an open letter to my friends in the ELCA
Thursday, October 29, 2009 at 18:22 So some time has passed since the summer’s decisions regarding the Assembly’s decisions on sexuality and ordination. But, in conversations that are as important to our life as the ELCA’s recent actions, hopefully faithful people are still spending time in spiritual deliberation. I am very hopeful that Christian people are willing to work past the emotion of the short news cycle and seriously consider, read, study, talk and pray to understand the lay of the land before reacting. I’ve already heard of situations where folks are either gloating or leaving – both regrettable at a time like this. It’s a bit like Miriam rejoicing at the crossing of the Red Sea. Yes, the Israelites rejoiced, but the Egyptians drowned, and in the Midrash on that text, the Rabbis say that God said to Israel, “Silence, my children are dying.” A little perspective does help. And I hope that whether you are rejoicing in the ELCA’s decision or drowning in grief, that you just take some time to be still, think, read, pray and talk. Talk with your pastor or Bishop about what happened so that you can understand the reality the actual decisions that were made…not the newspaper headlines, but the actual decisions themselves.
And that is the point of this article, to help sift through the decisions that were made, consider the ramifications, and explore your options for dealing with the outcome.
First of all, no matter what your perspective on homosexuality and ordination, know this, and please do trust it. Everyone on all sides (not both sides as there is more than a simple “yes” and “no”) is prayerfully, hopefully, faithfully, and lovingly searching for the Truth in this matter for the sake of the Gospel. You really have to believe this. Luther’s explanation of the 8th commandment in the catechism demands that you believe the best about your friends in Christ until you absolutely know differently. To do otherwise breaks the 8th, 5th, and 1st commandments. So, I do hope you take comfort in your heart knowing that our Church is full of faithful people following Jesus. And while the path isn’t always so well marked, Jesus is pretty clear about one thing – sometimes the process is just as important as the outcome – in other words, the Kingdom of God isn’t a utilitarian game, and the ends don’t justify the means.
The question seems to be not WHAT are the right decisions but rather HOW do we make decisions? The way in which we decide what is “good” as a communion often builds up or tears down just as much as the actual content of the decision. This is the underbelly of ethics. Christian ethics is not just about discerning the right answer, but discerning the right moral framework to make the decision. It’s about tracing the horizon of the Divinely Created Order so that we can know how to frame a faithful decision. It’s like navigating at sea. Sometimes when the waves get rough, we are really worried about the wave that is right in front of us. However, if you make decisions based on that one wave, two things can happen. The first is, you don’t notice the other waves around you that could hold promise or peril, and secondly, focusing on the near field is sure to make you seasick. Focusing on the horizon makes it easier to plot the path over that wave, and keeps you from getting dizzy, disoriented, and…well…you know what comes next.
So, if we are going to truly wrap our heart and mind around this decision by the ELCA, and if you are truly going to be able to make faithful decisions about your place in the ELCA in light of the results, we need to look past the single wave of sexuality, and find the horizon within which this decision was made. That will keep us from getting sea sick, and help us plot a much better course to the safe harbor of the Gospel that lies beyond this issue where we are all hoping to steer this ship. If you trust me, I’d like to welcome you aboard, and be your captain for the next few paragraphs.
The first step I want to take is to make sure we understand why this decision came about. Then think about how it came about. Once that horizon is plotted, then we can talk about what is the actual content of the decision – which might actually surprise you. Finally, with all or our instruments calibrated, then I can suggest a future course that can hold this ship together by making good, well informed deliberations, and keep folks from jumping overboard just because someone shouts “Iceberg!”
The first step is to understand why this decision came about. It turns out the majority of folks who believed that the ELCA had to make a decision with regard to ordaining homosexual men and women in same sex relationships felt that true Christian orthodoxy was at stake. Some felt that we had to make the decision to make a decision to ban homosexual Christians from being ordained because it blatantly contradicted the Bible. On the other hand, some felt that we had to make the decision to ordain homosexuals in monogamous same sex relationships who had discerned a call to ministry because it was an injustice for the Church to deny a call to serve the Gospel based on sexual orientation, and such a systemic injustice contradicts the prophetic witness of the Bible. I hope you can see that these two views are polar opposites, and the numbers of folks subscribing to either of these positions are probably minorities. However, both of these minorities agreed on one thing – we had to make a decision – and together, they made a majority. So, we faithfully began a course whereby we, as a Church, were going to make a decision. This decision likely frustrates those that are in the middle saying, “Are we really ready to make a decision?” But that is why we are here.
