2007 CWA & Sexuality - What do you tell your congregation?

[jrubyaz]

Jeff Ruby writes:
With all due respect, when you were a parish pastor, did you debate anything and everything that arose in the Lutheran or it's predecessors? I doubt it.

I comment:
Well, I still am a parish pastor; and no, we do not debate everything in the Lutheran. What I object to are those who dismiss the magazine (or the whole ELCA) as troublesome or irrelevant for their ministry.

Jeff writes: Well, the truth hurts sometimes. As several other posts have noted, this is the elephant that does not go away. Were we to have the courage to say no, here are our reasons why, maybe we would not be held hostage to political correctness.   


Jeff Ruby writes:
Just because everyone of our 1,500 households don't get the Lutheran doesn't make me any less Lutheran, in fact, my family has been Lutheran since 1740 with seven pastors in the family tree. I don't know where you get off thinking that somehow a subscription to the Lutheran is what it takes to make one ELCA.

I comment:
Never said that. And not that it matters, but my family has been Lutheran since 1580.

Jeff writes: Not that it matters.........

Jeff Ruby writes:
The homosexuality agenda has consumed this denomination for 20 years or more, it will be it's downfall, and I don't know what Word and Sacrament ministry has to do with power lobbying political agendas and one issue extremists.

I coimment:
"Consumed"? Not at all, as was evident at our Assembly. And if you think the only reason to discuss sexuality is because we are being driven by political agendas and "one issue" extremists, then I think you need to look around the nation, our church and our world a little more.

Jeff:
Charles, what Assembly were you watching? What did we discuss for three days?> Yes, true, other things , important things, were on the agenda. Can you name for me ONE other issue that has been at the forefront of every SYnodical and CWA the past 20 years? You can't, because it is the issue.

Would you also say slick glossy photo books and press spin, as well as talking points are NOT political agendas? When the church splits (after this year, I say when, I would have said if before Chicago) maybe you will see that.


Jeff RUby

[Charles_Austin]

Jeff Ruby writes:
Would you also say slick glossy photo books and press spin, as well as talking points are NOT political agendas? When the church splits (after this year, I say when, I would have said if before Chicago) maybe you will see that.

I comment:
Well, if that's the definition of "political agenda," then I might modestly suggest that CORE does it too, though perhaps not so attractively or skillfully. And I find nothing wrong with trying to get one's point across. I do not believe the ELCA will split, though it seems likely that some dissidents will pull out.

[jrubyaz]

Charles,

Sorry, but number one:

I did not see CORE or other equivalents at every CWA the past twenty years doing this. In fact, one can argue they arose BECAUSE the revisionist agenda is so prevalent, and concentrated. I do agree the revisionists are much more organized. Probably because most of the moderate and conservative pastors are too busy in the parish to spend time on this.

You were the one who said there no extremists with agenda, so I am just pointing out there are.

Lastly, I hope your wish is true, that the ELCA does not split. I have no desire for it to happen. But you must ask yourself, if it does, are those really dissidents pulling out who have faithfully fought this issue for 20 years or so, or are they folks who are just sick of it, and finally when the church makes a position based not on scripture but improvisation, they have to leave because there is no choice to being faithful to the Word ?

Finally, out of the 40 largest ELCA churches 32 have indicated they would leave very soon after a policy was changed. If those churches do, then imagine the countless hundreds of other churches. It is not beyond the realm of thinking that within five years the denomination will be at 2million or less. It is already losing a half million every 8-10 years as it is.

Lutheranism will go back to the free congregational models. Maybe that is not all bad!

Jeff Ruby

Jeff Ruby writes:
Would you also say slick glossy photo books and press spin, as well as talking points are NOT political agendas? When the church splits (after this year, I say when, I would have said if before Chicago) maybe you will see that.

I comment:
Well, if that's the definition of "political agenda," then I might modestly suggest that CORE does it too, though perhaps not so attractively or skillfully. And I find nothing wrong with trying to get one's point across. I do not believe the ELCA will split, though it seems likely that some dissidents will pull out.

[Riegel]

Lutheranism will go back to the free congregational models. Maybe that is not all bad!

I'm pretty sure that a free congregational model would be less than salutary.  Except for the Church of Sweden in the New Sweden colony, most of early American Lutheranism could be fairly described as free congregational.  It didn't take them long to develop polities--and I don't think it was simply a Teutonic fetish for order (and goosestepping) that was behind it--Fortenbaugh's venerable dissertation on the rise of synodical polity among American Lutherans is still a worthwile read, especially as we pinder denominational disintegration.

Those megachurches which have become quasi-microdenominations of their own may not perceive a need for synods, ministeriums, or whatever one imagines as a polity, but the rest of us certainly benefit from those same things for which the Ministerium of Pennsylvania was founded 250 years ago.  There have been good reasons why nearly every immigrant body of Lutherans that have come to this country have coalesced into some type of polity--and I don't think it was provide warm fuzzies for all the EFs on the MBTI.

The thing has disturbed me as I listen to the rhetoric surrounding church (dis)unity is an apparent confusion between the Ecclesia visibilis and the Ecclesia invisibilis.  Sometimes it sounds as if we have made them, in our thinking, coterminus.  Some clarity in our ecclesiology might be helpful at this time.

