This Library contains documents from all recent United Church governance meetings, including General Council and its Executive. It also includes “Our Beliefs Explained” official policy documents dating back several decades. If you can't find something you think should be included, contact gcbusiness@united-church.ca.
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In the company of God and one another, our community can be transformative. Ethnic Ministries believes that God is calling us to transformation as individuals, as communities, and as church, with all the life-giving traditions, faiths, and cultures we have been gifted with for Godsmission
Therefore, we respectfully recommend the following motion: WHEREAS children, youth, women and men are all called to be members of the Body of Christ and the household and family of God. WHEREAS changes of language offers creative and expanding possibilities for Christians in their perceptions of God and of one another.
We affirm our acceptance of all human beings as persons made in the image of God, regardless of their sexual orientations. Accumulated social science research and the articulated experience of the vast majority of both heterosexual and homosexual men and women affirm that sexual orientation is not so much a matter of choice, as a “given” aspect of one’s identity, resulting probably from a complex interaction of genetic and environmental factors.
March 2012 Motion passed by the Executive of the General Council: Policies Related to Gender Identity The Executive of the General Council affirmed that: a. The United Church of Canada acknowledges the difference (distinction) between gender identity referring to a person’s innate, deeply felt sense of being male, female, both or neither; and sexual orientation – having to do with the gender to which one is emotionally and physically attracted, and b. “Gender identity” is not a barrier to membership and ministry of The United Church of Canada.
WE AFFIRM that our sexuality is a gift of God. In its life-enhancing, non-exploitive forms it is a primary way of relating to ourselves and to one another, and is the way God has chosen to continue the human race. We acknowledge that human sexuality, like all other aspects of human nature is affected and distorted by human sinfulness. We recognize the ambiguity of human nature and therefore of human sexuality. “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23)
Individually and in community, we do everything through the lenses of our cultures: there is no such thing as a culture-free perspective. Our experiences and understandings are shaped by our cultures. Since we cannot capture the complexity of God through our limited cultural understandings, our understanding of God is limited when we see this God through only one dominant cultural perspective. Instead, our understandings of God and our scriptures can be deepened when we come together, as disciples of Jesus Christ, in all of our differences and diversities to acknowledge intercultural reality and richness.
