Sound christian groups that stand up against homophobia, and are broadly secular?

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Sound christian groups that stand up against homophobia, and are broadly secular?

I always feel a bit sad to see christianity associating itself so strongly with homophobia and the desire to impose itself on others.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9074159/Christian-guesthouse-owners-lose-appeal-over-ban-on-gay-guests.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9073801/Prayers-before-council-meetings-ruled-unlawful.html
Whenever I express that view, christians pop up and say "I agree, those people are awful, not in my name" etc.
So I've been wondering, is there a prominent christian movement that stands up against homophobia, and is broadly secular, in the real sense of "the church shouldn't interfere with the work of the state and impose itself on others" (rather than "atheist").
People have mentioned Ekklesia, and they do look good. There seem to be lots of smaller groups that are focused specifically on the single issue of gender/LGBT equality. I'm posting this here really because I thought there were some interesting groups and ideas being mentioned on twitter, but twitter comes and goes, while blog comments are stable. So, if you know any good ones that likeminded people might want to check out, and you have 30 seconds to spare, do link them below.
- 10 February 2012
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4 months ago alanfricker (Twitter) responded:

I think you want the quakers. Very big on equality issues. Made a national commitment to gay marriage. Engaged in all matter of things around peace making, restorative justice, circles of accountability, green issues etc and so on

4 months ago notfit4purpose (Twitter) responded:

Agree about Quakers. Also see http://inclusive-church.org.uk/ as mentioned on Twitter, regarding women's equality and LGBT inclusiveness issues.

4 months ago Ben Goldacre responded:

a few mentions on twitter

catholics for choice

http://changingattitude.org.uk/ (just LGBT stuff i thnk)

quakers natch http://qfp.quakerweb.org.uk/qfp22-13.html

CSM tho headlining another idea http://www.thecsm.org.uk/

4 months ago Ben Goldacre responded:

http://www.iona.org.uk/iona_community.php

4 months ago daleof (Twitter) responded:

Except the quakers, as a denomination, would have no obligation to put out a press release (or something) when something like this happens. No reason to say that an organisation of quakers couldn't do something similar I guess.

4 months ago daleof (Twitter) responded:

That really should be distinguished from the Irish Iona Institute which is much less..... yeah... http://www.ionainstitute.ie/

4 months ago Ben Goldacre responded:

it seems to me that as a church shrinks, only a harder core remains, so they become more extreme (relative to society, not their own history, obvsly), and so alienate outsiders, and so become even more concentrated and extreme.

4 months ago Ben Goldacre responded:

sorry if duplicates

http://inclusive-church.org.uk/

4 months ago Jo Brodie responded:

Nice idea, wish you well with it.
Incidentally - nothing to do with the topic of the post - it's a bit sad that Twitter is so ephemeral: "...but twitter comes and goes, while blog comments are stable". It used to be much more trappable / archivable but they've done their best to make it much harder to capture (and export) threaded or hashtagged conversations.

4 months ago Juliet liked this post.

4 months ago hywelowen (Twitter) responded:

Anglicans? My local church is exactly what you say.

4 months ago quackonomics (Twitter) responded:

yeah nice idea. Its always good to be wary of stereotyping people imo.Not out of political correctness. I think personal cultural history plays a big role in why people are religious rather than any philosophical ontological questions. And alot of them are capable of reasoning on various issues without resorting to 'first principle' arguments. People - all kinds of them - are complex and complicated and interesting. and its always good to have that in the back of our minds, doesnt mean we have to compromise on anything like homophobia or 'condoms in Africa' etc, but its a good rule of thumb I reckon

4 months ago hardindr (Twitter) responded:

There are many such Christians in the US, but they do not have the same kind of visibility that the Christian Right has in the media, and are probably smaller in number compared to them. Many of them are in the "Mainline" Protestant denominations (i.e. Episcopal/Anglicans, United Methodist, etc.). The "Mainline" churches encompass a wide variety of theological views, from very liberal to very conservative and can make united stands about policy issues very hard. There are some fairly small denominations like the Unitarian Universalists and the United Church of Christ that are very liberal. Ordinary Catholics in the US have stands that are very different from the church hierarchy, but since most of the church's power is in the hierarchy's hands they can't do a lot to change the church.
Your comment about church's getting smaller is very interesting. It can go in either way. The "Mainlines" have lost a lot of members over the past few decades, some people who have become more secular, some people who are more conservative and object to their more the denominations more liberal stands, so the "Mainlines" have become more liberal. Many Catholic Theocons (like George Weigel, and the late Richard John Neuhaus) think that their Church should become smaller and more doctrinally pure, i.e. get ride of all the people who dissent from the hierarchy. In the end, they might succeed.

