Tag Archives: church

Sin is Communal: Why Churches Need Better Responses for “I Have Been Sinned Against”

Posted on by

This is our fifth post in our series on sexual abuse. Don’t miss parts one, two, three, and four.

As we discuss sexual abuse, we think it is important to address the problem that churches rarely respond to victims well. Many Christians will focus solely on the importance of the abuser repenting and the victim forgiving. Abuse is treated as though it impacts identically two people: the abuser and the victim. But this isn’t the case. Recently, Joel Miller wrote an excellent piece highlighting the limitations of this paradigm by analyzing Josh Duggar’s public statement. Miller notes how Josh references himself over 20 times while only obliquely hinting at his victims twice. If abuse only impacts two people, talking about one’s self can seem a lot like taking personal responsibility. But abuse does not impact only the abuser and the abused.

When we recognize the communal reality of sin, we need a way for people to blow the whistle and say, “I’ve been sinned against!” A person who comes forward ought to be taken seriously and soberly. There is a problem in the community, and the Christians who gather together need to take action in order to seek God’s justice lived out through communal repentance. But that rarely, if ever, happens. Instead, anyone who tries to sound an alarm that he or she has been sinned against is treated with grave suspicion and often gets a number of admonishments. Accusations of sexual abuse go against the grain because they call into question the abuser’s character. Abuse is about lording power over another; abusers frequently pick out people in the community who are least likely to be believed if they can ever summon the courage to come forward.

As Christians, we cannot speak of sin’s potential to rupture our relationships with other people if we do not have space for victims to say “I have been sinned against.” Part of the reason why sexual abuse is so insidious is that abusers depend on forcing their victims into silence and removing their victims’ ability to object to what is happening. Even if a victim attempts to pursue a “Matthew 18” approach in an effort to stop the abuse, the victim will at some point need to go to the Church in order to say, “I have been sinned against.”

Churches encourage people to deal with their own personal sin by avoiding judging others. There are times and places when it is appropriate to tell people to remove the log from their own eye, yes. However, instances of sexual abuse should not be occasions for admonishing the abused to focus on his or her own sins. Well-meaning Christians have assumed far too often that a victim comes forward because he or she needs help forgiving the abuser. Really, victims come forward to help expose a larger problem affecting the entire community, and forgiveness is a lengthy process that cannot be taken lightly. A church that demands victims simply forgive their abusers is a church that absolves itself from its responsibility to all of its congregants.

Christians can be notorious in asking victims to identify whether their sin had any part in the abuse. Especially if the victim has a developed or developing female shape, an absurd number of Christians will respond by peppering her with questions like What were you wearing? Did you have anything to drink? Did you say or do anything that could have indicated that you were open to sex? Were you immodest in anyway? How was your hair styled? and other such nonsense. Asking people who have been seriously violated to sear their own consciences for any hint of wrongdoing is spiritual abuse. Christians who ask these questions are not interested in providing comfort; these questions are about placing blame.

Unfortunately, many pastors and biblical counselors are experts at adopting a patronizing tone when talking with survivors. They focus on how the survivor needs to forgive and repent for his or her own part lest the survivor cultivate “resentment.” We can’t think of a more effective strategy for ensuring that sexual abuse victims do in fact come to a place of resentment…of the church and the shoddy theology used to justify this pastoral approach.

Recognizing that sin is communal opens the door to a different pastoral approach. Communities that see the communal nature of sin will ask themselves questions like, “How have we contributed to this situation? What changes can we make so that this never happens again? How can we help other churches be more proactive in this area? What can be done to ensure that the allegations are investigated by appropriate legal authorities? How can we extend pastoral care to known victims? Are there other people who have been victimized? What can we do to hold the abuser accountable?”

