Condemnation for bishop who called for gay people to ‘repent’ Independent
The Bishop of Rochester has been accused of pandering to hate and homophobia after calling on homosexuals to repent. Michael Nazir-Ali provoked outrage among gay groups when he urged Church leaders to stick to traditional values instead of being swayed by “culture and trends”.
While calling for the “traditional teaching” of the Bible to be upheld, the Bishop said of homosexuals: “We want them to repent and be changed.”
His controversial remarks were published just hours after more than half a million people, including the Prime Minister’s wife, Sarah, took part in the Gay Pride parade in London.
Sharon Ferguson, of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, condemned Dr Nazir-Ali for making comments that she said would encourage hatred.
“It feeds to the more fundamental individuals who are looking to have their opinions ratified and speak hatefully and behave hatefully,” she said.
“His comments are likely to cause more of a schism within the Church of England. He’s saying their [gays and lesbians] sexuality is a sin. It’s not. It’s a gift from God. God made us all.”
She added: “He is telling people ‘You have to repent’ for something they have no control over. It’s like asking someone to repent because they have blue eyes.”
Peter Tatchell, the gay rights campaigner, said he was “shocked” at the level of anti-gay prejudice voiced by the bishop. “Homophobia is a social and moral evil, just like racism. Bigotry, even in the guise of religion, has no place in a compassionate, caring society,” he said. “I call on the bishop to repent his homophobia. His prejudice goes against Christ’s gospel of love and compassion.”
Labour MEP Michael Cashman accused the Bishop of Rochester of being “selective” about which parts of the Bible he upheld. “When he calls for the closure of all the banks, finance houses and credit card companies because of what it says in the Bible about usury, then I’ll take him seriously,” he said. “Until then, unless he can say anything good, he should shut up.”
In his comments, made to a Sunday newspaper, the bishop said homosexuals should be welcomed into the Church but that a person’s sexual nature could only be correctly expressed in a heterosexual union within marriage. His remarks reopened the row over homosexuality that has for years threatened to tear the Anglican Church apart.
He made them on the eve of today’s official launch of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans at Westminster Central Hall in London where he is expected to speak in support of the organisation. The UK branch of the Fellowship is regarded by many liberals within the Anglican movement as an attempt to create a church within a church with the aim of heading off moves to ease rules on homosexuality. Dr Nazir-Ali is to step down in the autumn and he is expected to play an important part in the Fellowship’s activities.
The Very Rev Colin Slee, the Dean of Southwark and a prominent liberal, was so alarmed by the the impending departure of Dr Nazir-Ali from the See of Rochester that he described it as “clearly a move towards a sectarian alternative church intentionally designed to create turbulence in the Anglican Communion”.
Canon Chris Sugden, of the Fellowship, said a message from the Queen will be read out during the ceremony but a Buckingham Palace spokeswoman called it nothing more than a “standard response” to the many requests made to the monarch each year. “It isn’t endorsing anyone’s point of view,” she said.
Zeal of the convert: The Bishop of Rochester
*Michael Nazir-Ali has been one of the most vocal and controversial of bishops of the past decade and has rarely been afraid to speak out.
He was a leading contender to become Archbishop of Canterbury when George Carey stood down but has found himself at odds with Rowan Williams, the incumbent.
The issue of homosexuality has been one of the biggest causes of friction between Dr Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester, and the liberal wing of the Anglican Church.
In 2008 the rift was so marked that he boycotted the Lambeth Conference, a meeting of Anglican Church leaders held once a decade, because of the row over homosexuality. He is part of an evangelical wing urging the Church to stick to a traditional interpretation of the scriptures regarded by liberals, especially on the issues of homosexuality and women priests, as backward.
This year he announced he would step down as Bishop of Rochester in September to allow him time to concentrate on representing the Church in parts of the world where Anglicans are a minority religion or oppressed.
