LGBTQ+
Brief intro
4 things to consider
1. Consider the facts honestly
2. Consider the people and their reality
3. Consider the signaling
4. Consider the worldview
GALLUP FEBRUARY 24, 2021
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Estimate has risen more than one percentage point from 2017 update
- Majority of LGBT Americans say they are bisexual
- One in six adults in Generation Z consider themselves LGBT
Gallup's latest update on lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender identification finds 5.6% of U.S. adults identifying as LGBT. The current estimate is up from 4.5% in Gallup's previous update based on 2017 data.
More than half of LGBT adults (54.6%) identify as bisexual. About a quarter (24.5%) say they are gay, with 11.7% identifying as lesbian and 11.3% as transgender. An additional 3.3% volunteer another non-heterosexual preference or term to describe their sexual orientation, such as queer or same-gender-loving.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/329708/lgbt-identification-rises-latest-estimate.aspx
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/24/us/lgbt-identification-usa.html
Seattle Pacific University faculty votes ‘no confidence’ in leadership after board upholds discriminatory hiring policy
The Equality Act // Summary: H.R.5 — 117th Congress (2021-2022)
Passed House (02/25/2021)
Equality Act
This bill prohibits discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity in areas including public accommodations and facilities, education, federal funding, employment, housing, credit, and the jury system. Specifically, the bill defines and includes sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity among the prohibited categories of discrimination or segregation.
The bill expands the definition of public accommodations to include places or establishments that provide (1) exhibitions, recreation, exercise, amusement, gatherings, or displays; (2) goods, services, or programs; and (3) transportation services.
The bill allows the Department of Justice to intervene in equal protection actions in federal court on account of sexual orientation or gender identity.
The bill prohibits an individual from being denied access to a shared facility, including a restroom, a locker room, and a dressing room, that is in accordance with the individual's gender identity.
The Equality Act (2021) - HRC.org (Pro-Commentary)
The Problem (from the HRC)
Despite significant steps forward, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) Americans lack basic legal protections in states across the country. The patchwork nature of state non-discrimination laws and the lack of permanent, comprehensive federal non-discrimination laws leaves millions of people subject to uncertainty and potential discrimination that impacts their safety, their families, and their day-to-day lives.
The Equality Act would amend existing civil rights law—including the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Fair Housing Act, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, the Jury Selection and Services Act, and several laws regarding employment with the federal government—to explicitly include sexual orientation and gender identity as protected characteristics. The legislation also amends the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit discrimination in public spaces and services and federally funded programs on the basis of sex.
Additionally, the Equality Act would update the public spaces and services covered in current law to include retail stores, services such as banks and legal services, and transportation services. These important updates would strengthen existing protections for everyone.
https://www.hrc.org/resources/the-equality-act
https://www.hrc.org/resources/what-does-the-bible-say-about-homosexuality
All things considered, it is important to remember that throughout church history, new information about people and the world have frequently led Christians to reconsider their beliefs.This need not be a reason to distrust Scripture, but rather should serve as an invitation to wrestle with the contexts of the biblical writers and our own lived experiences. As it stands today, there are millions of faithful Christians around the world who have come to recognize the work of God in and through the relationships of LGBTQ people (click here to see a list of denominational positions on LGBTQ people within Christianity). As New Testament Scholar Daniel Kirk has pointed out, Christians today would do well by the tradition of the apostles and our current witness in the world to recognize that theological abstractions aside, God has already clearly embraced LGBTQ people into full communion, and it is now the church’s responsibility to simply honor that reality and rejoice (Luke 15).
Debating Bible Verses on Homosexuality
The debate over gay marriage is not just taking place in the nation’s courts – it is also a subject of intense discussion in the nation’s churches.
Matthew Vines, an openly gay, evangelical Christian and the author of “God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same-Sex Relationships,” has been actively encouraging conservative Christians to re-evaluate their beliefs about homosexuality. He has engaged them in private conversations, in public talks and through the organization he founded, the Reformation Project.
He was recently invited by the Rev. Caleb Kaltenbach, lead pastor of Discovery Church in Simi Valley, Calif,, to talk privately with a small group of evangelical leaders to discuss what the Bible says about gay relationships. Mr. Kaltenbach is the author of the forthcoming book “Messy Grace,” which is about how he reconciles his conservative Christian convictions with his experience as the child of gay parents.
The FAQs: What You Should Know About the Pro-LGBTQ Equality Act (TGC) - (Christian Commentary)
FEBRUARY 20, 2021 | JOE CARTER
What just happened?
Next week the U.S. House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on the radical Equality Act. The bill would amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Fair Housing Act to “prohibit discrimination” on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation.