There’s a tension for Christian communities. An abuser that goes to confession has taken a sacramental step towards his or her own healing. In traditions that do not practice sacramental confession, an abuser might share with an accountability partner which can also be a step toward healing. We are strong advocates that the seal of Confession must never be broken. Any person walking a path of repentance must be encouraged to continue his or her journey. We are constantly falling down and getting back up in order to grow towards Christ. A victim who seeks the church because he or she has been sinned against is calling attention to how the communal nature of sin directly impacts the community. Communities must be walking their paths of repentance together, changing policies and procedures that permit people to be victimized. Our churches must strive to be the most compassionate, the most loving, the most truthful, and the most hopeful communities in existence. But that can only happen when communities are constantly searching out their hearts so that God can shine light in every dark corner, including the culture of silence that permits abuse to continue.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

 

20 Things Christians Need to Stop Saying about Sexual Abuse

Posted on by

Hello readers! We are looking forward to writing regularly again. We’ve missed interacting with you all. Unfortunately, Sarah’s health has continued to decline. Because of this, it may be a while before we’re writing very consistently again.

Given recent items in the news, we have decided to spend some time talking about sexual abuse. It’s an important topic for the Church as a whole. We are disheartened to know that so many Christians feel woefully under-equipped and underprepared to respond appropriately to allegations of sexual abuse. Additionally, many Christians and non-Christians make strong assertions about how they think both celibacy and homosexuality relate to sexual abuse. We’ve shared previously that Sarah is a survivor of sexual abuse. We’d like to use today’s post to kick off a series related to sexual abuse, starting with 20 things Christians need to stop saying about this topic. Over the past few days, we have been engaged in many conversations about the molestation scandal within the Duggar family. While we are not talking about the Duggar family specifically, we’ve heard everything on this list either in response to this scandal or during Sarah’s process of healing from sexual abuse.

1. “Sexual abuse can’t happen in my church or in my family.” The problem with this statement is that yes, sexual abuse can happen in any environment. The vast majority of abusers are people known by the child. It’s much more likely that an abuser will be someone you know and trust than a shadowy figure lurking at the playground.

2. “But he (or she) is such a good Christian and contributes a lot to our community.” If you think a “good Christian” isn’t capable of sexually abusing a child, then you seriously underestimate the power of sin. Abuse happens because few people suspect those deemed by the community to be morally upright. Abusers are people who have regular access to children because they have earned a community’s trust.

3. “It was only touching. That’s not really abuse.” This is equivalent to saying something like, “It was only a knife. There’s no way your life was in danger during that mugging.” No one has the right to minimize someone else’s trauma. What is more, a person might be describing an incident of inappropriate touching as a way of testing whether you are a safe person to share with more openly about other kinds of unwelcome sexual advances. If you have never experienced unwanted sexual touching, you cannot know how frightening it is.

4. “But he’s only a teenager.” / “But he’s an old man who is probably senile.” / “But (insert reason here) and because of that, it shouldn’t be held against him (or her).” Making excuses because of a person’s age or ability level serves no one. Teenagers need to be held accountable for their actions. Those who are otherwise not mentally competent should be protected from finding themselves in situations where they would be at risk for behaving inappropriately. Focusing on the perpetrator and how responsible he/she is belittles the experience of the victim. The victim’s suffering is not contingent on the perpetrator’s age, motivation, sex, etc.

5. “Talking about this will bring scandal upon the Church and our family.” If you have an abuser lurking around because no one is willing to do anything about it, you already have scandal in your church. The victim is not the cause of scandal.

6. “But it happened so long ago.” Trauma is trauma, and the healing process rarely follows a nice, neat timeline. It’s easy to excuse the perpetrator by saying that he/she shouldn’t be held accountable for deeds done a decade ago when you aren’t the person having to live with the lasting consequences of those deeds. Saying that abuse shouldn’t matter because it happened years ago invalidates the experience of the victim.

7. “Everyone makes mistakes.” Abuse isn’t a mistake. It’s often the result of a careful process to select, groom, and gradually escalate episodes of inappropriate contact. Abuse is deliberate. And it’s a crime.

8. “But your abuser is welcome at God’s table. Who am I to exclude?” For the love of all things holy and sacred, do not use the sacred in this way. Would you have a person over for dinner if you knew that person was stealing substantive sums of money from you? Would you willfully see a person on a weekly basis if you knew that every time you saw that person he or she would be berating you with a steady stream of insults? We believe that different Christian traditions should be able to decide who can approach their communion tables, but if a sex offender receives communion as a member of a congregation that should never be held over the head of an abuse survivor. Don’t focus on who is receiving communion. Focus on promoting accountability within your faith community.

