Open and Affirming
We are an Open and Affirming Congregation, # 900 in the United Church of Christ
As an Open and Affirming congregation (Col. 3:11) we seek to provide a place for all people that will help them move deeper into relationship with God and others, living together with care, forgiveness, reconciliation and joy. (Col. 3:12-17) With God's grace, we seek to be a congregation that includes all persons, embracing differences of religious upbringing, age, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, mental and physical ability, as well as racial, ethnic, or socio-economic background. We welcome all to share in the life and leadership, ministry and fellowship, worship, sacraments, responsibilities and blessings of participation in our congregation.
The Mashpee Congregation Church is an active member of the Cape Cod Coalition of Welcoming Congregations. There are currently six members of the church who attend the Coalition's monthly meetings.
Rev. Scovil's most recent sermon on Open and Affirming is posted below:
The Pursuit of Perfection
Who can ever forget the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal in which fourteen-year-old Nadia Elena Comaneci scored a perfect 10 on the uneven bars? It was the first-time ever for such a score in modern Olympic gymnastic history. A perfect ten. The antiquated scoreboard could only handle two digits so her score showed up as 1.0.
Can you imagine accomplishing perfection in the Olympics?
In case you don't know the rest of the story, she married in Bucharest in 1996 and became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 2001. Today she resides in Oklahoma.
For those of you who have never achieved perfection in sports, perhaps you have done so in academia. If you have, you are among an elite group. Take for example the dreaded SAT's. Each of the three sections- Writing, math, and critical reading have scores ranging from 200-800, which means a perfect score would be 3 times 800 or 2400. About one million students take the SAT each year and on the average, only 20 of them get a perfect score. So, if you yourself scored 2400 or you know of someone who has scored 2400 you or your friend is in an elite group, to say the least. Perfect scores!
Jesus talks about being perfect in the Sermon on the Mount and in thinking about the text this week, about praying on it, I realized that for me at this time, at this moment in my life, as pastor of this new church, the notion of reaching for perfection has to do with all of us, has to do with this church. As I ask myself what would the perfect church look like several possibilities come to mind: outreach-oriented, committed to serving the community, generously supported by the congregation, with a building that is perhaps solar-powered, and so on. There are any number of ways to go, but the one that hits me squarely in the forehead this week is seeking to be a perfect host or hostess; what does perfect hospitality look like?
To get a handle on this, we start with the front cover of the brochure we just had printed up. We have heard the message, "No matter who you are or where you are in life's journey, you are welcome here." But what we haven't really talked about is our declaration that we are an Open and Affirming Congregation.
It's time.
On July 19, 2009 I preached a sermon entitled "Two Different Stories." I began it by reading this statement:
As an Open and Affirming congregation (Col. 3:11) we seek to provide a place for all people that will help them move deeper into relationship with God and others, living together with care, forgiveness, reconciliation and joy. (Col. 3:12-17) With God's grace, we seek to be a congregation that includes all persons, embracing differences of religious upbringing, age, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, mental and physical ability, as well as racial, ethnic, or socio-economic background. We welcome all to share in the life and leadership, ministry and fellowship, worship, sacraments, responsibilities and blessings of participation in our congregation.
In the sermon were two stories: one about a college student named Bill who finds acceptance in a church and another one about a young man dying from A.I.D.S. whose family disowns him by sending him his birth certificate all crumpled up. The sermon with these two stories has been posted on our web site ever since. I hope you have read it, if you were not in church that day.
After telling the story of the young man dying from A.I.D.S. I made these comments:
Good friends, Jesus Christ never turned anyone away and neither will we. But, not only do we welcome gay people, we affirm them. Huge difference. There are lots of churches out there that welcome everyone, or so they say, until a member of the gay community appears. Then suddenly the welcome is conditional: we welcome you, but we don't approve of you. Churches like Manifested Glory Ministries of Bridgeport, Conn. explain homosexuality as a "lifestyle." I do not. The church has a clip on youtube showing them trying to exorcise the "Homosexual demon" our of a young man.
