Tag Archives: Presbyterian

Minnesota Presbyterians ordain a gay man

When my wife and I spent our summer vacation volunteering at the ELCA Churchwide Assembly in Pittsburgh, we were called “church geeks.” I guess it’s true. After attending morning worship at my own congregation, St. Barnabas Lutheran of Plymouth, Minnesota, I drove into downtown Minneapolis Sunday afternoon to attend the ordination of Daniel Vigilante at Westminster Presbyterian.

The Southwest edge of downtown Minneapolis boasts a number of high steeple churches that date to the nineteenth century and whose pews have often been occupied by the Minneapolis aristocracy but whose kitchens have offered soup to the poor and homeless: the Roman Catholic Basilica of St. Mary, Central Lutheran, St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, Hennepin Avenue United Methodist, Plymouth Congregational Church, and … Westminster Presbyterian.

The ornate sanctuary of Westminster today witnessed a first in Minnesota—the ordination of an out gay man as a Presbyterian teaching elder—which is what the Presbyterians call their ministers of word and sacrament. From the comments of an impressive array of speakers, it was obvious that Dan Vigilante is an especially gifted man who is finally allowed to answer his call to the ministry nearly a decade after graduating from Princeton seminary. Since graduation, the New Jersey native has mostly served as director of ministries for youth and young adults at St. Mark Presbyterian Church of Newport Beach, California. The retired moderator of the Presbytery of Los Ranchos, Rev. Dr. Gary Collins, spoke with great respect and affection for Vigilante and his service in Southern California. Here’s a picture of Dan from the website of St. Mark.

Rev. Brian Ellison, whose tenure as executive director of the Covenant Network of Presbyterians is barely a year old, offered a stirring sermon. The Covenant Network as an institution is unique to the Presbyterian Church. Other progressive denominations have long had LGBT advocacy organizations, but they have mostly consisted of gays, lesbians, and a few straight allies operating on the periphery of their denomination. More Light Presbyterians was and is such an organization, but near the end of the twentieth century, the Covenant Network was founded by leaders of the Presbyterian establishment to promote progressive causes and especially LGBT inclusion. When well-heeled allies joined the gay and lesbian pilgrims on the journey toward full inclusion, momentum swelled.

The Twin Cities Presbytery boasts a distinctive history regarding LGBT ordination. Rev. David Bailey Sindt was ordained in this Presbytery before he came out at the 1973 General Assembly (national) by standing on a chair and holding up a sign asking, “Is anyone else out there gay?” More Light Presbyterians remembers that moment as the birth of their movement. In the early ‘90s, St. Olaf grad Lisa Larges sought ordination in this Presbytery, and when she came out to her candidacy committee, the presbytery supported her; only a decision by the Presbyterian ecclesiastical courts prevented her ordination. Toward the end of the century after the General Assembly passed onerous legislation regarding gays and lesbians, the Twin Cities Presbytery issued a formal apology to the gay community and also promised defiance of the policy.

Coincidentally, this Presbytery also played a double role regarding the national church’s decision to allow out gays and lesbians to be ordained. First, the Presbytery hosted the 2010 General Assembly in Minneapolis that passed enabling legislation, which required ratification by the 173 presbyteries spread across the country. As the presbyteries voted one by one, it became clear that the measure would be ratified, and with one more affirmative vote needed for ratification (with twenty or so presbyteries yet to vote), it was the Twin Cities Presbytery that cast the decisive vote on May 10, 2011.

Welcome Teaching Elder, Rev. Daniel Vigilante. Godspeed.

Queer Clergy to be released

OK, the headline refers to a book title that will soon be published. The book will be a chronicle of the LGBT struggle for acceptance in the church.

In the spring of 2011, I began to research the history behind the journey toward full LGBT inclusion in the mainline, Protestant denominations. From the outset, the book was intended to chronicle the parallel journeys of the United Methodists, ELCA Lutherans, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and the United Church of Christ (UCC).

