(PDF version available here.)
EC is looking forward to another Covid-conscious ConnECtion this summer with our guest keynoters, Cindy Stevens-Pino and Jim Lucas. It’ll be safely available on our website, www.ECinc.org in June.
In 1977, two years after we founded Evangelicals Concerned, a former beauty queen, pop singer and Florida orange juice spokesperson, Anita Bryant, launched her notoriously antigay crusade, “Save Our Children”. She was reacting to a recent Gay Rights law in Florida by pushing back with her propaganda that, homosexuals don’t reproduce, so, they’ll be coming to “recruit” your children into a life of Sodomy. Her own antigay efforts gained more clout after other Fundamentalists got behind her “crusade”, including Jerry Falwell, with his own extensive efforts to oppose rights for same-sex attracted folks through his self-righteously self-identified, “Moral Majority” movement.
Now, nearly half-a-century later, Anita Bryant’s own granddaughter has “come out” as lesbian and is planning her lesbian wedding. When she told her grandmother of this, it’s said that Anita was shocked speechless into abrupt alarm and total confusion.
Of course, many other conservative Christians also have same-sex-attracted folks in their families. And many such relatives have come up to speed to wisely understand their loved ones and accept them as gay or lesbian and as beloved family members.
Even prominent Evangelical families have same-sex oriented relatives. They include, in no particular order: Tim Keller, V. Raymond Edman, Ed Dobson, Charles C. Ryrie, Chuck Swindoll, Phyllis Schlafly, Oral Roberts, Richard Roberts, James V. Brownson, Samuel T. Logan, Jr., Tim and Beverly LaHaye, Charlie and Martha Shedd, Andrew Klavan, Lyle Schaller, James Merritt, Ginny and Walter R. Hearn, Lloyd John Ogilvie, John Ortberg, Philip Yancey, George Verwer, Mel White, Ford Porter, Barbara Johnson, Sherwood Lingenfelter, Carl McIntire, C. T. McIntire, Chip and Nancy Miller, Dick and Lynn Cheney, Linda and Rob Robertson, Velma and D. D. Davis, Jonalyn and Dale Fincher, Roger and Debra Talley, Sandra Crouch, Dick Eastman, Abby and Danny Cortez, Caleb Kaltenbach, David Gushee, Jen Hatmaker, William Edgar, Chester Wenger, Debby Causey, Luke Timothy Johnson, Brian D. McLaren, et al.
Justin Lee, founder of Nuance Ministries, will be a guest speaker at Andy Stanley’s North Point Community Church’s “Unconditional Conference”, September 28-29, 2023 in Alpharetta, Georgia. The event’s goal is to help parents of LGBT sons and daughters “demonstrate the unconditional love of Jesus”. Other scheduled speakers include Greg and Lynn McDonald, John Ortberg, Debbie Causey, and Stanley himself.
Lee’s keynoted for EC and EC’s founder is on Lee’s Nuance board.
Philip Yancey, popular bestselling evangelical author, keynoted for Lee’s ministry and is a friend of EC. When a scheduling conflict did not allow for his speaking at Princeton Seminary, he suggested that they invite EC’s founder and they did. Later, when Yancey and Blair were both at an evangelical ministry’s annual fundraiser, and we wanted to chat together without our being constantly interrupted by other folks at the fundraiser, we decided to meet in the hotel’s bar. And there, in the bar, we talked without any interruptions.
Yancey grew up in the racist South and has spoken all over the world. Recently interviewed by CNN, he was asked about the racism that surrounded him while he grew up. Yanceyis correct when he says that the core of racism is about having someone to “look down on”. One can detect this in all “put downs”, from dumbest to deadliest. Psychologically, it’s a most common irrational defense mechanism.
Distracted by one’s own attempt at denial over one’s own sense of true depravity, we get irrationally fixated on others’ not measuring up. So, instead of our dealing realistically with what all is truly one’s own sin, we desperately try to “put down” the others who, we imagine, are better or better off, than we are. It never works!
