I tend to think of ex-gay ministries as appealing primarily to fundamentalist evangelicals. But there are some “mainline” churches that also are conservative and that readily buy into the anti-gay activism that Exodus and NARTH offer.
Two such churches are Truro Church and The Falls Church, two large historic and affluent Episcopal churches in Virginia near the National Capital. The Truro Church supports “healing from homosexuality” and recommends Exodus, Love Won Out, and Exodus’ local affiliate, Regeneration. The Falls Church relies on NARTH as a source for why gay people are not entitled to civil rights.
Truro and The Falls are not ordinary Episcopal churches. They are far more conservative and just this month voted to sever ties with the Episcopal Church and align themselves with the Archbishop of Nigeria, Peter Akinola.
Although there were other areas of dispute building between the conservative and liberal branches of the church, the issue that brought this separation to a head was disagreement over the place of gay people within the church. So it is fair to compare that policy which they found unacceptable, namely the recognition of a gay bishop in New Hampshire, to that which they find far preferable, the beliefs of Peter Akinola.
Akinola is making a name for himself primarily on one issue, his opposition to homosexuality. And as such, he’s taken well documented positions and expressed his opinions without hesitation. In an article yesterday in the Amherst Times, Akinola reveals his sole experience with an openly gay person:
The way he tells the story, the first and only time Archbishop Peter J. Akinola knowingly shook a gay person’s hand, he sprang backward the moment he realized what he had done.
Archbishop Akinola, the conservative leader of Nigeria’s Anglican Church who has emerged at the center of a schism over homosexuality in the global Anglican Communion, re-enacted the scene from behind his desk Tuesday, shaking his head in wonder and horror.
“This man came up to me after a service, in New York I think, and said, ‘Oh, good to see you bishop, this is my partner of many years,’ ” he recalled. “I said, ‘Oh!’ I jumped back.”
Akinola is also an anti-gay political activist in his native Nigeria. In his Message to the Nation, the archbishop endorsed anti-gay legislation that “includes measures so extreme that the State Department warned that they would violate basic human rights.” The AP reports that
Lawmakers in Nigeria are debating a bill that would ban same-sex marriage and any form of association among gays, even sharing a meal at a restaurant.
Other activities prohibited under the proposed law include belonging to gay clubs or reading books, watching films or accessing Internet sites that “promote” homosexuality.
Punishment for viewing Ex-Gay Watch in Nigeria under Akinola’s favored bill would be five years in jail.
Akinola’s attitudes about gay persons go far beyond just his Biblical interpretation or understanding. It’s clear that Akinola views gays with fear and loathing. Perhaps some of this attitude is culturally initiated and perhaps some is based in ignorance or unfamiliarity.
However, it does cause me concern that churches who turn to ex-gay ministries for guidance on issues relating to sexual orientation would sever a relationship with their parent church over the issue of homosexuality and place themselves under the authority of a leader that embodies the very definition of homophobia.
Exodus claims that they seek to challenge those within the church “who respond to homosexuals with ignorance and fear”. It seems that their consistent vocal condemnation and political lobbying may have negated this part of their mission completely.
(thanks to commenter Ken R for providing information about the link to Exodus and NARTH)
Worth noting: The Episcopal Church in the USA (ECUSA) is mainstream in America. It, and much of the global Anglican tradition of which it is a part, cherishes the fact that scripture, tradition, and reason are all essential to the exercise of faith.
The Virginia parishes that are clamoring for Akinola’s oversight, as well as a few more from Texas and elsewhere who will follow, represent a minority of mainstream Episcopalians.
Even more than that, I suspect they represent a minority of the Episcopalians who happen to be conservative and support ex-gays more readily than they do openly gay folks.
Conservative Episcopalians can and do have a voice within their mainstream church. They need not leave the ECUSA in order to be heard or respected, accepted or tolerated. Their reason for leaving falls to their inability to tolerate the Episcopal tradition of tolerance and welcome to all.
