John writes - Why go for a vote that will inevitably divide us, when we might
have been able to find a middle way?
The current situation has been exactly that since the 80s. We have been
divided all these years and It hasn't been cost free for the huge numbers who
are LGBTQ+ their families and friends. I understand completely the points MET
put forward because I was a card carrying member of EA and HEADWAY the
forerunner of MET for many many years and hold still an evangelical zeal . But
the middle way was a promise that we would journey together - perhaps it wasn’t
that for some and it’s hard not to think some never wanted inclusion or
equality and saw lgbt people as a problem to be tolerated but never cherished.
Constantly saying let’s kick this into the long grass is desperately hurtful.
We have talked about this prayed about it and I pray listened to others for
decades - if we haven’t that probably means we have not engaged because we
didn’t want to.
The idea that only liberal unbiblical lgbt people want change in this area is
nonsense- the parents / grandparents / friends Who have learned to love their
child’s / grandchild’s / friends sexuality and understand it was never a choice
have moved so many on. The experience of lgbt ministers being loving faithful
biblically sound pastors has changed minds too. And it has been such a slow
and lifetime long journey.
Just as people had to learn god was leading on slavery or child labour or women
in leadership the road has been rocky and many have struggled to accept the
spirit is at work, yet the evidence of the spirit working seems so obvious to
me. So many churches and synods across our nation have understood that god is
at work. It’s not just been a sudden lurch to unbelief.
What I am unsure people realise I think is how LGBTQ+ people are made to feel
and I wish we would think of these when we say we can push this down into the
long grass and wait it out. I like many I’m our churches and communities was
told I was unacceptable to God, a mistake that proves sin is at work. And
much much worse.
The ridiculous gay conversion nonsense used on me and countless others caused
life long mental damage to us and those we love. If I pray that your ethnicity
be changed by God to Jewish before god could love you, or asian or black and
that only then would you be acceptable to your church your friends and your God
I would be condemning you to a life of deep despair sadness and futility,
suicide even, or pushing you out of church as many have been .
And it would be completely insane and impossible . Sexuality isn’t a choice
anymore than ethnicity. If it was who would choose this hate riddled path?.
The beating I received to drive the devil out happened at the instance of a
Methodist minister and I married a woman because he said that would confirm and
indeed make the cure. After almost 25 years marriage my ex wife was left
scarred and deeply damaged by that ridiculous policy as have I and our
children, and only after many suicide attempts did I escape and finally realise
that what I have preached to others actually applied to me, that I too was
fearfully and wonderfully made. That God didn’t hate me. It wasn’t loving or
kind or necessary and we should be ashamed as a Church that happened and
indeed still happens. Ashamed of the hurt we have caused. Yet many of us think
it should continue.
We have lived with a middle ground that has oppressed people like me and left
us damaged and hurt by church district and Connexion who think it is acceptable
to allow churches ministers and circuits and indeed Connexional office holders
to treat me like scum that pollutes the whole. I was told homophobia is
acceptable just like racism and sexism. Utter rubbish. We need to be Christ
like once again and start challenging unChristian behaviour - not sexuality but
hatred and prejudice .
People don’t have to get on with me but they don’t get to abuse me anymore than
they can a woman or a black or Asian minister. Yet they do and we pretend it is
acceptable.
Yet No one needs to leave - we hold contradictory positions on so many things
that do not destroy our fellowship; war, pacifism, abortion, sex outside
marriage, cohabitation, divorce, Palestine, the place of other faiths, hell,
heaven, the role of women, politics, taxation etc. There are Methodists who
still won’t receive HC from a woman or a black person. I am astounded and
repulsed by that and want to scream that we allow it. There are still places
where a woman cannot be stationed where a black minister cannot be stationed,
where I cannot. We accept that though I wish we would grow and understand how
horrible such things are. That they are against the spirit not just of liberal
laws but the spirit of Jesus.
I still cannot understand why my sexuality is such a stumbling block or why it
would cause people to break fellowship. I didn’t leave when I was told if I
walked into a church everyone would leave because of my sin polluting the
church. Or when I saw the racism exisited in the church. So many lgbt people
and their friends and allies have stayed for decades waiting for the
conversation and understanding. We are still here, serving faithfully. And
hoping that god and the church will stand with us.
The MET document worries me on many points BUT these are part of my Methodist
family, and more important they are family in Christ and I won’t walk away from
them or break fellowship . These are members of churches I grew in the faith
in and are people I have served and served with. And i would be denying the
faith Jesus called me to have if I didn’t love them and see the, as family.
Which is I guess why I am hurting so much reading posts that threaten
resignations I just don’t understand because I will not walk away or give up, I
will continue to stay and continue to know that my calling and my church are
worthy of my commitment and presence. God never called any of us to live in
Holy huddles or enclaves separate from the rest of the world rejecting those we
don’t think are our enough . That is not the Methodist or the Jesus way.
No GILUU doesn’t require anyone church or individual to act against their views
but does ask that we respect one another. Paul Smith is a wonderful example of
the journey I think we have made as a denomination over the last decades in our
church , proof I think that the spirit is at work.
Joe
On 24 Jun 2021, 09:39 +0100, methmins@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, wrote:
Why go for a vote that will inevitably divide us, when we might have been
able to find a middle way?