Born in Pakistan to Catholic parents, he converted at the age of 20 and holds dual British and Pakistani nationality. Appointed the 106th Bishop of Rochester in 1994, he was the first non-white diocesan bishop in the Church of England. Since then he has been a frequent critic of the rise of Islam in Britain.
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Voices of Witness Africa New documentary tells stories of gay Anglicans
Voices of Witness Africa is a new 30-minute documentary intended to help Episcopalians listen to the views and experiences of Anglicans who are gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) and to emphasize that homosexuality is “not just a North American or European issue,” says the Rev. Cynthia Black.
Co-produced by Black, rector of Christ the King Church in Kalamazoo/Texas Corners, Michigan, and Katie Sherrod, a writer and commentator based in Fort Worth, Texas, the documentary features GLBT Africans who talk about their lives and their relationships with God and the church.
“The voices of LGBT folks from around the world need to be heard,” says Black.
Among those interviewed for the documentary is the Rt. Rev. Christopher Senyonjo, retired bishop of the Diocese of West Buganda in the Anglican Church of Uganda, who leads a study and prayer group for gay Anglicans. “I’m sorry about what the church is saying. God loves you, God loves you,” Senyonjo says in support of GLBT Christians. While he acknowledges that speaking out has been “very risky,” Senyonjo adds, “When you know the truth, it should make you free.”
Although homosexuality is illegal in most African countries, “several people in the film cite cause for hope,” said a news release from the Chicago Consultation, a sponsoring organization of the documentary.
“Many, many years ago, when the townships were in smoke and people were dying, we never thought that we would be where we are now,” Yvonne Daki, manager of iThemba Lam Center of Inclusive and Affirming Ministries in South Africa, says in the documentary. “We will have one day a situation where gay people can speak openly about their sexuality.”
For Black, one of the surprises when working on the documentary was “how willing participants were to have their name and image used publicly, even when they knew their bishop would be receiving a copy of the film, and even when there could potentially be horrific consequences for doing so … Their courage is incredible.”
Sherrod was most impressed how the interviewees’ faith “informs their actions every minute of every day. All of them spoke of God as a intimate part of their lives, a presence who gives them hope and strength in the face of terrible oppression and active persecution, not only by the state, but in most cases by the Anglican church leaders in their country. To witness the depth of their faith was inspiring and humbling.”
“Viewers who have followed the plight of GLBT people in Africa will hear familiar and tragic stories of fear, imprisonment and abuse,” the Chicago Consultation news release said. “However, they may also be surprised by the support and hope voiced by some of the film’s subjects, including African Anglican bishops and priests.”
Black said that much inspiration can be found in the stories of hope that were heard — “hope that one day the church will have moved beyond the issues of sexuality that divide it.”
All the instruments of communion have supported a process of listening to the experiences of homosexual people throughout the Anglican Communion. At the 1998 Lambeth Conference, resolution 1.10 committed all the provinces of the Anglican Communion to a listening process. It was not until 2005 that the Listening Process was officially launched with the appointment of a facilitator who would monitor the work being done, share the results and enable further listening.
The Anglican Consultative Council, the communion’s most representative policy-making body, met in Jamaica in May 2009 and supported the renewal of the Listening Process, which has received a 2.5-year grant from the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at the Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia to run five “pilot conversations” around the communion.
The “Voices of Witness Africa” documentary is being released just before the Episcopal Church’s General Convention, which will be held July 8-17 in Anaheim, California. “At the meeting, deputies and bishops will discuss both the church’s mission in the developing world and the inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people,” the Chicago Consultation news release said. “The film is being mailed in advance to all deputies and bishops. It is also being mailed to all bishops of the Anglican Communion, including those who lead churches that are hostile to GLBT Christians.”
“With General Convention approaching, some people focus on what effect its actions might have on the part of the Anglican Communion that is more conservative than the Episcopal Church,” said Black. “I think the film helps us to remember that there are hundreds of thousands of LGBT folks in the communion who are watching what the Episcopal Church does.”
Further information on the film, including a study guide for use in Episcopal parishes, is available here.
