Pioneering lesbian minister Nancy Wilson honored as she retires

Pioneering lesbian minister Nancy Wilson is being honored today (July 6) as she retires as global moderator of Metropolitan Community Churches.

I worked closely with Nancy from 1991-94 as MCC’s ecumenical field director. Here are some photos of our efforts to advocate for LGBTQ rights at the World Council of Churches, National Council of Churches and other church events. Thanks, Nancy, for your passion and prophetic vision!

Nancy is the second person, and the first woman, to lead MCC since it was founded in 1968 by Troy Perry. When MCC was founded, homosexuality was still considered a sin, a sickness and a crime, but MCC gave religious affirmation to queer people. Nancy joined the new denomination as associate pastor of MCC Boston in 1972 when she was 22 years old.

After serving in numerous positions in MCC, Nancy Wilson was elected as moderator in 2005 following Perry’s retirement. President Barack Obama appointed Nancy to the President’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships in 2011. When Obama was re-elected, she became the first openly LGBT clergy to participate at the Inaugural Prayer Service at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

Her 44 years of ministry are being celebrated today with a “Tapestry of Thanks” event at MCC’s international General Conference in Victoria, BC, Canada.

In 2016 she wrote a new book: “I Love to Tell the Story: 100+ Stories of Justice, Inclusion, and Hope.” Her collection of true stories from the LGBTQ faith community will bring laughter, tears, insight and hope. Sections cover love and marriage equality, pastoring, death and funerals, hate and violence, laughter, portraits, kids and angels, MCC’s first decade, earthquakes and MCC buildings, sexuality and ecumenical adventures, and White House encounters. She draws on four decades of ministry and activism and ministry in MCC for motivational stories of pastors and porn stars, presidents and persons with AIDS, and many more.

Her other books include “Outing the Bible: Queer Folks, God, Jesus, and the Christian Scriptures” (LifeJourney Press); “Outing the Church: 40 Years in the Queer Christian Movement” (LifeJourney Press); and “Amazing Grace: Stories of Lesbian and Gay Faith,” which she co-edited with Malcolm Boyd. The two "Outing" books were previously published as "Our Tribe: Queer Folks, God, Jesus, and the Bible (HarperCollins).

Her prayers and poems are included in “Race and Prayer: Collected Voices, Many Dreams,” edited by Malcolm Boyd and Chester Talton (Morehouse Press) and “Equal Rites: Lesbian and Gay Worship, Ceremonies and Celebrations,” edited by Kittredge Cherry and Zalmon Sherwood (Westminster John Knox Press).

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, right, meets MCC National Ecumenical Officer Kittredge Cherry and MCC Chief Ecumenical Officer Nancy Wilson, and an unknown woman. The MCC delegation was in Johannesburg, South Africa in January 1994, to advocate LGBT religious rights at a meeting of the World Council of Churches.

Protestors carried a sign saying, “Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual: We are Already in the Church. Let us be Open, Free” when the National Council of Churches denied observer status to Metropolitan Community Churches in November 1992 in Cleveland, Ohio. Pictured in the middle is Nancy Wilson of MCC. Photo by Kittredge Cherry.

We held protest signs and took over the microphones when the National Council of Churches denied observer status to MCC in Cleveland, Ohio, on Nov. 12, 1992. Nancy, pictured in the middle, seized the podium and said, “It’s easier to get into heaven than into the NCC!” She banged her fist on the podium so hard that it cracked. Protest signs in this photo say, “Stonewall Rises Again!!!” and “Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual: We are Already in the Church. Let us be Open, Free.” Pictured are, from left, John Taktikos of Axios (Orthodox gay and lesbian group), Nancy Wilson of MCC, and Lorna Cramer of Unitarian Universalists for Lesbian/Gay Concerns. Photo by Kittredge Cherry. RIP John Taktikos, who died of AIDS in October 1993.

MCC clergywomen met Christian feminist authors at the “Re-Imagining” conference. Left to right: Lori Dick, Virginia Mollenkott, Susan Thistlewaite, Nancy Wilson and Kittredge Cherry.

