Former PCUSA pastor challenges
Covenant Network to ‘circle back’
By Edward Terry, The Layman, November 5, 2010
HOUSTON – The Rev. Katie Morrison, a lesbian activist serving as a pastor in the United Church of Christ, always found excuses to turn down previous offers to address Covenant Network of Presbyterians conference because by her own admission she simply wasn’t ready.
After agreeing to preach the opening worship at the Covenant Network’s annual conference on Nov. 4 in Houston and making two phone calls, Morrison said she was ready to step back into “the Presbyterian circle.”
Morrison had previously been ordained by Redwoods presbytery, but she left the PCUSA five years ago after her ordination was challenged due to her openly gay lifestyle which violates PCUSA’s constitutional “fidelity and chastity” standards.
At the Covenant Network conference, she preached from Acts 9:1-19 and rhetorically asked if a newly-converted Paul ever circled back to the Christians he previously persecuted.
Morrison reflected on her positive experiences growing up at Pasadena Presbyterian Church, where she was introduced to feminist and progressive theology. But when she came out as a lesbian, things began to change. She spoke of how her pastor, Dean Thompson, and Seminary professor Jack Rogers, broke her heart when she was not asked to participate in a post-General Assembly report to the congregation due to her sexuality.
“That was my first tangible moment of discrimination for being a lesbian from someone I knew,” she said.
Morrison shared that the two phone calls she made before preaching her Nov. 4 sermon were to Rogers and Thompson. In both cases they apologized, and she forgave them after sharing her feelings about the experience.
“This is a sermon about circling back; about asking for forgiveness; about the scales falling off and what is the next step,” she said. “There are so many who have been hurt, so many who are no longer in the denomination as a result.”
Morrison said she hopes the PCUSA can one day have a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” once it changes its position on LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) issues. She concluded by expressing her hope for the future of the PCUSA in the context of Saul’s meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus, being struck blind and being restored following his baptism.
“Presbyterian Church – the church of my upbringing – may the scales fall from your eyes,” she said. “May you be re-baptized. May you break bread together and then may you regain your strength.” Referring to the commitment of ordained officers to further the peace, unity and purity of the church, Morrison added, “And in breaking the bread may you circle back and right wrongs and ask for forgiveness so that in your strength there is PU and P (Peace, Unity and Purity) that is not false, but is true and just.”
Following the sermon, worshippers participated in a “baptism renewal” ceremony that included a prayer to “God our Father and Mother” and the sprinkling of water on attendees using a branch of greenery.
Katie Morrison was originally ordained in the PCUSA as the national field organizer for More Light Presbyterians whose singular agenda is to achieve leadership opportunities for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered people in the PCUSA. The Covenant Network of Presbyterians was organized for the purpose of stripping G-6.0106b from the constitution, allowing the open ordination of people living outside the Biblical standards of sexual practice of fidelity in marriage between one man and one woman or chastity in singleness.
The Covenant Network met at St Philip Presbyterian Church in Houston, Texas Nov. 4-Nov. 6.