This is an electronic reproduction of The Voice of Integrity, the quarterly publication of Integrity, Inc., the lesbian and gay justice ministry of the Episcopal Church.  All materials except those reproduced from other sources are copyrighted by Integrity, Inc.  You may reproduce all original material herein if you state "Reproduced from the Winter, 1992 issue of The Voice of Integrity, the quarterly publication of Integrity, Inc., the lesbian and gay justice ministry of the Episcopal Church."

Material may not appear exactly as published since some changes were made after the document was transferred to desk top publishing format.

We encourage you to join Integrity.  We encourage non-Episcopalians and non-lesgay persons to join.  If you are a lesbian or gay Episcopalian and don't belong to Integrity, you're benefitting from all our work and we hope you'll strongly consider helping us by joining.  Individual annual membership $25, Couple's annual membership $40, Low income/student/sr. citizen $10.  Please mail check or money order to Integrity, Inc., P.O. Box 19561, Washington, DC 20036-0561.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Our Stories Wanted Again

Some Instructive Parallels

Excerpts From The Presiding Bishop's Address to Executive Council

AIDS Funeral:  It Can Happen Where You Live Too

Highlights Of Fall Board Of Directors Meeting

More On Integrity Of The Sierras

Nominating/Election Committee

Proposed By-Laws Changes

Disciples of Christ Narrowly Reject Pro-Gay President

It Could be Worse, We Could Be Baptists

Alternative Views of Gay Origins

Integrity Chaplain Attacked By KKK

Claudia's Column

Sing Us A New Song, But Not This One

Integrity Prayer Calendar

A Chilling Wind from Canada

Keeping Integrity's Patronal Feast:  St. Aelred of Rievaulx

Elizabeth Carl Appointed to Seminary Board

More Reaction To General Convention

Bill Buckley And Company Attack Integrity

Integrity Resolutions Which Passed, Sort of

Forward Movement Disavows Pro-Gay Issue

Chapter Contributions To General Convention Presence

A Gospel For Gay People

'Ex-Gays' Invade Church of England But Without Carey's Blessing

Finding Our Voice: Carter Hayward's Sermon At the Ordination

  of Barry Stopfel

Comments By Bishop Spong At Barry Stopfel's Ordination

German Church: Gay Sex Not Sinful

Boswell On Being Gay In The Church

1991 Dignity Convention

Peoria Dean Pleads Guilty, Resigns Over Child Pornography

President's Page:  A Rainbow of Diversity Under An Umbrella

  Of Sanctuary

Court Upholds Dignity Eviction

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Winter 1992

*The Voice of Integrity*

Volume 2, Number 1

Published by Integrity, Inc.

P.O. Box 19561

Washington, D.C. 20036-0561

Telephone 718-720-3054

Bruce Garner, President

R. Scott Helsel, Editor

Edgar Kim Byham, Publisher

Contributing Editors:

Claudia Windal, Louie Crew

Blair McFadden, Layout

Dorothy Gunn, Production

Editorial Office:  201-868-2485

PO Box 5202; NYC, NY 10185

Member Episcopal Communicators and Gay Lesbian Press Association

Copyright 1992

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IN MEMORIUM

JEROME PAUL ELIAS

1940-1991

Jerome Elias, Treasurer of Integrity/Houston, was murdered on  September 9.  We read constantly about increasing anti-gay violence, and a majority of us have suffered personally from it to some degree.  But being killed because of our sexual orientation is still a thought we suppress and distance from ourselves.  Now it has struck our own family.  Even those of us who have never met our "cousin" Jerome are personally affected by his death.  Jerome was found dead in his apartment.  To date the police have no clues, but it appears certain that it was a bias crime.

*O Creator of All, we pray to thee for those we love but now no longer see.  Grant them thy peace; let light perpetual shine upon them; and in thy loving wisdom and almighty power work in them the good purpose of they perfect will.  Through our Redeemer. Amen.*

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OUR STORIES WANTED AGAIN

      The Office of the Presiding Bishop and the Executive Council of the General Convention have issued a "Storytelling/Story Gathering Guide."  It states: "We are very much interested in the type of stories we know you can provide.  We warmly invite and encourage you to share these stories with us.  Are you involved in planning groups?  vestries?  mission committees?  evangelical teams?  social ministry?  Please use this form to tell us stories from those groups as well. ...  The entire Church is being asked to tell its stories - success, risk, failure, corporate, personal, all types of stories.  These stories will serve to guide the future of the Church."  To obtain a copy of the form, please contact: EPISCOPAL CHURCH CENTER, 815 Second Avenue, New York, New York 10017, 1-800-334-7626, Attn.:  Vernon R. Hazlewood, Planning Officer.

