Dear Church and Friends of FCC
We are very privileged once again to have Rev O Young, of the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC) in New York, www.mccny.org, visit us during the weekend of May 17 & 18. Below (and in the attached in chinese) are details of a talk in Mandarin he will give on Sat May 17, and I urge us to invite our Chinese-speaking friends, especially if they are Christians, to this event.
He will also be preaching from our pulpit on Sunday, May 18 (in English), so there's another opportunity to invite our friends.
Date: May 17 Saturday
Time: 7 - 9pm
Place: FCC, 56 Lor 23 Geylang, Century-Technology Bldg, 3fl.
Topic: Christians and the Bible (Chinese)
Date: May 18 Sunday Worship
Time: 10.30am
Place: FCC, 56 Lor 23 Geylang, Century-Technology Bldg, 3fl.
Sermon: God is Calling (English)
Scriptures: Revelation 7:9-17, John 10:27-30
For those of you new to our church, Rev O Young is a prolific chinese author and the first openly gay Malaysian pastor currently serving at MCC NY and doing his doctoral studies.
He says, "As a Christian, I believe in Jesus. I always believe that the central Christian metaphor is God is Love; and perhaps this is the only definition of God in the Bible. I see Jesus as the ultimate manifestation of God’s love, not because he died a horrible death for us but rather how he had lived his life.
From the gospels, I can easily see that Jesus is primarily compassionate and concerned with human beings’ well-being. Human well-being, according to Jesus, is understood primarily in terms of relationships and community. I believe we are the Church and the Church is for everyone, and God does not give higher status to one than another.
The Christian faith community is neither exclusive nor status-bound. I believe the Bible is inspired by God. However, all readings are interpretation and the interpretation of scripture is historically contextualized. That said, I believe we, as queer people should challenge forcefully the assumptions and intentions of heterosexists that have been overlooked so long by so many biblical interpreters and Christians, such as patriarchy, homophobic and xenophobic attitudes of the time in which the texts were written and the scriptures were read."
Rev O Young in Singapore (May 4)
Sunday, May 4, 2008
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