crossandflame's blog

Last Fall, the United Methodist Church, in its highest court called the Judicial Council, issued a judgment that a pastor has the sole authority to keep a gay man from obtaining membership in the UMC. While those of you in congregational systems may ask why this is a problem, the UMC is a connectional system whereby pastors are accountable to other pastors and bishops and such. Hence, this ruling violates the systems of accountability in the name of homophobia.  read more »

Healing services walk a fine line between healing and abusing people. Case in point: An American preacher is distributing pamphlets in Lesotho that call people to a healing service...which includes healing from AIDS.

LINK: Ernest Angley and the road to Hell in Lesotho

here's the handbill:
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The American Bible Society has cancelled an order of New Testaments to be handed out at adult entertainment conventions. The reason? The covers of the Bibles, made by XXXChurch, said in bold letters "Jesus Loves Porn Stars" and the Society deemed them "misleading and inappropriate for a New Testament."

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I've been hit with a new word!

Was watching the Colbert Report, and saw Tony Campolo on there. He mentioned that he refers to himself as a..."Red-Letter Christian."

Two minutes letter...BAM, a link sent to me to an article by Jim Wallis about..."Red Letter Christians."  read more »

Frank Miller, the artist/writer of Batman fame, is writing a new batman graphic novel...this time, the enemy is not the Joker or Riddler....but rather al Qaeda!

LINK: Holy Terrorism Batman!

However, Miller expounds on his reason for choosing al Qaeda.  read more »

Brokeback Mountain...seen it? It's about two gay cowboys who go through a few decades wrestling with their lives, and their families are wrecked as a result of their taboo love.

Well, here's where life imitates art. In my state of Oklahoma, a gay man whose partner died has now lost their ranch, estate, and everything because of the lack of spousal rights.  read more »

Planned Parenthood of Connecticut has a new line of keychains that subvert typical images of culture with funny incorporations of condoms to promore safe sex. One of them is the image of the Sistine Chapel.

Here's the image while it lasts:

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It's all over the news and United Methodist circles: the reversal of the removal of a Virginia Pastor who denied membership to a homosexual man in his congregation.

To me, the pastor's exclusion of the gay man was a direction violation of the Christian tenet of hospitality. Hospitality, as defined by Christine Pohl in her book Making Room, involves:

Hospitality provides a context for recognizing the worth of persons who seem to have little when assessed by worldly standards. (page 62)

Hospitality thus has a counter-cultural edge to it as it embodies values and models that are not shared by the greater society. Additionally, Pohl relates the following quote about the relationship between the civil and religious spheres:

Expulsion from the civic sphere, in which the basic rights of citizens are protected, is the most dangerous form of expulsion, but the danger is intensified when particular religious, ethnic, and cultural identities are singled out for exclusion. (page 81)  read more »

We've all heard of the 'Priesthood of all Believers' as the recognition of the equal-accessibility of God to all God's followers. No longer was a priest needed to mediate between the people and God; the God of all is accessible to all.

What we tend to forget is that the role of the minister has two dimensions: the priestly, and the prophetic. While we have taken back the priesthood of all believers, we expect only our ministers to be the prophetic voice, to speak out against those parts of Creation that conspire against God's Kingdom. We assume that only the educated, the qualified, can possibly live up to the role of the prophet. In short, the 'prophethood of all believers' has been recognized, but not claimed, and marginalized only to those with ecclesial status.

So, come with me, and discuss what it means to be a part of a prophetic people's movement without a minister, without a leader, and to reclaim the 'prophethood of all believers' as the necessary counterpart, nay, the demand of God now that we all have access to God's grace.

Priesthood v. Prophethood

I heard last night someone use JL Adam's coined phrase "the prophethood of all believers" last night. It was in the context of reclaiming a faith that necessitated justice and right action. Very powerful stuff.

Practically speaking, the 'priesthood of all believers' doesn't mean that there are not distinctions between laity and clergy; rather, it means that there is no spiritual hierarchy that one must climb to get one's prayers and graces from God.

In the same way, the 'prophethood of all believers' does not mean there are not different roles for the laity and clergy to fill; but that to be a prophet is not a demand that necessitates theological education or spiritual status. Just as we ALL are priests, we ALL are called to be prophets.

When we demand equal access to God's grace, and rightly so, we diminish that grace by not accepting the equal demands God places on each heart: to speak, to act, to embody, and to bring forth the Kingdom of God.

