[The following is an official statement of the General Assembly of Grace Presbyterian Church (NZ). We believe it will be a helpful encouragement to all faithful Christians, not just the members and adherents of Grace Presbyterian Church (NZ). Ed.]
At the General Assembly 2018 a task force was commissioned to prepare a statement on gender and sexuality for the denomination. This most recent General Assembly saw that document adopted. May it be a blessing to the denomination and people.
A Statement on Gender and Sexuality
This statement has been written as an attempt to provide a harmonisation of love and truth in our context regarding gender and sexuality so that our people may have some pastoral guidance in dealing with these issues.
Introduction
Christians at the dawn of the twenty-first century find themselves living in a period of historic transition. Our society has become increasingly post-Christian and has begun to reinterpret what it means to be human. By and large the society we live in does not discern God’s design for human life nor delights in the beauty of being image-bearers of God.
Our societies’ unbelieving worldview denies God created human beings for his glory and denies that his good purposes for us include our personal and physical design as male and female. Therefore, the Church once more must strive to declare to the world, “that the LORD, he is God! It is he who made us, and we are his.” (Ps. 100:3)
All personnel in the Royal New Zealand Navy (RNZN) have been given the OK to wear false eyelashes, nail polish and makeup under new gender-neutral guidelines designed to maintain its military image.
The news was announced just hours before the RNZN paused to embrace Trafalgar Day, the traditional celebration of the victory won by the Royal Navy, commanded by Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson, over the combined French and Spanish fleets at the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805.
The changes come as the New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) updates its grooming and appearance guidelines to make the force “more inclusive.” “These updates are to reflect that the RNZN make no distinction between male and female members in terms of their personal grooming and appearance,” Chief of Navy Rear Admiral David Proctor confirmed to Newshub.
“The NZDF can confirm that as of November 1, 2019, guidelines around grooming and appearance for Royal New Zealand Navy personnel will be updated,” said Proctor. “These changes reflect that diversity and inclusion are critical to our success as an organisation, as are the unique traditions and characteristics of the RNZN.”
Proctor said the RNZN’s grooming standards are based on neatness, cleanliness, safety and military image.
Three very important but seriously under reported stories came out this weekend about Evangelical churches and their responses to LGBT issues. First the PCA (a supposedly conservative evangelical Calvinist denomination) adopted the Nashville Statement at their general assembly. Hurray, orthodoxy prevailed right? Except the vote was 803-541, or 60% to 40%. Which means that 40% of that church voted to deny their own church’s teaching on human sexuality. The same situation that caused the PCUSA to crumble will inevitably happen to the PCA, remember that the first vote on the LGBT agenda failed in the PCUSA by similar margins (298-221, 57% to 43%) circa 2006. Except the sexual revolutionaries kept bringing the issue up and the margins got closer and closer until in 2014 they succeeded. Given the status of Covenant Seminary and its open embrace of Revoice, I am not optimistic about the future of the PCA.
Secondly, the Evangelical Covenant church voted to expel one of their leading congregations. By a 77% to 23% vote, the annual meeting expelled First Covenant Church of Minneapolis over this issue. While that should in theory be a victory, remember that once again, theological nihilists are in charge of training future pastors for their church. Compare that to the situation at the Mennonite Church USA which was in a similar situation. The church itself was largely conservative, but liberals were in charge of training their pastors. In the Mennonite Church USA, they also had a church that began promoting the sexual revolution and the general conference expelled said church. The revolutionaries continued behind the scenes, revised the church’s position and said congregation was welcomed back with open arms.
The last story is a bit older, but no less significant and much less talked about. The Christian Reformed Church in North America (CRCNA) just completed its annual conference, and the forces of Sexual Revolution are on the march. There is now active organizations at all levels of the denomination seeking to “enlighten” the church on LGBTQ+ issues. Once again, given that theological nihilists are training pastors at their premier seminary, the future is not bright at that institution either.
