why I no longer believe in lgbtq+ friendly churches

I used to be in favour of lgbtq+ friendly churches.

My denomination, according to head office, has at least four lgbtq-friendly churches in this area¹. Generally, these churches are welcoming of people regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, allow involvement in ministry at all levels and have pastors who are theologically progressive.

Despite being lgbtq-friendly, these churches are uncertain spaces to many people, in that they have not declared if and how they value and embrace diverse peoples. To be specific in this context, these churches do not say anything about being lgbtq+ friendly, their website gives no indication of their welcome and there are no rainbows on the sign out front. The effect is that people in the neighbourhood and, in fact, even people inside the church itself, might have no idea.

And so initially I had thought that they needed encouragement to move toward becoming churches that openly declare that all people are welcome and valued. This is particularly important so that people who are at the edges and who belong to minority groups would know which churches will walk with them on their spiritual journey.

That's what I used to think. But now, I no longer believe in lgbtq+ friendly churches.

It’s not because they are hesitant to proclaim that the good news they believe truly includes everyone. It’s because just as lgbtq+ friendliness is absent from the signs and the website, so are all things lgbtq+ absent from the culture and structure of the church.

[god and us]

let them eat cake...

... homemade Italian sour cherry and chocolate cake

[mary]

 "Courage 3.0" by Tim Okamura. Found via a tweet.

For more of Okamura's work:
https://thecreatorsproject.vice.com/en_uk/blog/tim-okamura-women-of-color-portraits

[what the largest survey of transgender people says about our churches]

Sojourners has posted an article about the findings from the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey of 28,000 transgender people, in an article titled "7 Things the Largest-Ever Survey of Transgender People Tells Us About Our Churches."

The focus of their article, as the title suggests, is on the church and faith experiences. Interesting reading ...

Here's the first three things:

1. Most trans people have experienced life in a community of faith.
2. Trans people are afraid of religious rejection.
3. Trans people have a pretty good reason to be afraid.

Read the article here:
https://sojo.net/articles/7-things-largest-ever-survey-transgender-people-tells-us-about-our-churches

If you are interested in the overall survey report, you can get it here:
http://www.ustranssurvey.org/

[saint giles' welcomes...]

A sign outside of Saint Giles' Anglican Church in Cambridge. Photo by Lauren VanderHout.
Used by permission.

[*]

[we are all related]

I work downtown now, which means that there's lots to see when I go for a walk at lunch. Here's what I found in the atrium of Enterprise Square:

don't say "the pope blesses trans"

On a flight from Azerbaijan to Italy, Pope Francis was asked by journalists how he would minister to those feel that their bodies do not match their gender.

His comments were an interesting mix of pastoral care and highly conservative views. Here I've isolated two distinct sections from an article that Nicole Winfield, Associated Press, wrote on Oct. 3, 2016 with the title "Pope lashes out at ‘nasty’ transgender mentality and ‘world war against marriage’".

“I’ve never abandoned them,” he said. “When someone who has this condition comes before Jesus, Jesus would surely never say ‘go away because you’re gay.'”

Francis recounted the story of a Spanish transgender man who wrote him a letter recounting his transition from a woman to a man....

Francis praised the bishop who accompanied the man throughout his transition. But he criticized the man’s parish priest, who he said would yell “You’ll go to hell” when he saw him on the sidewalk.

Francis recounted that the man found a retired parish priest who had a different attitude: “He said, ‘How long has it been since you’ve gone to confession? Come on. Let’s confess so you can receive Communion.'”
....

While attention must be paid, he said, “in each case welcome, accompany, discern and integrate them” into the life of the church. “This is what Jesus would do today.”

And here's the second section:

He concluded by begging reporters flying with him on the papal plane: “Please don’t write ‘The pope blesses trans.’ Please.”

Read the whole article here.

What does this mean?  Based on his conversation with the press, he doesn't want them to report that he blesses trans, because he doesn't. Or perhaps he does, but he doesn't want it to get out because people will be upset?? Possible but less likely, in my opinion.

Or maybe he knows what will happen if word gets to God that the pope blesses trans:

That's pure sarcasm on my part; I'd of course be delighted if the Pope blessed trans people.


