You could ask your friends to submit their churches to the database.
They already have some Evangelical Lutheran churches, most of which look positive to me (admittedly I am a former Christian).
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Someone fetch me the smelling salts and a fainting couch for the surprise of this news has thrown me into a swoon.
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Speaking as a gay man who grew up in the Deep South: well, duh. It is the inherent racism and elitism that Christianity espouses both implicitly in their worldview, endless depictions of their white Jesus and white creator deity, and their explicit racism and white supremacist beliefs that now fully overshadow any notion this religion is based on “love”.
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Conclusive proof that humans did not share the Earth with dinosaurs. We’d all have been eaten after trying to domesticate them young.
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Do Lutherans even qualify as “evangelical”? There are a few Lutherans here in Austria, and many more in Germany, and they have made sure that the English word “evangelical” gets translated to “evangelikal” instead of “evangelisch” (which is basically used as a synonym for “Lutheran” around here).
At least around here, they don’t ever mention concepts like being “born again”.
Well, all-male, of course. Officially homophobic, but only the second worst kind (“gay marriage is a danger to society, but hate the sin and love the sinner”).
Officially led by the pope, and different in every country.
I suspect that they’re much stricter in America. I noticed that a Catholic Students’ Association in Canada was sending out reminders at the beginning of Lent, detailing the official Catholic rules for fasting with a seriousness and attention to detail that only priests born before 1900 would ever aspire to in Austria.
I guess that’s a consequence of the higher religious diversity in America and Canada: If you believe in God but don’t agree with what your priest is saying, go to some other denomination, there’s another Church right across the street.
In Austria, everyone used to be born into Catholicism, so the alternatives just didn’t come up. So nowadays, if your priest or even the pope is wrong, you don’t have to agree, but the pope is still the successor to St. Peter himself, so no reason to go elsewhere.
Racial diversity among priests? No idea about America. In Austria, surprisingly high by Austrian standards. There aren’t enough young Austrians interested in becoming Catholic priests to keep up services for the ageing population of churchgoers. So Catholic priests are on the list of highly-qualified sought after immigrants.
So, when a young gay man, openly living in a relationship in a small Austrian village, decided to become a parish councillor, he was voted in with a solid number of votes. The priest, a recent immigrant from Poland, protested. The arch-bishop intervened and, after meeting with the gay parish councillor, said that he was impressed by the young man’s “honesty and sincere belief” and that he would make an excellent parish councillor. After all, no one is without sin, he said. The priest, however, resigned in protest and went back to his native country. Good riddance.
Note: Please don’t interpret the above anecdote as a comment on racial diversity in the US. It is intended to be an interesting anecdote that shows how different places are different.
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It isn’t saying the Evangelical left doesn’t exist. I read this as a survey of the 100 largest evangelical churches in America, not saying anything about the other smaller churches. Am I wrong to read it this way?
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From Rob’s article post here:
“evangelical churches are universally hostile to LBGTQ people”
From the cited article:
“None of America’s 100 largest churches are LGBTQ-affirming…America’s mega-churches have apparently not received the memo. None of them have policies affirming same-sex people and relationships.”
Here’s another memo. “Hostile” is not the equivalent of “not affirming”. Although there are probably lots of members of these churches who are in fact hostile to LGBTQ people, to assume that anyone who is not openly affirming is “hostile” is BS.
The difference between “tolerance” which is a reasonable expectation in a free society, and “affirmation” which is not, seems to be increasingly hard to comprehend.
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Those fundies who would shove teh gays into the ovens differ only in bloodlust from those who would stand by and let them. Evangelicals wouldn’t raise a pinky to save LBGTQ people.
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How many evangelical Christians are in your circle of personal acquaintances? Just curious.
I actively avoid them. If there any, they know not to broach their religion with me.
Evangelicals already worship an imaginary being they believe will condemn anyone who doesn’t share their beliefs to eternal torture by fire. When people tell me who they are, I believe them the first time.
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Kurt Anderson’s latest book – Fantasyland – is a pretty good narrative on how the god-crazies took root in this northern area of the New World, tracing American reality denial over the past 500 years.
It’s an enjoyable read, but ultimately unsatisfying (wait until it comes out in paper, or get it from library) – no sourcing, no bib, damn few notes. Still worth a read, but could have been so much better.
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Affirmation is a requirement to be considered tolerant. If you aren’t accepting of people who live differently than you, you’re just arguing on the scale of how much you hate them; you aren’t actually tolerant at all.
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The church body I belong to is called the _Evangelical_Lutheran Church in America. The head of the organization is a woman, as is the pastor of our local congregation. We don’t do too well on attracting blacks and Hispanics, though. “Evangelical” refers to “bearing good news” which the so-called Evangelicals seemingly fail to do. Jesus told a parable about a wheat field that an enemy had spread weed seeds among the wheat. When the farmer’s workers saw the weeds sprouting they wanted to go in and pull them all out. The farmer said “No, let them grow together until the harvest. I’ll sort things out then.” So basically, what we’re taught is that it’s up to God to decide who is in and who is out, not fallible humans.
No.
I can get along peaceably with my neighbors, even though they may do things which I consider (and have said) to be wrong. That’s tolerance sans affirmation in a nutshell.
Hey, I couldn’t have posted on BB for over three years if I had not internalized that principle.
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Agree. I was raised in a Presbyterian church and I don’t reckon half the people in the congregation could tell you what set of beliefs they are supposed to align with as a result.
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Except you then vote for things which actively harm your neighbors, so you aren’t actually tolerant.
This “hate the sin, love the sinner” bullshit doesn’t fly anywhere outside of self-congratulatory intra-group discussions.
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“Hate the sin, love the sinner” is a necessary precondition for any civilized discourse, because not everyone agrees what a sin is.
I’m meeting them half-way. I consider their stance on homosexuality a sin, and I hate that. But I refuse to hate the sinners. As long as they, too, are willing to adhere to that minimum standard of tolerance. Not acceptance. Just tolerance.
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