More Light Presbyterians gather for national conference in Decatur, Georgia

from Doug King, your WebWeaver
[9-5-07]

Michael Adee, National Field Organizer of More Light Presbyterians, offers his report on the conference with the headline, "Presbyterians make history in Atlanta!"

With the theme "Liberating Love, Celebrating Hope!" some 75 registered participants and many drop-ins came together at North Decatur Presbyterian Church from August 31 through September 2.

In the opening time of worship on Friday evening, national field director Michael Adee spoke of the need to be clear about "asking the right questions" of ourselves and of the church. The central question, he said, is not about how to be right, how to be pure, but about how to love. And if we follow the example of Jesus’ love, our love will not be limited by ancient rules of ritual purity or of separation between one group and another.

Saturday morning’s keynote speaker was the Rev. Dr. Erin Swenson, who spoke as a transgender Christian and a counselor to many others. Her theme was our need to sort out the differences and connections between gender and love. She spoke movingly of her own struggles. "For us," she said, "the love of self does not come easily. When I was ten years old my life broke, as I became aware of not being like other boys." It took years of struggle – within herself, with people around her, and with her church – to come to real affirmation of herself. For her, this was the only way to begin living faithfully to Jesus’ command to "love God with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your heart, and with all your strength, and your neighbor as yourself." (She rearranged the clauses a bit for the purpose of her own exposition.)

Two rounds of workshops then considered a range of topics including parents and families, "marriage matters," how to be a welcoming congregation, "nurturing our spirits," a conversation with Jack Rogers, organizing for justice, and more.

One workshop, led by MLP co-moderator Bear Ride and national field organizer Michael Adee, considered possible overtures for the coming 218^th General Assembly in June, 2008. Adee talked of the important of each person’s being aware of his or her own location, and relating the struggle for justice to the people there, with their own attitudes and concerns and their own struggles for justice. One place to start, he suggested, is with the fact that we all, gay and straight, want to be part of a family – and that the church is clearly able to help meet that need for family.

Speaking of the coming General Assembly, Bear Ride reiterated the commitment of MLP to follow its 2006 statement, "No Turning Back." (No turning back, that is, on ordination equality, marriage equality, and more.) She pointed out that the actions of the 2006 GA in accepting the recommendations of the Peace, Unity and Purity Task Force for a "season of discernment" simply means more delay. While the action was supposed to avoid schism in the church, so far some 20 or 30 congregations are leaving, and more are likely on the way. The action called for no more overtures for another five years, but "dozens of presbyteries" are passing overtures to adopt "super-sized standards," making absolute all the standards in the Book of Order. So, she said, MLP will work again to take "delete B" overtures to the Assembly, along with renewed efforts to correct the mis-translation of the phrase in the Heidelberg Catechism that is cited as the single condemnation of homosexuality in our Book of Confessions.

Lou McAlister East, who attended the conference representing the Covenant Network, expressed the concern that "we can’t get ‘delete B’ through our presbyteries," especially in the South, where her work is focused. Ride acknowledged that people continue to say "We want to save you the pain" of another loss. But, she said, getting the issue to the presbyteries "gives us a chance to talk with people" and to continue raising the concerns of justice and love.
 

Saturday evening provided another time of quiet reflection and worship, with Dr. Jack Rogers, who was Moderator of the 213^th General Assembly, speaking on some of the main points of his recent book, Jesus, the Bible and Homosexuality: Explode the Myths, Heal the Church. He spoke very personally about his own journey, beginning in 1993 when he was asked to serve on a committee of Pasadena Presbyterian Church to consider whether they should become a More Light congregation. So, he said, "I began to study the Bible with a new focus, and I discovered it had more to say [about sexuality] than I had thought."

Since he was being asked to consider a possible change in the church’s position on a very sensitive issue, that led him to ask how the church had changed its views on two other contentious issues, slavery and the role of women. In both cases, he found the church had to overcome some deep, but false, assumptions – among them that the people in question – slaves or women – were cursed by God, and that they were "morally responsible" for their condition. And he finds that now people are using precisely those same false assumptions in dealing with homosexuality.

But he sees hope for change, as most churches today have moved beyond "total literalism," and affirm the Jesus Christ is the heart of Scripture and the key to interpreting it. And Jesus said clearly that the core of life is love – loving God and others and ourselves – and God’s love for us.

He then dealt with the famous eight Bible passages that are cited as the grounds for condemning LGBT people and excluding them from ministry roles in the church. In each case he argued that an understanding of the background and the circumstances from which each passage arose leads us to see them as condemning much wider and deeper sins such as a refusal of hospitality, greed, sexual exploitation, and so on.

And he pointed to the struggle of the early church to accept Gentiles as one case where the church has changed, setting aside a very basic definition of their Jewish identity when James, Jesus’ brother, convinced the Jerusalem council that God’s loving intention was for all to be included in the new Christian community. "And," he concluded, ‘the church changed! If they could do that, can’t our church do it today?"

More Light conference affirms the gifts lgbt people bring to the church ... and faces the challenges

Naomi Tutu offers keynote address

A special report by Gene TeSelle, Witherspoon Issues Analyst
[2-13-06]

More Light Presbyterians held a regional conference in Nashville, February 10-12, with about forty or fifty in attendance. Much of the planning was done by the local MLP chapter, with participation from members, elders, and ministers in at least seven different congregations.