9. “You must have done something to cause this.” No, no, no, and a hundred times more, no. This kind of willful ignorance re-traumatizes the victim, prevents other people from coming forward, and allows an abuser to go unchecked for that much longer. No victim ever causes his or her abuse to happen.

10. “If he was touching your breasts, you must’ve been old enough to have breasts and be a temptation to him.” Too often, Christians will go to amazing lengths to contort what happened so that it follows a convenient narrative of the female “temptress”: we sin because we are tempted; the best way to avoid being sinned against is to avoid being a temptation. When considered against the dynamics of how abuse works this line of thinking is, once again, willful ignorance. We will say more about this topic in a future post. For now we’ll say that Christians are generally helpful when a person says, “I have sinned,” but unfortunately clueless when a person comes forward with, “I have been sinned against.”

11. “It couldn’t have happened that way. You’re exaggerating. You’re lying.” Sometimes it’s easier to accuse victims of lying than it is to wrestle with the implications of their stories. People can assert that a victim is lying when, in reality, they are saying, “That couldn’t have happened. I don’t believe that it happened. I don’t want to believe that it happened. That’s absolutely horrible, it makes me sick to my stomach, and I don’t know what to do. I’m not going to think about it.” Never accuse a person of lying when he/she confides in you about an experience of abuse. If you believe the person who is claiming to have been abused, almost every time you are believing the right person.

12. “If you were really abused and it really wasn’t your fault, don’t worry: God protected your purity.” This kind of response misrepresents Christianity on a fundamental level. The goal of being a Christian is not to remain physically untouched before marriage. The goal of practicing Christianity is fully embodying Christ and coming into a deeper union with God. This message tells the victim, “An untouched body before marriage matters more than anything, and I don’t know how to square that with what happened to you, so I’m just going to say that God fixed it.”

13. “You need to be more forgiving.” Christians tend to be full of advice for sexual abuse victims. Advice like this is manipulation. It’s code for, “You just need to get over it. I’m done listening to you.” Unfortunately when it comes to sexual abuse, “forgiveness” is often used to hide the allegations as quickly as possible so that the family and community don’t have to think about the truth anymore.

14. “If you report this, nothing will be done about it anyway.” Authorities can respond to sexual abuse allegations in many ways depending upon the situation. Oftentimes, filing a report with the police is a necessary first step for taking other actions. Victims should be able to report what happened to them to the police if they choose to do so. A Christian should never encourage someone to remain silent.

15. “If you report this, it will only drag your reputation through the mud.” This sentiment is another way to blame the victim. It highlights that reporting sexual abuse can be a humiliating process. The better option would be to work on improving the process and making it less painful instead of steering the victim away from reporting altogether.

16. “You need to have more compassion for his wife and children. If you report this, you’ll be causing them pain.” It’s distressing how many people can think about cases of childhood sexual abuse from the alleged perpetrator’s perspective. Yes, a perpetrator’s spouse and children will experience pain when the truth is revealed. But whose fault is that? It’s the fault of the perpetrator. Reporting abuse can prevent other people from being victimized. Any pain experienced by a perpetrator’s family due to reporting is an extension of the perpetrator’s own sin.

17. “Going to the authorities is spiteful and vengeful. Jesus doesn’t want us to be spiteful and vengeful.” No, going to the authorities is not necessarily about spite and vengeance. It’s about protecting others and seeking accountability. It is irresponsible to use Jesus’ teachings to manipulate a victim into shutting up.

18. “If your parents didn’t report the abuse but you report it yourself, social services will think your parents are the abusers and take you away from them. The state persecutes good Christian families.” And this is just another way to get victims to shut up. Failing to report abuse is a serious matter. Parents who are aware of abuse and don’t report it are breaking the law irrespective of whether they are Christians. The state is not going to pull children away from a family unless the abuser lives in the home. This is a ridiculous lie created for the purpose of scaring children into silence.

