Oh, Please, don't forget our RIC pushing, nothing has really changed, b Brauer-Rieke of Oregon. Some of his sappy comments in a letter to the congregations:
B-R's words in quotes, some individual quotes within my own personal comments, are also set off with quotation marks.
"First of all my assurance that these decisions are not designed to coerce or require anything new or different from you or your congregation"......(REALLY !!).....
"Congregations have always had, and will continue to have, the authority to call or not call pastors as they feel led." (That is really nice, instead of the cwa saying GLBT pastors are equal to "hetero" pastors, all congregations will have to fight it out at the local level-gay or not gay...who decides, congregation, church council? If it is such a great step forward, why allow some to opt out (or possibly only for a little while since b BR thinks it may be unworkable).
"Secondly, while the ELCA has now embarked upon a new journey we will take it step by step. There is much work to be done before any specific new policies or practices are adopted." (Do you mean that the cart has been purchased and now we must find a suitable horse, barn, feed, driver and put in the fencing....oh, dear, maybe we should have thought of the fencing before the cart decision?) "Undoubtedly there will be some interim agreements while everything is sorted out, but the Oregon synod will not race ahead of the process." (No, the cwa already took care of the racing ahead.) "We will continue to work, pray and discern our way forward with the church as a whole." (Or, I say, whatever fragments are left of congregations.)
"Nobody knows exactly what "safety nets" might be put in place for those who are uncomfortable with these decisions, or what new requirements or privileges might be given to bishops or synods. It is our commitment as a church, through, to work with questions of this nature." (Well, so far, my Nephew, on the Church Council, who brought up the actions of the cwa, thinking that the congregation should be informed, has been ridiculed, scolded by the Pastor, and of course, told that it would not make any difference in our church, as we would not have to have "one" if we did not want to. Then the sermon three days later concerned lack of love and mentioned the council meeting, also, don't let sin win.....so much for speaking out concering the changing of scripture and historic Lutheran tradition. So much for bound conscience and respecting diversity of opinion. Several other instances with our call committee, traditional members called "looney" and other vitrolic comments emailed to them...they are VERY polite ladies who were targeted and were certainly taken aback and very saddened by this attack .It was from a call committee member who, it turned out, has a son in a "committed relationship" and had an undisclosed interest in a "gay friendly Pastor". Which they all had been, by the way, they were just continuing the search. I would say that this is a foretaste of the persecution to come. Inclusive seems to be a one way street, tolerance may be a closed street. Lots of other junk going on, none from the traditional side. There seems to be a lot of boldness on the part of those who are going to "straighten out" any dissenting voices. The motto must be "Agree, or we will drive you out". It's working!
Oh, yes, I was mailed from the church office, a four page "ad type" publication from the synod office extolling the virtues of the cwa and how WONDERFUL the event was, from ten of the voting members from Oregon. I and my grieving "bound conscience" certainly felt better after reading that..lots of unity and love and let's be in conversation etc. We would like to say, been there, done that over and over again. Why do they want to talk to us now and have a lot of unity? No one seemed to care before !! I think it was sent to me, as I had talked to our interim pastor about some of my reservations. Got the same old crock, "It won't affect us.....etc.".
