Friday, May 22, 2009

Something is rotten in Finland (part II)

I have posted on this issue before. It appears that it is an ongoing problem in the Finnish Orthodox Church.

Via InterFax:

Helsinki, May 21, Interfax - The clerics of the Finnish Orthodox Church of the Constantinople Patriarchate are going to participate in the European Forum of LGBT Christian Groups Conference Courage to Follow the Law of Love which opened Tuesday in Järvenpää and Helsinki, Finland.

The participants will begin every day by attending the Orthodox service, and then going to sauna, the social movement Yhteys (Unity) which is fighting for the rights of sexual minorities, reports.

May 22, Helsinki University will host the open church seminar which will address the issues of homosexual relations. According to a published schedule, General Secretary of the Finnish Ecumenical Council Archpriest Heikki Huttunen will present his paper Homosexuality in the Orthodox theology.

In January issue of Aamun Koitto, this well-known priest of the Finnish Orthodox Church addressed at length his viewpoint on homosexual "marriage" as "the reflection of the Divine power and benign sexual source."

The clergy of Constantinople Patriarchate also intends to hold a discussion of the issues of spiritual integration of homosexuals into the Church. The subject matter of one session is entitled as Can a male priest fall in love to another man and live with him?

Source.

Here is a copy of the program.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Do their bishops know about this? Why aren't they taking action?

AP said...

I am resisting the temptation to blog about this...

must... fight...the...temptation...

Ecgbert said...

There's charity (not condescension, true charity) to gays and then there's gay advocacy, the line the Episcopalians have crossed.

Based on what little I know it seems a classic case of a minority (here a tiny one) in a (culturally hostile) Protestant country assimilating (like when American RCs wigged out at the end of the 1960s). Lord, have mercy.

John (Ad Orientem) said...

Omorphia,
From what I have gathered in the past, the bishops are a part of the problem. They seem to be at least somewhat sympathetic to the LGBT crowd.

TYF,
That may be the case. But this goes far beyond legitimate charity. The line you refer to is clearly being crossed. Moscow has expressed serious concern over this in the past. I see a rupture coming unless the EP acts to reign the Finnish Church in.

Carlos,
Feel free to blog on it. Its not a state secret. We Orthodox do have our problems. But thankfully this is on a very small scale and is being firmly addressed by Moscow among others. If the Finns continue on their present course they are going to find themselves isolated by most of the Orthodox world. If push comes to shove I think Moscow will break communion with them.

Chris is risen!
John