[Vision2020] in a better world ...

[Bill London]

K-
Yes.  Please share more of your passionate prose.  You have a unique perspective and a real ability to inspire understanding through your writing.
I just hope you also share your writing with V2020 as well as your new blog
BL 
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: keely emerinemix 
  To: vision2020 at moscow.com 
  Sent: Saturday, July 26, 2008 11:42 AM
  Subject: [Vision2020] in a better world ...



  Visionaires,

  Never would I have thought that I would live in a community whose most well-known and powerful pastor, one who claims to be a Trinitarian Christian and a Bible teacher, would behave in the  hostile, hateful, and horrendous manner that Douglas Wilson of Christ Church has.  During my six and a half years of living in Moscow and loving it, I have been beyond dismayed at his theology, teaching, and engagement with the community, and I've learned not to be surprised at what comes from his pen or out of his mouth.  But I find that he yet has the ability to shock me, owing more to his crass conduct than to my naivete, and this morning offers another example.

  In a column bashing Pastor Greg Boyd's new book on the idolatry of Christians in claiming the United States as a "Christian nation," and throwing themselves into politics in an attempt to make the kingdom of God right here, right now, Wilson complains that Boyd has no basis, then, for judging anything to be wrong.  His serrated edge flashing, he says that, for example, if he told Boyd his church spent last night "lynching homos -- you shoulda been there!", Boyd couldn't reasonably object.

  Boyd won't, because Wilson's pontificating has, thankfully, a limited audience.  But I can, and I do.  In fact, my 15-year-old son Jonah and I both responded to Wilson on his Blog and Mablog, and while my son responded to the church/state issue, I'm as proud of him as I am embarrassed, once again, by the man who would like to be thought of as the Bishop of the Palouse.  I invite you to read my comments there.  If not, let me state in the most concrete way that I can:

  For a pastor to make a point, any point, by using "lynching homos" as an example, one of hyperbole and excess, is despicable, particularly given the virulent homophobia Wilson has espoused.  And for none of his readers to complain is, while predictable, most disappointing.  In a perfect world, or even a mildly better one, other Christians would howl in protest, rebuking Wilson immediately and publicly.  It ain't that kind of world, though.  And, hesitant church leadership notwithstanding, it's frankly just as sad to me that many of you don't want to comment, object, or even know -- and wish I would just shut up about the whole thing.

  Sorry, but I can't do it.  What I can and will do, however, is begin my own very publicized, very pointed blog devoted to defending the Gospel by correcting bad theology both within the Kirk and from other sources.  I don't know what to call it yet, and I don't know how to design it, but I intend to never let up 'til the day I die . . . 

  The stakes for our community are high, higher than most Moscow residents realize.  But the stakes are even higher for the message of peace and reconciliation, justice and love, spoken and lived by the Lord Jesus Christ and sullied by Wilson, et al.  If Christ means anything to me,  I can certainly endure the scorn of my neighbors and the mocking of the boys at the Kirk by writing against them.  I'll still write on Vision, and still write about Christ Church as relevant to the discussion, but the content of my blog will be theology, gender and peace-and-justice issues, and scathing critique of those who spew bigotry in the name of Christ.

  As a stay-at-home mom with a fairly useless BA from a quarter-century ago, I may be "just a housewife" to some at the Kirk -- but if I am a housewife, I am a thundering one, and I can't be silent.

  Keely





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