I admit that as I prepared to moderate the panel on Common Values: Building Bridges with People of Faith to Win Progressive Change at Netroots Nation, one of my assumptions was that progressives might be uncomfortable sharing their “tent” with people of faith. Continue

We had the following conversation over breakfast the weekend of their wedding in the Green Mountain Inn dining room overlooking the main street of Stowe, VT. Continue

Joe Kennedy is a son of Pittsburgh and the Presbyterian Church. We spoke recently sitting by the fire in my home. Continue

In response to several overtures concerning marriage and families, the 2008 PCUSA General Assembly did the very Presbyterian thing: they asked the Moderator to appoint a Special Committee to study the matter. Continue

On Wednesday, July 1, the Council of Allegheny County of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania became the third county in Pennsylvania to pass into law an anti-discrimination ordinance... Continue

I spoke a few days ago at the Six O’Clock Series, a monthly public lecture program at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. I was excited to learn from the young man who greeted me when I arrived that there had been a lot of talk around the student union anticipating my topic: Marriage on Trial: A Minister’s Journey.

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Every morning I confess “I have sinned in thought, word and deed, by what I have done and by what I have left undone,” and I ponder for a bit how that is true in the past stretch of my life. I have been thinking a lot of all that happened at the Pittsburgh Presbytery special meeting to vote on 0-B, an amendment that would allow our GLBT sisters and brothers in faith to heed God’s call to ordination in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) if they follow Jesus life and teachings.Continue

In the special meeting on March 14, 2009, Pittsburgh Presbytery voted 206 to 105 against Amendment 08-B to revise the ordination requirements to emphasize obedience to Jesus’s teaching and example as illustrated for us in Scripture.  This would open the door to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) people to ordination in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).Continue

I find myself waiting with nervous anticipation for this Saturday, when the Pittsburgh Presbytery will vote on Amendment 08-B. If passed, this amendment would allow all of us who follow Jesus’ teachings and example and who feel called by God — including our gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender sisters and brothers in Christ — to serve our communities as ministers, elders and deacons. Continue

As a Presbyterian, I belong to the reformed tradition in which change is both possible and necessary in Christian life. I also know that in any time of change, diverse opinions coexist. I hope that our dialogue and study here together will help us to reconcile with one another as we seek the fine future for marriage and ordination which God has in store for us.Continue