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

[Brian Stoffregen]

And, since I seem to be  one of only two people here who are not convinced the ELCA is headed over the precipice of perdition, I feel somewhat trapped. If I leave, who you gonna holler at?

I think I know.

[Charles_Austin]

O.k., Eric, here's the deal, before I head off to a bike ride and some other pleasant activities, including finishing the sermon before heading to New York for dinner at Becco, the premier restaurant of Lidia Bastianich, whom people might encounter on public television, if they ever leave off the debating here:
I am a doctrinal and confessional and scriptural "moderate," though in the minds of most here I am probably considered a flaming liberal "revisionist." (Although I am not championing any "revision," unless you count a couple of letters I have written saying lay presidency at the eucharist is non-Lutheran and offensive and that we should have endorsed the three-fold ministry of deacon, priest and bishop.)
I feel no overwhelming call to convince you of anything, nor do I feel the need to justify my faith to the rather small group of partisans gathered here. I do not have the patience of California Brian in presenting here the results of his scripture study. I do that in my parish preaching and teaching.
As I said upstream, I'm trying to provide some perspective from someone who has been around the block a few times. (Actually around a couple of blocks, a lot of times.) If my remarks and approach are inappropriate, I shall accept censure or banishment from the moderator. But you don't get to tell me how I should participate here.

[Richard Johnson]

Yes, the ELCA will have some difficulties with people who have blithely ignored our studies, conversations, ecumenical engagements, synod and churchwide assemblies, for 20 years; people whose pastors have not kept them informed about the broader mission and activity of the church; people who haven't engaged in Bible study since confirmation class, and people who have ignored the wider discussions in church and society (God is at work "out there" too) about a whole host of things. Suddenly they see something - often one thing - that surprises them and say "Where did that come from?"
I know some of those people and have hopes that, with patient prayer, study and counsel, they can catch up. Now I will duck for cover.

Charles, indeed you should duck for cover. You are painting with an awfully broad brush, and the splatters are everywhere. You insinuate that people who are concerned about the direction the ELCA is going have ignored the studies, ignored ecumenical conversations, ignored churchwide and synod assemblies; who are ignorant because their pastors have not kept them informed; have not been involved in Bible study etc. etc.

Perhaps some of those things are true in some places. They are patently false among most pastors and congregations that I know. I suggest that you apologize for a grossly unfair and hysterical generalization.

[Charles_Austin]

Our esteemed moderator writes:
You insinuate that people who are concerned about the direction the ELCA is going have ignored the studies, ignored ecumenical conversations, ignored churchwide and synod assemblies; who are ignorant because their pastors have not kept them informed; have not been involved in Bible study etc. etc.

I respond:
And I do apologize if you thought the brush was broad; for that was not my intention. I am sure that many people - some of them in this forum - have not been distant from our discussions over the past years, nor have they (I suppose) kept their congregations in the dark. But there are such people. And we do encounter them. And there may be, alas, more of them than we think. But my apologizes to people here who are not in that category.

[Richard Johnson]

And, since I seem to be  one of only two people here who are not convinced the ELCA is headed over the precipice of perdition, I feel somewhat trapped. If I leave, who you gonna holler at?

I think I know.

Didn't they tell you? There's no internet service in Yuma yet.   

[Richard Johnson]

Our esteemed moderator writes:
You insinuate that people who are concerned about the direction the ELCA is going have ignored the studies, ignored ecumenical conversations, ignored churchwide and synod assemblies; who are ignorant because their pastors have not kept them informed; have not been involved in Bible study etc. etc.
I respond:
And I do apologize if you thought the brush was broad; for that was not my intention. I am sure that many people - some of them in this forum - have not been distant from our discussions over the past years, nor have they (I suppose) kept their congregations in the dark. But there are such people. And we do encounter them. And there may be, alas, more of them than we think. But my apologizes to people here who are not in that category.

Of course there are such people. Just as there are people who haven't darkened the door of a Bible study in decades, and yet are convinced that God couldn't possibly object to two people of the same gender loving each other in whatever way feels good; people who believe whatever they read in The Lutheran must be OK because it's from our church; people who wouldn't know where to locate the Book of Hezekiah, but who are certain that all that Old Testament stuff is passe anyway, because Christianity is mostly about loving your neighbor as yourself; people who think the creeds of the church are irrelevent as anything but historical curiosities.