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*Integrity's President, Bruce Garner* of Atlanta, has been appointed to the National Church's Standing Commission on Human Affairs.  Not only is he the first lesgay person to serve on the General Convention interim body charged with oversight of lesgay issues, he is also the first openly lesgay person to serve on any standing commission of the Episcopal Church.

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SOME INSTRUCTIVE PARALLELS

by The Rev. Warner Traynham

"Gays and lesbians are the last minority to be harassed by the official church"

          John C. Bennett

      If someone were to ask you what the following list of groups had in common what would you respond?  The groups are: Jews, women, blacks, and gays?

      Each is or was an oppressed "minority."  Women of course are a numerical majority but like minorities they have been the victims of discrimination and marginalization.

      And if someone were to ask you what each of the groups had in common with respect to the church, what would you say?  One thing you could say would be that the church supported their oppression; that in each case, it identified biblical citations which reinforced society's prejudice against them and provided a "theological" rationale for that prejudice.

      It is my contention that homosexuality is not, in the first instance, a biblical or theological issue at all.  Like the other groups listed with it, it is an object of societal prejudice.  This prejudice has the same negative impact both to victim and victimizer which we associate with these other prejudices, therefore this prejudice has no real value to society.  In short, the biblical and theological issues are red herrings, rationalizations for prejudices arrived at for reasons having nothing to do with the Bible or theology.  The real issues are elsewhere.

      Every "minority group" is different and these are no exception.  The issue, in the case of the Jews is religion, in the case of women it is gender, in the case of blacks it is color and race, in the case of gays it is sexual orientation.  Each impacts society differently and the "majority" is of course different for each issue yet the patterns of oppression by the "majority" are remarkably similar.

      If one examines the three groups where a consensus has more or less been reached in the society and in the church, the results are I believe, instructive.  In each case, difference from the majority is clearly the focus of prejudice and it is admitted that fear and ignorance are the sources or motives for the oppression these groups experience.

      1.  Jesus and the first disciples were Jews.  The New Testament Church even debated whether or not gentiles had to become Jews, ie; undergo circumcision and keep the dietary laws, etc., in order to become Christians.  Initially, Christians were regarded as a Jewish sect.  It took some time for Christians to disassociate themselves from Judaism and from Jews sufficiently to forget their origins to the point where they could learn to hate their source and become anti-semitic.

      One can debate the origins.  Certainly Jews were regarded ambivalently by the Romans before Christ.  They were exempted from the Roman army because they would not recognize the Roman deities or fight on the Sabbath.  Strange and troublesome long before,in medieval Europe they appeared to be even stranger.  Rome was an amalgam of peoples and religions, one more hardly mattered.  Medieval Europe, except for the Moors who were finally driven out, was religiously one.  It was in such a context that the Jews seemed most strange and threatening.  Like the church, they were an international community but one that did not recognize Christ, indeed rejected him.  In a world accustomed to see difference as bad -- them and us -- if the church was on God's side,then the Jews must be on the devil's.  A perusal of scripture, especially the Gospel of John revealed that "the Jews took counsel against Jesus to put him to death."  Never mind that almost the entirety of scripture is by the Jews and about the Jews.  Never mind the Pauline struggle with the persistence of the Jews in a Christian context in the Epistle to the Romans.

      For centuries Jews were deprived of basic rights in Europe.  They were killed or forced to convert or driven out of whole kingdoms.  They were harried from pillar to post by Christians in the name of the King of love ostensibly because scripture said they killed Christ.

      Well, scripture does say that.  Why then do we not still give Jews the choice to convert or be burned as our ancestors did?  Not because scripture has changed, but because we have.  We have realized that the real reason we persecuted the Jews was because we believed they were evil and we believed that because they were different from us.  They rejected our good.  They worshipped differently, had different customs, spoke another tongue, did not celebrate our festivals, etc., and they persisted in that difference as if it had merit.

      Today we interpret the references to the hierarchy of Israel and their role in Jesus death, as applying universally to humanity and not merely to the Jews.  It is we, who, by making our historically conditioned perceptions absolute, kill Jesus over and over again in his people--in this case the Jews.