You have three supposedly conservative churches that are about to crumble to the forces of secularism. For the last 40 years, the only institution that has withstood the secularist assault has been evangelical churches; they have proven themselves to be very tough nuts to crack. But even the hardest walnut will eventually crumble. I know that you are currently writing a book about the resistance the church provided to communism, but I will not lie here or engage in pointless flattery:
I do not see how this turns out well for the church in America.
Israel Folau Controversy Proves Christians Are Fair Game
Northland Age
Peter Jackson
Editor
Israel Folau has been lambasted with hatred by the media for his beliefs. Israel Folau has been lambasted with hatred by the media for his beliefs.
The furore over Israel Folau's stated belief, in answer to a question, that unrepentant homosexuals are destined for Hell, is remarkable for one thing and one thing only — that it is news. And big news at that.
What should not surprise us is that it reminds us, if we needed reminding, that when it comes to the laws and social mores governing the denigration of people, cultures or religions, Christianity is in a class of its own. And not a good class. Clearly, Christians cannot be offended, and while they have the right to believe what they will, they do not have the right to articulate those beliefs.
Those who have objected to Folau's utterance might well have a point in terms of some who do not conform to the Christian view regarding what is sexually acceptable, namely heterosexuality strictly confined within the bounds of marriage, are fragile, and therefore vulnerable. Some who take his warning to heart, we are told, might in fact be so vulnerable as to take their own lives.
That concern might well be genuine and realistic, but the bigger issue is his right to say what he said, and the extraordinary reaction to it.
As the ancient proverb declares, those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad. We ought to expect, therefore, successive iterations of madness, on the one hand, followed by shipwrecks and destruction, on the other. Where? Amongst whom?
Behold the madness of transgenderism as it insists upon denying reality in favour of their madcap wishes and desires. Fast forward . . .
Transgender Actor Asserts Existence of ‘Biologically Female Penis’
Rachel Murray/Getty Images for Hulu
11:08
A man’s penis becomes a female penis once a man declares himself to be transgender, says Indya Moore, one of the players in a transgender-themed TV show on FX network.
The declaration is built on the transgender claim that men who say they are women are actually women. But once the men are women, their bodies are women’s bodies. So men’s penises become female penises.
Moore extended the “female penis” claim by declaring the existence of ‘male vaginas,’ which are presumably carried by women who are living as men.
The “female penis” claim went viral because it spotlights the logic of the transgender ideology, which insists the Department of Justice must blur and forbid any legal or civic recognition of the biological distinctions between the two different and complementary male and female sexes.
This policy must be imposed to ensure that children and adults can easily discard their female or male sex by simply declaring they have an opposite-sex “gender,” or have a “gender identity” which is between male and female, say transgender activists.
A person’s “gender,” say activists, is their personal feeling about being female or male, or something in between. For example, Moore’s feelings are described as “binary,” or neither male nor female.
Moore’s feelings-are-more-important-than-biology logic was explained by anothertransgender writer:
Moore took the often-heard rallying cry “trans women are women” one step further: She argued that if trans women are biological women, by definition, a trans woman’s penis is “a biologically female penis.” That’s a radical point missing in mainstream discussions on trans bodies, as trans women are often made to feel as if they should be ashamed of their genitals if they don’t have a vagina.
“Don’t use science to justify your bigotry,” Moore tweeted at critics of the “female penis” claim. “The world is way too weird for that s**t.”
The transgender effort to suppress any recognition that men and women are different and complementary would not matter except for the movement’s political alliance with wealthy progressives and radical feminists who wish to destroy the political power of the male-and-female family.
For example, editors at theNew York Timesinviteda February 7 op-ed which smeared women who reject the political claim that gender is more important than biology. Author Sophie Lewis described the vast majority of women as “terfs”:
… the most vocal trans-exclusionary voices are, ostensibly, “feminist” ones, and anti-trans lobbying is a mainstream activity. Case in point: Ms. Parker told the podcast “Feminist Current” that she’d changed her thinking on trans women after spending time on Mumsnet, a site where parents exchange tips on toilet training and how to get their children to eat vegetables. If such a place sounds benign, consider the words of British writer Edie Miller: “Mumsnet is to British transphobia,” she wrote “what 4Chan is to American fascism.”
