Plano Texas Decides to Leave ECUSA

PLANO, Texas ---- Christ Church Episcopal states it will leave the denomination because it opposes the national direction of the church.

The conservative Plano parish announced its plan Monday, a week after the Episcopal General Convention rejected demands from fellow Anglicans overseas and conservatives at home that they stop consecrating gay bishops for now. Delegates instead voted to call for restraint in future elections.

The convention also chose a new presiding bishop, Nevada Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, who voted in 2003 to confirm V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, the first openly gay bishop, and supports creating prayer services to bless same-gender couples.

"The mission of Christ Church is to make disciples and teach them to obey the commands of Christ," Christ Church leaders said in a statement. "The direction of the leadership of the Episcopal Church is different and we regret their departure from biblical truth and the historic faith of the Anglican Communion. ... We declare our intention to disassociate from ECUSA as soon as possible."

A spokesman for the Episcopal Church did not respond to a request for comment. The denomination is the U.S. branch of the global Anglican Communion.

The Plano church is one of the largest Episcopal churches in the nation, drawing about 2,200 worshippers each weekend to the Dallas suburb.

Under Episcopal rules, parishes cannot take their property when they leave. But Dallas Bishop James Stanton, who also opposed Robinson's consecration, said he intends to allow the congregation to continue using the building.

The Rev. David Roseberry, Christ Church pastor, said specifics of how the parish will leave the denomination will be decided in the coming weeks. Christ Church said it still regards the Dallas bishop as its "apostolic leader."

[Note: Well, I guess we will miss them. :( A church here in our own diocese of Kansas also pulled the plug several months ago. Christ Church (coincidentally the same name) in Overland Park, Kansas decided they could not work with the way things are going either, so they decided to pull out. Overland Park is a suburb of Kansas City, MO. A lot of us in the southeastern part of the state refer to the Johnson County area (OP and other Kansas suburbs of KC metro) look at that whole part of the state as Marshmallow land. PAT]

An Interview With Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori

WEB EXCLUSIVE:
Interview with Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori

June 21, 2006

RELIGION & ETHICS NEWSWEEKLY correspondent and program managing editor Kim
Lawton spoke to Presiding Bishop-Elect Katharine Jefferts Schori on June 20
in one of the first in-depth interviews the bishop has given since her landmark election. Excerpts from this conversation will be included in this week's edition
of the show (to be distributed Friday, June 23) as part of a larger story on the convention.

KIM LAWTON: You mentioned right away after your election that you saw the church as having an opportunity to be the vehicle for the reign of God. And I just wanted you to tell us a little bit more about what you see, what is that vision of the church?

Bishop KATHARINE JEFFERTS SCHORI (Presiding Bishop-Elect, U.S. Episcopal Church): Well, the church is a community that is really called to transform the world around it. That takes different forms in different places. Each one of us has got a piece to play in that kind of work. And the fact that this General Convention has adopted justice and peace as its first priority for mission in the coming triennium, particularly focused on the UN Millennium Development Goals, gives us an enormous opportunity to be part of building something that looks very much like the reign of God that's achievable in our own day.

LAWTON: Are you very mindful of the magnitude of what you are lurching into?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: Probably not fully. I'm sure that I will have much to learn that I don't even know about. But I think life is meant to be challenging. If we're going to use the fullness of the gifts that we've been given, it means we have to continue to be stretched. And I look forward to that.

LAWTON: What message does your election send to all the quarters of the Episcopal Church?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: This is not your grandmother's church anymore. When I was growing up, girls and women could only do things like sing in the choir and serve on the altar guild. And singing's not my great strength, so I had no concept of being active in leadership in the church when I was growing up.

LAWTON: And what about for the rest of the communion? What message, what signal do you hope this sends to other members of the Anglican Communion?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: I hope that our decisions at this General Convention send several messages to the rest of the communion: that we are incredibly anxious to be, to continue to be, part of the communion; that we are fully committed to partnerships across the globe; that we firmly believe that all people need to be included in the reign of God that is being built; that people of all colors and races and nations and language groups and sexual orientations are fully part of this creation that God has blessed us with.

LAWTON: What do you anticipate saying to some of the primates at your first meeting, including some that you know have problems with women being ordained? What can you imagine yourself saying to them?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: One would probably begin with "hello," to begin to build some kind of relationship, speaking about each other's contexts, who am I, where do I come from, what kind of history do I bring, what kind of theology do I understand that this church is being called to? And we cannot have substantive conversations until we know each other as human beings.

LAWTON: Some people say that this has been a real crucial time for the Anglican Communion just in terms of reexamining what Anglicanism means today in this world. Do you think that is going on right now?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: Yes it is, and I think it goes on in every age. Anglicanism has grown out of a history of struggle and tension. The great Elizabethan compromise that produced the Church of England was born out of incredible strife, but it has been a gift to many, many people around the globe.

LAWTON: And so in what way do you see, you know, what are some of the critical issues that global Anglicans need to be examining right now?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: We need to be examining the poverty that is real around the world. We need to be examining the fact that our brothers and sisters, Anglican and not, in places like Africa and Asia don't have enough to eat. Their children don't have the opportunity to go to school. AIDS and tuberculosis and malaria are rampant in many parts of this world and people with those diseases don't have access to adequate health care. That's where our focus needs to be.

LAWTON: Clearly, one of the big challenges, the big issue is the sexuality debates. What message do you hope that this convention sends to people who are very upset about the consecration of Gene Robinson and are really opposed to same-sex, the blessing of same-sex unions? What signal do you hope they get from this convention?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: That there is room for them at this table as well.

LAWTON: And what about for gay and lesbian members of the church who are concerned that maybe there is a backing away, that maybe they're being, in some way being called to make sacrifices for the sake of unity that aren't just, for a church that's emphasizing justice? What do you hope they hear from this?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: The same message, that there is room for them at this table as well, that God calls all of us to this bountiful table to share in the riches of creation that were given for all.

LAWTON: There've been some pretty pointed statements publicly from some of the conservative bishops and other leaders of that wing of the church, really raising questions about whether indeed everybody can stay at the table and whether this is a time when that is no longer possible. Do you feel that reconciliation is still possible, and what will you do to try and make that happen?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: Reconciliation is always possible. The Christian faith is about the eternity of hope. Once we give up hope, I think we cease to become active, engaged Christians. If we have no hope, we have repudiated the basis of our faith. There is always the possibility of reconciliation, resurrection, renewal. And once we lose a sense of that in a very deep way, we have challenged the very foundations of our faith. If -- if the resurrection, the reconciliation may come beyond the grave, but we insist that it is always possible.

LAWTON: Talk about the transition, oceanographer turned bishop. What led to that?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: Well, I knew I was supposed to go fishing, and it took me a while to figure out just what for. Christians often talk about being sent to fish for people; the gospel is about drawing all people into the reign of God. When it became apparent that I was not going to be able to continue to be an active oceanographer, that if I wanted to continue in the field it was going to be as a grants writer and hustling grant money, right at the very same time, three people in my congregation asked me if I'd ever thought about being a priest, just out of the blue. It seemed absurd, it seemed unfitting to the gifts that I recognized at the time. But I went and spoke at great length with the priest in that congregation and came to the conclusion that, at least, the time wasn't right. But five years later, I was asked to preach on a Sunday morning when he wasn't going to be there -- a new rector. And that experience and the response that I had to that experience finally let me say yes. And I was in seminary the next fall.

LAWTON: Describe some of your emotions on Sunday [the day she was elected the first female presiding bishop]. What gamut did they run?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: It was a long and challenging day -- to sit waiting, to recognize that this election might possibly call me into this office. I think we were all surprised, all of us.

LAWTON: And I have a personal question for you. Just, a lot of people have different practices to maintain their own spiritual spark, you know, and to maintain that, and I'm just wondering if you'd be willing to share what's most meaningful for you? How do you get your best connection with God?

Bishop JEFFERTS SCHORI: I've always found a great sense of spirituality in the out-of-doors. I ground myself as a creature in the midst of the natural created order. And taking Sabbath time is exceedingly important to me, taking time away, and I bring all of those together in seeking solitude in the wilderness. The wilderness is a place of great gifts. It may be threatening to some people; it ought to be threatening, I think, in some important way. But it is a place where I discover God, and what God is calling me to do and be.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/
week942/exclusive.html

Gay Pride Reports From Everywhere

America celebrates Pride
Adam Goldman, Associated Press

SUMMARY: A mending Kevin Aviance joins N.Y.'s lesbian council speaker and hundreds of thousands of others to mark Pride and the ongoing fight for rights.

NEW YORK -- Drag queens in knee-high boots, kids with two dads and New York City's first openly gay city council speaker were among hundreds of thousands attending Gay Pride parades across the nation, weeks after a vicious attack on a popular gay singer and the 25th anniversary of the start of the AIDS epidemic.

Tens of thousands of spectators lined New York's Fifth Avenue on Sunday for the city's annual parade, withstanding intermittent rain and turning the route into a sea of rainbows with colorful floats and lavish costumes.

"Everyone else has a chance to express their affection freely, and for one day in New York, you can be free and not feel ashamed or embarrassed," said 42-year-old Roberto Hermosilla, from Miami, attending his ninth Pride parade.

On San Francisco's Market Street, thousands of festively dressed people looked on as marching bands, dancers and floats bearing corporate logos streamed by. On one float, a bearded man wearing a white lace miniskirt and fishnet stockings sang Madonna's "Like a Virgin." A half-dozen men dressed in underwear and top hats danced behind him.

The parades also had a political message, with parade-goers bearing slogans about same-sex marriage, AIDS and discrimination.

"It's to have a good time, but also to remember the issues out there," said Jane Woodman, 26, in San Francisco. "There's still a lot of work to be done," she said, noting the national debate raging over whether gays should have a legal right to marry.

The New York parade marked the very public and triumphant return of singer Kevin Aviance, who rolled down Fifth Avenue atop a fake pachyderm and a circus-themed float just weeks after he was viciously beaten and his jaw broken. Police have charged four young men with assaulting the artist while yelling anti-gay slurs.

The theme of New York's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride March was "The Fight for Love and Life," but there was plenty of talk about hate following the Aviance attack. The New York Police Department said reports of anti-gay bias crimes totaled 25 through mid-June -- compared with 19 over the same period in 2005.

