Gay Marriage Splitting the Lutheran Church?

Well, I suppose if you’re bound and determined that you have no way of overcoming your bias, hate, intolerance and bigotry against the LGBT community it is.

In a post on the notoriously anti-gay CBN.com website:

The liberal Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is heading for a split over gay marriage.

The denomination voted in August to allow sexually active gay and lesbian pastors. Opponents say that’s in direct contradiction to scripture.

“We don’t feel we have a choice,” Paull Spring, a retired Pennsylvania bishop now chairman of Minnesota-based Lutheran CORE told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “The vote on sexuality opened the eyes of many to how far the ELCA has moved from biblical teaching.”

Conservative Lutherans say they will soon start drafting a constitution to form a new denomination. They hope to have it off the ground by next August.

So now there will be more us’s and them’s. But unlike our anti-gay friends over at CBN, I tend to view this as a positive instead of a negative. If you’re hell bent on hating the gays, then by all means, form your own “we hate the gays” religion. File your tax-exempt forms and use your tax exempt money in an attempt to uphold discrimination.

But for those who were strong enough (and obviously a majority in the Lutheran church) to stand up and say it’s not OK to discriminate. Thank you! As an American citizen, I applaud your strength, courage and wisdom.

Lutheran Church: Let Congregation Decide

Noting specific divisions within the Lutheran church over weather gay or lesbian clergy should be allowed to preside over congregations, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) task force has recommended a policy that will be considered at their biannual convention in August. The proposed policy would allow local congregations to decide whether or not those in “lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships” would be allowed to lead as clergy.

Gays and lesbians can now serve as clergy in the ELCA if they remain celibate, although some congregations have challenged the system and hired pastors who are in same-sex relationships.

Opposing views in the church claim that homosexuality is a sin, basing their arguments on individual interpretations of the Bible.

Finnish Pastor Breaks Rules – Blesses Lesbians

Going in direct violation of church rules, a pastor of Finland’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, which is state-supported, has blessed a lesbian couples partnership according to the Finnish Broadcasting Company.

Mikko Heikka, The bishop of Espoo, said no action will be taken against the Rev. Liisa Tuovinen. That is unless someone files a formal complaint over the matter.

Finland has had a registered-partnership law since 2002 and Lutheran bishops are expected to revisit the issue of same-sex blessings next year.