CLGS CALLS UPON ALL PEOPLE OF FAITH TO CONDEMN RECENT NIGERIAN ATTACK
On Thursday, 20 March 2008, a gay man in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, was severely beaten and almost killed because of his leadership role in Changing Attitudes Nigeria (CAN), an organization that seeks to work within the Nigerian Anglican Church to change its position concerning the acceptance and treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons. This unnamed man was attacked while attending a memorial service for the sister of CAN's leader who remains in exile because of threats of violence made against him. The physical attack in Port Harcourt was accompanied by verbal abuse that was, at least in part, religious in nature, suggesting that Christians may well have been complicit in or taken part in the attack.
The Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies in Religion and Ministry (CLGS) calls upon all Christians and other people of faith throughout the world (wherever they may stand on issues relating to homosexuality) to speak with one voice . openly, loudly, and unequivocally . and to denounce this kind of mob violence as being not only illegal but also unchristian and unbiblical.
This kind of mob justice is no longer the law of the land in most nations of the world, including Nigeria. Indeed, Nigeria is signatory to international human rights agreements that make such violence explicitly illegal.
It is well past time for Christians of all denominations, regardless of their respective positions on the many religious and philosophical issues that threaten the spiritual unity of the church throughout the world, to repudiate the use of mob justice . whether religious, secular, or governmental . which Jesus Christ himself condemned.
We recall that the Christian Testament tells of a woman caught in adultery who was brought to Jesus by a group of religious leaders who demanded summary mob justice. These leaders noted that the Law of Moses required death by stoning for an adulterer; they also pointed out to Jesus that mob justice was also approved in this case by Roman law in Judea. As both a Jew and a Judean, Jesus was called upon to disregard his own teachings of forgiveness and unconditional love in this clear-cut case. Instead, however, Jesus turned to the accusers of the adulteress and suggested that only those who had never broken Jewish laws or taboos themselves should execute mob justice on this woman. Since no one, of course, could make such a claim, she was not stoned to death. She was set free. (See John 8:1-11)
"You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself&" Romans 2:1a