On May 26th a workshop, entitled "Mission & Ministry in the ELCIC: What's at Stake?", was held at St. Peter's Lutheran Church, Kitchener, Ontario.
The workshop, hosted by the Eastern Synod's Kitchener/Waterloo Conference, was intended "for delegates to the 2007 National Convention and for all other pastors, congregational leaders and members". The format of the workshop was to "spend a day with knowledgeable people" exploring the synodical local option motion recommended by the National Church Council for consideration at the 2007 National Convention. The "knowledgeable people" included National Bishop Ray Schultz, former and current staff members from Waterloo Lutheran Seminary, and various Eastern Synod pastors. Many of these people had participated in previous Caring Conversations events hosted by the Kitchener/Waterloo conference, a vehicle to move the church towards accepting same-sex blessings and the ordination of non-celibate homosexuals.
From the list "knowledgeable people" who were to guide the discussion there can be no doubt that this event was intended to promote support for the National Church Council's motion to come before this year's National Convention. This motion, which would be in conflict with this church's constitution and teaching, attempts to give synods the authority to make decisions on matters such as same-sex blessings. The following is a summary the impressions of some of the people who attended the workshop.
The first item on the agenda, a gathering 'worship' with Kitchener/Waterloo Conference Vice-Dean Jim Koellner presiding and St. Peter's Pastor Frank Haggarty preaching, provided an early portent of what was to come. Although Frank Haggarty was to be the preacher at worship, he relinquished the podium to his congregation's music director, Dr. Peter Nikiforuk. Nikiforuk, a gay in a long-term relationship, began to berate his congregation, St. Peter's, Kitchener because they had balked at passing a motion which would have allowed Pastor Frank Haggarty to marry him and his partner. He openly slammed Solid Ground's members and demanded that the church put a stop to their "hateful" work. He accused the church of allowing this small group of cruel, unChristian people ("a brood of vipers"), to take control of the work of the body. He told the clergy that they have power and are not using it as they should to provide for the needs of faithful Christian homosexuals that want the church's solemnization of their unions ("We are hopelessly behind the times - and the United Church!"). He called the pastors to ecclesiastical disobedience ("What are you waiting for?"). Bishop Schultz was sitting in front of one of us. He was touched on his shoulder and asked, "Why don't you stop this?" He did not even turn around. Subsequently, several of us spoke right out in the midst of the homily and demanded to know why this was being allowed and challenged that this was most inappropriate in Worship. One of us stood up and stated that as per the agenda we had come to a worship service and not to a political convention. Nikiforuk said that would come later and Haggarty, sitting on the side, said "This has to be done sometimes". Being told that we had no right to interrupt, to sit down and be quiet, several of us walked out of the 'service'.
From this point on, we became more and more aware that we were the marginalized, unwelcome group at this event. Several us could not sing or pray, nor more importantly commune with the group as we realized that we had no community with the others.
In the question period following Bishop Schultz's talk, "The 'Why' and the 'What' of NCC's Action", he indicated, in reference to Jesus' encounter with the Canaanite woman who asked for healing for her daughter, that Jesus was taught something by the Canaanite woman that day and, likewise, we need to be open to learning from others. In response to a request for a clarification of what it meant to be "in Mission", the bishop explained that Jesus had to live and minister within the cultural setting of his day, among Jews and foreigners. In so many ways, the culture around him was undesirable, certainly not the way he wished it would be. So he had to adapt, eating with sinners, tax collectors and prostitutes. There were lots of sinful things going on around him but he accepted them and altered his message to fit in that context.
The workshop session, "What's at stake: The Bible & the Lutheran Confessions", led by Drs. Harold Remus and Oscar Cole-Arnel focused on how we can interpret scripture in a way that responds to the needs of our culture today. Dr. Remus described the open letter from Pastor Ed Skutshek, President of Solid Ground, to Bishop Schultz as an uninformed, misguided letter and an indication of just how biblically illiterate Lutherans have become. In response to a question as to what we were to do with what the Scriptures say about homosexuality being sinful, Dr. Remus responded that St. Paul and those who lived in bible times knew nothing of homosexuality because it didn't exist. The Bible speaks only in terms of heterosexual/heterosexual relationships or a heterosexual having intercourse with another heterosexual of the same sex. They did not know of those who are born homosexual. They could not fathom two people of the same sex living in a long-term relationship.
Both 'leaders' made a lot of jokes about how we misinterpret Scripture, Luther's diarrhea of the pen, and the inadequacy of language that inhibited the writers of the Lutheran Confessions, as well as the ignorance of the people of centuries past.
Oscar Cole-Arnal's message dealt heavily with so much time wasted on the homosexual union blessings that we aren't out doing the real commission of fighting justice and social injustice issues which is what Jesus called us to do.
At the workshop session, "What's at stake for the ELCIC?", led by Bishop Schultz and Teddy Pope (NCC lay member from the Eastern Synod), when asked what would happen if the vote at the this year's National Convention would be against same sex blessings, Bishop Schultz said he could imagine that some synods and congregations would disobey - as some have in the States - and just go ahead anyway with blessing/marriage and ordaining gay pastors. We had the feeling that it really does not make any difference how the vote comes out...there will be same sex blessing somehow. We were really surprised when the national bishop stated that, "Christ was only crucified because he was too inclusive and allowed everybody into Christianity". We'll let you all analyze this one!
Their bottom line message from the day's proceedings was that even in our diversity there is no reason we cannot remain in unity. If we don't remain together, as the ELCIC, we clearly act against God's desire. There are two perfectly acceptable ways of interpreting God's Word. If we don't begin to serve our Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) brothers and sisters, we will lose our relevancy in our culture today.
We found this pre-convention gathering to be a horrific experience. We wondered if this event represented a foretaste of what the convention will be like? Despite all the revisionists' talk about tolerance, love, welcome, inclusion, and "celebrating diversity", we came away with the general impression that we are wasting our time if we think that those who are promoting same-sex blessings have any interest in what we believe. Despite the vote against same-sex blessings at our last (2005) Convention, the National Church Council feels that they have the right to administratively ram this down the peoples' throats.
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Reflections on the "Mission & Ministry in the ELCIC: What's at Stake?" workshop by the following members of the Eastern Synod who were present at the workshop:
Ginny Berg, Wellesley, Ontario (delegate to the National Convention)
Paul Hoffman, Stouffville, Ontario
Gerhard Schickedanz, Markham, Ontario (delegate to the National Convention)
Rosalynn Tubbe, Kitchener, Ontario (delegate to the National Convention)
