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Soulforce keeps at it! Check out the links and the studyguide for youth (which Timmy may want to get permission to put on his site).
Press Release: June 17, 2004
SOULFORCE REPORT ON SOUTHERN BAPTIST ACTION IN INDIANA - ANTI-GAY
RHETORIC CONTINUES
(Indianapolis) - For the 5th year in a row, Soulforce volunteers
stood vigil outside the Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting
to confront the untruths perpetuated by Southern Baptist resolutions
and teachings against gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people.
The annual meeting, which took place in Indianapolis, attracted about
80 Soulforce volunteers, who gathered in Indy to try to help change
the hearts and minds of the Southern Baptists and empower GLBT people
to stand up against their own oppression.
For three days, in the heat and the rain, Southern Baptist messengers
encountered Soulforce volunteers at the street corners and sidewalks,
handing out literature and booklets, singing songs, and talking
about the spiritual violence wrought by Southern Baptist rhetoric and
policies.
Southern Baptist Convention passed resolutions supporting the anti-
gay Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA), which is intended to write
discrimination into the U.S. Constitution against GLBT couples and
their children by defining marriage as between one man and one
woman. Earlier in the day, President Bush spoke by satellite
praising Southern Baptists for their conservative views, and urging
them to support the FMA.
In addition, the Southern Baptist Convention pulled out of the
Baptist World Alliance (BWA) because the SBC felt the BWA was
increasingly anti-American and too tolerant of liberal theology, by
accepting the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship as a member in 2003.
On the final evening, Rev. Steve Gaines, pastor of First Baptist
Church in Gardendale, Ala., railed against homosexuality, by
saying, "God characterized homosexuality as an abomination in
Leviticus 18, and He sandwiched it right between adultery, child
sacrifice and having sex with an animal." He urged Southern
Baptists to contact their congresspeople to lobby for approval of the
Federal Marriage Amendment.
"The SBC continues to be a primary source of spiritual violence
against us. It saddens and sickens me that they are so full of fear
and condemnation. I know God loves gay, lesbian, bisexual, and
transgender people just the way we are, and some day, full equality
will happen, and the church will have to apologize to us," said Karen
Weldin, former Southern Baptist, graduate of Oklahoma Baptist
University, and Director of Operations for Soulforce. "We will be in
Nashville in 2005 for the next SBC annual meeting to continue our
relentless confrontation of the shameful untruths.
"Our hope in changing the SBC lies with the youth," said smith
McDaniel, co-chair of the Soulforce Southern Baptist Denominational
Team. Soulforce volunteers distributed a 48 page study guide geared
toward Southern Baptist youth, entitled: Christian Youth - an
Important Voice in the Present Struggle for Gay Rights in America.
The guide was written by Soulforce youth and young adults and is
available at http://www.soulforce.org/youth/youthstudyguide.pdf
Pictures taken at the action can be viewed at http://www.soulforce.org
Contact: Laura Montgomery Rutt
Cell: 717-278-0592 Laura@soulforce.org
"Always forgive your enemies...nothing annoys them quite so much." Oscar Wilde
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