Since 2015, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary has offered what they term an “LGBTQ Studies Concentration” (see page 19) for students pursuing their Master of Divinity. Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary is an official seminary of the United Methodist Church (UMC), and is heavily subsidized by denominational apportionments taken from local United Methodist congregations. Yet for years it has devoted an entire part of its academic programming to an apparent ideological rejection of its sponsoring denomination’s official teachings.
The UMC’s official Social Principles define marriage as a union “between a man and a woman” and teach that “sexual relations are affirmed only with the covenant of monogamous, heterosexual marriage.” Other sections of the denomination’s governing Book of Discipline require clergy to either be celibate in singleness or faithful in marriage; it also forbids clergy from having same-sex partners, and prohibits its congregations from hosting or its ministers from officiating same-sex weddings.
Alongside these teachings, he Discipline has a long-standing rule restricting the use of “general church” funds taken from the apportionments required of local congregations. Such money cannot be used to undermine the denomination’s stance on homosexuality. As Paragraph 806 of the Discipline says, “no board, agency, committee, commission, or council shall give United Methodist funds to any gay caucus or group, or otherwise use such funds to promote the acceptance of homosexuality…”
Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary’s “LGBTQ Studies Concentration” looks like an outright rejection of these standards. It receives funds from the UMC but opposes its teachings on homosexuality. An example is the Garrett course, “Queer(ing) Soul Care.” The course syllabus touts the professor’s preferred pronouns: he, him, and “siya.” The document then goes on to explain that the course has an explicit aim to identify practices which “promote the flourishing of LGBTQ+ individuals and communities.” The syllabus speaks of approaching the scriptures on homosexuality (the apparent referent of what the syllabus calls “clobber texts”) and aiming to “queer” them. Students also learn about “queer theology” and are encouraged to develop “a queer liturgy.” This seems to be an open contradiction of the Disciplines prohibitions.
But perhaps the most striking language of the course is found among “the queer methodologies” that students will learn: “cruising texts.” Cruising—a seemingly innocuous term—is slang for seeking a homosexual partner at night. The professor voluntarily uses the term, assumingly with all its imported usage, to describe how students will interpret “histories [and] traditions.”
While the Book of Discipline bars the use of church funds “to promote the acceptance of homosexuality,” it looks like this course aims to “promote” and normalize the open practice of homosexuality.
Such teachings by this United Methodist seminary will have lasting effect. Many students who go to Garrett and take this course and/or enroll in Garrett’s “LGBTQ Studies Concentration” will enter the ranks of United Methodist clergy. They will be trained to oppose church teachings. Dr. Rolf R. Nalasco, Jr., the Director of the Institute for Spiritual Formation at Garrett, who teaches this “Queer(ing) Soul Care” course, openly calls the Discipline’s stance “punitive and harmful.” Furthermore, he considers any attempts by the UMC to uphold its teachings as harmful to what is oxymoronically called “divinely queer.” There can be little doubt that students who undergo such training will be undermining the UMC’s standards from within.
Nalasco is not an anomaly at Garrett. The Rev. Grant Showalter-Swanson is employed as the recruitment coordinator for Garrett, while also serving as an ordained deacon at Urban Village Church. He is married to and living with another man, which, again, is in direct defiance of Church rules. While openly rebelling against the UMC’s rules, he influences the denomination by working at one of its seminaries and being a leader of a United Methodist congregation.
The aforementioned LGBTQ Studies Concentration is offered as part of a partnership with Chicago Theological Seminary. This partner seminary is on the short list of non-United Methodist seminaries approved as an option for United Methodist ordination candidates and is affiliated with the radical, rapidly declining United Church of Christ (UCC) denomination.
The danger in this should not be missed. The many students who enter this UMC-funded seminary, already vexed by a culture celebrating sexual sin, will hear sin be given theological justification. Being trained for several years at a seminary officially committed to such liberal values will shape how Garrett graduates go on to approach ministry within the UMC.
None of this should diminish the desire to seek the flourishing of all humans. The many Christians struggling with same-sex attraction should find assistance in seeking to live holy lives of faithful discipleship, just as any other Christian. But freedom from sin and the glorious gift of grace, only comes about when we recognize sin, and call it such. It is a paradox that we are freed only by submission to God. And we will only find true freedom, and true “soul care,” when we submit to, rather than openly oppose, Biblical teaching.
