Enduring Gut-Wrenching Pain to Find Your New Beginning

Enduring Gut-Wrenching Pain to Find Your New Beginning

I abhor bigotry, but why should we demonise schools that don't want to promote gay lifestyles?, Daily Mail Article

By STEPHEN GLOVER

PUBLISHED: 22:58, 21 August 2013 | UPDATED: 22:58, 21 August 2013

 
 
 

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We now live in a world in which civil partnerships are accepted by most people as perfectly normal and soon we will have gay marriage

The biggest social change of the past ten or 20 years must surely be the general transformation in attitudes towards homosexuality.

It was not very long ago that a homosexual embrace or kiss on television sent some newspapers and politicians into orbit, and a thousand angry pens into hyperdrive. Now we live in a world in which civil partnerships are accepted by most people as perfectly normal. Soon we will have gay marriage.

Most gay MPs no longer huddle beneath the parapet. The ‘gay vote’ is now considered so powerful that David Cameron sought an audience last week with the gay panjandrum Stephen Fry in an East End pub to discuss the ill treatment of homosexuals in Russia.

But some gays, it seems, still feel they are the victims of discrimination. Gay rights activists have identified some 40 schools across the country which allegedly state in their sex-education guidelines that governors will not allow teachers to promote homosexuality, or are ambiguous on the issue.

Stonewall, which campaigns for homosexual rights, is indignant, and suggests that these schools are reviving the language of Section 28, the law introduced by the Thatcher government in 1988 aimed at ‘loony left’ councils, some of which were energetically promoting homosexuality in schools.

Section 28 banned councils from using taxpayers’ money to fund books, plays, films or other material to promote homosexuality. Though its wording was hardly draconian, and no prosecution was ever brought under it, Section 28 has assumed mythic proportions in the minds of gay activists.

Despite opposition from rebels of all parties in the House of Lords, as well as from the Roman Catholic Church and other religious groups, the law was removed from the statute book by the Blair government in 2003. In 2009, David Cameron apologised for the Tories’ original championing of Section 28.

 

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How much has changed in ten years. The Department for Education is evidently embarrassed by the reports about the 40 or so schools, and various Tory, Lib Dem and Labour MPs are quoted as saying they must be brought into line, and we must not go back to the antediluvian past.

Many of these schools ‘outed’ by campaigners are self-governing Academies. Some have hastily backed down, while others have gone to ground. None seems to be eager to justify itself in public.

Yet the British Humanist Association, which has somehow got in on the act, huffs and puffs as though a major crime has been committed. Its spokesman speaks of the ‘pernicious’ Section 28, and the need to bring these errant schools to heel.

Meanwhile Ben Summerskill, chief executive of Stonewall, has circulated an email in which he announces a new series of training events for staff in primary and secondary schools this autumn ‘to equip teachers with the tools and confidence to tackle homosexual bullying’.

The 'gay vote' is now considered so powerful that David Cameron sought an audience last week with the gay panjandrum Stephen Fry in an East End pub to discuss the ill treatment of homosexuals in Russia

In fact, there’s no evidence of any homosexuals being bullied at any of these schools. Perhaps this is just Mr Summerskill’s way of saying that his organisation stands ready to re-educate teachers who show signs of straying from the new orthodoxy.

What strikes me about this story is that some of the representatives of a group that was once undoubtedly the victim of persecution are now showing a degree of intolerance towards people with whom they do not agree.

There are more than 30,000 schools in this country. A mere 40 or so have been identified as being either opposed to the promotion of homosexuality or ambiguous on the issue. This is a minuscule percentage, though of course there may be others.

And yet there is outrage, simulated or not. The campaigner Peter Tatchell, whose bravery in several spheres I admire, declares that ‘this is spookily similar to Section 28 in Britain and the new anti-gay law in Russia’.

Really? None of these schools appears to be demonising homosexuals. Grace Academy, which runs schools with a Christian ethos in Coventry, Solihull and Darlaston in the West Midlands, is quoted by The Independent newspaper as saying: ‘The governing body will not permit the promotion of homosexuality.’

Gay rights activists have identified 40 schools across the country which allegedly state in their sex-education guidelines that governors will not allow teachers to promote homosexuality, or are ambiguous on the issue

The two Crest Academies for boys and girls in Neasden, North-West London, have a similar rubric, as does the Castle View Enterprise Academy in Sunderland, though it has now deleted its guidance from its website.