Now that we understand why, let’s consider how. How is it that we made this decision? First of all, you have to understand that years ago the Church started down this road by conducting a study of homosexuality. Then, realizing that we had the cart before the horse, we engaged in a study of human sexuality, and created a social statement on the topic. Then, we engaged in a few rounds of study and consultations on the topic of homosexuality. In my experience a few things happened, or rather, didn’t happen. Like the distant rumble of a storm whose affects we can’t yet feel, most people chose not to engage this study on sexuality. Thousands of parishes were poised to have meetings, classes and consultations on the topic, and I’m afraid that most people just didn’t dedicate the time and energy to be informed with the Biblical scholarship, prayer, and community trust building that are vital to making these decisions. That coupled with the fact that the studies could only really scratch the surface of issues like Biblical authority, how to read the Bible, Law/Gospel and Christian ethics, I wonder how effective these conversations were in preparing the Church for the weight of this decision. But it must be said, it was truly up to each of us to be faithfully informed, and I wonder how many of us heeded that call.
Still, even if we were all well prepared for the issue, you might not have been prepared for how the issue was decided. At the time of Churchwide assembly the decision actually made a subtle shift from being an ethical issue about sexuality to an ecclesial issue about how we make a decision about sexuality. So even if you came with your theological ducks in a row, you might not have been prepared for the polity. Here is what I mean.
The Churchwide Assembly voted. As a Church, we voted. After serving parishes in the US and overseas, I want to suggest that voting is a lousy way to do any Church deliberative business – be they Churchwide decisions about ordination or congregational council decisions about how to set up donuts for fellowship after worship. The World Council of Churches has abandoned voting and instituted a model of Consensus decision making. The consensus model requires understanding, demands conversation, and refuses to progress unless trust is built between people on opposing sides of issues. Like Christ’s command to love even our enemies, making decisions by consensus goes as far as humanly possible to remove the fear of winners and losers so that we can maintain unity in the body. The consensus model also repents of western style democratic “majority rules” by returning to the faithful task of real Christian discernment. I am advocating that we should actually change our congregational and Churchwide constitutions to reflect a consensus model of decision making. No doubt you have some questions. Without voting, is it possible that the Church might not be able to make decisions on certain issues within prescribed time frames? Sure. But delays just mean we have some more faithful work to do. Is it harder? You bet. But a consensus model acknowledges that the body of Christ is too important to allow the tyranny of time to sacrifice the role of the Spirit in providing wisdom to her Church. And speaking of wisdom, now let’s consider exactly what it was that we decided.
Despite the headlines that crowbar faithfully complex realities into socially simple categories, the ELCA did not just decide to ordain homosexual clergy – there was much more to wisely consider. There are actually several major issues at stake. First of all, there are disciplinary issues that are not about ordination per se, but the Vision and Expectations for the life of the clergy. This document has to do with chastity in and outside of marriage, and the disciplinary actions that accompany those clergy who do not abide by the Church’s ethical guidelines for faithful living. The long and short of it is this – if you want to make a positive decision about an issue, you have to remove the negative prohibitions, and the ELCA hasn’t done this yet. Even so, that is still not the real content of the decision that was made.
The decision was basically ecclesiological – not exactly about the morals of sexuality, but about the way the Church makes decisions between the national and local level. Remember, as it exists now the ELCA is a communion of local Synods. 65 geographical synods that each ordain their clergy, and all adhere to the Augsburg Confessions and the policies agreed to by the ELCA Church Council. This summer, the ELCA Assembly actually decided to leave the decision of whether or not to ordain people in monogamous same sex relationships up to the conscience of local synods and congregations. In other words, the ELCA did not decide to ordain homosexual Christians. The ELCA Churchwide Assembly decided to allow those Synods with congregations whose consciences dictate that they are not able to deny homosexual Christians a call to ministry to ordain and issue a call. But in the same way, no synod whose collective conscience dictates otherwise necessarily has to ordain someone who is homosexual, and no congregation in a synod who ordains a homosexual person has to call a pastor who is homosexual. The bottom line is, the ELCA voted for you to be able to follow your conscience. Or more simply put – the conversation is not over! You still have something to talk about in your congregation and in your synod. So here is my plea – please keep talking about it. Follow your conscience and engage.
