I don't know any LGBT friendly Southern Baptist Churches. I don't know any openly gay Southern Baptists. I think that would be hard to pull off.
But I do know openly gay Catholics. The posturing in this thread is at odds with reality.
Sure there are gay "catholics" but they would be excommunicated as they are disregarding papal authority and living in death sins. Just because you can find them is meaningless to the overall statement Josh made. Those catholics are not in good standing with their authority structure by virtue of the church rulings. Now can some priest, or even bishop give them communion? sure... so can a satanist. Doesn't make them actually part of the catholic church.
To show you the ridiculousness of this... What would we call a Mennonite who started a conservative Mennonite church with all the trappings of the Conservative but affirmed and supported LGBTQ in their own church as members and eligible for all roles? Would we call that church conservative? I would say that the Catholics who submit to the papal authority would look at them likewise.
I don't know any LGBT friendly Southern Baptist Churches. I don't know any openly gay Southern Baptists. I think that would be hard to pull off.
But I do know openly gay Catholics. The posturing in this thread is at odds with reality.
It isn't about "promoting" homosexuality or abortion. No one is trying to sell or promote homosexuality or abortion to an unwary public.
In the case of gay people it is simply a matter of welcoming everyone into the church as Christ himself did. There are millions of Christians who do not see this as incompatible with Christianity. Indeed, many see it as their Christian duty. The fact that you disagree is utterly irrelevant. That's why we have hundreds if not thousands of different denominations. There are few points of doctrine that all Christians actually agree about.
In the case of abortion it is simply a matter of recognizing that it is a difficult moral decision best left to women, their partners, and their doctors. And that there are often complicated and complex extenuating circumstances that don't fit broad-brush laws. Which was actually the official position of both the Baptist and Mennonite churches (and most other Protestant churches) up into at least the late 1970s. You don't have to "promote" abortion and can actually find it abhorrent while still believing that it is an issue that is not best addressed by the criminal justice system.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Ken wrote: ↑Fri Jun 18, 2021 11:17 pm
It isn't about "promoting" homosexuality or abortion. No one is trying to sell or promote homosexuality or abortion to an unwary public.
In the case of gay people it is simply a matter of welcoming everyone into the church as Christ himself did. There are millions of Christians who do not see this as incompatible with Christianity. Indeed, many see it as their Christian duty. The fact that you disagree is utterly irrelevant. That's why we have hundreds if not thousands of different denominations. There are few points of doctrine that all Christians actually agree about.
In the case of abortion it is simply a matter of recognizing that it is a difficult moral decision best left to women, their partners, and their doctors. And that there are often complicated and complex extenuating circumstances that don't fit broad-brush laws. Which was actually the official position of both the Baptist and Mennonite churches (and most other Protestant churches) up into at least the late 1970s. You don't have to "promote" abortion and can actually find it abhorrent while still believing that it is an issue that is not best addressed by the criminal justice system.
Your belief is at odds with many here and many more conservative Mennonites.
Jesus never welcomed people living in sin into the church. The official position as you call it was disputed elsewhere as a claim from silence as the Conservative Mennonites didn't have to address it.
You have stated several times you elevate human law above Scripture so... Also they are trying to promote LGBTQ all over the place. You must live with your head in the ground and certainly not in Portland...
Soloist wrote: ↑Fri Jun 18, 2021 11:38 pmYour belief is at odds with many here and many more conservative Mennonites.
Of course they are. I realize that. I don't pretend to be a conservative Mennonite or speak for them.
However the beliefs of many conservative Mennonites are at odds with the bulk of Christianity as well. And the larger Mennonite world itself rarely finds universal agreement on much of anything.
You look for people to exclude and for reasons to exclude them. I look for people to include and for reasons to welcome them. One of us will be proven right in the end.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Soloist wrote: ↑Fri Jun 18, 2021 11:38 pmYour belief is at odds with many here and many more conservative Mennonites.
Of course they are. I realize that. I don't pretend to be a conservative Mennonite or speak for them.
However the beliefs of many conservative Mennonites are at odds with the bulk of Christianity as well. And the larger Mennonite world itself rarely finds universal agreement on much of anything.
