Posted on 03/26/2014 3:41:00 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
After days of backlash from Evangelicals, World Vision, an international nonprofit ministry, has reversed its decision to allow those in same-sex marriages to be employed.
"Today, the World Vision U.S. board publicly reversed its recent decision to change our national employment conduct policy," the Christian humanitarian organization said in a letter to supporters Wednesday. "The board acknowledged they made a mistake and chose to revert to our longstanding conduct policy requiring sexual abstinence for all single employees and faithfulness within the Biblical covenant of marriage between a man and a woman."
World Vision has come under heavy criticism since it made public on Monday its policy change. In a letter to its employees that was shared with The Christian Post on Monday, World Vision President Richard Stearns announced that while the organization is not endorsing same-sex marriage, it recognizes that its staff is comprised of believers from more than 50 denominations, some of which have sanctioned same-sex marriage. Thus, its board has decided to defer the issue to local churches, in its effort to "treat all of our employees equally."
Stearns' letter regarding World Vision's change in employee practices notes that the board spent several years praying for discernment about their decision after having witnessed the debate over same-sex marriage "tear apart the Body of Christ," in families, churches, Christian universities and denominations.
"The board and I wanted to prevent this divisive issue from tearing World Vision apart and potentially crippling our ability to accomplish our vital kingdom mission of loving and serving the poorest of the poor in the name of Christ," he stated.
The policy change drew criticism from such prominent Evangelicals as evangelist Franklin Graham and George Wood of the Assemblies of God.
"My dear friend, Bob Pierce, the founder of World Vision and Samaritan's Purse, would be heartbroken," said Graham, president and CEO of Samaritan's Purse and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. "He was an evangelist who believed in the inspired Word of God. World Vision maintains that their decision is based on unifying the church – which I find offensive – as if supporting sin and sinful behavior can unite the church. From the Old Testament to the New Testament, the Scriptures consistently teach that marriage is between a man and woman and any other marriage relationship is sin."
On Tuesday, the Assemblies of God issued a statement encouraging its churches and individual members to "gradually shift support away from the U.S. branch of World Vision to Assemblies of God World Missions, and other Pentecostal and evangelical charities that maintain biblical standards of sexual morality."
Denouncing World Vision's decision to allow people who are in a legal same-sex marriages to be employed at the nonprofit organization, Wood, general superintendent of the Assemblies of God, said that World Vision's policy change "cannot be construed as anything but an endorsement of same-sex marriage."
"Far from promoting Christian unity, the policy change enlists World Vision on the liberal Protestant side of the same-sex marriage debate as opposed to that of Pentecostal and Evangelical churches in the U.S., not to mention Pentecostal and Evangelical churches worldwide," said Wood, who represents a fellowship of more than 3 million members.
The Christian Post continues to reach out to World Vision for comment.
Amen to that.
IDIOTS!!! These two are TOO STUPID to keep their jobs!!<P.GAY.....GAY.....GAY.....ABORTION.....GAY....ABORTION....God will NOT be mocked!!
I still want to know how they came to the original anti-Christ decision in the first place.
They conveniently left that out of their letter.
I will conveniently leave any money out of any correspondence I send them from now on.
I can do no other because I actually read the bible and make my decisions accordingly.
Stearns is usually a Jewish name.....could he be Jewish?
Lots of wolves in positions of power at World Vision. Jesus always loved the sinner but he never accepted & tolerated the sin. The apostles faced jail for confronting sinners.
Yep, World Vision revealed their feet of clay.
Too late WV. You’ve already shown your hand.
I can’t help but be reminded of an episode of Malcolm In The Middle, or maybe it was the opening sequence, but one of the boys is watching bugs fly into a bug zapper. As he watches each bug get zapped he remarks, “Stupid.” After watching a series of bugs get zapped he reaches up and touches the zapper and gets zapped himself. We have seen huge public support for people and companies that stand for their Christian Beliefs, (Chik-Fil-A, and the Duck Dynasty dudes), and we have seen good companies marginalize themselves trying to appease the homosexual community. How many more times will squeamish Christians bow before the extremely small group who march before God in proud defiance of his word, before they understand?
Color me skeptical and judgemental, but I’m betting they did this more out of cost-benefit analysis of threats to their donation income, than any sense of moral right & wrong.
Precisely.
The initial decision to allow homosexuals to work for them is all I need to know.
No Christian organization would have even considered such a policy in the first place.
Where are the resignations of the people who initially supported homosexual marriage?
The problem is that so many people are ‘listening to their hearts’ and not reading the word.
The heart will lead you astray.
I’ll believe their sincerity when I see the resignations of board members behind this mockery of God. They have shown themselves to be unqualified to serve as leaders in a Christian organization.
There is no way they didn’t know this would be the reaction.
You’ve got to wonder if they were in the corporate offices snorting coke and downing shots when some bright guy says, “Let’s see what happens if we claim endorsing gay marriage will unify the conservative church.” “Far out, man,” says another while lighting up a big doobie, “Maybe we’ll make the evening news.”
And so they did.
Sorry...i think this is just a financial move.
Komen foundation all over again.
Precisely. Not sorry, just sorry they got caught and see the money going away.
Ah they read FR! Good job declare victory.
Anyone who "sanctions" same sex marriage is not a believer. At least not as the Bible defines it.
Here are World Vision’s audited financial statements for the year 2011: http://www.worldvision.org/resources.nsf/Main/annual-review-2011-resources/$FILE/ar2011-audited-financial-statement.pdf
I see a section on page 3 titled “Public Cash and Food Commodity Grants” <—— This would seem to me to mean “Government Funding” totaling $240,950 (in thousands of dollars so that must mean almost $241 million if I understand this correctly). So, they may well have been pressured by the Government. This may be what all of this is about.
It will be interesting to see how this develops. Maybe they had no government pressure so they could have a.) just decided to make the decision themselves, highly unlikely to me or b.) were pressured by another special interest group (advocates for same-sex unions, sounds logical since this is what this was about) on this matter. I will add in c.) also, perhaps a company could have pressured them too, a company that gives them commodities and supports so-called “diversity” such as Nabisco.
A mistake in adhering to basic scripture? Nonsense. They got caught. That’s why they’re sorry.
Phooey on them.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.