Congregations in Conflict: The Battle Over Homosexuality in Nine Churches

by Keith Hartman

Book Overview

A Methodist church puts its minister on trial after he marches in a gay rights parade. A Quaker meeting struggles to decide whether to marry a lesbian couple. An entire congregation is thrown out of the Southern Baptist Convention for deciding that a gay divinity student had a sincere calling to the ministry, and an order of celibate monks comes out of the closet. An Episcopal priest blesses two same-sex relationships--then a closeted gay lawyer leads...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0813522293
• ISBN13: 9780813522296
• Release Date: January 1996
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press
• Length: 195 Pages
• Weight: 1.22 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

A Fascinating Book

I bought this book, thinking it might contain good information but reconciled to the fact that it would probably be boring. NOT!!!! It is written in the style of "And The Band Played On." The stories arise from situations in churches in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area of NC. There's a good bit about Duke Divinity School also. Seeing the conflicts through the eyes of participants (some of whom I actually know) made them so real, so powerful. This book was very well researched and reaches some helpful conclusions. I recommend it highly.

Fascinating book that reads like a series of mysteries.

The book takes a crime-story approach to specific battles over homosexuality in each denomination in a small area of the country. You want to keep reading so that you can find out what happens. And some of the outcomes are really surprising, like the Baptist church that ends up blessing the gay union.