      An idol is conditional reality raised to the level of an absolute, unconditional good, a god.  The majority elevated their identity into an idol.  The idol was called Christianity.  To be a Christian was to be alright.  To be the opposite - a Jew - must then be all bad.  We equated God with Christianity so God was the opposite of the Jews and the Jews' enemy.

      The biblical texts cited against the Jews were the gospels, especially John.  They were Christ killers.  This form of prejudice we now call anti-semitism.  It is not the Jews who are the problem we have come to realize, it is anti-semitism; the fear and ignorance of the majority that make an idol of the Christian religion and demand the sacrifice of its opposite.

      2.  When did the subordination of women begin?  Primitive cultures usually assign different gender roles but they do not necessarily subordinate women to men as has been the case in the West.  Women were subordinate to men in Jewish society while in Roman society women were in some respects the equals of men.  Jesus himself fraternized with women contrary to rabbinic practice and was specifically criticized for it in the Gospel record.  The Apostle Paul seems rather double minded on the issue, in places saying women should be seen and not heard and at other times asserting that in Christ, being male or female made no difference.  That last insight got lost early in the life of the church.  The early bishops accepted stoic perspectives in these matters rather than Jewish ones.  While Jews subordinated women, every Jew was expected to marry.  Sex, they believed was God ordained.  The church fathers, following the stoics who exalted reason over the passions, exalted celibacy--using Jesus and Paul as examples.  St. Augustine, after Paul, the most formative figure in the early church, had a particularly difficult time reconciling his passion for women and his passion for God.  He came to see it as an either/or proposition and so, mutually exclusive.  That view was in the air and the church's leaders followed him.  Worse, they came to see women as temptresses.  Did not scripture say that it was through a women that sin entered the world?  Eve's weakness gave the devil an in and she seduced Adam.  All the evil in life could be laid at her door.  Alas, she was a necessity.  The race would perish without her, but her presence could destroy it as well and almost had.  Like a dangerous beast you could not do without, she was kept, but chained.

      Women after all are different.  They function, look and think differently.  They were not educated and accused of being ignorant.  They were given no or limited authority and accused of being incapable of exercising authority.  All of this emphasized their difference and left men with only half the race to compete with.

      Until quite recently humanity's knowledge of the reproductive process was rudimentary.  It was believed that women contributed nothing to the genetic make up of children functioning solely as incubators.  A man's child really was his and not theirs.  Semen after all could be seen but an egg could not.  Men gave life.  They were the 'generative principle,' women merely housed it.

      Fear of seduction and the power of sex, and ignorance of real physical function expressed itself in the male population as sexism.  Once again it was either/or.  Men were good, made in God's image.  Women were subordinate, derivatives, taken from Adams rib and bad or at least unreliable and seductive as Eve demonstrated.

      Woman was good only if separated from sex and fenced about, so the medieval image of the "good woman" is Mary ever Virgin.

      The origin myths of Genesis were the primary texts used to shore up this position.  They reflect rather than form it.  The Old and New Testament are full of the conviction that women should be seen and not heard because that was characteristic of Jewish society.

      The idol of course was maleness.  To be male was good.  To be female was bad.  The God and Father of Jesus Christ was a male.  The opposite was evil.  The creation chapters of Genesis ordained this subordination.  Those chapters proscribed it as woman's punishment for sin.  Now we understand these chapters to describe the results of sin.

      Once again, women are not the problem.  The fear and ignorance of the 'majority' that made an idol of maleness is the problem.  Women were suppressed, shunted aside stunted and trivialized and in this fashion used to shore up the idol.  In this manner they were sacrificed to maleness.

