An Open Letter to the Christian Reformed Church of North America

Hi there, 

You don’t know me. I mean why should you? 

My name is Peter, and I attended a CRCNA Church essentially my entire life. I grew up at a Christian Reformed Church in Edmonton, Classis Alberta North. I attended Sunday school, Sunday services, youth group, became their summer intern for children’s ministry and I was even their Associate Director of Children’s Ministry for a couple years. I invested my life there and only left there because they couldn’t continue to help me grow in my God-given gifts and abilities anymore, and that is okay. My entire extended family attends CRC churches. The point is, I was well acquainted with the CRC, and called it home. I still called it home even though I didn’t attend. That changed with Synod 2022. You have made it abundantly clear that I, and my queer siblings, are not welcome here. 

I knew that when I came out in 2018 that things would change. I anticipated being asked to leave the church I was serving (don’t worry it wasn’t CRC at that point), and I anticipated losing some friends. When I first heard that the CRC was putting together a committee for the Human Sexuality Report (HSR), I was hopeful that maybe something would change. Well, I was proven wrong. 

I want to start out by stating that when I read the HSR I was dismayed. Seeing the committee of predominantly non-queer individuals was disheartening. For an area of theology that has immense ramifications for a very real community within the CRC, this was not only rude, but frankly callous. Having other people decide what the Bible says about me, and for me, is ridiculous. I also found the lack of actual, queer-led, queer theology hugely misguided and miscalculated. There are many amazing queer theologians you could have read, cited, and met with to grasp a fuller, beautiful and colourful interpretation of the mere 6 verses used to oppress.

So, am I surprised with the results of the vote from this year's Synod? Not really? I had little hope that the CRCNA would actually provide pastoral care when the committee, and CRCNA itself, had already decided against my humanity. What I am most disappointed in is the lack of apparent empathy, forethought, and pastoral concern for queer individuals, their partners, their children and their extended family. Raising this to confessional status will have severe consequences for the CRCNA, and I honestly hope it does. I am angry. I am sad and, with all due respect, I hope that this causes serious questioning in the CRCNA as a denomination– from its office bearers, congregations, and individual members. The arrogance is unChristlike. 

I also want to talk to those pastors who hold credentials with the CRCNA. Now is the time to critically think about where your allegiance lies. Christ welcomes all to his table, no matter their skin colour, language, socio-economic background, ability, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression. How, in good conscience, can you lead a church and provide pastoral guidance to a diverse community, when the institution you hold credentials with is beginning to draw up boundary lines of who is in and who is out. The CRCNA has grossly overstepped their role. Christ welcomes all to His table, and God alone will decide where the boundaries are. I hope and pray that each and every pastor in the CRCNA, every elder and deacon will actually reflect on this decision's consequences. The CRCNA has now codified rejection, marginalization and oppression by this decision. Sure, they do it in the name of “holding truth and grace together” but in reality they have codified the very thing that Jesus came to dismantle.

Most importantly, I want to address the Queer Christian community who calls the CRCNA home. You are God’s dearly beloved. God looks at you and sees that you are wonderfully and beautifully created. God knew you in fullness before you were even born. This decision does not reflect the worth or dignity that God bestows on you because you are God’s child. I pray for you in this time that you would rest in the arms of the Great Parent who comforts and defends you, and the Great Friend you can confide in. I pray that you would find a true community–a community that welcomes all of you and doesn’t ask you to change to meet people’s expectations and standards. There is community waiting to embrace you with God’s unconditional love. 

In the blood of Christ, 

Peter Taylor-Visser