And Word Alone is not so positive.

NEWS RELEASE

WordAlone Network
Aug. 12, 2005
Contact: Betsy Carlson
Cell phone 651 269-7613

Reform movement leader says
door open to blessing gay unions

by Betsy Carlson
WordAlone Network editor

The 2005 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran
Church in America propped the door open for blessing of
homosexual relationships, according to leaders of the
WordAlone Network, a reforming movement within the ELCA.

The assembly did this Friday by approving an amended but
still ambiguous form of an ELCA Church Council
recommendation. The vote was 670-323.

"The blessings door has been swinging back and forth in the
ELCA, perhaps since 1993. This assembly has propped the
door open firmly. By what authority can the ELCA bless
homosexual relationships? Scripture clearly doesn't
authorize sex outside of marriage," WordAlone president,
Pastor Jaynan Clark Egland, stated in an interview that
day.

The assembly voted 490 for to 503 against the council's
third recommendation, a proposal to allow gays and lesbians
in same-sex relationships to serve as ordained or lay
ministers. It would have taken a two-thirds majority to
pass.

"Thankfully, at least the assembly didn't disregard the
authority of God's Word concerning the standards for church
leaders," she added.

Both proposals came out of recommendations from a task
force that studied homosexuality and church life for
several years. A third recommendation called for unity in
the denomination in spite of intense and conscientious
disagreements within the ELCA on the topic. It passed
851-127.

The churchwide council reviewed the recommendations,
modified them some and forwarded them to the assembly. Many
people called both the task force and later church council
recommendations on blessing same-sex relationships
ambiguous. Some asked for clarification. Both
recommendations included a portion of a 1993 Conference of
Bishops statement that seemed to ban blessing gay
relationships based on Scripture and tradition. But both
also included an ambiguous sentence calling for pastoral
care of persons in such relationships.

Opponents and proponents of blessing homosexual
relationships tried and failed to get the assembly to
clarify the council recommendation in favor of their
viewpoints. Finally, the assembly adopted an amendment to
drop the reference to persons in homosexual relationships
and included all persons to whom pastors were ministering.
This brought the resolution in line with the language of
the 1993 bishops' statement.

Egland said that even with this amendment the
recommendation okays same-sex blessings.

-end-

I had the honor of picking Pastor Egland up at the airport on Sunday. She is just great, as is Roy Harrisville. We have been very fortunate to have all their talent and hard work in the reform community.

---Katie