God Willing - LGBT Christians ask megachurch Willow Creek to include their families

[via the wonderful gay and lesbian editor at time out chicago - jason heidemann]

Willow Creek Community Church isn’t like the austere places of worship that many of us attended in our youth. Families don’t huddle together in pews on a hot Sunday morning while a robed man of faith reads from the good book. On the contrary, Willow Creek, located in suburban South Barrington (Illinois), is big and boisterous. Its 20,000-plus members fill the stadium seats even on a Saturday night. Sermons are witty and engaging and pale only in comparison to the theatrical elements of the evening—productions so lavish and well executed that they make some of Chicago’s theater performances look like cheap dime-store theatrics. Most noticeably, there’s not a cross in sight. In short, it’s a fun place to worship God.

But at Willow Creek and other megachurches across the country, homosexuality is still a sin and LGBT families still find themselves left out of the fold. According to Pastor Kevin L. Downer, who leads the year-old AChurch4Me at the Center on Halsted (a ministry of the gay-founded Metropolitan Community Church), Willow Creek still practices religious-based homophobia. “I know that they have what we would term an ex-gay ministry,” he says. “We do know of a number of LGBT people…who are challenged by the theology which basically says if you want to become a member of this church, if you want to have a leadership position, then you need to leave the lifestyle.”

Read the rest in Time Out Chicago.