Christian Brethern and Discrimination, update :: 1

Following from my previous post.

An update on the alleged discrimitation by the Brethren run camp at Phillip Island by the ABC

The Member of 'Way out' have just given evidence::

Under the Equal Opportunity Act, some church groups are allowed to discriminate based on their religious beliefs.
But the Policy Director for the Human Rights Law Resource Centre, Rachel Ball, says all groups should be treated equally.
"The Equal Opportunity Act shouldn't contain permanent exception for a particular groups," she said.
"All groups should be subject to the same process, where if they want to discriminate, they need to justify why they need to discriminate in the case and provide a reasonable explanation for that."

I'm looking forward to reading the Brethren's defence...

Christian Brethren and discrimination

Spotted this one on the local ABC news.

A Victorian gay youth group is taking legal action against the Christian Brethren Church alleging discrimination. The suicide prevention group, WayOut, says it was barred from hiring the church's camp grounds on Phillip Island in 2007. The group believes the church refused to do business because of its stance on homosexuality. Under the Equal Opportunity Act, discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is against the law, but some exemptions exist for religious organisations. The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) will hear the discrimination complaint today. Associate Professor Anne Mitchell from the Australian Research Centre for Sex, Health and Society says the camps are used to give children a break from homophobia. "Its somewhat ironic that in the process they experienced what we say is further discrimination." she said.

 I'm following this for a few reason. Its just down the road. I've stayed at there camp sites a number of time, they are excellent.
How a strong evangelical organisation is to navigate this will be revealing. It is interesting that the government is to enforce 'non discrimination.' I would think that Jesus would be non discriminatory. Must be something deeper...

The Sex question

 
The next question which Mclaren tackels in his recent book 'A New Kind of Christianity' is the 'Sex Question'.

I've always found that Mclaren skirts around the question reading his literature as well as listening to his podcasts.
In the book, I found his arguments regarding sexuality compelling for a greater need of acceptance with those different in sexual orientation than ourselves. What I find is frustrating once we come to the same conclusion as Mclaren is what do we do with it our new understanding....

Some of the things that I thought compelling::

-What do we do with people who are born with intersexuality? Children born with male and female organs?
- What do we do with people who are born with Klinefelter's syndrome? They have XXY chromosomes rather than XY or XX chromosomes.

-"Jesus' treatment of the marginalised and stigmatised requires us to question the conventional approach (To those of a different sexual orientation). We have many examples of Jesus crossing boundaries to include outcasts and sinners, and not a single example of Jesus crossing his arms and refusing to do so."

 So what would Jesus do? I think Mclaren answers this with the above quote.
-Sexualtiy had changed in the last 50 years
-homosexual sexual problems seem to be highlighted in the  Church yet heterosexual issues are just as rampant. Mclaren gives two good pages of examples on this one.
-The venom has gone out a lot of Christians regarding this topic which a larger percentage of congregations not having any issues with homosexuality.

"Love the Sinner....

My good friend Scott White has given good preachy tongue lashing to the term
"Love the sinner hate the sin" especially in regards to homosexuality:

This statement is so intrinsically flawed particularly in its application to homosexuality that it deserves some treatment. So in good ‘sermon’ mode here’s 3 simple points to get us thinking. (else this will end up being a very long post).

So go over and check out his post....

Kirby, speaks about homosexuality at the Parliament of World Religons

An interesting speaker at the Parliament of World Religions was Michael Kirby, former Australian high court judge. Kirby is an interesting choice because of his own homosexuality as well as his position within the Australian legal system.

Quoting from the age::

He urged religious people to read biblical texts in the context in which they were written, saying his 35 years as

a judge had taught him the importance of analysing words.

''You cannot take words out of context. You cannot take words in isolation … especially holy books that are written in terms of parables and in terms that are often poetic,'' he said.

Mr Kirby said Leviticus 20:13 was usually cited by Christians who condemned homosexuality, yet other passages of Leviticus that condemned men and women to death for adultery were no longer taken literally.

''There are many theologians now who say we have to re-read this, we have to read it in context. You've got to read it in the context of adultery being a death sentence for straight people,'' he said.

''Why don't all those people who are being nasty in religions to gays ever quote verse 10 [condemning adulterers to death]? If we are going back to the rules in Leviticus, we've got to be neutral and we've got to raise them all.''

He also went on to quote scientific studies that there was a 'Genetic' component to sexual orientation.

'If it's genetic, it means it is part of a great design,'' he said. ''In the end, in a battle between interpretations of scripture and science, science will always win.''

I'm not sure about the last quote. I see it problematic for there are many genetic issues facing humans. But yes Homosexuality does face bigotry unlike any human genetic disposition, if that is the point he is making. (I would like to have seen the full transcript for this)

Overall I think Mr Kirby is right. We as Christians have read the scriptures selectively especially in relation to sexuality. When overall Jesus spoke more about the dangers and corruption of money...

NT Wright's spin on Homosexuality

I've been giving N.T. Wright a bit of a big wrap lately on the blog. Interestingly he has written a piece a few days ago on his position on homosexuality, at the Times online.

"Jesus’s own stern denunciation of sexual immorality would certainly have carried, to his hearers, a clear implied rejection of all sexual behavior outside heterosexual monogamy. This isn’t a matter of “private response to Scripture” but of the uniform teaching of the whole Bible, of Jesus himself, and of the entire Christian tradition. "

A few thoughts, on the whole article

• loved his description of the issues as 'a slow moving train crash" for the anglicans.
• This probably isn't an emergent position. I thought that he may have taken a more neutral response.
  
• N.T. appears to have a really wanted the anglican community to stick together.