N A TIO N A L M A G A ZIN E O F THE L U THE RA N C HU RC H O F A U STRA LIA
NOVEMBER 2016
Re-formation TODAY
Homosexuality:
Walk a mile in our shoes
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I ’ m g ay ’
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The Lutheran NOVEMBER 2016
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NOVEMBER
Special features EDITOR'S
Letter
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I often think of a story my mum once told me. Someone at church was criticising someone else, so Mum responded, ‘Why don’t you pray for them?’ What a great piece of Christian wisdom! It’s a good thing to recall if ever the temptation to criticise or to tear down becomes stronger than the urge to compliment or build up. I was thinking of that story again because as I write this our church is taking part in a month of prayer for marriage and families, adapted for Lutheran congregations from a series by the Catholic Church’s Marriage and Family Council. And the focus of prayer for the Sunday ahead is for all persons who ‘experience same-sex attraction or gender uncertainty and their families’. The prayer calls on us to be ‘sensitive and supportive of all people who suffer with issues of identity, especially in times of trial’. It also asks that God would grant his ‘peace and joy to our family members and friends who experience same-sex attraction or gender uncertainty’. Like my mum’s story, this is a good and timely reminder of one of our key responsibilities as God’s children: to pray for others, in all circumstances. I have dear friends who are homosexual, just as I have dear friends who are heterosexual. It is my duty as a Christian to pray for all of them and my privilege to tell all of them God loves them. My friends who are gay tell me they did not choose their sexuality; they believe they were born with it, just as others are born heterosexual. The question begging to be asked is, ‘Why would they choose such a difficult path?’ They have suffered greatly because of their sexuality: frequent verbal and, in some cases, physical abuse; social exclusion; professional discrimination; family rejection; self-doubt, self-loathing and self-harm; and suicidal thoughts. Homosexual people who have grown up in the church have said they fear going to hell because of who they are. In this issue we look at this one element of human sexuality, and two members of our church each share the story of their family’s journey. These stories compel us to ask, ‘What if that were me?’ or ‘What if that were the person next to me in church?’ We also feature a Q&A on the LCA’s stance on homosexuality. This coverage is not comprehensive, but hopefully it will be a catalyst for respectful conversation on one of our church’s taboo topics.
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'Mum, Dad, I’m gay'
5
Homosexuality: what the LCA says
8
Re-formation today
9
Walk a mile in our shoes
10
Regulars 12
14
15
Heartland
4
Little church
12
Reel life
14
Go and Grow
15
Inside story
23
World in brief
26
Directory
27
Your voice (Letters)
28 29
Notices Coffee break
30
26
Even more, I hope it prompts us to pray often: for those in our church and world who feel the pain of exclusion, and that all of us, homosexual and heterosexual, ‘err on the side of helping hurting people, rather than on hurting helpless people’.
Lisa Our cover: from
iStock.com
JES U S I S G OD'S LOVE. HE G IVES U S NE W HE ARTS TO L AY AS IDE O UR OL D WAYS, TO B EL IE VE AND FOL LOW HIM, TO L IVE WI T H HIM E VERY DAY.
heartland
REV JOHN HENDERSON
Bishop Lutheran Church of Australia
THE TRUE SPIRIT OF RENE WAL People often ask me about Lutheran Renewal. What does the church think about it? How is the church going to respond to it?
One of my concerns as a church leader is that is we are forgetting our basics. Luther wrote the Catechism at a time of great stress and danger for the church, when people had forgotten their faith. They needed a reformation, a time of renewal and returning to the true faith.
The desire for renewal is hardly surprising in an age when individual fulfilment has become the most important thing in life. Naturally, we want more. That can be a good thing – we should want more of the So when people ask me about renewal, I say that things of God! The danger is that we put ourselves at renewal can be a good thing. The Reformation 500 the centre, demanding ever-greater proofs of our faith. years ago proves that. A number of our current church We can become spiritual ‘consumers’, leaders experienced revival in their own in much the same way as we are The danger is that faith as part of renewal movements. consumers in the world of daily work However, if a renewal movement and commerce. we put ourselves begins to go further than the Bible, Take baptism, for instance. Baptism is leading Christians to trust their own at the CENTRE, God’s binding commitment to us as his understanding and experience more demanding everchildren. It creates what it says: new than God’s promise and God’s working birth through water and the Spirit. This and if it makes us spiritual consumers greater proofs of is not just an experience, but most rather than believers, then it goes too our FAITH. importantly, it is a permanent relationship far. That would be idolatry, making created by our Heavenly Father. The a new god to place our hope and Catechism says that baptism ‘effects forgiveness of trust in, and forgetting the true God who sent his sins, delivers from death and the devil, and grants Son to die for us. eternal salvation to all who believe, as the Word and I pray that God does renew our church in the way that promise of God declare’. the writer to the Hebrews describes: ‘We must keep If, in seeking renewal, we were to start saying, ‘That’s our eyes on Jesus, who leads us and makes our faith complete. He endured the shame of being nailed to just not good enough; there must be more’, we would a cross, because he knew that later on he would be undermine trust in God’s work and God’s faithfulness. glad he did. Now he is seated at the right side of If we were to say that baptism isn’t complete without a God’s throne! So keep your mind on Jesus, who put second ‘filling’ of the Holy Spirit, and the gifts to prove up with many insults from sinners. Then you won’t get it, we would be telling God that he didn’t do the job discouraged and give up’ (Hebrews 12:1,2 CEV). properly. He had better do it again, but on our terms. When Lutherans look for renewal, we return to our original baptism, where God bound himself to us with a promise. That promise is the basis of our new life today and our hope for the future. Luther’s Small Catechism explains all this.