You look for people to exclude and for reasons to exclude them. I look for people to include and for reasons to welcome them. One of us will be proven right in the end.
I find your stance on green card marriages to be in question then.
Jesus said many will seek to find, but few will find it. Jesus said the cost to follow Him was high. Repeatedly repentance is urged... How did Peter fair on your statement with Simon when he sought it with money? Didn't sound very inclusive then. Paul told the church to kick out the sinner...
I don't know any LGBT friendly Southern Baptist Churches. I don't know any openly gay Southern Baptists. I think that would be hard to pull off.
But I do know openly gay Catholics. The posturing in this thread is at odds with reality.
Sure there are gay "catholics" but they would be excommunicated as they are disregarding papal authority and living in death sins. Just because you can find them is meaningless to the overall statement Josh made. Those catholics are not in good standing with their authority structure by virtue of the church rulings. Now can some priest, or even bishop give them communion? sure... so can a satanist. Doesn't make them actually part of the catholic church.
I disagree. There are LOTs of LGBT Catholics and priests and I bishops who support them. As you point out, MC-USA also has a huge problem with this. Like American. Catholics, our official doctrine on this issue is biblical.
This is not a problem in the Southern Baptist Convention, and neither Greear nor Moore are doing anything like this. They are, however, calling the SBC away from secular political loyalties and away from covering up sex abuse. I suspect that both of these are issues that the Southern Baptist Convention is currently struggling with.
Note that nobody in this thread has quoted the people they are falsely accusing. They just keep piling it on, without worrying about the truth of any of this.
Soloist wrote: ↑Fri Jun 18, 2021 11:06 pm
Sure there are gay "catholics" but they would be excommunicated as they are disregarding papal authority and living in death sins. Just because you can find them is meaningless to the overall statement Josh made. Those catholics are not in good standing with their authority structure by virtue of the church rulings. Now can some priest, or even bishop give them communion? sure... so can a satanist. Doesn't make them actually part of the catholic church.
To show you the ridiculousness of this... What would we call a Mennonite who started a conservative Mennonite church with all the trappings of the Conservative but affirmed and supported LGBTQ in their own church as members and eligible for all roles? Would we call that church conservative? I would say that the Catholics who submit to the papal authority would look at them likewise.
Spot on, Soloist
There are many who are excommunicated who still try to call themselves "catholics" and even have websites. That does not make them Catholic in communion with the Roman Catholic Church. Having a pr system does not validate their standing as Catholics; they are excommunicated and the only way to reverse that excommunication is through public and private repentance by giving up the abomination of homosexual life.
They will still try to pass themselves off as Catholics, however they are not Catholic. They will still engage the Hegelian dialectic to try to undermine Biblical Catholic teaching just as their counterparts have done in MCUSA, COB, the Episcopalian and even in branches of other denominations. It still does not validate their standing as a Christian for in God's eyes, flouting His Word is the first step in the road to eternal death.
Soloist wrote: ↑Sat Jun 19, 2021 1:01 am
Jesus said many will seek to find, but few will find it. Jesus said the cost to follow Him was high. Repeatedly repentance is urged... How did Peter fair on your statement with Simon when he sought it with money? Didn't sound very inclusive then. Paul told the church to kick out the sinner...
The attempts at twisting the whole of Biblical teaching into something it never says is often the hallmark of the Hd tactic. This is not a new tactic but rather went on in both the Old and New Testaments. Those who do not want to repent and put on the "new mind of Christ" will continue in darkness and seek to drag others to perdition with them.
Psalm 56:5
All day long they distort my words;
All their thoughts are against me for evil.
2 Peter 3:16
as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.
Acts 13:10
and said, “You who are full of all deceit and fraud, you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease to make crooked the straight ways of the Lord?
Micah 3:9
Now hear this, heads of the house of Jacob
And rulers of the house of Israel,
Who abhor justice
And twist everything that is straight,
Isaiah 59:8
They do not know the way of peace,
And there is no justice in their tracks;
They have made their paths crooked,
Whoever treads on them does not know peace.
Our calling is to stand firm in Christ and His teachings. We are to study those teachings and incorporate them into our lives.
