"DIGITAL MEDITATION"

+ (The editor mourns about Lambeth....)

The anti-gay endorsement by the majority of bishops at the Lambeth Conference has been painful for many of us in the Church. Not merely because of its obvious spirit of exclusion, not only because of its myopic reading of scripture, but also because of its particularity. It excluded some, and not others. Why being gay is worthy of rebuke by the bishops and being polygamous or divorced or capitalist is not, is simply beyond my understanding.

So the bishops made a cruel and ignorant decision. I simply look at the whole thing and tell myself it is not the first time that the bishops have chosen poorly. I frankly couldn't care less what the world-wide Anglican communion (whatever that means) says about gay people. The word of Christ rings clearly to me. And that word is not related to this particular decision at Lambeth.

the Gospel of Christ cannot be used politically. If it is, then it quickly ceases to be good news. I could reference the crusades, or slavery in U.S. history to support this. When the unusualness of a certain group of people (gay people in the case of Lambeth) are subjected to what seems a politically motivated beating, and the Gospel is the instrument of punishment, it cannot be good news. I mourn for what has happened.

And yet, nothing is really decided at Lambeth. The future belongs to the Spirit, and it will be the Spirit's movement in the Church that will create change. Pray for the Church, her pain, her hope, her glory.

Amen.

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