All Are Welcome

What say you at the judgment seat of Christ?

I’ve been wrong in the past and I will be likely wrong in the future.  I am not thankful about that but being wrong is not a bad thing.  It is often just an indication of a need for clarification and understanding.

When I was young I was often wrong—as I’m sure many of you were.  I didn’t understand lots of things; what my father did all day at his job, why my high school athletic program was so poor, or why I cried when my favorite dog died but not when my best friend did.

People are eager to set us straight about how things are—even if they don’t really know any better than we do, they weigh-in with their opinions no matter how right or wrong they may be. What I have learned about opinions—and right and wrongness—is this, when things get personal all bets are off regarding wrong and right.

My father and mother were bigots for most of their lives.  They didn’t like Catholics or people of other faiths, had no respect for people of color, and knew that homosexuals had chosen the wrong life-style.  But when Sol, a Jewish co-worker asked my father to be a character witness at his divorce hearing dad readily agreed.  When mom baked pies for us at home she always make an extra for the black janitor at the school where she taught, and when the son of a neighbor contracted AIDs and died they both volunteered at the Gay Pride clothes distribution center.  For them things became personal and that overcame the bigotry with which they had grown-up.

My Christian faith is on full display in our Book of Common Prayer. I believe that our duty to our neighbors is to love them as ourselves, and to do to others as we wish them to do to us.   I believe that God has been revealed to us by his Son as love, and it is our duty to follow Jesus; to work, pray, and give for the spread of the kingdom of God.

To do this I believe that the Church must be a big tent into which we welcome all people regardless of race, creed, gender, or sexual orientation—erring always on the side of inclusion.

At our General Convention this summer the Church will once again take up discussion of topics of same-sex marriage and the rights of LGBT people to receive Sacraments in our Church. Do not be shocked to read about our denomination in the news in the coming weeks. Many wish we would take our conversation and go away and stop talking about such things. But God is not about exclusion—He is a God of inclusion.

I may be wrong again.  When I appear before the judgment seat of Christ I may learn God was not in favor of same-sex marriage—that God did not want us to welcome all people.  But for me now, I will err on the side of being a welcoming priest—offering full acceptance of Christian LGBT persons and couples into the church.  All are welcome!

Peace,

Father Mark+