The following is a message that I sent to UMC Retired Bishop Daniel Arichea through email pertaining to his signing of a document counseling the Church through its leaders to abandon its long stance against homosexuality in the ordained ministry. The colored texts are direct quotations from the signed document.
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Greetings, Bishop!
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
First of all, I am a nobody for such a giant like you. I am just an ordinary inexperienced part-time pastor of a small local church here in Pangasinan with no formal education. I have an intense respect for you. Actually, just a pinch of your profile here floods me. I strongly believe that no one, or only a few at best, can ever rank along with you considering your accomplishments until Christ returns.
However, I am writing this letter to you because of an awful distress that I am feeling because of this news from the UMNS Report. You are one of the three most recent signers of A Statement of Counsel to the Church — 2011, which believes that “The United Methodist Church should remove the following statement from The Book of Discipline (2008):
‘…The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching. Therefore self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in The United Methodist Church.’ ¶304.3”
To state my purpose clearly, I want to let you know that a few clergy men and lay people from your Philippines are massively discouraged and dismayed with what you have done.
But before I totally throw my scabbard against you and consider you an enemy of Evangelicalism, please allow me to enumerate some surface questions after a shallow reading of the Statement.
With this statement of conviction and counsel we seek:
· To affirm that the historic tests of “gifts and evidence of God’s grace” for ordained ministry override any past or present temporal restrictions such as race, gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.
(1) Do you truly believe that homosexuality as a “sexual orientation” is a “temporal restriction” for the ordained ministry? Does that imply that 1 Cor. 6:9-10 speak of a temporal kingdom?
· To declare our conviction that the current disciplinary position of The United Methodist Church, a part of our historical development, need not, and should not, be embraced as the faithful position for the future.
(2) To whom or to what is the object of the “faithful position for the future”? Faithful to whom?
With increasing frequency we observe and experience the following disturbing realities and know them to be detrimental to the mission of a Church of Jesus Christ:
· Laity and clergy, gay and straight, withdrawing membership or absenting themselves from the support of congregational and denominational Church life in order to maintain personal integrity.
(3) Won’t it be also a disturbing reality and detrimental to the mission of the Church when laity and clergy withdraw membership from the UMC for the belief that it is drown into apostasy?
· Young adults, especially, embarrassed to invite friends and expressing dismay at the unwillingness of our United Methodist Church to alter its 39-year exclusionary stance.
(4) Won’t it be also a disturbing reality and detrimental to the mission of the Church when young people, especially, are embarrassed to invite friends and are dismayed with the willingness of the United Methodist Church to embrace an error which It fought against for decades?
· Closeted pastors, currently called and ordained in our church, living divided lives while offering effective appreciated ministry.
(5) Who defines ministry effectivity? Who defines an appreciated ministry?
· Bishops being drained of energy by upholding Church Discipline while regarding it as contrary to their convictions.
(6) Won’t it be also a disturbing reality and detrimental to the mission of the Church when Bishops are being drained of energy by upholding Church Discipline while regarding it as contrary to their convictions (Assuming that your sought change happens)?
· Bishops caught between care for the Church by reappointing an effective gay or lesbian pastor and care for the Discipline by charging them under current legislation.
(7) Again may I know who defines ministry effectivity?
· Seminary leaders desiring greater flexibility and openness from the church in order to advance their mission of identifying, recruiting, enrolling, educating and spiritually forming Christian leaders.
(8) How poor are the skills of these seminary leaders whose ability on nurturing spiritual formation lies dependent on flexibility and openness rather than on objective truth?
· Christian gay men and women understanding themselves called of God to seek ministry opportunities within their United Methodist family Church home, but having to decide between:
o leaving to go to accepting denominations, or
o staying and praying for change, or
o challenging Church law and accepting punitive actions.
(9)How about a fourth choice?
o being encouraged by the sufficient and infallible Word found in 1 Cor. 6:11, “And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
“…(A) The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching. (B) Therefore self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in The United Methodist Church.” ¶304.3
(10) The paragraph in question has two sentences which I marked as (A) and (B) above. Both are requested to be removed while the contents of your statement of counsel only deal with the second. This makes me curious of what you think will be the most fitting paragraph if this be changed.
a. …The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching. However, self-avowed practicing homosexuals are allowed to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in The United Methodist Church.
b. …The practice of homosexuality is compatible with Christian teaching. Yet, self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in The United Methodist Church.
c. …The practice of homosexuality is compatible with Christian teaching. Therefore self-avowed practicing homosexuals are allowed to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in The United Methodist Church.
Perhaps the crux of my disgust with your position is our differing view of whether homosexuality is detestable in the sight of the glorious Almighty or not. And perhaps, you may also hold the perennial justification of making a distinction between a homosexual and a practicing homosexual. That 1 Cor. 6 only abhors those who practice homosexuality only (not mentioning that ¶304.3 includes the words “practice of homosexuality”).
In Matthew 5,
He who practices murder and he who is a murderer at heart are equally guilty.
He who practices adultery and he who is an adulterer at heart are equally guilty.
How about him who practices homosexuality and him who is a homosexual at heart?
I will be very glad if I can post your response to my blog where I am posting this as an open letter.
Tearful but fearless,
Ptr. Bernard A. Rosario
PPAC, Philippines
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We are not alone and so there is indeed no picking up of our scabbard... For those who have read this, you may also visit this: http://www.mattoreilly.net/2011/02/and-so-it-begins-next-round-in-united.html
Thoughtful, faithful and inspired by the intellect of the Holy Spirit. Thank you.
Thanks, PreacherDB.
I also read your blog post, "33 UMC Bishops Doing Much Harm."
Well-said. My prayers are with you Preacher DB. May our guards be held strong by God's grace and mercy against the flaming arrows of the Enemy.
GOD bless you, Sokrateez.
hope the bishop is moved by your eloquence - more power - keep it up
"For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect." Matthew 24:24