Some extreme Christian groups have created an intense hatred of the church and Christians in the GLBT community by their constant opposition of gay rights. Often gays and lesbians were wanting nothing more than to be treated equality and with respect, especially to no longer be treated as sick or as criminals.

Because of this we now see that Christians are often stereotyped as gays and lesbians have been. that is all Christians are judgmental and condemning.

Those who are serious about reaching out to our GLBT community have a lot of ground to make up as a result of those Christians who have not fully understood Jesus’ message of love, grace and forgiveness. The apology has had a profound affect on many gays and lesbians and also those who took part.

At the time of these interviews the language of emergent and missional were not nearly as pronounced as they are today. Many in Australia were defining emergent (village) as a subset of emerging (church) and identifying with the latter over the former. The shift in jargon has helped to make the distinctions between ourselves and emergent village clearer, and I welcome that. But note the article was headed in terms of emerging not emergent. Paul was never limiting his comments to emergent cohorts alone, he understood the “emerging” movement to encompass both “missional” and “emergent” streams when he originally wrote this.