As New Testament Scholar Daniel Kirk has pointed out, Christians today would do well by the tradition of the apostles and our current witness in the world to recognize that theological abstractions aside, God has already clearly embraced LGBTQ+ people into full communion, and it is now the church’s responsibility to simply honor that reality and rejoice (Luke 15).
One of the most pressing questions of the day: Are LGBTQ students/teachers at Christian schools are discriminated against? A lawsuit and scholarly studies says yes! On March 2021, One of the 33 LGBTQ students who filed a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education alleging widespread discrimination at 25 Christian colleges was harassed, humiliated and forced to sign a statement saying he knew he was “breaking lifestyle expectations”.
Megan Steffen, A student at Moody Bible Institute who came out as a lesbian during her junior year, Threatened with the prospect of losing four years of her studies was told professors had expressed concern about whether she should be allowed to get her diploma. Two weeks before she graduated from Moody Bible Institute, two top administrators called Megan Steffen and grilled her about her sexuality.
Are you planing on dating , or on being sexually active with women?-Steffen asked during a Zoom meeting.
Steffen was one of the 33 LGBTQ students that have now filed a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education. claimed the department’s religious exemption allows schools, such as Moody Bible Institute, that receive federal dollars, to unconstitutionally discriminate against LGBTQ students
Joshua R. Wolff, a Clinical Psychologist and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychology at Adler University in Chicago, said “LGBTQ students at Christian schools have moderately elevated levels of depression, eating disorders, anxiety and academic distress, in comparison with LGBTQ students at secular institutions. Transgender students suffering from gender dysphoria at Christian schools are often misdiagnosed by campus counselors”.
In addition to LGBTQ students being harassed by fellow students and administrators, forced to attend conversion therapy, prohibited from dating people of the same sex, denied on-campus housing, blocked access to affirming LGBTQ websites and resources on the campus internet. Last year, The faculty of Seattle Pacific University, a Christian school associated with the Free Methodist Church, has taken a vote of no confidence in its board of trustees after members of the board declined to change its policy prohibiting the hiring of LGBTQ people.
Jéaux Rinedahl was working as a part-time professor at SPU and was applying to a full-time position in the nursing program in 2020.
“She called me, and she said, ‘We’re so excited, you’d be great, you’d be wonderful, we’re overjoyed,’” Rinedahl said, recalling a conversation he had with the assistant dean of the nursing program.
But then Rinedahl said he got a follow-up call where he was told he didn’t qualify.
“She said, well, the problem is, you’re not heterosexual” And I just sort of froze at this point.”
“Despite the equality that courts have recognized in establishing that gay men and women cannot be discriminated against, it breaks my heart that SPU still treats us differently as being unequal to all others who teach at the university,” Rinedahl said in a statement
It’s time we understand Christianity is about loving and embracing. It’s not about division and separation and hatred and anger” -Rinedahl added, SPU does have a hiring preference based on religion, but Reindahl says he is Christian and believes he was denied the chance at the full-time job just because he is gay.
Human beings are relational. From the beginning of times, human beings are described as having a need for relationship, just as God himself is relational. Sexuality is a core part of what it means to be a relational person, and to condemn LGBT people’s sexuality outright damages their ability to be in relationship with all people — and with God.
In the last 5 years, LGBTQ student leaders and teachers persevered and pushed the school’s administration to create a safer and more caring environment where such diverse groups are beginning to be treated with dignity and respect, but they still need your help to continue the fight for equal rights for all people.