What's he on about now?

In case the articles, essays and opinions throughtout this site just weren't enough for you, here's my online diary (a.k.a. 'blog'). It's as close as you'll come to the inside of my head, so don't say I didn't warn you
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   Tuesday, March 13, 2007

   CHURCHY GOODNESS!

Now any longtime reader knows that I'm quite hard on the Christian churches
--
can't
imagine
why
--
but I'm always strive to be fair, which is why I was so thrilled by two stories today.

First, I chatted on the phone today with Rev. Shawn Sanford Beck, an Anglican priest in Saskatoon who will have his ministry license revoked at the end of this month. Rev. Beck believed that denying gay couples the rite of marriage was "theologically problematic and fundamentally unjust." The bishop ordered him to recant and Beck has refused.

This afternoon, Beck explained to me how this stance was completely consistent with the work that he's done in Saskatoon's poor and Aboriginal communities. He still has a teaching job and his wife works with the food bank so, he says, they'll continue to "live simply" and get by. He was low-key and laid-back throughout the conversation. I told him how honoured I was by his support. I'm not sure I could be that brave in supporting a minority I have no connection with -- what a fantastic person.

But bravery can come from numbers and the second story today comes from the 30-million members of National Association of Evangelicals. Having recently weathered the loss of their hypocrite leader, the NAE have apparently reexamined their stance on a number of issues. Today, they publicly condemned the US government's use of torture while recently reaffirming a commitment to addressing the global warming issue, or what they sweetly call "creation care" -- this is a trend that began last fall but the NAE's involvement marks a big step forward.

Amusingly, the right-wing leaders of the other Christian groups are now freaking out over such disobedience, with a letter to the NAE warning that the global warming debate will "shift the emphasis away from...sexual abstinence and morality," leading (oh, of course) to mass abortions and infanticide. Jerry Falwell even calls the climate discussion "a tool of Satan" used by his usual laundry list of "liberal politicians, radical environmentalists, liberal clergy, Hollywood and pseudo-scientists."

No mention of gay men and lesbians, which is odd since we were (oh, of course) responsible for 9/11. I guess even sodomites can't be responsible for every disaster but what do I know? I'm working for the Jews.

Labels: fab, homo-a-go-go, politics, religion, repair