Future public screenings of Voices of Witness Africa will be held on:
June 5: All Saints Church, Pasadena, California
June 6: Christ Episcopal Church, Dearborn
June 7: Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge
June 8: All Saints’ Episcopal Church, Chicago
June 10: Church of the Ascension, Silver Spring, Maryland
June 12: Christ Church Cathedral, St. Louis, Missouri
June 14: St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church, Houston, Texas
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‘Day without a gay’ protest fizzles
Activists had billed Wednesday as “a day without a gay,” when gays and lesbians across the country would call in sick, boycott shopping and show the impact of their absence from everyday life.
Designed to be a protest against the Nov. 4 passage of Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage, the day’s events drew only scattered support in the Bay Area, the heart of the gay rights movement, and also criticism.
Several gay and lesbian people said they couldn’t afford to take the day off, particularly in a tightening economy where many are concerned about their jobs. And in the Castro district, business owners were livid that people were encouraged to not shop during the holidays, a peak time for retailers.
“Our rights have been taken away as much as anyone else’s,” said Rich Boutell, who runs Whatever comics on Castro Street and whose marriage was thrown into limbo with the Nov. 4 election. He and his husband, Cougar Andrews, kept their store open and wished the “day without a gay” organizers had encouraged gay-allied individuals to patronize gay-owned businesses. “The whole purpose should be to support your own, not to boycott. If you’re going to have a protest, it should be a positive thing. The gay dollar is powerful.”
Those who did take off work said they did it with the cooperation of employers.
They included Glenn Coffee, 48, a Noe Valley resident who works at Macy’s and said the store has always been supportive of gay employees and the gay community. The main purpose, he said, of calling in sick was to show that “as a community, we can show we have worth.”
The day’s events prompted a mixed response, which might indicate that the gay rights movement is still finding its voice. Gay and lesbian people are included in ways never imagined decades ago, such as domestic partnership rights in states across the nation and being included by a presidential candidate in his election-night victory speech.
But there are also dramatic challenges. Thirty states, including California, explicitly ban same-sex marriage, and Arkansas voters recently passed a ballot measure to ban unmarried couples from adopting children, an initiative directly aimed at thwarting gay and lesbian parenthood.
Religious groups, students, business owners and shoppers all had different views of a day focused on gay rights.
A group of Bay Area Catholics gathered in the Castro district on Wednesday evening for a prayer vigil to atone for the actions of church leaders. Because Wednesday was also International Human Rights Day, they focused their efforts on the rights of gays and lesbians.
‘Day without a gay‘ protest fizzles
San Francisco Chronicle, USA
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Episcopal Diocese of LA officially condones the blessing of gay unions
The bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles has announced that church leaders can bless the unions of same-sex couples as a matter of policy.
The Rt. Rev. J. Jon Bruno, whose diocese encompasses Los Angeles County and five other Southern California counties, made the announcement Friday during a diocesan convention in Riverside.
Bruno acted just days after hundreds of conservative Episcopal congregations in North America formed a breakaway church amid a rift that began with the ordination of a gay bishop in New Hampshire five years ago.
Bruno’s declaration is not expected to have a major effect on Episcopal churches in Southern California. Many have been blessing gay unions for years. But he has now made it official.
“The practice has not changed. The policy has. . . . It’s sort of like ‘coming out,’ ” said the Rev. Susan Russell, a lesbian priest at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. Russell also is president of Integrity USA, a group representing the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community in the Episcopal Church.
The rite endorsed by Bruno also allows the blessing of other relationships, such as those between two senior citizens who do not wish to legally marry because they might lose health insurance or Social Security benefits.
Church officials also noted that, unlike communion, the rite is not mandatory. Clergy may choose not to perform it.
Diocese representatives also passed a resolution at their convention calling on the Episcopal Church to let gays and lesbians become bishops.
See Episcopal Diocese of LA officially condones the blessing of gay unions
Los Angeles Times
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