Priorities

Let's see. If I were god, which of the following would I most want my followers, with their limited resources, to be most concerned about?
a) ending hunger
b) eradicating poverty
c) promoting peace
d) hating fags
e) the evils of cotton-poly blend

Black Episcopalians have decided that it's not (d). According to the article, black Episcopalian leaders are calling for the church to stop focusing on gay clergy while ignoring issues of poverty and oppression.

[Rev. Sandeye] Wilson linked the debate over gay ordination to the decades-old ordination of women -- a pill she said conservative leaders never fully swallowed. With women now incorporated into many churches, she said gays have become a new scapegoat.

She joined other leaders who said the church enlisted the support of right-leaning African bishops while overlooking issues facing their continent, including the HIV crisis.

On Tuesday, she asked black Episcopalians to remember the civil rights era as she held up a copy of the Windsor Report, a 2004 document that urged U.S. Episcopal leaders to apologize for dividing the faith.

"As I looked at the Windsor Report, there were echoes of all the oppression that I've experienced throughout my life as a black woman," she said. "We who have been oppressed and rejected ... do not need to be a part of rejecting and oppressing others."

I usually couldn't care less what churches are doing to "improve" their stance towards LGBT people (though I am more than ready with my Bag-o-Snark when they do stupid homophobic things). However, I was drawn to this article because of Wilson's expression of black people's solidarity with LGBT people. I think it's a ridiculous thing that, with everything else going on in their countries, African bishops seem to have made a huge issue out of Gays in the Church (ooh, wouldn't that be a great sequel to Snakes on a Plane?).