MCC clergy at “Re-Imagining: A Global Theological Conference By Women” conference Nov. 4-7, 1993 in Minneapolis included, from left, Revs. Coni Staff, Kittredge Cherry, Nancy Wilson and Lori Dick. More than 2,000 attended the conference, which was controversial for presenting female images of God, accepting LGBT people and other “heresies.”

Pictured left to right are Laurie Fox of Presbyterians for Lesbian and Gay Concerns, Kittredge Cherry and Nancy Wilson at a demonstration for LGBT rights at the Christian feminist “Re-Imagining” conference Nov. 4-7, 1993 in Minneapolis.

Nancy and I sang and held a banner at a demonstration for LGBT rights at the Christian feminist “Re-Imagining” conference Nov. 4-7, 1993 in Minneapolis. Our banner says, “A Christian fellowship reaching out to gays and lesbians around the world” with the logo for Metropolitan Community Churches.

The NCC-MCC Dialogue Committee gave an official report in November 1992 in Cleveland, Ohio. We sure look miserable. Our committee tried and failed to find common ground on homosexuality. Left to right: Bishop Clinton Hoggard (African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church), Jean Marshall, Kittredge Cherry (MCC), Nancy Wilson (MCC), Laura Bailey (Disciples of Christ) and NCC staffer Eileen Lindner. Some other committee members are not pictured. RIP Bishop Hoggard, died 2002.

MCC’s delegation to the World Council of Churches 1994 meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa, consisted of, from left, Kittredge Cherry, MCC ecumenical director; Sylvanus Maduka, head of MCC in Nigeria; and Nancy Wilson, MCC ecumenical officer (before she was moderator). We shocked many WCC leaders by urging them to stand up against homophobia in the church, and got a warm welcome from South African LGBT Christians.

Happy times with Kittredge Cherry, Nancy Wilson, and my spouse Audrey Lockwood in July 1993 after my ordination at MCC General Conference, Phoenix.

Nancy Wilson, left, and Kittredge Cherry advocated for LGBT rights at the World Council of Churches Assembly in Canberra, Australia in 1991. I’m wearing headphones to listen to the translation at the multilingual event. This was the first conference that I attended after being hired as Field Director of Ecumenical Witness and Ministry for MCC.

MCC’s delegation to the World Council of Churches Assembly in Canberra, Australia in 1991 included, from left, Revs. Steve Pieters, Sandi Robinson, Nancy Wilson and Kittredge Cherry.


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See more of my MCC photos at these links:

Happy birthday, MCC and Desmond Tutu!  (2011)

See LGBT history in photos (2010)

Happy 40th birthday, MCC! (2008)

Gay rights are human rights: Hillary Clinton speaks for Human Rights Day on religion and LGBT rights

“Gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared in a speech at the United Nations in Geneva this week. She gave the groundbreaking speech about LGBT rights in honor of Human Rights Day, which is today (Dec. 10.)

Clinton is magnificent in outlining and overcoming all objections to LGBT rights as human rights -- including the religious reasons. She stated that religion must not be used to justify violence against LGBT people, but can and should instead serve as a source of compassion.

I see her speech as a dramatic breakthrough for LGBT rights, based on my own experience advocating justice for queer people at the World Council of Churches in the early 1990s as ecumenical director for LGBT-affirming Metropolitan Community Churches.

Kittredge Cherry at the World Council of Churches headquarters in Geneva, where she advocated for LGBT rights, February 1994

In a sense I helped pave the way for Hillary Clinton’s LGBT rights speech! The WCC and the United Nations are both based in Geneva and have somewhat similar international structures leading to similar worldviews.

All hell broke loose at the World Council of Churches in 1993 when I asked their human rights committee to address lesbian and gay issues. Now almost 20 years later the U.S. Secretary of State herself has brilliantly answered the many objections they raised. Her speech provides the exact kind of carefully worded ideas that are needed by LGBT rights advocates in international organizations such as the WCC and UN.