The term coined to identify women like Ms. Parker and Dr. Long is TERF, which stands for Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist. In Britain, TERFs are a powerful force. If, in the United States, the mainstream media has been alarmingly ready to hear “both sides” on the question of trans people’s right to exist, in Britain, TERFs have effectively succeeded in framing the question of trans rights entirely around their own concerns: that is, how these rights for others could contribute to “female erasure.” Many prominent figures in British journalism and politics have been TERFs; British TV has made a sport of endlessly hosting their lurid rudeness and styling it as courage; British newspapers seemingly never tire of broadsides against the menace of “gender ideology.” (With time, the term TERF has become a catchall for all anti-trans feminists, radical or not.)
Lewis’ radical support for the transgender ideology is logical because she wants to minimize the role of male-and-female families. A review of her book,Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family, says:
Rather than making [birth] surrogacy illegal or allowing it to continue as is, Sophie Lewis argues we should be looking to radically transform it. Surrogates should be put front and center, and their rights to the babies they gestate should be expanded to acknowledge that they are more than mere vessels. In doing so we can break down our assumptions that children necessarily belong to those whose genetics they share.
This might sound like a radical proposal but expanding our idea of who children belong to would be a good thing. Taking collective responsibility for children, rather than only caring for the ones we share DNA with, would radically transform notions of kinship. Adopting this expanded concept of surrogacy helps us to see that it always, as the saying goes, takes a village to raise a child.
But Lewis’ ‘Terf’ smear is also aimed at lesbians who wish to maintain a clear distinction between women and men. For example, former tennis star Martina Navratilova is being slammed by political activists for her growing opposition to transgenderism in sports. TheGuardianreportedFebruary:
The former Wimbledon champion Martina Navratilova has been criticised for “disturbing, upsetting, and deeply transphobic” comments after she argued that allowing transgender women [men] to compete in women’s sporting tournaments was “insane and cheating”.
The tennis player and gay rights campaigner first drew criticism from equalities activists and trans athletes when she tweeted in December: “You can’t just proclaim yourself a female and be able to compete against women. There must be some standards, and having a penis and competing as a woman would not fit that standard.”
…
“To put the argument at its most basic: a man can decide to be female, take hormones if required by whatever sporting organisation is concerned, win everything in sight and perhaps earn a small fortune, and then reverse his decision and go back to [fathering] babies if he so desires.
“It’s insane and it’s cheating. I am happy to address a transgender woman in whatever form she prefers, but I would not be happy to compete against her. It would not be fair.”
TheGuardianalso saw fit to quote a man who is living as a woman describing Navratilova as beset by “transphobia,” as if the former tennis star is mentally ill.
Democrats argue that It is “cruel and unscientific” to define each person’s legal sex by biology. But if sex is not defined by biology/human nature, it will be redefined by politicians & the transgender lobby - regardless of damage to women, men & children http://bit.ly/2DxntFb
Navratilova’s criticism of the transgender ideology is increasingly echoed by women who say the ideology will erase society’s understanding of women — and of lesbians — as biologically, sexually, and socially very different from men.
This “biology matters” argument is also being made by Andrew Sullivan, a British-born gay advocate who led the political push to allow single-sex marriages. In a February article titled “The Nature of Sex,” Sullivan argues that a pending Democratic-drafted bill which provides legal recognition and rights to people who try to live as members of the opposite sex:
could put all single-sex institutions, events, or groups in legal jeopardy. It could deny lesbians their own unique safe space, free from any trace of men. The bill, in other words, “undermines the fundamental legal groundwork for recognizing and combating sex-based oppression and sex discrimination against women and girls.”
