Presbyterian dissent: opposition to Amendment B organizes

Christian Century, May 7, 1997 by Mark Oppenheimer

One of the faithful has fashioned a career from that hope. "When you personalize an issue, it makes all the difference," says Jane Spahr, a "lesbian evangelist" with the mission That All May Freely Serve (TAMFS). "When they meet us--see that we value family, we value relationships--it makes all the difference." Ordained in 1974, she was "grandfathered in" by the 1978 General Assembly ruling that allowed those homosexual ministers already ordained to keep their clerical robes. But in 1991 her call to the Downtown United Church in Rochester, New York, was disallowed by the Permanent Judicial Commission of the PCUSA. Downtown United then teamed with Westminster Presbyterian Church of Tiburon, California (in Redwoods Presbytery, of which Spahr is a member in good standing), to found and fund TAMFS. Since March 1993 Spahr has toured the country, preaching and meeting with Presbyterians.

Spahr's work is emblematic of the new dissenting movement in two ways. First, she has never considered leaving the Presbyterian Church. The predominantly gay Metropolitan Community Church holds no appeal for her, nor does the Unitarian Universalist Association or the United Church of Christ, which allow ordination of gays. Jervis makes clear that the Stonecatchers "are riot prepared" to leave the church; Hart-Andersen says that some of his worshipers discussed leaving but were quickly dissuaded.

Spahr is also, inevitably, working with the straight community. The movement against Amendment B is similarly inclusive and not limited to gay activists. Virginia West Davidson, a heterosexual, works closely with TAMFS and Spahr. Hart-Andersen is a married man, and Jervis says that the majority of the Stonecatchers are heterosexual. On January 12, 25 Presbyterians signed the 1997 Declaration of Reformed Faith, now known as the Rochester Declaration for the city in which it was signed. The manifesto says: "We . . . reject the false doctrine that the gender of the partners in a sexual relationship is a sign by which its inherent worth and acceptability before God can be judged." Most of the signatories were not gay, and "The Gift of Sexuality," the rubric under which sexual orientation is discussed, is but one of ten sections; the other sections concern theological themes, such as "Grace Alone" and "Priesthood of All Believers."

Spahr is fond of quoting a rabbi's answer to the question of whether he took scripture literally. Reworking a famous remark by Reinhold Niebuhr, the rabbi said, "Madam, I do not take the Bible literally. I take it seriously." That view, the dissenters might say, captures their opposition to Amendment B.

Mark Oppenheimer is on the staff of the New Yorker.