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A ray of sunshine: A megachurch preacher repents. [View all]
Author of Christian relationship guide says he has lost his faithJoshua Harris says his marriage is over and apologises to LGBT+ people for promoting bigotry
Harriet Sherwood - Religion correspondent @harrietsherwood
Mon 29 Jul 2019
Link: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/29/author-christian-relationship-guide-joshua-harris-says-marriage-over
(snips)
The American author of a bestselling Christian guide to relationships for young people has announced that his marriage is over and he has lost his faith. Joshua Harris, whose biblical guide to relationships I Kissed Dating Goodbye sold nearly 1m copies around the world after it was published in 1997, has also apologised to LGBT+ people for contributing to a “culture of exclusion and bigotry”.
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“To those who read my book and were misdirected or unhelpfully influenced by it, I am sincerely sorry.” This month he announced on Instagram that he and his wife were separating after 21 years of marriage because “significant changes have taken place in both of us”. Another Instagram message posted nine days later said he had “undergone a massive shift in regard to my faith in Jesus”.
He wrote: “The popular phrase for this is ‘deconstruction’, the biblical phrase is ‘falling away’. By all the measurements that I have for defining a Christian, I am not a Christian. Many people tell me that there is a different way to practise faith and I want to remain open to this, but I’m not there now.”
He added: “I have lived in repentance for the past several years – repenting of my self-righteousness, my fear-based approach to life, the teaching of my books, my views of women in the church, and my approach to parenting to name a few. “But I specifically want to add to this list now: to the LGBTQ+ community, I want to say that I am sorry for the views that I taught in my books and as a pastor regarding sexuality.
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“To those who read my book and were misdirected or unhelpfully influenced by it, I am sincerely sorry.” This month he announced on Instagram that he and his wife were separating after 21 years of marriage because “significant changes have taken place in both of us”. Another Instagram message posted nine days later said he had “undergone a massive shift in regard to my faith in Jesus”.
He wrote: “The popular phrase for this is ‘deconstruction’, the biblical phrase is ‘falling away’. By all the measurements that I have for defining a Christian, I am not a Christian. Many people tell me that there is a different way to practise faith and I want to remain open to this, but I’m not there now.”
He added: “I have lived in repentance for the past several years – repenting of my self-righteousness, my fear-based approach to life, the teaching of my books, my views of women in the church, and my approach to parenting to name a few. “But I specifically want to add to this list now: to the LGBTQ+ community, I want to say that I am sorry for the views that I taught in my books and as a pastor regarding sexuality.
I suggest this guy start a rehab center for evangelical preachers led astray by the almighty dollar and thirst for power.....
39 replies
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