A good friend of mine announced on Facebook recently that her girlfriend presented her with an engagement ring and proposed to her. Knowing my history in ministry and my experience both as a minister and with performing wedding ceremonies, she told me she wants me to be the one who marries her and her fiancée. I told her I would be honored to serve as the officiant at her wedding. The thought of performing a wedding ceremony for a gay couple just makes the civil rights activist in me smile. And I love doing weddings. I am an ordained minister, after all.
I got ordained into Christian ministry in 2002. I had already been doing Christian ministry for six years by then, but the formality of "making it official" was important to people, and I had just finished up at Lincoln Christian College, so this was the next logical step. If I wanted to ever get a "respectable" ministry position somewhere (as opposed to the low-pay positions I had been working), I needed my degree... and I needed to be ordained.
Here's a photo of my ordination ceremony:
A few notes about this photo:
1. This picture isn't the best quality. My printer (which has a scanner) is packed away in my closet, so what you're looking at is a photo of a photo taken with an iPhone (and edited in Paint, because I don't know how to illegally download Photoshop).
2. The woman kneeling next to me is ex-wife #1 Becka. They had her kneel with me at the end of the service so they could lay hands on us and pray for our future in ministry together (oops). I put a Guy Fawkes mask over her face because she probably doesn't want me to post pictures of her on my blog I like the photo better this way.
3. Yes, that's a Star Wars tie I'm wearing in this photo. I wore a Star Wars tie to my ordination ceremony. That's how awesome I am.
4. I was ordained into Christian ministry by the elders from my home church (including my dad, who's standing to my right with his hand on my shoulder), Becka's home church, and Bob, Steve's dad, who was like a second father to me growing up.
I know people can get ordained in a matter of minutes via the Internet, but my ordination was done the old-fashioned way. In fact, people would ask me, "are you really ordained or is it just something you did online?" My ordination was - colloquially speaking - "real." I had an actual ceremony with an actual group of people in an actual church. I was required to fast for three days prior to the ordination ceremony. Other ordained ministers commissioned me, and the church elders prayed over me.
Being "really" ordained is a process in which one gets selected and set apart for Christian ministry by a congregation of believers. A lot of people - even people in the church - don't really understand how being ordained works. Being ordained means one has been set apart for ministry, recognized by a group of believers as having the character and qualities necessary for being a minister of Jesus Christ. What most people (at least most non-denominational people) don't realize is that a person is ordained until that group decides to revoke the ordination. Being ordained was intended to be a form of accountability. The believers are supposed to make sure the minister they ordained keeps "walking the straight and narrow."
For many, many churches, getting ordained nowadays doesn't involve all that because they don't realize it should. I got ordained by a church that would revoke my ordination in a heartbeat if they thought that were necessary (or if they even realized they could or should). But like I said, they haven't thought about that part of ordination, so I'm technically still an ordained minister. Of course, I'm no longer a minister of Jesus Christ; nevertheless, I like to think that I am still a minister, sans any religious connotation. I am still a minister insofar as I try to serve and care for others. I am also a minister in that I have the authority to perform certain services - including wedding services - which in itself is a form of service to others. I served as the officiant at my friends' wedding six months ago, and was honored to be able to fill that role for them.
The book I'm holding with my notes in it in this photo isn't a Bible. It's a old "Introduction to Reason" textbook. That's right. Best. Minister. Ever.
Questions concerning any legal issues involved with my friend's upcoming wedding aside (we might have to roadtrip to a state where same-sex marriage is recognized), I have the authority to perform the ceremony. I'm not relying on my Christian ordination, because I don't really put much stock in that any more. I decided to get ordained through the First Church of Atheism. Yes folks, I got ordained online. It's "real" in that it's as legal as my Christian ordination. In the eyes of the First Church of Atheism, I am Reverend Bud Uzoras. If you want a non-religious wedding ceremony, let me know. Reverend Uzoras is at your service.
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If you haven't heard of this, I assure you it's not a joke. I heard about it from fellow former minister John Loftus, who is also ordained through the FCA. This "church" was started to give guys like me and John and other former ministers who have been freed from the shackles of faith a chance to utilize the skills we acquired in ministry, and to give people a chance to have the ceremonies they want to have (like, say, a wedding) without the constraints of religion imposed upon it. Hopefully soon our country recognizes that every consenting adult has the right to get married to whichever consenting adult she chooses. Hopefully the constraints of prejudice and hate will be removed soon, and reason, thought and compassion will prevail.
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