19. “God will judge based on truth. Do you think the police will judge better than God?” This sentiment places full responsibility back on the victim’s shoulders. This kind of counsel can help an abuser hide easily and avoid any kind of consequences. The kingdom of God is both “already” and “not yet.” Building the kingdom of God means dealing with injustice in the here and now as well as having faith in divine justice.

20. “You and your abuser are the same because we are all sinners.” This line of thinking is dangerous. It prevents victims from saying, “I have been sinned against.” It normalizes and equalizes abuse as “just another sin” and blames the victim in the process. It is true that we are all sinners, but this is not an appropriate response to someone who has experienced sexual abuse.

It is our hope that more Christians will start thinking about how to help the victim journey through the entirely messy healing process. If someone confides in you about being abused, consider responding with something like, “It really means a lot to me that you would trust me enough to tell me about this. Have you told anyone else? How can we work together to help make sure that you’re safe?”

Stay tuned this week for more installments in our series on sexual abuse.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

On celibacy, head covering, and all things countercultural

Posted on by

A reflection by Sarah

Why do people do the things that they do and choose the ways of life that they choose? Sometimes, there’s a clear story. Other times, the pathway is much more meandering with few direct signposts. Our journey with Christ is replete with experiences of God inviting us into different things, giving us gifts, and opening up to us unexpected possibilities.

During Lent this year, I took some time to step back and reflect on how intentionality is present in different aspects of my way of life. I think it’s important to examine our motives and our intentions regularly because life with God is dynamic. What was spiritually helpful two years ago might not be entirely beneficial now. We need time to discern what God might be calling us into in the here and now lest we find ourselves in a bit of a rut. God is calling us all to grow towards Christ.

Lindsey and I wrote an answer to the question “Why celibacy?” as our second blog post ever. We’re both asked the question constantly even now. Every time a person asks us why we’ve chosen celibacy, we have the opportunity to reflect anew on the life we committed to freely and joyously. My answer remains the same: I am celibate because I experience a strong sense of call to celibacy, and it brings me abundant joy. Living celibacy and blogging about celibacy with Lindsey has taught me a great deal about how other people perceive celibacy. Celibacy is countercultural, and one might argue that celibate partnership is countercultural in a different way than celibacy lived out in other contexts. Few people are accustomed to thinking about celibate vocations as diverse. Based on my early experiences of being drawn to celibacy, I’m not entirely surprised that as an adult I experience a call to this way of life. I committed to celibacy because I sensed that God was making this way of life possible for me.

But aside from vocation, I’ve experienced God opening up other things for me that would likely be deemed countercultural in American society. To be clear, I didn’t set out asking God to bless me to live a radically countercultural way of life. I wanted — and still want — to pursue Christ’s guidance and receive all of God’s provisions for my own journey, whatever those may be. There are parts of my life and my spirituality that would probably been culturally normative. And there are some parts that just seem a bit weird to others, including some members of my own Christian tradition.

My first encounter with head covering was interacting with Catholic nuns. I didn’t think any woman who wasn’t a nun covered her hair, and I had never thought much about it. The first time I realized that some Catholic lay women cover was in my early 20s when I attended services at one particular parish where a small group of women engaged in this spiritual practice. Immediately I found these women a bit brash and arrogant because they seemed interested in policing everyone else’s modesty. They would hand out pamphlets on modesty to uncovered women on a reasonably regular basis and shoot glances at people who were not dressed “properly” for church. I immediately associated these women with everything negative about overtly conservative forms of piety. They were the kind of people who always had an opinion about what rendered a Catholic especially devout or especially heretical and rarely hesitated in sharing their thoughts. There was no way ever that I would have wanted to be anything like these women. I didn’t see anything in their faith and practice that I wanted to emulate. Head covering was the last practice I ever wanted to adopt: I saw it as distracting, oppressive, unhealthily obsessive with proper devotion, and as an invitation to make one’s church politics visible.

Imagine my surprise when I got the first inkling that God might be opening head covering as a spiritual practice for me after my transition from Catholicism into my current Christian tradition. Whenever I experience a new idea that would — if followed through — case a major change in my life, I try not to jump to the conclusion that God is asking me act immediately. I know far too many people who have conveniently sensed “callings from God” that aligned tightly with their own desires, and have become miserable as a result of acting on these desires. I was confused because I didn’t actually want to start covering, so I kept an open mind that the idea might be coming from God and continued my regular spiritual practices as always.

