AnglicansUnited.com

http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=33439

Posted on Jul 30, 2010
by Michael Foust, Assistant Editor, the Baptist Press

YPSILANTI, Mich.–A string of recent controversies regarding views on homosexuality in the counseling realm has some wondering whether conservative Christians eventually will be shut out of the profession.

The latest controversy involves Augusta (Ga.) State University, where the faculty allegedly required Jennifer Keeton — a counseling student with strong Christian beliefs — to attend “diversity sensitivity” training, increase her interaction with homosexual populations, read scholarly articles about homosexuality, and then write about what she learned and how her beliefs were impacted. The faculty allegedly even encouraged her to attend a “gay pride” parade in Augusta.

The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal group, filed suit against the school July 21. The school, in part, pointed to the American Counseling Association’s (ACA) code of ethics, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of a host of categories, including “sexual orientation” and “gender identity.” The American School Counselors Association has a similar code.

The Augusta case, though, is only the latest dust-up pitting religious beliefs against non-discrimination policies.

On July 26 a federal judge ruled that Eastern Michigan University was within its rights to dismiss a graduate student, Julea Ward, from its counseling program because she chose not to counsel a homosexual patient; the man previously had been counseled about his sexuality and now wanted counseling for depression.

Ward wanted to refer him to another counselor, but the school found her action insufficient. She was given three options: 1) going through a “remediation program,” 2) voluntarily withdrawing, or, 3) going before a university panel. She chose to appear before the panel, which found she had violated the ACA’s code of ethics. The panel, made up of three faculty members and a student representative, even asked Ward if she viewed her “brand of Christianity as superior to that of other Christians who may not agree with her.”

Jeremy Tedesco, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, said Eastern Michigan might as well tell incoming students, “If you want to be in the counseling profession, you better check your conservative, orthodox Christian beliefs at the door.”

The Alliance Defense Fund is involved in the Eastern Michigan case and is filing an appeal.

“The problem is that they are dismissing a student from their program because of her sincerely held religious beliefs and views,” Tedesco said.

Elsewhere:

– In March a federal judge said the Centers for Disease Control was within its rights to release a contracted Georgia counselor, Marcia Walden, who had halted a counseling session with a lesbian client in order to refer the woman to another counselor. The lesbian woman, who wanted counseling pertaining to her relationship with her partner, filed a complaint. Walden is a Christian; the ruling is being appealed. Read more…

[Ed. Note: Apparently, they must or be denied a job or a degree. As the Mccoys' and Hatfields' said a century ago: "If you're not for us, you're agin' us." Politically correct America will leave few doors open for any type of objection to the gay steamroller. Cheryl M. Wetzel]

http://www.bpnews.net/BPFirstPerson.asp?ID=33444

Kelly Boggs for the Baptist Press
Posted on Jul 30, 2010

ALEXANDRIA, La. (BP)–Must students affirm a behavior they believe is morally wrong in order to achieve a counseling degree? At least two public universities say yes and a federal judge agrees.

On July 26, federal Judge George Steeh rejected Julea Ward’s lawsuit that charged her expulsion from Eastern Michigan University’s counseling program amounted to an unconstitutional infringement on her religious freedom and free speech rights. Ward believes homosexuality is morally wrong.

“This is about behaviors that are appropriate or not appropriate within counseling,” Irene Ametrano, a professor of counseling at Eastern Michigan told USA Today. She asserted that the university’s policies were in line with the ethics code of the American Counseling Association (ACA). Eastern Michigan’s counseling programs, she said, couldn’t keep its accreditation if it violated the code.

The judge stipulated in his ruling that the ACA code of ethics was at the heart of his decision.

The rift between Ward and Eastern Michigan occurred in 2009 during a required counseling practicum. When Ward was assigned a client who had discussed his homosexual relationship in the past, she asked to refer the client to another counseling student. That set off a series of events that led to disciplinary hearings and her expulsion from the program.

Jennifer Keeton has filed a suit similar to Ward’s in an effort to stay enrolled in the counseling program at Augusta State University.

According to Keeton’s suit, Augusta State wants her to undergo a re-education program intended to change her religious belief that homosexuality is a behavior that is morally wrong. Since the suit has yet to be litigated I can only speculate as to the university’s defense of their actions. That said, given the outcome of Ward’s suit, Augusta State would be foolish not to cite the ACA code of ethics.

It seems that the ACA Code of Ethics is at the heart of the counseling matter. The most recent edition of the code, approved in 2005, consists of 19 pages of rules to be embraced by members of the ACA. After reading the ACA code (yes, I read all 19 scintillating pages) I found that the rules are subject to at least some measure of interpretation.

In Section A.4.b under “Personal Values,” the ACA states, “Counselors are aware of their own values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors and avoid imposing values that are inconsistent with counseling goals. Counselors respect the diversity of clients, trainees, and research participants.” Read more…

http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81803_123796_ENG_HTM.htm

By ENS (Episcopal News Service) staff, July 30, 2010

Episcopal Diocese of Maryland Bishop Eugene Sutton has issued guidelines for clergy who wish to conduct same-gender blessings.