Not one school cited by campaigners denounces homosexuality, or suggests that gays are in any way reprehensible. They simply do not want to promote it on an equal basis with heterosexuality. Of course, there may be schools, particularly Muslim ones, that take a harder line.

In my perfect world, schools would not offer any view about any sexual orientation.  Certainly no teacher ever did in an explicit way at my school. It should really be a matter for parents. But I accept that the State has long since arrogated to itself the right to instruct — I will not say indoctrinate — children in these matters.

What, though, if some parents do not agree with the State on grounds of conscience or religious belief? The whole philosophy behind Academies is that they should be self-governing and independent, and as free as possible from government diktats imposed by Whitehall.

Ben Summerskill has circulated an email announcing a series of training events for staff in schools this autumn 'to equip teachers with the tools and confidence to tackle homosexual bullying'

Most of us, I think, would abhor any educational establishment that encouraged its pupils to discriminate against homosexuals, or any other social group. Apart from being morally objectionable, such an approach would break a number of laws.

If there is evidence of any teachers in a state school — or indeed any school — preaching hatred against gays, or stirring up prejudice against them, they should at the very least be dismissed, and preferably prosecuted.

But shouldn’t parents who have reservations about the promotion of homosexuality on equal terms with heterosexuality be free to send their children to schools where their views are reflected, as well as respected?

Such views were held by a majority of people until quite recently, and they are still held by many decent folk who don’t think that homosexuals are inferior or deviant or to be pitied in any way. Nonetheless, all things being equal, they would probably be happier if their children turned to be straight rather than gay.

Don’t such people have a right to influence their children’s values according to their own beliefs and consciences, rather than having them imposed by gay campaigners or commissars from the Department for Education, who extol freedom so long as it is the kind of freedom of which they approve?

Gays should be free to live and work and play just as non-gays are, and it is a credit to our society that at last they are able to do so. They have been abominably treated in the past, and perhaps a few of them still are.

But those gays and non-gays who believe in freedom of conscience should defend the rights of their fellow citizens so long as their own rights are not threatened.

Section 28 is dead and buried, and rightly so. But prejudice and intolerance live on. And they have a strange propensity to flourish among the people who were once their victims.

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Ordinary Christians in the Hands of the Extra-Ordinary God. Part 4:

 

I Corinthians 1-12:13, 3:4-11, 3:21 – 23  New Living Translation.

12 Some of you are saying, “I am a follower of Paul.” Others are saying, “I follow Apollos,” or “I follow Peter, [d]” or “I follow only Christ! …… 4 When one of you says, “I am a follower of Paul,” and another says, “I follow Apollos,” aren’t you acting just like people of the world? 5 After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. 6 I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow.  11 for no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have—Jesus Christ…. 21 So don’t boast about following a particular human leader. For everything belongs to you— 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Peter,[g] or the world, or life and death, or the present and the future. Everything belongs to you, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.

When we look at the Church today, what do we see and what do we mean by the word Church ? to some the word Church has a negative effect on the other hand, the word Church has a positive effect, to others Church should be consigned to the past, and it doesn’t have any relevance to them and society both today in the present or indeed tomorrow the future, some think of the word Church and they think of a physical building others think of the New Testament concept of God’s people or a spiritual building.

The Church today is divided into various camps or tribal groups, that more often or not have very little to do with other camps or tribal groups, sometimes different churches can be close to each in terms of a physical distance, but miles apart in so many other ways.   Is the Church somewhere we can go to or is it a body of people that we belong to, and are joined alongside each other to work alongside each other to see the Good News of the Gospel of the Kingdom preached to those without the Good News of Salvation through our Lord and Saviour Jesus.

We are divided into groups or denominations that have more to do with our past, and very little to do with our present or future. We hold onto ways of both doing and being church because of our history and our responsibilities to that history, and the expectancies of others. Sometimes we're divided into seemingly rival tribal groups, because for some our revelation of being and doing church is driven by being the people of God where His Presence dwells, but on the other hand we're divided because of politics and personalties !.

We don’t need another “ new “ expression of Church, being built  out  of people’s own sense of importance ,  and because of their misguided zeal  they will attempt to draw followers after themselves  from established churches, offering false promises and prophecies and they tell  people that if join us, the grass will be greener, unfortunately these “ new “ expressions of  church have no foundations and no covering,  because they think that we will build our own foundations and we will become our own covering,  we need to be built up together as one church,  and not be separated into another tribe or grouping. 

