Counting on both visibility and invisibility.

March 4, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

Diane Silver at 365Gay.com has a good perspective on the coming U.S. Census: “Get Counted! Why the Census is crucial to Gays.”

The article quotes Jaime Grant, the director of the Policy Institute of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.  “Without data, you have no community portrait, and without a portrait, you have no needs, you have no identity, you have no funding. The census has always had a civil rights component to it,” says Grant.

The LGBTQ community has its share of disagreements, and the Census is no exception. We know it can be to our advantage to be more visible. I remember paying attention ten years ago that our household could mark the form indicating we were unmarried partners, and still mark us both as being male.

Silver points out that the Census Bureau did not tabulate the data, beginning in 1990, which would have revealed a portrait of some of America’s lesbian/gay households. Outside entities, including the Policy Institute, dug out the story from the raw data.

Credo Action is pushing a campaign to “Queer the Census” and if you identify yourself to them, you get a free sticker (Wow!—bumper, or back-pack?). Their web site says they’ve given away 29,940 stickers so far.

So why doesn’t the Census Bureau gather more information about LGBTQ households? There are two obvious reasons. Silver only mentions one: Congress has control of the Census. Although it is mandated in the U.S. Constitution, what data are gathered every ten years is tightly controlled by law and therefore by politics. At present there is no plan to add questions to the 2020 form about gender identity, sexual orientation, etc.

But the other reason that data is not gathered nor processed is that LGBTQ people have an ambivalent attitude about being visible. We like being out and proud when it is cool or advantageous to be out and proud. But we also like to evade detection when that is advantageous. We are sometimes evasive about describing or naming our significant relationships, for example. We deflect questions or avoid situations where we might have to leave a paper trail (a legal trail) about our lives.

Much of this is closetedness, but it is not enough for all of us to prod each other to “come out” and be counted. As a community, we still have reason to be fearful to identify ourselves as lesbian/gay/etc., as individuals, if the present openness of our society could possibly turn more negative and punitive again.

And we’re aware that coming out is usually a multi-part process that has to go on for a long time: first to a few trusted friends, and maybe family, employer, neighbors. But in public records?

It is often said that none of us are free until we are all free, and so it can be argued that none of us can truly be “out” until we’re all “out.” But with the constant rants and manipulations of the Religious Reich and the well-funded social conservatives/reactionaries at all levels of politics, it could be dangerous if the social, legal and political reforms we’ve made since 1969 were reversed.

How do you go back into a closet, if there are documents in publicly records in which you’ve identified yourself as lesbian or gay or transgender?

Personally, I threw my hat in the ring for the liberalizing trend and permanent change decades ago, but it was not without misgivings. When I accepted the call (job offer) to serve my church as an openly gay/partnered Pastor, and the story hit the Associated Press and the internet, I knew there was no turning back.

But I am very aware that not everyone has moved in that same direction of being permanently and irrevocably out, at least at the same place. So the Census Bureau forms will probably not change to fully and completely include us and count us until the LGBTQ people in this nation are overwhelmingly ready to take all the risks in order to claim all the rights.

— Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in LGBT Rights, Public Affairs, Coming Out, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

We’re here, we’re queer, we’re Christian.

February 27, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

Further to my recent post on the “core” of the faith and those congregations voting to leave the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the March 2010 issue of the Lutheran magazine has one entire News page devoted to this mess. From this source, a box with a fraying rope picture reports:

Congregations vote to leaveTwenty-eight of the ELCA’s some 10,200 congregations passed a second and final vote to leave the denomination as of Feb. 4.  The Office of the Secretary also reported an additional 128 passed a first vote, while first votes in 64 congregations failed.  In four congregations the votes are being disputed.  Nineteen of the ELCA’s 65 synods had no congregations taking votes.Synods with the most congregations taking votes were: Montana (17), Southwestern Texas (12), East-Central Synod of Wisconsin (11), Southeastern (11), Pacifica (10) [Orange County, California, etc.] and Eastern Washington-Idaho (10).”The Lutheran magazine is trying to be even-handed and journalistically professional. At least they’re reporting this, rather than hiding or ignoring the conflict.  On the same page, other news briefs indicate that some congregations that had been withholding benevolence money from the denomination over the pro-LGBT vote last August have now decided to begin donating it again.  The news also reports on an Iowa congregation that is disputing with its bishop over the exact count of a 2/3 vote of voting members needed to leave the denomination.  And meanwhile the Northeastern Iowa Synod Council has rescinded two very anti-gay resolutions it had previously adopted.  Iowa, you will remember, has legal same-sex marriage, so it’s an issue that is closer to home than the streets of San Francisco.  But such turmoil! trouble! disagreement! 