I visited with a local UCC pastor, who was an out lesbian, for contact suggestions within her denomination. I already had good contacts within my own ELCA. After a geographical move from Northfield, Minnesota to Arlington Heights, Illinois late in the summer, I visited the Gerber-Hart Library of Chicago which stored archival material from the early days of Lutherans Concerned, the Lutheran LGBT advocacy group. Chicago was also the home base of the Methodist advocacy group known as the Reconciling Ministries Network, and I visited their offices and with early Methodist leaders such as Mark Bowman and Morris Floyd. I took a drive up to Madison, Wisconsin for lunch with Steve Webster and Jim Dietrich. Steve had organized the first gathering of gay Methodists way back in 1974. Rev. Amy DeLong corresponded with me about her recent Methodist ecclesiastical trial.

I began to write, and by thanksgiving, I was up to forty pages. During the winter and spring of 2012, Pilgrim Press offered to publish the book, which then carried the title, Gays in the Pulpit. The pages of the manuscript swelled.

I contacted Dr. Louie Crew, the founder of the Episcopal group called Integrity, and he provided valuable information about the Episcopal journey. Later, I contacted Bishop John Shelby Spong. Many are familiar with his voluminous writings, but fewer know about his own role as the leading advocate for LGBT issues within the Episcopal House of Bishops in the late ’80s and ’90s. Professor James D. Anderson served as the editor of the Presbyterian newsletter, More Light Update, for twenty-two years and had written his own article about the history of the Presbyterian journey. My wife and I had dinner with him near his home in Florida, and he loaned me several boxes of archived newsletters. When I traveled to Cleveland to conclude an agreement with Pilgrim Press in the spring, I also visited with UCC LGBT leadership, including Rev. Loey Powell, who had been ordained in 1977. Later, I visited with Rev. Powell and others at the fortieth anniversary celebration of the ordination of Rev. William Johnson that was the theme of the UCC Coalition gathering at Johnson’s alma mater, Elmhurst College, in the Chicago suburbs. I visited with Rev. Johnson, and he provided valuable background information.

In addition to the UCC Coalition gathering in June, the summer of 2012 also included networking at the UMC quadrennial General Conference in Tampa, the biennial Presbyterian General Assembly in Pittsburgh, the Episcopal triennial General Convention in Indianapolis, and the biennial gathering of Lutherans Concerned, renamed to Reconciling Works, in Washington, D.C.

Throughout the process, key subjects of the story have offered great support and background details. They also fact-checked my growing manuscript. The list of helpful correspondents is lengthy.

Though the manuscript was mostly complete by the end of 2012, Pilgrim Press planned the book for inclusion in their fall, 2013 catalog. Thus, the pace slowed considerably during the first half of 2013, but allowed for the addition of new details and revisions. Pilgrim Press suggested a title change, and after receiving comments and suggestions from many of my sources, the title became Queer Clergy, with the pretentious subtitle, A History of Gay and Lesbian Ministry in American Protestantism. The most recent manuscript contains common material plus five, separate sections on each denomination; altogether, the manuscript consists of nearly seven hundred pages, including nearly nine hundred end notes.

Pilgrim Press has just announced that Queer Clergy will be released in November, 2013, and they have also designed the book cover, which is included below.

Shout it from the rooftops

Last week I received a comment that I refused to publish because it attacked an individual or a group. Apart from the personal attack, the commenter attempted to make the point that gay friendly resolutions by mainstream churches explain a general membership decline.

Au contraire.

Two years ago, a book entitled American Grace became a national best seller, and I blogged about it in a post entitled Conservative Christianity Driving a Generation Away From Religion. That post included this quote from another blog that suggested American Grace:

makes the case that the alliance of religion with conservative politics is driving young adults away from religion …. Among the conclusions [of a major survey] is this one: “The association between religion and politics (and especially religion’s intolerance of homosexuality) was the single strongest factor in this portentous shift.”

