{"id":20262,"date":"2014-11-25T06:00:45","date_gmt":"2014-11-25T11:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?p=20262"},"modified":"2014-11-24T19:21:04","modified_gmt":"2014-11-25T00:21:04","slug":"evangelicals-take-part-in-vatican-marriage-conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/11\/evangelicals-take-part-in-vatican-marriage-conference\/","title":{"rendered":"Evangelicals take part in Vatican marriage conference"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Evangelicals, Pentecostalists, and even Mormons<\/a> took part in a recent Vatican conference on marriage, which was hosted by Pope Francis.\u00a0 Southern Baptist social ministries spokesman Russell Moore was an invited speaker.\u00a0 So was megachurch pastor Rick Warren, who was said to have turned the Roman Catholic meeting into a \u201crevivalist meeting.\u201d\u00a0 (Does anyone know if any Lutherans participated?)\u00a0 The Catholics gave the evangelicals a standing ovation.<\/p>\n

Do you think this was a good thing\u2013religious people of various stripes rallying in defense of marriage\u2013or a problematic and potentially dangerous\u00a0 bit of unionism?<\/p>\n

From Michelle Boorstein, Vatican opens conference on traditional marriage \u2013 The Washington Post<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Pope Francis Monday opened an unusual high-level interfaith conference to support traditional marriage, saying \u201cchildren have the right to grow up in a family with a father and a mother.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

The three-day \u201cComplementarity of Man and Woman\u201d conference includes global faith leaders including prominent U.S. evangelical pastors Rick Warren and Russell Moore, former Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom Jonathan Sacks and Anglican, Muslim, Pentecostal and Hindu leaders. For the first time, a top Mormon leader \u2013 Henry Eyring \u2013 is in official attendence at a Vatican conference.<\/p>\n

The conference in Rome comes a few weeks after Francis convened another event that garnered major attention for a very different reason: opening greater room to discuss the role of families with divorced and same-sex parents. That event made clear there is a great deal of debate even at the top of the Catholic Church about how to support traditional marriage while also considering ways to accept and embrace gays and lesbians.<\/p>\n

This week the focus is on what participants call a \u201ccrisis\u201d in traditional marriage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe now live in a culture of the temporary, in which more and more people are simply giving up on marriage as a public commitment. This revolution in manners and morals has often flown the flag of freedom, but in fact it has brought spiritual and material devastation to countless human beings, especially the poorest and most vulnerable,\u201d Francis said in opening the conference. \u201cChildren have a right to grow up in a family with a father and a mother capable of creating a suitable environment for the child\u2019s development and emotional maturity.\u201d<\/p>\n

The participants at this week\u2019s conference come primarily from the conservative side of the spectrum, people who are often outspoken critics of gay equality.Among them is Moore, perhaps the most visible public leader of the Southern Baptist Convention, who wrote earlier this month in explaining why a Baptist is going to talk with a Pope: \u201cAs one who has been charitably (I hope) critical of Pope Francis on more than one occasion.. I can hardly criticize from across the Tiber and then refuse to talk, when invited, about these matters,\u201d he wrote. \u201cHere\u2019s what I hope comes out of the meeting. I hope that this gathering of religious leaders can stand in solidarity on the common grace, creational mandate of marriage and family as necessary for human flourishing and social good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also attending are Dr. Eugene Rivers, a prominent Pentecostal minister from Boston and his wife, Dr. Jacqueline C. Rivers, who leads a research center on the black church.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

From Christianity Today:<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThere is always a danger in being the 28th speaker in a conference,\u201d said Rick Warren during his speech today at Pope Francis\u2019s marriage conference. \u201cWhat\u2019s left to say?\u201d<\/p>\n

Apparently plenty, as Warren\u2019s speech\u2014which he said he wrote from scratch the night before after yesterday\u2019s speakers covered his previously prepared main points\u2014was \u201cprobably the first time ever the synod hall resembled a revivalist meeting<\/a>,\u201d tweeted David Quinn, an Irish Catholic columnist. The Saddleback Church senior pastor reportedly received a standing ovation<\/a> following his remarks defending marriage between a man and a woman.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs Christians we seem to be known more for what we\u2019re against than what we\u2019re for. I want to change that<\/a>,\u201d said Warren. According to his prepared remarks obtained by CT, he explored why Hebrews 13:4 commands that \u201cmarriage is to be honored by everyone\u201d and laid out an \u201caction plan\u201d for conference attendees. In true evangelical form, his eight steps are in mostly alphabetical order:<\/p>\n

\n

Affirm the authority of God\u2019s word
\nBelieve what Jesus taught about marriage
\nCelebrate healthy marriages
\nDevelop small group courses to support marriage
\nEngage every media to promote marriage
\nFace attackers with joy and winsomeness
\nGive people confidence
\nTeach the purposes of marriage<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIt is a myth that we must give up biblical truth on sexuality and marriage in order to evangelize,\u201d said Warren in his conclusion, which noted how Saddleback recently baptized its 40,000th adult convert. \u201cIn the end we must be merciful to the fallen, show grace to struggling, and be patient with the doubting. But when God\u2019s Word is clear we must not\u2014and we cannot\u2014back up, back off, back down, back out, or backslide from the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberties Commission, also addressed the conference, acknowledging that the gathered audience came from different\u2014and potentially warring\u2014countries and represented a variety of faiths.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut all of us in this room share at least one thing in common,\u201d said Moore. \u201cWe recognize that marriage and family is a matter of public importance, not just of our various theological and ecclesial distinctive communities, since marriage is embedded in the creation order and is the means of human flourishing, not just the arena of individual human desires and appetites.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Evangelicals, Pentecostalists, and even Mormons took part in a recent Vatican conference on marriage, which was hosted by Pope Francis.\u00a0 Southern Baptist social ministries spokesman Russell Moore was an invited speaker.\u00a0 So was megachurch pastor Rick Warren, who was said to have turned the Roman Catholic meeting into a \u201crevivalist meeting.\u201d\u00a0 (Does anyone know if […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,16,47],"tags":[729,787,1381,2481,1919],"class_list":["post-20262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church","category-family","category-theology","tag-ecumenism","tag-evangelicalism","tag-marriage","tag-pope-francis","tag-roman-catholicism"],"yoast_head":"\nEvangelicals take part in Vatican marriage conference<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" 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