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The Lutheran NOVEMBER 2016
Note: you can find a useful resource on the LCA website. Go to www.lca.org.au, click on Resources, then scroll down to Doctrinal Statements & Theological Opinions, and look for G. The Lutheran Church of Australia and Charismatic Renewal.
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’ y a g I’m
Having a son or daugh ter ‘come ou t’ as homosexual is not something many parents expect or are prepared for – especially wi thin the church. How would you respond if this happened to you? One family shares the story of their journey since that day 20 years ago. What do you say when your child tells you, ‘I’m gay’? I still remember that day and the words I spoke; how I wish I could take them back, but their angry barbs found their mark. I remember He believed he was that face marked by fear, those hurting eyes, and the fragile heart ACCEPTABLE placed in my hands by someone I love. This is the one I wept for joy to God through when born; the one I taught to baptism on account for ride a bike, whose scraped knee of Christ, but felt I kissed, and whose trembling MARGINALISED hand I held while getting stitches. How quickly the years pass. Now in the life of we stand face-to-face and my child’s sense of peace, identity and the church. acceptance needs a response in real-time; in a moment my opportunity is gone. What do you say? That’s a question my family faced 20 years ago. We are not alone. That’s a question many congregational families have faced and will
continue to face in future. That’s a question the LCA faces beyond public statements made by bishops and theologians. This is my story. I tell it not because it is unique or particularly special, but because it gives voice to the unspoken; makes visible what we choose to keep invisible. My story is typical of Christian parents who respond to the news that the child they love and admire is gay. Maybe it will help other stories to be told, and memories to be healed, as we as church look for ways to stand together in face of a reality that will not go away. I told my son I didn’t believe him; I didn’t want to believe him. Much of what I knew about homosexuality I had read in books, or seen in movies. Then there was what I had learned in church: that God created people male and female for the purpose of reproducing the human race and established marriage as the proper setting; samesex relations are to be seen as a distortion of nature and prohibited by God. The Lutheran NOVEMBER 2016
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This was not my son. He didn’t fit that image of a homosexual. He was bright, talented, funny, caring, honest, ethical, a person of faith. If he thought he was gay, there must be a reason for his confused state. ‘When the right girl comes along’, I thought, ‘he will resolve it; he will be alright.’ As my denials continued, so did my efforts to explain it. Was it some recent trauma and depression that were the reason for his confused state? Or had he deliberately chosen to rebel against nature and God’s will? Or, as parents, had my wife and I unknowingly contributed to some perverted development of his sexuality? But we couldn’t realistically see where that had been the case. So we continued to search for explanations. We learned that there is more than one theory about the causes of homosexuality: genetic, hormonal, environmental, social. Each of these factors may contribute in varying degrees to the sexual orientation of a particular individual. Unfortunately, none of the theories agree sufficiently with each other to form anything that looks like a consensus on the subject – except, perhaps, that sexuality is a ‘given’ rather than a choice. So where do you go when you cannot deny it or explain it away? The next steps in our journey involved prayer and psychotherapy. As my son grew in awareness and acceptance of his sexual identity, as a Christian he also was acutely aware that in the church homosexuality was seen as something unacceptable to God. He believed he was acceptable to God through baptism on account of Christ, but felt marginalised in the life of the church and denied at the altar. He believed that God loves people unconditionally and offers change and renewal to those who come to him with humble and penitent hearts. But God did not change him. Neither did God’s people welcome him. So what did this experience do to his mind, heart, and spirit?
In the face of social shame and personal pain, impulses for acting out and the dark urges of suicide, we encouraged our son to seek counselling and psychological support. Yet, as we were soon to discover, counselling services and psychotherapy have long since been convinced that homosexuality is not an illness and there is no known treatment to change it. Certainly, behaviour can be changed or constrained towards celibacy, but the basic affective orientation and makeup of homosexuals is not changed. There is no fix. So therapy helped my son come to accept the reality of his being, thankfully, before the social shame and his growing inner alienation climaxed in any threatened premature death.
