The position of the Orthodox Church toward homosexuality has been expressed by synodical canons and Patristic pronouncements beginning with the very first centuries of Orthodox ecclesiastical life.
Thus, the Orthodox Church condemns unreservedly all expressions of personal sexual experience which prove contrary to the definite and unalterable function ascribed to sex by God's ordinance and expressed in man's experience as a law of nature.
Thus the function of the sexual organs of a man and a woman and their bio-chemical generating forces in glands and glandular secretions are ordained by nature to serve one particular purpose, the procreation of the human kind.
However, the human sexual apparatus appears to have been designed not only as the medium by which the necessary physical contact for the purpose of sex is affected, but as the generator as well and the center of a highly complex system of feelings which all together are known by the name eros, love between husband and wife.
Therefore, any and all uses of the human sex organs for purposes other than those ordained by creation, runs contrary to the nature of things as decreed by God and produces the following wrongs:
a. They violate God's ordinance regarding both the procreation of man and his emotional life generated by his instinctive attraction to the opposite sex not only for procreating but for advancing the personalities of a man and a woman to a state of completion within the association of the Sacrament of Marriage. For all this, homosexuality is an insult to God, and since it attempts to alter the laws regulating creation it is a blasphemy.
b. Homosexuality interferes with the normal development of societal patterns and as such it proves detrimental to all. These endangered patterns include personal values regarding sex which people normally take to be a vital part of their existence and a valuable asset to their living a normal life, esteemed by others.
c. The homosexual degrades his own sex and thus denies to himself the self-respect that is generated from the feeling that one is in line with God's creation.
Homosexuality appears to be of two kinds: physico-genetic and habitual. Physico-genetic homosexuality is of physical origin due to secretory abnormalities that may produce organic changes. This type of homosexuality is rather rare and is treated as any other medical disorder.
Habitual homosexuality may have more than one cause. All, however, point out to a moral failure at some stage of the individual's development, or to the animate environment from which the homosexual originated.
Thus, although homosexuality followed as a way of life by the sufferer, may be subject to psychopathological investigation and treatment, the origin of it, in all but the few physico-genetic cases mentioned above, brings with it a moral failure. It is because of the realization of this that homosexuality has been described from ancient times as a moral stigma.
Thus, the Orthodox Church cannot subscribe to the demand that homosexuals be recognized by society and its agencies as legal spouses and as deserving the same respect as men and women enjoy in the state of wedlock.
Society and its values, religious and societal, have legitimate claims over the behavior of its members, especially in so vital a function as the sexual one on which not only the survival but its quality as well depend. No one has the right to do whatever he wishes with his body and still claim recognition and respect on the part of society.
The Orthodox Church believes that homosexuality should be treated by society as an immoral and dangerous perversion and by religion as a sinful failure. In both cases, correction is called for. Homosexuals should be accorded the confidential medical and psychiatric facilities by which they can be helped to restore themselves to a self-respecting sexual identity that belongs to them by God's ordinance.
In full confidentiality, the Orthodox Church cares and provides pastorally for homosexuals in the belief that no sinner who has failed himself and God should be allowed to deteriorate morally and spiritually.
Psychiatric restoration, without religious direction and reconciliation with God, is bound to prove short lived.
A healthy society and various religions do not recognize perversions. Rather, they work to restore the homosexual to the status of a self-esteemed individual and thus to a valued instrument of their own survival and wellbeing under God.
HARTFORD, Conn. - A controversial two-year bid by the homosexual-oriented Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches to become a member of the National Council of Churches of Christ was rejected for the foreseeable future by the ecumenical body's Governing Board Nov. 9 here.
By a vote of 116 to 94 after almost two hours of debate, the board agreed to "postpone indefinitely" a decision on whether the UFMCC was eligible for membership in the ecumenical agency. The action was interpreted by the parliamentarian to mean that the Metropolitan Community Churches would have to submit a new application to be considered for membership in the future.
