholics, etc.

Every denomination of Christians knows full well that they already have lesbian and gay clergy in their ranks. But most of them have preferred the continuous hypocrisy of plausible deniability – that they are unaware or even sincerely believe that they do not have lesbian and gay clergy because, well, they don’t allow such a thing. (By the way, the word “plausible” has an interesting history of its own.)

At any rate, the outrage and indignation over the reality of sexual variation even among decent and God-fearing people, is at least the flashpoint for a lot of upheaval in the Christian world.

Upheaval is usually caused by a lot of light material being tossed around by stronger forces. (I imagine the example of, say, a card table full of champagne glasses is upset by a fast-moving house pet.) There is far less upheaval of any sort when something is built on bedrock, and I always thought that the Christian faith was built on bedrock. I was brought up to believe that. More on that later.

But upheaval there is, and many well-respected commentators have been suggesting now for years that what we see emerging is an enormous realignment in the world of religion. Breakaway groups from mainline Protestant denominations, for example, may simply team up and form new unions.

So as the CORE Lutherans announce they are moving ahead to form their own little churchbody, we can’t help wondering if they will eventually converge with the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod if that latter can trust their conservatism, or even the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (which is really not evangelical and not Lutheran in my humble opinion).

As a side note, I will watch with enthusiasm mixed with amazement to see how many ELCA congregations actually do go with the CORE movement. My count today on their web site is that 87 congregations are moving in their direction. Keep in mind that somewhere between 300 and 400 ELCA congregations have signed on with the Lutherans Concerned Reconciling in Christ program to publicly welcome lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. So at the moment this doesn’t look like a serious realignment of apocalyptic proportions.

But the this ecumenical thing popped into the news, the so-called Manhattan Declaration which came out three days ago, that attempts to put up a barricade to the enormous social change of recent decades, over the signatures of Orthodox, Catholic and Evangelical Christians.

(It seems more than a little odd this group would grab the title from the climate change people who in 2008 issued the Manhattan Declaration in Manhattan. This month’s 7-page religious moratorium was actually released in Washington D.C., not New York. I suppose now anybody could just write up his or her own version of truth and issue it under the title “The Holy Bible,” and it would be okay, huh?)

But this seems to fit the pattern of that “strange bedfellow” coalition of Mormons and Roman Catholics who donated huge sums to “defend” heterosexual marriage in California and again in Maine.

Bruce Garrett, of Truth Wins Out has written a cogent piece (”Statement Of Conscience: Just Give Us The Money”) on the Declaration and warns of its blatantly anti-gay political agenda.

Is there a real Christian realignment going on? Realignment is hard to detect for certainty when things change at glacial speed. And you know how the media loves to exaggerate, hence the word “upheaval” when 87 out of 10,000 congregations pick up their marbles and leave the ELCA’s game.

Personally, I doubt that there is a grand realignment that will abide for very long. The Mormon/Catholic alliance over Proposition 8 was a marriage of convenience. Both, as I have said, did their best to take the moral heat off of their own houses (a wild history of plural marriages, and a current pattern of sexually-abusive priests and pedophiles) by amping up their indignation over same-sex marriage.

Even in the current Declaration, there is so little holding Evangelical and Catholics together theologically that I doubt it means a massive or fundamental realignment. There are still plenty of evangelical Christians who think the Pope is Antichrist, for example. And Benedict XVI hasn’t done anything to dispel that age-old antipathy. It was more than amusing to see the Catholic News Agency identify some of the writers who put the Declaration together as including “renowned Evangelical leader Charles Colson.” Charles Colson, of Watergate notoriety? Charles Colson, who wrote “Born Again” in 1976 after serving time in prison for obstruction of justice? Well, I guess so, because he got into bed with ex-Lutheran convert to Roman Catholicism (the late) Richard John Neuhaus to publish “Evangelicals and Catholics Together: Toward a Common Mission” in 1995. (You can get your used copy from Amazon right now for 59¢.)

And I suspect the Orthodox are not about to cave into Roman Papal authority any time soon, especially in light of its astonishing resurgence in post-Soviet Russia. The ecumenism of recent years on that front has Orthodoxy being cordial but not really trusting the Papacy. And Benedict is not likely to suggest parity with the Patriarch. His recent”generous” offer to welcome disaffected Anglicans back into the Roman fold, for example, smacks of canon law machinations: an Anglican bishop can become a Roman priest, keeping his wife but forfeiting his episcopate. Gee thanks, Ben.

If the Christian faith and witness is built on real bedrock, it is not the bedrock of Christian history nor a unified view of the divisive social issues in any era. It could only be the bedrock of the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the historic creeds and confessions of what it means to be Christian. (So there go the Mormons, who hold to some very odd beliefs about God, Jesus, Adam, and human beings becoming Gods, and who turn up their noses at the ancient statements of faith.) Clearly, the bedrock of Christian faith, and the “core” of Lutheran theological teachings, are about what God does for humanity in Jesus Christ. Those core believes including nothing about who is Pope or whether one needs a pope, a bishop or a priest. the core believes including nothing about human sexuality, homosexuality, or marriage, for that matter.

