Once one of the nation's most popular televangelists, the Rev. Robert H. Schuller is watching his life's work crumble.Neither the elder Schuller, the family, church officials or his departing son are commenting as to what went wrong, but this gives you a clue.His son and recent successor, the Rev. Robert A. Schuller, has abruptly resigned as senior pastor of the Crystal Cathedral. The shimmering, glass-walled megachurch is home to the "Hour of Power" broadcast, an evangelism staple that's been on the air for more than three decades.
The church is in financial turmoil: It plans to sell more than $65 million worth of its Orange County property to pay off debt. Revenue dropped by nearly $5 million last year, according to a recent letter from the elder Schuller to elite donors. In the letter, Schuller Sr. implored the Eagle's Club members - who supply 30 percent of the church's revenue - for donations and hinted that the show might go off the air without their support.
"The final months of 2008 were devastating for our ministry," the 82-year-old pastor wrote.
The Crystal Cathedral blames the recession for its woes. But it's clear that the elder Schuller's carefully orchestrated leadership transition, planned over a decade, has stumbled badly.
But the church announced on Nov. 29 that Schuller Jr. had resigned as senior pastor, just a month after he was removed from the church's syndicated broadcasts. In a news release, Schuller Sr. said: "Robert and I have been struggling as we each have different ideas as to the direction and the vision for this ministry."Hmmm. I wonder what those differences might be?
For the views of the elder and younger Schuller on LGBT rights, they are below the fold.
From a January 23, 2006 joint appearance on Larry King Live:
CALLER: I'd like to know what your position is on gay marriage. I'm not actually a Christian but I was wondering what your positions are.KING: Fair question. Father, first.
R.H. SCHULLER: I am addicted to excellence, totally committed to excellence. That's where I'm coming from. It's a different position on this and any time there's a controversy, choose the interpretation that is more excellent.
And I feel that heterosexual marriage is the more excellent way, and it surely is approved holy by the Holy Bible, and it holds so many more possibilities, the possibilities of having children of both the mother and father, the male and the female. I think it's all very important, and...
KING: What then does the church offer to those homosexuals who want to be together?
Well, we hold the view -- I'm a conservative here. We hold the view that practicing sexuality should be within commitments of loyalty and faith and trust, and so we do not approve or launch --
KING: So not even a state a union?
No, no.
KING: You share the same view --
I do.
But I want you to know we've had homosexuals as representatives of our church the last 40 years.
KING: Don't they feel left out?
No, they do not feel left out but they know I'm not going to use my energy into the gay liberation movement because I don't want to talk somebody to a viewpoint where you have less than excellence where you don't have thanksgiving with the grandkids and all of that.
KING: Even though they might turn out to be homosexual.
Oh, sure, they might.
KING: Do you attack it?
No, we do not.
We do not.
KING: Do you feel for those who are put in a different position by society?
Yes.
Yes.
Absolutely.
Yes, yes, and that's why we are well-known, I think, in the gay liberation movement, they respect my commitment to our historic viewpoint, the classic historic jew dayic christian viewpoint. They also respect the fact that I do not add to their problems, which they all have, as we all do, by intentionally embarrassing and shaming them.
Once one of the nation's most popular televangelists, the Rev. Robert H. Schuller is watching his life's work crumble.Neither the elder Schuller, the family, church officials or his departing son are commenting as to what went wrong, but this gives you a clue.His son and recent successor, the Rev. Robert A. Schuller, has abruptly resigned as senior pastor of the Crystal Cathedral. The shimmering, glass-walled megachurch is home to the "Hour of Power" broadcast, an evangelism staple that's been on the air for more than three decades.
The church is in financial turmoil: It plans to sell more than $65 million worth of its Orange County property to pay off debt. Revenue dropped by nearly $5 million last year, according to a recent letter from the elder Schuller to elite donors. In the letter, Schuller Sr. implored the Eagle's Club members - who supply 30 percent of the church's revenue - for donations and hinted that the show might go off the air without their support.
"The final months of 2008 were devastating for our ministry," the 82-year-old pastor wrote.
The Crystal Cathedral blames the recession for its woes. But it's clear that the elder Schuller's carefully orchestrated leadership transition, planned over a decade, has stumbled badly.
But the church announced on Nov. 29 that Schuller Jr. had resigned as senior pastor, just a month after he was removed from the church's syndicated broadcasts. In a news release, Schuller Sr. said: "Robert and I have been struggling as we each have different ideas as to the direction and the vision for this ministry."Hmmm. I wonder what those differences might be?
For the views of the elder and younger Schuller on LGBT rights, they are below the fold.
From a January 23, 2006 joint appearance on Larry King Live:
CALLER: I'd like to know what your position is on gay marriage. I'm not actually a Christian but I was wondering what your positions are.KING: Fair question. Father, first.
