Posted by:
Nightingale
(
)
Date: March 01, 2023 01:32PM
NB: Christian content below***
A Christian school in Missouri added this statement to its web site last year:
"We are an affirming school. We stand with the LGBTQIA+ community and believe in their holiness. We celebrate the diversity of God's creation in all its varied and beautiful forms."
Now the school faces closure due to withdrawal of financial support from the community.
Article:
https://abcnews.go.com/US/christian-school-embraced-lgbtq-community-forced-close-doors/story?id=97037899Excerpts:
“According to the school, that update [on its web site re inclusivity] prompted donors to stop contributing, many of them citing their interpretation of Christianity as the reason. Now, UCA has announced it will close at the end of the school year due to the loss of financial support.”
The church “describes itself as providing "a tuition-free, high-quality, Christ-centered education for low-income students."
“The school's mission statement has always stressed inclusivity.”
"We lost our network" of donors, Callaway-George [ED] told ABC News. "In December of 2021, right before we publicly supported the LGBTQ community, we raised $333,985. One year later, after we had posted on our website and made a stance, [in] December of 2022 we raised $14,809."
A rep from another school stated: "Our greatest concern about the Accepting and Affirming stance is that it denies the Biblical definitions of sin and identity and thereby renders the grace of God meaningless."
“Even though administrators expected negative reaction and some loss of resources, they believed an explicit show of support for this community was necessary because of an influx of teenage students and changes in society.”
“UCA concluded that publicizing its supportive stance was necessary for students dealing with those issues [sexuality and inclusion] to feel welcome and safe.”
“Callaway-George expressed hope that "there will be conversations in churches and around dinner tables where people ask critical questions about what they believe and how their beliefs are affecting other people."
"The essence of the Christian faith is promoting and offering love," she said.
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I've never understood how you can preach love yet scorn and restrict and expel people who have different beliefs and approaches to life than your own.
I do understand the imperative to 'protect' the institution, especially if you feel its appearance must be flawless and its reputation sterling. But why can't you say here are the values of the church as a whole (love and peace would be my vote) and we understand that people are individuals. That could set your principles out clearly and you wouldn't have to worry about each individual potentially tarnishing your reputation. That is what the objections of church leaders and members are based on, in my experience. IOW, how people perceive the church is based on their experience with an individual inside it. That is the leaders' take on it and indeed that is reality, in part. But a hardline approach to 'how we appear' causes issues such as the unfortunate one with this school.
Its the immovable object - the church's "reputation" - putting that above all other considerations, that causes most of the problems, in my view. The imperative to protect the institution over the person is the result. We can see how well that works out (not).
This approach boils down to a message of exclusivity, not inclusivity. Surely that cannot be right. We love every precious soul the Lord creates but you're not welcome here.
Does not compute.
As usual, it comes down to a question of interpretation. The fact that there can be so many interpretations surely goes against a message that everything is written in stone. But many religious people, in my experience, grab that rock and cling onto it above all other things in life, not re-evaluating, not evolving. I think it has the effect of shutting off part of the brain as in once decided never revisited. I'm not just throwing that out there to be offensive and don't mean to be but of course it sounds like it to people protecting their beliefs and approaches when it comes to the sometimes contentious issues around religious belief. But if you accept a certain idea 100% and never re-evaluate there's no hope of growth or needed change.
If I had never considered alternative viewpoints and evaluated new information I would still be a JW. That would have been a negative outcome for my life and would also have adversely affected others, not to mention being a major waste of time. There's a reason the overseers want members to make a definitive choice and fully commit to it forever despite all else.
My takeaways from Christian belief are as follows:
Do unto others. Love your neighbour.
I don't know why the basics have to be any more complex than that. That encompasses everything for me. The rest is just an interesting (to me) mix of traditional beliefs and observances in many different forms.
If we put those two precepts into practice maybe then we wouldn't see schools closing down for being 'inclusive' because the people with the loudest voices think their religious beliefs dictate the opposite.