Comment by Steve on August 1, 2022 at 6:20 pm
Took a class there in Methodist history. Most in my class either were not Methodists or did not plan to be UMC clergy. The problem with the UMC-supported seminaries (a problem most Christian denominations with supported seminaries have) is the limited number of diverse seminaries when it comes to theological perspectives. The UMC and many other denominations have fallen victim to the socio-political definition of “diverse” and now all their supported seminaries offer exclusive left-of-center theological perspectives while denominations, such as the SBC, have supported seminaries with a right-of-center theological perspective. Of course, all seminaries claim to offer all theological perspectives, just like most Christians claim there is only one “true” theological perspective – their own. Progressive and Conservative Christians deny a personal relationship with God and replace it with a communal relationship based on their socio-political worldview. Christians today are allowing themselves to be polarized by the worldly, and the seminaries are no different. Very sad.
Comment by Loren J Golden on August 1, 2022 at 8:46 pm
It would seem that yet another mainline seminary has openly declared its allegiance to the rainbow flag of the LGBT Qult, and to the sexual perversions for which it stands. If Biblical Languages, Old and New Testament Studies, Systematic Theology, Church History, and Apologetics won’t reel them in, perhaps we’ll try something radically forbidden by Classical Christianity! Maybe the next self-proclaimed Prophetess of Thyatira (Rev. 2.20) will graduate from these hallowed halls…
That’s right, United Methodists—this is your apportionment dollars at work!
Comment by Jeff on August 2, 2022 at 10:23 pm
UMC: “All queer!! All the time!! Queer queer QUEER! P.S. Jesus was queer & bible is bogus and GOD’s pronouns are she/her/they!”
GMC/WMC retort: “Whatever floats your boat! Let’s just divorce. You keep the house, the kids, the car. You’re righteous too, different peeps-groups mission etc, I’m OK you’re OK, we’re just “mitosing” & we’re hoping to pay our extortion bill & slip away and build a… well, we’re not sure what we’ll build just yet but our elite council of elite seminary-trained betters will figure it all out for you sheep and won’t you pleeze vote for us and send us your dough?”
What a disgusting mess. John & Charles Wesley look on in amazement at the UMC.
The Good News: “Upon this rock I will build my ecclesia [royal priesthood] andTHE GATES [GOVERNANCE] OF HELL SHALL NOT PREVAIL AGAINST IT”. That is a promise we can trust!
Comment by Justin on August 5, 2022 at 10:42 am
sco or Rev. Showalter-Swanson? You make no attempt to see if there is fruit being born from this course of study or the soul care being offered. Your polemic likewise remains ignorant to the simple reality that the majority of the UMC will rectify past mistakes, excluding Queer people in the coming years, similar to when the UMC finally rectified and repented from their participation in the colonization of America and the cultural and human genocide of indigenous persons. My main issue with dogmatic conservatives such as you is your attempt to domesticate the divine belief that the way something once was is the way it ought to be. This requires willful ignorance of the historical diversity of Christianity as well as enshrining Puritan ideals as universal strictures for all who follow Christ. Unlike your speech on Taiwan, Christ doesn’t require an external threat to form the imagination of those who follow him. Situating Christ as coming just to save us from hell is one of the more grotesque twistings of Jesus’s message by evangelicals. Why do you then need to situate Queer people as an external threat to the sanctity of the UMC? How does this form your imagination?
Comment by Loren J Golden on August 5, 2022 at 11:11 pm
—Matthew 19.4-6 (see also Gen. 1.26-28, 2.18,21-25, Mal. 2.15)
—Exodus 20.1-3
Justin,
“Queer people” are not a threat to the holiness of the Church of Jesus Christ.
LGBTQ ideology is.
Its adherents might not be organized into a structure like a traditional religion, but it is well on its way to becoming the de facto state religion of a nation that purports to prohibit its Congress from making any “law respecting any establishment of religion.” It might make no claims regarding the existence, nature, and attributes of God, but it makes metaphysical claims nonetheless, regarding sexual orientation and gender identity, which have no tangible manifestation in the physical world and are yet treated as irrefutable fact.
LGBTQ ideology claims that one’s self-conception and desires are more real than the tangible fact that one is born as a male or a female, capable upon reaching physical maturity of procreation within a heterosexual coupling.