Sutton also recommended for trial use a rite developed by a committee of the Diocese of Southern Ohio, along with a document that the Southern Ohio committee wrote, in Bishop Thomas Breidenthal’s words, “stating the theological convictions that underlie the policy” to allow same-gender blessings in that diocese.

The original Southern Ohio documents are at: [http://www.diosohio.org/How%20we%20work/blessing-of-same-gender-unions.html]

No priest of the Diocese of Maryland will be required to perform same-gender blessings, Sutton said, adding that he respects “the pastoral judgment and decisions of the clergy under my pastoral oversight.”

Priests who do perform blessings must follow the diocese’s requirements for marriages, the bishop said. “Couples shall be prepared to make a lifelong commitment to each other, and must have received adequate pastoral counseling prior to the union,” Sutton said.

No priest from outside of the diocese may enter Maryland to perform such a blessing unless the priest’s diocese also allows same-gender blessings, according to Sutton. And, members of other dioceses cannot have their same-gender relationships blessed in Maryland unless their home dioceses allow blessings.

Sutton said that he based his actions on the permission given by the Episcopal Church’s General Convention in July 2009 to bishops to “provide generous pastoral response to meet the needs of members of this church.” Resolution C056, Sutton noted, also said that the convention “honor[s] the theological diversity of this church in regard to matters of human sexuality.”

C056 also called for the collection and development of theological and liturgical resources for blessing same-gender unions. The church’s Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music has begun that work with the help of a $400,000 grant to Church Divinity School of the Pacific, an Episcopal Church-affiliated seminary based in Berkeley, California.

http://www.christiantoday.com/article/conflict.is.sign.of.a.healthy.church.says.us.episcopal.head/26387.htm

by Lillian Kwon, Christian Post
Posted: Friday, July 30, 2010, 8:23 (BST)

The existence of conflict in the church is a sign of health and vitality, the head of the Episcopal Church told a live web audience Wednesday.

“If there’s no conflict, it means that we’re dead,” said Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. “There has always been push and pull in the church. It’s a sign that the diversity among us is passionate and that is a gift from God, not something to be squelched.”

Jefferts Schori was speaking in the first of a series of webcast conversations, which have been designed to foster better understanding in the church and to address current issues.

Jefferts Schori had just returned from a meeting in London involving a number of Anglican primates – chief bishops of the Anglican Communion’s 38 provinces – and others on the Standing Committee. During the July 23 to 27 meeting, committee members rejected a proposal that the Episcopal Church be separated from the rest of the global body. Cutting the US church would inhibit dialogue on issues of human sexuality and therefore would be unhelpful, they agreed.

“There was … a clear reflection by members of the group that the Episcopal Church’s presence is important to that dialogue, an unwillingness by the group to exclude us even though one member called for that because of that commitment to dialogue even when we don’t agree on something,” Jefferts Schori said during the webcast.

Noting the significance of staying united, the Episcopal leader said the Church could serve God’s mission more effectively together.

The proposal for the US Church’s separation was made after it ordained its second openly homosexual bishop in Los Angeles despite calls for restraint by the wider Anglican Communion. The ordination caused uproar as conservative Anglicans called it another act of defiance by the US body of Scripture and the 77 million-member communion. The Episcopal Church consecrated its first openly gay bishop in 2003.

When asked by a viewer of the webcast, “Has the Anglican Communion abandoned us, have we abandoned them?” Jefferts Schori responded, “Nobody’s abandoned anybody.
“We continue to be committed to God’s commission together even though there [are] certainly some members of the Anglican Communion as there are some members of the Episcopal Church who disagree with decisions by various bodies either in this church or in others.”

Diversity is a blessing, she made clear on Wednesday, and her goal as presiding bishop is to help others recognise that.

“I’ve been clear from the very beginning that I think a big part of our challenge in the current age is to recognise that we are a multicultural church in many different ways – in terms of nationality and language, in terms of gender and orientation, in terms of socioeconomic status, in terms of educational level – and to value that diversity, to see it as a blessing and not something to be criticised or avoided,” she said in response to a question on the primary goal she wants to achieve by the end of her nine-year term. Read more…

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/30/us/30bcrites.html?_r=2

By RICHARD PARKS rparks@baycitizen.org
Published: July 29, 2010

Armed with a new $400,000 grant and the support of the Episcopal Church, a Berkeley seminary is convening priests from across the country to craft the liturgical rite for same-sex couples to receive religious blessings.

The new rite, which will take years to complete, will most likely consist of a series of original prayers, Bible readings and two essays: one on the theological meaning of same-sex blessings, and one advising priests who administer the new rite. If approved, the new blessing would be just the third addition to Episcopal liturgy since 1979.

“This is very significant,” said the Rev. Ruth Meyers, chairwoman of the church’s Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music, who is heading the effort. “It does acknowledge a fuller participation of gays and lesbians in the life of the church.”

The Episcopal Church approved the development of “theological and liturgical resources” for the blessing of same-sex relationships at its 2009 convention, citing “changing circumstances in the United States and other nations.” It then partnered with the Berkeley seminary, Church Divinity School of the Pacific, which last month received a grant from the Arcus Foundation, a gay rights organization in Kalamazoo, Mich., to coordinate the effort.

Most of the grant money will finance travel and accommodations for a series of meetings to garner contributions from all 110 Episcopal dioceses, most in the United States. Read more…