Even the phrase “Progressive Christianity” means different things to different people. I prefer to side with C.S. Lewis who wrote how our nostalgia for the “golden moments in the past” can be informative as memories. “[If} properly bedded down in a past which we do not miserably try to conjure back, they will send up exquisite growths,” Lewis argued. “Leave the bulbs alone, and the new flowers will come up. Grub them up and hope, by fondling and sniffing, to get last year’s blooms, and you will get nothing.”

Many people who embrace a more progressive attitude toward the forward-moving growth of humanity, utilizing the Holy Spirit’s influence on modern scientific understanidng and insight, actually are pro-conservation of the words and actions of the namesake of their religion of Christianity.

People like to focus on the six verses in the Bible known collectively as the “clobber versus” when they argue against the Church being inclusive to the LGBTQ+ community.

A better approach would be to instead of focusing on six isolated places within the Bible for exclusion, we should focus on the overarching theme of the Bible where God is clear that God would like to redeem the entire world.

John 3: 16 - “For God so loved the WORLD” (note: no exclusionary commentary) “that he gave his only begotten son…”

Genensis 1:27 - “So God made humans in his image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them.” (note that God’s image includes BOTH the male and female - and therefore not mono-gender.)

1946 was the first year that the word “homosexual” was ever included in the Bible. For centuries, interpretations and translations reflected the societal stigma against exploitative sexual practices within the sacred writings of the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. Actions of exploitation categorically condemned. Specifically mentioned are acts of gang rape, prostitution, and child abuse, all of which included a power differential between the parties involved.

When the translation team for the Revised Standard Version of the Bible were meeting, they (later admittedly) mistranslated/changed the accepted previous translation a type of sexual exploitation and attributed the action to an entire group of people. The RSV translation team retracted there mistranslation but not before other translating teams moved forward on the mistranslation prior to it being publicly retracted. This is definitely a topic for gracious discussion.