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)

LGBT religious history meets Independence Day: Clergy picketed for LGBT equality in 1965-69 Annual Reminder protests

Early LGBT rights protests happened every Fourth of July from 1965 to 1969 in front of Independence Hall in Philadelphia. Among the protestors was Robert W. Wood, the first member of the clergy to picket for LGBT rights.

The events were called Annual Reminders because they aimed to remind the public that “homosexual Americans” were denied the rights to “"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as guaranteed in the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

Robert W. Wood

Wood, an ordained Congregational minister, wore his clergy collar while picketing for LGBT equality. This gay-right pioneer also wrote America’s first book on homosexuality and Christianity.

“Christ and the Homosexual” was published in 1960 under Wood’s own name with his photo on the dust jacket, even though friends and colleagues warned him that this would damage his reputation. The book calls for the church to welcome homosexuals, recognize same-sex marriage and ordain homosexual clergy.

In 1962 Wood met his life partner Hugh M. Coulter, an abstract artist, cowboy and a fellow World War II veteran. They lived together as a couple while Wood served as pastor of three different parishes over the next 27 years until Coulter’s death. Now age 93, Wood is retired and living in New Hampshire.

American patriotism mixed with LGBT rights at the Annual Reminders, which preceded and paved the way for the Stonewall Uprising. The date and location were strategically planned to connect LGBT rights with other American freedoms.

Jack Nichols at the first Annual Reminder in 1965

The demonstrations happened on Independence Day at Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were written. It was also the home of the Liberty Bell, the iconic symbol of American independence inscribed with the message, “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.” Abolitionists and suffragettes also used the Liberty Bell as a logo.

The Annual Reminders were a collaboration of the East Coast Homophile Organizations (ECHO). The primary organizers were LGBT rights pioneers Frank Kameny and Barbara Gittings.

Forty gay men and lesbians from Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and New York picketed at the first Annual Reminder in 1965. At the time it was the largest demonstration for LGBT rights in world history. From then on, the demonstrations grew bigger. The rest is history.

Wood’s LGBT Christian message is still powerful today. As he wrote in “The Church and the Homosexual” in 1960:

The Church has done much to keep the homosexual from Christ. Society, often under the influence of the Church, has also thrown roadblocks in the pathway of the homosexual who seeks a higher purpose in life beyond the sexual plane of pleasurable existence.

But the struggle is difficult, the motives misunderstood, the behavior pattern considered perverted. Yet Jesus Christ, whose struggle was also difficult, whose motives were also misunderstood, whose behavior pattern was revolutionary, awaits all men — even the overt homosexual.

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Related links:

Rev. Robert W. Wood: Gay Pioneer (lgbt50.org)

Annual Reminder (Wikipedia)


Books on LGBTQ American history:

“A Queer History of the United States” by Michael Bronski

“Stand by Me: The Forgotten History of Gay Liberation” by Jim Downs

“Gay American History: Lesbians and Gay Men in the U.S.A.” by Jonathan Katz

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Top image: Barbara Gittings at the Annual Reminder in 1966

Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
http://www.jesusinlove.blogspot.com/
Jesus in Love Blog on LGBT spirituality and the arts

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This post is part of the LGBT Calendar series by Kittredge Cherry at the Jesus in Love Blog. The series celebrates religious and spiritual holidays, holy days, feast days, festivals, anniversaries, liturgical seasons and other occasions of special interest to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people of faith and allies.

Saints of Stonewall inspire LGBT justice -- and artists, authors and film makers

“It was Beautiful” by Douglas Blanchard shows the Stonewall Rebellion

Oil on canvas, 24" x 36," 1999.

Queer people fought back against police harassment at New York City’s Stonewall Inn launching the modern LGBT liberation movement on June 28, 1969.

Their bold rebellion against government persecution of homosexuality is commemorated around the world during June as LGBT Pride Month. The Stonewall Uprising continues to inspire a variety of art that is featured here today.

For a new version of this article, click this link to Qspirit.net:
Saints of Stonewall inspire LGBTQ justice -- and artists, authors and film makers

This year the site of the Stonewall Uprising was designated a national monument by President Obama. “I’m designating the Stonewall National Monument as the newest addition to America’s National Park System. Stonewall will be our first national monument to tell the story of the struggle for LGBT rights,” he said.

The White House also released a video about the Stonewall Uprising and how it sparked a movement for LGBT equality. The monument includes the Stonewall Inn and nearly eight acres around it in New York's Greenwich Village.



The LGBT people who resisted police at the Stonewall Rebellion (also known as the Stonewall Riots) are not saints in the traditional sense. But they are honored here as “saints of Stonewall” because they dared to battle an unjust system. They do not represent religious faith -- they stand for faith in ourselves as LGBT people. They performed the miracle of transforming self-hatred into pride. These “saints” began a process in which self-hating individuals were galvanized into a cohesive community. Their saintly courage inspired a justice movement that is still growing stronger after four decades.

Before Stonewall, homosexuality was illegal and police regularly raided gay bars, where customers submitted willingly to arrest. A couple of dozen acts of resistance pre-dated and paved the way for Stonewall, such as the 1967 demonstration at the Black Cat Tavern in Los Angeles.

A new but controversial effort to tell the story of the uprising is the 2015 film “Stonewall.” It is directed by Roland Emmerich, better known for directing the action movie “Independence Day.” The film is a drama, not a documentary, told through the eyes of a fictional young white man from Indiana. Many in the LGBT community objected that the film downplayed the importance of drag performers, trans and bi women, butch lesbians and people of color in the Stonewall rebellion. Boycotts were organized to protest the way the erasure of these real-life activists in favor of a fictional white man.

