From the Providence Journal:
Karen Jones, a member of Open Table who had been asked to help the congregation extend its outreach to people of all orientations, said in a recent interview that there was so much enthusiasm among so many of the 150 black, white and Hispanic congregants attending the Mother’s Day service, she didn’t notice there were some who did not go to Communion.
“So many people came up to me afterwards to say it was a wonderful service,” she said in a later interview. “A very elderly traditional Methodist woman said it was the most beautiful service she had been to.”
It was only after Jones got home that afternoon and saw some of the e-mails on her computer that she realized not everyone was happy. At least three very large families, Haitian and Liberian, including one headed by one of the church’s lay leaders, wrote that they did not think the service was appropriate.
Nehemy Theodore and his wife, Rosemith, who have lived in the United States since moving from Haiti in 1992, told Jones and the pastor that they and their four children would no longer be attending the church, even though Nehemy had been one of the three top lay leaders.
Rosemith Theodore said in a recent interview that she was shocked that an openly gay man had been allowed to speak from the pulpit, especially since she had always been taught to believe that the Bible condemns the practice of homosexuality as a sin.
To suggest that God would accept the practice is disturbing, she said. “We don’t want our kids listening to that. Who knows what they will pick up?
“We don’t want those ideas to get into their heads.”
Mrs. Theodore estimated that “25 to 30” people left the church after the incident, including the family of her sister, Medith Bergiste, who used to travel to services from Woonsocket with her husband, Raymond, and their four children. Since the incident, the Theodores have been attending First Haitian Baptist Church, which has weekly services just over the Cranston line.
It didn’t take much time, either, for members of Abundant Life to react. By June, the primarily Hispanic congregation moved back to its old building and sent a letter to the superintendent of the United Methodist Church for the Rhode Island-Southeastern District. It complained that in allowing a gay man to the pulpit, the Open Table of Christ had violated the denomination’s Book of Discipline.
88 Comments •
Comments:
Who ‘disagreed’ with them before, say, 40-50 years ago?
), the entire teaching it gives about the nature of sexual relationships, marriage, the relationship between God and Israel and Christ and the Church, do more than just condemn homosexual sexual relationships, they completely exclude it from serious consideration. 
This is getting good.
Sad very sad. But both sides cannot be right. One is wrong and I for one would align with the side that is the Truth which is contained in scripture. I believe that the Theodore’s have it right.