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Would Your Church Host a Gay Funeral?

Orginally published on Monday, August 13, 2007 at 7:01 AM
by Todd Rhoades

There has been much press during the past week about High Point Church offering to host a funeral for a man outside their church who had just died. Evidently, they offered their facility to the family of the deceased veteran for free; then discovered he was an open homosexual. The church then retracted their offer to the family, saying they could not host the funeral. Much has been written about the situation, and today you can read some additional response from the High Point pastor...

Here’s part of the original Dallas News story about the incident:

An Arlington church volunteered to host a funeral Thursday, then reneged on the invitation when it became clear the dead man’s homosexuality would be identified in the service.

The event placed High Point Church in the cross hairs of an issue many conservative Christian organizations are discussing: how to take a hard-line theological position on homosexuality while showing compassion toward gay people and their families.

But the dispute between High Point Church and the friends and family of Cecil Sinclair has left confusion and hard feelings on both sides.

Mr. Sinclair, 46, died Monday. He was a native of Fort Worth, a Navy veteran who served in Desert Storm helping rescuers find downed pilots, and a singer in the Turtle Creek Chorale, said his mother, Eva Bowers. He did not belong to a church.

His brother, Lee, is an employee and member of High Point, a nondenominational mega-congregation led by the Rev. Gary Simons. Mr. Simons is the brother-in-law of Joel Osteen, nationally known pastor of Houston’s Lakewood Church.

When Cecil Sinclair became ill with a heart condition six years ago, church members started praying for him out of love for his brother, Mr. Simons said Thursday. And when Mr. Sinclair died of an infection, a side effect of surgery intended to keep him alive long enough for a heart transplant, a member of the church staff was immediately sent to minister to the family, he said.

Both the family and church officials agree that the church volunteered to host a memorial service, feed 100 guests and create a multimedia presentation of photos from Mr. Sinclair’s life.

But the photos that the family selected alerted church officials that there might be a problem with the service, Mr. Simons said.

More here...

Here is part of what Pastor Gary Simmons had to say to the church yesterday:

High Point Church regrets the unfortunate situation regarding the memorial service for Mr. Cecil Sinclair. Mr. Sinclair was not a member of High Point Church, neither was any one in his family, except for Lee Sinclair, who is employed by the church. Lee requested for the church pray for his brother when he became ill. The church prayed for Mr. Sinclair both enthusiastically and faithfully. Lee called one of our ministers to inform him that his brother was in the hospital in critical condition.

When the High Point minister arrived at the hospital, Mr. Sinclair has already passed. The church minister reached out to the family and tried to comfort them the best that he could. The church did offer the family, free of charge, the use of this facility for the memorial service. It was not disclosed at this time that the deceased was homosexual or that the family desired an openly homosexual memorial service.

The family requested that the church produce a video of Mr. Sinclair’s life for the memorial service. When the photos were presented to the church, there were some inappropriate images that alerted the church to the homosexuality of Mr. Sinclair. The family requested an associate of the Turtle Creek Chorale, an openly homosexual choir, to officiate the service and for the choir to sing.

They also requested an open microphone format to allow anyone in attendance to speak. High Point Church ministers would not be allowed to direct the service, or to have control over what was said or emphasized. It appeared to the church staff that the family was requesting an openly homosexual service at High Point Church, which is not our policy to allow. [applause.]

You can read more here at the Dallas News Religion Blog...

FOR DISCUSSION:  How would you have handled this situation?  Do you agree with High Point’s assessment and actions?


This post has been viewed 2205 times so far.


  There are 96 Comments:

  • Posted by

    Our church would not knowingly host a gay marriage. Our church would do a funeral for a gay person, but not in a way that is inconsistent with our values as a Christian church. If an alcoholic died, we wouldn’t show photos of him with bottle in hand.

