Georgia Preacher Leads Anti-Gay Crusade in Uganda

KAMPALA, Uganda (Nov. 21) -- A Georgia-based evangelical ministry is linking up with church leaders in Uganda and neighboring countries to discourage homosexuality in the African region.

Carl Jenkins, founder and presiding bishop of Christ Central Christian Ministries Worldwide in Albany, Ga., argues that east Africa's economic potential is suffering and that a stronger morality needs to be instilled.

"Overall, we're not seeing the moral change and economic change that Christ can give if you are obedient and dedicated to the word of God," Jenkins told AOL News.

Jenkins is spending much of November in east Africa to finalize Christ Central's organizational structure. On Sunday, the organization consecrated 16 bishops from Kenya, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda.

The movement is based in Teso, Uganda, where a Christ Central Academy and Health Center will be opened. It claims about 30 branch affiliates in Uganda alone and hopes to double that number by next year. Another 55 are being planned for Kenya.

"I'm not homophobic," Jenkins said. "But I can glean from the Bible that God is not pleased with homosexuality."

In ultra-religious Uganda, many people share Jenkins' Bible-based view on same-sex intimacy. They've also been known to adopt hardline positions against it. A Pew Global Attitudes Project poll in 2007 found that 96 percent of Ugandans think homosexuality should not be tolerated.

Even Uganda's educated classes are known to believe homosexuality is a Western import and that homosexuals are covertly recruiting the country's youth to join their ranks. In October, a Ugandan publication ran a cover story with photos of 100 alleged homosexuals in Uganda and urged readers to "hang them." Condemnation of the publication was scant, and several of the accused were forced to flee their homes.

While he opposes homosexuality, Jenkins thinks anti-homosexual attitudes in Uganda have gone too far. He said he doesn't agree with "all the forms of resistance -- homophobic violence, ostracism and embarrassment," he said.

In fact, Jenkins said, he is looking to instill greater tolerance in east Africa: "God did not put us here as judgers. The problem is we use God's word to express our own intolerance and miss the spirituality. I want to focus the heart and mind toward spiritual things."

Jenkins' view breaks from that of the American Christian evangelicals who arrived in Uganda last year claiming homosexuals were conspiring against the traditional African family. That helped whip up anti-homosexual hysteria in Uganda and led to the drafting of anti-homosexual legislation, which originally called for the death penalty for homosexual offenders.

In May, a government committee determined that Uganda's anti-gay bill possessed "technical defects in form and content," and anti-homosexuality fervor has quieted considerably since then.

Jenkins said he doesn't believe draconian punishment is the answer, nor that homosexuality should be outlawed. "You aren't going to purify and rectify society through genocide and persecution," he said. "You do that and they'll reject what you're saying. But if you show real compassion, you have a better chance of reaching them."

But views on the matter of homosexuality vary down through the ranks of Jenkins' ministry. Bishop Bernard Ebiau, the Ugandan point person for Christ Central Christian Ministries Worldwide, told AOL News in an interview last month that some form of the anti-homosexual bill should be passed.

"I don't believe in hanging or corporal punishment. But homosexuality shouldn't be legally allowed either," he said. "That would be the same as promoting it. We believe that when the government allows unnatural behavior, it can attract negative judgment of God to a place."

Several other bishops consecrated last weekend stopped short of saying homosexuality should be made illegal, but they felt ostracization from church and society would be an appropriate response. This, they said, would produce shame in the offender and encourage him or her to change.

Jenkins is concerned that his "holistic" approach to biblical teachings -- one that emphasizes Jesus' compassion and Christ-like actions -- could be misconstrued. "But that's just something you have to hand over to faith," he said.

Jenkins gave a rousing introductory speech Nov. 13 during an orientation that brought about 140 members of the church and its affiliates around east Africa together for the first time. Speaking in a rhythmically impassioned southern Baptist style he has clearly perfected, Jenkins said he is not going to try to control leaders of Christ Central Christian Ministries Worldwide. "They should already be under control, under control of the holy spirit!" he declared.

Richard Kikonyogo, a Ugandan musician and newspaper feature writer, sees danger in entrusting the local faithful with the power to influence perspectives on morality. "This is a society that is unequipped with information, so how can you ask them to engage in an intellectual exchange of ideas?" he said. "They're likely to come up with the usual set of intolerant answers."

Some of those appointed to Christ Central ministerial positions said they have no ministerial backgrounds but may go through training at the bishops college next year. How that goes could well determine the success or failure of Jenkins' mission.