This is what you may have read recently in a newspaper or magazine: “Two large and influential Episcopal parishes in Virginia voted overwhelmingly on Sunday to leave the Episcopal Church and to affiliate with the Anglican Archbishop of Nigeria, a leader in a churchwide fight against homosexuality.”
This is what you did not read, though the events were played out in large numbers of homes throughout the nation:
“Two righteous and devoted parents in Florida (or Idaho or Kansas), Kenneth and Margaret, voted overwhelmingly on Sunday (or Friday or Wednesday) to disown their seventeen year-old son Mark in consequence of their principled commitment to the fight against homosexuality.
“The day after Mark confessed to his parents that he was gay and had been aware of that fact for at least nine years, Mark’s belongings were placed on the front porch, including his guitar, his Eagle Scout award and his stamp collection. ‘We will not give shelter to abomination,’ his father told him. ‘If you repent and turn from Satan to the Lord, we will welcome you back into the family. But until then, you are not ours.’
“Neighbors described young Mark as looking downcast as he piled his belongings into a friend’s restored ‘76 Chevy Impala.”
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If our reporter were able to follow Mark and give us occasional updates, we might read this. “Mark subsequently discovered a larger family, a community that took him in and gave him love, self-esteem, good role models and support, helping him create a life of dignity and accomplishment. He and his partner attend a welcoming Episcopal church in their neighborhood.”
Or, our reporter might possibly give us this bit of news. “Four years later, after a series of bad breaks, disappointing relationships and alcohol problems, Mark committed suicide. At the funeral, held not in the church but in a funeral home, Mark’s father quoted the well-known scripture, ‘The wages of sin is death.’”
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The ripping apart of churches over the issue of homosexuality is a sad thing to see. But it pales in comparison to the ripping apart of families. We look to our religious leaders for guidance. When they condemn our children, we feel we must condemn them as well. When they excommunicate our children, we feel our families must do the same.
What if the One to whom all churches are dedicated grieves mightily at these divisions?
What if we all—churches and families alike—remembered that, in the words of Rabbi Harold Kushner, “The task of any religion is to teach us whom we’re required to love, not whom we’re entitled to hate.”
What if we actually used the great power of all our religions not to divide, but to unite? What a headline that would make!
Source: http://www.ArticlePros.com/author.php?Carol Lynn Pearson
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