And, we are the people who started all this?  Well, hardly.  No.  We refuse to take responsibility for homophobic reactions to our lives.  We are LGBT Christians, in the midst of the larger church, who decided to claim our integrity as well as our inborn sexuality.  We decided to be honest, to tell our church that we are here and that we have faith and that we want to fully participate in the community’s life of faith with honesty. All the turmoil is not coming from us, but from the people who can’t handle the truth. When they are prodded to handle the truth, some of them want to flee from the church, and want to believe they are being driven out.  Hey, we could write the manual on what it feels like to be driven out, and guess what?  We didn’t leave.  We are the people of faith who didn’t cave in or go away when we felt unwelcome because we knew the truth that God welcomes, God includes, God blesses, and God heals.

I know there are thousands—millions—of people raised in the Church of Christ who came to terms with their sexuality and no longer have anything to do with any church.  Some are deeply scarred and have rejected all religion, all Christian spirituality.  Others long to come home, but they are not about to come home unless it is safe to do so.  They need assurance they will not get beat up again.

Watching the ELCA come to terms with its lesbian and gay clergy is kind of like watching a family come to terms with a lesbian daughter or a gay nephew.  You want to walk away—quickly—but it’s your family, and something deeply rooted in you believes that, because you know your family, they will eventually come around.  It’s still painful watching them argue with each other, and bring up their wildly irrational fears and complaints, but after awhile, all the emotion sort of drains out of it, and they are still the same people we’ve lived with our whole lives.  They’ll get over it and life will go on.

All I can do is commend these people, this church, and this process, to the all-embracing arms of God.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in LGBT Christian, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, Faith, Public Affairs, Ministry, Coming Out, ELCA | 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 Spirit moves among us.

February 11, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

I was quite astonished to read the following, because the subject matter in the e-mail didn’t completely display in my window. The parable in this is that you have to wait for the last word, in this case, “lifted.” I think my spirits are lifted, too.  — P.D.

Censure of Abiding Peace Lutheran Congregation LiftedBishop Gerald Mansholt, ELCA Central States Synod, has lifted the censure against Abiding Peace Lutheran congregation of Kansas City, Missouri, which had been imposed in March 2001 because the congregation called and ordained Pastor Donna Simon the previous October. Pastor Donna is rostered with Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries (ELM) and was ordained extraordinarily (meaning outside the normal rubrics of the ELCA) under a provision in the Lutheran Confessions allowing such ordinations when bishops can’‘t or won’‘t.

Pastor Donna has served that congregation since her ordination and call. That service and her ministry drew praise from the bishop. In his letter to the congregation, he said of Pastor Donna, a lesbian not yet on the roster of the ELCA, and her service as pastor for nine years: “…though ordained outside the established processes of the Church, Pastor Simon has been a gracious witness among us in this synod as well as in the larger Church. She has spoken the truth in love, and shared her witness and struggle as a baptized child of God, even as she has prayed for a day of wider understanding and acceptance in the Church.”

Bishop Mansholt, in notifying the synod of the lifting of the censure, repeated the above praise for Pastor Donna and commented on the faithfulness of the congregation at Abiding Lutheran: “As the Church studied, prayed and conversed with one another over the matters of gay and lesbian people in the Church, Abiding Peace Church might have walked away. But they remained in the Church and stayed in dialog with brothers and sisters who were trying to make sense of these issues in the light of the Gospel. They kept on praying for a better day, a time of wider awareness and acceptance. . . . I know the congregation also longs for the day when their pastor might be welcomed onto the roster of the ELCA.”

Emily Eastwood, Executive Director, Lutherans Concerned, said, “We are very pleased that the stalwart faithfulness and grace-filled witness of both Pastor Donna Simon and the congregation of Abiding Peace have at long last been recognized and uplifted by the Church and the body of Christ they serve so well. It is our fervent, prayerful hope and our continuing advocacy that more of the Church come to understand and honor the service of LGBT Lutherans as we continue the journey from ignorance, misunderstanding and oppression into the light of Christ Jesus.”

See http://tiny.cc/PE9ks for the full text of Bishop Mansholt’s letter to the Central States Synod.

Phil Soucy

Director Communications LC/NA

communications@lcna.org

Posted in LGBT Christian, Faith, History, Ministry, ELCA | 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 »

The Cause of it all.