Watch her speech on video or read the whole text at this link. Here I will simply quote the section where Clinton talks about religious justifications for violating the rights of LGBT people:

The third, and perhaps most challenging, issue arises when people cite religious or cultural values as a reason to violate or not to protect the human rights of LGBT citizens. This is not unlike the justification offered for violent practices towards women like honor killings, widow burning, or female genital mutilation. Some people still defend those practices as part of a cultural tradition. But violence toward women isn't cultural; it's criminal. Likewise with slavery, what was once justified as sanctioned by God is now properly reviled as an unconscionable violation of human rights.


In each of these cases, we came to learn that no practice or tradition trumps the human rights that belong to all of us. And this holds true for inflicting violence on LGBT people, criminalizing their status or behavior, expelling them from their families and communities, or tacitly or explicitly accepting their killing.


Of course, it bears noting that rarely are cultural and religious traditions and teachings actually in conflict with the protection of human rights. Indeed, our religion and our culture are sources of compassion and inspiration toward our fellow human beings. It was not only those who’ve justified slavery who leaned on religion, it was also those who sought to abolish it. And let us keep in mind that our commitments to protect the freedom of religion and to defend the dignity of LGBT people emanate from a common source. For many of us, religious belief and practice is a vital source of meaning and identity, and fundamental to who we are as people. And likewise, for most of us, the bonds of love and family that we forge are also vital sources of meaning and identity. And caring for others is an expression of what it means to be fully human. It is because the human experience is universal that human rights are universal and cut across all religions and cultures.

A few LGBT leaders have criticized Clinton’s speech as hypocritical, considering the ongoing violations of LGBT rights in the United States. However, Clinton acknowledged in the speech, “I speak about this subject knowing that my own country's record on human rights for gay people is far from perfect….We, like all nations, have more work to do to protect human rights at home.” I see her speech as a big step in the right direction.

Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia

International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia is today, May 17.

This year the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHO) campaign focuses on the role of religion in promoting -- or ending -- violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

We join LGBT people and our allies around the world in calling upon religions to condemn violence and prejudice based on sexual orientation or gender identity, and to create communities of respect for all people. Click here to read and sign the official IDAHO appeal. I signed it on behalf of this blog and JesusInLove.org.

Many IDAHO events are happening around the world, including the Great Global Kiss-In and an arts exhibition in New Caladonia.

May 17 was chosen for IDAHO because the date is the anniversary of the World Health Organization’s May 1990 decision to remove homosexuality from its list of mental disorders. I was shocked when I learned recently that this decision was made only 20 years ago. The American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality as a disorder in 1973.

I especially want to support the Day Against Homophobia because it is international. I have personal experience with religious homophobia at the international level, so I know how important it is. I confronted it when I worked with the World Council of Churches as ecumenical officer for Metropolitan Community Churches in the 1990s.

I also know how “internationalism” can be used to mask homophobia, because progressive religious leaders don’t want to “offend” the developing nations that they imagine are more prejudiced against LGBT people.

I decided to highlight the international nature of this blog by adding the “Flag Finder.” I’m an American, but as you can see below, only about half of our blog visitors come from the United States. The rest come from all across the globe.

I pledge to make this blog a safe space where everyone is respected. I pray for an end to hatred and violence against GLBT people in every nation.

Happy 40th birthday, MCC!

Kittredge Cherry, left, shakes hands with Bishop Desmond Tutu, the Nobel-Peace-Prize-winning human rights activist from South Africa. They met at the World Council of Churches meeting in Johannesburg in 1994. She was part of the MCC delegation there.

I put together a set of photos to honor the 40th anniversary of Metropolitan Community Churches, a denomination that ministers primarily in the lesbian, gay, bi and trans community. The photos show highlights from my own ministry in MCC during the 1980s and 1990s.