The Governing Board, in the resolution as adopted, also resolved to "develop a process whereby the NCCC and the UFMCC can remain in study and conversation together" and to "recognize that our reluctance to take action on the eligibility for consideration for membership of the UFMCC results from unresolved differences regarding ecclesiology, interpretations of the Word of God, human sexuality and Christian unity within the NCCC."
United Methodist Bishop James Armstrong, NCCC president, who called the decision "agonizing" for many "in this room and for many beyond it," said that while the present process of considering the church for membership has been ended, the dialogue that has been in progress since September of 1981 will continue.
"We are not ready now, perhaps we will never be ready to receive this church into membership," Armstrong said. "But we will keep the lines of communication open."
Meeting with reporters later, he said he did not consider the decision "a rejection of persons," but "a rejection of the practice (of homosexuality) on the part of the majority" of the Governing Board.
A spokesperson for the ecumenical agency said it was the first time that a membership application that has come this far through a five-part process has been rejected.
The Metropolitan Community Churches has approximately 27,000 members in 180 congregations. Its membership is predominantly, but not exclusively, made up of homosexuals.
NCCC officials said the issue has been the most controversial membership application in the ecumenical body's history.
In mid-October, the bishops of five Eastern Orthodox churches that are members of the NCC said they would leave the ecumenical agency if the UFMCC was admitted. These five are the Greek, Ukrainian, Antiochian and Serbian Orthodox, and the Orthodox Church in America.
The other Orthodox Church bodies in the NCCC are the Syrian, Coptic and Armenian Orthodox Churches and the Patriarchal Parishes of the Russian Orthodox Church in the USA also opposed eligibility.
Other church bodies have said an affirmative vote on eligibility for membership would create problems for them including the American Baptist Churches USA and the black denominations.
If the ecumenical agency had voted here that the UFMCC was eligible for membership, the next stop would have been to vote on whether actually to admit them.
The following joint paper was prepared both for the special Faith and Order study of the issues arising out of the application for membership to the National Council of Churches of Christ of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, and for the Orthodox Caucus, the representatives of the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox member churches to the Governing Board of the NCCC.
The paper has been drafted by Father Stanley Harakas of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese. Editorial comments of Father Joseph Allen of the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese have been incorporated into the text. Supplementary comments by Father Thomas Hopko of the Orthodox Church in America appear here as an appendix.
The application of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches for membership in the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA has created a situation for the member churches of conscientious questioning and theological searching. This is true as well for the Orthodox Church, raising perhaps for us even more serious questions than for the Protestant member communions of the NCCC.
Without doubt the problem is raised not because of any fundamental objection with the theological beliefs or polity of the UFMCC. These are typically Protestant. Nor is it because these theological and polity factors are out of harmony with the criteria for official membership in the NCCC. Nor, in fact, can it be said that (at least until now) the Orthodox have found problems of ecumenical fellowship with communions which teach views of morality which are contrary to Orthodox Christian teaching. For example, from an Orthodox Christian perspective, abortion is perhaps an even more serious moral error than the UFMCC advocated and approved homosexual stance. Yet the Orthodox have not argued that communions which teach a woman's right to abortion as a morally appropriate stance should not be admitted to membership in ecumenical bodies such as the National Council of Churches.
If our sense of a problem with the UFMCC application arises out of an unreflective reaction to homosexuality as the one and unique moral failure which would justify the breaking of ecumenical fellowship, it could not be supported consistently. Homosexuality is not the only sin which excludes from the Kingdom. To be consistent, before entering into ecumenical fellowship with other church groups we would have to approve and agree with all of their moral stances.
The UFMCC application, as the NCCC Faith and Order study outline indicates, challenges all the church groups in the NCCC to go back to first principles. At the least they raise questions of the nature of the Church and the Christian way in which the Church deals with those bodies with which it is not in communion.
