This morning at Pilgrimage UCC, we re-affirmed our ONA covenant.  Here’s the text of the covenant along with a picture of the mat we all signed.  The mat will frame the text of the covenant and we’ll display it at the church.  As you’ll see in the pic, the rainbows showed up today!  Thanks be to God!

Pilgrimage United Church of Christ

Open and Affirming Covenant

July 2017

We, the people of the Pilgrimage United Church of Christ, Marietta, Georgia, guided by the love of Jesus Christ, celebrate the diversity of God’s creation. As such, we seek to practice extravagant welcome and radical inclusion. Through this resolution, we declare publicly that which we have been, in fact, practicing as a congregation since its inception. We are an open and affirming congregation. We are called to act as agents of reconciliation and wholeness within the world and within the church. We know that our lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender family members are often scorned by the church and devalued and discriminated against both in the church and in society. We believe that such practices are incompatible with the gospel. We commit ourselves to caring and inclusion of people of all sexual orientations, genders, gender identities and expressions, relationship identity, and romantic preference identity.

Further, we declare ourselves to be a congregation that is open and affirming to all marginalized groups. Thus, we affirm, honor, care, and support

people of every race, including bi- and multi-race people,

people of every ethnicity and nationality,

people of any socio-economic status,

people of all ability levels.

We strive to be a place of unconditional love that inspires all people in our community and beyond.

To keep this covenant, we will practice its tenets in ways that include but are not limited to the following:

• Welcome all people who enter into our community
• Be intentional in using inclusive language throughout our community and in our hymns
• Be inclusive in worship practice by encouraging persons to share their talents and energy in worship, ministry, mission, educational programs, and leadership of PUCC
• Invite all voices to speak and participate in decisions affecting the congregation
• Actively and publicly celebrate diversity through acknowledging histories and displaying pride flags, for example
• Support and celebrate relationships, partnerships, and families of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people
• Practice non-discrimination when hiring church staff and contracting for goods and services
• Condemn acts of violence, be it homophobic, sexist, racist, religious, or otherwise directed toward a particular group of our world-family
• Support the work of the Open and Affirming Task Force to work with the congregation and its council and committees to implement the covenant statement in the life and ministry of Pilgrimage United Church of Christ.

(Resource: Open and Affirming Covenant of the Edgewood United Church of Christ, February 7, 2010)