LGBTQ ideology claims that gender is a social construct and not determined by one’s having been born biologically male or biologically female. The roles that men and women fill are strictly determined by society’s expectations of them and not in any way by their physical nature as males and females. If a male shows the slightest inkling toward interests or behaviors typically associated with females, he should be encouraged to pursue those interests or behaviors (and likewise females with interests or behaviors typically associated with males).
LGBTQ ideology claims that gender is fluid, not fixed in two distinct genders. Male and female are two points of reference within this spectrum, but anyone may freely choose a sexual identity anywhere along this spectrum, or even outside of it, if he/she/it/they so chooses. But it is solely the choice of the individual and must absolutely be respected and regarded as sacrosanct.
LGBTQ ideology likewise claims that one’s preference in the gender of a sexual partner—or in sexual partners—is also the exclusive province of the individual, holy, sacred, and inviolable, and any criticism of it must be met with the greatest of hostility.
These are the tenets of a religion, and they are being enacted into law in the United States and other pagan nations in the West. Hodges v. Obergefell is but the tip of the iceberg of the what the threat that is LGBTQ ideology will do.
“My main issue with dogmatic conservatives…is (their) attempt to domesticate the divine belief that the way something once was is the way it ought to be.”
“How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” (Mt. 7.4-5)
Justin, the very thing you are criticizing “dogmatic conservatives” of doing is precisely the same thing that you are doing, with the only exception being, that instead of putting forth Biblical teaching as the way we should live our lives, you are promulgating LGBTQ ideology as “the way it ought to be,” and “domesticating the divine belief” to serve its cause. “This requires willful ignorance of the historical diversity of Christianity,” you said, “as well as enshrining Puritan ideals as universal strictures for all who follow Christ.” Yet you exhibit willful ignorance of the Scriptures and enshrine LGBTQ ideals “as universal strictures for all to follow.”
“Situating Christ as coming just to save us from hell is one of the more grotesque twistings of Jesus’s message by evangelicals,” you said. But Jesus said, “Whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. … If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.” (Mt. 5.22,29-30) And again, “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Mt. 10.28) If the Lord Jesus did not come to rescue sinners from Hell, why did He preach so much on the subject (see also Mt. 18.9, 23.15,33, Mk. 9.43,45,47, Lk. 12.5), more than anyone else in all of the New Testament (compare Jas. 3.6, II Pet. 2.4, Rev. 19.20, 20.10,14-15, 21.8)?
LGBTQ ideology is not compatible with Christianity, for not only does it show utter contempt for God’s purposes in His created order of our species as male and female, it also sets itself up as an idol to be worshiped. “No one can serve two masters,” the Lord Jesus said, “for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” (Mt. 6.24) Likewise, one cannot serve God and the LGBTQ ideology.
—Deuteronomy 30.19-20
Comment by April User on August 6, 2022 at 10:17 am
Gosh, Justin, indigenous people were bashing each other’s heads long before the Europeans landed on American shores. But I haven’t heard my tribe (Sioux/Lakota) repent of their sins and past murderous atrocities to any other tribe. And you’re probably not even tribal! Enough of this tired rant; it’s so ‘80s.
Comment by Paul Zesewitz on August 6, 2022 at 12:37 pm
Garrett needs to at least be honest and remove the word EVANGELICAL from their name. Most evangelicals I know don’t agree with the homosexual/ lesbian/LGBTQ lifestyle.
Comment by Rev. Dr. Lee D Cary (ret. UM clergy) on August 14, 2022 at 4:12 pm
I’m a two-time graduate of GETS. Master’s in Divinity and Doctorate of Sacred Theology ’79. At the time, it was a degree granted by the theology school that required two years of additional classroom study (in addition to the three years in the Master’s program), a qualification exam (that required a year’s prep) and a dissertation (two more years of research and writing.). 6 years total beyond the Masters.
There were two students in the program. Jonathan Keaton, who became a Bishop, and I. Professor Chatfield was our mentor.
The faculty in Biblical Studies (my major) were all fine scholars and good people.
I’m saddened to see where the school has gone. But I am not surprised.
Here’s the lesson for those with ears to ears:
Those whom the progressive left cannot persuade, they invariably seek to destroy. And they have successfully destroyed the United Methodist Church.