Yancey illustrates by telling the CNN reporter: “I’ve been to 87 countries now. And I found that kind of instinct all over. When I first went to Norway, they started telling jokes about Swedes. They were the same jokes that we Whites told about Blacks growing up. I went to New Zealand and they’re telling the same jokes about the (indigenous) Maori people. Or then you go to Africa, like in Rwanda, where they have exactly the same color of skin. And one group starts killing the other group because they’re a little bit different. And there’s something about that fear of the other that we’ve got to overcome.”
Says Yancey: “As a Christian, this fear just stands out to me. Jesus talked about the Good Samaritan, not the Good Jew. The very first missionary in the book of Acts was a castrated Black man, the Ethiopian eunuch. The Apostle Paul was raised to be a Jew of all Jews, but he eventually said that, in Christ, there is no Jew or Gentile, there’s something bigger than race.”
CNN’s reporter then asks: “Do you ever wonder if what you call the ‘thoughtful mainstream evangelical’ subculture has evaporated in the last couple of years?”
Yancey replies: “I would say, no, it hasn’t. The group I came out of would be, Wheaton College, Christianity Today magazine, InterVarsity, and Fuller Theological Seminary. I’ve spoken at a lot of Christian colleges and universities and there’s some really bright scholars in those places producing wonderful work. I love being in a room with those people, and I wish that’s what people thought of when they thought of evangelicals. I don’t think they have disappeared, but what’s happened is the spotlight has turned away from those people, and it (the term, ‘evangelicals’) has become a political filter. People only want to judge evangelicals by politics. Growing up, we weren’t political. Fundamentalists would never aspire to political office. And now the word ‘evangelical’ almost implies right-wing politics to most people. And that’s really dangerous.”
It’s truly tragic that, on average, on any given day in America, over 3,500 living and growing babies are deliberately killed in their mothers’ wombs. These deaths of the most innocent of all human beings are anything but their very own “choice”, to reference that favorite of self-defensive alibies in the so-called “Pro-Choice” Movement.
Who among all of us who weren’t aborted, would rather have been aborted than to have been born? Even with years of experience in the typically mixed-bags of daily life, only 132 Americans on any given day chooses suicide Ponder it: only 132 self-chosen suicides per day, compared to 3,500 innocent infants slaughtered per day.
Basil, in the 1st-century, reasoned plainly: “The hairsplitting difference between formed and unformed makes no difference to us. Whoever deliberately commits abortion is subject to the penalty for homicide.” John Calvin, in the 16th-century, observed that: “The fetus, though enclosed in the womb of its mother, is already a human being and it is a monstrous crime to rob it of the life which it has not yet begun to enjoy. If it seems more horrible to kill a man in his own house than in a field, because a man’s house is his place of most secure refuge, it ought surely to be deemed more atrocious to destroy a fetus in the womb before it has come to light.” And neither Basil nor Calvin ever saw a yet unborn baby wriggling around inside a womb on ultrasound. What excuse do we have today?
In this 50th year of the annual March for Life, more hopeful signs appeared with so many young people countering the “woke” propaganda they’re fed and fed-up with, in all of their “progressive” schools. And, among them, were marchers for the sake of an LGBTQ generation yet to come out of their mothers’ wombs and yet to “come out” in a world of less homophobia than ever before. They spoke up for those whose choice in the matter of their own lives doesn’t matter to “pro-choice” lobbies. But Jesus’ Golden Rule rescues the unborn from stubbornly self-indulgent and self-destructive ignorance.
Nasty Pro-Choice protestors have been surrounding Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s private residence as they bang on their drums and shout their hate speech, screaming vitriol and claiming that she’s “illegitimate and unfit”. Such harassing at Justices’ private homes is, of course, illegal. But, of course, a pro-abortion Administration turns its back on this in the interest of its own agenda. “Nothing to see or hear, here!”, they pretend, but they’re not blind nor deaf. They’d not tolerate these screechers on their front lawns.