January 22, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

I am constantly surveying the news and opinions of the Religious Reich and the conservative milieux in the hopes that they are getting wiser. Alas but this process is not making me an optimist. The old saying is, “people see what they want to see.” Or as Jesus put it, “If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.” (John 9:41)

Several years ago, I tried to give systematic thought to the problem the Right has with sexual minorities. It all comes down to “the cause of it all.” Here is the reasoning: As long as conservative/heterosexual people are determined to follow a preconceived mental outline, they will force its logic to a conclusion that supports their determination. This can be outlined quite plainly:

1. There is something terribly wrong with homosexuality.

2. When something is wrong, there must be a reason or cause that “normal” sexuality “went wrong.”

3. If it can be found what went wrong, then a way to fix it can and must be found.

Ergo, in response to this logic, organizations that operate “ex-gay” ministries have created a formula, a service, an entire industry geared to working with people who are unhappy with being homosexual, or are motivated to change.

Most often, however, the unhappiness and motivation to change are the result of family and societal pressures to be heterosexual, to “appear” to be heterosexual, or at least behave heterosexually in a heterosexual world. The emphasis on the “fix” in these ministries is an emphasis which firmly believes that sexual behavior can be successfully re-directed, like turning someone who is blindfolded around and pointing her/him in a new direction.

In some cases, “ex-gay” leaders will quietly admit that an inner change of sexual orientation may not or does not happen. they are content enough if somebody replaces the “homosexual lifestyle” with a “heterosexual lifestyle,” whether or not any fundamental psychosexual change has actually taken place.

However, many young people who come to these “ex-gay” therapy operations do not come because they are unhappy or motivated to change, but because their parents or families are unhappy or highly motivated to make them change. It is often said that a sweater is what a child puts on when the child’s mother is cold! The pressure on young people to conform comes not only from peers but from parents. As more and more people come out to their peers and families, peer pressure to be heterosexual is literally disappearing. But parental pressure is another thing.

Wayne Besen, in his preface to his book Anything But Straight, tell the story of coming out to his own parents. His mother bought a motivational tape for him titled “Gay and Unhappy” which, he said, tried to create a problem in his relationship with his parents and make it the cause for why he is gay.

“The problem was, I always had a very close relationship with my parents—at least until I came out. I listened to the tape twice and realize that there was absolutely nothing in it that applied to my life. It was trying to establish a cause and effect relationship that did not exist. It actually seemed like the tape was trying to create a wedge between my parents and me by having me manufacture a traumatic event from my past that did not actually occur.”Besen describes the scene at the breakfast table the next morning, after listening to the tape twice and trying for the third time. “‘So, how did it go with the tape last night?’ my father keenly asked while my mother’s eyes glowed with anticipation.‘Dad, it was great. All I’ve got to do to become straight, according to the tape, is figure out when you and Mom became lousy, distant parents.’That was the last subliminal ex-gay tape they bought me.The reactionary defenders of “cause” thinking, of course, often try to tie it to molestation. That is, homosexuals are homosexual because they were seduced, drawn, led or somehow forced into homosexual behavior against their real nature by some other homosexual.So in the federal Proposition 8 case going on right now in San Francisco, right-wingnut pro-8 witness Hak-Shing William Tam still insists that homosexuals are child molesters.

(Tam is one of the defendant-intervenors in the case, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, who later wanted to withdraw from the case entirely.  See “The likely real reason for Hak-Shing William Tam pulling out of Perry v. Schwarzenegger” on the Box Turtle Bulletin site.)

Here’s a summary of an Associated Press story posted January 21 on Newser:

(AP) – A proponent of California’s same-sex marriage ban testified today that he thinks gays are more likely to be pedophiles and that allowing them to wed would lead to efforts to lower the age at which teenagers can legally have sex with adults. Lawyers seeking to overturn Proposition 8 called Hak-Shing William Tam in their efforts to prove that bias toward gays fueled the campaign to pass the measure.Prop 8 sponsors have tried to distance themselves from Tam, even though his name appeared alongside ballot arguments for the measure in voter- information pamphlets during the 2008 campaign. Tam is secretary of a Chinese-American evangelical Christian group whose site contained a link to another article claiming gays were 12 times more likely to molest children; under questioning, Tam said he agreed with that view though he could cite no evidence to support it.Well, that kind of nails it for me.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Fundamentalism, Public Affairs, Ministry, Ex-Gay | Print | No Comments »

The devil you say.

