Friday, May 01, 2026

Progressive Christianity?

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Is there even something that could be considered to be "Progressive" Christianity?

And if so, what do they teach? And what makes them "progressive?"

Apparently, if you preach anything that is not the biblical Gospel, you may consider yourself "progressive."

Let's take a closer look at what churches around the country are teaching and preaching in the name of progressive Christianity.

Be informed, not misled.

A woman pastor, who considers herself to be "progressive," circulated this recently:

This is heresy.

Notice the left-wing clichés that start with “I’m a pastor…”

I'm a pastor. Of course, I believe that all lives matter, but right now, black lives are the ones under attack. 

I'm a pastor. Of course, I take seriously God's command to welcome those who are foreigners in your land, because you too were once strangers in a strange land. 

I'm a pastor. Of course, I believe in the separation of church and state, which means theology never gets codified into law.

I'm a pastor. Of course, I believe in healing brokenness, but you will never hear about shame, judgment, or even sin at this church. 

I'm a pastor. Of course, I believe that all lives are sacred, which means that women, and those who can bear children, should make the decisions that they, their doctor, their family, and their God believe is best for them. 

I'm a pastor. Of course, I believe in the salvific nature of the cross, but it was because Jesus nonviolently stood up to the empire and refused to fight back or back down, not because some immature, unhealthy parent God required blood and guts.

I'm a pastor. Of course, I believe we should be exactly as God designed us to be, which means that queer lives are worthy, divine, beloved, and acceptable exactly as they are. No exceptions. 

This is the pastor: 

So much heresy. So much blasphemy. And none of it is the Gospel.

It’s interesting to me how some groups/denominations cling to the traditional elements like stained glass, the collar, candles, etc., but abandon Truth.

In Rockford, Ill., two churches merged a few years ago. First Presbyterian (a liberal PCUSA congregation) and Second Congregational (a UCC church) merged to form Second First Church. In a recent sermon, a woman pastor named Rebecca White Newgren talks about how she’s racist because she doesn’t have enough black friends.

Here's what she had to say:

A woman walked up to me last weekend while I was visiting my alma mater college, and I — we were not friends because she is black. We were not friends because I used to get nervous when I talked to a black person, not because I thought less of them and not because I didn't want to be friends, but I was intimidated by the difference, nervous I might say the wrong thing.

We were not friends because I was naïve and frankly ignorant of what we had in common and all that could have made us friends. And that realization made me sad. I missed out on knowing and being friends with an amazing soul. And I need you to know that that was an expression of racism.

This isn’t so much indicative of progressive Christianity as it is of progressivism in general.

She didn’t make friends with black people because she was scared of saying things that might offend black people.

The pastor's sermon was essentially this:

We know a type of creeping, self-perpetuated sin, and we need to be liberated from this as well, delivered by the almighty God from the depths of privilege, raised to new heights through repentance and the retraining of our habits and our biases, shown an alternative to a preference for all things white, an alternative to thinking that what is white is normal.

And then there is this:

This one comes from a church called HA: N United Methodist Church, whose website says that the congregation is “a multi-ethnic and LGBTQIA celebrating church. It was originally founded by a small group of lay Korean American Christians looking for an alternative to evangelical and conservative theology.”

The lead pastor of HA: N is Sulkiro Song, “a queer Korean American woman” who uses “she/they” pronouns. The church went virtual in 2020 during the pandemic and has stayed that way.

In February, the church hosted a guest speaker. Kimberley Briana Gordy trumpets her pronouns as “she/hers/ella” — are these people doing multilingual pronouns now, too? — and a bizarre bio: "Kimberley is a Womanist and LGBTQIA + affirming spiritual caregiver whose identity as a multiple spiritual belonger draws her to those in liminal spaces with a focus on liberation for each individual."

What do all those words actually mean?

Takeaway

Last week, Fox News reported this:

Democratic House candidate Sarah Trone Garriott's campaign is on the defensive after a resurfaced video showed her recounting her role in the marriage of a pair of satanists while serving as a minister-in-training.

Trone Garriott, a Lutheran minister running in a battleground House district in November’s midterm election, participated in the wedding of a satanist couple in 2006 while serving as an intern pastor in a West Virginia parish.

Nearly two decades later, she delivered remarks for the Des Moines Storytellers Project, where she reflected that the marriage of two satanists in the church offered a "spiritual lesson" about love.

"He asked me to pick the Scriptures," Trone Garriott said on stage in 2023, referring to the senior pastor. "Irritated, I flipped through the Bible. Should I pick something with Satan in it to make them feel more at home?"

The senior pastor went ahead and married them anyway, with Trone Garriott reading the words, "Love is patient; love is kind" over them. 

Though Trone Garriott initially expressed concern about the wedding, by the end of the ceremony, she spoke tenderly about the man with a pentagram tattooed on his face.

At no point in her speech did Trone Garriott suggest that she or the senior pastor had asked the couple to reject satanism.

"So what happened to that couple? I have no idea," Trone Garriott reflected. "We never saw them again."

Trone Garriott wrote an op-ed in 2015 calling out Christian lawmakers who protested a Wiccan-led prayer, arguing, "Jesus engaged with pagans."

Jesus' final instructions to His followers before He ascended were in Acts 1:8,  "...but ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth."

Jesus did not tell His Church to make atheists feel good or homosexuals feel affirmed. 

Christ did not die to affirm sin. He died to pay the price for it.

  • Matthew 28:19-20: Often referred to as part of the Great Commission, Jesus also stated just before this time, "...Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen"

It's time for the Christian Church to get a clear vision of what He has called us to do, and then do it.

Be Informed. Be Discerning. Be Vigilant. Be Engaged. Be Bold. Be Prayerful.

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