InterVarsity Christian Fellowship USA, an inter-denominational evangelical Christian campus ministry, is denying a report that it has threatened to dismiss its employees who support same-sex marriage.
A recent article published in Time magazine alleged that InterVarsity required all of its employees to uphold traditional marriage. "Staffers are not being required to sign a document agreeing with the group's position, and supervisors are not proactively asking employees to verbally affirm it. Instead, staffers are being asked to come forward voluntarily if they disagree with the theological position," the article reads.
"When they inform their supervisor of their disagreement, a two-week period is triggered, concluding in their last day. InterVarsity has offered to cover outplacement service costs for one month after employment ends to help dismissed staff with their résumés and job-search strategies," it says.
In response, InterVarsity has come out with a statement, saying that the magazine "wrongly stated that InterVarsity is firing employees for supporting gay marriage."
The group made its statement on its Facebook page on Thursday evening. It points out that it does not fire employees based on this criteria since it does not have a policy regarding employees' views on civil marriage. "We do continue to hold to an orthodox view of human sexuality and Christian marriage, as you can read in our Theology of Human Sexuality Document at the bottom of the article," it says.
The campus ministry stresses that people from the LGBT community have already experienced great pain, even from Christians, so they have no intention of adding more pain and burden.
"That said, we believe Christlikeness, for our part, includes both embracing Scripture's teachings on human sexuality — uncomfortable and difficult as they may be — as well as upholding the dignity of all people, because we are all made in God's image," it says. "Within InterVarsity and elsewhere in the Church, there are LGBTQI people who agree with this theology, at great personal cost. We are learning together to follow Jesus."