Please note however, that even this plea to follow your conscience is not as easy as it sounds. Conscience, in the Christian tradition, is not that little voice in your head, or the rational average between the angel on your right shoulder and the devil on your left. Conscience, as defined by everyone from Augustine to Aquinas, Luther to Benedict, the Lutheran Book of Concord and your congregation’s constitution is the matrix of Holy Spirit, Scripture, confessions, Law and Grace. Our consciences after the fall need the Spirit’s grace to fully realize love. So, before you go off to the next council meeting to give them a piece of your mind, please remember this – by “Conscience” we mean the Divine perspective; that horizon that is the Divine “phroneo” as in Jesus demanded that we put our mind on “divine things” or “phroneo”; as in Paul saying to the Philippians, be of one “mind”, one “phroneo” in Christ Jesus. You have to use your God given, Christ redeemed and Holy Spirit nourished conscience. No one in the ELCA is telling you yes or no, they are giving what is called a “local option”. Just like Luther, the ELCA will not mandate a law here, but asks you to exercise your faith. So, please be faithful, and stay engaged. By the nature of the actual decision it’s not fait accompli. It is an invitation to more faithful discernment to help your congregation and your Bishop make good, faithful, informed policy decisions as we continue to faithfully go forward.
Are you surprised by that analysis that the ELCA actually didn’t make a hard and fast decision? While the local option will no doubt frustrate many, I hope you can find the joy in it. Because the Church is trying to point to the fact that there are other issues of Salvation and Peace that are greater than the sum of our moral questions, and you are free to be faithful. But what if you just don’t agree? This, too, is fine. And there are options for you to exercise your conscience. But rather than write a long list of the myriad positive options, I’d like to highlight two negative options that I hope you do not take. While there are many creative and positive options, these are the two decisions that will do a great deal of damage to the Body of Christ for years to come.
The first negative option is one that has been promoted by CORE, a Lutheran group whom I honestly know nothing about. They may very well be a fine group, but they are promoting a practice that I can’t abide – that is voting with your wallet. They are actually suggesting that a good protest to this local option will be to remain as members of the ELCA, but withhold your benevolence. This is possibly the most unfaithful option that you can choose for two reasons. First of all, by using money as leverage you are not sending a message to Chicago, instead you are withholding money from social and global missions of your Church that go to feed the hungry, house the homeless and provide medical care and education for children on other continents who have nothing to do with American morality. The least of these will suffer because of wallet voting. By doing this you are granting the same amount of power to the dollar as you are to the needs of your neighbors, and this is idolatry on several planes. Secondly, you are making a commodity of your faith by giving equal value to your financial wealth as your commitment to give to the body of Christ. Capital should always serve humanity, not vice versa. So, please, don’t vote with your wallet, it only makes you look affluently petty, tempts you to selfish neglect of a fundamental spiritual practice and denies life to the most vulnerable in the kingdom.
The second negative option that I hope you avoid is simply leaving your congregation, because leaving causes profound damage to the Body of Christ. I have already heard several cases where congregations have left synods or people have left congregations over this decision. The unfortunate part of their leaving is the reason that people give. They say, “I am leaving because the ELCA has left Biblical principles” or something to that nature. But without fully realizing it, by turning away from the community of faith over moral issues you are actually breaking an even more fundamental Trinitarian principle – unity. Let me make the point this way. Luther was an Augustinian monk. And it was Augustine who said, “If you have grasped it, it’s not God.” Luther knew this truth powerfully. There are so many Christians who believe with their entire faithful conscience that they have this “sexuality thing” figured out. They have reduced the question to a basic case of “read the verses in Romans and it’s over”, without taking into account any kind of serious theological realities about Biblical authority, confessions and the role of the Spirit in the faithful life of the living Word. To that, Augustine and Luther would say please tread lightly – if you have grasped it, it’s not God. In other words, even if you are conscience bound over a moral issue, please realize that our moral issues are penultimate. There is always something more ultimate than our ethical deliberations. And after centuries of post Reformation violence and condemnations, Lutherans should know this better than most – disturbing Trinitarian unity is as much an affront to the Gospel as any number of ethical sins. After all, while Jesus said nothing about the gender orientation of priests in the New Testament, his last prayer before going to the cross was for us – that his followers would be one. (John 17)
If you had one prayer before dying, what would it be? Jesus’ last prayer was for the unity of his followers. In Greek he prays that we would be one, “oti”, “so that” the world may know the reconciling, healing love of God. You see, the unity of the Body of Christ is not just about being nice to each other, and it is certainly not about agreeing with each other. It is in itself a witness of active peacemaking that is central to God’s Mission entrusted to us. Ethical decisions about moral issues are categorically second order questions, and they have to be based on first order concepts. A second order question is, “what am I going to do if my Church makes a decision about sexuality that I don’t agree with?” The first order concept that should inform your answer is – Jesus prayed that his followers would be one. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote in his Summa Theologiae that love is realized in friendship through unity with God. Christian friendship is the place where the love of God can be realized in our midst by seeking to work out goodness or make just ethical decisions. Christian friendships, as in Jesus saying “I have called you friends”, are therefore elastic enough to embody God’s love in a manner that holds them together even through penultimate hardship, suffering, and even persecution. One party doesn’t just go home because the other party disagrees with them. That’s not the kind of rigid friendship that Jesus displayed on the cross. Jesus was solidarity embodied. The Body of Christ is life giving unity in the face of injustice par excellence.
