Reconciling Ministries Network

Foundation for a Better World

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now that we have moved beyond another Martin Luther King Observance, the first celebrated with the presence of the Martin Luther King Memorial in Washington, I invite you to join me in what will be a re-reading for some of us and a first reading for others. The Reading: Martin Luther King: The Inconvenient Hero by Vincent Harding, Orbis Books, 1996. This book provides a number of informative, prophetic, and soul, heart, and mind-stretching essays that serve as a counterpoint to the poem of Carl Wendell Himes that Dr. Harding includes in the book:

Now that he is safely dead,
Let us praise him
and build monuments to his glory
and sing hosannas to his name.

Dead men make
such convenient heroes. They cannot
rise to challenge the images we would
fashion from their lives.

And besides, it is
easier to build monuments,
than to make a better world.

And after re-reading the book, rather than immediately pointing a finger at others, I will remember that when I do that, I am pointing three fingers at myself. These moments will not be well-served in memory of Dr. King if we fail to acknowledge that each one of us must join others of us, no matter how different their race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or politics. "A better world" requires all of us to contribute to its making, by discovering, and then giving, the best that we have.

-Gil Caldwell
Asbury Park, New Jersey

Don't Ask Don't Tell and the Church

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

On Friday, July 22, 2011, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, Joint Chief of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen and President Barack Obama sent a notice to the Congress declaring that "...military readiness would not be hurt by a repeal of the 17 year old Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy." This new policy will be in force in 60 days.

The debate about whether the Church should change culture or follow culture has been long-standing. Sadly, the Church has sacrificed much of its justice credibility over the years by "screening out" those whom culture has in time, "screened in". Thus, the Church has been in the forefront of proclaiming exclusion when, after much struggle, society has become inclusive. The history of colonialism, racism and sexism is a history of much of the church playing "catch up" with a changing history.

It is difficult for many of us to comprehend why The United Methodist Church since 1972 has held to its "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy vis-a-vis same gender loving clergy. The military, the President and the Congress have decided that maintaining the DADT policy would compromise the values and commitments of the military as well as the values it expects of those who serve in the military.

The United Methodist Church in its Book of Discipline language and legislation expresses the belief that affirming clergy who acknowledge that they are in committed same gender relationships are "incompatible with Christian teaching".There was a time when "Christian teaching" justified colonialism, racism and sexism. The words of the Scriptures that were used to justify these isms have not changed, but the teaching and practice of Christian faith on these isms has changed!

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (The Mormons) disavowed polygamy in the 1890's when Utah's statehood was at risk.The Church in 1978 eliminated its policy of refusing to ordain "black men of African descent" into it's priesthood. This was done because of a new "Divine Revelation" that proclaimed the policy of racial exclusion in error. What will it take for The United Methodist Church at the 2012 General Conference to proclaim a "Christian teaching" that includes rather than excludes? The growing inclusiveness of society, a Divine Revelation, or both?

The God who is at work in and beyond the Church is still at work. May The UMC follow God's lead.

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. Gil is now working on the documentary Truth in Progress (www.truthinprogress.com).His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

From Ghandi to Amy DeLong

"Gays and Lesbians have a more difficult time than we (blacks) did. We had our families and our churches on our side. All too often they have neither."  - James Lawson

I re-discovered these words of James Lawson, now a retired United Methodist minister who was/is a proponent and living example of, as well as teacher of nonviolence in the Civil Rights Movement. His relationship with Martin Luther King and leadership in "The Movement", is well-documented and well remembered by those of us who were "foot soldiers" during that time.

My search for this quotation from Jim was prompted by the headline of a United Methodist News Service story; "Gandhi urges graduates (of Africa University) to transform Africa". Gandhi who is the grandson of Mohandis "Mahatma" Gandhi was the speaker at this year's Africa University graduation in Zimbabwe. Jim Lawson, Arun Gandhi and I and scores of others were arrested at the 2000 Cleveland United  Methodist General Conference, protesting UMC language and legislation that is anti-Homosexual and homosexuality. Jim Lawson as one of the participants in the Soulforce demonstrations at the Conference, spoke the above eloquent and factual words as we prepared for our protests.

We are on the brink of the Amy DeLong trial and as we hear some say that delegates from Africa to the 2012 General Conference will vote to maintain our discriminatory United Methodist legislation, I wonder how many at the Africa University graduation knew this bit of Arun Gandhi's history?