Today I ran across another blog post about a more recent book that makes the case even more starkly. Here’s the open-ended survey question that formed the basis for the book:

What words or phrases best describe Christianity?

How would you respond? What’s the first word that pops into your head? Then, give yourself a couple of minutes to think and then answer again. What’s your answer after reflection?

Now shift your thinking. How do you think others, self-identified as non-Christian and aged 16-29, responded to the question? What of those who self-described as Christian?

With an open-ended question, one would expect a wide variety of answers, but it turns out there was a single theme that was listed on a startling 91% of the responses from this youthful age group that self-identified as non-Christian. What do you think that one answer was?

Ready?

Antihomosexual.

Ouch! Thanks UMC and General Conference 2012 (GC2012) for reinforcing the perception.

Well, what about the self-identified Christians in that age group? How did they respond?

Antihomosexual.

But, it was only 80%.

The blog post contains this quote from the book, unChristian, by David Kinnaman.

“The gay issue has become the ‘big one, the negative image most likely to be intertwined with Christianity’s reputation. It is also the dimensions that most clearly demonstrates the unchristian faith to young people today, surfacing in a spate of negative perceptions: judgmental, bigoted, sheltered, right-wingers, hypocritical, insincere, and uncaring. Outsiders say [Christian] hostility toward gays…has become virtually synonymous with the Christian faith.”

That’s the bad news. The good news is when a problem is so clearly defined, the solution also becomes obvious. The United Church of Christ, the Episcopal Church, the ELCA Lutherans, and the PC(USA) Presbyterians have opened their doors. They understand that “all means all”. They have decided to become part of the solution rather than part of the problem. By inviting gays into their pulpits and to serve at their altars, they have welcomed the whole host, the entire gay community, into full communion, full participation, full inclusion in the life of the church.

Don’t be shy, don’t be embarrassed, don’t hide your light under a bushel. Tell the world what you have done. Shout it from the rooftops!

UMC leadership structure

I’ve been paying a lot of attention to the five, principal mainline Protestant denominations lately (UMC, ELCA, PC(USA), Episcopal, and UCC). The ELCA is a full communion partner with each of these, and I heard Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katherine Jefforts Schori speak highly of the Episcopal/ELCA partnership at an Episcopal Diocesan Convention.

Both the ELCA and the Episcopal Church function with a national presiding bishop, a full-time, long term position. Bishop Mark Hanson, only the third ELCA Presiding Bishop since the denomination was formed in 1988, is nearing the end of his second term. Presiding Bishop Schori serves out of the Episcopal Headquarters in NYC though she was previously Bishop of the Nevada Diocese. She is only the 26th presiding bishop in Episcopal history which goes back to Revolutionary War days.

The UCC has a General Minister/President, the Presbyterians have a General Assembly Moderator, and the Methodists have a President of the Council of Bishops who serves a two year term while continuing to serve as bishop of his or her regional body.

At the upcoming UMC quadrennial General Conference in Tampa, delegates will consider revisions to their organizational structure. Among the proposed changes is the creation of a full-time President of the Council of Bishops without responsibility for any jurisdiction other than the national church.

Would this position be more like the presiding bishops of the ELCA and Episcopal Churches? “Commenters have called the proposed position everything from a United Methodist archbishop to the denomination’s CEO.”

Click here for full details from a UMC News Service report.

Interpreting Paul the apostle

Paul is such fun.

While his preeminent importance in the development of normative Christian doctrine is indisputable, his writings are enigmatic at best and indecipherable at worst. What is the heart of Paul? Does Paul reveal himself in Galatians 3:28, the so-called “Christian magna carta” —no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female—or in other writings that seemingly support slavery and the subjugation of women?

Paul also finds himself plopped down in the midst of 21st century debates over gays. Again, the question arises whether he was the great inclusivist who encouraged Gentile participation in the early church without precondition, without the proper male genitalia, against the wishes of church leaders, and contrary to scripture and centuries of tradition, or was he the greatest gay-basher in history? Though his “vice lists” have been dubiously translated to include homosexuality, his ranting in the first chapter of his letter to the Romans may be the favorite “clobber passage” of modern gay-bashers.

they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.

