Updated Friday morning
Christianity Today reports that David Zac Niringiye, the Church of Uganda’s assistant bishop of Kampala, says that American Christians should cultivate relationships before condemning the proposed legislation.
Read Ugandan Bishop Pleads With American Christians on Anti-Homosexuality Bill by Sarah Pulliam Bailey.
And there is a related article by the same author, Anti-Homosexuality Bill Divides Ugandan and American Christians.
The Times has just published this Leading Article, Uganda’s Inhumane Bill.
The European Parliament approved a resolution criticising the Ugandan legislation. See this press release.
Friday morning update
The Episcopal Church of Brazil has published an Official Note on the Proposed Ugandan Bill.
Today’s Church Times has a report by Pat Ashworth headed Dr Williams ‘shocked’ by Ugandan Bill.
According to Episcopal Café the Church of Scotland has issued a statement which is copied below the fold.
Statement from the Church of Scotland on the proposals before the Ugandan Parliament on Homosexuality
Church of Scotland has had a long record of standing against injustice and inequality especially when it is perpetrated institutionally. The Church of Scotland is therefore appalled at the draconian measures proposed by the Ugandan Anti-Homosexuality Bill.
In 2007 The Church of Scotland’s General Assembly received a report which stated that “Theological approaches to homosexuality which present gay or lesbian people as unlovable or less loved by God than any other person are unacceptable”. To discriminate on issues of sexuality is unacceptable in the eyes of God and of the law.
Rev Ian Galloway, convenor of the Church of Scotland’s Church and Society Committee said “This draft legislation is without question an infringement of human rights. It is morally repugnant. The Church of Scotland wants therefore to strongly add it’s voice to the many calling for the immediate withdrawal of this discriminatory Bill.”
“Christianity Today reports that David Zac Niringiye, the Church of Uganda’s assistant bishop of Kampala, says that American Christians should ***cultivate relationships*** before condemning the proposed legislation.”
They just better NOT be same-sex (spousal) relationships! >:-/
This section blew my mind: My considered reading of Scripture and my considered understanding of today’s culture is that the application of the Scripture, the application of the spirit of the Scripture in today’s time would seem to disallow death as a legitimate penalty for any offense. We will not deny that the Scriptures seem to allow the death penalty. In the culture in which the Scriptures were written it seems that there was an allowance. I would say that in applying the same Scripture today, it seems that the culture is so different from then that we would say… Read more »
“Christians, Muslims, and Roman Catholics”? That’s odd. I thought Roman Catholics “were” Christians. Equating all forms of homosexual activity, including consensual acts between rational adults, with rape, murder and other crimes is loathsome. I see Uganda and the People’s Republic of China are using the same talking points coach. When faced with harsh criticism about their treatment of GLBT people (Uganda) or Tibetans (China) they say that Western societies don’t understand their culture. I say there are universal norms that even Exodus and Charles Colson agree with. And the repeated plea that people act behind the scenes? While I appreciate… Read more »
Simon, the European Parliament link is flawed. It needs an “h” in front of “ttp”.
Sorry, now fixed.
S.
“You must go beyond laws. Laws simply reflect where societies are at. For me, this is the debate. It is not right that Western societies should impose cultural norms and values upon us. – Assistant Bp. of Kampala (A.C. of Uganda) – Laws simply reflect where societies are at – this is true, and Uganda is still behind the times. It could be said that not just culture but justice and common human rights are at issue here. It is true, also, that Uganda has absolutely no right to impose it’s own cultural norms and values on Western societies. This… Read more »
I havent seen Pastor Martin Ssempa’s response to Rick Warren’s pastoral letter here.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/special/pdf/1217ssempaletter.pdf
BBC World Service had a package about the Uganda Legislation with an interview with David Bahati, the sponsor of the bill.
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/worldservice/globalnews/globalnews_20091218-0500a.mp3
About 6:00 in.
“Christianity Today reports that David Zac Niringiye, the Church of Uganda’s assistant bishop of Kampala, says that American Christians should ***cultivate relationships*** before condemning the proposed legislation.”
Absolutely, that’s the principle behind the listening process. Uganda should try it out some time instead of just condemning their own lgbt people to death.
should cultivate relationships
Well, they knew when and what Lambeth was, but they took themselves off to GAFCON instead, so don’t give us it.
I, too, noted that the general form of the argument for reconsidering whether an automatic death penalty proclaims God in our modern era and cultures is quite parallel to the typical form of the typical Anglican argument for change in our views of queer folks, sexuality in general, and human embodiment overall – given the fast changing science that affects and grounds all three domains of believers weighing what a faithful yet intelligent Anglican view might be. So, Africans can no longer just get away with preaching: Your western queer stuff just doesn’t compute. If you can follow the typical… Read more »
Simon, my source for the Church of Scotland statement was,
http://www.truthwinsout.org/blog/2009/12/5435/