Africans in Africa, and African Americans in the USA, in our struggles for racial justice had our families and our churches as allies in our struggles. Jim Lawson reminds us that this is not always true for Gays and Lesbians in their struggles for justice.

African and African American delegates at the 2012 General Conference could help to "transform" The United Methodist Church if they vote to affirm rather than reject those whose sexual orientation is same gender loving.

Could it be that the words and the presence of, Arun Gandhi at Africa University could encourage The UMC to become a Church for the 21st century, and not a reflection of centuries long gone?.Many of us are praying and hoping this will be true.

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

The Trials of Amy Delong and Tituba

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

Amy DeLong an ordained United Methodist Minister will go on trial on June 21, 2011 for performing a Holy Union of two women in 2009. and because she has been open about her committed relationship to her female partner of 15 years. The United Methodist Church has for many years abided by language and legislation enacted by the legislative body of the denomination, a General Conference of many years ago, that prohibits United Methodist clergy from performing Holy Unions for same sex couples. The denomination also puts on church trial, clergy who have been charged because they acknowledge that they are in a same gender relationship. Many of us are praying and hoping that Amy Delong will be judged not guilty in 2011 as Tituba was in 1692 in her Salem, Massachusetts witch trial.

Who was Tituba? I first heard of her in one of the classrooms of a racially segregated school in Texas where I "grew up" many,many years ago. Our teachers, all of whom were black as was the student body, felt that it was important for their black students to become acquainted with black persons whose names and lives were an important part of history.Too often their stories were made invisible by a culture and practice that rendered them second class. Tituba was a slave who belonged to a Rev. Samuel Parris. She was one of the first three women to be arrested who were accused of engaging in witchcraft during the beginnings of the Salem Witch Trials. Tituba, who in some writings is described as the "black witch" was dark of skin because of her ancestry that was thought to be South American Indian. Before arriving in Salem, she spent time as a slave in Barbados. Tituba was not hanged as were many olf the women, but the visions that she described and the demons she claimed she saw, made her a "witch" in the minds of many of those who knew her.

The coming trial of Amy DeLong cannot help but cause me to remember what I have heard and what I have read about those long ago trials in Salem. The United Methodist Church in its language and legislation and its trials, has made of clergy who help same sex couples celebrate the love from God that they express toward each other, "Witches". And, if those clergy persons acknowledge that they are in a same gender loving relationship themselves as Amy has done, their "Witch-ness" is compounded. We now regret the insensitive irrationality of the Salem Trials. I wonder how will The United Methodist Church express its regret, when in that time that is certain to come, performing a same sex union and/or being open about one's same gender relationship, will no longer be considered "incompatible with Christian teaching" as our current United Methodist Book of Discipline states?

How ironic it is that in a year when The Presbyterian Church (USA) through voting at the regional level, affirmed the ordination of same gender loving clergy, we in The United Methodist Church are bringing Amy Delong to trial. Amy DeLong and Tex Sample in 2000 published a book they edited that was titled: "The Loyal Opposition: Struggle Within The Church On Homosexuality." (Abingdon Press). I was asked to contribute a chapter to the book and I titled my chapter; "The Last Prejudice" (The words of Peter Gomes who was Minister to Harvard University who died this year. Gomes openly acknowledged that he was Gay).

My hope is that the Rev. Amy DeLong will be found not guilty as those who judge her remember how wrong the Methodist denomination was when some in the Church once used the Bible to support slavery, racial segregation and prohibitions against the ordination of women. And, if those memories are insufficient to render her not guilty, may her jury recognize that if the military now believes that the practice of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is morally unjustifiable, why cannot The United Methodist Church do the same?

We used to sing in the marches and the protest lines of the Civil Rights Movement, a Spiritual that ended with these words; "Before I'll be a slave, I'll be buried in my grave, and go home to my Lord and be free." I have known Gay United Methodist clergy who because of the restrictions of their Church against them being open about their Gay sexual orientation, were less-than -they could have been in their ministry because of our United Methodist DADT policy. They are now in the presence of the God who created them as persons who in their sexual orientation were same gender loving. With God now, they are free! May the trial of Amy DeLong result in a not guilty verdict that allows her to be free in life and within The United Methodist Church "a free person", unlike those who before her found that freedom only in their life beyond death...