Delfin Bautista, a trans Latino Catholic who attended World Youth Day this year, says this about the pope:

I have been reflecting on the various messages we have received from the pope this week…live your truth, make a mess, and who am I to judge....

Looking at the three papal phrases that resonated with me, I realize that the pope has perhaps subversively blessed and invited us to live our truth by making a mess so that more and more people can live a life that is judgment free.

Source
http://www.equally-blessed.org/blogs/making-truth-filled-mess-judgment-free

Gotta love the spin he puts on that, eh? 

heavenly laundry

[when jesus looks like a sex offender]

Hugh Hollowell ministers with the poor in Raleigh, North Carolina. I am quite a fan of his as I've often seen how he embodies in our time the Jesus that I read about in the Bible.

He has posted a story on his blog called "When Jesus looks like a sex offender'. Here's the beginning of the story:

An acquaintance of mine, a man who is a deacon in a local church, stopped by, and asked if he could talk to me.

We sat down in the small conference room at the community center we run.

“What do y’all do about sex offenders in church?” he asked.

A man named Andy had been coming to their church – a nice, successful, red brick, steeple church – for the last few months. He had attended their adult Sunday School, and everyone liked him.  Andy was an older man, in his late fifties, with a short beard and horn rimmed glasses. He was well read, knew his Bible and listened with rapt attention in the service. He was thinking about joining the church, so he scheduled a meeting with the pastor.

“That was when it went south. He told the preacher he was a sex offender, and he wanted to join the church,” the deacon said.

How would your church respond in this situation? How do you feel about it?

Read the rest of the story at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/hughhollowell/2016/10/when-jesus-is-a-sex-offender/

more than others...

[gender-based analysis plus]

Though Gender-Based Analysis Plus has been in use by the Government of Canada since 1995, many people might not have heard of it.

Here’s how they describe it:

GBA+ is an analytical tool used to assess the potential impacts of policies, programs, services, and other initiatives on diverse groups of women and men, taking into account gender and other identity factors. The "plus" in the name highlights that GBA+ goes beyond gender, and includes the examination of a range of other intersecting identity factors (such as age, education, language, geography, culture and income).

source

Part of the goal of using GBA+ is to ensure that programs and services which are intended to produce positive results do not inadvertently have a negative effect on one subset of the population.

Read more here.

Educate and equip yourself! Take a short, free course on GBA+

interest convergence

Interest Convergence means that you will support something that previously you were against or uninterested in, if it benefits you to do so.

Warren Blumenfeld writes this:

The late Dr. Bell of New York University Law School forwarded the theory of “interest convergence,” meaning that white people will support racial justice only when they understand and see that there is something in it for them, when there is a “convergence” between the “interests” of white people and racial justice. Bell asserted that the Supreme Court ended the longstanding policy in 1954 of “separate but equal” in Brown v. Board of Education because it presented to the world, and in particular, to the Soviet Union during the height of the cold war, a United States that supported civil and human rights.

In like fashion, I posit that evangelicals and other conservative Christians, as they see more and more people supporting and more states passing civil and human rights protections based on sexual and gender identity and expression, and more and more people are leaving those religious institutions that have not caught up as welcoming congregations, evangelicals seemed to have “evolved” somewhat from dictating policies to at least debating varying perspectives. Whether they will eventually soften their stands is another matter.

(source)

Quote from: Can LGBTQ people ever forgive Christian evangelicals for their sins?
Author: Warren Blumenfeld
http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2016/04/can-lgbtq-people-ever-forgive-christian-evangelicals-for-their-sins/

[from john pavlovitz: the church beloved]

In a recent post, John Pavlovitz presents:

The Church Beloved: A Manifesto of LGBTQ-Affirming Christians

Here's an excerpt:

A new Church is coming, or rather with each passing day it is becoming; person by person being renovated.

Heart by heart it is waking up.

For a long time we have been shamed into silence, relegated to the periphery of the faith community, believing in quiet. But these days demand volume and today we raise our voices so that there can be no mistaking our intentions.

We are unrepentantly, unwaveringly LGBTQ-affirming Christians.

We will continue to make the Church and this world a more open, loving, and safe place for the queer community and their families.

Read the rest of the manifesto:
http://johnpavlovitz.com/2016/06/29/the-church-beloved-a-manifesto-of-becoming/