The ELCA adopted a statement on Human Sexuality at the Churchwide Assembly in Minneapolis in 2009. It “provides guidance on key matters, such as marriage, family, same-gender relationships, protection of children and youth, sexuality and the self, sexual intimacy, and cohabitation.”
Have ELCA congregations accepted this statement? Has Women of the ELCA? If so, why am I so afraid to identify myself?
As the church and as individuals, we must do better. I have heard so many people say they accept the LGBTQIA+ community. They are accepting of and loving to someone they have a relationship with, but not with strangers in the same community. I have seen several potential members of my community be turned off or turned away because church members aren’t committed to the statement’s words.
Show your friends, neighbors, and fellow siblings in Christ that you do love and accept them as they are, just as you love yourself. Open yourself up to honest, possibly uncomfortable conversations with people of the LGBTQIA+ community. Listen to what they—we–have to say, to how we feel. See us as fellow human beings and give us the same respect that you give others.
This message is an excerpt from a Women of the ELCA blog by someone who wishes to remain anonymous. Today we remember Ambrose, bishop of Milan, who died in 397.
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