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

Remembering Peter John Gomes

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

Peter John Gomes

Minister to the Memorial Church and member of the faculty of Harvard Divinity School Dead at the age  of 68

I had not heard until recently that Peter John Gomes experienced a stroke in December and then today I received the news that he had died last night (February 28th) from complications related to the stroke.

His book THE GOOD BOOK: Reading the Bible with Mind and Heart impacted me in ways few books have. The 8th chapter in the book is titled "The Bible and Homosexuality: The Last Prejudice". It was his "last prejudice" idea that prompted me to write my RMN blog post "The Last United Methodist Church Trial".

Peter Gomes announced he was gay in November of 1991 after a student magazine published an issue condemning homosexuality. Gomes spoke to the Harvard community and said, "I am a Christian who happens as well to be gay...These realities are unreconcilable to some, yet are reconciled in me by a loving God."

I became the first African American pastor of the Bryantville and West Duxbury, Massachusetts Methodist Churches in the summer of 1958. The mother of Peter Gomes, who lived in nearby Plymouth, Massachusetts, was a close friend of one of the white members of one of those churches. They spoke frequently and my member shared with Mrs.Gomes that although a few members were upset with having a Black Pastor, most members were pleased with me, their new Pastor. The first time I spoke to Peter Gomes, he told me that the conversations between his mother and my member concerning my ministry, encouraged him to believe that a black minister in a predominantly white Church could be successful.

For some people, the idea of a black minister in a predominantly white Church or a gay minister in a predominantly straight church is unreconcilable. But Peter Gomes and I knew that despite the biases and bigotry of some, reconciliation within and beyond takes place through a loving God.

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

The Last United Methodist Church Trial

by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell

The news about the coming Church Trial of Rev. Amy Delong evokes within me a series of memories. Full disclosure prompts me to say that I was honored to be asked to write a chapter in the book that Amy and Tex Sample edited; "The Loyal Opposition; The Struggle Within The Church on Homosexuality". The title of my chapter was "The Last Prejudice". The following are some of my thoughts as I ponder another Church Trial in this the 21st century.

1. Over and over again I hear, I am told, and I read, "Race and gender are realities at birth, same sex loving orientation is not." This paraphrase of these statements is often followed with something like this; "Therefore because responding to same sex loving inclinations is a choice, when this choice is acted upon and self-acknowledged by a clergy person, he/she must be brought to trial by the Church."

If there is such clarity on the wrongness of punishing/harming persons because of their race or gender, where were the Church Trials of those Church members who engaged in actions, sometimes violently, against persons because of their race or gender in the past?

2. It is encouraging to read that some persons who support the charges and the trial of Rev. Amy Delong do so reluctantly because they are in disagreement with the punitive language/legislation in the Discipline.

Another set of trials comes to mind as I read the above, the Nuremberg Trials. President Harry Truman said of those trials; "Never again can men say, 'I was following orders. And never again can men in power give such orders." Those who make the decision about the future ministry of Rev. Amy Delong, I am sure will ponder; "How must I respond to my conscience that is at a place distinctly antithetical to the legislation of the denomination?"

3. Those of us who are against the death penalty, have at times raised this question; "Why do we keep on killing people to show that killing people is wrong?" I ask, and I am sure many others ask as Amy Delong prepares for her trial; "Why in the Church, the community of faith that acknowledges that we all are sinners, do some in the Church believe that bringing to trial other members in the Church, is justifiable?"

It is obvious that heterosexism, that "uses" Scripture for its justification is still with us even if some express the hope that it is "The Last Prejudice". My hope is that the trial of Amy Delong will touch us so deeply and unearth the sense of justice that is within all of us that her trial will be "The Last United Methodist Church Trial."

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

Response to "The 'Other' Marriage Crisis"

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

"Judicial Council isn't the place to decide such matters (same sex marriage). General Conference is...." (A critical comment about my last blog)

We speak of "Holy Conferencing" in the United Methodist Church. This is my effort at engaging in "Holy Conversation" in response to a comment that was critical.

One of the aspects of the "exceptionalism" of the United States of America is our acceptance of the checks and balances that are represented by the Legislative, Judicial and Executive branches of our national government. We have no checks and balances in United Methodism. We believe that the decisions voted by a majority of the delegates at a General Conference have an almost sacred "rightness" about them and therefore should not be challenged or changed until a General Conference, 4 years later does so.

