A rather unusual questionnaire will be sent to churches across the green and pleasant English country of Sussex towards the end of the year, the like of which I never thought Id see in my home county, reports Jason Shaw, GayAgenda.com's UK correspondent. .
The churches are being urged to have parishioners to rate their own church's suitability as places of safe worship to the GLBT community, helping us pick a place of worship.
Honestly, I'm not making it up, it's true, churches all over Sussex will be sent a survey to find out how receptive they are to gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgendered people and the results will be used to create a 'Which Church?' consumer guide to help southern England's LGBT population choose the church that is right for them.
Further more, this new, unprecedented, move has been backed by Dr John Hind, the Bishop of Chichester. He is the leader of the Church of England in Sussex and made the comments after meeting representatives from the LGBT community recently. This groundbreaking survey will start in autumn with all Church of England churches in Brighton and Hove area being asked to rate themselves in terms of attitude on a four point scale. The scale ranges from the “homosexuality is condemned by the Bible” traditional view, to am far more modern and encompassing view “openly gay people are integral to the life of our church”
The survey will then be extended to cover churches of all Christian denominations right across Sussex. Dr Keith Sharpe, from Changing Attitude Sussex, said the meeting with the bishop and other local groups had been “very positive and productive”
It really makes a change for me to write about positive moves from within a religious organisation such as the church of England to be more understanding, tolerant and welcoming to the GLBT community.
For further details visit www.changingattitudesussex.com.
Jason Shaw
"A deeply engaging and personal blog, laced with wit, humour, and a healthy dose of reality" Borstal Boy, Writer, UK.
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