      3.  Blacks were first encountered in numbers by Europeans through the Moors of Spain who introduced black slavery into Europe.  Later, Portuguese traders brought black slaves to Europe and later to the colonies of the New World.  The most striking thing about blacks, in European eyes was their color.  It did not change with the climate like sun burn.  Secondly, they were encountered in large numbers by the Europeans of the New World as slaves.  How were Christians to justify keeping human beings as property?  How justify treating them so differently?  They justified it on the grounds that the blacks were different -- a different kind of life, a different kind of human being.  This was proven by the fact that they were different in color and culture.  They were not Christians, not one of them, and so could be treated differently.  Later their difference in culture was made an argument for their bondage.  By being enslaved, they could become exposed to the light of the gospel.  The color of blacks was so distinctive people sought a reason for it.  The church supplied that reason with an interpretation that mirrored the European response to it.  It was a curse.  The story was the so called "curse of Ham" in Genesis.  In it Noah passes out in a drunken stupor after the ark lands.  Ham sees his father and laughs.  His brothers behave better.  When Noah learns what happened he curses Canaan one of Ham's children.  The 18th and 19th century American church interpreted the color of blacks to be the curse.  Ham was taken by the Jews to be the progenitor of the Canaanites, Israel's rival in the land.  The actual curse of Noah on Canaan is to be a "hewer of wood and drawer of water for his brothers," an understandable wish of the conquerors of the land for its original inhabitants.  There is no reference to skin color, the Canaanites being as white as the Jews.  Nor is the curse on Ham.  Furthermore the curse is Noah's not God's.  Nor is it described as multigenerational.  As a justification for black slavery it is nonsensical.  Nevertheless Christians in the south used this story to justify that institution for more than two centuries.  They buttressed its use with the numerous references to slavery in the Old Testament and the New.  Once again they turned to Paul, who instructed slaves to obey their masters and sent one runaway back to his owner.

      They ignored the fact that the Noah story has nothing to do with blacks and that Paul's perspective was shaped by the expectation of the imminent end of the world which made social reform moot.

      That a tale like the curse of Canaan could serve this purpose is clear indication that the matter was determined before the biblical support was sought.  The real cause of the prejudice against blacks was fear of difference and ignorance of the unknown.  The desire to denigrate is reinforced by the realization that they had already treated blacks badly by enslaving them.  They had to justify their actions after the fact.

      The problem was not the minority group, but rather the fears of the majority which we call racism.  Once again the church was pressed into service to give a theological and biblical prop to prejudice arrived at from another source.

      The idol in this instance is whiteness.  Its opposite is blackness.  If it was good to be free, white and 21, it was bad to be enslaved, black and any age.

      Blacks were held in bondage for 300 years and legally discriminated against for a hundred more.  Blacks were regarded as inferior and as late as the 1850's the Supreme Court of the U.S. held that a black man had no rights a white man was bound to respect.

      The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ was white so black was evil and had either to be destroyed or kept in its place.  The havoc wreaked upon the black community as a result of the idol of race is known to all.

      In each of these instances fear and ignorance are the real motives for prejudice which is after all a form of control.  In each, we have come to realize, the problem lies not with the minority group, but with the majority's attitude toward them.  In each instance the response is not to what they do really, but to who they are.  In each instance some aspect of the majority has been made absolute and literally identified with good so the minority can be defined as bad.  In each instance the issue is seen as a dualism, black or white, good or evil and mutually exclusive.  In each instance the 'other' is seen as deviant from the norm, from what the majority is or is used to and that is equated with what God requires or has give.  Finally, in each instance the Bible and the church have been called in to sanction the majority's belief.

      4.  Homosexuality is no exception.  The Jews disapproved of homosexuality for various reasons.  It was associated with their enemies, the Canaanites who practiced homo and hetero -sexual prostitution in their religion.  It was non-procreative when the Jews sought to conquer the other inhabitants of Palestine by a combination of warfare and population growth.  For the Jews marriage and procreation became articles of faith essential to the expansion of a small people into a significant power.

      Later homosexuality was associated with the Greeks and the Romans who tolerated it and whom the Jews had reason to hate and distinguish themselves from since both people conquered them.  Paul shared the prevailing Jewish perspective in this area as he did with respect to women and slavery.  We do not know what Jesus thought because he is not recorded as having ever mentioned it.

      At times in antiquity homosexuality was approved.  At times it was disapproved of.  Interestingly, where women had lower status, gay people usually did too.  Some ancient cultures practiced anal rape by victorious soldiers on the losers as a form of humiliation.  The humiliation consisted of the fact that the losers were used like women who had a status and value inferior to men.

      At some point in the dark or middle ages, the antipathy to homosexuality began in Europe.  The early church as we know was suspicious of sex and penalized women as a result of that fear.  Sex threatened holiness because passion could override reason and reason was identified with God.  Sex was a necessary evil to be engaged in only for procreation, never for pleasure alone.  Where no children were possible sex was sinful.  Homosexuality was the quintessential form of sex without hope of procreation and therefore the example of sinful sex.  That and the fact that it compromised the male image, which we have seen in our discussion of sexism was an idol, seems to have been enough to earn it contempt in the West.  It was the opposite of what a real man or woman was.  It was therefore a threat to the idol of heterosexuality.  As with each other prejudice we have examined, the real problem, we are beginning to realize, is not with gay people but with the response -- called homophobia or heterosexism -- originated by straight people.