The Stonewall Inn catered to the poorest and most marginalized queer people: drag queens, transgender folk, hustlers and homeless youth. Witnesses disagree about who was the first to defy the police raid in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969. It was either a drag queen or a butch lesbian. Soon the crowd was pelting the officers with coins, bottles, bricks and the like. The police, caught by surprise, used nightsticks to beat some people before taking refuge in the bar itself. News of the uprising spread quickly. Hundreds gathered on the street and a riot-control police unit arrived. Violence continued as some chanted, “Gay power!”

Drag queens started spontaneous kick lines facing the police with clubs and helmets. That dramatic moment is captured in the painting “It was Beautiful” by Douglas Blanchard. The drag queens met violence with defiant humor by singing,

We are the Stonewall girls
We wear our hair in curls
We wear no underwear
We show our pubic hair
We wear our dungarees
Above our nelly knees!

That night 13 people were arrested and some hospitalized. The streets were mostly cleared by 4 a.m., but a major confrontation with police happened again the next night, and protests continued on a smaller scale for a week.

A month later the Gay Liberation Front was formed, one of many LGBT rights organizations sparked by the saints of Stonewall. LGBT religious groups are indebted to the saints of Stonewall for our very existence.

“Gay Liberation” by George Segal commemorates the Stonewall rebellion (Photo by Wally Gobetz)

One of the most significant Stonewall artworks is also the world’s first piece of public art honoring the struggle for LGBTQ equality. “Gay Liberation” was created in 1979 by famed pop sculptor George Segal. It consists of four statues, a gay couple and a lesbian couple, cast in bronze and painted white in Segal’s typical style. The figures are arranged realistically in casual poses, evoking the power of love with their ghostly presence.

The idea for a public sculpture honoring the 10th anniversary of Stonewall came from LGBT activist Bruce Voeller. His vision inspired the Mildred Andrews Fund of Cleveland to commission Segal to create the sculpture. After much controversy, vandalism and alternate locations, the sculpture was installed permanently across the street from the Stonewall Inn at Christopher Park, which also holds two monuments to Civil War heroes.

Artists usually choose between two approaches when addressing the Stonewall Uprising. Some focus on the action in the past while others highlight the present-day Stonewall Inn, which is still in operation as a bar for the LGBT community.

Artists who recreate the past include Doug Blanchard, a gay New York artist who teaches art at City University of New York and is active in the Episcopal Church. “It was Beautiful” and other Stonewall paintings by Blanchard were shown at the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center of New York in 1999. His series “The Passion of Christ: A Gay Vision” has been featured here at the Jesus in Love Blog and in a 2014 book with text by Kittredge Cherry.

“The Battle of Stonewall - 1969” by Sandow Birk

California artist Sandow Birk put Stonewall history into heroic context in a big way. The oil paintings in his Stonewall series measure up to 10 feet wide. The crown jewel of the series is “The Battle of Stonewall - 1969.” It updates the classic painting “The Battle of Mons-en-Pévèle - 1304” by 19th-century French artist Charles Philippe Lariviere. In both cases, the physically superior side attacked those who were considered weaker, but the underdogs won and gained their freedom. Birk replaces swords with police batons and turns national flags into “Gay Power” banners. The knight in shining armor is replaced by a drag queen in mascara and high heels. For more about Birk’s Stonewall series, see my previous post: Sandow Birk: Stonewall's LGBT history painted.

The actual Stonewall riots weren’t as white as Birk's paintings make it appear: “On the first night of the Stonewall riots, African Americans and Latinos likely were the largest percentage of the protestors, because we heavily frequented the bar,” scholar-activist Irene Monroe writes in  Dis-membering Stonewall, her chapter in the book Love, Christopher Street. “For homeless black and Latino LGBTQ youth and young adults who slept in nearby Christopher Park, the Stonewall Inn was their stable domicile.”

“Stonewall Inn” by Trudie Barreras (Collection of Kittredge Cherry)

The location where history happened is emphasized in the colorful painting of the Stonewall Inn by Trudie Barreras, a long-time member of Metropolitan Community Churches. Her art and writing on queer religious themes have appeared frequently here at the Jesus in Love Blog. She also does personalized pet portraits as “donation incentives” for Jesus in Love.

“Prostrations at the Holy Places and Veneration to Our Martyrs (Stonewall Pilgrimage)” by Tony O’Connell

British artist Tony O’Connell paid homage to the power of Stonewall by photographing his own personal pilgrimage to the historic bar in New York City in 2013. He prayed with incense at the Stonewall Inn as part of his series on LGBT pilgrimages, which he does as performances recorded in photos. He travels to places of importance in LGBT history, treating the trip as a pilgrimage to the shrine of a saint. For more about O’Connell’s pilgrimages and other art, see my previous post Tony O’Connell reclaims sainthood: Gay artist finds holiness in LGBT people and places.

Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem and the Stonewall Riots happen in Station 8 from “Stations of the Cross: The Struggle For LGBT Equality” by Mary Button

Tennessee artist Mary Button weaves together the LGBT uprising at Stonewall with Christ’s journey to Calvary in Station 8 of her LGBT Stations of the Cross. She shows that a chain of oppression that stretches from the crucifixion of Christ to police harassment of LGBT people today, offering hope for resurrection. For more about Button’s Stations, see my previous post LGBT Stations of the Cross shows struggle for equality.

