For much of our nation's history keeping slaves was a core Christian ideal. I think the Lord uses the world to teach us lessons, get us out of our shells. It is good that Christian groups are being made to allow gay leaders because those leaders can help Christians understand something they have been unwilling to understand, and show them how their practices have been detrimental to the witness of the love of Christ. These gay leaders will be in a good position to lead many in the church who are homophobic into better understanding and a more compassionate, heartfelt love for others. Not an easy thing for the church to acquire, but so powerful when it happens. Our nation is better for having forced Christians in the past to have their core concepts about black people challenged. It wasn't easy, but it was good. The churches that let blacks in became better for it, even if it took a secular society to force them into it. God works in mysterious ways.