Friday, January 4, 2013

Happy, clappy, and out of the closet: Evangelicals who say being gay is OK

From The Independent (UK)-

Jeremy Marks used to believe you could make a gay man straight through prayer. Despite knowing he was himself gay, as a committed evangelical Christian he was utterly convinced that homosexuality was wrong in all circumstances.

In the late 1980s he set up a group which he hoped would “heal” homosexual men and women on their way to becoming straight. Then something remarkable happened. He began to change his mind.

“However much support we gave people it didn’t result in a change in their orientation at all,” the 60-year-old explains. “Once support was withdrawn they just felt high and dry, worse than before. Many lost their faith altogether. The only ones that did well accepted they were gay, found a partner and accepted it was right. It made me begin to realise that what I was doing was wrong, not them.”

The ongoing theological debates surrounding women bishops and same sex marriages has often been framed as one where liberal Christians are battling against a rising tide of highly organised evangelical zealots. Evangelicalism, the fastest growing form of Christianity in Britain today, is often seen as a byword for social conservatism.


More here-

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/happy-clappy-and-out-of-the-closet-evangelicals-who-say-being-gay-is-ok-8437527.html

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