January 20, 2010 by Pastor Dan.

I guess I am not through lambasting Robertsonian Christianity (fundagelical-blame-the-victim-praise-Jesus-cash-the-check theology). When I wrote recently, “Is he still totally nuts?” I hadn’t yet absorbed the fullness of the history lesson that wasn’t even in my college history textbooks.

Pat Robertson insinuated a “what do you expect?” view of the disastrous earthquake which has collapsed most of the infrastructure of Haiti, the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. The ex/wannabe reverend Robertson, who takes in hundreds of millions of dollars annual and has a personal fortune estimated to be near one billion dollars, is said to be quite compassionate for the people of Haiti: he called for prayer for them. Not he sent funds to help emergency life-saving efforts. He called for prayer.

Robertson gives a bad name to prayer and an evil name to what it means to be Christian. Why is he being singled out for criticism? For his remark that Haiti’s slaves in 1791 “made a pact with the devil” to obtain their freedom from the French. Mind you—this was a man who launched a campaign to run for President of the United States. Imagine how his foreign policy views would have shaped up.

Thank God for Elizabeth Palmberg’s blog entry on the Sojourners blog last week (and in posting it here I reproduce her important hyperlinks):

“So Pat Robertson, to whom the media are still inexplicably willing to pay attention, is saying that Haiti is being punished for an alleged pact with the devil?

“This might be a reasonable time to point out that, when Haiti threw out the French, it was the latter who were on the side of evil — first, as slave-owners (Haiti was the only modern nation created by a slave revolt). And then, when Haitians had finally attained freedom from plantation chattel slavery, France forced Haiti to pay reparations to the former slave-owners, to compensate them for their loss of ‘property.’

“You read that sentence right — the ex-slaves were forced to pay their former masters, the equivalent of $21 billion (billion-with-a-b) in today’s dollars. It took the tiny nation from 1825 to 1947 — that’s right, over a century — to finish paying off this “debt,” a crushing burden which bled away resources for education and economic development.

“I’ll leave it up to you to decide where the devil is in that history. But if you want to be on the side of the angels — and God’s Jubilee economics, as laid out in the Old Testament — then surf over to Jubilee USA and see their advocacy points for Haiti today.”

Now, what has this to do with an LGBT/Christian blog? It is not Pat Robertson’s inanities which need to be shamed somehow. But it is important that we who are open-hearted, “progressive” and compassionate Christians—whether sexual minorities or not—absolutely divorce ourselves from the evil theology that uses Jesus as a commodity to make money for the preacher not for ministry. Robertson is only an emblem of this kind of profitable evangelism. He is not the only one. But his misuse of Scripture and of God Above to blame the victim, shame gay/lesbian people, and now malign an entire nation, is irredeemably shameful.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

Posted in Fundamentalism, Violence, Go figure!, LGBT Christian, History, PRAYERS, Public Affairs, Ministry | Print | No Comments »

The birth of joy in a season of darkness.

December 23, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

A church member called me this morning from the Midwest, where she had gone for Christmas, to report that her nephew was killed yesterday on a highway in Texas. It has abruptly changed her holiday plans as she and her family now drive down to Texas for a funeral the day after Christmas.

Our parish has suffered five deaths in the extended family during this December, beginning with the loss of our pastor emeritus Harry Durkee on December 2, who had served from 1960–1991.

I am mindful that my mother lost her father in December also. Years later her mother succumbed to cancer on Christmas Night. The holiday season seems especially unfair as a time of joy to be taken away by the cruelty of death.  Even as I do my final preparations for Christmas Eve, I cannot shake the sadness of so much death and loss.

We modern people are wimps when it comes to dealing with the reality of death and grief. They are hard, but they are also bracketed by love and grace, and resolved only in a life of faith. I used to think it strange that St. Thomas and St. Stephen were memorialized on the church’s calendar during the days surrounding Christmas. But perhaps it is the wisdom of centuries of faithfulness that Christians offer up to God in prayer. We are certain that God’s gift to us cannot be undone by the meanness or the unfairness of sudden and untimely death.

What better time to remember those we have loved who have lived in faith, than in the very season when we also proclaim a holy birth among us – the coming of Jesus into our world of darkness and sorrow?