And our unity is important because our unity is the witness, the image of his body on earth. Jesus prayed that we would be one, “so that the world may know” the love that is found in communion with the one, true, Triune God. After years of serving in international ecumenical ministry, I need to say this – the world outside the Church cares precious little right now about WHAT our decisions are regarding sexuality. They frankly see it as a quaint intra-Christian controversy at best and apathetically irrelevant at worst. But what the world is watching with crystal clear understanding and laser sharp interest is HOW we make our decisions. That is what matters to people “on the outside”. And to the outside world desperately looking for a living sign of life giving hope, if they see a body of people who are easily dismembered by moral disagreements and distracted enough to trade the cruciform virtues of love and peace for disunity and distrust – then what could the Way of Jesus possibly have to offer a broken world?
If your conscientious deliberations about penultimate ethical issues cause you to sever the limbs of the body of Christ, you are bearing two witnesses. First you are saying that your ethical consciousness is so close to the heart of God that it is more real to you than the unity of the Body of Christ. And perhaps you are so certain either way that you are willing to take that stance. But please remember this second point. By leaving communion you are demonstrating to those outside of the Body of Christ that your ethical certitude is more important than the work of reconciliation that God has entrusted to you in Christ Jesus.
You know, in his hymn “A Mighty Fortress is Our God”, Luther said that in all the violence that was done to the Body of Christ in the name of the Gospel, in all of the words and proclamations and volumes of theological theses that were written, one little Word subdues us. That Word is not the Bible, not a particular proof text, not the Law. That Word is Christ. Jesus the Christ, who wept that we would know the ways that make for peace, showed us how, entrusted his ministry of reconciliation to us, and then prayed for our unity so that the world might see a witness to the precious, healing, life giving, peacemaking gift that we have to offer. And when the world sees us walk away from members of our own community over penultimate issues, why would they want to come be a part of that? What do we have to offer to a world in need of healing, life giving unity? We have to model the ways that make for peace. That is exactly why the WHAT of our decisions about sexuality gets distilled into headlines and sound bites for public enjoyment, but HOW we respond as Christians is what truly reveals our witness.
And this brings me back to where I started. If you’re sifting through the fallout of this decision about sexuality searching to piece together goodness and righteousness, start building on the concept of unity. Start by committing yourself to acts of radical, peacemaking and sacrificial unity within your congregation and Synod that bears witness to the unity of the Trinity “so that” you can show the world the way of Peace. At the most it means committing yourself to the ongoing conversation. Studying, learning, communing with, talking to and praying for those that you disagree with, because if you name your opponents in prayer that means you are standing together before God, and relative to God you have far more in common with your opponent than whatever divides you. At the least it means not leaving the communion of the Church, because otherwise the realities of ethical division are greater than the Unity of the Holy Spirit.
In the end, the question asked by the ELCA’s decision is not only about who will be ordained. No, this decision asks whether or not you will choose to live in the unity of the Spirit by the bond of peace with those that Christ loves and you happen to disagree with. So I ask, what is a more powerful witness for the healing of the world? It is a real question for you, because there is no peace without justice, and there is no justice without God. So, what does a faithful witness to God look like? I believe no matter what the moral outcome looks like, it has to reflect Trinitarian koinonia, communion, unity to be Christian.
