South Africa and Gay Christians

Following the lead of the Americans, other churches are stepping up on the challenge of gay laity.


I am aware that the Methodists did not want a gay related measure, but the Episcopalians have led the way, and the Lutherans have also gone their way. Despite the opposition from within the congregations. Yeah, for the methodists, you cannot be Gay and Christian. Or Methodist. What would Christ say about that???


But, and a big but, here is something that is happening in South Africa. Part of the Anglican Communion, this in Africa, is starting to do something about gay sheep. The other sheep, indeed!


Here is the article

Church makes key decision on gay couples

August 23 2009 at 10:52PM

By Staff Reporter

The Anglican Church in the southern part of Africa has taken a small step towards accepting gay people in "faithful, committed relationships" - although civil marriage between same sexes is not legal in any of these countries other than South Africa.

The Anglican Diocese of Cape Town, which includes Anglican bishops from South Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland, Mozambique, Namibia, St Helena, Tristan da Cunha and Angola, passed a resolution at the weekend asking the church's bishops to provide pastoral guidelines for gay parishioners living in "covenanted partnerships".

The resolution was proposed by St George's Cathedral clergy, as they said the parish had come to be seen as a "safe space" for gay Christians in Cape Town.

The Cathedral needed guidelines to help it provide pastoral care to gay parishioners in same-sex relationships.

Globally, the Anglican Church does not accept same-sex marriages. The Anglican Consultative Council, which represents Anglican Churches around the world, has put a moratorium on the "authorisation of public rites of blessing for same-sex unions".

On Sunday, Archbishop Thabo Makgoba said the synod's resolution might be seen as tame, but he saw it as "an important first step to saying: 'Lord, how do we do ministry in this context?'"

"I'm a developmental person. I don't believe in big bangs. If you throw a little pebble into water, it sends out concentric circles and hopefully that way change comes from that," he said.

He said the issue of same-sex partnerships has led to a schism in the Anglican Church in the United States. He wanted to avoid the issue becoming a source of division in the Anglican Church in southern Africa.

"In South Africa we have laws that approve a civil union in this context, but not in the other countries within our province. In central Africa and north Africa, both the Anglican Church and the state say 'no'.

'I am not one for numbers'

"The reason for this resolution was because we have these parishioners, and the law provides for them to be in that state, so how do we pastorally respond to that?" Makgoba said.

Asked how close the voting was, Makgoba replied: "I am not one for numbers, but for the quality of the debate."

Amazing Lutherans

In Uganda, in most of Africa, they would consider that the world has ended for something like this to happen. It is so amazing to find that a person of my sexuality is affirmed like so, by people who are not of the same sexuality. That they would risk ‘communion’ with those of their denomination to have me included.

I actually feel overwhelmed by such a thing. Why?

Because, from what our country mates believe, shout, say, we so often believe that we are less than equal, because they say we are. But here is a church which has had the guts, through a democratic process, that is described as long, and tough, and gut wrenching, to come to a momentous, significant decision. To include such as me and mine in Church. Yes, I feel amazed, and humbled, by their faith in such as me.

I wonder, what would Orombi say, of these Christians, of those of his own Church? What would Ssempa say? Most likely that they are not Christians. That they dont have Christ in them. How ironic.

Here is the full article

gug


'Monogamous' Gays Can Serve in ELCA
Largest Lutheran Denomination in U.S. Split on Divisive Issue

By Jacqueline L. Salmon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, August 22, 2009

Leaders of the nation's biggest Lutheran denomination voted Friday to allow gays in committed relationships to serve as clergy in the church -- making it one of the largest Christian denominations in the country to significantly open the pulpit to gays.

Previously, only celibate gays were permitted to serve as clergy in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, a denomination of 4.8 million members. But delegates to a church assembly voted 559-451 to allow gays in "life-long, monogamous" relationships to serve as clergy and professional lay leaders in the church.

The vote is the culmination of a years-long process in the ELCA, and was accompanied by plenty of emotion at the convention in Minneapolis. After standing in long lines to reach microphones during debates that extended all day, some delegates shook and others cried as they expressed their opposition or support of the measure.

Quoting the Bible and denomination founder Martin Luther, delegates sought to place the decision within their interpretation of their Lutheran faith.

"We live today with an understanding of homosexuality that did not exist in Jesus' time and culture," Tim Mumm, a lay delegate from Wisconsin and supporter of Lutherans Concerned, an gay-rights organization, said during the debate. "We are responding to something that the writers of Scripture could not have understood."


But other said the recommendations weaken the Biblical standards of the church.

"As Luther taught us, Scripture does not have a wax nose," said the Rev. Ryan Mills, a delegate representing Texas and Louisana. "It cannot be twisted into anything we want it to say. But that's just what we're doing with these following recommendations."

Conservatives tried to derail the vote, losing a ballot that would have required a supermajority of two-thirds to approve the proposal. They lost a similar vote earlier in the week.

Some critics of the proposal predicted its passage could cause individual congregations to leave the ELCA, which is what occurred to the 2 million-member Episcopal Church when it consecrated an openly gay bishop in 2003. Last month, Episcopalians voted to make gays eligible for any ordained ministry.

Most mainline Protestant churches are struggling to balance what many view as Biblical injunctions against the practice of homosexuality with the country's burgeoning gay-rights movement. Among the major mainline denominations, leaders of the Presbyterian Church (USA) recently defeated a proposal to ordain openly gay pastors, but with a much narrower margin than in previous votes. And United Methodist church leaders faced an emotional debate last year when they upheld their ban on openly gay clergy.

"I really believe . . . what we are about to do will split the church," said ELCA delegate John Sang of Ohio during the debate.

Delegate Terri Stagner-Collier wept as she predicted that opponents would be "ripped away" from the church if the measure were approved. "I urge you not to do this -- not to do this at all," she said, "[for] these people in the pews and in my family."

In essence, the vote puts gays under the same set of rules that have govern heterosexual clergy. They are required to be monogamous if married and to abstain from sexual relations if they are single. Individual congregations would not be compelled to take on pastors who are in same-sex relationships.

The ELCA was formed in 1988 by the merger of three Lutheran organizations, and it has 10,500 churches in the United States, including 80 in the Washington area. It is generally considered the least conservative of the three major present-day Lutheran denominations, although it has a sizable conservative minority.