We would rather err on the side of HELPING hurting people than on hurting helpless people.
As parents, we faced two choices at this point, both involving some form of loss – if not death. One choice was to reject and separate from our child: treat him as an outcast, as if he were dead to us. That’s the sad choice many parents have taken and many congregations approve in relation to gay and lesbian members. However, this is not the choice we have taken. Ours was another choice: to die to our ignorance, prejudice, and misunderstandings. It’s a choice that has cost us in grief and loss. Gone is our nice tidy worldview, with black and white answers to complex human realities. Lost is a level of openness, support, and comfort within our church community. Lost is our security in a handful of Bible verses to justify our actions. Lost are
some hopes and dreams we held for our son’s ‘ordinary’ happiness in church and society. A final form of grief and loss has been the realisation that our pain and suffering were secondary to our son’s experiences. Now we choose to be supporters of the life God blessed us to bring into the world. Now, the acceptance of our gay son is leading to a celebration of his life. We are not there yet, and there is a sense of guilt and shame in finding ourselves in a time of muted acceptance. There is much unfolding beauty in his life, but our sense is that many in the LCA are not ready to hear it. Someone once said that the biggest problem in being gay is not the gayness, but the reaction of heterosexuals to it. Perhaps, one day, he will tell his story and people will draw the connections. That will be our public celebration. What do you say when your child tells you, ‘I’m gay’? We have not finished our journey yet, but our substance has clearly shifted there. Where you end up in your journey depends on what you think homosexuality is. Is it simply a conscious and defiant rebellion against God’s law and nature requiring repentance and forgiveness? Is it an illness like alcoholism or any another addiction that can be solved by behavioural correction? Is it a tragedy of nature, something never intended by God and contrary to his will? Is it another example of the effects of the fall: a condition for which the victim is not responsible and cannot be changed, but can never be called good? If so, what makes homosexuals less deserving of the compassion and support we give to others who innocently suffer in this
broken world? How might we respond? Is it right to grant homosexual couples a sanctioned relationship, recognised as legitimate by society? Would that be sufficient? Isn’t that the best we can or should do? But what if homosexual people are not a deviance from the norm, whom we feel sorry for and compensate for as best we can? Could homosexuality in fact be one of the infinite varieties in God’s created world? Is that what homosexuality is? Are we to celebrate that as a gift of God? For now these are still questions for my family, as well as many congregational families, and the LCA. We continue to search the Scriptures for what they do say and don’t say and we listen to the best available scientific research. As for me and my family, we believe we are called to live by faith and walk with risk in love. We would rather err on the side of helping hurting people than on hurting helpless people. And I pray to God that my son – a gentle and loving soul – won’t allow the ungodly treatment he has received from some of God’s misguided children to keep him from seeing the God who suffers all to seek after him. Name withheld
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Homosexuality : what the LCA says DO PEOPLE CHOOSE TO BE HOMOSEXUAL? When we think of ourselves as God’s created beings, we remember that God created us to share life. Included in our shared life is the desire for an intimate sharing with another person. For most people this is a desire for intimacy with a person of the opposite sex. For a minority it is a desire for intimacy with a person of the same sex. A homosexual preference can be strongly internalised, and there has been a long debate as to whether it is innate or learned unconsciously early in life. People do not generally choose to be homosexual. Others choose to experiment in their sexual life, and we may feel that current social standards encourage this.
IS IT A RESULT OF THE FALL? All people receive the blessings of God’s gift of sexuality but Genesis 3 shows how God’s good gifts have been marred by human sin. God’s people believe that the gift is enjoyed to the full when we follow his word and live faithfully. We are called to faithfulness in relationship, yet we are tempted towards unfaithfulness. There is tension between the right use of our sexuality, and the selfish use. If we agree that God created male and female to share intimately with one another, then we might view the inability to share sexually with the opposite gender as one of the losses caused by human sinfulness. However, our response to that reality is one of understanding and care, rather than of negative judgement.
CAN A HOMOSEXUAL PERSON BE ‘CURED’? Some have viewed homosexuality either as a disease or a perversion and have attempted to change people’s sexuality by psychological or spiritual programs. Such attempts might be (sometimes) well meant, but they are abusive and can contribute to incidents of self-harm and suicide. It is more helpful to respond pastorally, to help people understand that it is our relationship with God, rather than sexuality, that is the basis of human identity. Christians can support and guide each other to make healthy choices in how we express our sexuality. Jesus always made it his priority to show love for all people – meeting, speaking and sharing meals with them – without discrimination.
