Talk about a “Lord, save us from your followers!” situation.
So the British planted the Seed. This Alien Legacy
More than 80 countries around the world still criminalize consensual homosexual conduct between adult men, and often between adult women.[14]
These laws invade privacy and create inequality. They relegate people to inferior status because of how they look or who they love. They degrade people’s dignity by declaring their most intimate feelings "unnatural" or illegal. They can be used to discredit enemies and destroy careers and lives. They promote violence and give it impunity. They hand police and others the power to arrest, blackmail, and abuse. They drive people underground to live in invisibility and fear.[15]More than half those countries have these laws because they once were British colonies.
This report describes the strange afterlife of a colonial legacy. It will tell how one British law-the version of Section 377 the colonizers introduced into the Indian Penal Code in 1860-spread across immense tracts of the British Empire.Colonial legislators and jurists introduced such laws, with no debates or "cultural consultations," to support colonial control. They believed laws could inculcate European morality into resistant masses. They brought in the legislation, in fact, because they thought "native" cultures did not punish"perverse" sex enough. The colonized needed compulsory re-education in sexual mores. Imperial rulers held that, as long as they sweltered through the promiscuous proximities of settler societies, "native" viciousness and "white" virtue had to be segregated: the latter praised and protected, the former policed and kept subjected.MORE
And now? Here come the US Evangelicals, in search of power to add fertilizer and water to the poisonous plants that in this garden grow.
A new report released today details the role that US-based renewal church movements have played in mobilizing homophobic sentiment in at least three African countries. “Globalizing the Culture Wars: U.S. Conservatives, African Churches & Homophobia,” written by Rev. Kapya Kaoma for the progressive think tank Political Research Associates, was the result of a yearlong investigation into the relationship between conservative clergy on two continents, which has hastened divisions within denominations and has “restrict[ed] the human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people.” Renewal groups and their neoconservative ally, the Institute on Religion and Democracy, have long sought to conservatize or split mainline American churches—frequently over gender or sexuality issues—and liberal scholars have traced many of the mainline schisms that have dominated headlines over the past several years to groundwork laid by the IRD and others.*
Increasingly, though, renewal movements have begun looking abroad for allies. Focusing on three mainline denominations under assault by these renewal movements (the Episcopal Church, the United Methodist Church, and the Presbyterian Church USA) in three African countries (Uganda, Nigeria, and Kenya), Kaoma has documented a clear trend of the US Christian right exporting its battles over social and sexuality issues to Africa. There, churches have been pressured to sever ties with mainline funders in exchange for conservative support, and have become recipients of a more fiercely anti-gay message than the US Christian right delivers at home.
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This report describes growing anti-gay movements in African churches as a “proxy war” for US culture battles. Can you explain?
Since the ’90s, we’ve seen this shift from the American conservatives who are going to Africa, and they started spreading this anti-gay rhetoric across sub-Saharan Africa. We started getting a lot of statements from US evangelicals that homosexuality is wrong and that there is this Western agenda among gays to take over world. So it is coming from the West. Why is it a proxy war? In America, these politics have been going on for a long time—since the ’80s they have been used as a political tool to gain support in American churches.But we saw a shift in the [tactics] to allow that war to be fought outside American soil: They’ve allowed Africans to get involved and fight on behalf of conservatives. You see [US evangelicals] going to Africa and making statements and having political access to leadership there, asking them to criminalize same-sex orientation. And now, when they do that, the Africans are benefiting the religious conservatives, because they’re helping them fight in America. But American conservatives are also benefiting African leaders in terms of giving them not just an ideological framework—the anti-LGBT arguments that have been used in America—but also providing them with legitimacy.
The second aspect is very interesting in a sense, because in addition to the ideological framework, they’re getting the religious leaders in Africa involved by telling them to misrepresent the progressive or mainline churches as evil—part and parcel of a gay agenda to take over the world—so you cannot deal with them. They say they’re going to partner with [African leaders and churches], if they can disassociate from mainline churches [in the United States], which are part of the gay agenda. So [the African churches] cut the relationship, and then the American conservatives take over financially.
That’s how the war is being fought. Thus, when the Africans come [to the United States] they have nothing to do with mainline churches; instead they side with American conservatives against mainline churches. And the mainline church in Africa is bigger and stronger than in America. So the conservatives are relying on the numbers of African leaders; they start fighting mainline church leadership using Africans to win the American battle, and come across as though they care about Africa.MORE
The FULL REPORT:Globalizing the Culture Wars PDF
Rick Warren and Homophobia in Africa November article
After an uproar, during which he said that that nobody cared about dead Christians anyway thus giving the impression that since noone cared about dead Christians, why should he care about dead gays (how about the part where he is helping to incite their murders?…Rick Warren Urges Ugandan Pastors to Speak Out Against Proposed Anti-Gay Law December 10 Post. This bigoted little fucker, by the way, was sold to us as a moderate when he was chosen by Obama for his inaugural, remember?
