Church apologises for gay slur

Australia’s third largest church is to apologise after publishing remarks that equated the choice to be homosexual with the choice to molest a child.

The Uniting Church Insight magazine printed a reader’s letter in the May edition that said, I cannot go along with this idea that [homosexuality] is entirely due to genes, DNA, or any other excuse. One might as well say that prostitutes are not responsible for their choices, or murderers or child molesters.

Warren Talbot, of the church’s Uniting Network LGBTI group, replied to Insight expressing his dismay.

You should have edited and excluded the odious comparison between gay members of the church and murderers.

Speaking to the Star, Talbot placed responsibility on the shoulders of church leaders: Once again, the leadership, which is tolerant and benign, just doesn’t get the plot.

If it was Aborigines or migrants they would never circulate that sort of material.

Insight deputy editor, Stephen Webb, said Talbot had misinterpreted the letter.

The letter was making a point about the use of DNA evidence and people’s choices -“ it wasn’t saying that homosexuals are the same as murderers.

However, Webb said an apology would appear in the next issue.

Meanwhile, in another example of a layperson standing up to their church, a Catholic parishioner has taken his message of gay equality to the lectern.

Paul Harris’s local priest invited him to talk at St Joseph’s church in Newtown at Mass on 10 May.

Being human is about being able to love and let others love you in return, said Harris. And to me that love is towards a man.

The response was rapturous, Harris said.

Does he feel his words will make a change to the Catholic Church in Sydney, which under Cardinal George Pell has taken a hard line on gay members?

One parish is a tiny drop in the ocean. My talk isn’t going to change the attitude of the pope but it might change the heart of a few people who were there.

Reverend Karl Hand, pastor of the Sydney Metropolitan Community Church (MCC), which is popular with gay worshippers, believes non-mainstream churches are the best way to get GLBT religious issues raised.

I understand and I respect people who stay in mainstream churches and try and change from within, he said. [But] if the church says -˜we don’t accept people who are gay’ and you stay inside and try and change -“ that won’t work.

Rev. Hand is not unduly worried by the rise of Pentecostal churches such as Hillsong, which, according to the latest National Church Life Survey, have seen their congregations rise by 30 percent over the last decade.

MCC, he said, has seen many spiritual refugees from charismatic congregations who hear a view of God that is compassionate and embrace it with open arms.

While admitting their socially conservative viewpoints aren’t desirable, Rev. Hand also sees some light in the darkness.

If charismatic spirituality makes the traditional churches re-encounter what it is they are about, there will be some positive aspects of the new trends emerging.