One mission of CBMW is to help Christians think through secular and ecclesial trends on gender and sexuality. Through this work, we pore over a lot of different news reports and articles as we attempt to wade through the ceaseless flow of information on the web. In our weekly Gender and Sexuality News Roundups, we aim to distill some of the more pertinent information for you.
The articles below are from a wide variety of sectors and publications, organized generally into three categories. They are presented in aggregate, not necessarily endorsed.
If you see an article that you think should be featured in future CBMW News Roundups, you can send it to [email protected] with the subject “News Roundup.”
News: SBC resolution on sexuality influenced by Nashville Statement, CBMW (Matt Damico)
“Resolution Five, ‘On Sexuality and Personal Identity,’ is in part a response to issues surrounding the Revoice conference and so-called ‘gay Christianity.’… The resultant resolution bears resemblance to parts of Article 7 of the Nashville Statement, especially its denial that any homosexual or transgender ‘self-conception’ is contrary to God’s purposes, and its affirmation that the grace of God offers both ‘pardon and transforming power’ to Christ’s followers.”
Southern Baptists take action to address church sexual abuse, ERLC (Joe Carter)
“During the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) annual meeting this week in Birmingham, Alabama, Southern Baptists took several significant actions to address the crisis of sexual abuse in Southern Baptist churches.”
Equal or complementary? Gender roles in faith traditions, Religion News Service (Jonathan Woodward)
“While the Baptist faith and message says that, ‘The office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by scripture,’ there are many who call themselves ‘complementarians’ who are more flexible when it comes to women teaching men, or even preaching.”
Responding to Revoice: The Case for Overture 28 at the PCA General Assembly (Part One), The Aquila Report (Steven Warhurst)
“The teachings of the 2018 Revoice Conference may soon split the Presbyterian Church in America. If the errors in their teaching are not addressed, churches and possibly presbyteries will leave our denomination. Overture 28 is an effort to address the errors of the Revoice Conference and to commend a better way of helping those who struggle with sexual sin. Our hope is that the purity and peace of the PCA can be preserved at the 2019 General Assembly.”
Methodist Church’s LGBT stance threatens uniy, NJ.com (Alexander Santora)
“The United Methodist Church, one of the largest Christian denominations in the world, is heading toward a split over LGBT issues. By a margin of 54 votes, its special general conference in February drew a line in the sand, saying that same-sex clergy in relationships and the blessing of same-sex unions violate their policies. Clergy can be charged and removed without pay and congregations that defy were almost prodded to leave.”
A Kind of Experiment, Separating Gender and Sex: Why the Church Says No, National Review (Kevin D. Williamson)
“The [Roman Catholic] Church has made a statement on this notion in ‘Male and Female He Created Them: Towards a Path of Dialogue on the Question of Gender Theory in Education.’ The stakes here are high, as the Church sees it, employing language that will be entirely familiar to American conservatives: ‘Similar theories aim to annihilate the concept of nature,’ the document reads, ‘that is, everything we have been given as a preexisting foundation of our being and action in the world.'”
Social media on fire following local church bulletin’s ‘Pride’ warning, countylive.ca (Administrator)
“A local church bulletin telling Catholics and Christians that Pride events are contrary to faith and could be harmful to children has set social media in Prince Edward County on fire and roused the community to show love and solidarity for the LGBTQ community before mass this Sunday at St. Gregory’s Catholic School in Picton. Michael Mulhall, Archbishop of Kingston, stated he did not sanction the message and ‘it does not reflect the spirit of accompanying charity and compassion that should always characterize our faith.'”
A Historic Breakthrough for Sex Workers’ Rights, The New Republic (Melissa Gira Grant)
“Back in February, advocates for sex worker rights in New York announced their intention to fully decriminalize prostitution in the state. But no one really suspected then that within two weeks, Democratic candidates for president would be pledging support for competing legislative visions of what they called (at times, incorrectly) sex work decriminalization.”
50 years after Stonewall, LGBT rights are a work in progress, ABC News (David Crary)
“From the perspective of veteran activists, the progress has been astounding. In 1969, every state but Illinois outlawed gay sex, psychiatric experts classified homosexuality as a mental disorder, and most gays stayed in the closet for fear of losing jobs and friends. Today, same-sex marriage is the law of the land in the U.S. and at least 25 other countries. LGBT Americans serve as governors, big-city mayors and members of Congress, and one — Pete Buttigieg — is waging a spirited campaign for president.”
Supreme Court Dodges Decision in Christian Bakers’ Refusal to Make Cake for Same-Sex Wedding, The Daily Signal (Kevin Daley)
“The Supreme Court lifted an order Monday that punished a Christian couple in Oregon who refused to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding, telling a lower court to reconsider the dispute in light of the high court’s decision last year involving another Christian baker in Colorado.”
Teen Vogue Encourages Children To Explore Prostitution As A Career, The Federalist (Chrissy Clark)
“Promoting unlimited, legal prostitution is not freeing and not something that we should be promoting to young women, especially during a time when women are doing exceptionally well in America and the doors are opening for women in all job fields. In fact, 70 percent of people see the wide-ranging benefits of female leadership. Why should we open up avenues for women to fall into the dangerous clutches of sex work—or worse, sex trafficking—when the working woman’s opinion is of such value?”
Are Abortion and Gay Rights Really American Values?, The American Conservative (Patrick J. Buchanan)
“To many Americans, diversity—racial, ethnic, cultural, religious—is our greatest strength. Yet Poland and Hungary are proudly ethnonationalist. South Korea and Japan fiercely resist the racial and ethnic diversity immigration would bring. Catalans and Scots in this century, like Quebecois in the last, seek to secede from nations to which they have belonged for centuries. Are ethnonationalist nations less righteous than diverse nations likes ours? And if diversity is an American value, is it really a universal value?”
How Should a Husband Treat His Quarrelsome Wife?, Desiring God (John Piper)
“Covenant-keeping in marriage is obliged by covenant-keeping with God. It goes both ways in marriage because it’s rooted in covenant with God. For God’s people, human covenants are rooted in the divine covenant. The man with a quarrelsome wife is not free to abandon her. He has a covenant. He’s made a covenant with her.”
Why the Gay and Lesbian Equality Movement Must Oppose Surrogacy, Public Discourse (Gary Powell)
“As gay people, we cannot insist on the right to carry out practices that harm the rights of others. Rather than being an LGBT rights issue, surrogacy is a women’s rights issue and a children’s rights issue; and like the sale of human organs, it is not an activity that should be promoted or indeed permitted.”
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