    The family/survivors wanted to bring in other people to direct the service and bring it’s message--people who were openly gay. No, we wouldn’t allow this. Every time I’ve held a funeral at church and the family wishes someone else to lead the service, that person chosen by the family has contact with me to be sure that the message going out is consistent with our church’s value. We are the body of Christ, not a funeral home.

    Todd, please be aware that if the debate over wheter homosexuality is a sin or not gets heated, you will need your monkey pictures.

  • Posted by Danny Daniels

    I fully support pastor Simons and his church. I agree that if the homosexuality were not going to be emphasized it might be ok to hold the funeral service there. But that is apparently not the case. We as Christian are to love all people gay or straight. We know that but that does not mean that we can endorse or approve of something God considers an abomination.  Homosexuality is demonic and perverse. We love people enough not to condone demonic behaviours.
    We love them by being kind and helpful and supportive of them as people but not endorsing the lifestyle as normal or acceptable.

    God loves homosexuals very much. Jesus died on the cross for them. He desires that they place their trust and faith in Him and His completed work of the cross and allow Him to deliver them from the strongholds of Homosexuality.  His plan is wholeness and health emotionally, physically, and spiritually for all people.

  • Posted by utech

    From the quotes that were included it sounded like the leadership of the congregation was offering the use of the building for a memorial service. No one from the leadership was participating in the service and the family was making the arrangements. Again, the only thing that this congregation was doing was allowing their building to be used. I don’t see a problem. Does this facility allow other events to be hosted there? If not then maybe they should have thought about what they were offering before they made the unconditional offer. I really think the “church” missed the point here, especially when they reneged their offer. When would you have a better opportunity to minister to people who are disconnected from church? Granted I don’t think anyone who have crossed the line of faith but I think they would have been moved closer.

  • Posted by slw

    The situation is unfortunate, but given the circumstances, the church did the only thing they could do. It was a mistake, perhaps to offer the facility in the first place, but thank God, they had the fortitude to amend their decision and do the right thing.

  • Posted by Kirk Longhofer

    Whatever your theological views on the issue of homosexuality, this one was handled so badly.  The result was a family and community who did not see the heart of Christ. They saw condemnation. That brings no honor to God. To say this was doing the right thing is hard for me to hear.

  • Posted by bobby

    Dang.  Tough situation here.  I think there’s a bigger question than whether or not we would host te funeral.  I’m curious as to how a church so bug does not have some sort of system in place to communicate and agree upon expectations for their facility before offering it in the first place.  All of this could have been avoided with some sort of prior planning.

    Hopefully the church will use this as an opportunity to fix that issue so the problem doesn’t arise again.

  • Posted by

    The most telling thing about this is that the people applauded the decision, as if, “yay, we kept the gay out!”

    This is not a decision you make happily with applause.  If you make that decision, you should make it sadly with tears for those who will not understand and only interpret it as another case of Christian hypocrisy, and your congregation should understand that is with a heavy heart that the decision was made.

  • Posted by utech

    based upon the applause it is clearly a case of Christian hypocrisy. it’s sad that we continue to take a couple of verses and condemn a small group of people who need understanding and compassion

  • Posted by Danny Daniels

    “it’s sad that we continue to take a couple of verses and condemn a small group of people who need understanding and compassion “

    We do not condemn them...they condemn themselves. 

    It is true that they need understanding...they need to understand that God loves them more than they can possibly understand and that it breaks His heart that they completely disrespect Him and worship their sexual appetite more than Him.

    Whether we like it or not God is the boss and we must obey Him and trust Him or face the undesired consequences that go along with rebelling against God.

    People don’t go to hell because they are gay. They go to hell for rejecting Jesus as saviour and Lord (Boss). 

    Being gay is a product of sin and its effect on humanity; and living to serve the fallen adamic nature which is perverse and self serving. We all have a version of that nature that we are born with.  The rest of us simply have more socially acceptable sins that we have to overcome.  The point is this: we all have sins that need to be forgiven.  God can and will forgive us if we ask Him to and decide to live our lives in a way that seeks to do His will.