WHAT DOES THE LCA SAY ABOUT SAME-SEX MARRIAGE? Marriage is a divine order created by God for the good of humanity. The gift of marriage has three main parts: lifelong love and fidelity between husband and wife, the enjoyment of sexual intimacy within the context sanctioned by God, and the potential privilege and challenge of bearing and raising children. When a society, perhaps with the best of intentions, legalises committed same-sex relationships as marriage, it diminishes the uniqueness of the life-giving malefemale relationship which we believe a marriage properly is. The church acknowledges the right of the state to recognise civil unions between people of the same sex and to accord them full legal recognition and rights.
DOES A HOMOSEXUAL CH RISTIAN HAVE TO BE CELIBATE FOR ALL THEIR LIFE? All Christians need to seek Godpleasing choices about the way they live their lives. Homosexual Christians will seek God’s guidance for their life choices. Some are convinced that God’s will is that homosexuals live a celibate life and seek their life fulfilment without a life partner. They may see the celibate life as an opportunity to offer another form of Christian service. Others believe that God’s will allows them to express their sexual feelings in some form of intimacy, and may form a friendship in which they can do so. It is important to remember that there are many dimensions to intimacy and commitment, including care and support. There is spiritual and mental, emotional and social intimacy, as well as physical intimacy, and there are different expressions of physical intimacy. All of us should make responsible judgements about our sexuality, and be careful about making judgements regarding each other.
These answers were prepared by Pastor Jim Pietsch, who was commissioned by the Commission on Theological and Inter-Church Relations to prepare a set of studies to accompany the commission’s statements on Human Sexuality, released in 2015. His answers to this Q&A are informed by the LCA’s statement, but are not on behalf of the CTICR. These are intended to be an introduction to this conversation. For further exploration of the commission’s study, read their paper, ‘Human Sexuality: Three Key Issues’ in Section C at www.lca.org.au/dstos The set of study guides, including one titled ‘Sexuality and Homosexuality’, is available at www.lca.org.au/studyguides
Re-formation T O D A Y by GERALDINE HAWKES
As part of the lead-up to the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017, an ecumenical working party of Lutherans and Catholics has been planning a program of projects and events to jointly commemorate the occasion. One is a series of articles, written by Lutheran and Catholic authors from around Australia, to be published in both Lutheran and Catholic publications. The final piece in our series of six is by Geraldine Hawkes, Ecumenical Facilitator of the South Australian Council of Churches (SACC). She was also the first Catholic to hold the role of Executive Officer of the SACC.
It seems timely to be writing on the subject 'Re-formation today' as we journey through spring, towards summer. When I think of these months, I think of how our landscape in the southern parts of Australia is transformed, as rain and cloud give way to warmth and light. So it is also on the ecumenical journey, especially as we ponder 500 years since the Reformation, a time that radically changed the landscape of our ecclesial life. There are signs that the climate between us as Catholics and Lutherans is changing: that warmth The potential and light guide our journey together, ... is that our and that re-formation – or perhaps, structures, transformation – is possible. systems, When I think of the individuals practices and
from the time of the Reformation, and beyond, I give thanks for all processes may who, in seeking faithfulness to the be transformed gospel, drew attention to or acted to more clearly on aspects of our faith life together radiate the ... in which some of us may have been living in the shadows. I like to think light of Christ. that such insights were both offered and received in a spirit of faith, hope and love. However, I do wonder to what extent the internal disposition informed or inhibited gracious listening and learning. Today I am inspired by two movements, both of which invite us into a new disposition towards one another. The first is Receptive Ecumenism, which offers a fresh ecumenical methodology emphasising listening, learning and receptivity; about learning from others in order to learn about ourselves. It
requires openness to the Holy Spirit, and calls for a spirit of self-awareness, vulnerability and humility. The potential of Receptive Ecumenism is that our structures, systems, practices and processes may be transformed to more clearly radiate the warmth and light of Christ. The second source of inspiration comes from the person of Pope Francis. One example, pertinent to the marking of the Reformation, comes from his homily during the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity this year when he said that: ‘As Bishop of Rome and pastor of the Catholic Church, I want to ask for mercy and forgiveness for the behaviour of Catholics towards Christians of other Churches which has not reflected Gospel values. At the same time, I invite all Catholic brothers and sisters to forgive if they, today or in the past, have been offended by other Christians. We cannot cancel out what has happened, but we do not want to let the weight of past faults continue to contaminate our relationships. God’s mercy will renew our relationships ...’ [Reference http://www.news.va/en/news/pope-francishomily-for-christian-unity-vespers ] As we continue to traverse this landscape together, I feel encouraged that if our individual and our ecclesial dispositions can be imbued with self-awareness, humility, mercy and forgiveness, we together will be transformed, and the warmth and light of Christ will shine in our world. in e a ld Ge r k es Ha w
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