My back, arms, butt all ache. Too much sitting, too much typing, too much tension.
My heart aches. Too much anguish.
Wonderful morning worship–read all about it here. We heard loud and clear: If we don’t declare murderers and racists incompatible with Christian teaching, it’s time to stop declaring homosexuality incompatible with Christian teaching.
The message and music lead us to praise God, to love each other.
And then the delegates go into their legislative committees and . . . reports say that the massive block voting by those whose goal is to purify the church, both in doctrine and in sex, not only vote to keep all discriminatory language in our Book of Discipline but also to mandate set and severe penalties for any clergy who, out of conscience, step out of line where same-sex marriage is concerned.
Apparently, murders and racism are still not a problem. But being born not fitting the absolutes of the gender binary or supporting those in that community is. Sigh.
OK, I’m exaggerating. A bit. I had a long interview this morning with someone who sits on the committee that deals with the sexuality issues. As soon as the interview is posted, I’ll link to it. For now, know it was one discouraging recital after another. What really got to him was that his sub-committee actually voted down a petition that would seek to protect the most vulnerable of our youth: the GLBTQ kids.
Yes, they voted it down.
Thanks be to God, and because of his passion and determination, it came to the floor of the larger committee and ended up passing there, but by a such a slim margin that this still has to go to the floor at a plenary session.
Can you believe that? We are so dysfunctional that we can’t even agree across the board and with open hearts to care for the least among us.
Time to get a bit to eat. The team here still needs to record a “bantering” podcast this evening as we try to recap together the wildness of this week.
And I have a 6:30 am meeting tomorrow morning to start yet another long day.
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