8/2/2012
In this last (July 22nd) Sunday’s Tribune editorial page, seven members of the “People of Faith for Justice” (one of whom is the pastor of the Methodist church in Morro Bay) wrote a letter to the editor appealing to all of us to deny support for the Boy Scouts because of their stand against allowing homosexual men to lead their chapters, and allowing openly gay boys to join their chapters or clubs. The letter is full of religious double speak. I submitted my letter of response below to the Tribune that afternoon, and so far it has not been published, which if they choose not to publish it, will be in keeping with how they normally choose to deal with my letters. (BTW – They never published it).
Re: “Deny support to Scouts” If the seven members of “People of Faith for Justice” want to give their opinion on the Boy Scouts courageous stand for the values that have made them what they are over the last decades – that is their right. But to frame it in religious, much less Christian terms is quite deceptive. One thing that “reverence” demands is that worshippers worship God on His terms and agree with Him on His creative order. And that creative order is best summed up in Gen. 2:24, which both Jesus (Matthew 19:4,5) and the apostle Paul (Ephesians 5:31) quote when they teach on God’s original plan for marriage: “For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.” Young boys must be taught to: 1. Accept and appreciate the two God created and complimentary genders; 2. Prepare for marriage by learning to control their lusts and reserving the wonderful gift of sex for the marriage relationship. 3. Learning to be protectors of women and not predators. 4. Learning how to walk in and stand up for traditional values when enemies of those values unleash their venom. To whatever extent the Boy Scouts help teach these truths, they have our full support. Randy Nash Pastor – Los Osos Christian Fellowship
The last paragraph of the letter I responded to in the letter above goes like this, “It grieves us to take this position, but as an interfaith voice for social justice, we are called to embrace the moral fiber built into the fabric of creation.”
Does not Gen. 2:24 explain in very clear terms what this “fabric of creation” is supposed to look like? Not to mention Gen. 1:26-28!
And if we are really committed to social justice, since the law of the land from a federal stance is DOMA= Defense of Marriage Act – defining marriage as between one man and one woman – – passed overwhelmingly by Congress and signed into law by President Clinton, and never overturned since then, and since California has voted twice to uphold this definition, shouldn’t we be concerned to support the law of the land?