Lutheran church.

[Strong Atheist]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jMEVyyQh_4sDAGGEDWTjtQQ4mEYQD96ER1T01

[xchrom]

1. nothing is going to keep conservatives from splintering

churches that want to move forward on issues of women and sexuality.

and it is my strong belief that at the root of pissing and moaning about lgbt clergy -- is the issue
of raing women to the status of priest or pastor.

conservatives have never been comfortable with that -- and lgbt clergy provides cover for raising women.

not unlike how the catholic church is using gay men to cover up for other problems.

[Carl Skan]

2. Re: Women Clergy

The ELCA has allowed women clergy for quite some time now. The ELCA has always been quite a liberal denomination.

[xchrom]

4. and i'm an episcopalian -- and we're very liberal

as well.

however the conservative elements of the church have always hated raising women to the priesthood.

[Carl Skan]

7. Not sure what your point

So then how would opposition to this in the ELCA be about preventing women clergy? They've allowed women clergy for decades. The last time I went to an ELCA church there were four female lay pastors going through their training to become full time pastors.

[xchrom]

13. that there are female pastors doesn't mean there isn't

opposition to female pastors.

[Carl Skan]

14. huh?

Are you familiar with the ELCA? Why would somebody who has issues with female clergy be a member of an ELCA church?

It's not some little secret of that denomination, they're pretty well known for their promotion of women into church leadership.

[Veritas_et_Aequitas]

3. They'll just head on over to the Missouri Synod.

I think that's as conservative as they get in our country.

[xchrom]

5. and really that's where they belong.

it's past time that holding congregations hostage to one topic of conversation be the norm.

[Carl Skan]

6. Actually AFLC

The AFLC has a bunch of church's that didn't like the very liberal interpretation of the Bible of the ELCA. It had been a more scriptural based denomination than the ELCA for a long time before that.

If a congregation is conservative enough to go Missouri Synod, they would have never been a part of the ELCA.

[KitchenWitch]

8. Actually I believe both the Wisconsin Synod of the Lutheran Church

And the American Lutheran Church (ALC) are more conservative than the Missouri Synod.

[Carl Skan]

9. ALC?

Did you mean the AALC? The ALC has been a part of the ELCA since the merger in 1988.

[KitchenWitch]

10. Could be

There is a Lutheran denomination that is even further right than the WELS though. One of my friend's brother was kicked out of the clergy of that denomination because he got divorced.

[Carl Skan]

11. Yeah

There are about a dozen of them.

I'm just saying that if a congregation is conservative enough to go all the way to Missouri Synod (or the ones you mention), they wouldn't have been a part of the ELCA in the first place.

The ELCA being an extremely progressive church body is nothing new. There's a rather large gap between the ELCA and most Lutheran denominations regarding the inerrancy of the Bible. I still remember hearing somebody predict this news back in 88-89 and thinking to myself that they were just using hyperbole to make a point.

[KitchenWitch]

12. Oh I agree

I love that the Evangelical in ELCA really does not mean anything.

I am (as a pagan) moderately comfortable in an ELCA church. Can't say that about any of the other synods.

[Kajsa]

15. Kitchy, that's the church I grew up in.

I attended PART of fifth grade at a Lutheran school in Santa Monica,CA.

It was the Missouri Synod and it was night and day different from the churches
I had been to.

That lasted for a whole three months- after watching some of my classmates
spit at nuns from St. Monica's, my Mom pulled me from that school.

Waaay different!!

[KitchenWitch]

17. I grew up Catholic

which has its own set of "special" baggage.

I was involved in a long term relationship with a Missouri Synod Lutheran...he would go on and on about how they were not as conservative as the WELS Lutherans. But it was a fine line.

[RetiredTrotskyite]

16. Ther's a Lutheran group more conservative than....

the Missouri Synod? I'm ex-Missouri Synod myself and I thought they were the worst, though as I remember, the Wisconsin Synod people could give the Missouri Synod folks a run for their money.

[KitchenWitch]

18. There is the Wisconsin Synod

and another small synod, I thought it was the ALC but I am mistaken. All I know is that a friend's brother who was clergy in that smaller sect of the Lutheran church, was defrocked because he got divorced.