      Once again, the Bible and the church provided support.  The story of Sodom and Gomorrah was cited as the primary biblical justification buttressed by prohibitions in Leviticus and the New Testament Epistles.

      The story of Sodom may not be about sex at all.  It depends on the meaning of the Hebrew word translated "to know."  The issue is intellectual vs. carnal knowledge.  If it is about sex, it is not about homosexual love but homosexual rape - something most people gay or straight would disapprove of.  The focus of the story seems to be on a violation of the principles of hospitality.  That is how Jesus apparently understood it.  One author observes the irony that for centuries a story condemning inhospitality has been used to justify inhospitality to gays.

      Because the story represents Sodom and Gomorrah as destroyed by fire from heaven after this incident, the Emperor Justinian concluded that tolerance of homosexuality would lead to the destruction of the state so he made homosexuality a capital offence.

      Interestingly, the one place in the New Testament which clearly criticized homosexual behavior (Romans 1:19-27) is one in which Paul cites it as a result of idolatry.  If this argument is correct, it is Paul who with his countrymen shares the idols of maleness and heterosexuality.  His words illustrate the results of that idolatry in excluding one part of the human family from acceptance by the whole.  He makes his point, but rather differently than he intends.

      Until recently, and in some quarters it is still the case, people believed homosexual orientation to be a matter of choice and therefore perverse -- a willful rejection of heterosexuality, analogous to the medieval Christian's view of Judaism.  If it were a choice, it would not thereby be demonstrated to be wrong or bad.  But no reputable scientist or student of the phenomenon any longer believes it to be a choice.  While no one is sure how sexual orientation is established, it is clear that once established for the great majority, it is irreversible.  Gays, like women and blacks, are feared and hated for who they are not just for what they do.

      While it is no longer acceptable in the general society to hold Jews or women or blacks in contempt, while it is illegal to discriminate against these groups, it is still acceptable to hold gays in contempt and still legal to discriminate against people because of sexual orientation.  But the pattern of behavior in the society and the church with regard to them is the same as that with regard to these other groups.

      For the present, contempt and physical injury are still justified by intelligent people on bases substantially the same as those they previously cited for these other forms of prejudice.  Gay people in short continue to be sacrificed to the idols of the majority.

      As is the case with any deeply held prejudice, there is a lot of double talk and obfuscation.  Society is ostensibly being protected from some threat.  In fact the threat is not to society but to some particular idol society holds.  The real threat is usually not to what God expects but to what the majority is used to.

      Invariably, great social damage is forecast.  While change undoubtedly results from the abandonment of prejudice, those who abandon it seldom wish to reclaim it.  The oppressed minority group allowed to develop normally, is able to make a contribution to the larger society which that prejudice deprived it of.

      Certainly, the abandonment of irrational prejudice is a good of the gospel.  Certainly, the Christian faith stands against the making of idols, that is to say, the absolutizing of any aspect of human life, including the church itself, which then demands uncritical allegiance and takes on the reverence and inviolability due only to God.  Certainly the gospel stands against the idea of an in group and an out group.  Jesus died for all.  Certainly, our experience with the first three issues should persuade us that God is not the enemy of difference and that difference is not best understood in the context of dualisms - either/or, good or bad, or in the context of absolutes -- this is all bad, this is all good, but in the context of variety, of the richness of the divine will.

      As we once believed the exclusion, subjugation and attendant persecution or discrimination against Jews, women or blacks was necessary, ordained by scripture and warranted for the safeguarding of society.  We are now ashamed of that attitude and believe the succeeding inclusiveness to be a benefit, not only to the oppressed group but to the majority as well.  When we come to our senses I believe this win prove equally true of the gay issue.

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The Rev. Warner R. Traynham is the Rector of St. John's Church, Los Angeles.  He was a Deputy to General Convention and will be a featured speaker at Integrity's National Convention in July, 1992.