"A few hateful homophobes will not set us back," said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who marched in the parade. In January, Quinn became the first woman and first openly gay person to lead the council.

Organizations that marched in San Francisco included Rocket Dog Rescue, a volunteer group that helps abandoned dogs find homes. One marcher with the group walked with a pit bull that was dressed in a rainbow tutu.

In Ohio on Saturday, thousands gathered for the 25th Stonewall Columbus parade. Michael Eblin, marching in his first parade, followed a black Hummer pulling a float of men.

"For the first time, I'm going to be part of a majority," the 18-year-old Eblin said just before the parade began.

Along the route, protesters held large signs reading, "Homo sex is sin" and "God abhors you," while a boy in blue tie-dye held up another: "2 Moms. 2 Dads. Too Cool."

The parades commemorate the Stonewall uprising of 1969, when gay bar patrons resisted a police raid.

Associated Press writer Dan Goodin in San Francisco contributed to this report.

If you'd like to know more, you can find stories related to America celebrates gay pride

Copyright © 2006 Planet Out.

Gay Pride Day Around the World

Rain can't dim N.Y. gay pride parade
ADAM GOLDMAN, Associated Press Writer

Tens of thousands of raucous parade-goers braved a steady downpour and lined Fifth Avenue on Sunday for the annual gay pride parade, an event that comes just weeks after an attack on a popular gay singer and the 25th anniversary of the start of the AIDS epidemic.

Outrageous costumes were abundant all along the parade route, including men in short skirts and tiaras and long-legged drag queens in knee-high boots. The floats and marchers also turned Fifth Avenue into a sea of rainbows.

"Everyone else has a chance to express their affection freely, and for one day in New York, you can be free and not feel ashamed or embarrassed," said Roberto Hermosiloa of Miami, who was attending his ninth parade.

It was one of several gay pride parades around the country this weekend, including a similar-size one in San Francisco.

The theme of New York's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride March was "The Fight for Love and Life," but there was plenty of talk about hate following the suspected gay-bashing attack of singer Kevin Aviance last month in Manhattan. Aviance has recovered and was expected to take part in the parade.

"A few hateful homophobes will not set us back," said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who is openly gay and marched in the parade.

The parade also took place just weeks after the 25th anniversary of the start of the AIDS epidemic, and city leaders used the event to call for a greater focus on combating HIV and AIDS.

On Saturday, thousands gathered for the 25th Stonewall Columbus parade in Ohio. Michael Eblin, marching in his first parade, followed a black Hummer pulling a float of men. A cross-dresser in a beaded white gown perched atop the vehicle, holding a sign reading "The Closet."

"For the first time, I'm going to be part of a majority," the 18-year-old Eblin said just before the parade began.

A boy along the route wearing blue tie-dye held up a sign: "2 Moms. 2 Dads. Too Cool."

The New York parade attracted diverse segments of the gay community. One contingent was a group of former and current yeshiva students who held up signs saying, "Jewish? Orthodox? Gay? You are not alone."

The parades commemorate the Stonewall uprising of 1969, when patrons of a New York gay bar resisted a police raid.

The New York Police Department said reports of anti-gay bias crimes totaled 25 through mid-June — compared with 19 over the same period in 2005.

But Clarence Patton, executive director of the New York City Gay & Lesbian Anti-Violence Project, said anti-gay and transgender incidents tend to spike in June because of the high-profile events that are held such as the parade.

"It's like the apex of gay visibility," he said.

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press.

And there have been Gay Pride demonstrations and parades in countless cities around the United States and elsewhere in the world over this weekend. In addition to the parade in New York City, there is also one going on this afternoon in San Francisco, and in Chicago -- among many others. PAT

Breaking Up Still no Simple Matter For Embattled Anglicans

By: BRIAN MURPHY - Associated Press

The obituary-in-waiting for the Anglican Communion goes something like this: A nearly 500-year-old worldwide fellowship of Christian churches splits apart over disputes about gay clergy -- and American liberals get most of the blame.

It's a crisp, tidy farewell. But one that may not prove true, even as gloomy predictions were rampant after the U.S. Episcopal Church wrapped up a gathering Wednesday without coming close to meeting demands of conservatives across the 77 million-member communion.

Powerful considerations -- both practical and theological -- still stand in the way of one of the biggest meltdowns in Christian unity since the 16th century Reformation, clerics and scholars say.

"The problems are very, very deep," said Canon Martyn Minns, rector of Truro Church in Fairfax, Va., and a leader of the conservative bloc at the Episcopal meeting in Columbus, Ohio. "But I don't share the view that it's moving toward a decisive break. That's not how we do things."

What's more likely, many experts say, is a continued erosion from within -- an implosion rather than explosion.

This could fold Anglicanism's big tent, the denominations rooted in the Church of England and roughly stretching across former British colonies and the old Empire. In its place, the 38 Anglican provinces might stay linked, but in name only -- each going their own way on key issues including same-sex blessings, women clergy and the ordination of openly gay priests and bishops.

"Anglicanism, as we know it, would no longer exist," said the Rev. Peter Moore, dean emeritus at the conservative Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pa. "Something else would take its place."

The Episcopal delegates made it clear they relish their independence. The assembly rebuffed Anglican demands to temporarily halt electing gay bishops. In the final hours of the meeting, they approved a nonbinding, and vaguely worded, compromise resolution to "exercise restraint" when considering bishop candidates whose lifestyle "presents a challenge" to the communion.

But it falls far short of the moratorium proposal, which was suggested by top Anglican officials as a way to ease anger among conservatives following the 2003 election of Bishop V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, who lives with his longtime male partner.

Anglican traditionalists, led by African clerics, consider homosexuality a violation of Scripture and accuse gay clergy supporters of driving a wedge into the communion. Gay advocates counter that the conservatives are the dividers, by demanding a uniform view of Scripture in a communion that has welcomed a diversity of views.

Conservatives received a further jolt last Sunday when the Episcopal leadership selected Nevada Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori as the first women ever to head an Anglican province. Some conservative Anglican strongholds, such as Nigeria and Tanzania, do not permit the ordination of women.

The forecasts for the communion now carry an extra dose of bleakness.

Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, of Rochester in England, was quoted as saying "virtually two religions" now exist between conservatives and liberals.

"A schism exists right now," said the Rev. George Curry, chairman of the Church Society, a conservative Anglican group based in Britain. "Everyone must recognize that the Anglican Communion is fractured beyond repair."

So what's holding up the big crumble?

For one, there is no structure within the communion to expel a member church. Anglican tradition is based on broad-brush inclusion built around common prayer and worship styles. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan William acts as the spiritual leader, but has no power to punish or make doctrine.

"There's no way to really stop someone from being an Anglican," said Paul Handley, editor of the Church Times, a London-based weekly that covers Anglican affairs.

This leaves conservatives facing a decision on whether to walk out on their own. The threats are there, but so are the consequences.

Breakaway churches -- especially in Africa or the small conservative factions in the United States -- would immediately lose their stature and voice as part of a global religious group. Crucial financial assistance to African provinces could dry up. Disputes over church property might drag on for years and amass huge legal fees.

The Rev. Colin Slee, dean of Southwark Cathedral in London, called the "apocalyptical visions" for the communion overblown and part of conservative power plays "to push their agenda."

Also, no one seems to want the responsibility of toppling one of the institutional pillars of Christianity.

The Anglican Communion is the most tightly knit global Christian community to emerge from the Reformation-era breaks with the Vatican that also produced Lutherans and other mainline Protestant denominations. In recent decades, Anglican leaders have played a central role in efforts to forge wider Christian fellowship, including closer bonds with Roman Catholics and Orthodox churches.

"The Anglicans are the only team that Protestants have in the field that have this worldwide, organic unity," said David Steinmetz, a professor of Christian history at Duke Divinity School.

The Anglican struggle also represents a larger trend across Christianity: the waning influence of the West and the rapidly expanding clout of the former missionary churches in the "Global South."

The message from an Anglican rupture is one every Christian leader wants to avoid -- that "old and new" Christianity cannot work together, noted Moore of the Trinity Episcopal School.

"What you have is a tragic situation developing. The split ... would take place along the lines of the North-South, rich-poor, white-non-white, educated versus the developing world," Moore said. "It's a split the Body of Christ does not need."

On the Net:

Anglican Communion: Anglican Communion Web Page

Book Review: The 'Religious Right' and Balmer's Book Thy Kingdom Come

Morning Edition, June 23, 2006 · President Bush and the Republican Party find strong support among evangelical voters. But in his new book, Thy Kingdom Come, author Randall Balmer says that allegiance is misplaced.

"I don't find much that I recognize as Christian" in the religious right, says Balmer, a professor of religion at Barnard College, Columbia University and contributing editor to Christianity Today.

He says blind allegiance to the Republican Party has distorted the faith of politically active evangelicals, leading them to misguided positions on issues such as abortion and homosexuality.

"They have taken something that is lovely and redemptive and turned it into something that is ugly and retributive," Balmer says.

He argues that modern evangelicals have abandoned the spirit of their movement, which was founded in 19th-century activism on issues that helped those on the fringes of society: abolition, women's suffrage and universal education.

"I don't find any correlation in the agenda of the religious right today," Balmer says.

Book Excerpt: Thy Kingdom Come by Randall Balmer

NPR.org, June 22, 2006 · In the 1980s, in order to solidify their shift from divorce to abortion, the Religious Right constructed an abortion myth, one accepted by most Americans as true. Simply put, the abortion myth is this: Leaders of the Religious Right would have us believe that their movement began in direct response to the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. Politically conservative evangelical leaders were so morally outraged by the ruling that they instantly shed their apolitical stupor in order to mobilize politically in defense of the sanctity of life. Most of these leaders did so reluctantly and at great personal sacrifice, risking the obloquy of their congregants and the contempt of liberals and "secular humanists," who were trying their best to ruin America. But these selfless, courageous leaders of the Religious Right, inspired by the opponents of slavery in the nineteenth century, trudged dutifully into battle in order to defend those innocent unborn children, newly endangered by the Supreme Court's misguided Roe decision.

It's a compelling story, no question about it. Except for one thing: It isn't true.