4 months ago hardindr (Twitter) responded:

I also don't know what you mean by "broadly secular?" Do you mean they accept democratic pluralism, or they separation of church and state? Churches by their vary nature are interested in the sacred.

4 months ago NaylorMatthew (Twitter) responded:

Ekklesia are the one I've encountered. Quakers I follow on twitter seem spot on about most issues. I (and my wife) have defected from organised churchiness and such organisations because the message that strikes a chord with us from christianity isn't very into organising things and labelling things unnecessarily. Plenty of people do the same, and so although there seem less rational, thoughtful christian groups out there... that's partly because lots of us rejecting the unnecessary traditions don't organise ourselves into groups but act independently in accordance what we feel is right etc.
Good idea for the post though. I'll look up some of the links shared thus far.

4 months ago amsutcliffe (Twitter) responded:

Lots of Christians who probably share those views are involved in organisations such as
http://www.pcnbritain.org.uk/index.php and http://www.stmarkscrc.co.uk/ but they both tend more to be about people's individual journeys rather than a campaigning approach. Greenbelt probably would be at the same end of the spectrum when it comes to Christian Festivals and is more willing to campaign, though often is more concerned with poverty and justice rather than prayer before council meetings.
And that is often the problem. Christians who share those views (and the secular one is much much rarer than the anti homophobia one) are often more involved in either internal campaigning (even, say, still trying to push the C of E further on Women Bishops, never mind the homosexuality issues) or being so disillusioned with established (small e) Christian groups that they tend not to organise.

4 months ago nembow (Twitter) responded:

The Marin Foundation? http://www.themarinfoundation.org/about-us/mission/

4 months ago jonathansc (Twitter) responded:

"the desire to impose itself on others". I am not sure why you would expect Christians to sign up to that as a good thing. Jesus said "go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit". So how can we call ourselves Christians if we do not do what Jesus tells us - I agree that opens the door to all the things Jesus said that I should do and am not very good at doing. At its foundation Christianity is a proselytizing religion. I agree that is not about imposition but it does mean that we talk the talk and walk the walk.

4 months ago snozboz (Twitter) responded:

Mennonites http://menno.org.uk/ and Anabaptists
Third Way magazine http://www.thirdwaymagazine.co.uk/
Greenbelt festival http://www.greenbelt.org.uk/
Ship of Fools website http://ship-of-fools.com/
and amsutcliffe makes goods points (above)

4 months ago Ben Goldacre responded:

i dont doubt that there are many christians who think it is great to impose your prayers and rituals on strangers at official council meetings. i also don't doubt that there are many christians who think it's fine and indeed desirable to be homophobic.

my query is whether there are large numbers of christians who recognise those behaviours as inappropriate, worry that they will make people think rather badly of you, and if so, whether they have organised.

4 months ago hardindr (Twitter) responded:

In the US, there are many such Christians, though they are probably not more numerous than evangelicals, who are more likely to support such things:
Here are a few organizations in the US:
http://www.interfaithalliance.org/index.php
http://www.catholicsforchoice.org
http://rcrc.org
http://www.wabaptists.org
These are just a few in the US.
I think it is important to point out that all evangelicals do not have the same beliefs and should not be lumped together.

4 months ago annesadleir (Twitter) responded:

Inclusive Church is great, and there's also a group called Accepting Evangelicals, but I don't know much about them. Or come along to St John's Waterloo in London sometime! The vicar, Giles Goddard, is chairman of Inclusive Church.