You can appeal all you want to tradition, and loyalty to the real Holy Bible, but unity of faith is grounded on a great deal more than widely-held prejudices and a quickly assembled outrage and bluster promulgated to grab the attention of the media. And most important, a 7-page statement drawn up by indignant traditionalists does absolutely nothing to make reality go away. And a significant part of reality is that there are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning human beings out there, many of whom were raised in Christian homes and in spite of all the conservative bluster still acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus Christ. We’re here, we’re queer. We’re Christian. Get used to it. Do I have to say that into Latin?

— Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Doctrine, Catholic matters, Bible & Interpretation, Ecumenical Issues, History, LGBT Christian, ELCA | Print | No Comments »

Pope or poacher?

October 25, 2009 by Dan Hooper.

The man who walks in the “shoes of the fisherman” — Pope Benedict¹⁶ —has gone on a major fishing expedition that certainly raises more questions than eyebrows.

It is not surprising that Rome, under Ratzinger’s leadership, should try an opportunistic gesture to collect disaffected Anglicans back to Rome. After all, he doesn’t consider any Christian communion to be the genuine church unless it is under his authority. So it’s not surprising that his gesture of outreach to unhappy Anglicans and Episcopalians in this country fits with his agenda to strengthen and broaden his own personal authority.

But this latest may have the effect of actually weakening his authority, and this is where the surprises come from:

Rome has long has a curious dispensation to allow married Anglican priests (or, theoretically, married Orthodox priests) to come back to Rome and remain married. It seemed n anomaly of history and Canon Law when I first heard of that, since the Roman Catholic Church has enforced clerical celibacy for at least 800 years. (I have hundreds of pages in manuscript form that provide details on that). But this curiosity seemed all but a historical footnote until this latest gesture.

And Benedict is hurting for priests, as they exit the priesthood by old age and death, marriage, therapy or prison. I’ve been told on good authority (but it’s too broad to Google or Snopes this) that one quarter of all Catholic parishes globally have no priest.

But if the Pope wants to welcome married and disaffected Anglican priests back to Rome, with their wives, he has essentially reinforced the point that clerical celibacy is simply a rule of the church and has no real authority in Scripture or dogma. If it is simply a church rule that can be bent or relaxed by the guy who wears the authoritative hat, then why doesn’t he just get rid of the rule and welcome his own married ex-priests back to Catholic altars?

(It is hard enough to admit to a change of mind in public—the media and the opposition will tell you in a New York minute that you are “waffling”— but to change your mind and go against the last 90 Popes or 800 years, whatever, that takes nerves of steel.)

Benedict has also thrown in a bone to the Protestant Reformation by suggesting that disaffected Anglicans can keep their beloved Prayer Book, the very anchor of the Church of England since 1549, and as fiercely defended by Anglicans as the papacy is by Catholics. But if returning Anglicans can bring along their Prayer Book, in the English language, so much for the Roman Missal, the Roman Rite, and all the dogmatic baggage packed into the Mass. In other words, so much for Rome’s unblinking authority.

The third shocker is Benedict’s suggestion that Anglicans who come home to Rome can bring along their own bishops. If he thinks he will be expanding his authority by adding bishops under him, what becomes of Apostolic Succession? And come to think of it, this is backhanded gesture to undercut the authority and insult the person of Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams. It is as if to say, “since you can’t control your boys any more, I will take them off your hands.” Every Anglican Bishop that returns to Rome is one less Bishop under Canterbury.

Astonishingly, Rowan Williams seems content to accept this slap and spin it to sound like ecumenical progress! According to Steve Doughty of the U.K’s Daily Mail Online “Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams said it showed that relations between Anglicans and Roman Catholics were closer than ever.” Perhaps Archbishop (”Red Riding Hood”) Williams has mistaken Benedict for his own grandmother?

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Catholic matters, Doctrine, Ecumenical Issues, History, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

Just Say Nope!

October 24, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

I offer somebody else’s blog and two comments.  i’ll save my comments until after I read some more news stories.  On its face, this is just too fascinating to pass up. — Dan Hooper

Pope Welcomes Disaffected Anglicans

Steve Benen points to the following.

“In a move expected to cause confusion within Anglican and Catholic parishes alike, the Vatican on Tuesday announced it would make it easier for Anglicans uncomfortable with the Church of England’s acceptance of women priests and openly gay bishops to join the Catholic Church. A new canonical entity will allow Anglicans ‘to enter full communion with the Catholic Church while preserving elements of the distinctive Anglican spiritual and liturgical patrimony,’ Cardinal William Levada, the prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said at a news conference here on Tuesday.”

What it probably means is that married Anglican priests can become married Catholic priests because God knows that priestly celibacy can be thrown overboard when put in service of denying women priesthood or acceptance of gays within the priesthood. Sounds like the patriarchy circling the wagons again.

