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03/18/2004: "Lesbian pastor's trial starts, silliness makes early appearance"

The trial of United Methodist pastor Karen Dammann, accused of violating the church's prohibition on active gays in the ministry, began Friday in Seattle. According to this AP story, one of Dammann's witnesses made an interesting comparison between the trial and Jesus' crucifixion:

One of her first witnesses Wednesday was Mary Ann Tolbert, a professor of biblical studies at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, Calif., and executive director of its Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies.

Tolbert said the church is inconsistent in how it applies its Book of Discipline. At one time, for example, divorce was not allowed, but the church has since changed its stance, she said.

"It seems to me that, with all due respect, you are acting as a hypocrite," she said.

This has got to be garbled by the reporter. Surely Tolbert is not so dumb as to not understand the distinction between changing the Discipline and ignoring it.

Tolbert reminded the jurors that Jesus was killed because he disagreed with the religious norms of his time.

Do you suppose anyone will head up to Seattle to protest Tolbert's obvious accusation of "deicide" directed at the Jews of Jesus' day? I mean, what did the Romans care about Jewish "religious norms"?

I also wonder why people like Tolbert seem so incapable of understanding the difference between form and substance. Jesus was not crucified because He "disagreed with the religious norms of his time." Lots of people had religious disagreements within first century Judaism. What does she think the divisions between Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes were about, the proper way to prepare lox?

Look, here are a few other examples of people who "disagree with the religious norms" of today's United Methodist Church: skinheads, Neo-Nazis, Klansmen, anti-Semites, polygamists, atheists, and worshippers of Gozer. Should David Duke be ordained and lionized in the UMC because he "disagrees with the religious norms" set down in the Discipline?

"We have to be very careful, you have to be very careful, that you don't replicate the crucifixion of Jesus in what you do," she said.

As far as I know, no one has ever been killed for not abiding by the Methodist Discipline. And as far as I can discern, losing your ordination is not really the same thing as execution. But this kind of melodramatic victim-mongering is standard fare in the religious gay rights movement. Dr. Tolbert no doubt had to be carried from the church with an acute case of the vapors.