Committee #1

 

SECOND PARTIAL REPORT

COMMITTEE ON CHURCH AND SOCIETY

 

 

RE: Recognition of Homosexual Members of the Moravian Church Northern Province

 

Whereas,          Scripture affirms the inclusion of all persons in the community of faith; including those once believed to be sexual outcasts, the unclean, and others as set forth in Isaiah 56:1-8; and

 

Whereas,          Scripture affirms that all who hold the Sabbath and choose what is pleasing to God will be given within the household of faith; a name better than that of sons and daughters, and never be cut off from God as set forth in Isaiah 56:1-8; and

 

Whereas,          God’s house may truly be a house of prayer for all people; and 

Whereas,          The Holy Scripture illuminates the heart and guides the soul; providing in both Old  Testament and New Testament examples of God’s acceptance of the outcast and the  inclusiveness of God’s outreach, i.e., Ruth the proscribed Moabite - Deut. 23:3 -  an ancestor of David; the inclusion of proscribed eunuchs - Lev. 21:18-20, Acts 8; Jesus’  inclusion of tax collectors, lepers, foreigners, harlots, sinners, the Samaritan woman in   John 4: 7-15; and 

Whereas,          The spiritual journey of homosexual Christians is a valid journey of faith, and the same journey of walking with the Lord as is the faith journey of all baptized believers; therefore be it

 

RESOLVED    (5) The 2002 Synod of the Northern Province shall recognize that persons who are homosexual can be members of our church because they are children of God and seek to know God’s grace which is freely given to all people who have faith in God; and be it further

 

RESOLVED    (6) Homosexual individuals shall be supported and affirmed by being allowed to celebrate their lives as individuals and/or couples completely within the bounds of the church and under the grace which our Creator imparts to all persons; and be it further

 

RESOLVED    (10) The church shall continue to enter into dialogue in a Christian manner with homosexual persons in order to understand their lives and their spiritual walk.

 

 

 

June 17, 2002