For members of the Orthodox Caucus of the NCCC there is not need to repeat at any length the Orthodox understanding of the Church -- i.e., the ecclesiological doctrine and convictions of Orthodox Christianity. Suffice it to say in all humility, yet with historical, apostolic and doctrinal conviction, Orthodoxy sees itself as, in fact, the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ. In its doctrines, polity, worship, spirituality, moral teaching and sacramental life, Orthodox Christianity is the Church. From an Orthodox Christian ecclesiological perspective all other church groups are at once in greater or lesser measure separated from the Church; but also in greater or lesser measure, they may share in the doctrine, polity, moral teaching, spirituality and the teaching regarding the meaning of the worship and sacramental life of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
The Church, in relating to these groups which are not "Church" in fulness, has two goals. The first is to protect the flock from influences emanating from schismatics and heretics which would draw the faithful out of communion with Her. The second aim is to bring those who are not members of the Church into communion with the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
The methods of the Church seeking to realize these goals have been based on a recognition that the groups which are not the Church differ significantly among themselves as to how much they do in fact reflect in their beliefs and practices the total life of the Church. Thus, those who were divided only on the question of polity -- e.g. those who failed to recognize the legitimate Episcopal leadership of the Church in a given location, were deemed schismatics. Those who varied in essential doctrines of faith could and were treated differently in accordance to the severity of the differences. Thus, in the Holy Canons some heretical groups/persons are received back into full communication with the Church with a profession of faith; others through Chrismation; and others through Baptism.
Thus the methods of dealing with those who are not the Church varied in the light of the closeness or distance of groups to the whole life and ethos of the Church: doctrine, polity, worship, spirituality, moral teaching and sacramental life. It also varied in terms of the practical methods used in order to achieve the goals of protection from destructive influences and for the return of those separated from full communion with the Church. One means, seen in the writings of many of the Holy Fathers, was persuasion in the form of biblical commentary and theological teaching. Another means used was denunciation, condemnation and threat. Anathema and breaking of communion sealed the difference and formalized the division.
Since 1922 the Orthodox Church has added another means which seeks to eventually realize the union of all Christians -- the method of dialogue and cooperation, i.e., ecumenism. The Orthodox Church has participated in various ecumenical movements and programs on the conviction that by sharing in such movements She can witness to the fulness of the Orthodox Christian Catholic truth in the spirit of love and charity, thus beginning to remove age-old barriers of misunderstanding and mistrust so as to further the cause of unity.
The Orthodox understanding of the propriety and acceptability of differences in liturgical traditions, piety, even doctrinal emphasis, does not mean that this unity would necessarily be based on a rigid requirement on the part of the Orthodox that all others would have to become "Eastern," much less identify totally with Greek, Russian, Antiochian or any other Eastern tradition, in order that unity with the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church be achieved.
The ecumenical involvement of the Orthodox churches in a body such as the NCCC must then be seen in this context. The Preamble of the NCCC as adopted in 1981 describes the nature of this organization. According to the UFMCC By-Laws, the doctrines described a normative for them are much more inclusive and traditionally Christian than that minimum statement, though it falls short of a full Orthodox Christian theological position. The UFMCC as a Christian communion more than adequately meets that official requirement.
The NCCC Preamble continues: "These communions covenant with each other to manifest even more fully the unity of the Church." Here Orthodox participation in the NCCC both finds its justification and hope as a future consequence, and concurrently begins to reflect the strains of the present reality. The painful fact of Orthodox participation in the NCCC is that what is frequently manifested is not "ever more fully the unity of the Church," but the differences between the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Tradition and the teachings and practices of the Christian communions. Yet the hope and desire to grow toward that fuller manifestation has justified continuation of the Orthodox in these movements.