Go here first to see whats at stake. The Implications of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill
President Museveni has joined the anti-gay crusade
The Rachel Maddow Show: U.S. Ties to Ugandan Anti-Gay Bill
The Rachel Maddow Show Attempts to Get Some Responses on the Ugandan ‘Kill the Gays’ Bill
Rachel Maddow vs Formerly Gay Author
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
I should note that the bill no longer says in law that homosexuals should be killed or imprisoned for life. Probably due to the international outcry. More pressure must be placed on Uganda to get rid of the law entirely. But remember kids 1. Uganda has just discovered oil. 2. The evangelicals need to be reined in. Something has to be done about these murder-inducing snakeoil salesmen who use the oppression and murder of innocents as a way to gain power.
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(the Episcopal Church, the United Methodist Church, and the Presbyterian Church USA) in three African countries (Uganda, Nigeria, and Kenya),
I can’t speak for the Presbys or the Methodists. However, I’ve been an Episcopalian all my life, and a statement like this reveals a misunderstanding of how the Episcopal church – or really, the Anglican Communion – works.
Henry the VIII – and what people present as the reasons is still controversial when Anglicans and Catholics talk – essentially nationalized the English Church. The Pope was no longer in charge. The Crown was now the head of the English Church. Government and the Church were now intertwined – which it already had been, actually, but this cut the Vatican out of the loop both governmentally and doctrinally.
Fast forward to the creation of the American Colonies. The Church of England had a presence in America. Lots of the people in power belonged to it. The Bishops swore allegiance to the Crown as a condition of being ordained Bishops, and the ordinations occurred in England – not that they ever visited their American dioceses much. There were, of course, other denominations here, but even if the C of E was not the established church in a given colony (and most of them had an established church) they had a presence.
Now comes the American Revolution. After it’s success the C of E here in America had a bit of a problem. The clergy were sworn to the Crown. The 1666 Prayer Book (still the C of E standard) and the liturgy therein still had numerous prayers for the English Crown and viewed it as the head of the church. That was unsatisfactory for Americans. So the American church (after pulling a couple of fast ones to get Bishops that were within the Apostolic succession but that had not sworn allegiance to the Crown) organized itself as a separate church that from a governing polity viewpoint was autonomous but that recognized a fairly loose link of spiritual authority to the Archbishop of Canterbury – he being the senior cleric in the C of E and “first among equals”.
As the British Empire became established this model ended up being replicated. Most nations that were British colonies had their natives converted to Christianity by missionaries from the Church of England, but the Church in each nation (or 2 or 3 nations combined) after indpendence if not sooner ended up as a local national church with it’s own governing polity – and like the U.S., but unlike the C of E, mostly independent of the national government. In fact, the Church of Uganda has had a history of having their clerics executed by the government from it’s beginning up to Idi Amin’s execution of their Archbishop in 1977.
They are all also independent of each other and of the C of E. They collectively comprise the Anglican Communion. Their formal bond is that they all are “in communion” – whatever that means seems to vary from country to country – with the Archbishop of Canterbury, their Bishops attend the decennial Lambeth Conference (at the A o C’s personal invitation), their heads attend the annnual Primates Meeting, and they send representatives to the Anglican Consultative Council – none of which have any authority to compel adoption or observance of particular points of doctrine or practice on their members. In this context it’s worth noting that the AoC did not see fit to invite Bp. Gene Robinson to the last Lambeth Conference.
My point then is this (and please forgive the discourse into Church history); the Anglican Church of Uganda is not the Episcopal Church in Uganda (and the same should be said of the churches in Kenya and Nigeria. They never have been. Their roots are not in TEC (The Episcopal Church, as it now styles itself) and they have never modeled themselves on us. Their approach to Christianity is rooted in the practices and philosophies of the Church of England’s traditions as of the time that it’s missionaries evanglelized them, and the development of their churchs’ doctrines, practices and liturgies were internally driven by their understanding of Christianity and their people’s customs and traditions and had nothing to do with anything going on in TEC – especially their attitudes towards homosexuality.
I’m an Episcopalian who’s been following the various controversies in TEC for about the last 7 years. If you research this you’ll find that TEC used to send the African churches money. However, once TEC started going off in a non-Christian direction with regards to how it addressed the issues of homosexuality the African churches told them to keep their money, as it was tainted. If anyone was trying to buy influence in the African churches it was TEC. Financial support from others followed that development, it did not lead it. The African churches’ attitudes towards homosexuality was not developed due to conservative financial support. Conservative financial support developed due to the African churches’ actions in expressing their conservation of the faith. If you think (as it appears here, but correct me if I misinterpet) that the African churches have taken the moral positions that they have due to the influence of American money from conservative groups you have not spent sufficient time reading up on the background and history of these issues.
