Episcopal Leader Says "Homosexuality" Is Not A Sin

The first woman leader of the 2.3 million member Episcopal Church, which is the U.S. branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion, says that homosexuality is not a sin and that homosexuals were created by God to love people of the same gender reports Reuters News. Interviewed on CNN, Jefferts Schori said when asked about the issue:

"I don't believe so. I believe that God creates us with different gifts. Each one of us comes into this world with a different collection of things that challenge us and things that give us joy and allow us to bless the world around us," she said.

"Some people come into this world with affections ordered toward other people of the same gender and some people come into this world with affections directed at people of the other gender."

Reuters reports that her position is likely to create further rifts in the church, with several churches threatening to break away. She recently supported allowing the consecration of a gay man in the church as a bishop. Asked to reconcile her position with Bible verses which fundamentalists argue condemn homosexuality she responded:

The Bible has a great deal to teach us about how to live as human beings. The Bible does not have so much to teach us about what sorts of food to eat, what sorts of clothes to wear -- there are rules in the Bible about those that we don't observe today," she said.

"The Bible tells us about how to treat other human beings, and that's certainly the great message of Jesus -- to include the unincluded."