Glen Morris United Church is currently exploring the Affirming Ministries Process. This is a program offered through Affirm United/s’affirmer Ensemble that invites communities of faith to discern if and how they are feeling called to publically, intentionally, and explicitly engage in 2S and LGBTQIA+ justice issues.
This is an opportunity for prayer, worship, brave conversations, curiosity, bible study, and learning from one another. To facilitate this work, the Affirming Committee has:
-hosted Q&A sessions after worship
-placed resources in a rainbow basket in the lobby
-hosted events such as PIE Day and a Pride worship service
If you have any questions or comments about the process, please be in contact with any of the Affirming Committee members (Karen, Joy, Charlotte, Don T, Michiko, Deb F, Lynn) You can learn more about what inspires our committee members by reading their statements below:
Affirming Statements from Congregants
I’m more a New Testament person than Old. The teachings of Jesus to “love one another” have always resonated with me. My parents instilled in me the lesson that we are all the same in God’s eyes.
Our travels have really enforced this way of thinking. We’ve learned that not everywhere are the mores as strict as they perhaps are in parts of our North American society. Life is to be lived and people are to be respected and the differences embraced
-Deb F.
I’d like to let you know why I feel that becoming an Affirming congregation is important to me.
I have always been in the United Church of Canada. As a child and young adult, I worshipped at Knox United in Ayr. Sitting in the church on Sundays, I listened to the scriptures and heard a historical account of Jewish living in the Old Testament. I listened to the rules for living from those scriptures, including items like one should never wear two types of fabric or grow 2 different crops in adjoining fields. These were punishable offences, some with stoning. Of course, as a daughter of a farmer, I often saw 2 different crops in adjoining fields. And often in the ‘70s, I wore more than one kind of fabric at one time. So clearly I learned that we don’t follow all the rules laid out in scripture. Does this mean we have ‘sinned’ or has our understanding and interpretation of scripture changed as we have matured as a society?
But I listened to the messages in the New Testament from Jesus, to ‘love one another as I have loved you’ and to ‘ love your neighbour as yourself’. These resonated with me. Of course my neighbours, when I was young, were geographically close to me and looked like me. As I matured, I realized that my neighbours were not limited to the folks across the road. They included the ‘Samaritans’, the Iranians, the queer community and more folks who did not look like me or live like me or move like me. I can’t imagine how it feels to be discriminated against because of the colour of my skin or my gender identity or my sexuality or my racial background or my physical disability.
I believe that we are all created by God. I believe we need to be clear to someone who is anxious about experiencing discrimination based on race, gender, sexuality, physical disability, that they are welcome here. We sing it ‘all are welcome, all are welcome in this place’. We need to announce it so folks can find and feel safe in coming here.
It’s the message Jesus preached: Love one another as I have loved you.
-Lynn M
Love and acceptance, it’s all I ever felt within my family, and was what we were all taught to give to those around us, both near and far. No matter the class level, no matter the colour of skin, no matter the mental health issues, no matter the sexual orientation or anything in between. All were to be respected, seen as equals and loved and accepted as beautiful fellow human beings and it just sits well within my heart. I may not be like most in a church setting who find the scriptures to be their guide, but the teachings of an incredible man who lived over two thousand years ago, speak to love and acceptance of ALL, loudly and clearly, and continue to be words and lessons for us all to live by.
-Karen MH
I have been reviewing the vision and mission statements from both the United Church of Canada and the Glen Morris United Church. My personal beliefs align fully with the beliefs of the United Church of Canada. I also believe that being an affirming church also aligns with those values.
I feel that we in Glen Morris have been able to live in a bubble where kindness and love dominates. Perhaps falsely feeling insulated from the wider, more angry world. But the world is changing and is dominated by world leaders focused on greed and self serving ideals. This is a time when we can’t be silent about our beliefs and we must educate ourselves and others so that falsehoods and violence are still considered undesirable. I was lucky to be raised in a kind and loving Christian home and to believe that love overcomes all things. I have witnessed this in life and in my work and feel it is important to help others feel safe to have their individuality valued.
I believe that by becoming an affirming church we will only see our church family grow as it will force us to have more open and challenging conversations about our beliefs with the end goal of everyone being loved and respected for who they really are.
-Joy
During my life I have belonged to 6 United Churches in 3 provinces. My usual seat in these churches have been in the choir loft. From that perch, as I surveyed the congregations, my feeling is: The less I know about what goes on in the congregants’ bedrooms, the better.
In these churches, we came to know several members of the LGBTQ2+ community. Michiko is the fourth one of our ministers to identify as LGBTQ2+. As a choir member in all of these churches, two of the choir directors I worked with were in long term same-sex relationships.
While none of these six congregations were affiliated with Affirm United while we were there, three have since joined: Wesley United, Cambridge; Central Okanagan United, Kelowna; and Glebe St. James United, Ottawa. Charlotte and I and our adult children have gay friends and frankly, we do not see their orientation as an issue in our friendships.
I took it for granted that our LGBTQ2+ friends would always be welcome in these congregations, and that they would never feel threatened walking in those doors. I see now that that assumption may have been unrealistic.
As a straight person, my road has been easy. LGBTQ2+ people face challenges at every turn and need positive assurance that the path ahead is safe. While I always see church as a safe and welcoming place, LGBTQ2+ people, because of their life experience, may well not make that assumption. While we at GMUC see ourselves as an open and welcoming congregation for all, I believe we need to be proactively welcoming to the LGBTQ2+ community in order to make it clear to them that they are safe here. The Affirm United designation may be the way to proactively promote our church as a safe space for the LGBTQ2+ community. There may be other means to this end which the committee could consider. We do need to undertake this process with care. In proactively welcoming the LGBTQ2+ community we must take care to not alienate existing members. They are the foundation of our church. I look forward to working with the committee to determine a path forward that will be a positive experience for all
-Don Taylor
Links to Affirm United website
Links to Affirming Passing the Peace Letters