Despite the progress made, police raids of gay bars have continued in recent years, such as the notorious 2009 Rainbow Lounge raid in Forth Worth, Texas. June 28 is also the anniversary of the 2009 raid on the Rainbow Lounge, a newly opened gay bar in Fort Worth, Texas. Five customers were zip-tied and taken to jail, multiple others were arrested or detained, and one got a severe brain injury while in custody. The raid sparked an unprecedented public outcry that led to reforms.

The history of the Rainbow Lounge raid and reaction is told in the 2012 film “Raid of the Rainbow Lounge,” directed by Robert Camina. He says it has “haunting parallels” to Stonewall. Emmy-nominated actress Meredith Baxter narrates the documentary. A video trailer is posted online.



May the saints of Stonewall continue to inspire all who seek justice and equality!

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Related links:

2015 book for teens: “Stonewall: Breaking Out in the Fight for Gay Rights” by Ann Bausum

Book: “Stonewall: The Riots That Sparked the Gay Revolution” by David Carter

Book: “Stonewall” by Martin Bauml Duberman

Video: “American Experience: Stonewall Uprising”


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This post is part of the GLBT Saints series by Kittredge Cherry at the Jesus in Love Blog. Saints, martyrs, mystics, heroes and holy people of special interest to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) people and our allies are covered on appropriate dates throughout the year.

Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
http://www.jesusinlove.blogspot.com/
Jesus in Love Blog on LGBT spirituality and the arts

UpStairs Lounge fire: 32 killed in deadliest attack on LGBT people (until Orlando)

“See You at the UpStairs Lounge” by Skylar Fein

Before the Orlando massacre this month, the deadliest attack on LGBT people in U.S. history was an arson fire at the UpStairs Lounge, a gay bar in New Orleans. The fire killed 32 people on June 24, 1973, exactly 43 years ago today.

For a new version of this article, click this link to Qspirit.net:
UpStairs Lounge fire: 32 killed in deadly attack on LGBTQ people


It is enlightening the re-examine the UpStairs Lounge fire in the wake of the Orlando shooting that killed 49 people at the Pulse gay bar in Florida on June 12.

Few people cared about the UpStairs Lounge fire at the time. The crime was never solved, churches refused to do funerals for the dead, and four bodies went unclaimed. Now there is a resurgence of interest in the martyrs of New Orleans.

The fire is being remembered in powerful new ways, including the 2016 book “Stand by Me: The Forgotten History of Gay Liberation” by Harvard history professor Jim Downs. The fire is covered in the first chapter, titled “The Largest Massacre of Gay People in American History.”

“Upstairs Inferno,” a documentary directed by Robert Camina and narrated by Christopher Rice, is currently playing at film festivals around the United States before its release on DVD. The film brings humanity to the headlines by interviewing more than 20 people, including several survivors who have kept silent for decades.

Other recent works about the fire include an award-winning online exhibit at the LGBT Religious Archives Network; the 2014 book “The Up Stairs Lounge Arson: Thirty-two Dead in a New Orleans Gay Bar, June 24, 1973” by Clayton Delery-Edwards; and the musical drama “Upstairs” by Louisiana playwright Wayne Self. In 2013 the New Orleans Museum of Art acquired Louisiana artist Skylar Fein’s major installation “Remember the UpStairs Lounge.” The tragedy is also recounted in a short documentary by award-winning film maker Royd Anderson released on June 24, 2013, and in the 2011 book “Let the Faggots Burn: The UpStairs Lounge Fire” by Johnny Townsend.

For queer people, the UpStairs Lounge served as a sanctuary in every sense of the world. It was a seemingly safe place where LGBT people met behind boarded-up windows that hid them from a hostile world. Worship services were held there by the LGBT-affirming Metropolitan Community Church of New Orleans. The pastor, Rev. William R. Larson, died along with a third of congregation. Half the victims were MCC members. Those who died included people from all walks of life: preachers, hustlers, soldiers, musicians, parents, professionals and a mother with her two sons.

The horror of the fire was compounded by the homophobic reactions. Churches refused to hold funerals for the victims. Finally MCC founder Rev. Troy Perry flew to New Orleans to conduct a group memorial service. Families of four victims were apparently so ashamed of their gay relatives that they would not identify or claim their remains. The City refused to release their bodies to MCC for burial, and instead laid them to rest in a mass grave at a potter’s field.


UPSTAIRS INFERNO - Teaser Trailer [HD] from Camina Entertainment on Vimeo.

The full-length feature documentary “Upstairs Inferno” was produced and directed by Camina, whose previous film was the widely praised “Raid of the Rainbow Lounge” about a police raid at a Texas gay bar. Now he has created the most comprehensive and authoritative film on America's biggest gay mass murder. Survivors interviewed in the film include Ricky Everett and Francis Dufrene and a survivor who lost her lover Reggie Adams in the blaze.

Narrator Chrisopher Rice is an openly gay New York Times bestselling author whose hometown is New Orleans. His debut novel "A Density of Souls" got a landslide of media attention, mostly because he is the son of famed vampire author Anne Rice.

Two videos trailers for the film have been released. The first trailer provides an overview while the second trailer present additional interviews about the personal impact of the fire.


UPSTAIRS INFERNO - Trailer 2 [HD] from Camina Entertainment on Vimeo.