Jaroslav Vaja captured the essence of this in his Christmas hymntext, “Before the Marvel of This Night”. In his imaginative poem, the angels before God speak to one another as they prepare to “tear the sky apart with light” and come down to announce the birth of Christ and peace:

The love that we have always known,
our constant joy and endless light,
now to the  oveless world be shown,
now break upon its deathly night.
Into one song compress the love
that rules our universe above:
sing love, sing love, sing God is love.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

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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 »

Tell Minnesota about your life and faith.

November 25, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

My friend Steve just tipped me off to an informal survey which Minnesota Public Radio is conducting about reactions to the ELCA’s August 2009 decision to allow same-gender-partnered clergy in its ranks. In recent days more than a thousand people have expressed their opinion to MPR’s Public Insight Network. Here is how the network summarizes it:

“Of the people who wrote to us, most said they haven’t considered leaving the church over the ELCA’s stance allowing people in committed same-gender relationships to be pastors. In fact, many were concerned that we are giving too much attention to those who want to leave, rather than focusing on the story that most individuals and churches plan to stay with the ELCA. Some wrote to say that this change will bring them back to the church, or keep them from leaving.”

Here is the link to add your name and commentary. Or click on the graphic.

Of the 1,100 people who have written responses, MPR says that 150 are clergy (15%). So I decided to add my “two cents” to their survey:

“I am one who never left the church, not during college years, not even when I came out as a gay man. In seminary, I was deeply conflicted until I gained the spiritual maturity to see that the Gospel was speaking to me with the good news that it is not my achievements nor my self-denial which earned me God’s favor. It is pure grace.

“I began to serve the Church as an ordained pastor–at first closeted, over time less closeted, more outspoken. When the church pushed me off its clergy roster in 1991 I remained faithful anyway. In 2004 I was called back to ministry, by a courageous Lutheran congregation willing to ignore the rules, and specifically to do outreach with gay and lesbian people. I remain in ministry with Hollywood Lutheran Church in an increasingly diverse local community. We are grieved that other powerful and fearful churches threaten to pull out of the ELCA (God bless them wherever they come to rest). As for me and our parish, we continue to give thanks to God for courage, compassion, and open-hearted ministry wherever it springs up. And we believe the Holy Spirit speaks to all through these things.”

Obviously I could say a lot more. This is probably the most condensed form (in 200 words) I have ever told my story and explained my faith.

The hardest to explain briefly is my growing confidence that what has happened in the ELCA, over the last number of years which reached its dramatic conclusion last August, powerfully illustrates the work of the Spirit among us as we try to arrive at truth. It is not the absence of 100 or so congregations which are voting to exit, or the larger number of those congregations who are retaliating against the ELCA by withholding funds, which will change the course of the church to follow Christ more closely. It is the growing number of congregations, pastors and individuals who act courageously, pray fervently, offer hospitality to LGBT people and reserve judgment, and gradually come to see their role in the larger ministry of grace and healing which the whole Christian Church has been given. Regardless of threats of schism, we absolutely must use the courage God gave us to do what is right, continue ministry, speak honestly and lovingly, and not hide in closets of fear or uncertainty.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

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Deeply flawed at the core.

November 21, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

My friend Steve writes/rants about the latest ecclesiastical saber-rattling:

Hey, it’s Thursday, so the Lutherans must be forming yet another break-away denomination. Did you see the LA Times today? A little piece from AP that the CORE group is moving ahead more rapidly than they had originally anticipated in the formation of a new denomination for those unhappy with the direction of the ELCA. [Good background article from Associated Press here]

Well, need I say it? What will their foundational docs look like: “We are the church that thinks homosexuality is a sin.” So much for the solid rock of faith. E gads.

AND what a phenomenal WASTE of resources…to put all that energy into leaving and forming something “new” (which is, in actuality, a rehash of something very OLD…can you say “Missouri?”) What good could be done with all those resources!

Oh, and so much for the “bound conscience.” These folks, apparently, were never bound to anything but their own dogmatism. As soon as they didn’t get their way, they decided to take their marbles and go home. OK, bye!

SO…maybe NOW the ELCA will be able to move into God’s future, unencumbered by these folks. There’s a vision you can hang your hat on!

End of rant (for now).

My thoughts (which I will one day express just a tad more completely): the church that is held together merely by habit and antipathy to someone else’s sex life is deeply flawed. May God bless them. They need it. – DH

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Berlin: let your light so shine.

November 10, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

“You are the light of the world. . . .No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others. . . .” —Matthew 5

This week’s news includes the 20^th anniversary of the Berlin Wall, and I keenly remember the events as the world rapidly changed in the late 80s— early 90s.