Drawing from the varying perspectives of the bodies who make up the NCCC, the NCCC Preamble verifies that it relies upon the "transforming power of the Holy Spirit" to help bring "these communions into common mission." From the Orthodox ecclesiological stance the only direction the Holy Spirit could be moving "these communions" would be in the direction of the Apostolic rule and canon of faith and practice. It is here where the UFMCC application seems most at variance with Orthodox purposes and interests in the ecumenical endeavor. A Christian communion which is specifically organized around a moral failure, and which finds support in a thoroughly rewritten exegesis of the apostolic, patristic, canonically embodied mind of the Church, cannot be leading "these communions into common mission."
Thus the dilemma for the Orthodox participants in the NCCC: On the one hand, UFMCC membership in a purely formal manner cannot be considered as any more objectionable than that of other groups who have doctrines, pieties, spiritualities, moralities and polities which are equally unacceptable to the Orthodox. Were the Orthodox to vote for UFMCC eligibility or membership in the NCCC -- or were we to vote against UFMCC eligibility and membership and then remain in the NCCC should they be elected to membership -- it is conceivable that the Orthodox would be actively supporting a moral stance which is Apostolically condemned. That this is the case for the NCCC is seen in the G. William Sheek statement (NCCC Director, Family Ministries and Human Sexuality). According to Sheek, NCCC membership of the UFMCC will contribute to the "High Visibility" which has been tending to legitimatize homosexuality. May the Orthodox Churches accept that consequence for the sake of the ecumenical effort? If the Orthodox Caucus moves in that direction it certainly will have at least two effects. It will increase the sense of estrangement between the Orthodox and the NCCC, and perhaps the ecumenical movement as a whole. It will without doubt lower the significance of the ecumenical enterprise itself as a valid means for working toward Church unity. It will also lower the sense of seriousness with which the Church's two-thousand year moral teachings are seen as valid and normative by the faithful.
On the other hand, a vote against UFMCC membership and a consequent withdrawal from the NCCC, should they be elected to membership, will serve to break the positive tradition of accomplishment in the bridging of the differences among Christian communions and return the Orthodox to the older stance of condemnation and anathema. It would be an abandonment of the ecumenical method on the national level in this country. It would however provide notice that for the Orthodox there are limits to ecumenism which we are not willing to cross. A body whose reason d'etre is not the faith of the Scriptures and the Creeds, but a passion universally condemned in the age-long tradition of the Church as inappropriate and unfitting to the calling of the Christian life, cannot in fact be seen as a Christian communion by the Orthodox. By analogy with the ancient practice, the UFMCC would be denied membership to the NCCC by the Orthodox precisely because it shared so little in fact with the Apostolic tradition that it would be anathema.
From an Orthodox perspective, whichever of the two alternatives occurs, the UFMCC application for membership can only be seen as weakening the significance of the ecumenical movement as means for enhancing Christian unity. In effect, the Orthodox -- whatever the course of action we take -- will be forced to de-emphasize the hopes in, and the significance of, the NCCC as contributing to ecclesial unity. There is no way the UFMCC membership In the NCCC can be conceived by the Orthodox as "manifest(ing) ever more fully the unity of the Church," while withdrawal from the NCCC by the Orthodox equally would fail in this manifestation. Were the Orthodox Church to remain in the NCCC with the UFMCC, She would also interpret such a move as not being an "ever more full manifestation of unity," but rather, a further dilution of the meaning of the work and its possible fulfillment. The task of the Orthodox Caucus is not to choose the better course -- it is to choose the lesser evil.
The points here presented concerning Eastern Orthodox participation in the NCCC in the light of the application of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches for membership are my own. They are, nevertheless, the result of discussions on the issue with Father Stanley Harakas, Professor of Ethics at Holy Cross School of Theology in Brookline, Mass. who was asked to present a paper on the issue for the Orthodox Caucus of the NCCC, and Father Joseph Allen, Professor of Pastoral Theology at Holy Cross and St. Vladimir's Seminary in New York, who was appointed to participate in the debate on the issue by the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese in North America. They also take into consideration the thoughts of others in the Eastern Orthodox Church, including Elenie K. Huszagh who represented the Greek Orthodox Church in America at the November 12-13 meeting of NCCC member church representatives discussing the issue. At this same meeting Father Michael Buttero of the Armenian Orthodox Church expressed substantial agreement with the positions taken by his Eastern Orthodox colleagues. Therefore, although the summary here is my own, for which I take sole responsibility, I do believe that I am expressing a general Eastern Orthodox view on the subject, at least that of those who have been involved in it to date.