Now, having said all that:
These bills would make immoral law. I’ve read them. It’s quite one thing to refuse to give governmental support to homosexual relationships. But criminalizing such relationships between consenting adults is in my opinion wrong, and applying the death penalty for such is horrible. In fact, I believe they can be fairly described as un-Christian.
@RonF Thank you very much for the background behind the Episcopalian Church. This is one of the things I love about blogging, the fact that I can post something, and my commenters can add stuff that broadens the conversation on a whole. I will say though, that none of the sources that I linked to, as far as I understand them, said that the Ugandans were homophobic because of the American conservatives. In fact, the first link blames the British for upping whatever level of homophobic sentiment that that may have existed among teh population. The other article notes that the evangelicals helped to whip up these sentiments to further heights.
Er, Ron, as far as I understand, being a curtain-twitching prude is perfectly Christian. Since G*d (if he exists) hasn’t offed these anti-gay guys, I assume He/She/It is on their side. That said, I’ve always thought Jesus had his head screwed on straight. His followers on the other hand..
It cannot be publicised enough how many of the “backwards, primitive, violent” attitudes and/or behaviours of former colonies are in fact direct transplants from their former colonial rulers. I have had this argument with my father (who grew up in Zimbabwe when it was known as Rhodesia) so many times, and yet it’s always civilised Europe vs primitive Africa, no matter what is or was done by the colonisers to the colonised. Thank you for starting your article with this.
Politicalguineapig, great damage has been done to the public perception of Christianity by the actions of some of those who claim to be adherents of it. People tend to note the wrong that such people have done while forgetting the good that others have done in it’s name.
Of course, the same could be said of Islam – especially in recent years.
I’ve never really understood this about Anglicanism. Could Elizabeth II, for instance, override the Archbishop of Canterbury on doctrinal matters? (Or whatever committee or conclave decides these things for Anglicans.) The whole sect seems rather blasphemous to me. Doesn’t it come down to worshiping the state?
RonF: You’re quite right. Unfortunately, the good people don’t shout as loudly as the bad ones do. And the bad actions have to be remembered: we can’t let people think religion is all good, because then they turn off their brains, and then disaster naturally follows.
Could Elizabeth II, for instance, override the Archbishop of Canterbury on doctrinal matters
No, the British Monachy lose most of it’s powers of state with the execution of Charles I, at the end of the Civil War. When Charles II was invited to take the throne, he had to accept a large number of restrictions on what the monach could and couldn’t do (and these grew over time).
At this point two names are given to the British Prime Minister by an ad hoc nominating committee formed when the AoC position opens up. The PM chooses one and gives it to the Crown for approval – I have no idea what would happen if the Crown got it into her head to turn the nomination down. They’d probably have to come up with another name. The Crown is the Supreme Governor of the Church, the AoC is the actual spiritual head. The Crown’s role is pretty much limited these days to signing off on the AoC appointment. I do wonder if the current holder of the Crown could prevail upon him successfully to resign if she was so inclined.
It’s not worship of the State. Even before the schism the State pretty much chose Bishops – certainly Archbishops – and forwarded their names to the Pope for approval, which he rarely withheld. When the Pope had final approval it didn’t result in worship of the Pope.
Or whatever committee or conclave decides these things for Anglicans.
And therein lies the foundational difference between the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion. There is no central body that has the authority to decide doctrinal matters for the entire Anglican Communion. Each member does that for itself. It could be the Archbishop, it could be a conclave of the Bishops with more or less influence by the Archbishop, etc. TEC is much more democratic than most. We have a triennial General Convention. It is chaired by the Presiding Bishop (currently elected from among the Bishops every 3rd General Convention for one and only one 9 year term) and is comprised of two houses. One is the House of Bishops and the other is the House of Delegates. The latter has representatives of the clergy and (separately) the lay people from each Diocese in TEC – they in turn elect their delegates at their annual Diocesean conventions.
General Convention has the authority to revise TEC’s Constitution and Canons. So far it has yet to revise the canon that prescribes that marriage is for a man and a woman only, and since GC was last held this summer that canon will be on the books until at least 2012. But while the Canons prescribe trial procedures and discipline procedures for clergy who violate the canons, in practice there have been no trials for liberal clergy that violate the canons – say, for conducting ersatz marriages for same-sex couples, for knowingly administering Holy Communion to unbaptized people, or for denying the resurrection of Christ. The procedures have only been used, at least for the last 30 years, for trying and defrocking conservative clergy.
In any case, that’s why we have a crisis in the Anglican Communion today. Up to this point any differences among the members were generally a matter of style – there was little disagreement on substantial points. But by choosing now two homosexuals who are openly in same-sex relationships as bishops (a lesbian priest was chosen as a bishop by the Diocese of L.A. last week) TEC is saying that homosexual behavior is not sinful and that those who engage in it are worthy to be leaders. This is a violation of the consensus and is causing a split because of the lack of a central authority that can act to provide discipline and enforce conformity.
Not that central authorities are all that great either: for example, see the Catholic Church.