Although various Roman Catholic groups denounced the ruling, and Christianity Today complained that the Roe decision "runs counter to the moral teachings of Christianity through the ages but also to the moral sense of the American people," the vast majority of evangelical leaders said virtually nothing about it; many of those who did comment actually applauded the decision. W. Barry Garrett of Baptist Press wrote, "Religious liberty, human equality and justice are advanced by the Supreme Court abortion decision." Indeed, even before the Roe decision, the messengers (delegates) to the 1971 Southern Baptist Convention gathering in St. Louis, Missouri, adopted a resolution that stated, "we call upon Southern Baptists to work for legislation that will allow the possibility of abortion under such conditions as rape, incest, clear evidence of severe fetal deformity, and carefully ascertained evidence of the likelihood of damage to the emotional, mental, and physical health of the mother." W.A. Criswell, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention and pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, expressed his satisfaction with the Roe v. Wade ruling. "I have always felt that it was only after a child was born and had a life separate from its mother that it became an individual person," the redoubtable fundamentalist declared, "and it has always, therefore, seemed to me that what is best for the mother and for the future should be allowed."

The Religious Right's self-portrayal as mobilizing in response to the Roe decision was so pervasive among evangelicals that few questioned it. But my attendance at an unusual gathering in Washington, D.C., finally alerted me to the abortion myth. In November

1990, for reasons that I still don't entirely understand, I was invited to attend a conference in Washington sponsored by the Ethics and Public Policy Center, a Religious Right organization (though I didn't realize it at the time). I soon found myself in a conference room with a couple of dozen people, including Ralph Reed, then head of the Christian Coalition; Carl F. H. Henry, an evangelical theologian; Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family; Donald Wildmon, head of the American Family Association; Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention; and Edward G. Dobson, pastor of an evangelical church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and formerly one of Jerry Falwell's acolytes at Moral Majority. Paul M. Weyrich, a longtime conservative activist, head of what is now called the Free Congress Foundation, and one of the architects of the Religious Right in the late 1970s, was also there.

In the course of one of the sessions, Weyrich tried to make a point to his Religious Right brethren (no women attended the conference, as I recall). Let's remember, he said animatedly, that the Religious Right did not come together in response to the Roe decision. No, Weyrich insisted, what got us going as a political movement was the attempt on the part of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to rescind the tax-exempt status of Bob Jones University because of its racially discriminatory policies.

Bob Jones University was one target of a broader attempt by the federal government to enforce the provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Several agencies, including the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, had sought to penalize schools for failure to abide by antisegregation provisions. A court case in 1972, Green v. Connally, produced a ruling that any institution that practiced segregation was not, by definition, a charitable institution and, therefore, no longer qualified for tax-exempt standing.

The IRS sought to revoke the tax-exempt status of Bob Jones University in 1975 because the school's regulations forbade interracial dating; African Americans, in fact, had been denied admission altogether until 1971, and it took another four years before unmarried African Americans were allowed to enroll. The university filed suit to retain its tax-exempt status, although that suit would not reach the Supreme Court until 1983 (at which time, the Reagan administration argued in favor of Bob Jones University).

Initially, I found Weyrich's admission jarring. He declared, in effect, that the origins of the Religious Right lay in Green v. Connally rather than Roe v. Wade. I quickly concluded, however, that his story made a great deal of sense. When I was growing up within the evangelical subculture, there was an unmistakably defensive cast to evangelicalism. I recall many presidents of colleges or Bible institutes coming through our churches to recruit students and to raise money. One of their recurrent themes was,We don't accept federal money, so the government can't tell us how to run our shop—whom to hire or fire or what kind of rules to live by. The IRS attempt to deny tax-exempt status to segregated private schools, then, represented an assault on the evangelical subculture, something that raised an alarm among many evangelical leaders, who mobilized against it.

For his part, Weyrich saw the evangelical discontent over the Bob Jones case as the opening he was looking for to start a new conservative movement using evangelicals as foot soldiers. Although both the Green decision of 1972 and the IRS action against Bob Jones University in 1975 predated Jimmy Carter's presidency, Weyrich succeeded in blaming Carter for efforts to revoke the taxexempt status of segregated Christian schools. He recruited James Dobson and Jerry Falwell to the cause, the latter of whom complained, "In some states it's easier to open a massage parlor than to open a Christian school."

Weyrich, whose conservative activism dates at least as far back as the Barry Goldwater campaign in 1964, had been trying for years to energize evangelical voters over school prayer, abortion, or the proposed equal rights amendment to the Constitution. "I was trying to get those people interested in those issues and I utterly failed," he recalled in an interview in the early 1990s. "What changed their mind was Jimmy Carter's intervention against the Christian schools, trying to deny them tax-exempt status on the basis of so-called de facto segregation."

During the meeting in Washington, D.C., Weyrich went on to characterize the leaders of the Religious Right as reluctant to take up the abortion cause even close to a decade after the Roe ruling. "I had discussions with all the leading lights of the movement in the late 1970s and early 1980s, post–Roe v. Wade," he said, "and they were all arguing that that decision was one more reason why Christians had to isolate themselves from the rest of the world."

"What caused the movement to surface," Weyrich reiterated,"was the federal government's moves against Christian schools." The IRS threat against segregated schools, he said, "enraged the Christian community." That, not abortion, according to Weyrich, was what galvanized politically conservative evangelicals into the Religious Right and goaded them into action. "It was not the other things," he said.

Ed Dobson, Falwell's erstwhile associate, corroborated Weyrich's account during the ensuing discussion. "The Religious New Right did not start because of a concern about abortion," Dobson said. "I sat in the non-smoke-filled back room with the Moral Majority, and I frankly do not remember abortion ever being mentioned as a reason why we ought to do something."

During the following break in the conference proceedings, I cornered Weyrich to make sure I had heard him correctly. He was adamant that, yes, the 1975 action by the IRS against Bob Jones University was responsible for the genesis of the Religious Right in the late 1970s. What about abortion? After mobilizing to defend Bob Jones University and its racially discriminatory policies, Weyrich said, these evangelical leaders held a conference call to discuss strategy. He recalled that someone suggested that they had the makings of a broader political movement—something that Weyrich had been pushing for all along—and asked what other issues they might address. Several callers made suggestions, and then, according to Weyrich, a voice on the end of one of the lines said, "How about abortion?" And that is how abortion was cobbled into the political agenda of the Religious Right.

The abortion myth serves as a convenient fiction because it suggests noble and altruistic motives behind the formation of the Religious Right. But it is highly disingenuous and renders absurd the argument of the leaders of Religious Right that, in defending the rights of the unborn, they are the "new abolitionists." The Religious Right arose as a political movement for the purpose, effectively, of defending racial discrimination at Bob Jones University and at other segregated schools. Whereas evangelical abolitionists of the nineteenth century sought freedom for African Americans, the Religious Right of the late twentieth century organized to perpetuate racial discrimination. Sadly, the Religious Right has no legitimate claim to the mantle of the abolitionist crusaders of the nineteenth century. White evangelicals were conspicuous by their absence in the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Where were Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and Billy Graham on August 28, 1963, during the March on Washington or on Sunday, March 7, 1965, when Martin Luther King Jr. and religious leaders from other traditions linked arms on the march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, to stare down the ugly face of racism?

Falwell and others who eventually became leaders of the Religious Right, in fact, explicitly condemned the civil rights movement. "Believing the Bible as I do," Falwell proclaimed in 1965, "I would find it impossible to stop preaching the pure saving gospel of Jesus Christ, and begin doing anything else—including fighting Communism, or participating in civil-rights reforms." This makes all the more outrageous the occasional attempts by leaders of the Religious Right to portray themselves as the "new abolitionists" in an effort to link their campaign against abortion to the nineteenth century crusade against slavery.

Excerpted from Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America
Copyright © 2006 by Randall Balmer.

Dimwit Homophobe Starts Fire in Library Reading Room

Fire started in Chicago library's gay books section
June 15, 2006
BY ANNIE SWEENEY Crime Reporter
Chicago Police are investigating a suspicious fire that burned about 100 books from the gay and lesbian selection at a North Side Chicago Public Library branch.

The small fire at the John Merlo branch, 644 W. Belmont, ignited about noon Tuesday and the cause remained under investigation, officials said.

Detectives were not investigating the fire as a hate crime, Chicago Police Department spokeswoman Monique Bond said. But gay rights activist Rick Garcia was concerned that it might be, given the subject matter. "It wasn't the history section," he said.

Bond said the fire was under investigation as an arson.

The fire was set on the second floor of the library in a remote corner, and the section is not marked by any sign reading "gay and lesbian," sources said.

After the fire was discovered, library staff evacuated patrons to safety on the first floor, said Margaret Killackey, a library spokeswoman.

The gay and lesbian collection includes roughly 1,000 books ranging from history and athletics to travel and culture, and it was almost entirely destroyed, Killackey said.

asweeney@suntimes.com

Copyright 2006 © The Sun-Times Company

Note: Well, that's one way to handle things. If the faggots won't go away on their own, then burn them out. We've seen many churches with an emphasis on serving GLBT people burned down by homophobes, why not the libraries and schools as well? Of course Chicago Police are not going to treat it as a hate crime; they do not believe in 'special rights for gay people' as a police officer once stated to me. PAT
See a follow up report here in July 29, 2006. The woman who started this fire was caught by Chicago Police. It was a homeless woman who had been living in or around the library. PAT

Final 'Gay' Resolution Leaves No One Happy

Bishop Robert Duncan at a press conference following the compromise solution reached Wednesday afternoon.

‘Restraint’ urged in allowing gay bishops
Rita Price and Felix Hoover
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

In a last-gasp effort to preserve its place in the worldwide Anglican Communion, the Episcopal Church called on leaders yesterday to show "restraint" when considering gay bishop candidates.

Supporters of the resolution, passed just hours before the nine-day General Convention ended in Columbus, say they want to keep doors open for the denomination’s many gay members.

At the same time, they’re trying to appease conservative Anglican leaders who have warned of a schism unless the U.S. church enacts a gay-bishop moratorium and apologizes for the 2003 consecration of V. Gene Robinson, an openly gay bishop from New Hampshire.

The not-so-delicate balance left many unhappy.

"We’re again in quite a muddle," said Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh, a leader of the conservative wing of the U.S. church.

Bishop Dorsey F. Henderson Jr. of the Diocese of Upper South Carolina, head of the special committee that studied the church’s response to the Anglican demands, acknowledged that the action did not please either side.

