Christianity and lgbtq+
How Should Christians Respond to Gay Friends or Family Members?
Caleb Kaltenbach (M.A. ’07) is an alumnus of Biola’s Talbot School of Theology, lead pastor of a large church in Simi Valley, Calif., and a married father of two. He’s also an emerging voice in the discussion of how Christians should engage the LGBT community. That’s because Kaltenbach has an insider perspective, having been raised by a dad and mom who divorced and independently came out of the closet as a lgbtq+ man and a female homosexual. Raised in the midst of LGBT parties and pride parades, Kaltenbach became a Christian and a pastor as a juvenile adult. Today, he manages the tension of holding to the traditional biblical teaching on sexuality while loving his gay parents.
Kaltenbach’s unique story is detailed in his new novel Messy Grace: How a Pastor with Gay Parents Learned to Love Others Without Sacrificing Conviction and landed him on the front page of the New York Times in June. Biola Magazine reached out to him to talk about his manual and his perspective on how Christians can excel navigate the complexities of this issue with authenticity and grace.
In your manual you say that it’s time for Christians to own the issu What Does The Bible Speak About Homosexuality? Introduction For the last two decades, Pew Research Center has reported that one of the most enduring ethical issues across Christian traditions is sexual diversity. For many Christians, one of the most frequently first-asked questions on this topic is, “What does the Bible say about attraction to someone of the matching sex?” Although its unlikely that the biblical authors had any notion of sexual orientation (for example, the term homosexual wasn't even coined until the slow 19th century) for many people of faith, the Bible is looked to for timeless guidance on what it means to honor God with our lives; and this most certainly includes our sexuality. Before we can bounce into how it is that Christians can maintain the authority of the Bible and also affirm sexual diversity, it might be helpful if we started with a concise but clear overview of some of the assumptions informing many Christian approaches to understanding the Bible. What is the Bible? For Christians to whom the Bible is God’s very written word, it is widely understood that God produced its contents through inspired With a total membership of approximately 600,000 people, individual congregations are organized in 32 self-governing regions across North America. Denomination-wide governance is exercised through participation on the General Board and at the biennial General Assembly, which calls on representatives from all churches and regions. While “matters of conscience” can be debated at the General Assembly, the voting body cannot dictate a particular stance for individual congregations. On “matters of policy,” however, the Assembly can request that congregations and regions adhere to specific standards, such as those related to ordination. At the General Assembly in 2013, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) voted to affirm and welcome Homosexual people in all aspects of church life, including governance. While the resolution does not dictate policy for individual congregations, the denomination actively encourages congregations interested in becoming more inclusive. (The GLAD Alliance provides in-depth practical back through a large variety of Being both queer and Christian often means having a front row seat to all the ways the church has failed to embody God’s radical, boundary-breaking love. Even as more churches are welcoming LGBTQ+ folks fully into their pews and pulpits, other Christians are at the forefront of movements to eliminate trans health care, marginalize gay youth, and denigrate those who assist LGBTQ+ people. Yet creature both queer and Christian is also about joy — celebrating God’s goodness and the goodness of all who are made in God’s image: transitioned, asexual, queer, nonbinary, lesbian, gay, pansexual, and all the other labels used to name God’s expansive creativity. In this series, we asked LGBTQ+ Christians to write about the joy of being both homosexual and Christian. We hope by creating some space for positive expressions of queer Christian faith, we can suggest a very obvious portrait of the community we crave to build: a world and church where LGBTQ+ folks are beloved and empowered. A new learn by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law and Utah Express University finds that among LGBTQ people who were raised Christian, those who are older, Black, cisgender men, and/or live in the South are more likely to continue to identify as Christian as adults. LGBTQ people who were never Christian reported coming out to family and friends at younger ages than those who were raised Christian. More people who stayed Christian had a history of conversion therapy than those who left Christianity or who were never Christian. Using facts from the nationally exemplary Generations and TransPop studies, researchers examined Christian religious identification and de-identification among LGBTQ adults and how it correlates with psychological distress in adulthood. Almost two-thirds of LGBTQ people who were raised Christian no longer identify as Christian. Results show that LGBTQ people who left Christianity were bullied in childhood more frequently than people who stayed Christian. People who identified as Christian as adults reported more internalized homophobia/transpho
What Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality?
Stances of Faiths on LGBTQ+ Issues: Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
LGBTQ+ EQUALITY
ON SEXUAL ORIENTATION & GENDER IDENTITY
The Joy of Existence Queer and Christian
LGBTQ people raised Christian announce more minority stressors, similar health to those who were not