An Eighty-Year Christian Partnership is no More



There is a march of groups in Christianity away from, rather than toward, each other. The Asbury Seminary graduated preachers and fed them into the pool of the United Methodist denomination for 80 years. Asbury insists gay marriage is a sin and, apparently, teaches this in some of its classes. United Methodist decided it did not need such pastors and took Asbury off of its list of approved seminaries. 

A spokesperson from Asbury was baffled as to why United Methodist has blacklisted the old institution. This is not hard to understand. Do any of the large denominations still say interracial marriage is against God's plan and refuse to recognize them? My impression is this is mostly in our country's rear view mirror.  

How long will it take for U.S. society to entirely treat gay and trans people as equals? Slavery, perhaps a metaphor, took 400 years. Myths live on for a long time. The myth that the Bible condemns homosexuality is one of these myths. 

United Methodists did the right thing, an act that is in its own best long term interests, when it dumped Asbury. The denomination cannot claim it follows the most basic of Christian tenets and allow the message that homosexuality is sin. Whether the partnership with Asbury was 80 years or 180, it had to end.

We can be thankful people see the light and leave behind ideas in Christianity that are false and cruel. Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter left their life-long Southern Baptist church in Plains, GA to join another Baptist church in Plains that accepted women pastors.

The entire "industry" of training preachers has fallen on hard times with the decline of churches. Those who run the seminaries need to get themselves up to date to stay in the game. If history is repeated, many will close rather than change. 

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