But he said the Episcopal Church wanted to find a way to maintain discussions and membership with the larger, worldwide body.

"It’s a heartbreak for a lot of people," Henderson said. "For gays and lesbians, who think the response was too much. For conservatives, who thought it too little."

The compromise was introduced and first passed in the House of Bishops. It then passed in the House of Deputies, a body of more than 800 clergy and laypeople who had defeated a stronger version of the legislation a day earlier.

The Rev. Heather Buchanan Wiseman of Cincinnati, a deputy from the Diocese of Southern Ohio, voted against Tuesday’s resolution but supported the newer resolution after listening to pleas from outgoing Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold and from Presiding Bishop-elect Katherine Jefferts Schori.

"They came to us and said we need to keep the conversation open. We needed to make that sacrifice," Wiseman said. "We voted with tears in our eyes."

Jefferts Schori, the first woman leader of the 2.2-million member denomination, likened the Episcopal Church in America and the Anglican Communion overseas to "conjoined twins."

Doctors don’t separate them unless "both can live full lives," she told deputies. "I think we are in a church much like that."

Jefferts Schori said she remains committed to the inclusion of gays, but she urged acceptance of the resolution asking Episcopal leaders to "exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration" of candidates whose "manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church."

Conservatives were upset that the nonbinding resolution did not mention homosexuality or same-sex union blessings. They said it leaves sufficient wiggle room for dioceses to choose more gay bishops.

Gay advocates saw it as plenty restrictive.

"Obviously I’m disappointed, and I think we disagree about the way in which we can best be able to continue the conversation," Robinson said.

He said he had doubts about whether the church really would split because of gay bishops. But Robinson said he wants to trust leaders who said the action had to be taken to salvage unity.

"I hope and pray that the personal sacrifice will be honored for what it was," he said. "And I ask: Are they (Anglican leaders) really going to be in conversation with us? "

In a statement released after the vote, Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury —leader of the Anglican Communion — hedged his answer.

Williams had urged the General Convention to respond to the demands set forth in the Windsor Report. That 2004 document called on Episcopal leaders to place a moratorium on gay bishops, to stop blessing same-sex union ceremonies and to apologize for the turmoil caused by Robinson’s consecration.

The church took no action during the convention on same-sex blessings. It expressed regret for the pain caused, but not for the consecration of Robinson.

"It is not yet clear how far the resolutions passed this week and today represent the adoption by the Episcopal Church of all the proposals set out in the Windsor Report," Williams said.

"The wider communion will therefore need to reflect carefully on the significance of what has been decided before we respond more fully."

Some conservative leaders said additional defections from the moderate-to-liberal U.S. church are certain. "Many laity will now leave. Clergy will now leave. Parishes that have been waiting will now leave," said the Rev. Canon David C. Anderson, of the American Anglican Council.

Bishop Kenneth Price of the Diocese of Southern Ohio said he also expects liberal dioceses to look for the broadest interpretation of the resolution. Dioceses elect their own bishops.

"We may over the next three years see some tests of this," Price said.

Robinson said nine days of wrangling and politicking took a toll on both the convention and its participants.

"I feel sorriest for those who voted ‘yes’ on that resolution and did so knowing it wasn’t what is in their hearts," he said.

"I’d rather be me than them tonight. I can go to bed with a clear conscience."

Book Review: New Book on Bishop Robinson

Going to Heaven: The Life and Election of Bishop Gene Robinson
by Elizabeth Adams

1-933368-22-5
Trade Paper 6 x 9
Biography 308 pp. $14.95
To be Published on July 28th 2006

An exploration of the man—Gene Robinson, the world's first openly gay Episcopal bishop—who many believe will be the catalyst for the breaking apart of the Episcopal Church.

It may be a uniquely American success story: not long ago, who would have thought that the son of tobacco sharecroppers in Kentucky could become an Episcopal bishop? No one could have predicted that this boy, born poor, ill, and given little chance of survival, would in fact be elected and ordained 56 years later as the first openly gay bishop in Christendom, finding himself at the center of unprecedented positive and negative reaction in the religious world and beyond.

Gene Robinson’s life is a compelling story of challenges overcome by hard work, intelligence, humor, love, and deep faith. It is also a story of one man’s journey into his own “otherness”; of courage found and integrity retained; and the emergence of a ministry that speaks to countless people who believe in a Gospel of love and inclusion, and want the church to reflect that vision.

Through a lively text based on extensive interviews with Bishop Robinson, his closest associates, family, colleagues, and observers, and illustrated with photographs from all phases of his life, this book paints a portrait of Bishop Robinson not as a symbol but a human being who is, as he puts it, “neither the angel nor the devil some would make me out to be.” It illuminates his life; his struggle with—and eventual acceptance of—his sexual orientation; his calling to become a priest and later a bishop.

It tells the story of the critical, central events of his election and consecration amid intense opposition, huge security concerns, and media attention. The book follows him through the next two years as he juggles dual roles—Bishop of New Hampshire, and symbol of gay achievement and the progressive church— while the opposition stirred by his election creates increasing pressure for schism in the Episcopal Church of the United States and the Anglican Communion worldwide.

The book concludes with a discussion of the deep theological and historical significance of Gene Robinson’s election and personal vision for the future, and what this means both for individuals and for a Church seeking to be relevant in a today’s world.

Elizabeth Adams has been granted unique, extraordinary access to Bishop Robinson and the events and people surrounding him. She also has significant knowledge about the Episcopal Church gained through lifelong membership and active participation, and has been an observer, writer, and speaker for many years about the interface between religion and contemporary life and politics.

Read a sample chapter on line here .

Gay People are Sometimes Bigots Also, and Vicious at Times

School Acknowledges that Attack by Group of Kids was "Planned and Premeditated"
Parental Rights Activist David Parker's Son Surrounded and Beaten-up at School on Anniversary of Same-Sex "Marriage" in Massachusetts; Caps year-long public campaign of anti-Parker hate by activists in town

By Brian Camenker

LEXINGTON, MASSACHUSETTS: MassResistance has learned that on May 17 - the two-year anniversary of same-sex "marriage" in Massachusetts - David Parker's first-grade son, Jacob, was dragged and beaten at the Estabrook Elementary School in Lexington during recess, receiving multiple blows to the chest, stomach, and genital area.

Last year David Parker was arrested and made national news over the school's refusal to notify him when adults discuss homosexuality or transgenderism with his son, then in kindergarten. The school system has continued to refuse to notify any parents. On April 27, 2006, Parker, his wife, and another family filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the school system.

During the recess period, a group of 8-10 kids suddenly surrounded The teachers' aide apparently determined that since she could not see external bleeding, and since Jacob apparently was not hit in the face, she did not send him to she school nurse. The Parkers were notified by the first-grade teacher within an hour of the incident.

School authorities told the Parkers that from their investigation they have determined that the beating was indeed planned and premeditated.

Safe schools? Tolerance? Diversity?

There can be no question that this beating has little to do with children. It was fueled and incited by adults (and, yes, school officials) in the town of Lexington. And it reflects the culture of extreme intolerance against anyone with traditional beliefs, and the willingness of adults to bring children into adult issues.

* It cannot be accidental that this happened on May 17 - the two-year anniversary of same-sex "marriage" in Massachusetts - a day when emotions were particularly high among certain activists.

* None of the kids involved were suspended from school. Instead, from what we are told, a "diversity" training session of sorts was held in the first-grade class. What if it had been a "gay" child who had been beaten, or even taunted? Across Massachusetts children are routinely suspended from school for even using the term "gay" in a less than positive fashion.

* The Estabrook Elementary School library has continuously displayed two particular issues of the local Lexington Minuteman newspaper which depict David Parker in big articles on the front page on a prominent table where kids often go. Those two issues were still displayed after this latest incident. [See MassResistance picture.]

* Estabrook Elementary School is proud of its long-time involvement in various "Safe School" programs that make the schools "safe" for homosexuality but dangerous for anyone with a different viewpoint. The current rage there is the "Open Circle" program, which has ties to GLSEN.

* A group of adults in Lexington maintain and regularly update an angry anti-Parker website, www.LexingtonCares.org. In addition to angry anti-Parker diatribes, they meticulously catalog all anti-Parker letters to the editor, newspaper articles, etc. They also organize anti-Parker rallies and demonstrations, and go on TV and radio bashing Parker. The group is led by well-known lesbian activist Meg Soens, who was involved in the infamous GLSEN "Fistgate" conference in 2000. (Soens also runs a second pro-homosexual Lexington website, www.RespectingDifferences.org. )

* Adults in Lexington have conducted a nasty and hateful anti-Parker letter-writing campaign in the local newspaper, the Lexington Minuteman, that has lasted for well over a year. *The "Lexington Cares" group, and others, have recruited young children to participate in angry anti-David Parker public demonstrations. [See pictures below.]

David Parker says:

"We understand that skirmishes happen on the playground. What concerns us greatly is the premeditated, well planned and coordinated nature of the assault.

"We are aware that the school administration sent notices home with all the young children concerning the Parker arrest, the "King and King" incident and the federal lawsuit. In addition, the school administration prominently displays the front-page Minuteman biased headlines of such incidents in the elementary school library for the children to see, read, and discuss. We also know that activist lesbian mothers and vehement anti-David Parker parents are spewing hateful, inflaming rhetoric to their young children. What kind of atmosphere are they creating? Are their children acting out their parents' hate? Was this attack part of the "group think" that the pro-homosexual crowd espouses?

"Isn't the school supposed to be addressing safety and preventing bullying and violence? Or are such programs only focused on children with homosexual parents? You can be certain that if this happened to a child with homosexual parents more would be made of this and that "lessons" teaching tolerance and diversity of homosexual behavior normalization would be forced upon the young children."

Just waiting to happen

This outrageous incident should not come as a surprise to anyone. The hatred and vituperative nature of the homosexual activists and their allies, both in the schools and in the community, toward anyone who does not agree with their agenda has been well documented. This also clearly demonstrates the complete ineffectiveness and moral bankruptcy of the so-called "safe schools" programs, which cause far more problems than they solve. Unless things are forced to change, more innocent children will be at risk.