The transgender push to create legal rights for people living as members of the opposite sex would also threaten the legal rights won by gays and lesbians, Sullivan writes:
If you abandon biology in the matter of sex and gender altogether, you may help trans people live fuller, less conflicted lives; but you also undermine the very meaning of homosexuality. If you follow the current ideology of gender as entirely fluid, you actually subvert and undermine core arguments in defense of gay rights. “A gay man loves and desires other men, and a lesbian desires and loves other women,” explains Sky Gilbert, a drag queen. “This defines the existential state of being gay. If there is no such thing as ‘male’ or ‘female,’ the entire self-definition of gay identity, which we have spent generations seeking to validate and protect from bigots, collapses.” Contemporary transgender ideology is not a complement to gay rights; in some ways it is in active opposition to them.
And the truth is that many lesbians and gay men are quite attached to the concept of sex as a natural, biological, material thing. Yes, we are very well aware that sex can be expressed in many different ways. A drag queen and a rugby player are both biologically men, with different expressions of gender. Indeed, a drag queen can also be a rugby player and express his gender identity in a variety of ways, depending on time and place. But he is still a man. And gay men are defined by our attraction to our own biological sex. We are men and attracted to other men. If the concept of a man is deconstructed, so that someone without a penis is a man, then homosexuality itself is deconstructed. Transgender people pose no threat to us, and the vast majority of gay men and lesbians wholeheartedly support protections for transgender people. But transgenderist ideology — including postmodern conceptions of sex and gender — is indeed a threat to homosexuality, because it is a threat to biological sex as a concept.
A growing percentage of progressives oppose any recognition of the reality that men and women are different. But conservatives and feminists are championing the normal view that women and men are different, Sullivan wrote:Pol
It might be a sign of the end-times, or simply a function of our currently scrambled politics, but [in late January], four feminist activists — three from a self-described radical feminist organization Women’s Liberation Front — appeared on a panel at the Heritage Foundation. Together they argued that sex was fundamentally biological, and not socially constructed, and that there is a difference between women and trans women that needs to be respected. For this, they were given a rousing round of applause by the Trump supporters, religious-right members, natural law theorists, and conservative intellectuals who comprised much of the crowd. If you think I’ve just discovered an extremely potent strain of weed and am hallucinating, check out the video of the event.
Polls show the transgender ideology is deeply unpopular, especially among women and parents.
In 2017, Obama told NPR that his promotion of the transgender ideology made it easier for Donald Trump to win the presidency. Multiple polls show that most Americans wish to help and comfort people who think they are a member of the opposite sex, even as they also reject the transgender ideology’s claim that a person’s legal sex is determined by their feeling of “gender identity,” not by biology. A U.K. survey shows a similar mix of some sympathy for people with lopsided opposition to the ideology.
The transgender movement is diverse, so its different factions have different goals and priorities. It includes sexual liberationists, progressives, feminists who wish to blur distinctions between the two sexes, and people who glamorize the distinctions between the two sexes. It includes high-profile children, people who are trying to live as members of the opposite sex, and people trying to “detransition” back to their sex, men who demand sex from lesbians, masculine autogynephiles who say are entitled to women’s’ rights, wealthy donors, politicians, political professionals, and revenue-seeking drug-companies and medical service providers.
Transgender advocates claim that two million Americans say they are transgender to a greater or lesser extent. But very few people who describe themselves as transgender undergo cosmetic surgery of the genitals. Only about 4,118 Americans surgically altered their bodies in hospitals from 2000 to 2014 to appear like members of the opposite sex, according to a pro-transgender medical study.
Yet the gender ideology is rapidly gaining power, aided by huge donations from wealthy individuals and medical companies. In Ohio, for example, in February, a judge forced parents of a teenage girl to give up custody so she can begin a lifetime of drug treatments and surgery that will allow her to appear as a male.
The progressive push to bend Americans’ attitudes and their male-and-female civic society around the idea of “gender identity” has already attacked and cracked many of the popular social rules that help Americans manage the cooperation and competition among and between complementary, different, and equal men and women.
Transgender billionaire tells GOP estb. that he will stop donating if GOP keeps supporting laws which recognize the two sexes as equal, different & complementary. But Trump is aggressively defending those laws. http://bit.ly/2CZ3pKe
