Help ReconcilingWorks welcome the newest Reconciling in Christ (RIC) community: St. Luke Lutheran Church (Portland, OR).
Their welcome statement reads:
“WORSHIP: We WORSHIP God who is love, and we love because God first loved us. We believe God’s love upholds, sustains, and embraces all people, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity/expression, race or ability. We believe that being LGBTQIA+ is a part of God’s beautiful and holy intention for equal diversity in the body of Christ. “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
CONNECT: We believe all people bear the image of God. We acknowledge that many of God’s children, especially of the LGBTQIA+ community, have been historically excluded, alienated, marginalized, or viewed as “less than” by the church. We are committed to welcoming and including all who have experienced the trauma of homophobia, transphobia, racism and hate in all its forms. We thank God for the resilience of marginalized peoples – LGBTQIA+, Black, Indigenous, People of Color – and for their courage in continuing to desire to CONNECT with the church. We believe that in Christ we can be healed from the hate and from the trauma it causes and be reconciled as people of God.
SERVE: We emphatically welcome everyone, including people of all sexual orientations, gender identities and gender expressions as well as those who may have been excluded because of other human distinctions, such as race, ability, age or economic status. We commit ourselves to the work of anti-racism, and anti-discrimination of all forms, in institutions and internally, interpersonal and structural. We welcome ALL to SERVE and engage with us at all levels of participation in the church, including leadership, ministry, baptism, communion, worship, social justice, activism, education, music, and fellowship. We do so following Jesus’ teaching to love God and love our neighbor as ourselves – by seeking to meet the needs of our neighbor.“
Learn more about St. Luke Lutheran Church at: http://www.stlukechurch.com