Page 6 - Presbyterian Connection

6 SUMMER 2024
PRESBYTERIAN
Church Support for LGBTQI+ People Facing Persecution
By Carragh Erhardt, Life and Mission Agency
On May 29, 2023, Uganda’s Pres- ident, Yoweri Museveni, signed a bill into law that imposes harsher punishments on LGBTQI+ peo- ple, including life imprisonment as punishment for same-sex sex- ual acts. The Anti-Homosexuality Act also imposes the death pen- alty for what the Act describes as “aggravated homosexuality.”
This law is one of the harshest examples of the ongoing rise in anti-LGBTQI+ sentiment around the world, which encompasses
a rise in hate crimes, the use of scapegoating in political cam- paigns and the introduction of leg- islation that would limit the rights of LGBTQI+ people in many countries, including Canada. The 2023 General Assembly adopted several motions in response to the rise in anti-LGBTQI+ hatred, legislation and violence, locally and globally.
Commissioners at General As- sembly agreed “that the Interna- tional Affairs Committee and the Life and Mission Agency Com- mittee work together to allocate $50,000 to agencies in Canada
that help to settle people who identify as LGBTQI+ and seek refuge.” The money from re- stricted funds will provide funds to fulfill this decision. A group representing the International Af- fairs Committee, Life and Mission Agency and PWS&D met and re- searched organizations that sup- port LGBTQI+ refugees to settle in Canada. Eight organizations received funding, each of which engages in one or more of the fol- lowing types of support:
• Provide assistance to indi- viduals who need emergency travel arrangements to flee
persecution;
• Accompany individuals to
navigate the process of
claiming refugee status;
• Create opportunities for refu- gees to build connections with one another and their wider community upon ar-
rival in Canada;
• Help to find appropriate
housing and employment for
refugees.
The General Assembly also
encouraged congregations “to consider responses in their lo- cal communities to acts of hate and harm towards the LGBTQI+
community and sponsorship sup- port of LGBTQI+ refugees.”
The article “A Faithful Response to the Rise in Anti-LGBTQ+ Hate” on page 13 of the Spring 2023 edition of the Presbyterian Con- nection newspaper describes ways that Presbyterians can learn more about the needs of LGBT- QI+ people in our communities and discern meaningful, appropri- ate ways to positively contribute to the safety of all.
Communities are safer for eve- ryone when neighbours know and take care of one another. This is
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Continued on page 7
Why We Worship As We Do: Hearing the Word of God
By the Rev. Dr. Emily Bisset, Calvin Presbyterian Church in Toronto, Ont.
I wonder sometimes how many of us really listen to the scripture as it is read aloud during worship. I think lay people are better at this than preachers, who sometimes tend to think of the reading as a precursor to the sermon. How often do we stop and think about the fact that we are reading words written thousands of years ago— words handed down by handwrit- ten manuscripts in Hebrew and Greek, translated by teams of Biblical scholars, and finally fall- ing on our ears in Canada in the 21st century?
When scripture is read in wor- ship, Christians believe that God is speaking words that we need to hear in our lives, our com- munity and our church. And, as Presbyterians, we believe that we can only understand and interpret the scriptures through the power of the Holy Spirit. For this reason, we offer a Prayer for Understand- ing or a Prayer for Illumination before the scriptures are read and the sermon is preached. We be- lieve that the Holy Spirit is active and present. Living Faith says, “The Holy Spirit gives us inner testimony to the unique authority of the Bible and is the source of its power” (5.2).
When we gather for worship, it is always a new and unique coming together. We have never
before assembled in quite this configuration, on this day, at this time. And so, when the Word of God is read, it is different from every other time it has been read. And because we believe the Holy Spirit is at work—always working something fresh and new—we can hear a unique word to the community, and to us, as indi- viduals, each time we gather. Gail O’Day, in her essay “Shaped by Hearing,” in the book Questions Preachers Ask, says “Communal hearing creates something that did not and could not exist prior to that moment” (p. 9).
I was once asked to read scrip- ture for the conference preacher and was given the text at the last minute. It was the geneal- ogy of Jesus, as written in Luke 3:23–38. There are a lot of very difficult names in that text, but a great teacher once told me that if you read with confidence, people
will think you know how to pro- nounce them! The lectern that I was to read from was too tall for me and the congregation could barely see me over the golden eagle that was mounted on the front of it. I plunged into reading it, trying to imagine the people I was speaking of—from Jesus, son of Joseph, all the way back through the generations to Isaac, son of Abraham, and to Seth, son of Adam. I got caught up in the reading, feeling the momentum, and when I got to Adam, I took a breath, and read the last words, “the son of God.” And when I stopped, there was complete si- lence in the room. It was as if eve- ryone was holding their breath. I felt it, and others felt it too. There was a sense of God’s presence in a palpable way and an expec- tancy of what might come next.
In the same way, the sermon on any given Sunday morning is
an event, an experience, that we all participate in and in which we all have an active role. Although the preacher is (usually) the one doing most—or all—of the talk- ing, sermons are not meant to be lectures, monologues or informa- tive essays. Sermons should have a conversational tone about them, inviting people into an ex- perience of God’s word—an ex- perience that may be comforting, challenging, inspiring or thought- provoking. As a teaching elder, the preacher’s job is not merely to explain the scriptures but pro- claim good news. Sermons are not about passing on information or knowledge. O’Day says that if preachers try to “explain” the Bi- ble to the people in the pews, the congregation becomes passive, while the role of the preacher is lessened and belittled from how Jesus envisioned it and God in- tended it. Rather, when the Good News is proclaimed, sermons invite people into an experience of holy possibility, transformative imagination and a shared experi- ence in the new thing that God is doing now, among us.
The 20th century theologian Karl Barth talked about a threefold understanding of the word of God (see Church Dogmatics, Volume 1, 90–121). There is the word of God written, which refers to the scriptures. The Bible is the library of texts that recalls God’s past revelation and promises. It forms our understanding of God and
God’s action and interaction with God’s people. The word of God written points to and depends on the word of God revealed, which is Jesus Christ, the Living Word, the Word made Flesh. God has graciously chosen to continue to speak through the word of God preached, working through the proclamation of the church and human speech to communicate Good News now.
In addition to this threefold understanding, and through the pervasive work of the Holy Spir- it, there is also the word of God heard. People come to worship, seeking God’s direction for their lives. They are looking to Jesus, the Word Revealed. They listen, in gathered and unique commu- nity, to the reading of the word of God written. They engage with the preacher in the word of God preached. And then, that Living Word interacts with their own lives, circumstances, thoughts, needs and faith so that individuals and communities are transformed by what they hear and receive. “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accom- plish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:10–11).