Meanwhile a different film crew working on “Tracking Fire” discovered vandalism on the memorial plaque while filming an interview there in May 2015. Someone through a paint bomb at the plaque, leaving it discolored even after the paint was cleaned off.

A sidewalk memorial plaque outside the UpStairs Lounge building in New Orleans was dedicated in 2003 and vandalized in 2015 (photo courtesy of "Tracking Fire")

Another documentary still in production is “Tracking Fire” with director Sheri Wright. A video trailer is posted. “My focus is to tell the story of what happened, honor the victims, including the mother who died with her two sons, the survivors, their friends and family. It is also my intention to present a way for healing to replace the pain of tragedy and to offer a healthy resolution for personal and social conflict,” the film’s website explains.

Announcing the full-length trailer for Tracking Fire, a documentary which chronicles an unsolved case of arson that claimed 32 lives - one of the worst tragedies in LGBT history in America.
Posted by Tracking Fire on Monday, March 24, 2014

LGBT Religious Archives created an online exhibit about the UpStairs Lounge Fire with more than 120 artifacts that weave together stories about the fire and its aftermath, early gay activism, and the beginnings of Metropolitan Community Church in New Orleans. Original artifacts include newspaper and journal articles, photographs, correspondence, government reports and recordings from the time. The exhibit went online in September 2013 and received the 2014 Allan Bérubé Prize for “outstanding work in public or community-based LGBT and/or queer history.”

The crime received little attention from police, elected officials and news media.  The only national TV news coverage at the time was these video clips from CBS and NBC:



Louisiana playwright and composer Wayne Self spent five years weaving together the stories of the UpStairs Lounge fire victims and survivors. The result was the dramatic musical "Upstairs," which has been performed in various cities in Louisiana, New York and California after opening in New Orleans and Los Angeles in June 2013. He says his work takes the form “of tribute, of memorial, even of hagiography.”

The musical "Upstairs" brings back to life people such as MCC assistant pastor George “Mitch” Mitchell, who managed to escape the fire, but ran back into the burning building to save his boyfriend, Louis Broussard. Both men died in the fire. Their bodies were found clinging to one another in the ashes. In the musical, Mitchell sings a song called “I’ll Always Return”:

…Modern age,
Life to wage.
To get ahead, must turn the page.
I can't promise I'll never leave,
But I'll always,
I'll always return….

“I’ll Always Return” is one of five songs from the musical that are available online as workshop selection at http://upstairsmusical.bandcamp.com/.

Self raised funds so that Mitchell’s son and the son’s wife and could travel from Alabama to attend the play. Many victims of the UpStairs Lounge fire were survived by children who are still alive today.

The musical also explores the unsettled and unsettling question of who set the fire. Rodger Dale Nunez, a hustler and UpStairs Lounge customer, was arrested for the crime, but escaped and was never sentenced. He was thrown out of the UpStairs Lounge shortly before the fire for starting a fight with a fellow hustler. He committed suicide a year later. Self says that other theories arose to blame the KKK and the police, but he implicates Nunez -- with room for doubt -- in the musical.

A gay man may have lit the fire, but the real culprit is still society’s homophobia that set the fuse inside him. Hatred for LGBT people was also responsible for the high death toll in another way. The fire was especially deadly because the windows were covered with iron bars and boards so nobody could see who was inside. But they also prevented many people from getting outside in an emergency.

The UpStairs Lounge is recreated with haunting detail in Skylar Fein’s 90-piece art installation. He builds an environment with artifacts, photos, video, and a reproduction of the bar’s swinging-door entrance, evoking memories of how the place looked before and after the fire. “Remember the UpStairs Lounge” debuted in New Orleans in 2008 and was shown in New York in 2010. In January 2013 the New Orleans Museum of Art announced that it had acquired the installation. Fein donated it to the museum, saying that he did not want to dismantle the work or profit from its sale. He discusses the fire and shows objects from his installation in this video.

The victims of the UpStairs Lounge fire are part of LGBT history now, along with the queer martyrs who were burned at the stake for sodomy in medieval times. Their history is told in my previous post Ash Wednesday: Queer martyrs rise from the ashes.

The UpStairs Lounge fire gives new meaning to the Upper Room where Jesus and his disciples shared a Last Supper. It was also the place where they hid after his crucifixion, but the locked doors did not prevent the risen Christ from joining them and empowering them with the Holy Spirit.

The shared journey of LGBT people includes much loss -- from hate crimes, suicide, AIDS, and government persecution. But the LGBT community has also found ways to keep going. Reginald, one of the survivors of the UpStairs Lounge fire, expresses this strength in the song "Carry On" from the "Upstairs" musical:

I can speak.
I can teach.
I can give of the compassion I've received.
I can build.
I can sing!
I can honor all the loves,
That have passed away from me,
By sharing all the good that they have ever shown to me.
I can live my life.
I can carry on.
Carry on.
Carry on!

New Orleans film maker Royd Anderson's “The UpStairs Lounge Fire” documentary lasts 27 minutes (longer than the fire itself) and includes interviews with an eyewitness, a son who lost his father, a rookie firefighter called to the scene, author Johnny Townsend, and artist Skylar Fein, whose art exhibit about the tragedy gained national prominence. Here is a video trailer for the documentary.



