Evangelical covenant church gay marriage
Minneapolis church pastor expelled over his support of male lover marriage
MINNEAPOLIS >> Leaders of the Evangelical Covenant Church voted to defrock a Minneapolis pastor and expel his church for permitting gay marriage.
The Rev. Dan Collison had his credentials removed by a 77% vote at the Evangelical Covenant Church’s annual rendezvous in Omaha, Nebraska, on Friday night.
Leaders also voted to expel Collison’s First Covenant Church, a founding member of the year-old denomination.
Collison, who became a pastor at First Covenant in downtown Minneapolis in , told the Actor Tribune he was “not surprised” but “saddened” after he was voted out.
“I feel grounded in the path we have chosen. I feel grateful for the pastors and churches who stood up for us. I feel caring to those caught in the middle,” Collison said.
The ECC says First Covenant is free to retain operating as a church and can keep its church building. First Covenant says Collison will endure serving as lead pastor.
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By clicking to sign up, Dear President Walter, As I’ve watched the unfolding developments in the Covenant Church’s strife with the topic of LGBTQ inclusion, I hold felt at various times anger, frustration, disappointment, injure, and deep sadness. I grieve for our church not only as a gay man who cannot fully thrive under our current position, but also as a lifelong Covenanter who laments that the process we have followed in this conversation has strayed from the wisdom of our heritage and brought us to a place of such profound divide. I am writing this letter publicly, but welcome your private response and will hold our correspondence in confidence. I want to speak to you candidly, from one Covenanter to another, and there are a scant things that I desire you to know. The first thing I want you to know is that I have been offend by your words and your leadership. I acquire read and watched your remarks on this topic over the past year, and I want you to know how some of your words sound to the ears of one who is actually gay: they hurt. When you describe my sexual orientation merely as an “attraction” that I must “navigate,” that hurts. It undermines the legitimacy of the love LGBTQ people touch for The Evangelical Covenant Church (ECC) voted Friday to evict a pastor and expel his Minneapolis church from the denomination, ending a five-year conflict over LGBT inclusion, news outlets reported Saturday. It was the first time a pastor and a church have been involuntarily removed in the denomination's history—because of the ECC's disinclination toward lgbtq+ marriage. Pastor Dan Collison was one of two pastors to be booted at the annual meeting of the ECC in Omaha. The Star Tribune reported that ECC leaders also voted Friday night to remove retired Reverend Steve Armfield over a disagreement on LGBT rights and values. First Covenant will apparently continue to operate, "but the denomination will never remain the same," Collison said, according to The Star Tribune. Covenant Church leaders reportedly recommended that Collison, Armfield and First Covenant be expelled because they violated its policies on "celibacy in singleness and faithfulness in heterosexual marriage." In other words, they were seen as either supporting or condoning premarital sex and same-sex marriage. First Covenant's conflicts with the denomination reportedly broke out after a First Covenant For the second occasion in its history, the Evangelical Covenant Church has formally removed a congregation from its membership over policies that affirm lgbtq+ marriage and invite LGBT individuals to hold leaders positions in the church. At the ECC Annual Conference last week in Garden Grove, California, the theologically conservative denomination voted to remove Awaken Covenant Church of St. Paul, Minnesota, from its official roster of congregations. At issue is a statement of confirmation enacted by the church, which allows Awaken’s pastors to officiate same-sex weddings despite it being against ECC policies on sexual ethics. Subscribe to fetch daily/weekly email with the top stories (plus exceptional offers!) from The Christian Post. Be the first to know. "Awaken has adopted policies and practices that do not align with the Covenant’s human sexuality guidelines," an ECC church status report reads. "The Covenant Executive Board brought a motion to the Annual Meeting recommending that they be involuntarily removed from the roster. Deleg .
Evangelical Covenant Church drops congregation over LGBT 'policies and practices'
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