In the meantime, urge your Synod and congregation to explore the consensus model of decision making, and if you want to know more about it, be in touch. Stay involved and exercise your faith. And as your conscience wrestles with all the words about scripture, discipline, votes, policy and ethics, please, let the most important, little Word subdue your witness.
Reader Comments (3)
Chad, i will have to admit; i'm not a very religious person. this i'm sure comes at no surprise to you! ha! even before coming out, i've always had a problem with my own relationship with God. In my early years i place the blame completely on my own shoulders; i didn't do my part to learn, read and begin to understand the complexities of a personal relationship with God. Later, after coming out and revealing myself to others, i slipped into a very easy place for homosexuals; I rejected a whole institution and point of view because of the perceived hostility to my community. Although now i'm 10yrs into my "gay career" (my own terminology for life after coming out) and i'm no longer so apt to just reject religion. I think mostly this is because of the perceived "acceptance" in the religious world and i no longer feel so demonized as i walk into the church door. Since i'm just now starting a new journey i have no idea where it might take me. Right now, i'm still firmly in the agnostic category; I know there must be something, but how can i understand it? I guess my ultimate problem comes from my bias that human hands tend to distort everything. How can i believe in the infallibility of the Bible when i know that thousands of human hands have altered, changed, re-interpreted, and decided what is in and what is out of it. to me, that is too much of a distortion from the "original source". But, that is a topic for another day :)
I really wanted to comment about the discussion your larger church entity had about the "homosexual issue". hehe. i think you gave a GREAT rundown on the situation and the how and why of the issue. i love your eloquence on stepping back and changing the way the church "votes" and the larger picture advocation you give.
However, I am a bit discouraged about what the decision actually was ... by way of your explanation of it. I agree that sparking more discussion, thought, and prayer on the subject is nothing but positive. However, i feel like the council kinda "passed the buck" onto the lower Synods. i can understand the reasoning about it, but it feels more like a political move rather than an ethical, moral, or religious one. although, i will have to say i like at least what they passed down ..... the openness in allowing Synods to ordain openly gay people. what a wonderful step forward!!
i also chuckle sometimes at the absurdity of it all. Its as if homosexuals just "popped up" in the world. like your church and every church or religion on earth hasn't had homosexual members, leaders, priest, etc. i mean its sheer ludicrous to think that homosexuals aren't there now and haven't always been there. the problem is that we are less likely to hide it anymore and that is what is sparking the debate and anger.
this has been long winded and probably disjointed but i've written it rather quickly and haven't edited it.
Hope you and your family are doing wonderful!! i look forward to reading more of your writings. keep up the good work!
Carter
I read your insightful article, and while it shows you have given this issue alot of thought. I wanted to put down my own thoughts. It is my belief that this issue was handled in such a way that we can not simply resolve this by further conversations and debate. As you say "The bottom line is, the ELCA voted for you to be able to follow your conscience. Or more simply put – the conversation is not over! You still have something to talk about in your congregation and in your synod. So here is my plea – please keep talking about it. Follow your conscience and engage."
I contend that this issue is so devisive and polarizing that the ELCA will never be able to achieve unity. In addition, I need church to be a place of edification and spiritual uplifting.
A period of rest from the constant debate that goes on in our world in the workplace and society at large. How do we get rest from a continued debate on the sabboth. Further, in my opinion this is such a departure from my training and early training(confirmation) I feel the church as left me.
This departue seems to be mainly from a departure from scripture. We should strive for unity. And it is my belief that our unity in Christ transcends all that could devide us. But, because we have a savior does not preclude us from obedience.
We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The man who says, "I know him" but does not do what he commands is a liar, and trust is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God's love is truely made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. 1 JOHN 2:3,4,5,6
Our tools for unity our the Holy Spirit and the Word. And the word is Spirit. We can not depart from it.
Peace Be With You.
Dennis Holzschuh
This is really beautiful, and I think really on point. It reminded me of another post I read recently on the possibilities God creates for us when we dare to meet with those we disagree with...
http://blog.sojo.net/2009/10/22/i-am-perfectly-happy-not-liking-evangelicals/
Hope your page might be one such meeting place. Looks like it might be already.
peace, Aileen