Recently, Woodstock Church, which is a member of the Southern Baptist Convention, has garnered large amounts of controversy and criticism after threatening to expel one of its members for being lesbian.
Openly gay Christian, Krystal Cox received a letter on April 1 from the elders of the church she attended that threatened to excommunicate her from the church if she did apologize for and openly repent from her sexuality by April 30. Cox had a very negative reaction to the letter and described herself as being ‘deeply hurt.’
“I honestly felt kind of enraged when I first read the letter.”- Krystal Cox
Cox decided she was going to leave the church and posted a picture of the letter on Instagram and the post quickly went viral, garnering several thousand likes, shares, and comments within only a few hours. Many Christians and nonbelievers alike have reached out to Cox to express their support and sympathy.
Maddy Trammel, a sophomore business major, disagreed heavily with the actions of the church. “I’m a devout Christian and personally believe that marriage should be between one man and one woman, but I still think it was completely wrong of Woodstock to threaten to expel this woman from the church. Everyone is a sinner and no one is perfect, so if you kick out one person for sinning, you have to kick out pretty much everyone,” said Trammel.
Adam Herring, a junior finance major, also condemned the decision of the church saying, “I believe that everyone should be free to worship in church, regardless of whether or not they’re straight or gay. I don’t really think it’s the elders’ decision to decide who is and isn’t allowed to come to church, it should be open to everyone.”
Max Browning, a junior political science major, also criticized the actions of the church, but from a different perspective. “I’m an atheist and this is one of the many instances that show the harm that religion does. There’s nothing immoral at all about being gay or lesbian and if the God that this church worships says that loving the wrong person is a sin, they should really pick a different God to worship,” said Farley.
