A Historic Ordination
On Saturday June 7th the Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church hosted an ordination service as our last act of our annual conference meeting. This year it was historic because two openly LGBTQ candidates were ordained in that service, one Deacon and one Elder. You may recall that these were the same candidates who had been rejected by the clergy session when they went before them for commissioning in 2022.
We at Spring of Life strive to be an inclusive community. I recognize this is hard and complex work that requires honoring and valuing the image of God in every person. We seek to welcome everyone across the divides of race, gender, age, partisanship, language, culture, sexual orientation, and more. We acknowledge that it is harder to be a diverse and multicultural community than it is to be a monocultural and homogeneous church.
The ordination of two openly gay candidates was a step towards demonstrating pathways to leadership for a group that historically not been allowed to share leadership in the church. I have the privilege to know both of these candidates personally and can speak to the quality of the ministry they are doing as a hospital chaplain in Gainesville and local church pastor in Miami Beach.
Many people within the church begin a conversation about gay inclusion by citing Bible verses that appear to condemn the practice or citing Bible verses that appear to support inclusion of LGBTQ people in the life of the church. If you are interested in having a conversation at that level, I’d welcome a conversation and can share books I’ve found helpful on the topic. My hope is that we can have a conversation that goes beyond citing Bible verses and includes how we live out the values of our faith in Christ.
Many people outside the church begin the conversation about gay inclusion in a different place. Yesterday was the 9th anniversary of the Pulse shooting in Orlando Florida and June is Pride month. I’ve heard some pastors say Pride celebrates the sin of arrogance but that interpretation doesn’t align with the history. The first pride event was formulated in response to police brutality at a gay bar called the Stonewall Inn located in New York. The first Pride events organized in June of 1970 sought to affirm the dignity and worth of LGBTQ+ people. Since then, celebrations have proliferated to include a lot more over the years. Within that historical context, I see pride as a way of remembering the people who lost their lives at Pulse and a small step towards creating a world where tragedies like that never happen again.
Last Sunday we celebrated Pentecost, remembering the Holy Spirit being poured out on the people of the early church who happened to be extremely different from one another. We ask that the Holy Spirit of God be poured out on our church filled with people who offer different perspectives and come from different backgrounds. What made the people back then and the church today fit for ministry was not who they were but the way God used them as vessels of the Holy Spirit. As always, I want to talk with you, please reach out and continue the conversation, PastorMike@SpringChurch.org.