The value of remembering the UpStairs Lounge fire was summed up by Lynn Jordan in the LGBT Religious Archives online exhibit that he co-curated. Jordan, founding member of MCC San Francisco, visited New Orleans shortly before and after the fire. In his introduction to the UpStairs exhibit, he explains:

“I left New Orleans with the promise to each of the 32 who would become immortal, that I would remember their sacrifice and carry them with me in all that would unfold in my life. The research and documentation that is an integral part of this Upstairs exhibit is “my” living into completion the promise to these “32 martyrs of the flames” that they “would not” be forgotten.

For those who would say that this event was so yesterday, i.e., we have achieved so many advances in our civil rights and in our acceptance for this to happen again, I would remind them that hate and intolerance are not constrained to finding shelter in any one moment, any one location in our “queer” history. To focus only on how far our LGBTQI communities may have progressed in 40 years; to fail to remember the sacrifice of all the lives lost or shattered in this journey; to lapse into complacency about our personal security: places us at risk of reviving the tragedy of our past in the present.”

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Related links:

UpStairs Lounge online exhibit (LGBT Religious Archives)

The Horror Upstairs (Time.com - June 21, 2013)

UpStairs Lounge arson attack (Wikipedia)

The Tragedy of the UpStairs Lounge (Jimani.com - website of the bar now at the same location)

32 Died, and I Wrote a Musical About It: Why I Did It and Would Do It Again by Wayne Self (HuffingtonPost)

NOMA acquires evocative major artwork by Skylar Fein: 'Remember the Upstairs Lounge' (nola.com)

‘Upstairs Inferno’ Recounts The Gay Mass Murder You Didn’t Know About (2015 interview with Robert Camina)

Poem: “Faggots We May Be” by S. Alan Fann

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This post is part of the LGBT Calendar series by Kittredge Cherry at the Jesus in Love Blog. The series celebrates religious and spiritual holidays, holy days, feast days, festivals, anniversaries, liturgical seasons and other occasions of special interest to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people of faith and allies.


Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
http://www.jesusinlove.blogspot.com/
Jesus in Love Blog on LGBT spirituality and the arts

Artist seeks suggestions for LGBT history series

Suggestions for an art series on the LGBT civil rights movement are requested by New York artist Stephen Mead.

He wants to present pre-Stonewall figures, especially the obscure and unsung, with his new LGBT series.

In addition, Mead responded to the recent mass shooting at the Pulse gay nightclub in Orlando by issuing a special invitation. Victims and their loved ones are invited to share their stories and photos for the new LGBT art series. “The only legacy I can think of at the moment, against terrorism, is love,” he said.

Mead is a gay mixed-media artist and poet. His work has appeared internationally in books, galleries and cyberspace, including here at the Jesus in Love Blog. He often addresses spiritual themes or reveals the spiritual dimension within secular subjects.

Images, ideas and stories may be submitted to Mead via email.

“I am working on montages for this series tentatively titled ‘From Nostalgia Though Now and Beyond’ as a way of paying homage to the international LGBT Civil Rights movement, especially prior to Stonewall, where so many lived ‘in the life’ but unsung,” Mead said. “I see this as an ongoing series as I learn of new stories and imagine either gathering them on a website such as Weebly or published through CreateSpace, but I am open to ideas as to what presentation platform might works best.”

He has already created several photo-montage images for the series, including a tribute to Willem Arondeus, a gay Dutch artist who participated in the Nazi resistance movement and died in the Holocaust. His last message before his execution was, “Let it be known that homosexuals are not cowards.”

“Sergius and Bacchus Eternal Love in Thee” by Stephen Mead

The new series also includes religious figures such as Sergius and Bacchus, a pair of third-century Christian martyrs who are often considered gay saints.

“The swords side by side at the bottom-most layer represent the layers of history burying the lovers who are still symbolized by the power within their proximity. The Jesus and Sacred Heart message of course represents both the theory that Jesus loved all, but that it was not anathema to be gay, soldiers, a couple, and religiously devout,” Mead explained.

“We Beg Your Pardon, Sir Alan Turing” by Stephen Mead

In a related series, Mead has created hundreds of images of Alan Turing, the British computer scientist and codebreaker who was driven to suicide in the face of “chemical castration” after his conviction for homosexual acts. The images are featured on a short-collage film at Vimeo.

Alan Turing, the Soul of the Man Beyond the Verdict, Beyond the Machine from Stephen Mead on Vimeo.

Mead’s most recent book is “According to the Order of Nature (We too are Cosmos Made): Art and Text for Gay Spiritual Sensuality.” published in 2016. This mixed-media series of paintings aims to reverse persecution, exploring LGBT sensuality for its spiritual roots and profound bonding. The cover image is “No Doubts, Thomas,” a reference to the apostle Thomas, who doubted Christ's resurrection until he could see and feel the wounds that Jesus received on the cross.

“No Doubts, Thomas” by Stephen Mead

His previous work on the Jesus in Love Blog includes “The Last of Laramie” (inspired by Matthew Shephard) and “Kuan Yin is Coming.” Other books by Mead include “Our Book of Common Faith,” which features his lyrical Laramie painting dedicated to Matthew Shepard. For more about Mead and his art, see the previous post “Gay Artist Links Body and Spirit.”

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This post is part of the Artists series by Kittredge Cherry at the Jesus in Love Blog. The series profiles artists who use lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) and queer spiritual and religious imagery. It also highlights great queer artists from history, with an emphasis on their spiritual lives.

Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
http://www.jesusinlove.blogspot.com/
Jesus in Love Blog on LGBT spirituality and the arts

LGBT church history: Axios and MCC at National Council of Churches

LGBT protest at the National Council of Churches in 1992: John Taktikos, Nancy Wilson and Lorna Cramer (Photo by Kittredge Cherry)

Important events in LGBT church history came to mind this week when I got an announcement that Axios launched a new Facebook page.

I remembered how the fiery truth-telling of Axios President John Taktikos shook up the Orthodox leaders who were keeping pro-LGBT Metropolitan Community Churches out of the National Council of Churches.

Axios is an organization of Eastern and Near Eastern Orthodox, and Byzantine and Eastern-rite Catholic LGBT Christians.I met John Taktikos in 1992 through my work as MCC's international ecumenical director.

I arranged for John to advocate for LGBT rights with Orthodox church leaders at the 1992 National Council of Churches annual meeting in Cleveland, Ohio. He spoke passionately to the Orthodox leaders, who were the main opponents blocking MCC’s membership. LGBT representatives from many other NCC member churches joined us too.

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 Wilson, pictured in the middle, seized the podium and said, “It’s easier to get into heaven than into the National Council of Churches!” She banged her fist on the podium so hard that it cracked. Nancy is retiring this summer after 10 years as moderator of MCC.

On that dreadful day I took the photo at the top of this post. Pictured are, from left, John Taktikos of Axios, Nancy Wilson of MCC, and Lorna Cramer of Unitarian Universalists for Lesbian/Gay Concerns.

Protest signs in the photo say, “Stonewall Rises Again!!!” and “Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual: We are Already in the Church. Let us be Open, Free.”

The AIDS crisis was raging and John died before he could attend the next NCC annual meeting. Axios vice president Alexi stepped in to fill his place.

Over the years I have kept and treasured the elegant envelope addressed to me at MCC headquarters in John’s own handwriting.  It is dated Oct. 17, 1992, when we were planning for the NCC meeting.

I scanned it this week when Axios launched a new Facebook page. This graceful calligraphy reflects a beautiful spirit who helped lay the foundation for LGBT people of faith today.

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Related books:

“Homosexuality in the Orthodox Church” by Justin R. Cannon


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See more of my LGBT church history photos at these links:

Happy 44th birthday, MCC! Photos show LGBT church history

Happy birthday, MCC and Desmond Tutu!  (2011)

See LGBT history in photos (2010)

Happy 40th birthday, MCC! (2008)

Level Ground Fest creates LGBT religious dialogue through art

I was inspired by attending this weekend's Level Ground Festival, which uses art to create space for dialogue on faith, gender and sexuality.

Most of the people organizing and attending the conference Feb. 24-27 in Pasadena, CA seemed to be millennials with evangelical roots. Their youthful energy and optimism gave me confidence that they are changing the church so that LGBT people will always be welcome.

I arrived at the Level Ground Festival with my life partner Audrey

I went to a reading by Deborah Jian Lee, author of “Rescuing Jesus: How People of Color, Women, and Queer Christians are Reclaiming Evangelicalism.” It is on my list of the Top 25 LGBTQ Christian books of 2015. She reported how evangelicalism is evolving due to diverse younger members, especially openly LGBT people, women in leadership, and more people of color.

The main example she discussed at the festival was Biola Queer Underground, a student group at a conservative Christian university in southern California. They took risks to open up dialogue on a campus where students could be expelled for “homosexual acts.”

Lee, an award-winning journalist who teaches at Cornell College, also told her own journey of growing up Chinese American in a non-religious home in a mostly white Chicago suburb. She found her “first true belonging at a Chinese immigrant church…. They taught me Jesus’ message was for everyone, no exceptions.” But anti-LGBT messages from various churches eventually turned her into a “refugee from evangelicalism” and led her to try to “make amends” for the damage done by Christian bigotry.

Kittredge Cherry and Deborah Jian Lee

Deborah and I first “met” on Facebook last year when I put her book on my list of the year’s Top 25 LGBTQ Christian books. We are both journalists who write about religion, love Jesus and are interested in Asia, so we had a lot in common. It was a joy to meet face to face.

"Rescuing Jesus" panel

Her reading was followed by discussion led by a diverse panel of experts, including journalist Christian Brown. He blogs on faith, sexuality and race at The Dispatch.

Kittredge Cherry and Christian Brown

Level Ground Executive Director Samantha Curley is another Facebook friend whom I got to meet in person for the first time at the festival. She co-founded Level Ground three years ago with Chelsea McInturff. I was impressed by the diversity and positive spirit of the conference through their leadership.

Executive Director Samantha Curley, right, with Kittredge Cherry and Audrey

Hundreds of people attended the festival in Pasadena, not far from to my home in Los Angeles.

This was the first time I attended an event sponsored by Level Ground. But it won’t be the last.

I love the Level Ground motto: “A safe space for dialogue through art.”


Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
http://www.jesusinlove.blogspot.com/
Jesus in Love Blog on LGBT spirituality and the arts

Ash Wednesday: Queer martyrs rise from the ashes

For a new version of this article, click this link to Qspirit.net:
Ash Wednesday: Queer martyrs executed for homosexuality rise from the ashes

Today on Ash Wednesday queer martyrs rise from the ashes as we recall the thousands who were executed for homosexuality throughout history.

This is not just a historical issue. The death penalty for homosexuality continues today in 10 countries (Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Mauritania, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, and United Arab Emirates).