[Charles_Austin]

Jeff Ruby writes (re activists at the Assembly):

I do agree the revisionists are much more organized. Probably because most of the moderate and conservative pastors are too busy in the parish to spend time on this.

I comment:

And how do you know this? Almost every person advocating change that I have spoken to over the past five years is an active parish pastor or lay person. And members of CORE and other such groups that I have known are also active parish pastors or lay persons. I do not believe your statement can be supported by facts.

[Maryland Brian]

And members of CORE and other such groups that I have known are also active parish pastors or lay persons. I do not believe your statement can be supported by facts.

LOL!  OK, let me find my slick orthodox daily devotional materials given out at the assembly.  Crap, can't find mine.  You still have yours Charles? 

MD Brian

[Charles_Austin]

Brian exclaims:
LOL!  OK, let me find my slick orthodox daily devotional materials given out at the assembly.  Crap, can't find mine.  You still have yours Charles?

I respond:
Yep. It's the daily prayer book and collection of hymns that was on the table in front of every voting member and visitor at the Assembly, used as we prayed and sang frequently during the sessions. I didn't save all the programs for the daily eucharists, but they were nicely-designed, too.

[Maryland Brian]

Yep. It's the daily prayer book and collection of hymns that was on the table in front of every voting member and visitor at the Assembly, used as we prayed and sang frequently during the sessions. I didn't save all the programs for the daily eucharists, but they were nicely-designed, too.

LMAO.  You know I meant the GoodSoil materials.  And I haven't found a similarly slick production from CORE.  Gee ... who is it that keeps driving this issue?

MD BRian

[Charles_Austin]

A little testy, today?
You asked where the orthodox worship materials were. I told you. This has nothing to do with "driving" any issue. Nothing presented by the goodsoil organization was used at the worship services of the Assembly.

[Maryland Brian]

You asked where the orthodox worship materials were. I told you. This has nothing to do with "driving" any issue. Nothing presented by the goodsoil organization was used at the worship services of the Assembly.

I assume you meant DURING the time the CWA was in session.  There was that service at which a Bishop of ELCA presided and at which voting members of the CWA assembly attended that was on the site of the Assembly.  I'm surprised by the lack of precision in your language.  Given her position in the church and given where it was held, I would interpret that GoodSoil worship was *of* the assembly, it just held no part in the legally called gathering of those who was also there for the CWA meeting and worship.

BTW, lmao is hardly the actions of someone being testy.  Thanks Charles, for me personally you're always a hoot and good for a laugh! 

And since this meeting is about what to tell our congregations, I've let my leadership know about the worship service held on site and led by an active bishop of the church. 

Anyway, back to preparing for a dive today.  Great weather out here and I feel a need to breathe nitrox at depth!

MD Brian

[Maryland Brian]

I would interpret that GoodSoil worship was *of* the assembly, it just held no part in the legally called gathering of those who was also there for the CWA meeting and worship.

Obviously should have been "the legally called gathering of those who WERE also there for the CWA meeting"  Laughing so hard I'm not paying attention to what I'm typing!

MD Brian

[jrubyaz]

No, they just had their OWN Eucharist, called the Goodsoil Eucharist. Talk about heresy.

J. Ruby

A little testy, today?
You asked where the orthodox worship materials were. I told you. This has nothing to do with "driving" any issue. Nothing presented by the goodsoil organization was used at the worship services of the Assembly.

[jrubyaz]

Well, first of all, there is no doubt that Goodsoil and LCNA have been far more organized on this than the orthodox or whatever one wants to call oneself. I think that it is easy to be focused on a single issue, and while many clergy have been involved in that, I don't I see too many pastors from larger churches promoting their agenda.

As for CORE, I am not sure, but I hope to find next month at Lindenhurst. I am planning on going. I think this was a big wake up call that those who don't want policy changes (although in effect it already has) had better get organized.



Jeff Ruby

Jeff Ruby writes (re activists at the Assembly):

I do agree the revisionists are much more organized. Probably because most of the moderate and conservative pastors are too busy in the parish to spend time on this.

I comment:

And how do you know this? Almost every person advocating change that I have spoken to over the past five years is an active parish pastor or lay person. And members of CORE and other such groups that I have known are also active parish pastors or lay persons. I do not believe your statement can be supported by facts.

[Brian Stoffregen]

As for CORE, I am not sure, but I hope to find next month at Lindenhurst. I am planning on going. I think this was a big wake up call that those who don't want policy changes (although in effect it already has) had better get organized.

It might be more accurate to say that what has been our practice for a decade or more now has the "stamp of approval" from the CWA.

[jrubyaz]

Brian,

I would agree with you in one sense, , i.e. some Bishops were already picking and choosing what they were going to do or not do. In that sense, all CWA did was give them their "stamp of approval".

However, it was a sea change in that for the first time a yes vote was given to this issue, a green light so to speak, and the lack of organization (thinking this all was coming down in 2009) and impetus by the Schmelling case threw the orthodox off guard.


J. Ruby

As for CORE, I am not sure, but I hope to find next month at Lindenhurst. I am planning on going. I think this was a big wake up call that those who don't want policy changes (although in effect it already has) had better get organized.

It might be more accurate to say that what has been our practice for a decade or more now has the "stamp of approval" from the CWA.