# What's happening with SSM in your church? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 28, 2014, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976 "2014-01-28T19:45:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![InternetLegend](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/internetlegend/32/13154_2.png) [@InternetLegend](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InternetLegend)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/21 "2014-01-30T04:13:54Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I know there was just an announcement in the United Methodists, for example, that they were going to be reviewing a resolution in support of same sex marriage, but I don’t know how things work in that church, so I don’t get whether this is a big or a small deal. I finally left the United Methodist church because they formally came out against same-sex marriage back in the early 2000’s (that was actually the final straw for me after years of feeling that the church was getting less and less liberal). The review in this case is the UMC’s Judicial Council reviewing a resolution by the Desert Southwest Council in favor of gay marriage - a betting man would probably put money on the Judicial Council reaffirming the earlier decision to essentially condemn gay relationships in general (although the Book of Discipline uses a lot more weasel-words to express that). ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/22 "2014-01-30T04:36:53Z")
> [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](#): > > I’ll just add to this that the phrase is actually “generous pastoral response,” and what that means depends entirely on who’s interpreting it. (One of the most frustrating things to me, as an Episcopalian, is the church’s tendency to never say anything clearly if it can be said obscurely.) The RCC tends to be pretty clear, although sometimes you do need a dictionary to decipher things. Every official pronouncement I’ve seen on the subject has been quite clear on the notion of “marriage is between a man and a woman”, with the pronouncements divided between those who specify “RCC marriage, note that civil marriages can be whichever way local laws allow” and those who want to impose their definition on the civil side of things. Those priests and bishops who think that the Church should think about maybe some century considering SSM do not make official pronouncements. But in some ways it’s less agressive about this subject than about other parts of its definition of marriage. Remarried divorced people are supposed to be “separated from the Church”, but nobody is going to turn them away at the door -it’s going to get you in trouble if you are/want to be a catechist, or the Religion teacher in a Catholic school. People in civil SSMs aren’t even supposed to be separated. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/23 "2014-01-30T11:58:49Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Nothing happening on the Assemblies of God front, as far as I can tell, even though there are some tongue-speaking gay churches. > > Even had to endure a sermon praising Phil Robertson, with the guest speaker having called and complained about his suspension. Yeah. I can safe sum up the Assembly of God position as “No way in Hell”. I’m expecting it to actually be discussed more (as an issue, not an acceptable thing) as my state legislature works on an anti-SSM amendment to its constitution, having just dropped the ‘anti-marriage alternative’ clause. Due to alternating car, health, & weather problems, I had to miss a lot of church during the Phil Robertson kerfuffle, but if anything was said, I’m sure it was supportive of him. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/24 "2014-01-30T12:21:04Z")
I don’t practice any religion but I was raised Reform Jewish. We’ve had gay ordained rabbis and same sex commitment ceremonies for decades. As soon as gay marriages were legal, reform rabbis were doing them. I believe that the same can be said about Conservative Judaism. ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/25 "2014-01-30T12:27:12Z")
I saw the thread title and came in to say that I’d always thought that texting during mass was frowned upon. Sorry. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/26 "2014-01-30T12:28:03Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > The Church of Lapsed Catholics That Only Go To Church For Weddings and Funerals has been pretty quiet about the subject. I’ll have to check at the next wedding. Or funeral. 😃 That’s got to be one of the largest denominations in America… ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/27 "2014-01-30T14:41:08Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > Well, there was more or less an exodus - since 2006 about a half-dozen entire dioceses split from the church\* and membership is way down across the board. A lot of the loss in membership is probably conservative members who left quietly; some folks were probably driven away by all the acrimony and fighting; and there are probably some who left for places that are more unequivocally supportive of gay rights. On top of the fact that participation in organized religion of any kind is on the decline. > > \*The dioceses claim to have left as a whole. The church’s position is that the bishop and clergy and laity may have left, but the diocese itself still exists and all its assets still belong to TEC. That has resulted in a number of lawsuits, which TEC pretty universally has won. > > ETA: So to answer your question - the last couple of conventions I have been to (national and local) have been much more amicable than they were 10 years ago. Not so much because everyone agrees now, but because those who have stayed have agreed to disagree and live together while those who were unable to tolerate the difference of opinion left the church, for the most part. The average attendance at Episcopal churches has gone done by 25% in the last decade. The median age is 57, this means half of all current church members will likely die in the next 18 years.It has been a kind of slow motion suicide. My mother in law is Episcopalian and it has been sad to see what the fanatics have done to the church. ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/28 "2014-01-30T15:24:35Z")
I’m a Unitarian. Lesbian and Gay marriage is one of our prime recruiting tools, and we’re a little torqued off at the mainstream denominations stepping on our turf 😉 ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/29 "2014-01-30T15:38:55Z")
> [@Count\_Blucher](#): > > I saw the thread title and came in to say that I’d always thought that texting during mass was frowned upon. > > Sorry. Heh. I have to restrain myself from asking kids to turn theirs off, and glaring at the parents who allow this. I’m not supposed to be judging people after all! :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/30 "2014-01-30T15:40:07Z")
We don’t go to church, but I can report on family’s churches. My in-laws small rural Presbyterian church recently bought its way out of the Presbytery so that it can refuse to perform SSM and not allow female pastors. It took all their collections and tithes for two years to do it. Way to help the poor and sick. My sister-in-law’s evangelical megachurch is also against it. They believe that if you’re gay you should pray it away… and stay celibate until you do. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/31 "2014-01-30T16:00:26Z")
