Michael Brown is quite upset that Sojourners head Jim Wallis now supports marriage equality, and in a column for Charisma yesterday accused Wallis of “apostasy” and taking the “path to spiritual and moral suicide.” “Rev. Wallis, you have brought reproach to the name of Jesus, to the Word of God and to evangelical Christianity,” Brown writes, “you will need to humble yourself and repent.”
Rev. Wallis, you have brought reproach to the name of Jesus, to the Word of God and to evangelical Christianity.
You raised concerns for many of us when you argued in 2008 that justice requires Christians to support (and even bless) same-sex unions, but you also stated clearly in 2008, “I don’t think the sacrament of marriage should be changed. Some people say that Jesus didn’t talk about homosexuality, and that’s technically true. But marriage is all through the Bible, and it’s not gender-neutral.”
Now you have declared your support for the radical redefinition of marriage, explaining, “I think we have to talk about, now, how to include same-sex couples in that deeper understanding of marriage. I want a deeper commitment to marriage that is more and more inclusive, and that’s where I think the country is going.”
How can you say this as a student of the Word and a professing disciple of Jesus?
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Rev. Wallis, you don’t strengthen marriage by removing its foundational components—as emphasized by Jesus Himself in Matthew 19—namely, one man and one woman coming together in sacred, lifelong union. Instead, by advocating for the radical redefinition of marriage, you align yourself with the many groups in America who want to marginalize, ostracize and even criminalize religious opposition to same-sex “marriage.” What has become of your Christian conscience?
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What? Jim Wallis, the critic of the religious establishment; Jim Wallis, the counter-cultural revolutionary; Jim Wallis, the advocate of a Jesus who changes the world rather than conforms to it. You, sir, are now willing to redefine one of the most foundational and sacred human institutions, the institution of marriage, based on where the country is going? Isn’t that the path to spiritual and moral suicide?
You of all people should know that as followers of Jesus, we are called to swim against the conformist, worldly tide of the age, calling society back to the timeless ways of God, especially when society forsakes the Word of God and the God of the Word. Yet you have now joined in the apostasy, choosing to go with the populist flow—one that is becoming more anti-faith by the day—rather than having the courage and integrity to stand your ground.
Rev. Wallis, your best years of ministry could still be ahead, but you will need to humble yourself and repent. I am praying that you do.
