A Nazarene pastor and professor who was labeled a heretic and expelled from membership in his denomination told Baptist News Global he still has hope for the church of his childhood to break free of its impulses toward legalism.
“I think these ideas really matter. I’m in it to try to help queer people, to encourage allies and to possibly move the denomination toward an affirming position,” said Thomas Jay Oord, who was expelled from the Church of the Nazarene July 28 after a trial that found his pro-LGBTQ beliefs are heresy.
Oord spoke with BNG from his home in Nampa, Idaho, less than 48 hours after the verdict came down from the jury of four clergy and two laypeople.
“We, the members of the Regional Board of Discipline, unanimously find to a moral certainty and beyond a reasonable doubt … that Thomas Jay Oord is guilty of conduct unbecoming a minister and of teaching doctrines out of harmony with the doctrinal statement of the Church of the Nazarene,” the verdict reads.
“Thomas Jay Oord is guilty of conduct unbecoming a minister and of teaching doctrines out of harmony with the doctrinal statement of the Church of the Nazarene.”
That verdict not only revokes Oord’s ordination but added the unusual and harsh provision of expelling him from membership in the 2.5 million-member denomination that is part of the larger Wesleyan Holiness movement. That apparently means Oord, who already had been banned from preaching, no longer will be able to volunteer to hold babies in the church nursery.
Oord is the second clergyperson to be defrocked by the Nazarenes in short order.
Selden “Dee” Kelley speaks at Point Loma Nazarene University in 2019. (YouTube/PLNU Chapel)
Selden “Dee” Kelley, who served as pastor of San Diego First Church of the Nazarene for 17 years, last year was found guilty of teaching that contradicts church doctrine by writing an essay, “A Hope for Change,” in Oord’s book Why the Church of the Nazarene Should be Fully LGBTQ+ Affirming.
Two other Nazarene pastors surrendered their credentials without a trial: Jim Scharn was asked to kick out two church members who served on its praise team for allegedly being involved in a same-sex relationship he was unaware of. He refused. Rick Power, a Nazarene pastor and leader for 46 years, resigned in April from his job as superintendent of the church’s Hawaii-Pacific District. His crime was failing to discipline his daughter Rachel, a part-time district employee, who had officiated at a same-sex wedding five years earlier.
A lightning rod
Oord has been a lightning rod for conservative critics in the Nazarene Church for years. That critique came to a head last year with publication of the book he coauthored with his daughter, Alexa Oord.
That book was the culmination of years of thought and study on the topic. Oord told BNG his views on same-sex relations began to change in 1994 while he was a seminary student.
He and a couple of classmates “decided to take on these issues as a class project, and so I read the scholarly literature, I looked at … all the biblical passages that are typically appealed to and whatever sociological stuff and psychological stuff was available and I just came to think that same-sex sexual behavior could be compatible with authentic Christianity.”
Oord acknowledges his pathway to an affirming theology differs from most Christians, who more commonly change their minds after someone they know or love comes out as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.
“I’m the weirdo. I changed my mind academically by looking at the Scriptures and reading things.”
“I’m the weirdo. I changed my mind academically by looking at the Scriptures and reading things,” he said with a laugh. “I wasn’t persuaded by the incredible generosity and capability of some queer person I knew.”
But even then, knowing the beliefs of his denomination, he had to hold his ideals close. He did so, he said, for the sake of kids and young adults who needed a lifeline.
“I stayed partly because I knew a lot of other Nazarenes who held that view — I wasn’t the only one, especially among the educated — and also because I felt like I might be able to help kids who had these questions and identified as what today we would call queer,” he explained. “And so that’s what I did for 25 years, trying to work from the inside to bring change.
Thomas Jay Oord
“That’s a tough thing because you feel guilty a lot that you’re not doing more. Oh yeah, you’re helping lots of kids and not just queer kids but also straight kids to think through these issues.”
Oord taught at Eastern Nazarene College and Northwest Nazarene University. He was pushed out of his job at Northwest Nazarene in 2015 and now teaches at Northwind Theological Seminary, which is a Christian school not controlled by the Church of the Nazarene.
In the Saturday verdict against him, the Nazarene court said: “Oord has shown absolutely no repentance or willingness to submit to the authority of the church,” and “his behavior exhibits a pattern of disregard and disrespect for authority.”
Legalism vs. love
From his perspective, Oord sees a battle raging inside the Church of the Nazarene between those who focus on legalism and those who focus on love.
“This is a battle fueled by the broader culture wars.”
“This is a battle fueled by the broader culture wars between a younger generation (that thinks) the theological center revolves around issues of love and standing for the marginalized and justice and another group, comprised primarily of older people, that sees our center primarily in terms of ethical markers that make us distinctive from what they would call the liberal culture or secular culture,” he said.
This is why so many young people are leaving the Christian church in general and churches in the Holiness movement in particular, he said. “The last time I looked on Pew Research, the Holiness movement is the worst at keeping our youth. The only people worse than us are the atheists. And so, people are leaving, and kids are leaving, in droves. And it’s not just the queer issue, but that’s probably the most prominent one right now.”
The conservative movement within the Church of the Nazarene is concerned about purity at all costs, he said.
This is not unlike what has happened in the Southern Baptist Convention and The United Methodist Church. The SBC has taken such a strident stand on doctrinal purity against women in ministry that it last year expelled its largest church for ordaining women and allowing women to preach. The UMC currently is experiencing a schism, with the theological purists against LGBTQ inclusion leaving to form their own denomination.
The Church of the Nazarene and the UMC come from the same family tree. Both trace their roots back to John Wesley.
“Our group started in 1908 as a conservative reaction to the Methodists we thought were too liberal,” Oord explained. “They were dancing and smoking and going to theaters and going to baseball games and all that sort of stuff.”
Nazarenes emphasized righteous living and the theological doctrine known as sanctification — “which meant living a pure and holy life.”
Blurred denominational lines
Current culture war trends have blurred denominational lines, Oord said. “For the typical Nazarene in the pew, it’s hard to distinguish that person from the typical Southern Baptist in the pew — in terms of their worldview and their theological assumptions. The typical Nazarene academic is very different, and a growing number of young people are different as well.”
“For the typical Nazarene in the pew, it’s hard to distinguish that person from the typical Southern Baptist in the pew.”
Understanding some of the trends that are driving national politics and the rise of Christian nationalism helps explain what’s happening in the Church of the Nazarene, he said. “My verdict has to do with the wider culture wars and people like me who also are opposed to Christian nationalism, don’t like Donald Trump and believe science can tell us truth even if it doesn’t seem to fit that literal reading of Scripture.
“I’m sure this is playing out in lots of denominations,” he continued. “What makes us different is our heritage has been as a pretty conservative denomination, with pretty strict codes. But there’s a growing dissatisfaction with that strictness and so there’s a fight, there’s a battle, there’s an attempt to try to gain control.”
Oord admits “there’s not a lot of hope for folks like me in the short run” but predicts “in the long run, we’ve got demographics on our side.”
The Church of the Nazarene already is experiencing the same kind of numerical decline most U.S. denominations have been seeing for years now. Thus, one fear of denominational leaders, Oord said, is with the Methodist split that has created the new Global Methodist Church, “there’s now a conservative option available.”
Nazarene leaders worry that “unless we really toe the hard conservative line, then the Nazarenes will just join the Global Methodist Church. They’ll just switch over to the conservative version of Methodism and leave the Nazarene Church.”
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