Posted by Mary at October 24, 2009 09:57 AM | Religion | Technorati links 

Comments

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith , previously known as the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition… which means Cardinal William Levada is the Grand Inquisitor. How cool is that!

Posted by: JimD at October 25, 2009 10:24 PM

Posted in Catholic matters, Doctrine, Ecumenical Issues, History | Print | No Comments »

Lasting Peace: the Unsplit Life

October 23, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

On the train to Riverside today I finally picked up a book I had set aside last July: the anthology “Wrestling with the Angel” [Brian Bouldrey, ed.; New York: Riverhead Books, 1995]. Today I came to Andrew Holleran’s chapter in which he wrestles with Catholic guilt more than any angel.

Holleran (Eric Garber) is a gay novelist and essayist roughly my contemporary in age but far more advanced in finding his voice as an activist. You can Google for a lot about his life and work if you like.

So much of what he writes about religion parallels my own awareness if not experience, and I can’t help wondering if it is more because he was Catholic and I Lutheran that he left most of the faith behind and I never did. Holleran identifies, at least he did in 1995 in “The Sense of Sin” as a “cafeteria Catholic,” taking what he wants from the religious smorgasbord and leaving the rest behind. But his chief insight in his brief autobiography of confession reveals that he could neither abandon his childhood and adolescent Catholic faith nor fully embrace it.

“The sense of Sin is, of course, missing in some people, keen, more keen, keenest in others. When I drew up a list of my own one evening, I was surprised to see that all of mine amounted to sins that did not include homosexual acts themselves but the consequences of hiding them from people who loved and expected more out of me, perhaps than I’d given the world. In other words, I suspected myself of shame, withdrawal, and finally that most classic of Catholic sins, despair. Still, none of them seemed correctable; I hadn’t any more faith in homosexuality’s virtues, really, than I did in the existence of God—though the latter was no something I could bring myself to entirely disbelieve, either.”For me, this no-man’s land, this love-hate experience is what happens when one has absorbed the Religion of Christianity without ever finding a manner in which to live out the Christian Faith. Guilt truly is the gift that goes on giving, and we have good reason to jokingly insist that the Lutheran persuasion is “Catholic Lite: one third less guilt.”As a young writer and preacher I was always more than a bit brash, but taking the longer view now in mid-life and mature years I notice with enormous gratitude that I did not pick up much guilt about sex and sexuality in childhood and adolescence. Lutheran preachers were far too conventional and inhibited even to mention that sexuality exists. There were no warnings or scoldings from Sunday School teachers. Luther’s Small Catechism sticks to the basics of the Christian faith —faith in God and Christ and the Spirit and the Sacraments— rather than building moral fences and trying to provide guidelines to control our daily impulses. So to this day I insist that attitudes about human sexuality and homosexuality cannot, in and of themselves “split the church.” Opening our minds about gay and lesbian people and relationships is not an “abandonment of the historic faith” because, the Lutherans would insist, the true Christian faith does not contain doctrines about sex in the first place.

Holleran’s dilemma is that he cannot live with the dire ultimatums which either Catholicism or fundamentalism presents to him, but he realizes at mid-life that homosexuality and sexual liberalism are not a substitute faith, either. Even as a fallen child of his Church, he sees his sexuality in Catholic vocabulary: “a cross one had to bear.”

“That one kept thinking in Catholic phrases was, of course, part of the legacy of a Catholic childhood. The gay Catholic operates on two levels, I suspect; on the one hand, he believes it is quite moral to act on his sexual orientation, to form a sexual bond, of whatever duration, with another man; that the antihomosexual tenets of Christianity are parochial, culture-bound, and heterosexual; that the active gay man has acquired, and provided others, a human dimension available uniquely in erotic intimacy; that kindness, beauty, tenderness, love can be experienced only through the medium of another person. On the other, he suspects that he has turned sex into a form of fast-food junk, that he is trapped in a way of life from which there is no escape and no real chance of finding any lasting peace of mind. In other words, this was cognitive dissonance as a way of life.”All that I can counter is that I do not suffer that dissonance and I preach to dismantle its power over others. But my understanding is not to trivialize the core message of Jesus nor to re-Puritanize sexual expression. That I have remained not celibate but monogamous is not because I have struck some self-devised compromise with God or have internalized homophobic guilt about having casual or anonymous sexual experiences. It is because I have experienced the greatest personal and spiritual growth in relationships (one man, one Lord) which are long-lasting and able to grapple with the tension most human beings live with between the superficiality of the flesh and the overwhelming depth of the soul.If all of that is really a cross one has to bear, it is the cross I have chosen not because of a bifurcated life (hiding my sexuality from the church and hiding my faith from the boys at the gay bar), but because of my awareness that I live only one life and will struggle to keep it integrated. If I can live without splitting my life, then maybe the Church can live without splitting itself apart.—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Sex, Gay Catechism, Catholic matters, Doctrine, Ecumenical Issues, Faith, LGBT Christian, Fundamentalism, Spirituality | Print | No Comments »