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A Personal Journey, 5: Love vs. Legalism

About six years ago, St. Stephen hosted two speakers, pro and con, on the issue of ordination of LGBT folk in the PCUSA. The issue had heated up again with the “Peace, Unity and Purity” Task Force Report to the 217th PCUSA General Assembly in 2006. The task force comprised 20 pastors and theologians on both sides of the issue of gay ordination. They advocated a “season of discernment” before any final decisions were made; but during that season there should be a “live and let live” attitude in which no one–pastor, officer, or governing body–was prosecuted for ordaining, or not ordaining, according to their conscience. It seemed a good time for a public presentation of the issues.

The first speaker was the Rev. Dr. X (forgive me for using pseudonyms–I would prefer to focus on issues, not people!). Dr. X had written a book about his own journey from evangelical condemnation of homosexuality to faithful acceptance. The next week we hosted Dr. Y, a strong critic of ordination of LGBT folk. Both nights were well attended, by people from both church and community. Many of our gay and lesbian members, and folks on both sides of the issue attended. Dr. X was well-received, but Dr. Y was not, and the reason was simple: he was a legalist.Read More »A Personal Journey, 5: Love vs. Legalism

A Personal Journey, 3: Theology “In The Flesh”–The AIDS Crisis

Some time after seminary, when I was serving my second parish, in rural Virginia, I was in a regular case study group of pastors and counselors led by a Clinical Pastoral Education supervisor. One participant was a very sharp Christian counselor. He presented the case of a young man who came in and confessed that he was gay and wanted to leave his marriage. I can’t remember what the counselor told him, but he explained to us that his philosophy of counseling was that the Bible was like a mathematical formula, into which you plug the variable of a human life, and then you get the answers you need.

We immediately challenged him on this. The Bible is not in fact a formula, or a manual like a car’s manual, or any sort of mechanistic analogy. And people are not variables in God’s formula for life.Read More »A Personal Journey, 3: Theology “In The Flesh”–The AIDS Crisis

A Personal Journey, 2: The Bible and LGBT Issues

In 2011, the PCUSA officially ended its policy of excluding gays and lesbians from ordination. This was a long, hard-fought battle for many of us, but there was no time for celebration, because there were casualties. Our evangelical brethren and sistren have started leaving the church, claiming that the PCUSA had transgressed the bounds of Biblical morality. One of those leaving was a dear friend from seminary, a man I love as a brother, but who believes, as does his church, that the PCUSA had strayed from Scripture and traditional Christianity in a profound way.Read More »A Personal Journey, 2: The Bible and LGBT Issues

A Personal Journey, 1: How A Teenage Evangelical Came to See That God Loves Gays

I feel blessed to pastor a church that is recognized in the community as LGBTQI-friendly. (For those who, like me, don’t usually use initials other than when texting, that’s “lesbian/gay/bi-sexual/transgender/questioning/intersex.” If you don’t know what it all means, which is understandable, I recommend: the Internet.)

I believe I am fulfilling God’s calling by serving on a task force to address issues of gay teen suicide and acceptance in Fort Worth.  If you are a non-Christian, you may look at this and think, “Of course. How can anyone who believes in a loving God do anything else?”Read More »A Personal Journey, 1: How A Teenage Evangelical Came to See That God Loves Gays

What to Do When Jesus Leaves–John 6: 1-15, 30-36

By Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch

John 6: 1-15, 30-36

July 29, 2012

St. Stephen Presbyterian Church

Fort Worth, TX

Last week (and the week before–someone this morning commented that anybody who preaches the same passage three times is bound to get it right eventually!) I preached on this same story as it’s told in Mark. I pointed out that though the disciples advise Jesus to send the crowd out to get food, Jesus says no. He knows they’re sheep without a shepherd, and he has compassion for them, because he knows that what they really need only he can provide. They need the assurance of God’s love and the spiritual nourishment of staying together as the Beloved Community, united by their certainty that God loves them. These are things only Jesus can provide, and He provides them.

Then the Gospel of Mark says, Jesus “immediately” sent the crowd one direction, the disciples another, and himself left to pray. (Mark 6: 45)

He was the glue that held them together, but then He left and exploded the crowd after all, the very thing He’d not wanted to do at the beginning.

What do you do when Jesus leaves?

Read More »What to Do When Jesus Leaves–John 6: 1-15, 30-36

The Miracle–Mark 6: 34-44, Part 2

By Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch
July 22, 2012
St. Stephen Presbyterian Church
Fort Worth, TX

Reporter Charles Duhigg tells the story of a US Army major in the town of Kufa, in Iraq, who decided to do some behavior modification. He

had analyzed videotapes of recent riots and had identified a pattern: Violence was usually preceded by a crowd of Iraqis gathering in a plaza or other open space and, over the course of several hours, growing in size. Food vendors would show up, as well as spectators. Then, someone would throw a rock or a bottle and all hell would break loose.Read More »The Miracle–Mark 6: 34-44, Part 2

Broken Pieces–Mark 6: 35-44, Part 1

 

By Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch, St. Stephen Presbyterian Church

Fort Worth, TX

The Lord’s Supper

July 15, 2012

 

Jesus’ disciples want to send the crowds home to get something to eat. Instead, Jesus tells his disciples “You give them something to eat.” He has them organize the thousands present in groups of hundreds and fifties, as were Roman army units, and they pass out the bread.

And somehow, everybody has enough.

We call this the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes, but the Bible doesn’t say it’s a miracle. Scholars will argue forever about whether the food somehow multiplied like bunnies or if in fact people there really had brought food with them, and decided that rather than hoard it, they would share it with the members of their group. We aren’t going to solve that mystery today, and that’s not what I want to focus on.

What’s interesting is that Jesus tells the disciples to give the crowd something to eat, but the disciples don’t really do anything special. They organize the people and they hand out the food. That’s it.

And then, they gather the broken pieces.Read More »Broken Pieces–Mark 6: 35-44, Part 1