The dynamics of the conference were best expressed during one of the closing meetings. A straight person expressed gratitude for being made to feel welcome. In response a few GLBT participants said they had been surprised to find straight people there. This led to a statement that GLBT people are a gift from God, often with more than the usual amount of talent and grace.

For the final service, members of the conference joined the congregation of the Woodland Presbyterian Church in urban East Nashville, where the session has discussed the issues of sexuality and championed the removal of G-6.0106b from the Book of Order.

The keynote speaker was Naomi Tutu, now a Nashville resident (formerly Program Coordinator for the Race Relations Institute at Fisk University, and now Associate Director of the office of International Programs at Tennessee State University). She was calm, reflective, and convincing as she asked how we can pay attention to what people can give — and receive. We are called to "the true fundamentalism," she said, not the gospel of prosperity, which makes the rich and powerful the model ("How did that work for Jesus?" she asked). She recalled having heard, from an Episcopal pulpit in Nashville after the consecration of Bishop Gene Robinson, prejudice and hate expressed in "such beautiful words." "We have been given a great gift, a great opportunity," she said, to show that there are none whom God does not love.

There were several parallel workshops, most of them conducted in both morning and afternoon.

Perhaps the most vivid was an audio-visual series on the theme "Telling Our Stories/Sharing Our Faith," presented by Janet Edwards of Pittsburgh Presbytery's Taskforce on Ministry with Sexual Minorities, and the Community House Presbyterian Church. GLBT Presbyterians, their family members, and friends share their lives, their faith journeys, and their desires for the church in several modes. The video stories are in two volumes. There are also audio stories. And a booklet briefly summarizes a number of them. These can be secured from the Digital Storytelling Director, (412) 321-3900, ext. 216, or by contacting Janet Edwards, revjmephd@worldnet.att.net.

Erin Swenson, who is accustomed to introducing herself as "the famous transgender minister in Atlanta," and is also the outgoing co-moderator of More Light Presbyterians, was an active participant in the conference and led a session on "Transgender Issues: Where and How does the T in GLBT Fit in the Church?"

She and Michael Adee, National Field Organizer for More Light Presbyterians, summed up many of these issues in a workshop on "Caring for All God's Children: Pastoral Care for GLBT Persons and Families."

Adee quoted the statement by Judy Shepard, mother of Matthew Shepard, that "the worst kind of hurt is church hurt." He noted that Bishop John Shelby Spong, in his book The Sins of Scripture: Exposing the Bible's Texts of Hate to Reveal the God of Love(HarperCollins, 2005, 336 pp., $19.95), speaks of "killer texts." The program of most congregations, Adee pointed out, still assumes a Fifties profile of intact heterosexual families. "Fidelity and chastity" (G-6.0106b) continues to be an expectation not only of ordained officers (not always observed!) but implicitly of all members. But congregations are learning that they have to consider the "special needs" of singles and divorced people. So how might they minister more effectively to GLBTs in their community and their membership?

Adee took life's passages as his theme. Baptism is the first hurdle, for some ministers refuse to baptize the child of a same-sex couple. In adolescence there are questions how GLBTs will be accepted in the youth group. There are also questions about "coming out," a major issue of "truth-telling." To whom can one say it first? And how can the family, the pastor, and members of the church "come out" as allies, knowing that they will be challenging social norms? Coming out at a later time (which often happens) may be experienced as a second adolescence, learning new kinds of behavior and relationships. Gender change is an even more drastic transition. Marriage or a committed union is another rite of passage, filled with conflict for Presbyterian churches and ministers. And at the end of life, illness may be dogged by questions whether a partner is really "next of kin," able to visit and able to make decisions. Even in death there may be rejection.

Hal Porter, Pastor Emeritus of Cincinnati's Mt. Auburn Presbyterian Church, led a workshop on the theme "Homosexuality is Not a Sin." He noted the "harm, division, and ill will" caused by the 1978 General Assembly's categorical declaration that "the practice of homosexuality is a sin." Porter reflected on a number of biblical, theological, and clinical statements. He also distributed copies of an overture recently adopted by the Cincinnati Presbytery, calling on the upcoming General Assembly to amend the 1978 policy statement by deleting seven statements which set homosexuality in a negative light.

Those who were at the 2004 General Assembly will recall a dispute, continuing long after the close of the Assembly, over quotations read out during floor debate by Scott Schaeffer, a former member of the Stated Clerk's staff, during a debate over deleting G-6.0106b. Some of these were from the background paper and thus were not part of the 1978 Assembly's action. But there are negative evaluations of homosexuality in the Assembly's policy statement, too. Hal Porter pointed out that, if you go to the www.pcusa.org web site, click on Search, and type in "homosexuality," the first thing that pops up is this 1978 statement. (I tried it, and that's indeed what happened.)

Much has happened since 1978. The American Psychiatric Association and the American Psychological Association have made important statements about homosexuality and about attempts at "conversion therapy" which assume that it is a reversible "disorder." There have also been many discussions of biblical and doctrinal perspectives on homosexuality. It is time for the church's most formal policy statement on sexual orientation to be brought up to date and be made less blatantly offensive.