²⁴Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, ²⁵because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

²⁶For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, ²⁷and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.

²⁸And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done. ²⁹They were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, ³⁰slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents, ³¹foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. ³²They know God’s decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die—yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them.

How do modern exegetes unpack these harsh words? Yes, this passage is about idolatry, first and foremost. The evils of homosexual behavior are his assumption not his point. Yes, Paul’s words must be viewed from the cultural perspective of the 1st century Greco-Roman world, and yes, Paul must be understood as a Jew learned in the law to include the Levitical abominations. These influences certainly colored his perception, and it is unfair to ask a 21st century question of this 1st century man. He simply would have harbored a radically different understanding of human sexuality than we do today.

But, we can go further. What was Paul’s central theme of his letter to the Romans? Grace. That humankind is made right with God through God’s own offer of welcome and not through human effort, achievement, or merit—“works of the law” in Pauline terms. Trust God and rely upon that promise (faith). Paul works this out as he wrestles with the premise of Hebrew religion that Jews are God’s chosen over against his view that Gentiles should also be included. Justification by grace through faith and not by works is the simplified summary. So, if these are Paul’s themes in his letter to the Romans, where do his introductory remarks (quoted above) fit in?

Paul is setting a trap. He is speaking to Jewish listeners, and he gets them nodding as he recites their cultural stereotypes about the unclean gentiles. But wait, he suggests as chapter two unfolds, aren’t we Jews also guilty of breaking the rules? How are we different? Don’t we also depend upon God’s grace? And then Paul is off and running with his interplay of the themes of grace, faith, works, Jew and Gentile, etc. throughout the remainder of his letter to the Romans.

In doing research for my current book project about the history of the movement for full inclusion of gays in the life of the church, I came across a succinct version of this exegesis, which came in a 1977 Presbyterian debate. George Edwards of Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, a member of a Presbyterian Task Force on homosexuality, spoke these words:

Paul says here that “God gave them up to dishonorable passions”. Is this, then, Paul’s theology? Of course not! God never gave anybody up! What kind of theology would that be? Paul is here using a rhetorical device to get his legalistic reader all worked up in self-righteous frenzy before he hits him over the head with his own inadequacy and dependency on God’s grace.**

Perhaps we can take meaning from this passage of Paul after all. Perhaps it is a clobber passage that offers an analogy for our current debate, but no, not to strike gays but to slam the “self-righteous frenzy” of 21st century legalists and to point them, and all of us, toward our inadequacies and dependency on God’s grace.

Paul, you sly fox. What a wretched man you are. Sounds like a good book title.

**Quoted in Chris Glaser, Uncommon Calling: A Gay Christian’s Struggle to Serve the Church (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1988) p. 164.

I’m back!!

Well, at least for the moment.

I have been pouring hours and hours into my book project, Gays in the Pulpit. My working draft is now over 170 pages, which is probably half. And the stories! And the people!

Chicago is home to Reconciling Ministries Network—the Methodist LGBTQ advocacy group–and I have visited with Troy Plummer (their director), Pastor Bonnie Beckonchrist (their board chair), Pastor Morris Floyd (activist in the 80’s and 90’s), and Mark Bowman (original founder). Bowman is also the director of LGBTran Archives, which contains biographies and more about leading LGBTQ icons. Turns out I already knew Steve Webster of Madison, Wisconsin who organized the first Methodist gay caucus back in 1975.

Thanks to these excellent resources, my draft includes chapters covering the Methodist history up to around 2000. The Methodists are the remaining holdout among the five principal mainline Protestant denominations. The others (ELCA, Presbyterian, Episcopal, and United Church of Christ) all ordain gay clergy, but the upcoming UMC quadrennial General Conference may change that. It’s close, with US delegates firmly on board, but because the UMC also has delegations from Africa, the Philippines, and elsewhere who tend to be very conservative vis a vis LGBTQ issues, the US delegates may need around 65% positive to offset the likely 90% negative from outside the US. The Conference is scheduled the end of April in Tampa, and I’m thinking I may attend and do some live-blogging as I did during the historic ELCA Assembly in 2009.