Being gay is not a moral choice, nor is it attributable to demons: it is a God given part of one's unique identity.
There will be no demonizing of gay people inside these walls, nor will there be any disparaging comments of any kind about anybody! Our own Mashpee High School has it right: Mashpee is no place for hate.
About 25 years ago, the Open and Affirming movement began in the United Church of Christ through the efforts of members of LGBT community or lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered persons. The ordination of gay persons had already happened in 1972, almost 40 years ago.
By incorporating this into our identity early on I saw us in some respects as an almost post ONA church in that the movement seems to be expanding and changing. Just the fact that we have said that we will welcome all persons and have been specific about that is a huge step. Beyond that we also say that we welcome all into the every aspect of the life of the church.
What this means to me, then, is that all people who come through our doors on Sunday morning are not only welcome but welcomed generously, extravagantly. What this means then is that when a guest arrives, we treat that guest the same way Jesus treated people. We treat the person the way we would like to be treated.
We welcome tree hugging conservationists and we welcome land developers.
We welcome the politically conservative and we welcome the politically liberal.
We welcome European whites we welcome people of color.
We welcome hawks; we welcome doves.
We welcome gay people; we welcome straight people.
We welcome people with physical and mental limitations which means we welcome everybody!
We even welcome Yankee fans!
We treat everyone with respect and dignity.
What do we not do?
We do not presume ourselves to be superior to any of God's children.
We do not go running if we see someone different coming through the door, realizing that our definitions of normal are not the same as those definitions held by others.
We do not avoid guests at coffee hour.
We don't talk about people behind their backs.
We don't gasp when a teenager walks in with purple hair.
We don't look horrified if two men come down the walk hand in hand.
We don't rush to get home to make a phone call or send an email about the "odd" person in church today, the gay or lesbian couple, the women who needed help with her wheelchair, or the autistic girl who was so distracting in the service, or the parishioner who was emotionally unstable.
Even the schools teach that. I know for fact that the Mashpee school system works very hard at addressing any bullying. We will not bully anyone who comes into this church, nor will we demean them, nor will we slander them, nor will judge them. Instead, we will welcome them and love them as they are.
Although the Open and Affirming movement was started by members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered community, I believe that it promotes tolerance, compassion, understanding, and affirmation for all people. Civil rights leaders from the 60's promoted specifically the rights of African- Americans. Today, that movement has broadened into other arenas such as fair wages for all people, housing and job training. So has the church expanded its welcome.
Nevertheless, I don't want to water this down: what we all need to understand is that the term Open and Affirming is a sign to members of the gay community that should they enter an ONA church, that they will be greeted with as much respect, dignity, love and affirmation as anyone else who walks through the door.
Typically, the process of becoming an ONA church takes a couple of years following bible studies and discussion. Then, there may be a vote. Needless to say, the process can be painful. But here's the thing: growing into the loving people God wants us to be in following the ways and teachings of Jesus Christ is a process. Even if a vote is positive, churches still must work on it. Changes can come slowly and they are not without controversy. Case in point:
Tomorrow we will honor the first President of the United States George Washington, by remembering his birthday. Obviously this was a great man, one deeply venerated by our nation. By the same token, at age 11 he inherited ten slaves from his father. By the time of his death, he had over 300 slaves! He did emancipate all of them at the time of his death and even made provisions for some of them to receive a pension. Yet, our founding fathers as brilliant and committed to public service as they were, supported the institution of slavery and refused to allow women the right to vote.
The country is evolving, is growing up. After Washington it took some 150 years for women to get the right to vote!
Here's the thing: people used to quote scriptures to justify slavery; people used to quote scriptures to prove that women should not have the right to vote; people are still using scripture to say that all gay, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people are sinners. Personally, I have looked at those scriptural texts that declare homosexuality is a sin and I put them in the same category as the statements in I Peter: "Servants, be submissive to your masters" (I Peter 2:18) and "wives, be submissive to your husbands." I personally am not interested in digging out such vindictive and oppressive texts from an ancient tribal civilization that was totally dominated by males, and insisting that we apply them to our lives today.
