EVERY CHURCH ON THE ISLE OF LEWIS from the Church of Scotland (C of S) has taken a stand against allowing practising gay clergy to become ordained ministers.
Lewis Presbytery, representing the church on the largest island in the Outer Hebrides, which was famously home to the 1949 Hebridean revival, is concerned that biblical views on marriage are being sidelined by the national Church body.
The General Assembly of the C of S has been reviewing whether to allow actively homosexual ministers to be appointed. Every elder and minister at the Lewis Presbytery gave a resounding ‘no’ to the idea in a recent vote.
A number of ministers and churches across Scotland have left the denomination after an openly gay minister was given a leadership role at Queen’s Cross Church in Aberdeen in 2009. St George’s Tron Church in Glasgow was even made homeless after a split with the C of S over the issue in December 2012.
A statement from St George Tron’s Church read: “This followed years of prayer and preparation as a result of this denomination’s contemplation and then clear choice to allow ministers to be in same sex relationships, in clear rejection of the authority of the Bible.
“Regretfully therefore, in order to remain in fellowship with orthodox Christianity worldwide, we had to break fellowship with our denomination despite very significant consequences for our church family.”