Resolution 2009-07:

Resolution of Welcome and Support to Persons of Same-Gender Sexual Orientation

Passed as ammended

Download the PDF (unammended resolution)

1 WHEREAS, Lutherans believe that
2 what is at stake in the Bible is the
3 Gospel, and

4 WHEREAS, over the years, Lutherans
5 have changed the way they
6 understand various assumptions
7 and ideas of the Bible in light of
8 scientific discoveries by
9 astronomers, paleontologists,
10 biologists, etc., and

11 WHEREAS, not only in matters of
12 geophysics and history, but also in
13 very human matters, the church
14 has been led by the Gospel and
15 human understanding to turn away
16 from previously accepted "truths"
17 such as the inferiority of women,
18 dark-skinned people, and those
19 who are left-handed, and

20 WHEREAS, the study of human
21 sexuality now recognizes that
22 sexual orientation, though most
23 often an orientation toward
24 heterosexuality, also manifests
25 itself in a same-gender, or
26 homosexual orientation, and

27 WHEREAS, Lutherans now know
28 that the old fear of homosexuality
29 being contagious arose from
30 falsehood and misunderstanding,
31 and the concern that gay, lesbian,
32 bi-sexual and transgendered adults
33 might "recruit" young people to
34 same-gender orientation is based
35 on this falsehood, and

36 WHEREAS, members of Southeastern
37 Minnesota Synod congregations
38 during the past 20 years have
39 learned from gay, lesbian, bi-
40 sexual, and transgendered people
41 in their own families and
42 congregations that God can and
43 does call such people to lives of
44 faith and faithfulness without
45 renouncing their sexual orientation
46 and identity, just as the early
47 church learned over time that the
48 Holy Spirit did not require gentiles
49 to become Jews in order to be
50 welcome in the family of God,

51 THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED,
52 that the Southeastern Minnesota
53 Synod hereby declares in assembly
54 that it understands same-gender
55 sexual orientation to be fully part of
the same fallen creation that God loves
and has redeemed in Jesus Christ as all
of us are
[Removed: 56 God’s good creation, not a
57 perversion of it]; and that the time
58 has come for the church to commit
59 itself to welcoming and supporting
60 people with such orientation into
61 the full life of the church,
62 encouraging them to live by the
63 standards and commitments of
64 sexual faithfulness to which all
65 God’s children are called.

Submitted by Rev. W. Bruce Benson and the undersigned voting members of the 2009 Southeastern Minnesota Synod Assembly:
Rev. W. Bruce Benson, Rev. Joy Gonnerman, Rev. Diane M. Goulson, Rev. Jennifer Anderson Koenig, Rev. Judy Gustafson, Erin Armstrong, Monika Hartsel, Rev. Joanna Mitchell, Rev. Richard L. Jorgensen, Rev. Michael Gustafson, Rev. Kristen Schlauderaff, Roger Sween, Zashata Burton, Marcia Nagel, Jim Nagel, Tom Engstrom, Dottie Barrett, Rev. Jason Bryan-Wegner, Allan J. Bieber, Rev. Robert Albing

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