I am not personally interested in slogging through the "terrible texts" in Genesis 19:4-5, Leviticus 18:22; Leviticus20:13; and Romans 1:22-27 to justify an anti-gay stance. For those who insist on doing so, then I say don't cherry pick the Book of Leviticus but live by the entire book which means amongst other things that you had better get used to sacrificing bulls, pigeons and turtledoves,; that you had better be prepared to give up clam dinners; that you should be prepared to eat locusts and grasshoppers; need I go on?
The creation story justifies our blaming of all sin on women. Is that something we promote today? Of course not! We know that the Bible says that Eve tempted Adam, but we also all know that this story evolved in a time when women were property of men!
I think you get my point about society in biblical days...
The life of Jesus is a much different way: it stands way above the culture of his day. Jesus broke down the barriers of discrimination speaking favorably of Samaritans, dining with tax collector, and ministering to prostitutes. Jesus was about love and not about hate. Jesus tells us to love our enemies. Jesus says later in the Sermon on the Mount "Judge not, that you be not judged."
Yesterday I attended a meeting of the Cape Cod Coalition of Welcoming Churches. UCC and Methodists were there. This was about promoting acceptance of LGBT people on the Cape. I was warmly welcomed. I knew several of the people in attendance. I would like to go to their next meeting on March 19 at the Osterville Methodist Church but Diane and I will be away visiting our daughter and her family at that time, which by the way includes a granddaughter who was just born yesterday.
Will someone volunteer to go on my and this congregation's behalf? Please see after the service is over.
Here's the thing I want to say: when people, no matter who they are, walk into those doors on Sunday morning we are going to welcome them as Christ would welcome them. It's easy to be welcoming and gracious to people we invite into our homes-we are selective as to whom we invite. But when people come through these doors they are entering God's house and we are the hosts and hostesses.
As always, life's great principals take on meaning and power in the form of stories and as you might expect, I am going to end with one.
A few weeks ago two women came to church together as guests. They were vacationing in the area for a few days and were delighted to see that there was a church in Mashpee, they had heard of it, and in looking at the web site, they saw that the church was Open and Affirming.
I had a chance to speak with them briefly before the service started and, of course, we went through the usual introductions, except this one was not all that usual. One woman said to me, "I'd like to introduce you to my wife."
We talked some more after worship and later Diane and I contacted them and invited them to join us for dinner in our home in Centerville. Both had been married to men before, both had children, and both had remarkable stories to tell. Their journeys had been painful and in one case, the behavior of a church once she had come out to the world of her sexual orientation almost killed her. We talked, laughed and cried for a couple of hours. These are real people and real stories. For those who insist that sexual orientation is a choice, I ask, "Why would anyone choose to be gay knowing the painful situations like this that they would have to face?"
As they were getting ready to leave, the one woman with whom I had first spoken at church said, "This was the first time in a church anywhere that I felt comfortable introducing my wife." I can't begin to tell you the healing that I sensed that was happening within her. They were more than tolerated at our church, more than welcomed-any church can do that-, they were affirmed. Their love for one another was affirmed.
I know that this kind of affirmation for some of you may be difficult. I respect that. Let me repeat: becoming the perfect church is a process.
On Thursday morning our newly formed Safe Church Team met to discuss the many ways we can work together to make this a safe place for our children as well as all we older adults for whom trekking across an icy parking lot can prove to be both challenging if not treacherous. The team talked about lights for the parking lot, phones for emergencies, fire extinguishers and emergency evacuation plans, the two adult rule for Sunday School, permission slips, and so on.
But we all know that what I am talking about this morning is Safe Church on yet a whole other level: although we are not perfect as Christ beckons us to be we are working on it and insofar as we are able we are going to welcome all people coming through the doors as a brother or sister in Christ, without judgment, without condescension, without prejudice and hopefully, without fear. As we do so, may we all achieve the affirmation for which we all so deeply hunger as children of the same God.
AMEN