[Apologetics] Rowan Williams says anti-gays misread Bible

[Bret Bellamy]

The head druid of the fracturing Anglican communion has been smoking too much of the cheap stuff.

-----Original Message-----
>From: Art Kelly <arthurkelly at yahoo.com>
>Sent: Apr 21, 2007 12:17 AM
>To: Apologetics Group <apologetics at gathman.org>, Jim Murphy <jmurf80 at bellsouth.net>, Father Phillips <frphillips at atonementonline.com>
>Subject: [Apologetics] Rowan Williams says anti-gays misread Bible
>
>I think Rowan Williams is out of his mind! 
>
>Here's what St. Paul's 1st Epistle to the Corinthians,
>Chapter 6, verses 9 and 10, says:
>
>"Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit
>the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither the
>immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor sexual
>perverts, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards,
>nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of
>God."
>
>Furthermore, Leviticus 18:22 says, "You shall not lie
>with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination."
>
>Art 
>
>Rowan Williams says anti-gays misread Bible
>
>Wed Apr 18, 2007 5:58AM BST
>By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor
>
>PARIS (Reuters) - The spiritual leader of the world's
>77 million Anglicans has said conservative Christians
>who cite the Bible to condemn homosexuality are
>misreading a key passage written by Saint Paul almost
>2,000 years ago.
>
>Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, addressing
>theology students in Toronto, said an oft-quoted
>passage in Paul's Epistle to the Romans meant to warn
>Christians not to be self-righteous when they see
>others fall into sin.
>
>His comments were an unusually open rebuff to
>conservative bishops, many of them from Africa, who
>have been citing the Bible to demand that pro-gay
>Anglican majorities in the United States and Canada be
>reined in or forced out of the Communion.
>
>"Many current ways of reading miss the actual
>direction of the passage," Williams said on Monday,
>according to a text of his speech posted on the
>Anglican Church of Canada's Web site.
>
>"Paul is making a primary point not about
>homosexuality but about the delusions of the
>supposedly law-abiding."
>
>The worldwide Anglican Communion is near breaking
>point over homosexuality, with conservative clerics
>insisting the Bible forbids gay bishops or blessings
>for same-sex unions. Its U.S. branch, the Episcopal
>Church, named a gay bishop in 2003.
>
>In fact, Williams also revealed on Tuesday that he had
>considered cancelling the Anglicans' once-a-decade
>2008 Lambeth Conference, which has the potential to
>become a flashpoint over homosexuality.
>
>"Yes, we've already been considering that and the
>answer is no," he told the Anglican Church of Canada's
>Anglican Journal.
>
>"We've been looking at whether the timing is right,
>but if we wait for the ideal time, we will wait more
>than just 18 months."
>
>In the passage of Romans that Williams referred to in
>Monday's speech, Paul said people who forgot God's
>words fell into sin. "Men committed indecent acts with
>other men and received in themselves the due penalty
>for their perversion," Paul wrote.
>
>Williams said these lines were "for the majority of
>modern readers the most important single text in
>Scripture on the subject of homosexuality." But right
>after that passage, Paul warns readers not to condemn
>those who ignore God's word.
>
>"At whatever point you judge the other, you are
>condemning yourself," wrote Paul, the first-century
>apostle whose epistles, or letters, to early Christian
>communities elaborated many Church teachings.
>
>NEITHER SIDE WINS
>
>Williams said reinterpreting Paul's epistle as a
>warning against smug self-righteousness rather than
>homosexuality would favour neither side over the other
>in the bitter struggle that threatens to plunge the
>Anglican Communion into schism.
>
>It would not help pro-gay liberals, he said, because
>Paul and his readers clearly agreed that homosexuality
>was "as obviously immoral as idol worship or
>disobedience to parents."
>
>This reading would also upset anti-gay conservatives,
>who have been "up to this point happily identifying
>with Paul's castigation of someone else," and
>challenge them to ask whether they were right to judge
>others, he added.
>
>"This does nothing to settle the exegetical questions
>fiercely debated at the moment," Williams said.
>
>But he said a "strictly theological reading of
>Scripture" would not allow a Christian to denounce
>others and not ask whether he or she were also somehow
>at fault.
>
>Williams warned of the danger of schism.
>
>"The Communion has to face the fact that there is a
>division in our Church and it's getting deeper and
>more bitter," he said. "If the Anglican Church
>divides, everyone will lose."
>
>(Additional reporting by Randall Palmer in Ottawa)
>
>
>
>ART KELLY, ATM-S
>13524 Brightfield Lane
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>
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