1. The Eastern Orthodox have always participated in the ecumenical movement, including membership in the WCC and the NCCC, while identifying herself as the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, and denying this claim to others. In his paper prepared for the Orthodox Caucus of the NCCC, Father Harakas explains this position in the following way:
For members of the Orthodox Caucus of the NCC there is no need to repeat at any length the Orthodox understanding of the Church -- i.e. the ecclesiological doctrine and convictions of Orthodox Christianity. Suffice it to say in all humility, yet with historical, apostolic and doctrinal conviction, Orthodoxy sees itself as, in fact, the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ. In its doctrines, polity, worship, spirituality, moral teaching and sacramental life, Orthodox Christianity is the Church. From an Orthodox Christian ecclesiological perspective all other church groups are at once in greater or lesser measure separated from the Church; but also in greater or lesser measure, they may share in the doctrine, polity, moral teaching, spirituality and the teaching regarding the meaning of the worship and sacramental life of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
After describing how the Church over the centuries dealt in various ways with those outside her confession of faith and sacramental and spiritual communion, Father Harakas continues:
Since 1922 the Orthodox Church has added another means which seeks to eventually realize the union of all Christians -- the method of dialogue and cooperation, i.e. ecumenism. The Orthodox Church has participated in various ecumenical movements and programs on the conviction that by sharing in such movements She can witness to the fulness of the Orthodox Christian truth in the spirit of love and charity, thus beginning to remove age-old barriers of misunderstanding and mistrust so as to further the cause of unity.
The rationale for participation in "councils of churches," therefore, appears to be three-fold: a) to witness to God's truth which Orthodox believe to be preserved in the Orthodox Church; b) to affirm this truth in other ecclesial communities where it is to be discovered and c) to call others to this truth where it is absent, overlooked or rejected.
2. In view of the above, the purpose of the NCCC for the separated Christian communions to "covenant with each other to manifest ever more fully the unity of the Church" must be seriously questioned by the Eastern Orthodox. Such a formula may be accepted if it is understood (as Fr. Harakas in his paper, and the Orthodox who accepted it in the NCCC have understood it) to mean that the God-given unity of the Church which exists fully in the doctrinal and sacramental forms of the Orthodox Church must be manifested more fully and correctly among all churches in the NCCC. It cannot be accepted (as it has not been in the WCC where Orthodox participants steadfastly reject the language of manifestation) if it means that the God-given unity of the Church is somehow already mystically present in all churches, and need only be "more fully manifested;" or if it means that the God-given unity of the Church which exists as a mystical reality in and from God is presently manifested fully nowhere, and can only come to be manifested by all Christian churches acting together.
Simply put, the languaging of "manifesting" unity is misleading. Christian communities are presently separated and divided. They must be united. The work of ecumenism is to unite that which is divided. It is not to "manifest unity" which is currently in all, or none, of the churches. It is to recover the unity which is already doctrinally and sacramentally actualized in the Orthodox Church despite the sins and divisions of her human members.
3. For the Eastern Orthodox the goal of ecumenism is for all Christian churches to be orthodox and catholic, and so to be factually and actually one in faith and worship, in doctrine and church order, in proclamation and action. This does not mean that all Christian churches must become spiritually and culturally "Eastern." It does mean, however, for them to be dogmatically and liturgically orthodox. Father Harakas expresses it this way:
The Orthodox understanding of the propriety and acceptability of differences in liturgical traditions, piety, even doctrinal emphasis, does not mean that this unity would necessarily be based on a rigid requirement on the part of the Orthodox that all others would have to become "Eastern," much less identify totally with Greek, Russian, Antiochian or any other Eastern tradition, in order that unity with the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church be achieved.