Ephesians 4
17 So I say this, and affirm in the Lord, that you are to no longer walk just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their minds, 18 being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; 19 and they, having become callous, have given themselves up to indecent behavior for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. 20 But you did not learn Christ in this way, 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, 22 that, in reference to your former way of life, you are to rid yourselves of the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, 23 and that you are to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.
25 Therefore, ridding yourselves of falsehood, SPEAK TRUTH EACH ONE OF YOU WITH HIS NEIGHBOR, because we are parts of one another. 26 BE ANGRY, AND YET DO NOT SIN; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and do not give the devil an opportunity. 28 The one who steals must no longer steal; but rather he must labor, producing with his own hands what is good, so that he will have something to share with the one who has need. 29 Let no unwholesome word come out of your mouth, but if there is any good word for edification according to the need of the moment, say that, so that it will give grace to those who hear. 30 Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.
Perhaps the best known example of all re the twisting of Scripture for evil ends perpetrated by the devil himself:
Luke 4 And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit 2 for forty days in the wilderness, tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing in those days; and when they were ended, he was hungry. 3 The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” 4 And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’” 5 And the devil took him up, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory; for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it shall all be yours.” 8 And Jesus answered him, “It is written,
‘You shall worship the Lord your God,
and him only shall you serve.’”
9 And he took him to Jerusalem, and set him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here; 10 for it is written,
‘He will give his angels charge of you, to guard you,’
11 and
‘On their hands they will bear you up,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.’”
12 And Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’” 13 And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.
I don't know any LGBT friendly Southern Baptist Churches.
I don't know any openly gay Southern Baptists. I think that would be hard to pull off.
But I do know openly gay Catholics. The posturing in this thread is at odds with reality.
This is puzzling.
(i find) the topic addressed consistently in this thread AND consistently on former MD and present MN.
i.e., “what is authentic Christianity?” “what did Jesus Christ actually say?” with predictable understanding (not posturing) from each posting member. Ken makes it more confrontational and pointedly judgmental, the approach he seems thoroughly comfortable with on all topics in most walks of his life, with few exceptions, by his own words. (ex., his mother in law may be a mild exception.)
the idea that conservative believers do not recognize those living in unrepentant sin of any description versus liberal believers who sanctify+celebrate unrepentant sin of popularized choosing, has been at peak contest since the 1990’s, at least. IN EVERY DENOMINATION, Catholic, Protestant, Anabaptist - made highly political - which many embrace, others resist.
i do not find conservative members “posturing” as they patiently share their beliefs. in attempt to offer vital Truth.
Ken is just extoiling his signature (sanctimonious) wrong and defiling others-everywhere, is that posturing?
there is NOTHING surprising about the link you shared. (i believe the church pic they chose is in Iceland, altho Iceland is not included in their lists of churches to contact.) it’s not hard to find U.S. churches sporting gaudy blasphemous rainbow flags/regalia in the U.S.
do you really believe any active members here are not aware of what is in the world?? i don’t.
there is more indication the haughty world refuses to accept there are others still not in full compliance with them.
from what i understand, conservative Mennonites generally reject flags of any description? if so, a deal-breaker from the get-go. defiling God’s created rainbow to glorify sodomy/sin adds insult to injury. it’s really sad.
but that’s the goal, isn’t it? blatant, flamboyant insult of everything respected, held sacred, for the glory of sin.
no longer hidden away, it’s normalized, in-your-face, without restraint or shame.
be warned: “your sin is worse than mine!” is unlikely to impress Jesus Christ. i wouldn’t suggest it.
ALL are called to “sin no more,” not, “sin less than the other guy” - and wave flags to promote your chosen sin.
i glanced at the link list for Illinois - i believe all locations listed were Chicago area. the list must be incomplete.
i’m not interested in a complete list.
- - - - - -
the fact that gaudy rainbows are marketed directly to children+minors should be contested, as Joe the Camel was:
What kind of character was Joe Camel portrayed as?
"R.J. Reynolds has conducted one of the most effective advertising campaigns in decades.
Joe Camel has become as recognizable to kids as Mickey Mouse.
May 28, 1997 https://www.ftc.gov › 1997/05 › joe...
Joe Camel Advertising Campaign Violates Federal Law, FTC Says | Federal Trade Commission
The posturing in this thread is at odds with reality. 
i don’t.