An amazing affirmation happened when I went to the copy shop to scan these photos from my old photo albums for this blog tribute. I had been having some doubts about whether it was worth the cost and effort to post old photos of events that happened 15 or 20 years ago. When I got to Kinko’s, I needed a lot of technical assistance to work the scanning machine. The clerk was a young black guy who seemed understandably frustrated at having to go over the basics with an older white woman like me.

Then he saw the photo of me shaking hands with anti-apartheid activist Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa. Suddenly we connected. We had a fascinating discussion about religion, politics and Barack Obama while he happily scanned all my photos. It was a holy moment, and a reminder that the events of the past do still have meaning and power. What we did matters, and our actions live on to make an impact in the future.

MCC was founded in 1968 in Los Angeles by Troy Perry, a Pentecostal minister who was defrocked for being gay. He was incredibly brave and visionary to create a church where gays and lesbians were welcome back in 1968, when homosexuality was still considered a sin, a sickness and a crime. He put an ad in the local gay newspaper and held the first worship service in his living room on Oct. 6, 1968. Twelve people attended. Now it has grown to almost 300 churches in more than 30 countries.

I joined MCC in 1985 and became an ordained minister. I served as program director at MCC San Francisco, then joined the denominational headquarters in Los Angeles, where I had the privilege of working closely with Troy and current MCC Moderator Nancy Wilson.

I was part of many historic GLBT events, such as the 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Rights. These photos capture just a few moments from those memorable times.

I believe it’s important to preserve our history. In searching the Web for images from MCC, I noticed that there are a few classic photos from the 1960s to the early 1970s, and many recent photos, but almost none from the years in between. Therefore I post these images from MCC in the 1980s and 1990s as a tribute to MCC and to all GLBT people of faith who dare to believe that God loves us just as we are.

So here are the photos and the stories behind the pictures.


Protesters for gay and lesbian rights in the church picketed a National Council of Churches “Faith and Order” meeting in Berkeley, California, on March 19, 1993. The “Faith and Disorder” protest was led by Rev. Kittredge Cherry, MCC’s National Ecumenical Officer. Signs say: “We’re here, we’re queer, we’re going to church,” “Ruth and Naomi, Jonathan and David, me and my girlfriend,” “Thank God I’m gay” and “We’re everywhere.” People in the photo are, from left, Brian Cross (New Life MCC Berkeley member), unknown protester, Bill Pugh of MCC-SF, Kittredge Cherry, Leslie Addison of MCC-SF, and Beth Downey.

“Sometimes faith in God’s order calls all Christians to act in ways that may seem disorderly because they disrupt the social order established by human society,” Rev. Cherry said in opening remarks at the Faith and Disorder worship service held afterward in the Pacific School of Religion chapel. About half the NCC members present, including NCC General Secretary Joan Campbell, attended the service. Nearly 150 people filled the chapel. Photo by Audrey.


Kittredge Cherry speaks at Hands Around the God-Box, a prayer demonstration to end homophobia in the church. Kitt organized it as MCC's national ecumenical director. It was held at the National Council of Churches headquarters in New York City in 1994 on the 25th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising. MCC founder Troy Perry is clearly visible in the crowd.


MCC founder Troy Perry, center, joins Kittredge Cherry, right, and her life partner, Audrey, in 1993, at the MCC General Conference in Phoenix, Arizona.


Women’s retreats were the highlight of the year at MCC San Francisco in the late 1980s. Women at the 1989 MCC-SF Women’s Retreat had fun sewing a patchwork quilt. Retreat leaders holding the quilt include Kittredge Cherry, left, who organized the retreats as MCC-SF program director.


MCC’s delegation to the World Council of Churches 1994 meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa, consisted of, from left, Kittredge Cherry, MCC ecumenical director; Sylvanus Maduka, head of MCC in Nigeria; and Nancy Wilson, MCC ecumenical officer (before she was moderator). We shocked many WCC leaders by urging them to stand up against homophobia in the church, and got a warm welcome from South African GLBT Christians.



Kittredge Cherry preached at MCC of North London in February 1994.