“Black Harvard Democrat charged with anti-gay hate crime – peers blame pro-life group”,as The College Fix reports. “Naod Nega approached another student outside Langdell Hall on the afternoon of Jan. 23 and repeatedly punched the student, calling him a homophobic slur”, according to The Harvard Crimson, based on police reports. The bat wielding “Nega has been charged with assault and battery for the purpose of intimidation — a hate crime under Massachusetts state law.”
A federal judge in Oregon has dismissed a lawsuit brought by 44 former and current students in religious schools challenging religiously-rooted exemptions regarding LGBT rights under Title IX. The judge concluded: “Plaintiffs do not plausibly demonstrate that the religious exemption was motivated by any impermissible purpose, let alone that Congress was ‘wholly’ motivated by such an impermissible purpose.”
This decision is taken to be a win for Christian colleges defending their exemptions in areas in which their religious views on homosexuality conflict with anti-discrimination laws. The president of the Council on Christian Colleges and Universities says she’s delighted with the decision.
The Church of England publicly apologizes “for the times we have rejected or excluded you, and those you love.” This is among its most recent statements about same-sex couples. “We are deeply sorry. The occasions on which you have received a hostile and homophobic response in our churches are shameful, and for this we repent.”
Nonetheless. its official position on same-sex matrimony remains in place, i.e., only unions of one man and one woman will be honored with a sacred ceremony. However, it’s offering same-sex couples the opportunity to have some sort of a service inside a church building, with prayers of dedication, thanksgiving and God’s blessing after the couple already has had a civil wedding or is registered as a civil partnership.
The Evangelical Alliance has called on Church of England leaders to reaffirm their previous commitment to the “traditional” doctrine on marriage. The Alliance argues that the current proposals “dramatically compromise the Church’s teaching and practice on relationships and sexual ethics”. The Alliance’s statement was written by its CEO, Gavin Calver, and describes the Anglicans’ plans as “an unsustainable way forward”.
The King’s Singers a cappella group of six young men from Cambridge, UK, was scheduled to perform at Pensacola Christian College. At the very last minute, PCC cancelled the concert due to the Singers’ alleged gay member. Students, including the “closeted”, again witnessed their school’s homophobia in depriving them of the group’s beautiful hymnal harmonization, but it’s on The Web — unless it, too, is blocked at PCC.
The Presbyterian Church in America is polling its 88 presbyteries on disqualifying from church office anyone who even identifies as homosexual, no matter if he’s committed to lifelong celibacy. Such is the PCA’s gross ignorance and utter hypocrisy. No wonder honest, involuntarily homosexual PCA folks are leaving the PCA!
Same-sex weddings in the Evangelical Covenant Church are controversial in this American denomination, popularly called the “Swedish Covenant” church. Since 2015, the ECC has disallowed same-sex weddings. But now, an LGBT-supportive pastor at an ECC congregation in St. Paul, Minnesota, is arguing that these issues of same-sex weddings should be a “nonessential” matter within the denomination.
Colorado baker, Jack Phillips, won a U.S. Supreme Court ruling after he was sued for declining to design a same-sex couple’s wedding cake in violation of his own religious belief. Now, he’s being ordered by the Colorado Court of Appeals to design a cake to celebrate a gender transition. Some Christians urge him to make such cakes to treat others as we want to be treated, an anciently universal “golden rule” which Jesus, too, endorsed. But, of course, such anti-Christian lawsuits won’t end until all of the rest of Christophobic hostility ends, and that’s not coming until Christ’s Second Coming.
Pope Francis says homosexuality is not a crime, but it is a sin. He stated his distinction in a press interview at The Vatican.
Reuters reports on LGBT+ activists in the Democratic Republic of Congo celebrating the Pope’s arrival in Africa. It’s thought that his push for de-criminalization of same-sex relations gives them hope of greater acceptance of their communities across Africa.
Depending on different criminal jurisdictions and cultures across the globe, same-sex acts are unlawful in some places but lawful elsewhere. And, as this Catholic Pope says homosexuality is a sin, many Christian scholars disagree — even evangelical scholars are in disagreement on these matters of biblical interpretation, “natural law”, and the scientific research on homosexuality’s etiology and treatment.
