Summer Madness and the church's "homophobia"
I chaired a debate on homophobia in the church today at , Ireland's largest Christian festival. The house voted by a sizeable majority in favour of the motion "The House believes that the church promotes homophobia." The motion was proposed by the writer and broadcaster Gareth Higgins and Mark Russell, the chief executive of the Church Army; and was opposed by Earl Storey, director of the Church of Ireland's Hard Gospel project, and Brendan McCarthy, leader of Omagh Community Church. We'll have more from the Festival on tomorrow's programme, and an extended interview with , one of this year's keynote speakers.
Comments
Having heard the interview with Bart Campolo, I can only hope that the young people at Summer Madness were receiving more Biblically sound material than what he was offering. He seemed stangely reluctant to agree with Scripture on any of the issues raised.
As expected - William cornered him on the 'gay' issue, and he was found sadly wanting. (I can't help wondering if William's chairing of the 'Homophobia' debate was entirely impartial? It isn't usually on Sunday Sequence!)
As I have said before, the most loving thing a Christian can do for a 'gay' person is to point them to forgiveness and a changed lifestyle through faith in Christ.
(see John 8v11)
Come on Philip, b nice. U say Will cornered him on the gay issue. Listen again. Campolo brought up the subject and crawley dragged him back to the heresy topic. I had a tough time following campolo, he took forever to get a point out and never answered the questions, will even pointed that out to him i think. Wish he'd have just stuck to the subject but i suppose he was worried that the philip campbells of the world might be after him for thinking live on the radio. Ho hum.
Well done the Summer Madness kids for recognising that the church is messed up and homophobic. Lets hope your parents wake up to that soon. Its typical that young people lead the way when it comes to social justice. Thank God for that!
I was there and i was so proud of the young people from my youth fellowship. They listened and voted and it was really simple for them in the end. It all came down to how we treat one another. They have gay friends, unlike many of their parents, and that changes how people think about this debate. They talk to their gay friends and hear their stories of mistreatment in the church, in schools and in jobs. It's obvious that the church is part of the problem: we have minsiters and leaders who ignore the issue or perpetuate the problem. People are excluded and called names or silenced and shut out.
Many of our kids said to me they weren't sure if gay sex was a sin or not but they WERE sure that hurting gay people was a sin. I thought that was really profound.
I can't tell you how disappointed I was with Brendan McCarthy and Earl Storey. They rambled on about semantics and the meaning of the word homophobic and they made no sense to our young people because the issue is whether people are getting hurt, not what name you give to that hurt.
I thought both Brendan and Earl were on a journey with this one. Brendan got angry when Crawley asked if the leviticus verse about capital punishment for homosexuality was a homophobic verse. He didn't want to face that question. How can you say a verse calling for the killing of gay people is NOT homophobic? That was weird. SO instead of dealing with it he got into some souped up point about how that was a red herring. Hello? That verse is quoted in churches all over the country and gay people have to listen to it. It doesn't sound like a red herring to them.
If you're reading this Brendan, no offence, I respect you. Just please realise that you sounded like you wouldnt face up to this one.
I've more of a problem with the head of our hard gospel project because that's supposed to be a project to deal with difference issues in the CoI yeah? Earl totally lost it. He didn't have a clue how to even talk about sexuality difference. That was the moment I felt most at sea with my own church in this debate.
The others taking part were a bit unfocused I thought thats a pity. Gareth Higgins is a very good speaker and he had an argument that made sense up to a point. His heart's in the right place, he loves peple and hates injustice. All that is great. BUT! He wanted to avoid the issue of whether homosexuality was a sin, but im not sure you can avoid that when you ask if the churches teaching is part of the problem. Please put me right Gareth if I didnt get you. Mark Russell was a bit of a surprise cos I tend to think of the church army as a more traditional and evangelistic outfit. He was passionate and sounded like he wanted to take his army into the churches and root out the homophobia in person!!! I'd have to say again that he might have been clearer on the bible and whether the churches teaching needs to change if the church is to become a safer place for gays and lesbians. I was please that crawls (sorry!) asked about the bible cos thats where a lot of the kids I work with ARE on this issue.
At the end I really thought Brendan's tactic of asking everyone to abstain might have persuaded a lot of people. One girl in the room made a speech and told him it was a daft move on his part and I nearly applauded. When it comes to a justice questions, Christians have no right to abstain. Either the church promotes homophobia or it doesnt, let's deal with the question head-on and fix it. Yeah?
MASSIVE masive massive applause to JK and the Summer Madness staff for putting on the debate and helping to make this conversation happen in the church. I saw a couple of episcopal heavies in the room probably on a heresy hunt lol! They didn't get any heresy, they just got a lot of young people who love Jesus and want to love others too. They said it loud and proud: Homophobia is out, gay people are in. That's my kind of church. I walked away relieved and enthused and glad to be a christian.
Is God/the bible democratatic? No.
Most church members and youth have their views formed primarily by the world and do not actually study the bible for themselves.
PB
"crawls"!
Classic lol!!
PB,
you can't even spell DEMOCRATIC. How illuminating.
GW
Unfortunately, I didn't hear the discussion, but knowing William, I would expect him to raise/focus some points just for controversy and discussion.
I have read the above comments with interest.
I was surprised that Bart Campolo was even invited to SM2007, since his beliefs leave a lot to be desired, and at the least, seem out of keeping with Biblical Teaching.
On the subject of Homosexuality, it is easy to take verses out of context and make them say anything. It seems, that in todays society, unfortunately, that if anything or anyone questions 'Gay' issues, then they are wrong, and not homosexuality. A side issue here is the word Homophobia, which in keeping with other phobia's, should mean ' a fear of man'????
Scripture is clear in stating that Homosexual acts, not tenancies, are both sinful and wrong. Therefore I would see it that, we are all sinners, needing to be saved by Grace, and on acceptance of Christ, those with Homosexual tenancies should 'stay celibate'. In every case, including this one, we must remember that God does love the sinner, not the sin.
I agree ivan. It's will's job to ask those controversial questions. How weird that an evangelical like mccarthy would be angry that someone asked at the debate about the bible. Shouldn't he be mentioning the bible instead of running away from those texts?
why would evangelicals (so-called) object to a journalist asking them questions about what the bible says? these church of ireland evangelicals dont know what they believe .