Talk:LGBT-affirming religious groups

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Reason for this article
This article was created as a result of a longstanding impasse at Talk:Welcoming Congregation. That article, for a long time, equivocated in its subject, sometimes talking about the UUA "Welcoming Congregation" program and sometimes talking aboutthe general category of "welcoming churches" that that welcome LGBT info fellowship but that are not neaceearily affiliated with UUA. As of today, these will be separate topics with separate articles. MPS 03:38, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Dropping fuel in the fire
I'm probably going to get burned for this, but is there cause to broaden the scope of this article to encompass non-Christian religious groups? Obviously Jewish or Islamic associations with LGBT-friendly programs would be related, theologically, but there may be others. Maybe this is already well covered in other articles, though... *shrug* -- nae'blis 17:01, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I see no reason not to broaden the scope. And change the title accordingly to something like LGBT-welcoming religious groups. —Angr 17:06, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Yeah go ahead if you want to. I am sure if the article gets too long we can always fork it back out. I would recommend that it be divided by religion though, to keep all the Christian groups together and all the, say, Islamic groups, together. Come to think of it, this could be a long and confusing article structure if you do all the permutations of (Religion X level-of-officialness). Official Islam. Official Jew. Unofficial Islam. Unofficial Christian. Unofficial illegal Sufi. etc etc etc MPS 21:38, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

what does "official" mean?
I see no distinction between the status of More Light vis-à-vis the PCUSA and that of AWAB vis-à-vis ABCUSA. And some of the other groups listed as "Official" are even less tenuously tolerated by the actual "official" denominational leaderships. (E.g. the Mennonites, or the Reformed.) As a Baptist I see a POV problem here, but it may just be a nomenclatural one. It seems to me that UUA and UCC (and of course MCC) are the only Christian denominations of any size in the USA that are really "official" about welcoming TBLG folks and the congregations that affirm them [possibly I need to add DOC Haruo 09:54, 22 October 2006 (UTC)]. But I do appreciate this article as a step up from linking all denominations to a UU-centered article. I was going to do something like this, now I don't have to... --Haruo 09:51, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, I'd see a distinction on if:
 * a) The denomination's website/bylaws/handouts include mention of the GLBT program;
 * b) The denomination has ever taken a vote/issued an edict with regards to the program (this is trickier when you've got congregational polity);
 * c) The program's website/bylaws/handouts explicitly state that they are a sanctioned/official program of their denomination.

It's not an exact science, but it might be a start. I agree this is a big step up from simple inclusion on the Welcoming Congregation page, and we were starting to have the "what's official?" discussion there just to trim the list. Here, it's somewhat less important, but might make for a logical organization of the page (official programs first, then tolerated grass-roots, then outlawed grassroots?). -- nae'blis 17:20, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
 * As the creator of this article, I just want to say that the section headers I made are somewhat arbitrary based on a schema I made up. If there is a better way to lay out the programs then be bold and do it. This article is young and flexible. MPS 14:25, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Indeed -- I think sanctioned/tolerated/outlawed is a useful distinction, but I'm not sure all the programs listed are currently in the right section. Definitely move any you see are in the wrong place. --Alynna 00:04, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

External links and general scope
Before the external links get too bloated... what exactly is supposed to be there? Currently we seem to be adding any Christian LGBT-affirming group. Is that appropriate? For those already listed earlier in the article, should their websites be in external links as well?

Somewhat relatedly, what is the scope of this article? Is it about associations that a congregation [or similar applicable term] can affiliate with to show support for LGBTQ inclusion? Or is it about any LGBT-welcoming religious group? --Alynna 00:04, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Synagogues
Since at least one Jewish group has been added, I'm adding the word synagogue to the intro, ok? Maybe elsewhere? thanks. HG | Talk 18:18, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Page organization
I am not sure that creating a separate section for MCC makes sense unless it is significantly expanded. The title is also misleading in that it implies that any church/denomination not there is not affirming of LGBT people, and, for example, the UUA as a whole is (but has the Welcoming Congregation program as a way to focus on it). Aleta  Sing 19:33, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Ah, well it is no longer just MCC now... :) Aleta  Sing 19:42, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

