Sep 08 2008
Tutu says Church obsessed with gays
[BBC]
Archbishop Desmond Tutu has accused the Anglican church of allowing its “obsession” with homosexuality to come before real action on world poverty.
“God is weeping” to see such a focus on sexuality and the Church is “quite rightly” seen by many as irrelevant on the issue of poverty, he said.
It may be good to “accept that we agree to differ” on the gay issue, he said.
“I must imagine that God is weeping, and the world quite rightly should dismiss the Church in those cases as being totally irrelevant.”
“We seem to be engaging in this kind of, almost, past-time [while] there’s poverty, hunger, disease, corruption.
Archbishop Tutu accused some of his fellow Anglicans of going against the teaching of Jesus in their treatment of homosexual people by “persecuting the already persecuted”.
Read more here.
[From me]
I agree that the church should be focusing on poverty and suffering. But you can’t throw out Biblical beliefs just to appear relevant. The church becomes relevant when they minister to the community. Ministry is more than just preaching and teaching but it is an important part. I just think the church needs to find the delicate balance of doing both–solid Biblical teaching and being the hands and feet of Jesus.
What do you think?
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While I commend Bishop Tutu for his focus on poverty, what about the many other bishops and church leaders who are focused on human trafficing, or how about capital punishment, or the environment?
Just as God gifts us all different, He gives each of us a heart’s passion that may be different from the minister down the street or across the world. Doesn’t mean our focus is less important and theirs is more important.
Yet, whatever those passions may be are secondary to our focus on the main thing–Jesus Christ born, raised, crucified, resurrected, and returning! Where’s the good bishop’s focus and passion for that?
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Maybe???you have it right when you said the church being the hands and feet. Maybe??? through the leaders presenting the beauty, majesty and holiness of Christ it spurs the body to move into action. Maybe???if we focused on Christ the other stuff would be motivated from within, rather than called for from ‘the top’.
Tutu is wrong about the church being obsessed with homosexuality. Actually, some in the Anglican church are using their religious platform to promote homosexuality as a legitimate lifestyle. It appears to me that the obsession is the other way around.
Furthermore, I am consiously trying to lead my fellowship to be the hands and feet of Jesus to the poor and disadvantaged… that includes ALL sinners. “For ALL have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God!” (emphasis mine) When we start eroding the foundations of Biblical prinicples in the name of political correctness to appease certain “groups”, we are wrong.
Let me give an example… we just had a poor homeless man come in asking for help, we gave him food and shared the gospel. It was obvious though that his lifestyle, not homosexuality, but his alcohol and drug addiction is costing him an opportunity in this life to be a productive citizen. I refered him to another ministry that could help him with this… but he explicitly told me, “I don’t need help there!”
Now, tell me, is his lifestyle to be accomodated because it is the polite thing to do? No. The gospel of Jesus Christ is mankind’s only hope! As the apostle Paul put it plainly in 1 Cor. 6:11, “… and that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sancitified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
J.D. is right: Tutu and the rest of the theological liberals are the ones who are obsessed. They brought the topic up. They disagree with Jesus on the matter. They are willing to destroy churches and denominations over it. They are willing to resort to pathetic name-calling.
How does He know God is weeping? Maybe God is disappointed that Tutu and friends are trying to usurp God’s role and de-classify homosexual behavior as sinful and making up a new sin, that of reading the Bible in context.
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While I don’t agree with Tutu on a lot of things, it’s been my observation that the evangelical church of today is a lot more “obsessed,” or perhaps better said “fixated” on the issue of homosexuality than on a whole lot of other things they could be spending their time on (such as, oh, say, the righteousness of God that we’ve become as a gift from God!).
I look at Romans 1, and other scriptures that name various sins by name, and I have to tell you that my observation has been that homosexuality has been talked about in the church far more than all of the other ones.
Working at a Christian radio station, I used to be in charge of recording Family News in Focus from the satellite, and I can tell you that if I didn’t have to listen to it during that time, I wouldn’t listen to it! The two minute program aired 3 times per day (3 separate programs), for a total of 15 per week. Every single week, at least 3 to 4 (and usually more) of the programs had something to do with homosexuality.
Where were the programs on covetousness, envy, strife, deceit, lack of discernment, lack of trust, unforgiveness, etc, etc… all those other issues that are mentioned in Romans 1 and elsewhere? Some of those issues are, in my opinion, far, far worse for the family and society than homosexuality. There is an enormously unbalanced fixation (again, in my opinion) on homosexuality in the evangelical Christian world, and I just don’t see how it helps to spread the good news, and even turns people away from Christ because through His people all they see is a God who is against them.
As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t believe Paul’s point was even to make a list of things Christians were to be against, but rather a list of all the ways in which people can understand that the whole world is guilty of sin. Yes, homosexual acts are sinful, but that’s not the point! So is covetousness, envy, strife, lack of discernment, boasting, etc. Paul’s “therefore” at the beginning of Romans 2 brings him to his point about all of that: Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself…
I don’t know if I’d go along with Tutu’s quote that God is weeping about all this, but I honestly think His people are missing the point with this ongoing fixation.
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Joel,
You make an excellent point. I especially like your distinction between obsession and fixation.
Kevin,
when I first began blogging here, you also seemed to fixate quite a bit on homosexuality. Then not too long ago, you vowed that you would no longer fixate on that one issue (which made my respect for you grow!) and you have kept your word. What were some of the things that caused you to change your mind? I ask because I am personally curious, and I also ask because I wonder if your experience might help others who may still fixate on homosexuality to see why the fixation is unnecessary (or possibly even detrimental) to their own witness or their declaration of faith.
A3,
I only have a short break from making lattes.
I would say people like you, MIT, Joel, Robert & others who pointed out my harshness. I’m a work in progress & I hope I’m becoming more like Jesus.