Brian Camenker can be reached via email at mailto:info@MassResistance.com - More information is at Mass Resistance Web Site

Already, Some Episcopalians Fighting With New Presiding Bishop

The new Presiding Bishop of Episcopal Church

Bishop election upsets Episcopal diocese
By RACHEL ZOLL, AP Religion Writer

One of three Episcopal dioceses that rejects ordaining women appealed for help Monday from the head of the Anglican Communion after the U.S. church elected a female bishop as its national leader, the first woman ever to lead an Anglican province.

Bishop Jack Iker of the Diocese of Fort Worth, Texas, read a short statement from the floor of the Episcopal General Convention, asking Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams to put the diocese under the oversight of another Anglican leader.

On Sunday, the convention chose Nevada Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori as the first female presiding bishop for the Episcopal Church, the U.S. arm of the global Anglican Communion.

Supporters of women's ordination rejoiced that Jefferts Schori won, but the vote complicates attempts to maintain unity in both the American denomination and the Anglican Communion.

Three years ago, Episcopalians stunned the communion by consecrating its first openly gay bishop — V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire. The convention will decide this week whether to appease angry overseas archbishops by temporarily barring homosexuals from leading dioceses.

Iker said in a separate statement that Jefferts Schori's election continued policies that have "divided the Episcopal Church, impaired our relationship with a majority of other Provinces, and brought the Anglican Communion to the breaking point."

Many Anglicans believe women should not be ordained. Only two of the 37 other Anglican provinces — New Zealand and Canada — have female bishops, although some allow women to serve in the post.

Williams released a brief statement Monday acknowledging that Jefferts Schori's election would cause problems among Anglicans, but pledged his support "as she takes up a deeply demanding position at a critical time."

Beside Fort Worth, the two U.S. dioceses that do not accept women priests are Quincy, Ill., and San Joaquin, Calif., according to the Anglican Communion Network.

All three are members of the network, which was formed in response to Robinson's confirmation and represents about 10 U.S. traditional dioceses and more than 900 parishes that remain within the denomination but are considering breaking away.

The outcome of the General Convention will shape their response and that of overseas Anglican leaders.

On Monday, delegates were scheduled to take up an Anglican demand for a promise from the American church not to install any more gay bishops, at least for now.

The proposal being sent to the floor, however, stops short of a moratorium and instead urges dioceses to "refrain from" choosing bishops "whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church." Delegates can revise or reject the measure.

Debate begins in the House of Deputies, comprised of lay people and clergy, then goes to the House of Bishops for their approval.

Jefferts Schori would not say whether she thought the church should stop electing gay bishops for now since delegates hadn't yet voted on the measure. The meeting ends Wednesday.

However, she had voted to confirm Robinson in 2003 and supports blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples. She will be installed for a nine-year term Nov. 4 in the Washington Cathedral.

The presiding bishop represents the Episcopal Church in meetings with other Anglican leaders and with leaders of other religious groups. But the presiding bishop's power is limited because of the democratic nature of the church. The General Convention is the top Episcopal policy-making body and dioceses elect their own bishops.

On the Net:

Episcopal Church: http://www.episcopalchurch.org

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press.

About the Time You Thought it was Okay to be a Methodist Once Again

EDITOR'S Note: In the three articles presented today, this one is the most disturbing, in my opinion. Someone, in another blog I read from time to time has stated his belief that "the Baptists are the most rotten of all". And while that may be true, at least the Baptists do not mince words: they tell you right from the start that you are going to go to hell if you are homosexual. In that respect however, they are a lot more honest than the United Methodists who like to jerk your chain and tell you what a great person you are, then the minute your back is turned stab you with a knife if you try to actually take them up on their claims of (your) goodness. Just try to find a position of some responsibility in the United Methodist Church ... like a pastor for instance, as the woman in this report tried to do. I am certain the person who tattled on her felt she was doing the 'right thing' by exposing the lesbian and saving the Methodist Church from the 'sinner'. That is why so many of us have given much consideration to the Methodist Church but wound up staying away. Some of us really and truly want to give of ourselves to Christ and the church and do things to help others. But don't try it where the Methodists are concerned; their talking about 'all are welcome here' is just so much bologna. PAT]

She found home in a new church
By Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY
The Rev. Jo Gayle Hudson will always grieve for the faith she grew up in.
But the United Methodist Church, the religion that taught her about social justice, the one in which she felt called by God to be a pastor, won't let lesbians such as Hudson serve in the pulpit.

She was in the closet when she was ordained a deacon and associate pastor. Just weeks before her ordination as an elder, she was "outed."

"Like many closeted gays, you truly believe if you are good enough, love well enough and work hard enough, everyone will overlook that one little thing about you that is just your normal life."

Instead, she had to find a new faith home.

Hudson switched to the United Church of Christ. It's similar to Methodism theologically, she says, but structured differently. Churches are autonomous, and one "had the courage to call an out lesbian."

Seven years later, in 2004, she was invited to preach at the pioneering gay church in Dallas, the Cathedral of Hope.

Immediately, "I felt the spirit. I felt at home.

"This is a church with a passion for radical inclusion, a passion for justice, an extravagant welcome," says Hudson, 52, now the Cathedral's rector and senior pastor.

"Every week I hear people say, with joy and relief in their voice, 'You've saved my life.' "

Says Hudson, joy and relief in her own voice: "God creates out of chaos. God does new things."

Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2006-06-12-god-gays-hudson_x.htm

Episcopalians Elect First Female Bishop

By RACHEL ZOLL,
AP Religion Writer

COLUMBUS, Ohio - The Episcopal Church on Sunday elected Nevada Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori as the first female chief pastor of the denomination and the first female leader in the history of the world Anglican Communion.

The choice of Schori as presiding bishop complicates the already difficult relations between the American denomination and its fellow Anglicans.

Only two other Anglican provinces — New Zealand and Canada — have female bishops, although a handful of other provinces allow women to serve in the post. Still, there are many Anglican leaders who believe women should not be priests.

The presiding bishop represents the Episcopal Church in meetings with other Anglican leaders and with leaders of other religious groups. But the presiding bishop's power is limited because of the democratic nature of the church. The General Convention is the top Episcopal policy-making body and dioceses elect their own bishops.

Schori will inherit a fractured church. The Pittsburgh-based Anglican Communion Network, which represents 10 U.S. conservative dioceses and more than 900 parishes within the Episcopal Church, is deciding whether to break from the denomination. The House of Bishops recently started a defense fund that will help fight legal battles against parishes that want to leave and take their property with them.

Membership in the Episcopal Church, as in other mainline Protestant groups, has been declining for years and has remained overwhelmingly white. More than a quarter of the 2.3 million parishioners are age 65 or older.

Copyright 2006 Associated Press

[Editor's Note: Uh ... this makes me wonder how the conservative 'Bible believing' members of ECUSA (you know, the ones who are trying to hide their own homophobia where Gene Robinson is concerned by blaming it all on scripture) will manage to reconcile this appointment with the teachings of St. Paul, who was a notorious woman-hater and who pronounced in scripture at least once that 'women should remain silent in church'. And, as Bishop Duncan pointed out in the other item today, the church has certainly allowed divorce, so I must ask the good Bishop: if there are no problems with ignoring the scripture where divorce is concerned or where 'women not remaining silent in church' are concerned, then why is there such a big issue about a Bishop's sex life? PAT]

A Worldwide Revolution

Bishop Robert Duncan argues that the consecration of an openly gay bishop may bring an end to a unified Anglican church.

By Elise Soukup

Bishop Robert Duncan is the leader of the Anglican Communion Network, a coalition of conservative Episcopal bishops that formed after the controversial consecration of gay Bishop V. Gene Robinson. Bishop Duncan spoke with Elise Soukup:

Ms. Soukup: What's the problem with consecrating homosexual bishops?

Bishop Robert Duncan: The love of Jesus is for absolutely everyone; everyone is invited into the church. But the church has always understood that those who lead the church must be converted. They must lead holy lives. So the problem with a bishop in a partnered relationship is that it isn't a holy relationship as God has defined and designed it. It's against God's will as expressed in scripture.

Soukup: I spoke with Bishop Robinson earlier and he reminded me that the church has departed from scripture before. A good example of that is in allowing for divorce.

Duncan: Bishop Robinson is exactly right. We've left scripture before and that's a problem.

Soukup: You have said that because of Bishop Robinson's consecration, the church has now come to a moment where it's impossible to stay together.

Duncan: The difficulty that we face is there are really two reasons people choose the Episcopal church. One is because it is a reliable way to be both evangelical and Catholic and to be completely within scripture and in the tradition of the church. That's certainly how I came to it. There's another group that chooses the church because of its revolutionary actions in regard to leadership, innovation and social issues. So what I'm saying is that since 2003—since the Episcopal Church chose to embrace something that the Christian church had never done and something that the Anglican Communion, in fact, said couldn't be done—it's impossible to hold those two groups together. That's the impossible task.

Soukup: Yet church leaders are currently meeting to try to work out a compromise on this issue. Will the conservative bishops go along with it?

Duncan: The church is seeking to find a middle way with the Christian church and the secular world. It's a problem when you try to do that with moral issues. One of the ways you can say this is, how do you compromise with adultery? Do you just not do it very often? You see that's quite different from compromising on how you say "thee" or "thou." This compromise [with homosexual bishops] would stretch us to a breaking point. The worldwide Anglican Communion has said to the Episcopal Church, "Do you realize that you went outside of the boundaries?" And at this convention, a compromise would say, "Well, maybe we did, but please keep us in anyway."

Soukup: How might a break manifest itself?

Duncan: We would all love for this to be over soon. But I think it's going to take a long time.

Soukup: Is there a chance that conservative bishops will leave the Episcopal Church after the convention?

Duncan: The simple answer is no. The Episcopal Church has acted in such a way that the Anglican Communion has said, "Do you realize that if you continue to go in this direction that you're walking apart?" So one can only imagine that the [Episcopal] church's connectivity [with the worldwide Anglican community] is going to get less and less. But we're not going anywhere.

Soukup: Some congregations have already left the Episcopal Church and joined up instead with foreign Anglican bishops. What is your stance on that?

Duncan: I support those kinds of arrangements. They've been forced out by the actions of this revolutionary, activist leadership and through their own consciences. Again, this is about a worldwide revolution. So there's going to be all kinds of shifting and realigning.