I sat with this idea for a few months, and it never left. Over time, I came to realize that I might want to try covering. I eased into it slowly: I started wearing larger headbands to church to discern if there might be some spiritual benefit for me in covering. I noticed that since I never cover my head or wear large headbands when going about my daily life routine, wearing a covering at church or in my prayer corner helped me differentiate church from the rest of the world. I observed that it was easier for me to focus and viscerally encounter the truth that heaven meets earth during divine services. I saw my heart rejoicing with awareness that we exit time and space when we go to meet with Christ in prayer. I continued to bring all of my observations to God in times of private devotion, and I sensed God inviting me to make the practice of covering a regular part of my spiritual life.

While I felt peace about all of this, I noticed a huge amount of anxiety welling up inside of me at the same time because covering is easily noticeable. Even though a lot of women in my current Christian tradition practice covering, I still had some insecurity about whether I would stick out and cause distraction for others. Also, I didn’t know if other women who covered would recruit me to join some kind of effort toward spreading the practice to others in our community. I wondered if people would see me and think I had somehow willfully made myself a second-class citizen in church by consenting to the idea that women are somehow less than men. I thought about what my friends and acquaintances from other seasons in my life might think if they knew I was covering. How would friends who sat across from me in women’s studies courses respond? What lectures might I hear from Catholic friends at my former parish who robustly advocate against covering on any occasion? How would my friends who describe themselves readily as “liberated women” react? I even considered a question that I rarely ask myself anymore: “What would my parents think?” Despite all of these feelings and uncertainties, I decided to try it out anyway. I’ve been surprised and heartened that the practice of head covering continues to prove beneficial in my spiritual life.

When I’m talking to people about why I do what I do, I get just about as much variation in reactions from those asking me why I cover as I do from those asking me why I’m celibate. There are folks who expect me to respond with a blind appeal to one authority or another — something like “The Bible is clear that I should” or “Tradition has a consistent witness that I should.” These are the same kinds of answers people expect me to give when they ask me why I’m celibate. The real conversations begin happening when I explain the reasons for my choices. Occasionally a person who expects me to answer by appealing to authority will be challenged to consider alternate reasons for particular practices. Sometimes people ask me why I don’t answer first by appealing to authority. These folks occasionally go so far as to say that I clearly don’t respect the Bible or Tradition because I haven’t cited a certain verse or teaching as my first motivation. In these situations, I’ve received more than one lecture about why women should cover their heads and why gay people ought to be celibate. It seems odd to me that, for some people, unless your primary reason for making a particular choice is the Bible said so or Tradition clearly teaches, you can’t possibly be engaging in a practice in the right way. It’s bewildering to experience a person telling you that you’re just not committed to doing x, y, and z that you’ve made a voluntary decision to adopt because of God’s personal direction.

I don’t think every countercultural practice or way of life has to be engaged in with the intention of being countercultural. In fact, I think most of the time it’s better when a person adopts a practice because God has opened that practice up to that individual. I don’t think it’s necessarily good for a person to adopt a practice as an attempt to reject a cultural norm and shove it in other people’s faces. Taking on unusual practices in an effort to flee a cultural reality doesn’t always mean God will use that choice to bring one into a closer relationship with Christ.

It’s been interesting to live a few different realities that are countercultural alongside other realities that do fit into the box. I’m grateful for God’s immeasurable patience and good humor. And I pray that in all things God will continue to provide for me on my journey, whether God’s gifts are reasonably ordinary or delightfully personal in how they help me grow towards Christ.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

On Taking the Bible “Seriously”

Posted on by

When Christians disagree with each other on important theological questions, it can be easy to declare that the other person is ignorant, intellectually dishonest, or clearly missing the meaning of critical texts and simultaneously assert that you have come to the proper conclusion–end of story. Listening to the conversation about LGBT people in the church, it’s common for to hear some variations of “People who think you can be gay and Christian are twisting the Bible to say what they want it to say” or “Those who advocate for same-sex marriage are trying to throw 2000 years of Christian teaching out the window.” Rarely do these quick judgments prove true. In today’s post, we’d like to discuss why the claim “Any person who wants a same-sex marriage cannot possibly take the Bible seriously” is problematic.

