This Is Who We Are

Note: Anne Kybert is a member of St. Luke United Methodist Church on Montgomery Ave. The United Methodist Church recently took a vote with which most people in the local church disagree and she wrote this article to express her opinion.

It’s not often that a Christian denomination makes national news and if it does, it is usually for all the wrong reasons. I feared this might be the case for my church in the run up to the General Conference of the United Methodist Church back in February . It turned out my fears were well founded when a decision was narrowly made to more vigorously enforce a rule in its Discipline that “no self avowed practicing homosexual shall be ordained or appointed in the United Methodist Church”.

I had foolishly assumed that this rule had something to do with John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, but no it turns out this wording only entered the Discipline of the United Methodist Church in 1984, seemingly as a reaction to homosexuality becoming more acceptable in the US, or at least parts of it. This ruling caused controversy within the church from the outset. For decades the traditional wing, (which is powerful partly because it includes representatives from Methodist churches overseas), resisted the arguments from the more progressive delegates for the denomination to become more inclusive of LGBTQ people. Another Discipline rule in 1996 forbade United Methodist pastors from officiating at same sex commitment ceremonies. It was challenged increasingly over time, even after pastors lost their jobs for officiating at same sex weddings.

Earlier this year a Council of Bishops within the United Methodist Church, after long deliberation, made a last ditch effort to bring about unity. A structure was proposed, which would allow Methodist churches adhering to the discipline and those wishing to include LGBTQ people at all levels to be part of one United Methodist church. Sadly this is what was rejected by the traditionalists.

I say sadly, because for the most part, people at St Luke United Methodist Church, Bryn Mawr, PA, where I attend, were gutted when they heard the news. Did we want to belong to a church that had decided that homosexuality is incompatible with Christian doctrine? The initial reaction of some of us was “no”. This was an issue our own congregation had given a lot of thought to. Interestingly during the same week in June 2015 when same sex marriage became legal in the US, St Luke United Methodist Church made the decision to become a Reconciling Congregation. That decision made us part of Reconciling Ministries Network, which seeks the inclusion of all sexual orientations and genders in both the policies and practice of the United Methodist Church.

On the first Sunday after the General Conference decision in February, I entered church for the 10 am service with some trepidation. I was wondering what would be left of our small but mighty congregation, but that day everyone was there, including LGBTQ people. Our pastor David Tatgenhorst did not dodge the disappointing nature of the the decisions made at General Conference or the potentially difficult situation we were in as a denomination, but he made one thing clear: “This is who we are and we are not going back”.

Of course everyone is entitled to their own interpretation of scripture and there are passages in Leviticus and Romans for those looking for evidence in support of a more fundamentalist view. However to the best of my knowledge, Jesus didn’t say anything about homosexuality and doesn’t have much to say about matters of sexuality generally. This shouldn’t surprise us, as Jesus didn’t make judgements about groups of ordinary people. He made a point of spending time with those on the fringes of society, using his own example and generosity of spirit to influence individuals who had done wrong.

But for me even this in some ways misses the point. We have moved as a society from seeing homosexuality as some sort of illness or something deviant and therefore criminal, to seeing it as something that many people recognize in themselves often when they are very young. If we, as people of faith, believe that our sexuality is part of God’s gifts, then it is hard to accept that God would give some of us one sort of sexuality to enjoy and give another sort of sexuality to others that God would then require them to repress. I am not suggesting that there should be no limits when it comes to sexual morality, just that the same rules should apply whether we are talking about homosexual or heterosexual behavior.

On June 23rd 2019 St Luke United Methodist Church will be celebrating its fourth anniversary as a Reconciling Church. We have decided now is the time to make it more explicit by designing a banner with this theme for outside the church. It is a work in progress. We are now one of several Reconciling United Methodist Churches in the Philadelphia area and one of over a thousand nationwide. This is who we are and we aren’t going anywhere.