California’s San Diego Roman Catholic Diocese may very likely have to declare bankruptcy as it faces legal costs in some 400 lawsuits alleging that priests and others sexually abused children. Most of this alleged abuse took place some 50 to 75 years ago, and the earliest claim dates to 1945. It is predicted that it would cost the diocese $550 million to settle these cases. To date, none of the cases has gone to trial.
A former FBI Special Agent, whistleblower, Air Force vet and committed Roman Catholic, Kylee Seraphin, notes that, what’s so very strangely stereotyped as a case of “white supremacy” is a Catholic’s preference for the Latin Mass over Mass in English. This very odd interpretation is, indeed, irrational. Nevertheless, it’s exactly what’s being foisted with alarm. His Kyle Seraphin Show, unsurprisingly, is closely monitored by a drifting FBI’s Security Division. Seraphin’s show is syndicated by UncoverDC.com.
In January, a Roman Catholic High School in Ontario suspended a 16-year-old boy for the whole rest of the school year for his compassionate protest against transgender girls using the girls’ bathrooms. He says that he launched his protest after two girls at the school confided in him that they were very uncomfortable sharing bathrooms with these biological male students. This professedly “woke” Catholic school board says that the boy’s protest constituted “bullying” of transgender students. The boy’s lawyer is chief litigator for Liberty Coalition Canada. But this Roman Catholic School Board is stubbornly refusing to hear his appeal.
Egypt still enforces systemic discrimination against its indigenous Christians, the Coptic natives. In 2023, for example, in its Presidential list of 100 newly appointed vice-presidents of the State Council, only one is a Copt. And yet, Egypt’s Christians are around 15% of Egypt’s native population. It’s another example of the historical fact of anti-Christian prejudice that’s always been so common throughout the world. Actually, of course, this anti-Christian oppression was foretold at the very beginning — by Jesus.
The Gatestone Institute reports: “Overall, the global persecution of Christians remains higher than ever, with 360 million believers suffering high levels of discrimination and violence.” The World Watch List: 2023,published by Open Doors, reveals that, “on average, one in seven Christians (14%) are persecuted around the world. In Africa, the number grows to one in five (20 %), while in Asia it is as much as two in five, meaning a whopping 40% of all Christians are persecuted there. Extreme levels of persecution are suffered by Christians in the top 11 of the 50 nations. This ranges from being assaulted, raped, imprisoned or slaughtered on being identified as Christian or attending (usually underground) churches. … Those nations with respective rankings are, from the worst of all: (1) North Korea, (2) Somalia, (3) Yemen, (4) Eritrea, (5) Libya, (6) Nigeria, (7) Pakistan, (8) Iran, (9) Afghanistan, (10) Sudan, (11) India.”
Conservative Judaism is said to be intent on integrating contemporary societal values with religious and cultural traditions. According to Rabbi Bradley Artson in his Conservative Judaism: Covenant and Commitment, “It is precisely this traditional approach which combines fidelity to inherited tradition and the courage to integrate necessary change, that motivates Conservative Judaism today. Whether asserting the equality of women, reaffirming the centrality of Shabbat (Sabbath), kashrut (dietary laws), tzedekah (charity/justice), and prayer, or applying timeless wisdom to contemporary issues, Conservative Judaism insists on observance of tradition and respect for visionary change.” This branch constitutes around a fifth of the Jewish population in the United States. While the Rabbinical Assembly, and its Committee on Jewish Laws and Standards, sets policy for the denomination, rabbis and their congregations make their own choices regarding LGBTQ+ ordination, same-sex marriage, and commitment to the creation of welcoming and affirming communities.