    Be blessed.

  • Posted by Jeremy

    Danny,

    You’re right. Having the service at that church would have been completely wrong. It would have sent gay vibes out everywhere, and turned everything gay!

    The last time I checked, homosexuality was a sin: just like gluttony, lust, greed, sloth, pride, wrath and envy. Those are all an abomination. They are all sin. Not one is worse than the other. IT IS ALL SIN!

    This is how inconsistent the church is. They’ll have a funeral for an alcoholic, or a fat person, but they won’t have one for a gay person?

    That’s crazy to me.

  • Posted by Leonard

    Jeremy,
    If they had a service celebrating gluttony, (not the same as being fat by the way, but thanks for labeling all fat people as gluttons.) then that would be wrong too.  Likewise of the alcoholic had lived his life in rebellion to God and then wanted a funeral celebrating his rebellion, then that would be wrong too.  I admire your passion here but your reasoning is not too solid here. 

    That being said, if I had made the mistake of opening the door, I would have offered to at least pay for or part of a facility that would make more sense.  As for people applauding, think figure of speech here people.

  • Posted by

    I hate how this was handled, but there’s no inconsistency here. The issue was not that he was gay but that a service promoting homosexuality would be held in their church facility.

    I imagine the church would also not allow a service that would promote any of the other sins you listed.

  • Posted by

    Hard call to make, but as a pastor who wants to represent Jesus to a group of people who are most likely “lost,” I think I would do two things:

    <OL>
    <LI>Go through with the original commitment that was made to the family. Allow the funeral. Explain to the congregation that we are people of our word and that while we do not endorse all that will happen, we see it as an opportunity to do what Jesus did: to be “a friend of sinners” (of this particular variety) with no strings attached.

    <LI> Create a better policy, etc. to avoid the situation in the future (for example, “no funerals in our building that are not officiated by our staff.").

    </OL>
    Of course, having written this from the comfort of my living room easy chair and not actually being in the heat of the moment and having to make the call THEN ... maybe that’s why this site is called Monday Morning Insight?

    Grace and peace to all ...

  • Posted by utech

    “if I had made the mistake of opening the door”

    that says a lot.

  • Posted by Jeremy

    Leonard,

    I apologize if my comment came across that all fat people are gluttons. Heck, I’m fat myself, so Mr. Pot, meet Mr. Kettle. I’m sorry about that.

    I don’t know how you can “celebrate” homosexuality. How do you promote homosexuality? I think people are blowing this way out of proportion JUST BECAUSE it’s homosexuality.

    Can you imagine homosexuality being glorified in a worship service? I mean, I doubt the speaker stood up there and shouted, “GAY IS THE WAY! JESUS WAS GAY! WE NEED TO BE GAY! HIGH POINT IS GAY! THIS MAN WAS GAY! GOOOOO GAY!”

    I’m sure it would have been acknowledged that he was gay, just as it would be acknowledged at my funeral that I love food. Or that I have done some screwed up things in my past.

    Plus no one is taking into consideration the fact that the family (and the visiting pastor) would have probably respected the churches beliefs on where they stand and not openly proclaimed homosexuality as “the way, the truth and the life.” I would be interested to hear how the service went, and exactly what was said.

    Again, Leonard, I didn’t mean to offend with my post regarding fat vs. gluttony. My apologies.

  • Posted by Leonard

    Jeremy, not offended in any way, just pointing out the assumption.  As for celebrating, that is exactly what they were seeking to do.  No staff from the church were going to be a part of the service, thee had photos of male kissing to display, they had an openly homosexual choir, singing.  It matters in that these were not people saying, Wow, what a mistake that was made in choosing this lifestyle, lets remember this person.  They were saying, this is an accepted lifestyle, we celebrate that is who he was. 

