|
The Anglican News Digest came in the e-mail today, with the following story... "The Anglican diocese of the Arctic has given notice that it will not employ the following: anyone having pre-marital sex, homosexuals, lesbians and bisexuals, those who willingly engage in sexual activities with a minor and with those whom they are counselling or supervising (excluding spouse), and those who fail to disclose a prior conviction on child sexual abuse." Need I point out the slide they made right from homosexuality into pedophilia? It's a conception rampant among the uninformed (read: ignorant) that gay men are all lusting after little boys. Never mind that most sexual abuse is perpetrated by straight men - that's a fact that just gets in the way of our preconceived ideas of predatory homosexuals. It's comparable to the notion that if we legalize same-sex marriage then pretty soon people will want to marry their dogs. Yeah. It's telling when someone equates homosexuals with dogs, eh? Sort of indicates where that person is coming from. Later in the article, suffragan bishop Larry Robertson was quoted saying, "We are being honest and upfront. If we're honest how can we be discriminatory?" Well, those "Irish Need Not Apply" signs were perfectly honest, but horribly discriminatory. The Klan makes no bones about saying whites are the "pure" race. Heck, the Nazis were pretty up-front about thinking that Jews were inferior. I think one can be plenty discriminatory, even hateful, while still maintaining complete honesty on the issue. Whether or not such a thing is honest to one's baptismal vows is another thing altogether. The good suffragan bishop also indicated that the ban extends only to the matter of employment and not to church attendance. Somehow I think it's going to affect church attendance. I know I'd stop going if I were a gay man living in that diocese. But then that's probably just what the bishop would want, eh? Sigh...we have a lot of work to do. Luckily the church in this neck of the woods is a lot more open minded. |
