Listen y'all. It has been within the LAST CENTURY that it rape was legally recognized as possible within a marriage. Our experience with the concept of consent is REALLY new and still imperfect. But consent doesn't just apply to sex. Christians we need to talk about evangelism.

It is one thing to be so happy with what you've found spiritually that you want to share it with others. But if those others don't CONSENT to that sharing? You're not sharing your joy, you are infringing on someone else's.

It used to be (still is in places) that if someone wanted to join a monastery they had to be REALLY persistent. The monks didn't go out looking for people to join them, they actively DISCOURAGED it. This was to ensure you were really called to that path.

And I have colleagues of other faith traditions who practice similarly, if you want to convert you are gonna have to be a nuisance because they want to be sure you are really called to that path. This honors the agency of the seeker. It trusts their will and God in their lives.

Just because we've always done something doesn't mean we should KEEP doing it. And there are LOTS of ways to interpret scripture (as we've seen). We don't HAVE to read Jesus' words as a command to go force people into something they don't want. That's not the ONLY reading.

Given a lot of Jesus' other teachings it might not even be the most faithful reading of the text. In my tradition we vow at our baptism to respect the dignity of EVERY human being. Part of that? Respecting their choices. A BIG part of that.

And this important thread on how NEGATIVE consent isn't actually an honest or respectful practice. Saying "well they can say no" puts the onus and work on the other, which again does NOT respect them. See again analogies to rape: "she could have said no." https://twitter.com/JustSayXtian/status/1334258076258484224