G'day Stephen and the Group
At 05:31 PM 17/11/03 +1100, Stephen Webb wrote:
Resolution 84 issue sent to congregations and presbyteries for study before 2006 Assembly
The Uniting Church's national Assembly Standing Committee, meeting in Sydney last weekend, set up a three-step process to allow the breadth of the church to be heard on the matter of homosexuality and ordained ministry. READ ON
They seem to mean Proposal 84, rather than Resolution 84. Or is it now the same thing? And isn't this exactly what the rejected Proposal 81 would have done?
I'm glad. I have of course always been saying, stick with the UCA, give it three years. The 2006 Assembly is the place to fix what went wrong at the 2003.
And that, of course, remains an issue. Those who were at the 2003 Assembly continue to say, publicly and privately, just how 'spirit-led' the 2003 Assembly was. What they seem to mean by this is that they had a good time there. And that's good. But they then use this to attempt to silence those of us who question the decisions they took. That is not good.
The rejection of Proposal 81 remains such a colossal blunder that it calls the processes that led to it seriously into question. We must make sure that people *don't* have such a good time at Assembly 2006 that they come back to us unable to rationally consider the issues.
I'm sorry if that's blunt. But time is in a sense still short. This decision of ASC, and the similar decision of NSW Synod, are both ahead of the schedule I was hoping for. Perhaps that's good. If this momentum is maintained the prospects of 2006 Assembly are good.
Now, we need to ask, what would be a good outcome of Assembly 2006? It needs some miracles. Those of us who believe in such things should start praying for them.
We should first pray for some softening of attitudes on both sides. I didn't say opinions, or stands, or policies, or principles, or theology, or doctrine, or proposals, or anything linear like that. That comes later. First, the attitudes. Start with yourself. Especially if your prayers tend at first to concentrate on the issues, or on the 'other' side, or both.
And that's why I say "perhaps" above, and that time is still short. We have made a good start on the issues. How are the attitudes coming?
Let's be Church. Jesus said "This is how you'll know you're in Church: The love you have for each other will be obvious to everyone who walks in." We have some work to do. And so has God. He's willing. Are we?
Yours in Christ
andrew alder
email: andrewa @ alder . ws
http://www.zeta.org.au/~andrewa
Phone 9441 4476
Mobile 04 2525 4476
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