THE Dutch Reformed Church, found guilty of discriminating against a music teacher by sacking him when they discovered he was gay, is in a quandary over the apology it has been ordered to make.
Dominee Dirkie van der Spuy, head of the Moreleta Park congregation in Pretoria, was disappointed by the High Court judgment in favour of Johan Strydom, who won his discrimination case earlier this week.
The pastor said the church would have to study the judgment before deciding on how to apologise to Strydom.
He added that the church could not, however, apologise for the word of God.
But Christian values teach us to reach out to everyone in love, even to the sinner. We would want him (Strydom) to have peace.
Calling a man a “sinner” after you’ve just been found guilty of discriminating against him is hardly a good start to a judicially-ordered apology.
What Van der Spuy should be saying, we respectfully suggest, is:
We are a bunch of pathetic, deluded balmpots who used a foolish old book written by superstition-riddled primitives to treat you like shit, just as we used it for decades to justify treating all non-white South Africans like shit. We are an affront to humanity, and we apologise to you unconditionally for any distress our Christian bigotry caused you.
See? Easy!
Strydom, according to Pretoria News, said a public apology by the church would help other homosexuals. He added that the judgment would mean a lot to other gay people in the workplace, and prospective employers would now have to adhere to sound labour practices.
His lawyer, James Spies, said although they would prefer a public apology, the court only stipulated that it should be an unconditional apology.
It will have to be done within a reasonable time and I think it will probably be by way of a letter.
Spies added that the constitution prevailed over the right to religious freedom.
It means that you cannot infringe upon another’s right because of your religious beliefs.
Van der Spuy said the church would consider whether it would appeal the judgment.
UPDATE – September 2, 2008: Predictably, there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth among certain fundies in S Africa, as this report indicates. We predict that this story will run, and run.
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The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
August 30th, 2008 at 11:11 pm
Interesting that Christians find it so hard to get on with gays. You get the feeling that if a serial child killer said he was quitting murder for Jesus he’d be more welcome in church than a man who happens to be in love with another man. What is it these people have with sex? They can’t seriously believe the creator of our staggeringly ancient, vast universe cares that much about one little species’ sexual antics, so why do they?
August 31st, 2008 at 5:45 am
Valdemar, that is exactly what they believe.
Here’s a part of my opinion on the matter: they have been taught or discovered that sex or at least certain types of love make them feel uncomfortable. Then, to explain this irrational feeling, they decide this must be the will of the imaginary supreme being (who, after all is in their heads anyway.)
You often hear the religious types use these kinds of irrational excuses for more mundane matters. “I didn’t know what to do about (insert personal moral crisis here), so I opened up my bible, closed my eyes and picked a verse at random. And guess what! God spoke to me through that verse and told me to (insert irrational, emotional and possibly cruel action that they wanted to do in the first place and now feel perfectly justified to do.)
August 31st, 2008 at 8:07 pm
I think Strydom’s opinion that the to me very encouraging and highly surprising court decision will help other gays is true only to some extent - unfortunately. In my experience, so many South African gays seem to insist on staying in the church, even when it continues to persecute and demean them with its tunnel-vision self-righteousness, Strydom himself included. Aftr all, he describes himself as a “born again Xian”, and says that that was one of the things the Much Deformed Church didn’t like about him, in his opinion - quite apart from his sexual orientation! By expresing such sentiments, he affirms his loyalty to the church. These gays seem to believe that an outcome both possible and desirable is for them to reform the church from within to accept homosexuality. When will they ever learn? as Marlene Dietrich asked, or, to put it another way, when will people learn to consign all superstition, including religion, to oblivion? Even Strydom still seems to need that crutch, regrettably.
Also, one fears the battle may not necessarily have been won yet, and popping open the bubbly now might just be a little premature. On the morning after the finding, the Afrikaans press was asking how far the courts have a right to interfere in this essentially Afrikaans church’s internal/private affairs. It will be interesting to see if the church does decide to appeal the decision, as it says it may.