Amid the polarized debate, the conclusion that “God can and does bless same-sex marriage” is sometimes referred to as a “Side A” or “LGBT affirming” position. Here at A Queer Calling, we purposefully abstain from debating the permissibility of same-sex marriage or whether gay sex is a sin. If you want to participate in those debates, there are plenty of other places on the internet to do so. This post is not an apologetic for a “Side A” position, but is rather an attempt to shift the conversation away from polemics. Agree or disagree with progressive Christians who support gay marriage, it is generally a good idea to avoid writing a person off as a rebel, a heretic, or a revisionist before actually attempting to see where that person’s argument is coming from.

Taking the Bible seriously means carefully considering its claims relative to one’s Christian tradition. Christians throughout the centuries have wrestled with the Scriptures, and certain passages are better known than others for leading to conflicting interpretations. Consider:

  • So Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.’ John 6:53-56
  • Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. 1 Corinthians 6:27-29
  • Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. Matthew 18:5-6
  • And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Matthew 16:18-19
  • But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23
  • Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet.  1 Timothy 2:11-12
  • Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean. Romans 14:13-14

Theologians within every Christian tradition can examine Scriptures, shake their heads, and wonder how seemingly intelligent people from other Christian traditions can miss theological truths that are blatantly obvious. Each Christian tradition offers guidance on how to interpret the Scriptures, and interpretation sometimes varies widely. Roman Catholics can read Matthew 16 and wonder how it’s possible for any Christian not to accept the Pope as Peter’s successor. Many Protestant traditions read John 6 as symbolic and allegorical. The United Church of Christ has a different interpretation of Scriptures than the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod. If the PCUSA held to identically the same Scriptural interpretation as the Roman Catholic Church, then these two bodies would likely be much closer to each other in doctrine. Oftentimes, Christians from different interpretative traditions can agree on which Scriptural texts apply to certain theological debates.

We know a lot of people who believe that God blesses same-sex marriages. The vast majority of these friends are LGBT Christians who came to their conclusions only after devoting themselves to rigorous study and prayer about what the Bible teaches about sexuality, relationships, marriage, and the human condition. Whether one agrees or disagrees with their conclusions, it’s neither helpful nor fair to assert that these people have not considered what the Bible says. Many have turned to Scriptural interpretation tools within their Christian tradition in order to wrestle meaningfully with relevant texts.

As we have traveled on our own journeys with faith and sexuality, we’ve been blessed to meet so many friends searching the Scriptures using the light of their Christian traditions. Is Genesis 19, Leviticus 18 and 20, Romans 1, 1 Corinthians 6, and 1 Timothy 1 the right textual corpus to use when discerning one’s sexual ethic? What did Jesus say about marriage? How do the Scriptures bear witness to marriage? Where can we look in the Bible to discern what God wants for married people? What does the Bible say about gender and gender roles? What do we learn if we search the text for all instances of the words “sexual immorality”? Are there places where Christ surprised people by how he responded to those in sexual sin? How have the Scriptures been used to defend human sinfulness, particularly as it relates to slavery and misogyny? What is the historical context around particular verses? Are there parallel accounts in the Scriptures that can provide additional information? How has my Christian tradition understood celibacy? Which Biblical commentaries are accepted within my Christian tradition? How does reading alternate translations challenge my understanding of the texts? How does Christ love the Church? How do the commitments people make to one another mirror Christ’s love to the Church? It would be difficult to catalogue all of the thoughtful questions raised by friends who have concluded that the Bible is silent on the topic of loving, committed, monogamous, lifelong same-sex relationships.