Christians traditionally put ashes on their foreheads as a sign of repentance on Ash Wednesday. It is an appropriate time to reflect on the sins of the church and state against queer people, including the burning of “sodomites” and thousands of executions for homosexuality over the past 800 years.

Some of the executions for sodomy were recorded by artists, either long ago or in recent times. This post features images, both new and historical, to remember and honor those whose lives were desecrated and cut short.

The whole sad history of church- or state-sanctioned executions of queer people stretches from the 13th century almost to the present. For the first 1,000 years of church history, Christianity was relatively tolerant of homoerotic relationships.

Then came campaigns of terror that started to use the terms “heresy” and “sodomy” interchangeably.  Eventually hostility began to be directed at same-sex erotic behavior in particular. Terence Weldon of Queering the Church discusses the fateful period when the atrocities began in a well researched overview titled “Lest We Forget: The Ashes of Our Martyrs”:

In 1120, the Church Council of Nablus specified burning at the stake for homosexual acts. Although this penalty may not immediately have been applied, other harsh condemnations followed rapidly. In 1212, the death penalty for sodomy was specified in in France. Before long the execution of supposed “sodomites”, often by burning at the stake, but also by other harsh means, had become regular practice in many areas.

The church contributed to the deaths of thousands for homosexuality over the next 700 years. Witch burning occurred in the same period and claimed the lives of countless lesbian women whose non-conformity was condemned as witchcraft. (Current events in Uganda and elsewhere prove that some are STILL using Christianity to justify the death penalty for homosexuality up to the present day.) As Weldon concludes:

Obviously, the Catholic Church cannot be held directly responsible for the judicial sentences handed down by secular authorities in Protestant countries. It can, however, be held responsible for its part in fanning the flames of bigotry and hatred in the early part of the persecution, using the cloak of religion to provide cover for what was in reality based not on Scripture or the teaching of the early Church, but on simple intolerance and greed.

It is important as gay men, lesbians and transgendered that we remember the examples of the many who have in earlier times been honoured by the Church as saints or martyrs for the faith. It is also important that we remember the example of the many thousands who have been martyred by the churches – Catholic and other.

Sodomy is often considered a male issue, but the facts of history make clear that queer women were persecuted under sodomy laws too. The meaning of sodomy has changed a lot over the centuries. The “sin of Sodom” in the Bible was described as arrogance and failure to care for travelers and the poor.

“Catharina Margaretha Linck, executed for sodomy in Halberstadt in 1721” by Elke R. Steiner. Steiner’s work is based on Angela Steidele’s book "In Männerkleidern. Das verwegene Leben der Catharina Margaretha Linck alias Anastasius Lagrantinus Rosenstengel, hingerichtet 1721." Biographie und Dokumentation. Cologne: Böhlau, 2004. ("In Men's Clothes: The Daring Life of Catharina Margaretha Linck alias Anastasius Rosenstengel, Executed 1721.")

German artist Elke R. Steiner illustrates the last known execution for lesbianism in Europe. Born in 1694, Catharina Margaretha Linck lived most of her life as a man under the name Anastasius. She was beheaded for sodomy on Nov. 8, 1721 in Halberstadt in present-day Germany. Linck worked at various times as a soldier, textile worker and a wandering prophet with the Pietists. She married a woman in 1717. Her mother-in-law reported her to authorities, who convicted her of sodomy with a "lifeless instrument," wearing men's clothes and multiple baptisms. The subject is grim, but Steiner adds an empowering statement: “But even were I to be done away with, those who are like me would remain.”

“Catharina aka Anastasius Linck” by Ria Brodell

Genderqueer Boston artist Ria Brodell portrays Linck and several other historical women who were killed for sodomy in her “Butch Heroes” series. They include Katherina Hetzeldorfer of Germany, drowned in 1477 for female sodomy, and Lisbetha Olsdotter aka Mats Ersson of Sweden, who was decapitated in 1679 for cross-dressing and other crimes.

“The Shameful End of Bishop Atherton and his Proctor John Childe,” hanged for sodomy in 1641 in Dublin (Wikimedia Commons)

John Atherton, Anglican bishop of Waterford and Lismore, and his lover John Childe were hanged for “buggery” in 1640 in Dublin, Ireland. The bishop was executed under a law that he helped to institute! The picture comes from an anonymous 1641 booklet titled “The Shameful End of Bishop Atherton and his Proctor John Childe.” The title tries to shame and blame the victims, but the shame belongs to the church and society who killed them for who and how they loved.

Balboa executing two-spirit Native Americans for homosexuality in 1513 in Panama -- engraving by Théodore De Bry, 1594 (Wikimedia Commons).  

The Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa found homosexual activity among the Native American chiefs at Quarqua in Panama. He ordered 40 of these two-spirited people thrown to his war dogs to be torn apart and eaten alive to stop the “stinking abomination.” Executions for homosexuality continued during the “Mexican Inquisition,” an extension of the Spanish Inquisition into the New World. In one of the most notorious examples, 14 men were executed by public burning on Nov. 6, 1658 in Mexico City.

The knight of Hohenberg and his servant, accused of sodomy, were executed by burning in Zürich in 1482. (Wikimedia Commons)

The knight of Hohenberg and his servant, accused sodomites, were executed by burning before the walls of Zurich, Switzerland in 1482. Source: Diebold Schilling, Chronik der Burgunderkriege, Schweizer Bilderchronik, Band 3, um 1483 (Zürich, Zentralbibliothek)

Execution of sodomites in Ghent in 1578 -- drawing by Franz Hogenberg (Wikimedia Commons)

Five Catholic monks were burned to death for homosexuality on June 28, 1578, in Ghent, Belguim.