4. The question which the UFMCC raises for the Eastern Orthodox in the NCCC is whether or not the UFMCC has within it something "of the Church" upon which dialogue within a "council of churches," and cooperation on certain issues in action within such a "council," can be meaningfully and authentically grounded and pursued.
In my original paper (which was published in The Orthodox Church newspaper) before the November 12-13 meeting of delegates of the NCCC member churches and the December 10-11 meeting of the NCCC delegates from Faith and Order with the representatives of the UFMCC (in both of which I participated), I expressed my doubts. I thought, unlike Fr. Harakas who in his paper called the UFMCC "typically Protestant," that the conditions of its founding and its position on homosexuality placed the UFMCC beyond the boundaries of membership in a "council of churches" in which Eastern Orthodox could participate. Through my participation in the above-mentioned meetings, as well as through discussions with persons not directly involved, including Fr. Harakas and Fr. Allen, I have changed my mind. My position now, which I believe many others in the Orthodox Church to share, is that the UFMCC presents no greater difficulties for the Eastern Orthodox in the NCCC than do the Society of Friends, the United Methodist, the United Church of Christ, the Protestant Episcopal Church and perhaps others, all of which have approved and ordained openly committed and practicing "gay" men and lesbians to their membership and ministries, some of whom participated in the meetings mentioned above. This is not to mention the fact, as Fr. Harakas does in his paper, that these and other church bodies openly support the practice of clinical abortion, and the woman's right to such, which for the Orthodox is murder.
It would be dishonest and unjust, in my understanding, for the Eastern Orthodox Churches in the NCCC to oppose the eligibility and membership of the UFMCC in this organization, while continuing in membership with other ecclesial bodies which practice the same, if not worse, infractions and rejections of Christian teaching and behavior as understood and defended by the Orthodox.
5. My own position about the participation of the Orthodox churches in the NCCC (which I take to be that of Fr. Hafakas and Fr. Allen, though I would not hold them to it, and would not expect my present readers to do so) is that the Orthodox have only two possible options regarding their membership in the NCCC. These options have been unavoidably forced upon them by the application of the UFMCC for membership.
Either:
A. The Eastern Orthodox churches should withdraw from the NCCC immediately, certainly before any action is taken about the eligibility for membership, and the membership itself, of the UFMCC. They should do so because their rationale for participation in such a "council of churches" no longer holds because a significant number of member churches have formulated and enacted doctrines and practices far beyond the boundaries which allow for meaningful cooperation in the genuine pursuit of unity among divided Christians within such a "council." The debate engendered by the application of the UFMCC to the NCCC has demonstrated this fact beyond any reasonable doubt.
If the Orthodox leave the NCCC because of UFMCC eligibility or admission to membership, it would be wholly dishonest and unjust. It would lead to the conclusion, and rightly so, that the Orthodox can countenance ecumenical fellowship and "covenant" relationships with churches which openly approve homosexual behavior (not to mention clinical abortions) as long as these church bodies do not make much of an issue of it and can demonstrate some sort of dissent within their constituencies. (And here we do not even raise the issues of the meaning of the lordship and divinity of Jesus, the Trinitarian Godhead, the authority of the Bible, the sacraments, etc.) And such a departure from the NCCC would support the conclusion, again rightly so, that the Orthodox cannot deal with a church which openly and officially affirms "gay" relationships because of the outcry which would come from its members.
Or:
B. If the Orthodox churches decide to stay in the NCCC, then, it seems to me, they have no choice but to vote in favor of UFMCC eligibility and admission, and to radically redefine their rationale for participation in such an organization. In fact it is my firm conviction that whether or not the UFMCC is declared eligible for admission, and is or is not actually admitted, the Orthodox, if they will remain in the council as it is presently constituted, must radically reconsider their reasons for and their manner of participation.