I’m an ex-Mormon but follow along what they are doing. The LDS church is very much against SSM, and was the largest player in the Prop 8 campaign, lining up donors and volunteers for knocking on doors. The church has published a policy paper which defines a marriage as between a man and a woman (while failing to point out that the official policy of the church is that polygamy will be practiced in heaven). The only “softening” in the stance is that now they are not specifically calling gays evil, it’s only if one “acts” on the tendency. Doctrinally, there is no way that Mormonism can accept SSM, as it would conflict with the official belief that God and his wives made baby boy spirits and baby girl spirits. There seems to be a minority of members who are unusually vocal in disagreeing with the leadership. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/32 "2014-01-30T16:02:04Z")
**puddleglum** the precipitous decline in the Episcopal Church is certainly troubling, but I’ve seen the argument made that it has as much to do with differential birth rates as with people leaving. Total fertility rates for Episcopalians are around 1.8 or so, lower than for evangelicals although still higher than for secular people. If you’re an a Episcopalian concerned about demographic decline in the church, one of the best things you can do to stop it is to have three or more children. ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/33 "2014-01-30T16:27:46Z")
It’s also worth pointing that the decline in Episcopal church membership and attendance significantly predates the last ten years. Between 1960 and 2002 church membership declined by 32%, in a time of rapid population growth. See [Trends in Large US Church Membership from 1960](http://www.demographia.com/db-religlarge.htm). Yes, the drop over the last ten years has been larger, but it’s the same basic trend. Hard to attribute it all to the quarrel over SSM. And other denominations of mainstream Protestantism have likewise declined: the Presbyterians, the Methodists, UCC, not all of which have had similar squabbles about marriage equality. The United Methodists lost 50K people in ASA (average Sunday attendance) between 2012 and 2013. You lose a lot of useful information if you restrict your data to the Episcopal Church in the last ten years. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/34 "2014-01-30T16:43:48Z")
> [@kunilou](#): > > Gee, and I always thought ELCA congregations called ministers individually, rather than their being assigned from a central office. That’s how we got ours. My wife is an ELCA minister who recently graduated from seminary as is in the call process, so I know all the details. When a new pastor is looking for her first call, the national body assigns her to a synod. The bishop of that synod then assigns her to a church. The council at that church then interviews her. If they like her, the full membership of the church votes on whether to hire her. If either the council or the membership rejects her, then the bishop assigns her to another church and the process begins again. She is not allowed to interview or even speak with any church, other than the one that bishop chooses for her. If she eventually decides to leave her first call church and seek another position, she will have more freedom to speak freely with other churches. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/35 "2014-01-30T17:48:20Z")
I don’t go to church any more, except to socialize at fundraisers. But my former church and denomination – First Congregational Church, UCC – has been what they call “open & affirming” since at least 1995; they’ve never had a problem with gay marriage since I’ve been aware of them and have been doing same-sex ceremonies for all that time. So even though SSM is not legal in Tennessee and, absent a Supreme Court mandate won’t be for a long time, nothing’s really changed. A few years back they (then “we”) hosted a funeral for a gay woman who’d committed suicide even though she was not a member because her home church would not do so, and when the family asked what the cost would be our pastor said, “Well, nothing. Obviously.” I grew up in the Church of God in Christ, a Pentecostal denomination. They oppose SSM strongly. I have, on two occasions, witnessed COGIC pastors inveigh against the wickedness of Teh Gay DURING FUNERALS. I suspect that, regardless of the law, my father’s church will stop doing marriages for non-members before they’ll begin doing SSM ceremonies. When one of my gay cousins died, his husband-in-all-but-name was essentially barred by minister from sitting with the family. ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/36 "2014-01-30T17:53:11Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I suspect that, regardless of the law, my father’s church will stop doing marriages for non-members before they’ll begin doing SSM ceremonies. I’m pretty sure this would not be an issue. To the best of my knowledge no state that has marriage equality requires religious denominations to marry gay couples. Churches that have a problem with it can simply refuse without compromising their ability to marry heterosexual couples. ---
**Author:** ![RickG](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rickg/32/5174_2.png) [@RickG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickG)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/37 "2014-01-30T18:33:25Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > I don’t practice any religion but I was raised Reform Jewish. We’ve had gay ordained rabbis and same sex commitment ceremonies for decades. As soon as gay marriages were legal, reform rabbis were doing them. I believe that the same can be said about Conservative Judaism. Conservative Jew here. Yes, the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards (CJLS) of the Rabbinical Assembly (RA) approved the performance of same-sex ceremonies for RA members about 10 years ago. It’s basically up to the local Rabbi in consultation with his/her congregation whether or not to perform them. Took a while to get to this point, but the Conservative movement in Judaism is “small-c” conservative–change is deliberately slow and thoughtful, but recognizes social and institutional change as inevitable and necessary over time. It’s still not ok for RA members to perform wedding ceremonies between Jews and non-Jews. In other words, gay marriage is fine, but both partners must be Jewish. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/38 "2014-01-30T18:34:01Z")
> [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](#): > > I’m pretty sure this would not be an issue. To the best of my knowledge no state that has marriage equality requires religious denominations to marry gay couples. Churches that have a problem with it can simply refuse without compromising their ability to marry heterosexual couples. Probably true. But they CLAIM it to be an issue. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/39 "2014-01-30T19:42:13Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Probably true. But they CLAIM it to be an issue. Many do which makes them liars as well as bigots. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2014, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976/40 "2014-01-30T19:45:58Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > Many do which makes them liars as well as bigots. While I hesitate to imply that COGIC 's leadership is not largely composed of liars, that does not seem fair. They could simply be ninnyhammers. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-happening-with-ssm-in-your-church/679976.md?page=3)