When my spouse and I went to Berlin 10 years ago on a concert trip with the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles, we walked through the Brandenburg Gate easier than you could a turn-stile in an amusement park. We saw the thin bronze strip laid into the asphalt streets signifying where the famous Wall had stood.

Last night you could have knocked me over with a feather when I heard an NPR story about what led up to the break-through and the collapse of the Berlin Wall. It began with peaceful street demonstrations not in Berlin, but in Leipzig on September 4, 1989. What NPR said was that a Lutheran pastor, Christian Fuhrer, the pastor of St. Nicholas Church, known as “Nikolai Kirche” at the crossroads of two main streets on the main square in Leipzig, began holding Monday night “peace prayer” services, and they began to draw people from all over the city.

Within a few weeks, each time the parishioners spilled out into the Leipzig Karl Marx Square, they took their prayers and candles with them and began to keep a public vigil for peace. Before many Mondays went by, it was thousands of people carrying candles from the church, in non-violent protests against the government.

The STASI, the state police, held back, unwilling to cause a massacre. One of them later said “we were prepared for anything” that the crowds might do. But we were not prepared for prayers and candles.

Nikolai Kirche   ~   Montagsdemonstration

Pastor Fuhrer’s peace prayers drew a crowd of 10,000, and within weeks, 70,000—this in a city of half a million. By October 16, the Monday night crowd had swelled to 120,000, and the following week, to more than 300,000.

The most interesting note I found in the story of the Monday night demonstrations was this quote, from a cabaret artist Bernd-Lutz Lange, who said, “There was no head of the revolution. The head was the Nikolaikirche and the body the centre of the city. There was only one leadership: Monday, 5 P.M., the Nikolaikirche.”

My point is very simple and direct:  Never, never, never underestimate the power of one person, or one church, to make a huge difference in the world.

Within the first month of the peaceable demonstrations in Leipzig, Western Germany television was reporting what was happening. Viewers in East Germany learned of the candlelight marches, and Pastor Fuhrer’s vigils began to happen in other Easter German cities.

The context in which the first Monday night prayers for peace started was a mood of either resignation or hopelessness. This one Lutheran Pastor could not have dreamed that he would launch a movement to bring down the German Democratic Republic. But he did what he could do, and the people of Leipzig knew from the witness of this one church that the Lutheran Church supported their yearning for change.

“You are the light of the world.” Jesus tells us to put our lights up and out there like a lamp on a stand. “In the same way, let your light shine before others.” That light may be a candle. But it almost always includes other forms of courage, determination, sacrifice, strength and risk. If we are not stuck in a mood of resignation or hopelessness or powerlessness, any one of us has the ability to change the world.

— Pastor Dan Hooper, Los Angeles

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After the eye of the storm.

October 29, 2009 by Pastor Dan.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is still passing through a storm of internal discernment and anxiety about the vote taken by the voting members at its August biennial Assembly to liberalize its rules about lesbian/gay clergy. Before that vote was taken, there was a lot of noise and threats. The vote was like the eye at the center of a hurricane. Now the aftermath is playing out in congregations over whether to leave the denomination or not.Congregations who are probably as far away from interacting with lesbian or gay clergy as possible still feel compelled to consider breaking ties with the Church of their heritage. This is always the way it is. A congregation on the North Dakota prairie is in fact not affected or impacted by whether a congregation in urban California or Illinois has a lesbian or gay pastor. But they also have little to no contact with LGBT people. Their own closeted young people probably left town as fast as possible to look for a better life elsewhere, and the families of LGBT people simply don’t want to expose themselves to ridicule or misunderstanding. So these parishes –even larger ones— keep up the pretense that “we don’t have that problem here,” and feel they can’t even send their mission dollars to a denomination that welcomes us. This past Wednesday, I heard our own Bishop report on a few congregations in this Synod which are acting out the same scripts as in the news release below. Here it is harder to believe that an urban Los Angeles congregation could be so naive, or could not have recognized a powerful statistic: if one out of every ten people is lesbian or gay, then one out of every four families has a family member who is lesbian or gay. When a church says “not welcome!” to the larger community, it is putting one fourth of its own families on notice that they must enter the closet with the lesbian or gay family member and stay there.