Starting at the start…
This is the Nigeran legislation, the legislation that Akinola has categoricaly supported. Apologies for not being able to directly link to a Nigerian govt site (the text of the bill keeps moving about), but I have downloaded and highlighted the sections that are open to enormous abuse.
Perhaps of even more interest…
Despite the fact of the provisions in the legislation, and despite the fact that Akinola has categorically supported the legislation, and despite the fact that a U.S. bishop has clearly spelled it all out — the leading figure in Virginia (Minns) has falsely represented those facts to his flock. (sorry, its a Word doc). Or here.
And it this type of man, it is suggested, represents an opportunity for revival within the Episcopal congregations???
Then we come to the “reasonable” anti-gay voices. Not so silly as to deny, outright, what the facts are with Akinola and the Nigerian legislation we are instead presented with a long-winded excuse that basically comes down to “We don’t have to be nice to those revolting homosexuals, or even need to pretend to be nice, they deserve punishment, and anyway — look — the Muslims treat them even worse than we do.” A disingenuous approach also promoted by Akinola when he’s attempting to spin the issue of his clear support for that virulently anti-gay legislation.
Regardless of one’s religious views about homosexuality, one would think it not too difficult for most to agree that the provisions in that Nigerian legislation go utterly beyond the Pale. Akinola’s support for it should be soundly condemned, and by extension his “authority” to speak on the subject rightly rejected.
More, of course, over at the “Thinking Anglicans” site.
Archbishop Akinola needs to think a little harder about the horrific oppression that blacks have received over the centuries as they were treated as second class citizens and often far worse. He should think about how blacks were thrown in jail or prison if they questioned authority or tried to stand up to the oppression that they were receiving from non-black religious leaders and politicians. If the man can see beyond the end of his nose it shouldn’t take much time for him to see the powerful parallels to the lives and experiences of us who are GLBT.
Also (as a side note) the internet is changing the entire planet and it is natural that there are some cultures and people who are opposed to GLBT equality would try to censor the internet. Just think what this planet will be like in the next 10 or 20 years at the rate and ecceloration that information and communication is occuring all over this globe. Our brothers and sisters in Africa are placed next door to us and the rest of the globe by the force of the internet. We are all forced to deal with each other far more directly. There are fewer and fewer secrets (ignorance is becoming far less prevalent) as our lives and cultures become increasingly transparent and available for the entire world to see and understand.
frightening stuff.
I actually grew up in The Falls Church, we left for one in DC when I was a teenager. My impression from being there was seeing a steadily increasing obsession with money that seemed to override pretty much everything else. The last straw for me was when the rector preached an entire sermon on how people should give a whole year’s income to the church to build their garish new building (aka the Episcodome). They’ve had years to drive out all the moderates, so it’s actually not a surprise to me that they’d embrace NARTH. It would be interesting to ask John Yates what he thinks his new bishop would think of NARTH’s recent pro-slavery kerfuffle tho.
As an Episcopalian in a state (Connecticut) that is roiling with tensions and strife (intra-church) over the gay issue, I was wondering if any of the GLBT sites was going to pick up on the NYT Akinola piece. I’m glad this one did, because this is an issue that really needs attention paid to it. I would certainly hope that the article will cause leadership in the breakaway churches to look a bit more closely at this fellow… the “star” to which they are hitching their ecclesiastical wagons.
Frankly, Akinola strikes me as dangerously crazy. He’s as irrational on the subject of gays as Lester Maddox was on the subject of African-Americans, or as Henry Ford was on the topic of Jewish people. He’s so far “out there” that it seems astonishing that any American clergy would knowingly align with him. The guy physically recoils from shaking the hand of a gay person? Tell me how he differs in any way, shape or form from Fred Phelps?
One thing that really struck me from the article was the picture of this row of churchly men, all looking proud and determined and bold… all gathered together to form a grand crusade to… make sure people who are different can’t be happy? Boy, that’s sure a great use for a life, isn’t it? At some level you’d think people would be embarrassed, but I guess not.