I am also up to around the year 2000 in my ELCA chapters. Chicago is home to both the ELCA archives and the Lutherans Concerned (LCNA) archives. I recently returned to Minnesota and had a delightful lunch with Ruth Frost and Phyllis Zillhart of the famous extra ordinem ordinations in San Francisco in 1990, and I have been in email correspondence with Pastor Jim Siefkes (who organized the first Lutheran gay caucus back in 1974), Jeannine Janson (who compiled a booklet containing early LCNA history), Amalia Vagts (the director of Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries), and others.

Louie Crew, the founder of the Episcopal group Integrity, has been very helpful during phone conversations and email correspondence. His stories also go back to the mid 1970’s. I have exchanged emails with Ellen Marie Barrett, the first Episcopal lesbian priest way back in 1977, who provided a poignant look back at the pain of rejection but also the triumph—“I am a priest forever!” My Episcopal chapters go to around 1990.

The Presbyterians and the UCC still require a lot of work—those chapters only cover the very early 1970’s. I have been in touch with More Light Presbyterians and the UCC Coalition, but I now need to follow up on the leads they have provided. Retired dean of the United Theological Seminary Clyde Steckel has been helpful with early information about the UCC. Trips to Cleveland and Drew University in New Jersey are likely in the offing, which is where many key persons and records are located.

In addition to these contacts, I have also kept the nearby Arlington Heights Library busy with dozens of inter-library loan requests. Many official records of national church conventions are available online as well.

Gays in the Pulpit

I have several writing projects underway. I recently posted about Prowl, a compilation of five short stories based upon my Vietnam experience. I have also been working on a sequel to A Wretched Man. Third, last spring I started work on a non-fiction piece, tentatively titled Gays in the Pulpit, which will be a forty-year retrospective on the gay rights movement within the church. Now that we are settled into our new digs in Arlington Heights, I have again picked up that project in earnest.

I am personally acquainted with many of the more recent heroes of the push for full inclusion including Lutherans Anita Hill, Ruth Frost, Phyllis Zillhart, and Emily Eastwood; United Methodist Amy Delong; and Presbyterian Scott Anderson. If you click on their names, you will link to prior blog posts about these individuals.

My current research is also introducing me to earlier heroes. In 1968, Troy Perry was a gay Baptist/Pentecostal preacher who founded the Metropolitan Community Church, which now numbers over 250 predominantly gay congregations internationally. Father Robert Mary Clement was a gay priest who marched in the first gay pride parade in Greenwich Village and whose Beloved Disciple Church ministered to the gay community of New York City in the early ‘70s. Bill Johnson was the first openly gay man ordained by an established denomination way back in 1972 by the United Church of Christ. Ellen Barrett was the first out lesbian to become an Episcopal priest in 1977.

As I am reviewing the data from these early days, I have received invaluable assistance from Rev. Clyde Steckel, retired dean of the United Seminary of the Twin Cities. Rev. Steckel was witness to and participant in the UCC steps toward gay inclusion in the ‘70s. The record in the UCC is striking because they were so far ahead of the other mainline denominations. The UCC accomplishments in the 1970s foreshadowed the actions of the Episcopalians, Lutherans, Presbyterians, and Methodists a full generation later.

More to come.

Presbyterians, Methodists, and gays: an update

In May, the Twin Cities Presbytery became the latest Presbytery to affirm changes in the Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA) constitution. Their vote meant that a majority of Presbyteries had affirmed changes that would allow gay clergy, and thus the Presbyterians joined other mainline Protestant denominations with similar policies (United Church of Christ–UCC, Episcopal Church USA—ECUSA, and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America—ELCA).

