Sexuality Reports Back Presbyterian, Episcopal Changes : Task force: Opposition is rising among Presbyterians to recommendations, including ordination of homosexuals and endorsement of ‘responsible’ sex outside marriage.

Opposition is growing across the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) to a task force report that favors ordination of practicing homosexuals and endorses “responsible” sex outside marriage, according to a leading evangelical group in the church.

Betty Moore, executive director of Presbyterians For Renewal, said she believes that opponents will file more than 30 formal proposals against the report at the General Assembly, the church’s chief policy-making gathering, to be held in Baltimore June 4-12.

The report, called “Keeping Body and Soul Together: Sexuality, Spirituality and Social Justice,” was the product of a 17-member task force. It was completed in eaarly February.

The report contains 48 recommendations on a broad range of sexual topics--ranging from offering seminary courses in human sexuality, combating sexual violence and exploitation in the mass media to ordination of gay and lesbian ministers and formal church recognition of same-sex relationships.

Task force members were split 10 to 6 on recommending the document for study. Efforts failed to include a minority report to the General Assembly.

The task force report comes on the heels of a major survey of Presbyterian sentiment on one question addressed by the report--ordination of openly declared homosexuals. According to the survey, 86% of the church’s lay members and 90% of local congregational leaders oppose such a policy; 83% of the pastors also are against any change.

Current church policy prohibits ordination of “self-affirming, practicing homosexual persons.”

Not every point is thought likely to be voted on at the General Assembly. Forty “non-controversial” recommendations are expected to be presented for action; the remaining eight--including the ordination of practicing homosexuals--are expected to be studied for potential action in 1993.

The task force chairman, the Rev. John Carey, a professor at Agnes Scott College in Decatur, Ga., said that critics have unfairly taken some parts of the report out of context and are refusing to acknowledge the need to look at “the complexity of sexuality” in modern culture.