As a ray of hope, though, at least in CT the breakaway movement seems weak at best. The “Connecticut Seven” (or however many there were, or are), filed suit against the diocese for “censoring” their anti-gay speech… predictably enough, the federal court declined to get involved with issues of internal church discipline and dismissed the suit. Even though the “Seven” churches get lots of press, at least the one with which I am most familiar is hurting financially and membership is waaaaaay down (while the mainline Episcopal church in the same town is thriving). In my own church, under the former rector’s strongly anti-gay leadership, membership eventually dwindled to 14 families! The “new” and moderate rector has restored the church to nearly overflowing, is attracting scores of young families, and our Sunday School enrollment alone is over 100 kids. So, there is hope that the more moderate form of Episcopalianism can grow and thrive in today’s world, even as the breakaway churches get lots of attention.
I guess I could go on and on about this, but wanted to close by mentioning a great site for anyone interested in these issues. Search on the “Daily Episcopalian;” it’s a site maintained by the diocese of Washington, D.C. and contains all sorts of interesting information and links about different aspects of this issue.
Jane in CT
Nigeria is a country beset by so many staggering problems: poverty, Christian-Muslim violent conflicts, very high levels of violent crime, AIDS, malaria,TB, inadequate sewage and water supplies for the population, clashes over the distribution of the profits from oil production among the many ethnic groups in the country, recovering from recent military dictatorships, etc.
Akinola’s bizarre obsession with gay folks rather than the far more important crises that his country and congregants face makes him appear a very strange choice to lead Nigeria’s Episcopal Church.
It disturbs me that an unnatural fear of same-gender love can unite 2 very dissimilar cultures in a way that poverty, civil war, genocide, or rampant disease never could.
What does it say that some christians can unify and and work together across class, race and national boundaries to try & ‘rid’ the church of homosexuality when they could never find the same kind of unity to address these other other vital social issues?
As a professor of mine in seminary said, “5000 children dying every day from poverty & disease is a moral crisis. Two men who love each other is not.”
How did the body of christ arrive at such a warped sense of values?
Archbishop Akinola supports legislation in his home country that would make it illegal for two gay men to meet and have dinner. These are the values that he supports and advocates. By removing their church from the ECUSA and placing it under the authority of this Archbishop, the churches in Virginia, Texas, and elsewhere are implicitly adopting and supporting the position(s) of Akinola.
These churches now openly support criminalizing being gay, even down to two gay men chatting over dinner (to say nothing of actual sexual relations). I would hope the members of these churches did not fully understand that they are standing behind a man who supports such heavy-handed legislation. Unfortunately, I suspect they did know, and are encouraged that he is taking such harsh positions, and that they would support similar laws in their own neighborhoods.
They are churches of hate, nothing more, nothing less.
After doing a google search on the Archbishop and reading some of the letters he has written in the recent past, I can’t help but shudder at the hate he exhibits.
In one letter to churches like those in Virginia he tries to say that he really isn’t anti-gay, and that they are not supporting anti-gay legislation. Then he tells a story of how a muslim legislator wanted to push the bill that would outlaw any contact between gay men, even soclializing. The muslim leadership wanted stiff penalties up to, and including death while the Anglican legislator argued that they should fully debate the bill and only put violators of the proposed laws in prison.
Archbishop Akinola states that we should be grateful that the anglican legislator only wanted to imprison gay people, and that because the Archbishop only supports imprisoning gay people that he is not anti-gay. I for one will not fall down in happiness and relief because the Archbishop only wants to throw me in prison while is Muslim compatriot wants to kill me. Both of them are morally wrong, and both of them must be resisted and fought, as well as being declared the hate-mongers that their actions declare them to be in the eyes of the world.
At least two to three times a year, nearly a thousand Nigerians are immolated from tapping gas lines illegally to take gasoline for sale or personal use.
Every time a gas line is punctured, impoverished people rush to take, despite previous (and inevitable) explosions that burns many to death, and horribly injures even more.