How can this come about?

Learn from the Reformation. Martin Luther took a prophetic act: nailing the 95 Theses to the chamber door, to claim the 'priesthood of all believers'. To claim one side of the coin, the priesthood, took a prophetic act.

Perhaps today all it takes is a priestly act: to encourage our congregations to nail the laundry lists of what is wrong with society and what is incongruous with God's Kingdom to every door, sign, gate, and bridge. To claim the other side of the coin, the prophethood, all it takes is a priestly act of letting your parishoners know they have permission to act.

What would it look like?

Gosh, I have no idea!! But I know what a prophethood would do: Break down barriers, destroy idols, call to accountability the authorities in our midst! We cannot just call on the pastors and policy-makers to be the prophets; we must be them ourselves. Prophets are made when the world hears our message, and sees it as subversive and counter-cultural. By blogging, by acting, by speaking, by placing your body in harm's way...that is the demand of God's kingdom on the prophets.

Get involved today. Get out there! If we are to live into our priestly ideals of holiness, we must reclaim the prophetic ideals of justice, and never let one or the other fall to the wayside as we embody the Kingdom of God.

Your Turn

What keeps you from acting or speaking up? Do you not feel qualified? Do you think only the pastor's voice has the 'weight' to carry it through?

How can your community better envision the prophetic voice?

I just attended the Human Rights Campaign's annual event on LGBT and society issues. This years' was "Young and Gay in America" talking about the promise and the pain of being young and gay in America.

The four participants could not have been more appropriate. Judy Shepard (Mother of Matthew Shepard), Maya Keyes (Daughter of wacko Alan Keyes[dKos]), Mike Glatze (Editor, Young Gay America), and Chris Medeiros (Episcopal Divinity School professor). All four have extensive personal and professional experience with youth violence, oppression, and shared family pain of LGBT youth.

I was struck by how much religious language was used by the participants in the forum, and how pervasive the religious influence is in both perpetuating and preventing youth hate crimes in today's society.

The discussion began with a question of How to make Progressive churches respond more prominently and aggresively to LGBT issues. Medeiros said that American Christianity (which is his background) has been whitewashed as all anti-gay, as prominence and visibility are hard to attract from this current media that is focused on the Pope and Falwell. In reality, it has three tiers:

• The Religious Right wing (falwell, RCC, SBC)
• The Christian Left liberal churches (UUA, UCC, MCC])
• The huge middle gap of mainline protestant churches (PCUSA, UMC, Episcopal, etc...)

Thus, the primary force of progressive churches should be to expand the infrastructure, and to live into what it really means to be "welcoming." Take loud and proud stances and dont back down. Do more than wave a rainbow flag, and create institutions and infrastructure to deal with all the realities of what it means to be gay, from homelessness to poor to substance abuse and on up. It has to start with the people crying out "I am LGBT and I refuse to choose!!" Maya Keyes agreed, and stated that people aren't gonna know about openness until they target lgbt youth and let them know you are there. Thus, take the challenge of redefining the common concept of Christianity and flip that image, and Christianity can become a force for fighting oppression, not causing it.

The primary points I got from this conversation was that LGBT youth need the following things to truly find safe space, and all of these can be provided or influenced by the Church.

• Build an allies network. Reach out in little or big ways to find your friends in the community, and when the time comes, out yourself and your allies. The more people that can stand together, the more wind it takes to blow them down. Move forward from isolated individualism to community unity.
• Become Role Models. If LGBT culture is just the village people, or the white rich males, then it will lose. Be a role model or find a role model in your community to raise up.
• Break the Isolation. This is not 1993, you have the internet to find out information, and you have much more contacts than any other generation. Use it to break out of your shell.
• Help each other on the ground level. Focus on beds and help for homeless LGBT youth. Share information with other groups. We are all in this together, so coalesce and fight for humanity, not just gay culture.
• Small is Ideal: Small towns are great grassroots places for you to be heard. If you are safe enough and have enough support, out yourself and force a small community to deal with you. Exposure forces confrontation.

All in all, progressive churches need to step up the aggresiveness and the prominence of their witness, which will empower gay youth to break their culture-forced isolation and connect with others. Be loud and proud for homosexuality BECAUSE of your faith, not in spite of it!

What has worked in your community to reach out to gay youth? Discuss.