R.H. SCHULLER: I am addicted to excellence, totally committed to excellence. That's where I'm coming from. It's a different position on this and any time there's a controversy, choose the interpretation that is more excellent.
And I feel that heterosexual marriage is the more excellent way, and it surely is approved holy by the Holy Bible, and it holds so many more possibilities, the possibilities of having children of both the mother and father, the male and the female. I think it's all very important, and...
KING: What then does the church offer to those homosexuals who want to be together?
Well, we hold the view -- I'm a conservative here. We hold the view that practicing sexuality should be within commitments of loyalty and faith and trust, and so we do not approve or launch --
KING: So not even a state a union?
No, no.
KING: You share the same view --
I do.
But I want you to know we've had homosexuals as representatives of our church the last 40 years.
KING: Don't they feel left out?
No, they do not feel left out but they know I'm not going to use my energy into the gay liberation movement because I don't want to talk somebody to a viewpoint where you have less than excellence where you don't have thanksgiving with the grandkids and all of that.
KING: Even though they might turn out to be homosexual.
Oh, sure, they might.
KING: Do you attack it?
No, we do not.
We do not.
KING: Do you feel for those who are put in a different position by society?
Yes.
Yes.
Absolutely.
Yes, yes, and that's why we are well-known, I think, in the gay liberation movement, they respect my commitment to our historic viewpoint, the classic historic jew dayic christian viewpoint. They also respect the fact that I do not add to their problems, which they all have, as we all do, by intentionally embarrassing and shaming them.
(crossposted at Amplify)
Creating Change 2009…this has been a wonderful week. There are so many powerful spirits here in Denver. On Friday I was scheduled to present a session on the Advocates for Youth Anti-Homophobia/Transphobia Project. The intended purpose of the session was to inform session participants of the project work we have been doing at Advocates in concert with project partners around the country. Also, we wanted to give participants tangible tools to utilize when working to redress homophobia and transphobia in communities of color.
As usual I asked participants to introduce themselves by telling us their name, preferred gender pronoun, and they motivation for attending the session. As you might imagine, the last request assist me in gauging participants’ expectations and needs during the session. As we went around the room I quickly realized that the needs of my participants were not going to be fulfilled by my "professional” presentation on the work that was being done around the country to build capacity of providers to re-dress homophobia/transphobia. No. Instead, I had a room full of individuals that were eager to discuss the real life challenges to dialogue about homophobia/transphobia and racism. I was ready.
I threw the entire session agenda out of the window and we went to work. We discussed common challenges of being a part of a community of color and the reality that queer issues are not always a priority. In reality, many individuals of communities of color are more concerned with the everyday struggles of battling oppression, sometimes dealing with the constant fear of deportation and possibly trying to figure out how to keep a roof over their families’ heads. We talked about the ever-present divide between the queer groups (majority white) and the Black student groups on some college campuses. People expressed their personal challenges with bringing the two groups together on common ground. And, of course we had a conversation about the infamous Prop 8 debacle.
What I realized was that we, The GLBTQ community, have so many conversations to have. Together we processed through sentiments of frustration about the seemingly unwillingness of those in our people of color communities to consider how homophobia and transphobia effect use all. I challenged people to consider how we attempt to work in people of color communities, to consider that our feelings of urgency are our own and not those of many of our communities at-large. People were open about how they made special effort to consider the intersections of oppression that POC communities are often faced with. Folks were clear about the importance of history and culture in EVERY community, and so on.
We spent a lot of time discussing challenges and experience, but I didn’t want use to leave the space without some concrete tools that could be used when having these difficult conversations in our respective communities and I thought I’d list some suggestions here:
1. Know the community, be clear on cultural norms, beliefs and values
2. Establish trust within the community
3. Consort the gatekeepers an popular opinion leaders
4. Meet people where they are
5. Don’t make any assumptions
6. Do your homework
7. Work at the intersections of social issues (queer issues are not the only issues of importance)
8. Honor the collective experience of the community
9. Be respectful; and
10. Ask questions
By no means is this is not an exhaustive list but it is a start. We all have many parts that make up a whole. The GLBTQ community is not homogeneous, and therefore we must be willing to have difficult conversations about race, class, gender, etc. And if we want to make changes in other communities we must be willing to step outside of our comfortable queer activist/advocate boxes and get down, dirty and honest about how to tackle the huge problems that plague us. It was both an honor and pleasure to share space, knowledge and power with my session participants yesterday. I look forward to the work ahead …collectively and with honesty and love we will get the job(s) done.
This led me to thinking - has Obama used his power of executive order to send any positive signals to the LGBT community? Please, if he has done one concrete thing that actually helps us (rather than giving the haters ammunition to block progress, as with the DADT study), let me know.
I suggest that he at least proclaim Valentines Day a national day of respect for all loving couples. But I suspect we're more likely to see him promise to, someday, if we're good and if the normal people allow him, proclaim the day after Valentines day as National Love Crumbs Day for Teh Gayz.
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