"Timely Punishment..." shows Dutch massacre of sodomites in Amsterdam in 1730-31 (Wikimedia Commons)

A total of 96 gay men were executed for sodomy in the Netherlands years 1730-31.

More recent examples include the Holocaust or "homocaust" of persecution by the Nazis, who sent an estimated 5,000 to 60,000 to concentration camps for homosexuality. Executions on homosexuality charges in Iran continued to make news multiple times since 2011.

Many more die in attacks fueled by religion-based hate, including those killed in the arson fire at the UpStairs Lounge, a gay bar in New Orleans.

Milder forms of anti-LGBT persecution continue in the church. Now it is common to freeze LGBT people out of church leadership positions. Gay pastor and author Chris Glaser writes about the exclusion from clergy roles as a “fast imposed by others” in the following prayer based on the practice of fasting during Lent, the season of individual and collective repentance and reflection between Ash Wednesday and Easter.

One: Jesus,
     our fast has been imposed by others,
     our wilderness sojourn their choice more than ours.
Many: Our fast from the sacraments,
     our fast from ordination:
     our only choice was honesty.
One: With the scapegoats of the ancient Hebrews,
     sexual sins of generations
     have been heaped upon our backs,
     and we have been sent away,
     excommunicated, into the wilderness to die.
Many: Yet we choose life,
     even in our deprivation
One: Jesus, lead us to discern our call
     parallel to your own:
     rebelling against the boundaries,
     questioning the self-righteous authorities,
     breaking the Sabbath law
     to bring healing.


This prayer comes from “Rite for Lent” by Chris Glaser, published in Equal Rites: Lesbian and Gay Worship, Ceremonies, and Celebrations. Glaser spent 30 years struggling with the Presbyterian Church for the right to ordination as an openly gay man before he was ordained to the ministry in Metropolitan Community Churches in 2005. He writes progressive Christian reflections at chrisglaser.blogspot.com.

“Faggots We May Be,” a 2015 poem by Georgia poet S. Alan Fann, makes connections between gay men burned to death, global warming and the Rainbow Christ.

It is horrifying to remember the "burning times," especially for those LGBT people who consider themselves part of the Christian tradition. Let us rise from the ashes with these verses from the Bible:

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.
For thou hast no delight in sacrifice; were I to give a burnt offering, thou wouldst not be pleased.
[Psalm 51: 10, 17]

Is such the fast that I choose,
a day for a you to humble yourself?
Is it to bow down your head like a rush,
and to spread sackcloth and ashes under you?
Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to God?
Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up speedily.
[Isaiah 58:5-8]

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Top image credit: Dutch massacre of sodomites, detail (Wikimedia Commons)
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Related links:

“Burned for sodomy” (Queering the Church)

Lest We Forget: The Ashes of Our Martyrs (Queering the Church)

The blood-soaked thread (Wild Reed)

List of people executed for homosexuality (Wikipedia)

LGBT Victims (Gay History Wiki)

List of unlawfully killed transgender people (Wikipedia)

Victims of anti-LGBT hate crimes (Wikipedia)

“Victims of Hate” gallery on Facebook

Here are the 10 countries where homosexuality may be punished by death (Washington Post, Feb. 24, 2014)

Significant acts of violence against LGBT people (Wikipedia)

BURN BABY BURN: A Knight, a Squire, a Bishop, a Steward, Five RC Monks and Millions of murders initiated by bigots at Church! (Eruptions at the Foot of the Volcano Blog)

The Gay Holocaust (Matt and Andrej Koymasky)

Catharina Margaretha Linck, Executed for Sodomy (Queering the Church)

A History of Homophobia, 3 The Later Roman Empire & The Early Middle Ages (Rictor Norton)

A History of Homophobia, 4 Gay Heretics and Witches" (Rictor Norton)

Homosexuality in Eighteenth-Century England: A Sourcebook (Rictor Norton, editor)

“Pilloried” - a poem by Andrew Craig Williams

Queering All Saints and All Souls, Celebrating the Queer Body of Christ by Adam Ackley (Huff Post) (litany also suitable for Ash Wednesday)

Blessing the Dust: A Blessing for Ash Wednesday by Jan Richardson

Iran's New Gay Executions (Daily Beast, 8/12/2014)
"Two men, Abdullah Ghavami Chahzanjiru and Salman Ghanbari Chahzanjiri, were hanged in southern Iran on August 6, possibly for consensual sodomy..."

Four Iranian men due to be hanged for sodomy (Pink News, 5/12/2012)
"Iran court sentenced four men… to death by hanging for sodomy… named ‘Saadat Arefi’, ‘Vahid Akbari’, ‘Javid Akbari’ and ‘Houshmand Akbari.’"

Iran executes three men on homosexuality charges (guardian.com 9/7/2011)

International Holocaust Remembrance Day: We all wear the triangle (Jesus in Love)

Ex-gay movement as genocide (Jesus in Love)

Book: Homosexuality and Civilization by Louis Crompton
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This post is part of the LGBTQ Calendar series by Kittredge Cherry. The series celebrates religious and spiritual holidays, events in LGBTQ history, holy days, feast days, festivals, anniversaries, liturgical seasons and other occasions of special interest to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people of faith and our allies.

Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
Qspirit.net presents the Jesus in Love Blog on LGBTQ spirituality.