4 months ago amsutcliffe (Twitter) responded:

I think a very very large number of Christians would condemn homophobia if asked the question. A smaller, but still large, number see no problem with people engaging in (lifelong, faithful) homosexual relationships and would more actively condemn homophobia. They have organised - Changing attitude, inclusive church have been mentioned, I'm not sure lgcm has been yet (http://www.lgcm.org.uk/) and there are others. A number of these groups have formed a coalition partly to more directly deal with the C of E hierarchy (http://lgbtac.org.uk/). They are active campaigning organisations and I do see them quoted in the media, though perhaps I spot them more often because I'm familiar with some of the characters involved. I don't doubt that they could push the 'PR' aspect harder, but even the most active members tend to be volunteers with limited time.
On the secular issue I think there's much less impetus in Christian circles. Ekklesia are probably the only Christian org I've seen actively campaigning for it; there are many more who would be quietly happy if the Church of England were disestablished (which would help solve some of the problems) but don't want to push too hard on this, because, for example, they see the NSS claiming
that NHS money is wasted when spent on hospital chaplains and want to argue strongly against that viewpoint, so are scared of facing more technical secularism issues. Plus of course, many Christians who are more active evangelists who would see council prayer as helping to keep Christianity in the public consciousness and thinks that it would help allow people to experience God who might otherwise not...
I think this split between the two issues probably does reflect wider public opinion - is it not true that many more (non Christian, or 'cultural Christian') people would have an issue with inequalities towards gay people than would take issue with council prayer? I think that, say, the C of E's attitude towards gay people, and the real harm that's done to many individuals, is seen as a bigger issue than the Christian influence on, and place in, public life. The latter certainly has fewer obvious damaging effects on particular individuals.

4 months ago hardindr (Twitter) responded:

RE evangelicals and homosexuality:
http://www.philipyancey.com/q-and-a-topics/homosexuality

4 months ago snicketmom (Twitter) responded:

In the US, we Unitarian Universalists have our roots in Christianity, but our congregations are made up of many faith backgrounds. We strongly support marriage equality and separation of church and state. Looks like there are some in the UK as well- http://www.unitarian.org.uk/index.shtml.

4 months ago ThatPhotoBloke (Twitter) responded:

"the church shouldn't interfere with the work of the state and impose itself on others"
Something I absolutely agree with but for some reason don't hear argued very much. It annoys the crap out of me that my ability to find something to repair my broken water pipe at any time on a Sunday other than a very small gap of a few hours is entirely down to a noisy minority who seem to think my actions should be governed by the will of their fictional god in whom I have no belief at all.
And don't even get me started on prayers before council meetings.

4 months ago ThatPhotoBloke (Twitter) responded:

*inability*

4 months ago iangoggin (Twitter) responded:

Yup, Quakers are pretty much what you're looking for. I sort of am one. The LGBT community is extremely strong, and a vibrant part of Quakerism.
I was on 4Thought about gay marriage and civil partnerships this week, mentioning Quakerism:
http://www.4thought.tv/themes/should-gay-couples-be-allowed-to-get-married-in...
Ekklesia has been mentioned. Symon Hill from Ekklesia (also happens to be a Quaker) appeared on BBC: The Big Questions last Sunday:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01bsp28/The_Big_Questions_Series_5_Epis...

3 months ago daff55 responded:

i come from a very christian family,,i belief in god,,and believe we can all learn from jesus...dont know what it is about the church,not sure if you ever read the bible,i did for the first time about a month ago...end to end,,,the word homosexuality was never mentioned...adultery was mentioned maybe once...sin itself is not even the focus,,,acceptance,compassion,are the main mssgs..one of the main phrases jesus repeated is"listen if you have ears"and i have to say i think they could use some ears in church...when jesus was asked what are the two most important messages he said,,,love youre neighbour,and do not judge...my personal opinion is that sin is not an act,rather whats in your heart when you do...i dont understand how the church could get so many things so wrong,,from alienating people away from religion,,to giving too much importance to laws made by the church,over the words of jesus...i would absolutely love to involved in a movement that brings sense back to church...after reading both books,im really at a loss as to how they could get it so wrong,then again its not one of the richest organizations because the its being run with jesus in mind...i could go on and on,as its a subject very close to my heart...im a man of strong faith,,and i encourage everyone not to be discouraged by the arrogant ignorance,of those that think they know better,when what they dont know,is how wrong they actually are...stand up for your faith,we all have as much right to god as anyone else,,,and i will stand alongside anyone,that needs the support...
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