It's a chaotic process. There are already court battles going over property rights and pensions. It's abhorrent. This does not bring people to believe that the Episcopal Church is a good place to bring up children—not only with regards to these social issues, but in the way we behave.

Soukup: Some say that the average lay person doesn't even care about consecrating gay priests. Is this all much ado about nothing?

Duncan: The average layperson may very well not care, but that doesn't make it right or true. The savior of our world stood alone against the whole world and, remarkably, within two centuries the entire empire submitted. A majority opinion doesn't make it right.

Robinson Declares: I am Not an Abomination to God

Bishop V. Gene Robinson, first openly gay Episcopal Bishop in New Hampshire

By RACHEL ZOLL, AP Religion Writer

The first openly gay Episcopal bishop said at a packed church hearing Wednesday that he is "not an abomination," as he pleaded with the denomination not to bar gays from the office of bishop, even temporarily, for the sake of Anglican unity.

If Episcopalians "see Christ in the faithful lives of our gay and lesbian members," they should have the courage to say so, no matter the potential consequences, said Bishop V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.

"I am not an abomination before God," he told the Episcopal General Convention. "Please, I beg you, let's say our prayers and stand up for right."

But Bishop Robert Duncan, who leads a network of conservative Episcopal dioceses that opposed Robinson's consecration, told those at the hearing that the denomination is attempting an impossible task, "which is to hold together the conserving and progressive wings of our church."

"We've reached a moment where it is very difficult, indeed I think we've reached an impossible moment, in holding it together," said Duncan, of the Diocese of Pittsburgh.

The convention will vote over the next few days whether to meet demands from Anglican leaders to impose a moratorium on electing gay bishops and express regret for the turmoil caused by Robinson's 2003 consecration.

Bishop Robinson and Jon Solomese (gay activist) listen to responses from audience at Episcopal convention.

The Episcopal Church is the U.S. arm of the 77 million-member Anglican Communion, the global association of churches that trace their roots to the Church of England. The majority of overseas Anglicans believe the Bible prohibits same-sex relationships, and they want the Americans to follow that teaching or leave the communion.

If Anglican leaders dislike the outcome of the General Convention, which runs through June 21, the communion could break apart. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the Anglican spiritual leader, has repeatedly expressed concern about the future of the fellowship.

"We cannot survive as a communion of churches without some common convictions about what it is to live and to make decisions as the Body of Christ," he wrote in a message to the General Convention, which runs through June 21.

Wednesday night's hearing was organized by a committee crafting the Episcopal response to the crisis. The main proposal before delegates does not contain a moratorium on future gay bishops. Instead, it asks dioceses to "exercise very considerable caution" in electing leaders. However, delegates can revise or reject the legislation.

Bishop V. Gene Robinson, first openly gay Episcopal Bishop in New Hampshire

People began standing in line more than an hour before the hearing began to make sure they could get inside. Delegates and visitors filled the vast hotel ballroom to its 1,500-person capacity, while an overflow crowd outside listened on speakers as delegates took turns commenting on how the church should proceed.

Many expressed concern about the church's place in the Anglican family, while others said it would go against God to put restrictions on gay clergy.

On the Net:

Episcopal Church

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press.

Episcopal Church Airs Divisive Gay Issues

V. Gene Robinson, Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire and first openly gay bishop.

By Michael Conlon

The U.S. Episcopal Church, trying to quell the storm it created by consecrating the first openly gay bishop in Anglican church history, was showered with calls on Wednesday to repudiate the action and pleas not to abandon gays and lesbians.

"Are we courageous enough to recognize Christ in the lives of our gay and lesbian neighbors?" asked Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, whose elevation to the episcopate in 2003 set off turmoil in the 77-million-member Anglican Communion, as the worldwide church federation is called.

"I'm convinced I'm not an abomination in the eyes of God," added Robinson. "Please, let us say our prayers and stand up for right."

He was one of dozens of church members, ordained and laity, who took the floor in a packed hotel ballroom at the church's triennial convention to debate the fallout from his consecration at the last such gathering in 2003. He is believed to be the first openly gay bishop in more than 450 years of Anglican history.

Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh, head of the Anglican Communion Network, a group of bishops seeking a return to what they see as orthodoxy, spoke just before Robinson and warned it may already be too late to repair any damage.

UNITY AT STAKE

If the convention approves, as written, a series of resolutions crafted with the blessing of the 2.3-million-member U.S. church's leadership it will send a clear signal that it has decided to "walk apart" from worldwide Anglicanism, he said, and that unity is no longer possible.

The forum for Wednesday's discussion was the meeting of a committee which is considering the package of resolutions written by a special commission formed by U.S. church leaders. The resolutions attempt to respond to the Windsor Report, a paper issued at the behest of the archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, which demanded the Episcopal church apologize for the Robinson elevation, not do any others like it and make it plain that it is against the blessing of same-sex unions.

The committee will consider the testimony, perhaps reword the resolutions and send a report to the two legislative houses at the convention. One consists of bishops and the other is made up of diocesan representatives. Final votes may not come until Saturday.

The resolutions being debated include an admonishment that church congregations use "very considerable caution" in elevating gays to bishop; that clergy not authorize public blessings of same-sex unions until the broader church agrees on a policy; and that the entire convention reiterate a statement the Episcopal bishops made last year saying they regretted the pain the Robinson consecration caused.

From the men and women testifying at Wednesday's hearing there were repeated claims that the resolutions are meaningless in terms of addressing worldwide concerns, and many who said their approval or that of even stronger statements would make it look like the U.S. church is caving in to unwarranted pressure on a stand it took with moral conviction.

Copyright © 2006 Reuters Limited.

Robinson Urges Rejection of Episcopal Gay Moratorium

The first openly gay Episcopal bishop planned Wednesday to publicly urge the convention to reject the moratorium on gay bishops and any discrimination based on sexual orientation.

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - The first openly gay Episcopal bishop says it is unlikely the church's top policymaking body will create new barriers for homosexual clergy despite turmoil over his 2003 consecration.

The Episcopal General Convention, which runs through June 21 in Columbus, must vote on whether to stop electing gay bishops for now so the embattled Anglican family can stay together.

"Most Episcopalians think that God's gay and lesbian children are every bit as worthwhile as the rest of God's children and they won't be willing to sacrifice gays and lesbians on the altar of unity," New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson told The Associated Press in an interview prior to the meeting, which began Tuesday.

Joined by national gay rights activists, Robinson planned Wednesday to publicly urge the convention to reject the moratorium on gay bishops and any discrimination based on sexual orientation.

The 2.3 million-member Episcopal Church is the U.S. arm of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The majority of Anglican archbishops believe gay relationships violate Scripture and have been pressuring the Americans to adhere to that teaching or leave the communion.

The main proposal before the convention does not contain the moratorium that Anglican leaders are seeking. Instead, the measure asks dioceses to "exercise very considerable caution" in electing leaders. Delegates can revise or reject the legislation.

Robinson, who lives with his longtime male partner, said urging caution "does not tie the hands of the American church, but it does express our serious intention to be sensitive to the needs and concerns" of fellow Anglicans.

Episcopal leaders have never apologized for confirming Robinson; those who support ordaining gays contend the Bible does not bar monogamous same-gender relationships. But the denomination's leaders have repeatedly expressed regret for the turmoil his election caused.

"Do I wish that no caution were needed? Of course," Robinson said. "But that's not the world we live in."

The Rev. Tobias Haller, a New York City priest and voting convention member who supported Robinson's confirmation, hopes this week's gathering will bring both sides closer.

"It's very easy to write an angry blog comment, but it's another thing when you're sitting in the same room face to face with people," said Haller, pastor of St. James Church.

AP Religion Writer Rachel Zoll contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press.
Andrew Welsh-Huggins Associated Press Writer

Church to Address Fallout Over Gay Bishop

RACHEL ZOLL
Associated Press

Three years after confirming its first openly gay bishop, the U.S. Episcopal Church must decide whether to appease irate Anglicans by promising not to do it again - at least for now.

The choice puts a heavy burden on the Episcopal General Convention, which started Tuesday in Columbus, Ohio: If Anglican leaders don't like the outcome of the American meeting, the world Anglican Communion could break apart.

"Whether it will end up being two camps that still sit in the same tent, or whether they will finally decide to walk in different paths, I don't know," said David Steinmetz, a Duke University expert in Christian history. "Nobody knows at this moment."

New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson, who lives with his longtime male partner, became an icon for gay acceptance after the 2003 General Convention, where his election was approved.

His supporters contend the Bible does not bar monogamous gay relationships; detractors hold that Scripture explicitly condemns gay sex.

Anger over Robinson's elevation has echoed throughout the 77 million-member communion, where conservative views dominate. The Episcopal Church, the U.S. arm of Anglicanism, has scrambled to calm the worldwide furor.

New York Bishop Mark Sisk, co-chairman of an Episcopal panel guiding the convention debate, believes that many bishops and parishioners have no regrets about Robinson's consecration, "but are not anxious to exacerbate a crisis."

The "hope is that something will get passed that will signal to our communion that we actually are trying to listen carefully" to overseas concerns, Sisk said.

Circumstances inside the American denomination are less dire. Conservatives are a minority within the 2.3 million-member church, which has been shaken by infighting, but remains intact.

Four predominantly conservative dioceses - Dallas, Pittsburgh, Quincy, Ill., and San Joaquin, Calif. - have withheld payments to the national church, according to Canon Robert Williams, a national Episcopal spokesman.

And several parishes have voted to leave the denomination, prompting lawsuits over church property. Williams puts the number of departing congregations at 30 out of 7,679; the American Anglican Council, a conservative advocacy group, says the figure is closer to 140.

The biggest change, however, and the largest threat according to liberals, is the formation of the Pittsburgh-based Anglican Communion Network.

The association represents 10 U.S. dioceses and more than 900 traditional parishes that oppose ordaining gays. The network remains part of the Episcopal Church for now, but has separated from Episcopal leaders and is working closely with conservative archbishops overseas.

Network leaders won't give details of their post-convention plans, but they are maneuvering over the long-term for greater status within the Anglican Communion. They could ultimately attempt to replace the Episcopal Church as the American member of the communion.

"None of us wants the communion to break up," said the Rev. Peter Moore, former dean of the conservative Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pa., "but we realize we're talking different languages."