Why do these people take such a horrible risk, for just a few gallons, if that….of gasoline?
A Holocaust denial conference in Iran, that showed rebbes kissing Iranian President Ahmadinejahd, one who has vowed to destroy Israel by nuclear bomb, when he’s ready.
Radical Islam and Orthodox Jew, came together in solidarity to protest and threaten the Pride march in Jerusalem.
Hate has turned enemies into collaborators.
Anti gay sentiment has empowered a bishop, to the extent his denial and ignorance of the poverty and disease among his flock will not be challenged.
He can do something about the gay people, he can recount his reaction to a gay man’s handshake.
Ahmadinejahd can hang gay teenagers, but he can’t keep his country from disintegrating into war over Jews.
Before our eyes, there is danger indeed…and all the while, people who should know better,try to maintain the fiction that gay men and women are worse, more intolerable than the utmost of human miseries.
There is nothing here to forgive or understand.
Perhaps these few men are a minority within the greater world that lives within reason.
But Hitler was only one person, once upon a very bad time…
Like Akinola should be proud for arguing that GLBT people should only be imprisoned not stoned to death?
Christ demands that he would have fought for human rights. No prison or death to his fellow human beings.
He took the easy way, he sold out to curry favor with the muslims, preserve his power, and save his own hide.
As he has done to the least of those his bretheren, so also has he done…
A far different kind of a religious man than Desmond Tutu, isn’t it? (Reading wikipedia).
Though, Mr. Tutu feels gays should not be discriminated against he feels they should be celibate. Implied would be that gays should be denied the experience of love or a true loving relationship: the most basic of human rights.
Akinola may be demonstrably much more vitriolic but even moderate and liberal-minded clergy are not really pro-gay either.
I guess I should give credit to ECUSA for, at least, entertaining the thought of being gay-accepting. Though, I doubt in my lifetime MSR (Main-Stream Religions) probably will ever be totally accepting of gays.
Hi Everyone,
Thanks so much for your posts on this subject. I have expressed these opinions in many ways at many times and after a recent death in my family, I just didn’t have the energy to write at length.
I am a 48 yr old lesbian with a partner of 17 years. I am a cradle Episcopalian. My state of Iowa doesn’t have the horrible crises occurring that other state’s have. We have 1 diocese consisting of approx. 63 parishes and I believe that only 3 of those parishes is making formal moves for separation. Again, moving to the loving support of Akinola, who certainly embodies for me, the example of a man of God. (tongue in cheek, please!). The Diocese of Iowa has a wonderful Bishop.
The current strife and turmoil in our church does effect me however. As I finish my personal plan of initial discernment for the priesthood and I begin to look at what is in front of me “officially”, I feel very discouraged.
Much of who I am and much of the desire to dedicate my life to serving people through God is as a direct result of my lesbian relationships and the empathy I feel in general as a result of being a part of a minority. Yet, the Canons of 06 screamed moratorium on ordination of openly homosexual priests and bishops. It truly is a test of my love of the church at times. I love being an Episcopalian. I support Scripture, tradition, reason, and the ability we are supposed to have in accepting differences, in accepting the middle way, via media, etc. It does scare me that the path seems so slow and it terrifies me when the path moves backward.
I’ll continue my prayers for God’s direction in my life, in my church’s life, and for all of you out there in cyber-space.
Your Sister In Christ,
Karen
Dearest Karen,
I wish you peace and hope in the New Year, for you and your wife.
I also have fears when things go backward and serious gains are in jeopardy.
I am mystified too, that gays and lesbians are rendered greater enemies of mankind, than the chronic issues, disastrous for all human beings is.
I thank you for your commitment to the Episcopal Church. A church I spent my childhood in, but I was encouraged to embrace spending time in temple and gaining understanding and education from Jews, Buddhists and Hindus and Muslims as often as possible.
I haven’t found a church home to attend regularly, but a Bishop like Akinola and those on the panel who will align themselves with him….will make me RUN LIKE HELL to never set foot in the churches they represent.