“The ultra-Orthodox have an attitude of, basically, ignoring the [homosexual] issue if it doesn’t exist”, says Anshel Pfeffer, a British-born Israeli journalist writing commentary for the Israeli Haaretz. He claims that under the new Netanyahu regime, “They don’t want to even acknowledge the fact that there is homosexuality or other types of sexual persuasions. When it comes to some of the ultranationalists, they are actively and openly homophobic, and that’s part of some of these party’s platforms. And some of their leaders have quite actively campaigned against any kind of rights for the LGBTQ. One thing we can expect is that, since the leader of one of the parties, the Noam Party, which is basically its entire platform, based around saying that the whole issue of gay rights, is some kind of crazy progressive idea intended to erode the Jewish values and family values, etc. Their leader is now in charge of educational programs, and we can see in that, we can expect that there will be some kind of attempt to change those programs.” This was reported on NPR.
Heterosexuals Organized for a Moral Environment [HOME] was founded two decades ago by a former Catholic who’s now an agnostic. This Illinois-based group’s main notion is that homosexuality is evil and thus, it should be illegal. So: “Penalizing people for engaging in homosexual behavior is clearly not discrimination, just like penalizing people for exhibitionism or incest is not discrimination” and “Heterosexual activity is not illegalizeable [sic], while homosexual activity is definitely illegalizeable [sic].” It also insists that, “legalizing homosexual deviations” leads to a “confused and sick society.” HOME tells homosexuals to apologize “for all the STDs they’ve spread, and all the money those STDs have cost, and especially for setting bad moral examples for our children.” It accuses homosexuals of having a “pathological attitude” toward the opposite sex. It says homosexuality should not have been removed from the American Psychiatric Association’s list of mental disorders. It even claims that homosexuality is historically linked to Freemasonry, as women are not allowed to join the Masonic Lodge.
Britain is now seeking to ban all so-called “conversion” therapy for changing a person’s sexual orientation. These promises of reorientation have always been based in false claims and wishful thinking, as is proven by the history of all of the many failures in all kinds of attempts to change a person’s unchosen sexual orientation.
There’s never been any verified evidence that anything that was ever promised to work to that goal ever worked. Nothing ever accomplished the promised goal of reorientation. Indeed, there’s the tragic down-side of the aftermath of this history of trial and error that prompted many tragedies for some and, for others, prompted rethinking of the whole matter and acceptance of their given, involuntary, sexual orientation.
A “queer drag queen” is a United Methodist candidate for ordination, spewing blasphemy and profanity from the pulpit. The message is repeated over and over again: “God is nothing! The Bible is nothing!” All of this terribly “woke” UMC candidate’s “message” comes from nonsense. No wonder the United Methodists are splitting up!
Ben Shapiro, the bright Harvard Law alum, conservative columnist and host of his own podcast, interviews a teen who’s gone into and out of transgenderism. Watch the testimony at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwVyozpWWAU
A Fundamentalist Baptist preacher proudly proclaims that he hopes “every homo that exists” suffers “a slow, painful death”. Duncan Urbanek proclaimed his hope at what’s called, “Pure Words Baptist Church” in Houston. He added: “You know what my prayer for them is? They go straight into hell right now.” The prayer at “Pure Words Baptist”? A clip of it is shared by Hemant Mehta at his “Friendly Atheist” Substack blog.
Women who sought refuge in biblical counseling at John MacArthur’s mega- church say that they feared discipline for even seeking safety from their abusive marriages, as reported by Christianity Today. “The elders had publicly disciplined a woman for refusing to take back her husband. As it turned out, the woman’s fears proved true, and her husband went to prison for child molestation and abuse. The church never retracted its discipline [of her] or apologized in the 20 years since.”
A lawyer on this Sun Valley church’s elder board urged MacArthur to “make it right” with this wronged woman, but MacArthur told him, “Forget it!” When the elder pressed to call for the board of elders to “do justice” he was told again to, “forget it” or resign! This scenario is standard in these big militantly independent Fundamentalist churches.
AND FINALLY:
Don’t ask, “Is the Bible true?”, but ask, “How is the Bible true?” This is advice from Wilda Gafney, professor of Hebrew Bible at Texas Christian University’s Brite Divinity School. Learning how a text would likely have been understood by its original listeners or readers, we today can better determine how its point can apply to us today. Gafney assures us: “If all that sounds like hard work, it is.” Always, whatever’s worth understanding is worth putting some effort into understanding it. Capeech?