The United States Supreme Court on May 17, 1954 ruled that the practice of racially segregated public schools (separate but equal) was at variance with the equality provisions of our national Constitution. At the time the Methodist Church had a segregated Central Jurisdiction but it was not eliminated until a majority vote of the 1968 General Conference did so. Most Methodists knew that the Central Jurisdiction was in violation of Biblical declarations of inclusion and our own Methodist statments that expressed the same view, but it took 14 years after the 1954 decision for the voters at a General Conference to declare that a "separate but equal" Central Jurisdiction, was a violation of not only Scripture, but Methodist thought and wisdom!

The Methodist Church could have ordained women before 1956 if a Judicial Council had been able to say prohibitions against women were in violation of our understandings of Scripture, our affirmation of the rights of women as Methodists, and at variance with the movement for equal rights for women in the nation at the time. It is time that we find ways other than a majority vote of General Conference to protect the rights of minorities.

I have been disagreed with and questioned over and over again about my ally/advocacy for the equality rights of LGBTQ persons and same sex couples. Some of those who have disagreed with me have been less-than-kind in the ways they have expressed their disagreement. But, being a former "foot soldier" in the Civil Rights Movement in the south and in the north, I have developed the capacity to "keep on keeping on", no matter what.

Why at the age of 76, this month I will be 77, have I been so passionate about advocacy for the equality rights of LGBTQ persons in church and society? Langston Hughes in one of his poems (The Negro Speaks Of Rivers) has written, "I have known rivers...." I have known, I have experienced, I have been wounded, I have been made angry by the slowness of the Methodist and now the United Methodist Church to embrace in its biblical interpretation, its theology, and its practice, deep and authentic responses to its history of racism at worst and racial insensitivity at best. The gradualism of the denomination I love, in its efforts to repair the damage church-sanctioned slavery and racial segregation has harmed, not only those who are black, but all within the Church. It has left wounds within me that have not yet healed. We believe that black "visibility" at every level of the denomination means that we have been healed. But, with all of the black visibility there is, we have not gotten off of our beds and walked boldly to confront the racism that is so obvious all around us. Rather, some exert great pressure on some Board and Agencies and persons when they "dare" to address the elephant of race that is still in the USA room. And, a so-called racially inclusive United Methodist Church remains silent. Is silence the price we pay for being racially diverse?

I have prayed and hoped that the UMC would not do to my LGBTQ sisters and brothers what it has done to those of us who are black. But if we continue to allow majority votes at a General Conference to separate and segregate them from full equality in the United Methodist Church, it becomes de-je-vu all over again.

It is painful to observe that, that done to those of us because of our race, being done to others because of their sexual orientation and gender status. Of course there are differences between racism and heterosexism, but "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere". I believe if Martin Luther King were alive, he would ask United Methodism; "Did you not learn from your long struggle against racism that justice cannot wait to be enacted by majority votes. Justice take place when Spirit-led women and men are able to say, "History and culture may have condoned discrimination, but that history and culture was wrong. We say to today's Church, 'All God's children got a song'. Let them sing it in order that we all might be healed."

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

What Happens to a Dream Deferred?

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

The Senate inaction on Don't Ask Don't Tell last week brought to mind this poem of the African American poet, Langston Hughes;

"What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore --
And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over --
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?"

I paraphrase a bit of Scripture by asking this question; "What does it profit an elected official who responds not to his or her conscience, but to what they deem is the politically expedient thing to do in the moment? They may gain a few votes, they may even satisfy those within their religious institutions whose faith rests on the exclusion of Lesbians and Gay from the military. But, do they realize what damage they are doing to their souls?"

The damage the inaction of the Senate on DADT has done to Gay and Lesbian persons in the military and beyond cannot be calculated. Nor to those of us who allies and advocates. Many apparently do not care about this. But then I ask this question of their spiritual and patriotic self interests; "What about the inner explosion they must experience when they violate the principles of equality, fair play and freedom of the individual, that they speak of so often?"

Michael Jackson sang of the "Man in the Mirror". I wonder what some of the women and men in the Senate see in their mirrors this week?