lol, you beat me to saving my message. are UUA's really all affirming? if so, they would fit in that section too wouldn't they? (them having a "welcoming" program had made me assume it was a UCC-style opt-in program) Outsider80 (talk) 19:48, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * er, nevermind :-D Outsider80 (talk) 19:49, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Heehee, sorry for causing confusion! Aleta  Sing 19:58, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Alliance of Baptists
Is this considered an "Unofficial program"? I'm a wee bit confused.  APK  is proud to be a Tar Heel. In your face, Michigan State!  09:04, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't have said so. There may be LGBT-affirming Baptist churches in the Alliance of Baptists (I'd be surprised if there were none), but the AoB itself is probably on the whole less liberal-leaning than the American Baptists, and not even all American Baptist churches can be considered LGBT-affirming. —Angr 09:19, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Quakers
This seems missing, and yet many congregations have been LGBT-affirming longer than many other churches. It would be good to incorporate them, and they probably ought to be included under non-Trinitarian. Mish (talk) 21:31, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Christiantity (Trinitarian/Non-Trinitarian)
Is there some reason Christianity is broken into Trinitarian and Non-Trinitarian? Is Trinitarianism somehow relevant to whether they're LGBT-affirming? --Alynna (talk) 11:38, 7 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes, that is how it is handled on the Christian denominations & LGBT article. There is a difference between Trinitarian and non-Trinitarian Christianity.  All Trinitarian denominations consider Trinitarianism as a central tenet of Christian faith, non-Trinitarian denominations (e.g. Mormonism and Jehova's Witnesses) do not consider Trinitarian denominations as Christian.  Rather than trying to lump them all together, it seems better to have two sections, Trinitarian and non-Trinitarian.  If there is a problem with including UU under 'Christian', perhaps the list should just be 'non-Trinitarian', as I had always understood it was non-Trinitarian and incorporated non-Christian sprirualities as supplemental to Christian teachings.  If we are including UU as a non-Abrahamic faith, then the article should include Hindu and Buddhist sects as well, presumably.  Up to now it has only included denominations - I am not clear that Buddhism and Hinduism has denominations, but sects, while UU is a denomination.  If it is not a denomination, then I am not sure it belongs here.  Ditto for Islam, does Islam have denominations?  As far as I am aware, there are a number of sects - Sunni, Shi'ite, Sufi, etc.  Are these denominations? Mish (talk) 11:53, 7 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I think UU is generally considered an Abrahamic faith, but I don't know why that should matter one way or another for this page. As for sects/denominations/whatever of other religions, I think including them would be entirely reasonable. Lady  of  Shalott  12:20, 7 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Which article splits them like that? While there may be differences between trinitarian and non-trinitarian Christians, it doesn't seem so important aas to split them at a top level, since they're all still Christian (as far as Wikipedia is concerned). It might work as a split under Christianity, but Orthodox/Catholic/Protestant/etc seems like a more relevant split (but still a messy one). But this article isn't about the internal divisions in Christianity, and none of those seem particularly relevant regarding LGBT-affirming denominations. As far as UU, as Unitarian Universalism makes clear, they're not Christian (but have historical roots in Christianity). -Mairi (talk) 21:34, 7 August 2009 (UTC)
 * My mistake - it was Ordination of LGBT Christian clergy Mish (talk) 22:08, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

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Gay god section removed
I haven't seen any source of the sources in the section that calls Tu'er Shen gay god. I tried searching in Google I also didn't find any source that calls him gay god.--SharabSalam (talk) 13:11, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Pastafarians?
Listing a parody religion on the same level as real ones seems highly dubious. It seems like it would violate WP:UNDUE, or something like that...Nlburgin (talk) 03:59, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Satanism
The Satanism section has a clear bias favouring the Satanic Temple, as it attempts to put down the Church of Satan, saying they aren't accepting of LGBT people because of an 'anti-equality' shirt they sold. This shirt could understandably be perceived as tone-deaf, but the quote from Gilmore in the article confirms that the CoS has been accepting of same-sex relationships for at least 17 years. The shirt wasn't a comment against LGBT, but against the notion of 'egalitarianism', which is a running theme in the CoS. This means that they don't think all humans should be treated like they have equal worth, as they believe this discourages strength and self-improvement - this notion is not tied to sexual orientation, gender identity, sex or race. Could this part of the article be reworked? I'm hesitant to do it myself, because I don't want to erase any information. I just believe it is unfair to assert that the CoS is contradictory when talking about same-sex relationships; different members just have different ways of approaching the subject. Also, the information in this article appears to have been lifted off of the Satanic Temple website - specifically this page, which aims to make the CoS look bad and encourage people to join TST instead. Not only is the source not cited, but the source itself is heavily biased. Unfortunately, most members of TST and the CoS needlessly hold petty grudges against each other - even the most important higher-up members. –SmartInternetPerson (talk) 11:01, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree. I also didn't want to remove any information, so I rephrased it and added a citation needed tag, since it is wholly unclear who exactly has publicly criticized the Church of Satan for this. It was also previously written in such a way that painted the Church of Satan in a clearly unnecessary bad light. If someone could fill in the citation though, which I couldn't find, it would instead paint the whole picture in the less biased light. Derposoft (talk) 16:20, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

Removal of "needs additional citations for verification" message?
How do we feel about removing the "needs additional citations for verification" header? Recent editors have been great about adding sources and content. While there's always room for improvement, it looks like the article is now well-sourced and I cannot find any claims that need additional sources. Are we comfortable removing the needs additional citations for verification" message? If not, what claims still need better sourced? --Joiedevivre123321 (talk) 21:40, 6 December 2021 (UTC)