ANALYSIS

The Michigan diocese of the Episcopal Church has its first female and openly lesbian bishop. Rev. Bonnie A. Perry was ordained Saturday during a ceremony in the Detroit suburb of Dearborn.

Perry, who was elected in June, said in a news conference that "if you look at scripture, Jesus said absolutely nothing about homosexuality and over and over again, we see Jesus always with people who were perceived by other folks to be on the margin, to be outsiders or less than or not worthy."

The first portion of her comments violates what orthodox Christianity and Judaism have taught for thousands of years.

"Revisionist gay theology violates God's intentional design for gender and sexuality," Focus on the Family explains. "Revisionist theology places human feelings and desires above biblical truth, leading people to believe lies. Often those having a personal interest in the promotion of gay revisionist theology twist the plain teaching of Scripture to support and justify their behavior."

"The argument that Jesus said nothing about homosexuality in the gospels is misleading and illogical for at least five reasons," the Christian organization explains.

One of the reasons is explained by citing a Bible verse in which Jesus made it clear that heterosexuality is God's standard:

"Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, "Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh"? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate."- Matthew 19:4-6

And critics point out that the LGBT claim that "Jesus never condemned homosexuality" ignores the fact that he didn't need to address the issue because the entire Jewish culture and faith were already opposed to homosexuality, so there was no debate about it at that time. The New Testament clearly condemns homosexuality as a sin in later verses that were addressed to non-Jewish cultures where people were confused about the issue, like the Christians living in the Roman or Greek cultures in Rome and Corinth.

Nevertheless, the Episcopal Church began ignoring the Bible's teaching in the Old and New Testament and started embracing homosexuality more than a decade ago. The retired Rev. Gene Robinson became the Episcopal Church's first openly gay bishop in 2004. He married his same-sex partner in 2010 and later announced that he was divorcing him in May 2014.

In 2010, Rev. Mary Glasspool became the first lesbian bishop to take office in the Episcopal Church in Los Angeles.

The church's website affirms their movement to become more of a "gay-friendly" house of worship:

"We have a legacy of inclusion, aspiring to tell and exemplify God's love for every human being; women and men serve as bishops, priests, and deacons in our church. Leadership is a gift from God, and can be expressed by all people in our church, regardless of sexual identity or orientation."

It's no secret that attendance in mainline Episcopal churches has been dropping like a rock while attendance in their evangelical cousins is either growing, holding steady or falling at a far slower rate.

More than 30 Episcopal churches closed in 2016 (link) and more than 350 churches have an average Sunday attendance of 10 people or less.