As Alliance Defending Freedom notes, this legislation could be used to restrict the religious freedom of churches and religious nonprofits, including religious schools; set back protections for women in athletics, at work, and in private spaces like showers and locker rooms; and inhibit the ability of everyday Americans to live in accord with their beliefs.
What is the Equality Act?
The Equality Act would amend two landmark civil-rights laws—the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Fair Housing Act—to change the definition of “sex.” Instead of referring to biological men and women, the redefined word would also cover sexual orientation and gender identity for the purposes of employment, housing, public accommodations, jury service, education, and federal programs.
According to the bill, “sexual orientation” means homosexuality, heterosexuality, or bisexuality, and “gender identity” means the gender-related identity, appearance, mannerisms, or other characteristics of an individual, regardless of the individual’s sex at birth.
The bill says explicitly: “The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (42 U.S.C. 2000bb et seq.) shall not provide a claim concerning, or a defense to a claim under, a covered title, or provide a basis for challenging the application or enforcement of a covered title.” (See also 9 Things You Should Know About the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.)
Why should Christians be concerned about the Equality Act?
As Andrew T. Walker wrote in an article for TGC, “The bill represents the most invasive threat to religious liberty ever proposed in America. Given that it touches areas of education, public accommodation, employment, and federal funding, were it to pass, its sweeping effects on religious liberty, free speech, and freedom of conscience would be both historic and also chilling.”
“Virtually no area of American life would emerge unscathed from the Equality Act’s reach,” Walker added. “No less significant would be the long-term effects of how the law would shape the moral imagination of future generations.”
Twenty-four states have similar laws, and the consequences for residents of those states have been disastrous, says Monica Burke, research assistant in the Heritage Foundation’s DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society. “These policies are not being used to promote equality,” Burke says. “Instead, they are being used as a blunt-force weapon to ban disagreement on marriage and sexuality by punishing dissenters.”
Some of the examples cited by Burke include a teacher in Virginia who was fired for failing to use a female student’s preferred masculine pronouns, and a professor in Ohio who was disciplined for doing the same. A homeless shelter for abused women in Alaska has been sued for refusing to admit a biological male, and in California, Illinois, and Vermont, foster parents are expected to provide children experiencing gender dysphoria with transition-affirming therapies, despite parents’ medical or moral objections.
The Equality Act could make single-sex schools and clubs illegal. It would create an abortion mandate, since hospitals and clinics would be treated as public accommodations.
“Every human being ought to be treated with dignity, but placing sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes in this kind of legislation would have harmful consequences,” said Russell Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and TGC Council member in 2019.
“This legislation would make the situation worse in this country,” Moore aded, “both in terms of religious freedom and in terms of finding ways for Americans who disagree to work together for the common good.”
Sexual Challenges and Your Church’s Response
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/tgc-podcast/sexual-challenges-your-church-response/
Oral Roberts University isn't the feel good March Madness story we need | Opinion
While the school has been soundly mocked on social media for its archaic standards of behavior and code of conduct that bans profanity, “social dancing,” and shorts in classrooms, it is the school’s discriminatory and hateful anti-LGBTQ+ policy that fans should protest as the Golden Eagles advance in the tournament.
Twice in their student handbook, Oral Roberts specifically prohibits homosexuality. In their student conduct section, under the heading of Personal Behavior, the school expressly condemns homosexuality, mentioning it in the same breath as “occult practices.”
Also, as part of their honor code, the university requires students to abide by a pledge saying that they will not engage in “homosexual activity,” and that they will not be united in marriage other “than the marriage between one man and one woman.”
As a private university and under the banner of fundamentalist Christian beliefs, the school is free to impose whatever standards of behavior they see fit, even if those standards are wildly out of line with modern society and the basic values of human decency. Now, as Oral Roberts gains national attention, the focus shouldn’t just be on their very good men’s basketball team, but on their prejudiced teachings and moral regressiveness.
That Oral Roberts wants to keep its students tied to toxic notions of fundamentalism that fetishize chastity, abstinence and absurd hemlines is a larger cultural issue that can be debated. What is not up for debate however is their anti-LGBTQ+ stance, which is nothing short of discriminatory and should expressly be condemned by the NCAA.
Passages to consider
9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
(1Co 6:9-11 ESV)
26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
(Rom 1:26-27 ESV)
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. 3 But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints.
4 Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. 5 For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. (Eph 5:1-5 ESV)
- Must understand the definition, purpose, and solution to "sin."
- Cultures before, during, and after Jesus experienced wide ranges of sexual ethics.
- Must consider what being a follower of Jesus meant and cost.
- "The Bible says that sex and marriage isn't just about two people making each other happy. It's meant to be a little model of Jesus's love for his church. (McLaughlin, 125)
- It comes down to who gets the final authority in determining truth, purpose, and life?