While hoping for reconciliation, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the Anglican spiritual leader, has held meetings to prepare for any negative world reaction to the Columbus assembly, which ends June 21. One concern is that the rift will become so bad that frustrated conservative churches, particularly in the developing world, will leave the communion.

The Episcopal House of Bishops, meanwhile, recently started a defense fund that will help dioceses in legal battles against parishes that want to leave and take their property with them.

The key decision before delegates is their response to the 2004 Windsor Report.

That document was written by an international panel on Anglican unity, which asked for a moratorium on electing partnered gay bishops and a temporary ban on creating official prayer services for blessing same-sex couples. The Episcopal committee co-led by Sisk crafted legislation based on these requests - but stopped short of backing a moratorium.

Instead, the committee proposed that dioceses "exercise very considerable caution" in bishop elections from now on. The panel also suggested a temporary bar on same-gender liturgies, but used wording that leaves an opening for individual priests to conduct the ceremonies informally.

Convention delegates can revise or reject the proposals.

Separately, a new leader for the Episcopal Church will be elected at the convention from a field of seven nominees. Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold's nine-year term ends this year and church observers say none of the nominees would take the church in a dramatically different direction. Delegates will also vote on whether to consider reparations for black Episcopalians over the church's past support for slavery and segregation.

On the Net:

Episcopal Church: web site here

© 2006 AP Wire and wire service sources.

Episcopalians Grapple With Divide Over Gay Ordination

BY GARY STERN
GANNETT NEWS SERVICE

NEW YORK -- Bishop Mark Sisk, leader of the Episcopal Diocese of New York, believes the debate about homosexuality that could ostracize Episcopalians from the Anglican world is a good thing. Productive.

Meaningful. Necessary.

He says the Episcopal Church will survive whatever happens at its General Convention, which opens Tuesday in Columbus, Ohio, and closes June 21.

"People say there is going to be dissension at the convention, but that doesn't bother me a bit," Sisk says. "Easy agreement is sort of self-congratulatory. Debate helps you move ahead."

It has been almost three years since the church consecrated an openly gay bishop, Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, drawing fire from bishops across the 77 million-member Anglican Communion. This week, the Episcopal Church will try to decide how far it will go to repair the breach with its nearly 500-year-old Anglican family.

Sisk, the leader of the New York diocese since 2001, said last week that he does not foresee the Episcopal Church being thrown out of the Anglican Communion, a popular prediction these days even if no one is quite sure how such a divorce would happen.

"Relations could, however, become quite strained," he says with typical understatement.

Sisk, 63, is soft-spoken and thoughtful, someone who measures his words carefully because he wants to say exactly what he means. He is a strong proponent of full inclusiveness of gays and lesbians in church life, and he leads a proudly liberal diocese where gay and lesbian priests feel mostly welcome. But Sisk is playing a high-stakes role in helping the national church chart its potentially treacherous course.

He is co-chairman of a church commission that recommended in April that dioceses use "very considerable caution" before electing bishops who would prove divisive. Some commission members wanted to ask dioceses to "refrain" from such decisions, but the more moderate wording won out.

The commission was appointed to respond to the 2004 Windsor Report, in which Anglican leaders asked the Episcopal Church to start a moratorium on gay bishops until a new Anglican consensus might be reached.

So what does "very considerable caution" mean?

"It is not simply a decision for your own diocese; it is a decision that has implications for the church and the communion," Sisk says in his Manhattan office, which looks up at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, his bishop's "seat" and a vast reminder of Episcopal tradition.

"Does that mean that a body could vote in favor of someone in a committed, same-sex relationship? Yes. It seems to me they could hear that and say 'I am using caution. I have paid attention. And I still want to do this.'"

Not surprisingly, the term "very considerable caution" falls flat for the Rev. Daryl Fenton, canon for operations of the Anglican Communion Network, a group of 10 Episcopal dioceses and close to 200 parishes that opposed Robinson's consecration.

"What they're saying is 'We're trying to be nice about this, but we still disagree,'" Fenton says. "It isn't enough. I think the word caution implies that this is not a moral issue, as we believe, but an issue of getting along."

Sisk's commission also recommended that the Episcopal Church offer "apology and repentance" for causing such division within the Anglican Communion, and that dioceses stop creating ceremonies for blessing same-sex couples.

The recommendations will be taken up as resolutions at General Convention. Although they are certain to be modified, Sisk hopes they will be adopted in spirit.

"If General Convention should choose to authorize, let's just say, a liturgy to bless a same-sex union, that would be a significant problem," he says.

Sisk is aiming for a higher profile in the public square, and the diocese has hired the high-powered Rubenstein Associates in New York City to that end. The Episcopal Church has seen its cultural influence fade in recent decades, but Sisk believes a moderate, progressive Christian voice is needed.

"People want to leap in with simplistic answers, often in the name of God," he says. "It's so far from the truth and, frankly, makes religion look silly."

Long term, he thinks the Episcopal Church will survive the current conflict, battered but stronger. He says gay priests will become accepted over time, as female priests have since the first controversial ordination of a woman in 1977.

Sisk also believes the current debate is changing minds in the Southern Hemisphere, where opposition to Robinson's consecration is based.

"If there is anybody in Africa or anywhere else who has discovered through these debates that they may not be quite the pariah they are depicted to be by their own culture, and they have discovered some sense of hope and personal dignity, I think t is well worth it," he says. "We've paid a price, but I don't regret the price."

75 Years of Marriage For This Couple

In this month of June, and weddings, here is a happy story for you of a man and his wife, who have been married for _75 years_ ; sort of a rarity in the world as we know it today. June 13 marks their 75th wedding anniversary. You might like to send them a card. Marriages like this used to be more common; for example, my Aunt Myrtle and her husband Clarence Lowrance were together over 70 years. He passed away about a year ago; she died a few months later. For the final twenty-some years, he was in a nursing home, mostly incapacitated, but Aunt Myrtle went to the nursing home every single day to visit Clarence, that is how fond they were of each other. but today's story tells of another couple; he is 100, she is 98. Its a beautiful story, in my opinion. PAT

True love story has endured for 75 years

By Lolly Bowean
Tribune staff reporter

As he gently caressed his wife's left hand, tears welled up in Chester Licking's eyes.

He swallowed back his emotion as he wrapped his hand around her small wrist and softly stroked her arm. Mildred Licking reached over and patted his hand with her free one, leaned in, and their eyes connected.

"She's lost so much weight," he whispered, noting that she's about 20 pounds lighter and much more delicate than she used to be. Because of Alzheimer's, she doesn't remember as much as he does.

"It's not easy seeing her in this condition," he said.

Still, with him at 100 years old and her at 98, caring for each other is a job they've been doing nearly all their lives. The couple will celebrate 75 years of marriage on Tuesday.

"We've had a wonderful life together," she said.

"I never met or knew anyone that had been married this long," he said. "All you've got to do is live this long."

Though there are no statistics to support it, the diamond anniversary is becoming somewhat more common, experts say. That's mainly because people are living longer, said Linda Rubinowitz, a clinical psychologist and marital and family therapist at Northwestern University's Family Institute.

"These couples come from a period of time--divorce then wasn't so much understood as a viable option," she said.

Many couples who celebrate 75 years of marriage wed as teens. Mildred and Chester Licking are a bit unusual because they were in their 20s.

They met as children attending Sunday school in Milwaukee. He was 6 and she was 4, Chester said. It wasn't until they were in high school that they formally got together.

"I'd see her, but we were not dating," he said. "We fell in love that last year of high school. Then in college, that love just increased."

After high school, they both entered the University of Wisconsin. "We had a good time," he said. "We really got to know each other."

He liked her gentle demeanor and her interest in reading and writing. But most of all he liked looking at her, he said.

By the time they graduated in 1929, they were engaged. On June 13, 1931, they married in Genesee, Wis., and then moved to Chicago where he worked as a chemical engineer for Dutch Boy Paints.

"It certainly wasn't an unlucky day for us, being on the 13th," Mildred Licking said. "We've had a wonderful life."

The couple raised two children in Chicago, then moved to south suburban University Park in 1971 after he retired.

In 1978, Chester Licking went to work as deputy assessor for Monee Township. He still works in that job three days a week, he said. And he still drives, he proudly points out.

Through the years, getting along has been easy for them because they've always had a lot in common, Mildred Licking said.

"In all our years together I don't think we had one argument or quarrel," she said.
He could remember one -- over tuna salad.

"Tuna fish salad was cheap; it was all we could afford," he said. "Mildred got pretty good at making it. But one of us got tired of it."

For Chester, loving Mildred was easy. "She had a nice hand to hold in 1931," he said. "It's a nice hand to hold now too."

The best part of their marriage is the affection they share, he said. Even now, they still touch, hug and cuddle like they've just met.

"I can hold her tight when I want to," he said, laughing. "People in our time didn't do a lot of hugging back then. All my hugging went to one lady. I took advantage."

But time and age changed a lot in their lives, Chester said. Once an avid quiltmaker and homemaker, Mildred used to handle all the household affairs. She can no longer cook by herself, and he helps with much of the housework. She used to wash the dishes and he dried; now he washes while she sits nearby in a chair to help him.

"It's a chore we can still do together," he said. "Now I do the dishes, and Mildred checks if it's clean."

When caring for his darling, Chester is careful to pay attention to all the details, the couple's daughter, Helen Norton, said. Every week he drives Mildred to a salon to have her silky gray hair curled and set. He's diligent about making sure her favorite dresses, shirts and pants are clean and ready for her to wear.

"Mother always wants to look her best," Norton said. "She wants to have her hair done and her makeup and pretty clothes and jewelry. She has trouble with buttons now, so she picks out the clothes and he helps her put them on."

He organizes his wife's jewelry for her, Norton said. He even installed extra mirrors in the bathroom to make it easier for her to style her hair.

"He does little things that really help her," Norton said. "From the time I was little it was obvious they were in love. It's wonderful to see them together, I'm really proud of both of them."

As they sat across from each other, touching and holding hands, Chester Licking prodded at his wife's memory, asking if she remembered who was in her wedding party.

"That was a long time ago," she told him.

Then he asked her how many grandchildren they have.

"It's been a long time since I counted," she said.

He reminded her they have eight grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. And her sister was her maid of honor.

Yet, through the years their love for each other has only grown, Chester said. And their bond has grown stronger.

