Marriage – Page 19 – Family Council

Teach Your Church About Homosexuality

Sep 30, 2015Jerry CoxHomosexualityHomosexuality, LGBTQ, Marriage, Same-Sex Marriage

Today we continue our series highlighting special material our friends at Focus on the Family have provided for your family and your church.

Below are two guides Focus on the Family has released on teaching your church about homosexuality and gender confusion.

The guides outline:

The cultural shift we are seeing on homosexuality;
Ways in which gay activists have distorted biblical teaching on homosexuality;
God’s good design for marriage and sexuality;
How to lay a solid foundation for teaching your church about marriage and sexuality;
Ways in which the church can show Christ-like love to people who struggle with homosexuality without affirming the homosexual lifestyle.

These guides are designed to equip you as a leader in your family and in your church. You can download them below or from our “Resources For Your Church and Family” page.

Understanding Male Homosexuality: God’s Power to Change Lives, by Jeff Johnston.

What Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality? Answering Revisionist Gay Theology.

Talking to Your Church About Homosexuality: A Guide for Pastors and Church Leaders, by Jeff Johnston.

How Should We Respond? An Exhortation to the Church on Loving the Homosexual, by Joe Dallas.

Pope: Conscientious Objection to Same-Sex Marriage “a Human Right”

Sep 28, 2015Jerry CoxReligious FreedomMarriage, Religious Freedom, Religious Liberty, Same-Sex Marriage

Before concluding his first visit to the United States, Pope Francis voiced support on Monday for people who decline to solemnize or otherwise facilitate same-sex marriages.

According to NBC News, Pope Francis was asked, “Do you … support those individuals, including government officials, who say they cannot in good conscience, their own personal conscience, abide by some laws or discharge their duties as government officials, for example when issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples?”

According to NBC, the pontiff responded, saying:

“I can say that conscientious objection is a right that is a part of every human right. It is a right. . . . Conscientious objection must enter into every juridical structure because it is a right, a human right. Otherwise we would end up in a situation where we select what is a right, saying, ‘this right that has merit, this one does not.’ . . . It is a human right and if a government official is a human person, he has that right. It is a human right.”

Given the Catholic Church’s longstanding history fighting for rights of conscience on issues ranging from military service to abortion, Pope Francis’ remarks really come as no surprise. Bishop Anthony Taylor of the Catholic Diocese of Little Rock summed it up very well a few years ago, when he told a crowd gathered outside the Capitol Building, “Government must not require what conscience forbids or forbid what conscience requires.”

Photo Credit: Jeffrey Bruno from New York City, United States [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

Teach Your Kids About Marriage

Sep 23, 2015Jerry CoxMarriageMarriage

Over the next several days we will be highlighting special material our friends at Focus on the Family have provided for your family and your church.

Today we want to share a two-part guide Focus on the Family has released on teaching your kids about marriage.

The guide discusses:

Ways to model healthy marriage habits to your children;
How marriage benefits children;
How marriage benefits adults;
Age-appropriate conversations you can have with your children about marriage as they grow up;
Ways to pray with your kids and build a stronger family.

You can download these resources below or from our “Resources For Your Church and Family” page.