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

The Times They Are A-Changin'

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

I remember when a Governor who was a Methodist stood in a University doorway and said; "Segregation today, Segregation, tomorrow, Segregation forever." That Governor was so wrong. The wrong-ness of his words was evident if you watched the football game when that University won the national championship. The players on the field and on the bench, the coaches, the cheerleaders, and the spectators in the stands, were black and white and all of the colors in between.

We ought not bash or demonize that Governor. He had been taught and told at home, in school and probably in church, that racial integration was of the Devil and it would not work and it should be resisted whenever and wherever it raised its ugly head. The song in South Pacific captures through some of its lyrics how prejudice and bigotry and even hatred develop. "You've got to carefully taught, the people to love, the people to hate, by the time you are 7 or 8." He had been "carefully taught" and later in his life, he rejected his earlier teaching and learning on matters of race. All praise be to God!

But, "The times they are a' changing". A report that evolved from an "Operational Assessment Project" states that "United Methodist reliance on management through legislation is leading to an increasingly rigid and rule bound culture." The report further suggests that there is a "lack of a a leadership culture." This recently released report, despite its critique of the denomination, offers hope, possibility and opportunity that we must not let pass by.

This is not the time for any of us to respond to the report and say, "I told you so". As a United Methodist who is a retired clergyman, I believe that any criticisms of my denomination are criticisms of me as as a member of the denomination. I gain no solace in saying that I have resisted in the past and in the present, the "rigid and rule bound culture", that once on matters of race, and today, on matters of homosexual orientation, restricted/restricts some, and affirmed/ affirms others. The OAP report "describes the enemy and it/he/she is us". We who have resisted our United Methodist "rigid and rule bound culture" have been unsuccessful in reversing it. But I believe, much to the relief of more United Methodists than you can "shake a stick at", we are ready to change our Church culture of restriction to a culture of authentic affirmation. We are weary of the same old same old. We know that we have restricted ourselves from authentic mission and ministry, because we have been more focused on who is "incompatible with Christian teaching", when we know that at some places in our lives, all of us are. 2012 is when United Methodists will decide we have wasted so much of God's time screening some people out, when God is calling us to screen all people in.

Bob Dylan concludes his song with these words; "You better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone. For the times they are a-changin." I believe that at the General Conference in 2012, delegates will dare to swim in ways and to places where we have not been before. They know that the denomination they and we love is, "sinking like a stone". And, because "the times they are a-changing", they will change The United Methodist Church. Hallelujah, Alleluia, Amen.

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

A Request for Comments from RMN Bloggers and/or Readers

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

Recently I re-read Meeting Jesus for the First Time, The Historical Jesus and The Heart of Contemporary Faith, by Marcus J. Borg, Harper San Francisco, 1994. Two paragraphs from his Third Chapter, "Jesus, Compassion and Politics", "jumped out" at me. I responded to them with the oft-quoted comment; "This will preach and teach!" I am asking bloggers and readers to comment on the relevance of these words to our current United Methodist Church judgmental and punitive language and legislation in our Book of Discipline about same gender commitments and homosexuality. I believe that Marcus Borg's words will be helpful as we teach and preach from now until the 2012 General Conference.

"The inclusiveness of the Jesus movement continued into the early Christian movement as we hear it described in other parts of the New Testament. It was one of the most striking qualities of the movement. We see it in the book of Acts in the story of the Ethiopian eunuch, which revolves around the issue of purity and boundaries. Eunuchs were sexually defective, and hence were near the bottom of the purity system. They were excluded from full participation in the religious life of Israel. The eunuch's question to Philip, 'What is to prevent me from being baptized?' is really a question about whether the new community he has just heard about will exclude or include him. He is, of course included. The famous words of Paul also negate the world of purity and cultural boundaries and express the same inclusiveness: 'In Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male nor female.' Paul is not here announcing an abstract ideal; rather, the verse reflects the new social reality of the movement itself.

In short, there is something boundary shattering about the imitatio dei that stood at the center of Jesus' message and activity. 'Be compassionate as God is compassionate.' Whereas purity divides and excludes, compassion unites and includes. For Jesus, compassion had a radical sociopolitical meaning. In his teaching and table fellowship, and in the shape of his movement, the purity system was subverted and an alternative social vision was affirmed. The politics of purity was replaced by a politics of compassion."

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.