More recently, Presbyterian Ecclesiastical courts have issued two decisions interpreting and implementing the policy changes. In both cases that began before the recent policy changes, the ordinations of openly gay persons were at issue. Last week, the Scott Anderson case was dismissed on the basis that the issues were now moot, and

the way is now clear for him to proceed to ordination as Teaching Elder (the traditional Presbyterian term for minister). In his case, the GAPJC [court] found that the opponent’s argument was now moot because the rule barring participation in leadership by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender members no longer exists in the Book of Order.

The second case was remanded for further proceedings for somewhat murky reasons. See the reports at More Light Presbyterians for more information on both cases.

Scott Anderson currently serves as executive director of the Wisconsin Council of Churches. Here is the link to an earlier blog post that discussed his case. I recently had the pleasure of visiting with him during the Wisconsin United Methodist Annual Conference where we each had booths in the exhibit hall.

At that same UMC Wisconsin Conference, I renewed friendships with Pastor Amy DeLong and her supporters. Here is my earlier blog post about Rev Amy. At the Wisconsin UMC Annual Conference in early June, Rev Amy was only a week away from her own trial before a UMC ecclesiastical court, charged with a) being a “self-avowed practicing homosexual” and b) for celebrating a holy union of a lesbian couple.

Amy was calm and committed to the course ahead.

“What are your chances of winning?” someone asked.

“One hundred per cent,” Amy replied.

As Amy’s trial was pending, others within the UMC had engaged in supportive actions. On January 31, 2011 a large group of retired UMC bishops issued a statement calling for a removal of the UMC ban on gay clergy. At this spring’s round of UMC regional conferences, significant numbers of UMC clergy signed documents promising to “offer the grace of the Church’s blessing to any prepared couple desiring Christian marriage,” including same-sex couples, which was precisely the second charge against Rev Amy. I attended the Northern Illinois UMC Annual Conference, and they passed a resolution offering their own twist—for clergy convicted of officiating at a gay marriage, the penalty would merely be a one day suspension, an obvious signal to the Wisconsin Court in Rev Amy’s pending trial that a slap on the wrist punishment would be in order.

And that is precisely what happened. First, the charge that Rev Amy was “a self-avowed practicing homosexual” was dismissed for lack of proof. If I understand the decision correctly, it would have been necessary for the prosecution to prove that she engaged in same-gender, genital, sexual activity, and it was clear the court simply didn’t want to go there. She was convicted of the charge of performing a holy union, but the penalty was a mere twenty-day suspension, plus the task of writing and presenting a document regarding the UMC clergy covenant to be considered by the 2012 Wisconsin UMC Annual Conference for action.

Lastly, new charges have sprung up here in Minnesota. It seems that one of the UMC clergy who promised to perform same-gender blessings if asked to do so, did so. During the recent Gay Pride festival in Loring Park in Minneapolis, Pastor Greg Renstrom of New Harmony UMC in Minneapolis “participated in services of blessings”.

In a commendable display of openness and balance, Minnesota UMC Bishop Sally Dyck writes a current accounting of the case that is published online at the Conference’s website.

Bishop Dyck writes:

I don’t normally discuss formal complaints in a public venue like this or announce them through the clergy e-mail list as I already have done, but this is an unusual situation. This complaint comes in the context of a statement signed by 70 Minnesota United Methodists saying that they would “offer the grace of the Church’s blessing to any prepared couple desiring Christian marriage.” (At the time of writing this column I had not seen the signatory list so I don’t know whether Rev. Renstrom was among them.)

It also comes in the context of the United Methodist Church trial of Wisconsin elder Rev. Amy DeLong, who was tried for violating the denomination’s ban on “self-avowed practicing” gay clergy and its prohibition against officiating at same-sex unions. Many watched the trial closely.

Rev. Renstrom has agreed to this public reporting and I will give him opportunity to approve whatever I release. We both believe that it will help us all understand and bring clarity to this matter of leading holy unions in the context in which we find ourselves. (emphasis added)

To be continued …

Civil disobedience: effective LGBT strategy?