And we do encounter them. And there may be, alas, more of them than we think.

But I wouldn't count you or any other regular posters here among them, and I wouldn't make generalized accusations that might to understood to be so doing.

[Eric_Swensson]

We might ask why the Jesus movement did not take place among the Pharisees -- the traditional, conservative, devout Jews of Jesus' day?

Brian, we had a reform rabbi come to talk at our seminary who said that Jesus was basically, and I remember his exact words, "a hill country, Pharisaic rabbi."

Again, that was what he said, not me, and I remember it probably because I hadn't heard it before, but my point is that the Jesus movement did have leaders who were fishermen and a tax collector, a zealot and maybe a harlot but there was this guy Paul who was of the tribe of Benjamin perfect in the law (sounds like a Pharisee to me) as well as thousands of others. Who do you think those three thousand were who were in Jerusalem on Pentecost? Surely they were from all walks of life including Pharisees.

I'm not sure if it is mind-blowing or mind-numbing to hear this barely new twist on how we traditionalists are just a bunch of Pharisees and, well, it seems as though you are saying we are not out of the pure, clean stream of apostleship, but some degenerate, later legalistic form.

Have a good day.

[Brian Stoffregen]

And, since I seem to be  one of only two people here who are not convinced the ELCA is headed over the precipice of perdition, I feel somewhat trapped. If I leave, who you gonna holler at?

I think I know.

Didn't they tell you? There's no internet service in Yuma yet.   

Well, I do know that comcast.net that I'm using now isn't in Yuma.

[jrubyaz]

Yuma is not a bad place to be, by the way.

J. Ruby
Arizona resident for 30 years.

And, since I seem to be  one of only two people here who are not convinced the ELCA is headed over the precipice of perdition, I feel somewhat trapped. If I leave, who you gonna holler at?

I think I know.

Didn't they tell you? There's no internet service in Yuma yet.   

Well, I do know that comcast.net that I'm using now isn't in Yuma.

[Dave_Poedel]

And, since I seem to be  one of only two people here who are not convinced the ELCA is headed over the precipice of perdition, I feel somewhat trapped. If I leave, who you gonna holler at?

I think I know.

Didn't they tell you? There's no internet service in Yuma yet.   

Well, I do know that comcast.net that I'm using now isn't in Yuma.

So...did they tell you what they do to liberals in Yuma?  All I can say is that it's not pretty....

Dave
(Arizona resident for 35 years)

[Brian Stoffregen]

Again, that was what he said, not me, and I remember it probably because I hadn't heard it before, but my point is that the Jesus movement did have leaders who were fishermen and a tax collector, a zealot and maybe a harlot but there was this guy Paul who was of the tribe of Benjamin perfect in the law (sounds like a Pharisee to me) as well as thousands of others. Who do you think those three thousand were who were in Jerusalem on Pentecost? Surely they were from all walks of life including Pharisees.

Read, or perhaps, shout out loud, Matthew 23, then tell me again Jesus' opinion of scribes and Pharisees.

I'm not sure if it is mind-blowing or mind-numbing to hear this barely new twist on how we traditionalists are just a bunch of Pharisees and, well, it seems as though you are saying we are not out of the pure, clean stream of apostleship, but some degenerate, later legalistic form.

I just wonder about the similarities of one group of people saying that another group of people is unfit for God because they are sinners.

[Brian Stoffregen]

So...did they tell you what they do to liberals in Yuma?  All I can say is that it's not pretty....

I think my time on ALPB Forum has prepared me.

My folks have lived in Yuma for about 15 years. They were charter members of the other ELCA church.

[jrubyaz]

IS that Gloria de Cristo? I know Bill Timm , good pastor. Plus, any church named de Cristo is ok by me...

J. Ruby

So...did they tell you what they do to liberals in Yuma?  All I can say is that it's not pretty....

I think my time on ALPB Forum has prepared me.

My folks have lived in Yuma for about 15 years. They were charter members of the other ELCA church.

[Brian Stoffregen]

IS that Gloria de Cristo? I know Bill Timm , good pastor. Plus, any church named de Cristo is ok by me...

Yup. Bill and I served parishes together in the Kansas City area about 25 years ago.

[Eric_Swensson]

I just wonder about the similarities of one group of people saying that another group of people is unfit for God because they are sinners.

Why not elaborate on this thought? Try to include context, OK?