"We've always been glad to go to bed together at night," he said. "And to wake up together."

lbowean@tribune.com

Gay People in Church: Division Deepening As Denominations Draw Lines

The Rev. Sandi Rice, left, and the Rev. Carlene Wood offer the Eucharist at New Creation International Christian Community Church on Grace Way in Fletcher. Co-pastors Rice and Wood have been partners for 11 years.

By Andre A. Rodriguez
Mail: ARODRIGUEZ@CITIZEN-TIMES.COM ---— At a time when some religious denominations are tightening their policies toward homosexuals, others are looking at liberalizing their stance.

The board of directors of the 1.2 million-member Baptist State Convention of North Carolina announced recently a policy proposal that would forbid churches from ordaining gay clergy, making public statements supporting homosexuality or accepting as members people who have refused to “repent of the sin of homosexual behavior.”

On Tuesday, the Episcopal Church (USA) will begin its General Convention in Columbus, Ohio, where the issue will once again be raised. The 2.3 million-member denomination has been under fire from members of the worldwide Anglican Communion since 2003, when the ECUSA consecrated the first openly gay bishop, the Rev. V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.

Convention delegates will decide whether to fulfill a request from Anglican leaders for a moratorium on electing partnered gay Episcopal bishops and on creating blessing ceremonies for gay couples.

The debate over the inclusion of gays has broiled here in the mountains during the past year, first as Christian groups with opposing views of homosexuality held national meetings at area conference centers last summer, and in more recent months as three Asheville pastors protested the disparity between homosexual and heterosexual marriage rights.

In July, Exodus International, a Christian organization of former gays, hosted its annual Freedom Conference at LifeWay Ridgecrest Conference Center near Black Mountain with the Rev. Jerry Falwell, founder of the Moral Majority, as special guest.

Then in September, Reconciling Ministries Network, a national organization that wants gay United Methodists to be able to fully participate in the church, held its Hearts on Fire convocation at Lake Junaluska Assembly.

More recently, Asheville pastors Joe Hoffman and Mark Ward announced they would no longer perform civil marriage ceremonies until the state recognized same-sex marriages. Shortly thereafter, the Rev. Howard Hanger, also of Asheville, resigned his United Methodist ordination, citing the denomination’s opposition to same-sex unions.

“I have decided that I can no longer operate as a minister under the banner of an institution which so blatantly discriminates against the love of 10 to 20 percent of the world’s population,” Hanger wrote in a letter announcing his resignation.

Both sides cite Scripture
The main point of contention between the Episcopal Church (USA) and the majority of the Anglican Communion — and many other denominations that find themselves taking sides in the debate over homosexuality and the church — is what the Bible has to say on the subject.

The Communion teaches that gay sex is “incompatible with Scripture,” as does the Southern Baptist Convention, of which the Baptist State Convention of N.C. is the second-largest association.

According to the Rev. Billy Cline, retiring pastor of Celebration Church in Weaverville who previously ministered at Merrimon Avenue Baptist for 30 years, a Christian who understands Scripture will not want to be a homosexual.

“I think you can become a Christian when you are a homosexual, but I think once one understands — at least as many evangelical Christians do — that the practice of homosexuality is a sin, then they’ll want to overcome that,” he said. “They will depend upon God to help them do so, though it’ll be a struggle just like anything else.”

The Rev. Steve Runholt, pastor of Warren Wilson Presbyterian Church, disagrees and points out the fact that over the years the Bible has been used to support any number of things from slavery to war.

“The Bible has been used in any number of ways over the years to oppress or even victimize people,” he said. “It’s a very complex book. That’s the truth of the matter.”

Gay Christians
The Rev. Kathryn Cartledge, 59, and her partner of 24 years, Elizabeth Eve, 61, attend First Congregational United Church of Christ. Cartledge was ordained into the Presbyterian Church in 1986, but she was turned down for a chaplain’s position in 1996 because she was a lesbian.

“Because of my sexuality, I still have not had the opportunity to pursue a wide range of options in the church or in occupations even outside of the church like a hospital setting,” Cartledge said.

The Rev. Sandi Rice, 41, who pastors New Creation International Christian Community Church in Arden with her partner of 11 years, the Rev. Carlene Wood, 54, said there are seven or eight gay ministers attending her church who have been shut out of Christian ministry because of their sexual orientation.

“It breaks my heart. It really does,” she said. “The call to ministry, the call to service in my own life has been very powerful. It wasn’t something I went looking for — it came looking for me. And to run up against ecclesiastical walls everywhere saying, ‘No, you are not welcome,’ ‘No, you are not acceptable,’ knowing that God has placed a call upon one’s life has got to be one of the biggest conflicts and anguishes a person can experience.”

Eve considers herself to be spiritual but doesn’t call herself a Christian because she doesn’t like what Christianity has become.

“I would consider myself Christian in the sense that Christ meant for us to live our lives but not the way that it’s evolved in the last several hundred years,” she said.

Excluding gays
As gays and lesbians in the Episcopal Church stand on the cusp of fuller inclusion into the life and body of the church, the Baptists and others are taking steps to make their views on homosexuality clear.

According to a May 24 report in the Biblical Recorder, the newspaper of the Baptist State Convention of N.C., the BSC board of directors and executive committee recently met to create a policy that would exclude churches from membership in the association for making public statements in support of homosexuals, ordaining homosexuals, accommodating same-sex marriages or blessings, giving money to groups that support homosexuals or accepting members who refuse to give up homosexuality.

On May 11, the board of directors of the American Baptist Churches of the Pacific Southwest voted to withdraw from the American Baptist Churches USA because of a dispute over homosexuality. American Baptist policy states that “homosexuality is incompatible with biblical teaching,” but Southwestern Baptists were upset that, in local situations, practicing homosexuals were ordained to the clergy and held leadership posts in American Baptist agencies.

In November, a new Vatican decree was released saying men should not be admitted to Catholic seminaries or ordained as priests if they practice homosexuality, have “deeply rooted homosexual tendencies” or “support so-called gay culture.” Those with only “transitory” homosexual tendencies must be celibate three years before being ordained as deacons, the step before priesthood.

Moving the other direction, the Minnesota Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church voted on resolutions June 1 that seek to lift bans on gay clergy and homosexual unions and would call for equal access to the Methodist Church “regardless of sexual orientation.” These resolutions must be voted on at a national convention in 2008. Each quadrennial Methodist conference since 1972 has debated gay issues.

Religious capital
The Rev. L.C. Ray, president of the Baptist Ministers’ Union and pastor of Greater New Zion Missionary Baptist Church in Fletcher said he doesn’t believe Christ would endorse homosexuality but added there are many more pressing issues facing society.

“We shouldn’t spend all of our religious capital on things that there’s a possibility we may not have any control over as far as changing,” he said. “I feel like we’re dwelling on things that may not help, but there is disparity in education, disparity in health care, disparity in economics and so many unkind things happening to our people whether they be black, white or in between that we should be taking stands on and speaking out boldly.”

The Rev. Rice said that while there are only a few verses in the Bible that even seem to address homosexuality, none of these came from Christ’s mouth.

“Jesus never said a word about homosexuality, never in any of his teachings,” she said. “I really believe there are so much more important issues to be dealt with such as poverty, love, peace, inclusivity, and that’s what Jesus taught.”

Jesus may not have made an issue about homosexuals, but that doesn’t mean he would approve, Ray said.

“Do I feel like as a Christian that Christ would endorse (homosexuality)? No, I don’t feel that way, but neither do I feel that Christ would endorse some of the things that straight people are doing, too,” he said.

Hoffman cautions against prooftexting, or the practice of lifting specific verses from Scripture and not reading them in their original context.

“I think all of us have to be careful not to prooftext. To lift up a passage that says what we want it to say and to say, ‘This is the whole story,’” he said. “When I read the Bible, what I find is just an emphasis on love — loving one another, loving God — and I think we are called to be loving and not to be judging in that way. That’s what overrides everything for me.”

The Episcopal convention
As the Episcopal Church approaches its national general convention, most of the world’s focus is on how the denomination is going to address the issue of electing partnered gay bishops and creating a blessing for same-sex couples. When an openly gay bishop was consecrated in 2003, fellow Anglicans worldwide were outraged.

There are murmurs of a split if the denomination moves toward acceptance of homosexuality, and rumors of a liberal group of Episcopalians preparing to take control of the denomination have also circulated.

The Rev. Todd Donatelli, dean of The Cathedral of All Souls, said it’s senseless to worry about which way the convention will choose to go. It’s difficult to predict how the more than 1,000 delegates will vote once they come together and begin discussions, he said.

“When I went to the convention in 2000, what was most heartening was that all the speculation that happened before, some of it may have come to fruition, but in the moment when people finally get together and start talking and listening and praying and going to the Eucharist together, there are things that happen in the moment that no one can predict,” he said. “There are things in 2000 I would not have thought would have happened.”

Runholt said he remembers a time when pastors and church members threatened to leave the church when African-Americans and women were invited to participate fully in the life of the church. He said he sees similarities in the current debate over homosexuals in the church.

“There are ministers in our denomination as there are now in the Episcopal Church who are threatening to leave their denomination if the sanctions prohibiting the ordination of gay clergy are lifted,” he said.

Donatelli said he is encouraging his people to pray for those attending the convention that they might have the wisdom and discernment to make the right decisions.

“What I’m encouraging all our folks to do is not to speculate at this time because that seems to me simply to cloud and already begin to draw some lines before the spirit has had a chance to get us together and talk to us,” he said.

One step at a time

Cartledge, Eve and Rice can all envision a time when the question of whether a homosexual can be a Christian will no longer be relevant, but none can imagine this change taking place in her lifetime.

“I do believe there will be a number of denominations and some faith traditions that will not come full circle, but I do believe there will be a number of denominations and faith traditions that openly embrace gay Christians as children of God just like we are,” Rice said.

Cartledge said it will be the culture and not the church that will lead to change.

“It was the culture who changed and really led the march for justice for the inclusion of African-Americans in all rights that every one deserves, and then the church kind of fell into place,” she said. “At the beginning of civil rights they were not at the forefront. It was not until they felt it might be cool with the greater part of the culture that they stepped up to the plate.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Copyright 2006 Asheville Citizen-Times. All rights reserved.