Homosexuality is legal in NZ. Homosexual marriages are licit. And the pressure on the church to crumble — because people are humiliated that they do not meet the standard of the church — is starting.
We were assured this would not happen. But it will. And this is one situation where the Anglicans are correct in their stand.
A homosexual man is taking the Anglican Bishop of Auckland to the Human Rights Tribunal after being rejected for training as a priest. A hearing begins today following a complaint from the man, who says he feels discriminated against because of his sexuality.
It is understood the man – who is in a sexual relationship with his partner – has wanted to enter the church’s training programme for priests for years. But after applying to enter after years of study, he was rejected by the Bishop Ross Bay, who approves entrants. Bishop Bay told One News last night that he was simply following the church’s doctrines. The man was rejected “by reason of the defendant not being chaste in terms of canons of the Anglican Church,” the bishop said.
That means that anyone wanting to become ordained needs to be in what the Anglican Church deems to be a chaste relationship – a marriage between a man and a woman or committed to a life of celibacy.
In a statement to the tribunal, the complainant says he “felt totally humiliated that I had spent six years of my life in study, for a process that I was not permitted to enter because I was a gay man and in a relationship”.
“My humiliation and disappointment continue to this day.”
Now, my response to this is… to quote that great defender of all things rainbow, Helen Clarke…. diddums. Every year, over 1000 young people, keen and educated, do health sciences year one — looking at around 400 places in medicine, dentistry and pharmacy. In short, most will be disappointed. When your children are sick, you don’t feel like getting up to help clean up their puke. You just do it.
The church has criteria for leadership. Not many meet them. I don’t: not because I’m single (I am, and I’m not living with anyone) but because I am divorced. These standards — which include maturity, sound doctrine, hospitality and being the husband of one wife are not negotiable because they are part of foundational doctrine, written by Paul and confirmed from the beginning of the church.
It would be like a Muslim or atheist demanding they be allowed to become a priest.
I have no doubt that the man who has taken this case is hurt. But getting hurt is an inevitable consequence of living long enough, and using the secular law to interfere with a church — in a nation with no established church — is yet another form of soft tyranny.
And as the ancients had to reject the abhorrent practices of the Canaanites, so we must reject those of our day.
9When you come into the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you must not learn to imitate the abhorrent practices of those nations. 10No one shall be found among you who makes a son or daughter pass through fire, or who practices divination, or is a soothsayer, or an augur, or a sorcerer, 11or one who casts spells, or who consults ghosts or spirits, or who seeks oracles from the dead. 12For whoever does these things is abhorrent to the LORD; it is because of such abhorrent practices that the LORD your God is driving them out before you. 13You must remain completely loyal to the LORD your God. 14Although these nations that you are about to dispossess do give heed to soothsayers and diviners, as for you, the LORD your God does not permit you to do so.
I can see the complaints…. Chris says homosexuality is abhorrent. Well. yes. It’s a sin. So is fornication, so all those ladies in church who are sleeping with their partners while considering themselves to be good little Christians (AKA Churchians) are also in sin. So is greed, corruption, worshipping money and gluttony. The church needs to speak out at times against such, and the church inevitably will have opposition.
1James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion: Greetings.
2My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of any kind, consider it nothing but joy, 3because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance; 4and let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing.
5If any of you is lacking in wisdom, ask God, who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and it will be given you. 6But ask in faith, never doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind; 7, 8for the doubter, being double-minded and unstable in every way, must not expect to receive anything from the Lord.
9Let the believer who is lowly boast in being raised up, 10and the rich in being brought low, because the rich will disappear like a flower in the field. 11For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the field; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. It is the same way with the rich; in the midst of a busy life, they will wither away.
12Blessed is anyone who endures temptation. Such a one has stood the test and will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him. 13No one, when tempted, should say, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one. 14But one is tempted by one’s own desire, being lured and enticed by it; 15then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and that sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death.
Now please note that these temptations come from within us. This should not make us feel good. We should have some shame, when we consider how our lusts, our greed, our pride, our cold-heartedness hurts others and is driven by our wishes for personal power, comfort, avoidance of discipline and the satisfaction of bodily desires.
The church demands that single men are chaste and celibate or single and not lustful — and it is a daily test for me as I would prefer to not be single. I may be old, but I’m not dead, the desires remain. But to take a partner unwisely and outside of remarriage would be profoundly damaging to the children I am raising. And I am not on this world for myself, but for others.
As a consequences, we do not act on our feelings. Instead we need to do what is our duty, even though our duty will inevitably lead to conflict with the perfumed morons live as if there is nothing outside the political bubble in the capital. We will be honoured not for doing what the world sees as appropriate, but for bearing witness to more sustainable, more righteous and more reasoned solutions to the problems of this world. And we will have to accept that our feelings may, as a consequence, by fairly unpleasant in the short-term. In the long-term, however, peace and joy can sneak in, because we have done our duty.