 Following the initiative of the Cabinet last fall, FCC-UCC engaged in a three-month long process of discussion, discernment, prayer, study, and worship leading to the adoption of a declaration that we are an Open and Affirming Congregation, welcoming all without regard to sexual orientation. The process was guided by our Open and Affirming Committee. It focused on an adult class organized and led by Student Assistant Pastor Cheryl von Ehrenkrook to which all members and friends of our congregation were invited and in which many participated. Several sessions involved our youth as well with follow up conversations led by our Youth Director, Manda Adams.
The statement, adopted by an overwhelming vote of the members present at a special congregational meeting on 4 May 2008 is:
We, the congregation of First Congregational United Church of Christ, Fort Worth, declare ourselves to be Open and Affirming. We strive to be a congregation that includes all persons, embracing differences of sexual orientation, gender and its expression, marital status, age, mental and physical health and ability, racial and cultural identity or background, and educational or socioeconomic status. We welcome all to share in the life, leadership, ministry, fellowship, worship, sacraments, responsibilities, blessings and joys of our congregation’s life in Christ.
The statement expresses what has increasingly become a reality among us. It makes public our understanding that the God who loves and guides us is a God of radical hospitality and inclusion. It will stand as an ongoing challenge to us in coming years as we work to embrace each other across the artificial, human-made walls of separation and division. It will encourage us to proclaim boldly to the wider world an alternative to perspectives based on fear and sometimes hatred that condemn people for who God created them to be or for where the circumstances of life have left them.
But more than a challenge, more than an encouragement, this statement may help us sense the enormous opportunity God has placed before us by gathering us together in this community—a unique and precious opportunity to learn from each other what it means to be human, what it means to be loved by God, what it means to face life with hope and courage in all of the marvelously diverse ways each one of us has experienced on life’s journey.
With great thanksgiving for this congregation,
Dave
From the May, 2008 Newsletter
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