Being consistent with their own theology, ecclesiology and ethics, the Eastern Orthodox -- should they remain in the NCCC regardless of any decision concerning the UFMCC -- must state clearly that for them the NCCC is nothing more than an organization which brings together groups which call themselves Christian according to their own self-definition, interpreting the lordship of Jesus Christ, the Triune character of the Godhead, the authority of the Bible, the significance of the sacraments . . . and generally all doctrinal and sacramental teachings and practices, in their own ways. The sole purpose for this organization would be for encounter, discussion and debate. There would be no theological agreements required of any sort for membership, and certainly no ecclesiological significance given in any way to participation.
Given the present membership of the NCCC, and the common understanding of membership in the council -- since its entire membership is of churches which can loosely, yet accurately be called "liberal" (bearing in mind that the Roman Catholics who are members of the NCCC Faith and Order Commission are not members of the NCCC as such) -- it does not seem possible for the Eastern Orthodox practically to hold such a position as described above. It would be constantly misunderstood by the present membership, the press, the rank-and-file members of the Orthodox churches (not to mention pastors and leaders), as well as non-member churches and society at large. I do not see how the Orthodox could sustain such a manner of membership and participation in action.
6. The application of the UFMCC not only raises for the Orthodox the questions of participation in the ecumenical movement generally, and in the NCCC (and WCC) in particular; it raises also the issue of the Church's understanding and pastoral approach to "gay" men and lesbians, both within the Orthodox communities and outside.
The traditional Orthodox view, as presented by the 1980 Council of the Orthodox Church in America, stands, namely "that sexual activity outside the commitment of marriage -- fornication, adultery, homosexual relationships, are to be rejected as abnormal and destructive to human life made in God's image and likeness." The issue, however, especially concerning homosexuality, is incredibly complicated, to say the least. It cannot be put simply in terms of free will, choice and voluntary sin. The facts of original and involuntary sin; victimization, sickness, societal and cultural influences, etc. also must be raised up and examined in regard to people's lives, behavior and action . . . and church membership and sacramental participation. That the Eastern Orthodox, particularly the theologians, ethicists, pastors and spiritual counsellors must go much deeper into the issue, bringing to light and to bear on the issues the riches and resources of the Christian Orthodox tradition is obvious. And the living encounter with "gay" men and lesbians, within and outside the Christian communities, with or without the NCCC, is essential to this end.
HARTFORD, Conn. -- Attempts to have the National Council of Churches distance itself from the "inclusive language lectionary" published last month by one of its committees were turned back at the council's governing board meeting.
A resolution brought to the governing board by a caucus of Eastern Orthodox churches asked the board to make it "unequivocally clear" that the lectionary -- a series of Bible readings for use in public worship -- was produced "only by the committee of interested groups and individuals and disavowed by the council's own committee on Revised Standard Version of the Bible."
But in action taken after nearly an hour of debate, the council's governing board said only that it would acknowledge "divisions" within and among member denominations regarding publication of the inclusive language lectionary.
The board stressed that the lectionary was published in accord with the ecumenical organization's constitution and bylaws. A publication of this type does not require the approval of the governing board or member denominations, said Dr. David Ng, head of the council's education and ministry division.
In an attempt to avoid male bias in scripture readings, the inclusive lectionary uses such terms as "brothers and sisters" rather than "brethren" and metaphors such as "God the Mother and Father" instead of God the Father.
A significant number of members of the governing board seem to support the efforts of the lectionary committee and the type of language used in the lectionary was used in many of the worship services which opened and closed sessions of governing board meetings.
Nonetheless there is some opposition to the new version of scripture readings and some governing board members want it made clearer that the publication had not been officially endorsed by the governing board of the council.
The Orthodox delegates to the governing board said that the lectionary "implies a false theology and substantially alters crucial biblical witness to the church's understanding of God -- Father, Son and Holy Spirit."