The Church is a movement for change and transformation but for many of us The Church has become a monument to our spiritual forefathers who were a movement for change and transformation !.

We follow men and sometimes women, we follow the traditions that were our spiritual forefather’s doctrines and their distinctiveness from other tribal groups and when someone from another tribe says let’s meet together for fellowship and to share together, we say we can't because we’re group a and your group b and our big chief said in 1920 said that we need to avoid group b because your understanding of church and Christianity is different from way he told us to be the church and to be a Christian and therefore you’re wrong, or we do meet together but in a spirit of reluctance and/or a spirit of mistrust, we’ve created theories,  doctrines, theologies and solutions how we’re to be the church and to life our Christian lives and be a Christian Witness, but many of those theories etc belong in the past, and have become hindrances and obstacles for us today.

Many of our tribes or denominations have become tied to the way we did Church, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 or a 100 plus years ago, we look for structure and safety in the past.  

We think that the way we do and are the Church is the right or indeed the only way to be do or be Church,  we mistake our history for our present and future and wonder why despite our best efforts, our prayers indeed our prophecies, we’re unfulfilled !

When our Lord Jesus walked the streets of his homeland,  he saw a fig tree and when he looked for fruit he found only leaves Matthew 21:18-20, 18  In the morning, as he was returning to the city, he became hungry. 19  And seeing a fig tree by the wayside, he went to it and found nothing on it but only leaves. And he said to it, “May no fruit ever come from you again!” And the fig tree withered at once. 20 When the disciples saw it, they marvelled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither at once?

I would say that so many of our churches are like that fig tree, yes we have life but it has gone to produce only leaves, instead of producing leaves alongside fruit, indeed later in the same chapter, Jesus spoke about the physical nation of Israel, saying that because they trusted in themselves rather than trusting in the Lord, that had lost the Kingdom of God, Matthew 21:43 43 Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.

For many of our churches today, we’ve lost the Kingdom of God because we’ve trusted in ourselves, our systems, structures and strategies instead of trusting Him , our Lord and Saviour Jesus,  we’ve just grown leaves not fruit and God has gone and left us, even then we’ve created a theology and/or theory/or solutions around that, see Habakkuk 3:15-18 17 Even though the fig trees have no blossoms, and there are no grapes on the vines; even though the olive crop fails, and the fields lie empty and barren; even though the flocks die in the fields, and the cattle barns are empty, 18 yet I will rejoice in the Lord!    I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!

However there is a message of hope, for those Churches that once proclaimed God’s Message, Haggai 1:6  6 You have planted much but harvest little. You eat but are not satisfied. You drink but are still thirsty. You put on clothes but cannot keep warm. Your wages disappear as though you were putting them in pockets filled with holes! See Haggai 1, our transformation isn’t due to our living in the luxury houses that  are our own tribal groups/denominations/churches but rather our transformation comes through being part of His Church, or the Temple or the House of the Lord. We’ve become consumed that our way of doing and being Church is also the Lord’s way of doing and being Church, but our ways are not his ways of doing and being Church see Isaiah 55:8-11

We have set in place man made structures, systems and organizations to how to do and be the Church today, we set in place committees, clerical systems and called and commissioned those He’s not called and commissioned to lead us in being the Church and we wonder why nothing is working, we’ve watered down and diluted our message to make it pliable to others, we’ve accepted things that go against Biblical Standards like Homosexual Clergy  and wonder why God isn’t moving amongst us and blessing us

Yet, there is hope for us the Church,  the old wineskins of our ways,  those beloved ways of doing and being the Church aren’t working and if we try to add His way of being and doing Church or the new wine to our old wineskins, our old wineskins are going to tear and break up, instead we need His new wineskins of doing and being the Church, his structure, systems, and Leadership* and following those He has called and commissioned to lead us forward, see Luke 5:37-39.

We notice in Scripture, there is a God Ordained indeed Organized way of being and doing Church, no longer will our man made systems cope with the things, our message should be say no, to the status quo,  We don’t need any other or more denominations or tribes, we don’t need another methodology of doing and being the Church.  We need to be a Movement and not a Monument. We need to see a restoration of Apostolic Christianity, which is a Movement for the 21st Century Church not a Monument to the 1st Century Church.  We need to see Revival through a Renewed Church.

It says in Ephesians 4:11-13* 11 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. 12 Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. 13 This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.  See Ephesians 4:11-16 for context.

Yours in His Grace

Blair Humphreys

Southport, Merseyside