Last week at the PCUSA General Assembly in Minneapolis (GA219), a group of LGBT activists moved to the podium of the convention floor and refused to leave until the police ushered them out. The protest was organized by Soulforce and it’s executive director, Cindi Love. Here’s a link to the video from a local television station:

A few years ago at the 2005 ELCA Churchwide Assembly, a similar protest was mounted. Pastor Anita Hill of St Paul Reformation Church was one of the participants, and the following is from her sermon after returning:

I saw 100 people wearing rainbows (including 15 St. Paul-Ref members) walking to the front of the plenary hall as the business ground to a halt. As Margaret Schuster said: “There was disapproval raining down on our heads.” My heart beat fast and my hands shook. I heard the voice of our presiding bishop asking us to return to the visitor section. I heard the tension in the murmurs and groans of many voting members. It was hard to stand still. Bishop Mark Hanson was my bishop in St. Paul before his election to churchwide office. He has been my shepherd. I know his voice.

But we stood firm in our places.

We risked our reputations, risked losing the respect of the church we’ve been nurtured in along with our families for generations. We studied non-violence, sought to let our love be genuine, especially toward those we perceived to be against us; searched our hearts for ways to express God’s love as we brought our message to the church. Even without voice our message was delivered: no longer can you make decisions about us as though we are an “issue” to be handled by policy and procedure. We are human beings beloved of God, marked with the cross of Christ forever, just like you. As you make decisions, you’ll have to look into our eyes and faces, and see that we love God enough to suffer and to persevere in prayer and action.

But we stood firm in our places.

I’m convinced that whether the change we seek comes sooner or later, we must continue to be a congregation that embraces “justice rooted in gospel.” I’m ready for the day when I am a pastor known not only for being lesbian, but known for teaching, preaching, and leading in ways that move our community to care for those who are hungry, homeless, or sick, those in need of love and care, the “little ones” of the world. Let our community grow in global awareness and response even as we care for this particular metropolitan area. Let us live well and share well and witness well. Let us confound those who cannot fathom our faithful enterprise.

But we stood firm in our places.

An effective strategy or counterproductive? What say you?

Monday afternoon at PCUSA GA219

I was scheduled to autograph copies of my novel, A Wretched Man, in the Cokesbury bookstore in mid afternoon. I arrived an hour early in order to set up and to visit at the booths of the 4-5 LGBT advocacy groups clustered together in a prominent location of the exhibit hall. I met some very nice folks and gladly accepted a rainbow prayer shawl from the More Light Presbyterians (MLP). A question I asked without receiving a clear answer was why these groups don’t pool their resources, but it seems to an outsider that the MLP organization is the largest.

I snapped a few photos which I post here. The mixed generations at “That all may freely serve” pseudo malt shop invited me to sit with them in order to be included in the photo, so that’s my smiling mug you see.

The biggest order of business accomplished by the assembled delegates thus far was the election of new moderator, Cynthia Bolbach, and her election was praised by the volunteers staffing the LGBT booths. Apparently, of the six candidates, she was the one who spoke mostly openly about her support for LGBT issues.

Much of the work of these first few days takes place in committee, and the Committee on Civil Union and Marriage Issues voted 47-8-2 Monday to approve a report that urges Presbyterians to further study the issues and stay in covenant with each other while they do so. The committee rejected a minority report submitted by three members of the special committee. The minority report, which stated that “only marriage between a man and a woman is ordained by God,” was defeated 40-15, with one abstention.

There were two other authors present for the book signing. Gustav Niebuhr of the famous Niebuhr family, who had earlier spoken to the Covenant Network, offered his book Beyond Tolerance, and I spent quite a bit of time speaking with Dr. Mark Braverman who offered his book Fatal Embrace, Christians, Jews and the search for peace in the Holy Land. I hope to report on our conversation and his book in a later blog post.