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Sometimes the most interesting religion stories are about some small angle in daily life. And the Washington Post‘s William Wan has found a great one. He looks at how folks have filled out the “religious views” box on Facebook. Mine says “Confessional Lutheran,” for instance.
This was definitely the weekend for coverage of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s decision to change its position on the rostering of clergy in same-sex relationships. One of the nicer things was seeing reporters include local perspective. But one reader sent in a local piece that was not so good.
I’ve just returned from a vacation in Colorado and am catching up on the news of the past few days. I’m pleased by the amount of coverage we’re seeing of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s recent convention, although the depth of the articles varies wildly. Some are fantastic and cover a lot of ground and some are somewhat lacking.
If you were looking for cutting-edge discussions of gay theology back in the 1980s, all you had to do was head on over to the Iliff School of Theology, the United Methodist campus attached to the University of Denver. As one former faculty member of the university once told me, Iliff in that era was “the most liberal institution in American that still called itself Christian.”
We haven’t seen a bill voted out of the House of Representatives yet, but the culture war about health care reform is in full tilt, with allegations from conservatives that bills will include federal funding for abortions — not to mention “death panels” that will chose who will live, and who will die.
Since I became a member of my congregation almost a dozen years ago, we’ve had a huge increase in the number of young children attending. Hang on, this is linked to a news story.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church of America is having it’s biennial convention this week and we’re seeing coverage about the most politically exciting topic that will be debated — homosexuality.
Let’s make one thing clear: I am a smidgen too young to be into this whole, “Hey man, did you make it to Woodstock or not?” thing that’s going on in the mainstream media right now. My priest, however, is another matter, since he was there and I still think he looks like Jerry Garcia.