—Pastor Dan Hooper

ELCA News Service  -  October 29, 2009 09-241-JB

Some ELCA Congregations Vote to Leave or Redirect Funds, Find It’s Not EasyCHICAGO (ELCA)—Throughout the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), leaders and members have responded in a variety of ways to changes in the church’s ministry polices, a decision made by voting members of the 2009 Churchwide Assembly. Some members agreed with the decision. Some were opposed. Some weren’t sure how to react. Since the assembly, some ELCA congregations have taken votes to leave the denomination or redirect funds away from the ELCA. Leaders and members in a few such congregations report it’s not always easy to make such choices, and there can be unintended consequences.

The 2009 assembly, which met Aug. 17-23 in Minneapolis, adopted proposals to change ELCA ministry policies. One change makes it possible for Lutherans in publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationships to serve as ELCA associates in ministry, clergy, deaconesses and diaconal ministers.

For some ELCA leaders and members, the assembly directive was inconsistent with their understanding of biblical authority. They often repeat the assertion that “the ELCA has left them.” The assembly also adopted by exactly a two-thirds majority a social statement on human sexuality. The statement addressed a wide range of matters related to human sexuality, but a portion of it addressed same gender relationships, causing disagreement among the voting members.

Through Oct. 27, the ELCA Office of the Secretary reports an estimated 50 of the ELCA’s 10,396 congregations have taken first votes to leave the denomination or have scheduled them, nearly all because of the assembly’s actions on sexuality. Five such votes have failed. The estimate is based on reports from synod bishops, said David D. Swartling, ELCA secretary.

Some Vote to Leave the ELCA or Try. Generally congregations that want to leave the ELCA are required to take two votes, at least 90 days apart, and must achieve a two-thirds majority of voting members present for each vote. They are also required to “consult” with the synod bishop between votes to leave. Former Lutheran Church in America congregations and ELCA- established congregations must be granted “synodical approval” before their ELCA membership is terminated. The same approval is needed if the congregation chooses to be independent or relate to a non-Lutheran church body. At Wangen Prairie Lutheran Church, Cannon Falls, Minn., 31 members of the 40-member congregation voted 20-11 to leave but failed to achieve the required two-thirds needed under constitutional rules. That has left the Rev. Joy M. Gonnerman, who serves the congregation half-time, with a difficult situation. And she expects some members to challenge the vote. Gonnerman told the ELCA News Service the congregation narrowly defeated an attempt to leave in 2005, after the churchwide assembly that year declined a proposal to change ministry policies. She said Wangen Prairie’s ELCA membership “has been tenuous at best.”

“I keep praying for them, keep preaching and keep administering the sacraments,” she said. Gonnerman noted that most of the 11 who voted to stay attend worship regularly, and many of the others don’t. “I find that those so angry about the sexuality issue talk a lot about God, but not much about Jesus.

We (Lutherans) read the Bible through the lens of Jesus,” Gonnerman said. Gonnerman said she focuses on keeping the congregation together. “I work on unity. My goal as pastor is to work on unity and welcome people with their diverse ideas.” In the coming weeks she said she will offer guidance to members and keep in mind that whatever the congregation decides to do “must come from within.”

A similar situation exists at Christ Lutheran Church, Cottonwood, Minn., which voted 74-44 on Oct. 18 to leave the ELCA, but the vote failed to achieve a two-thirds majority. The congregation’s president, Joel C. Dahl, declined to be interviewed by the ELCA News Service, but said in an e-mail message, “I have hopes that after some further education of our congregation, we will vote again in the affirmative to separate from the ELCA and join another Lutheran denomination.” He told the Marshall Independent newspaper that an informational meeting for the congregation is planned sometime next month.

The Rev. James L. Demke, pastor, confirmed that the 600-member congregation will have “more discussion about the issues.”

St. John Lutheran Church, a 1,200-member congregation in Roanoke, Va., voted 342-143 to leave the ELCA Sept. 27, barely achieving the two thirds majority required. The congregation plans to take a second and final vote to leave the denomination Jan. 10, said the Rev. Mark A.

Graham, senior pastor. Graham explained that the congregation has been discussing issues of marriage, family and human sexuality for many years. After the churchwide assembly acted, he and St. John’s two associate pastors recommended to the congregation council that St. John begin the process to leave the ELCA on the grounds that “the ELCA has left traditional biblical teaching.”

It has not been an easy process. Graham expects as many as one-third of the members will leave the congregation. Some have already left. “The last thing I ever expected is to bring a recommendation that would cause conflict and division,” he said in an interview. “I know there are good Christians who disagree with us. It breaks my heart, but we see no other way.”

Even if the pastors had not made their recommendation, Graham believes many members would have left on their own, perhaps more than the one-third St. John expects to lose. “We would have had conflict here either way if we had not taken action,” he said.