We also know a lot of people who believe that the church should not bless same-sex relationships as marriages. Many of these friends belong to Christian traditions that clearly proclaim marriage is a relationship between a man and a woman. For people holding this viewpoint, what benefit is there in talking with a Christian who believes that God can bless same-sex marriages? Why is this point of view worthy of any respect? People ask us this almost weekly. First, the Bible is most living and active when one searches the Scriptures to guide one’s own life. Trying to live out one’s convictions means going beyond hypothetical scenarios. The Bible can speak to us when we approach readings by asking questions and seeking illumination from the Holy Spirit. Discerning one’s sexual ethic or vocation necessitates asking a lot of questions. Second, listening to a person from a different Christian tradition can give you insights into your own tradition. Call us nuts, but some of the best questions we engage in involve people in different Christian traditions. Theological thinking works differently across various traditions. Seeing another’s theological approach can challenge us to explore our own tradition more fully. Third, developing relationships with other Christians can provide mutual aid and support. Even if you think that a person is seriously theologically mistaken on one issue, do you want to go so far as to say that person doesn’t have a relationship with Christ at all? Asserting that any person who advocates for gay marriage does not take the Bible seriously comes close to saying that person does not value growing in Christ. Even across our most vigorous disagreements, as Christians we should hope that the Holy Spirit is at work in everyone’s lives. It’s possible to believe that a person is wrong while still respecting the intellectual processes that person has used to reach his or her current conclusions. We all are works in progress, relying on Christ as the good shepherd to lead us.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

Lent, a Time of Pilgrimage

Posted on by

Today, many Christians around the world are marking the start of Lent by observing Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday is Western in its liturgical origins. Eastern rite Christians start Lent by observing Forgiveness Sunday. No matter your liturgical heritage, Lent is a time of pilgrimage.

Every year, we approach Lent by considering what it means for us to journey towards Easter. Where are we now? Where might God be calling us next? Is Lent this year a time of moving or a time of staying still? No two Lenten seasons are ever the same. Yet, the two of us always experience Lent as a fertile time for spiritual growth.

For us, Lent is about being in a community where we prepare ourselves to encounter Easter. We look for ways to strengthen our shared spiritual life and dive more deeply into a community’s spiritual life. Lent has a rhythm of prayer, fasting, and alms giving. We discuss how we want to pray together and whether we want to commit to attending additional church services during the Lenten season. We love how Lent affords us more opportunities to gather with our broader church family. Living and eating together means that we typically take on the same fasting rule as much as we are able. Additionally, our church observes a collective fasting rule for when we eat together. We’ve belonged to many churches that take time to eat together during Lent, and we cherish how eating food together creates atmospheres of fellowship. Alms giving means different things to various people. Typically we choose to take on elements of shared service together.

Lent is also a time where we pray prayers that almost seem too big to pray at other times of year. We are preparing to encounter Christ in his passion, death, and resurrection. Who can predict what God will do? We pray for the grace to see our own sinfulness clearly, to align our lives more fully with how God intends us to live, and to proclaim the good news of Christ joyously. The rhythm of Lent gives us time and space to encounter God glorified while simultaneously searching our hearts.

This year, we find ourselves approaching Lent feeling a bit overwhelmed by possibilities. We have committed to attending a new local parish. We have adopted an adorable chocolate lab, Gemma, in hopes of training her to be a balance dog for Sarah. We are sitting on a mountain of prayer requests known fully by God alone. And we’re listening, hoping, and pleading to see what comes next. Lent has arrived once again. Where will we be when we proclaim the joy of the Resurrection?

Lent has many of those “thin places” where God seems quicker to act than we could possibly imagine. While it is a season of penance and acknowledgement of our mortality, it is also a season that brings excitement in unusual ways. We enter into Lent not knowing what bits of mystery God will help us to see more clearly. Even when neither of us expects it, we learn that God enters into our lives quietly and softly. Undertaking our Lenten efforts in community means that we open ourselves to see other people and ourselves in new light. We find that we’re more ready to listen to other people’s spiritual journeys and perhaps even take on a spiritual discipline that first strikes as as the antithesis of our spirituality. God can use the Lenten season to teach us lessons that we didn’t even know we needed to learn. Our Lenten efforts can help us leave time behind and tread upon holy ground. Lent is a time where communal and personal practices blur. One mark of a good Lent is when everyone in the community can point to specific places of personal spiritual growth.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on the Lenten pilgrimage. No matter what Lent looks like for you this specific season, we’re happy to pray for you. May Christ go with you, guiding and directing your steps.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.