    Imagine someone saying at a funeral, Old Joe here was certainly a glutton.  This man never met an excess he did not embrace.  But you know to say goodbye to him, we are going to have a ceremony embracing his gluttony, we have a choir filled with gluttons, all declaring gluttony is okay.  You an I would never stand for that.  Fill in your sin of choice.  Adultery, lying, stealing, bigotry, and imaging the choir of skin heads singing. 

    No the church made the right choice, but I would say a difficult choice at the very least.

  • Posted by bobby

    Hey Leonard,

    Just so you know, in regard to your prior comment, if you read the full article, the church did offer to pay for a different facility.  So it looks like you’re in agreeance there.

  • Posted by Leonard

    Thanks Bobby, I just missed that.  My bad.

  • Posted by Jeremy

    Leonard,

    I guess that’s where my problem is. I feel like this issue is being magnified JUST BECAUSE it is homosexuality. I don’t feel like many churches would care if it was some other sin. I feel like too many people feel homosexuality is worse than the others, just because it’s homosexuality.

    I’ve been a part of a church that has celebrated the life of someone who loved to party. That wasn’t the focus of the service, and I think it’s a bit of a stretch to say that everyone there was celebrating homosexuality—they were celebrating his life...not the fact that he was gay. And therein lies the problem that I have.

    I don’t believe for one moment that the intention of the family was to celebrate homosexuality, or the gay lifestyle. They were just wanting to remember their friend, brother, cousin, who was gay.

    Why is that so wrong?

  • Posted by

    BTW, it was noted that there was applause, which is different than noting that some applauded the decision.  Given the notation and context, I doubt that this was figurative.  This gives away their true attitude on the subject in my opinion.  There’s no way that we should be joyful about such a decision, if we even feel that it must be made.

  • Posted by Danny Daniels

    Leonard,
    I agree...well said.

  • Posted by jimmy

    I agree with Jeremy.  I doubt this would have been a problem if it had been just about any other sin.  What if the pictures of the slide show had shown unmarried heterosexual “life partners” kissing each other?  Do you think the church would have passed on the funeral?

  • Posted by

    From what I’ve read, it sounds like this situation was handled in a very God glorifying manner.  The church honored it’s commitment by offering to pay for an alternative site to host the funeral, while not compromising it’s own principles.  I think this church can be held up as an example.

  • Posted by Leonard

    After re-reading the articles again, I still stand by the decision of the church.  It seems rather than a cruel act of homophobia, the church did not possess full information about the deceased.  Some of the statements that stand out to me are as follows. 
    “Some of those photos had very strong homosexual images of kissing and hugging,” he said. “My ministry associates were taken aback.”
    “And then, he said, the family asked to have its own people officiate the service. “We had no control over the format of the memorial,” Mr. Simons said.”
    “The issue was not so much that Mr. Sinclair was, from the church’s perspective, an unrepentant sinner, he said. It’s that it was clear from the photos that his friends and family wanted that part of his life to be a significant part of the service.”

    It was also noted that this was a significant part of the service by those who attended.  The church produced the video, provided food and offered to pay for services.  This is not a case of a church being cruel but rather gracious in the face of an ethical dilemma.  They did not respond in hatred they responded with offers of support. 

    As for the difference between this and other sins, again I say, it was the intent of the family to make homosexuality a key part of this man’s identity as an acceptable way of living. 

    Put in any other sin you wish and ask this question.  If a family wanted to do a funeral service at your church for a pedophile and they were accepting of his being a pedophile as a part of his lifestyle.  They had an all pedophile choir singing, photos of the deceased with children, would you let them?  That is not about homophobia or a double standard it is about a church standing by the scriptures teaching that homosexuality is a sin.  It is about a church displaying grace to that family without compromising its standards.  It is about a family openly declaring that homosexuality is okay and acceptable.

  • Posted by jimmy

    Seriously, do you think the church would have (or should have) passed on a funeral if there were pictures of the deceased kissing a “partner” that they were not married to?

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