I’m sure that this is positive in its own way. My standpoint is that this is a lot different — perhaps even irrelevant — to civil rights laws.

Our laws by definition have to include everyone. In principle, at least, everyone is supposed to be treated equally, even if they’re despised by the rest of society.

A religious organization, on the other hand, is by definition exclusive. It doesn’t have to include anyone it doesn’t want to. You have to accept a specific set of beliefs in order to belong.

We have an obligation to make our laws reflect the principles on which they were founded. But if a church (or synagogue or ashram or mosque etc.) wants to believe that Leviticus 18:22 is one of its fundamental principles, that’s their right.

It’s just like a model railroad club can mandate the use of S-gauge trains instead of the HO scale as a requirement of membership. (Yes, I had to look that up!) The HO-scalers can wail and gnash their teeth, insisting that their way is just as good and accept whatever half-measures they can get from the S-gaugers. Or they can just start their own club where they won’t have to beg for equality from anybody.

Maybe that’s a little simplistic — you can’t just start another Catholic Church — but it illustrates my point: The efforts by religious gays to gain acceptance is a purely human phenomenon. It is a way to get other people to agree with their existing interpretations of their god’s will or their scriptures’ meaning.

And by continually petitioning their fellow human beings for acceptance, they place those human beings on an undeserved pedestal of power, as if their opinion could somehow validate religious beliefs that religious gays obviously hold already.

I could go on and on. But what seems to me is that gay Catholics just want to be part of the Catholic church, a human creation. Gay Mormons want the same from the Mormon church, another human creation. The Lutheran church (named for a human!) is yet another human creation.

So no matter how strongly held or fervent their beliefs, religious gays are really fighting for acceptance from human beings who are no better than they are. And because they want to be a part of a human institution — a church — they grovel at the feet of those who control it.

And that, Hans, is why I just can’t care that this latest move by the Lutherans is positive. It very well may be, for gay Lutherans. I’m not trying to be a dick. I’m really not. I’m just one of those gay people who’s been chewed up and spit out by religion and is much happier without it. So I guess I’m biased. And I guess that’s why I feel so sorry for those gay Lutherans.

I understand your sentiment completely and I’m not about to gush over a baby-step towards acceptance, but I still view it as a positive. This isn’t something that glbt Lutherans should be content with, but it’s a step closer. It might be a small victory, but a victory nonetheless.

From a legal/legislative standpoint I’m far less forgiving. To hell with civil unions, I want full and equal rights recognized by the state and I want them now. Religious institutions are a different game, though. You can’t legally challenge their points of view with very few exceptions, such as the Mormons overstepping into the political arena on Prop 8. Getting people to change the way that they’ve been interpreting a book for hundreds of years is a little more difficult than mounting a legal challenge to a discriminatory law.

I’m a little more accustomed to seeing religious leaders rail against us godless heathens. The Mormons will excommunicate people for merely having gay tendencies and not begging jesus and zombie-Joseph Smith to “fix” them (my family’s reunions are interesting). I understand where you’re coming from, but for me, to see the Lutherans actually wanting their openly glbt members to stick around and be part of their community is a sentiment from a religious institution that I’m just not used to seeing.

Don’t worry — as an anti-clerical agnostic, I hardly take it personally :-)

Corey

I suppose we’re coming from opposite points of view. You and Hans feel that this is a form of progress, while at best, I view this as a way for gays to be considered slightly less unequal by their fellow human beings.

You wrote:

A majority of the task force feels that partnered gays and lesbians should be allowed to become pastors. However, they don’t think this can be done without some way to tell who is “partnered” for life… The only way to do this is to make a publicly-accountable procedure, involving some kind of ceremony and registry, so that the members of the church know that it is for real.

Call me crazy, but I’m pretty sure that something like that already exists. It’s called “marriage.”

I really don’t mean to be snarky — really — but I still can’t help feeling sad for these gay Lutherans submitting themselves to judgment by people literally acting “holier than thou.” Holiness, I might add, that derives from nothing more than being born heterosexual.

They’re just begging for acceptance, and for no good reason that I can think of. If their faith tells them that their god does not consider them “sinful,” then why do they need buy-in from people? Is their god the center of their faith, or is it the human beings within the faith? If it’s their god, then no problem — they’re free to worship their god any way they want. But if it’s the acceptance of human beings they’re really worried about, then their pathetic supplication gets them what they deserve: degradation and table scraps.

I’m sorry I can’t take a more affirming view of this. I hope you don’t take this personally.