And what will happen if St. John fails to achieve a two-thirds majority at its second vote in January? Graham paused when asked that question. He said he will have some decisions to make about his own future in the ELCA.

“We’ve had publicity about this, and it’s not the kind I’m proud of. It’s a hard thing to convince people that were not anti-homosexual. We’re trying to convey a deep love for the Word of God. It breaks my heart that my own denomination would make decisions based on other factors,” he said.

About five congregations have taken two votes to leave the ELCA so far this year, the ELCA secretary reports. Of those, the largest was Community Church of Joy, Glendale, Ariz., which formally left Sept. 27. Only 129 of its 6,800 baptized members were present for the second vote, which was unanimous.

Some Choose to Withhold Funds. Some ELCA congregations, unhappy with the assembly’s actions, have stopped sending funds to support synod and churchwide ministries. The funds are used, for example, “to plant and renew congregations, to raise up and train leaders in seminaries and campus ministries, to send missionaries, to respond to hunger at home and abroad, and to rebuild communities after natural disasters,” said the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, ELCA presiding bishop, in a Sept. 23 letter to the church’s professional leaders.The ELCA Constitution requires the churchwide organization, synods and congregations “to share in the responsibility to develop, implement and strengthen the financial support program of this church.” Similar required language appears in the ELCA’s Model Constitution for Synods and the Model Constitution for Congregations, yet, decisions are being made in some places to direct funds elsewhere.

The congregation council at 250-member Peace Lutheran Church, Rockdale, Texas, suspended its benevolence payments to the ELCA shortly after the congregation’s pastor, the Rev. Janice A. Campbell, returned from the assembly where she was a voting member. Instead, it sent its September funds to support a Lutheran orphanage in Tanzania and will send funds for the remainder of 2009 to a local food bank and Lutheran Disaster Response, a collaborative ministry of the ELCA and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Peace’s annual benevolence is nearly $21,000, according to the 2009 ELCA Yearbook.

Campbell told members from the beginning that she didn’t want anyone to leave, and she urged the congregation members to respond together. Campbell said she is concerned about a member and a family that may leave the congregation. “I don’t want to lose those people. It is important that we listen to one another,” she said.

Some members are talking about joining Lutheran Congregations for Mission in Christ (LCMC), she said. “I don’t know if I’m going with them or not. LCMC is not for me,” she said. Campbell said she has been a strong supporter of the ELCA Southwestern Texas Synod in the past. Global relationships are more valuable to Campbell than is the denomination, she said. In particular Lutherans in Africa have much to teach the ELCA, she said. Campbell said she was not happy that objections to the sexuality proposals voiced by Lutheran churches in Africa were “skimmed over” and not shared with voting members at the assembly.

“I wish there was a way for the ELCA to come to realization that this was a catastrophic (theological) error,” she said of the actions on sexuality. “I will continue to pray for the ELCA, for the synod and for the bishops.”

The congregation council at St. Luke Lutheran Church, Cottage Grove, Minn., made a similar decision. St. Luke’s senior pastor, the Rev. Timothy J. Housholder, a churchwide assembly voting member, declined to be interviewed for this story. But he wrote to his congregation earlier this month that, since the assembly, he had received more than 100 communications, most expressing concern about the decisions. The council redirected remaining 2009 benevolence funds away from the ELCA Saint Paul Area Synod and the churchwide organization, he said, “to allow time for St. Luke to ‘breathe’ and discern what the ELCA’s recent actions mean for us.” Lutheran Social Services and Lutheran World Relief will be sent St. Luke’s funds, Housholder reported. St. Luke has 2,200 baptized members, and gives about $43,000 annually in benevolence funds.

Not all are in agreement. Two members of St. Luke, Rebecca and Alan Holz, wrote to the South Washington County Bulletin newspaper saying that the decision to withhold the funds was made without approval of the church’s members. “My husband and I feel strongly that this act is counter to what St. Luke’s prior statement to the community was of ‘the Welcoming Church,’ and we are deeply disappointed we were not allowed to express our views prior to the council’s decision,” their Oct. 14 letter said.

Member Natalie Seim also wrote the paper’s editor to point out that the council’s vote to begin “discernment” was not shared by all members. The council has scheduled a forum for St. Luke members on Nov. 1.

For information contact: John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or news@elca.org

http://www.elca.org/news ELCA News Blog: http://www.elca.org/news/blog

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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

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