Hi Billy, On Oct 13, 2010, at 10:54 AM, [email protected] wrote: > I believe evangelicalism’s tendency to publicly judge and condemn on > these issues forecloses the possibility for discerning alongside not only > GLBTQ peoples, but the many who are struggling with sexual brokenness > even inside our church communities. > > Alongside the perverted ? WTH ? Hey, let's open the Church to neo-Nazis, > let's show > neo-Nazis compassion and love and all will be well if we seek to understand > them. > Let's walk alongside the neo-Nazis and admit our own political brokenness and > not foreclose the possibility of acceptance of Hitler worshippers.
Um, yeah. I'd love to have a church full of tax collectors, prostitutes, pimps, neo-Nazis, drug pushers, Muslims, communists, capitalists, wife beaters, adulterers, fornicators, thieves, alchoholics, slanderers, gamblers, you name it. 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Corinthians%206:9-11&version=NKJV Let them come in, love on 'em, then help them see the power of the gospel for transforming them. If they refuse to submit to the gospel, then we cast them out of fellowship. There are consequences for unrepentant sin. But that doesn't mean we stop loving them. Yes, this requires an extremely mature church and capable leadership to handle people like that. And yes, there is a difference between what society should tolerate and whom the church should love. But that is the gospel I see Jesus and Paul living, and the one I see that actually *works* in transforming society. Loving confrontation changes lives. I've never seen unloving condemnation produce anything other than shame or division. Have you? You seem to be stuck on the dichotomy between "love as uncritical acceptance" and "justice as an uncompromising standard." I believe the radical center is to totally affirm both, as paradoxical as it is, because that is the only way to understand the cross. -- Ernie P. -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