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EXCERPTS FROM THE PRESIDING BISHOP'S ADDRESS TO EXECUTIVE COUNCIL November 2, New York City

      During our time together yesterday I said a little bit about the wonderful mini-sabbatical Patti and I had following General  Convention.  One of the things that made it wonderful was that every day we took great blocks of time for morning prayer and meditation and for reading aloud.

      One of the books we read was a collection of meditations called "Invitations to Prayer" by a former Dean of Westminster, Eric Symes Abbott.  I would like to share one of them with you because it says something about life as a faith community, and specifically our life together -- just beginning -- as the new Executive Council.

      "We are all persons in the making and in a real sense we are  making and re-making one another.  But how often personal relationships are marred by hasty, partial or over-severe judgments.  We must help one another, not judge one another, and we must leave the final judgment to the divine patience.  One of the greatest promises in the New Testament is that we are accepted in the beloved.  Let us try to be the ministers  of acceptance."

      We are all "persons in the making."  My ministry has shown me the truth of that.  We do "make and remake" one another.  What  an awesome responsibility!  As we stomp about the landscape or wander aimlessly, we can easily tread on one another's souls.  We  must move with the greatest of care.  We are going to come to know one another in a special way over the next years.  I pray that we will move carefully and try to be ministers of acceptance.

      I would like to begin with some reflections about our time together in Phoenix, because where we have been will shape where we are going.

      Our 10 days in Phoenix affirmed a truth we already know: prayer and worship MUST be at the heart of Christian community.  I believe the daily Eucharist and Bible study transformed the General Convention.  I continue to hear stories of the small groups, the healing that took place, as we "made and remade" one another and as we were shaped by Christ.

      Phoenix also affirmed for me that this church has a strong center.  There is so much more that unites us than divides us.  The strength of that center -- the cohesiveness -- provides an environment where those who are pushing up against the edges on one issue or another can do so.  They can speak up.  They can share their perceptions and have them tested.  Through the struggles of faithful people, wrestling with issues, we discern the will of God.  And THIS, we know, is the Anglican way.

      Our General Convention showed us once again that we have VERY different ideas about how the church ought to be the church.  We have common understandings, fundamental teachings that are central to our faith.  We also have different ideas about how these teachings are to be lived out.  For example, some want the church to be a place of nurture and support for the faith journey.  And it IS that.  Some want the church to be the hands and feet of the cosmic Christ -- living out the values Jesus taught and exemplified.  And it IS that.  Some want the church to be the vehicle for proclaiming the faith once delivered.  And it surely is.  Some want the church to be a force in the formation of public policy, bringing the Christian perspective to the moral questions before us.  And it IS.  Jesus Christ calls his church to be all of these.  As individual Christians, we do not all put our emphasis in the same place.  And each of us shifts the emphasis during our Christian journey.  We must honor the different ways we live out the faith.  We must remember that all of these ways are needed and that each proclaims only a part of the Gospel.  Jesus Christ needs and uses all of us and wants us to support each other.  We, the baptized, are all ministers, and we carry out that ministry every day, where we are.  Therefore, a major piece of the ministry of a national church, of a presiding bishop, of an Executive Council is to inspire and empower individual Christians to carry out their ministry in faith, where they are, and in the knowledge that they are not alone. ...

      As I address the dynamics of our common life, I need to acknowledge that there are some saddened, troubled, and angry people who are part of our faith community.  Much of the anger is around the issue of sexuality, and particularly the ordination of gay and lesbian persons.  Those who believe that homosexuality is just plain wrong, according to Scripture, have incredible difficulty sitting still for their church arguing about when and how and under what circumstances.  That is to be expected.

      I am quite sure as I stand before you this morning that we are not going to settle the issue of how Scripture is to be interpreted any time soon.  I also know that people of good faith who take seriously the authority of Scripture have different convictions about homosexuality.  Further, I know that we are not being faithful to God as revealed in community if we each simply assume that we already have the whole truth and nothing at all to learn.

      This is not new thinking.  In 1922, a commission appointed by the archbishops of Canterbury and York said:  "In estimating the relative value of different portions of the Bible, the standard is the mind of Christ as unfolded in the experience of the church and appropriated by the individual Christian through his spirit."  The report notes along the way the efforts of St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas to help the faithful understand that we always struggle together to find the mind of Christ.  That charge to struggle together remains before us.

      It is not an easy thing to be in conversation with people who don't agree with our opinions.  But I intend to lead this church into a deeper dialogue around those issues the Gospel calls us to address.  We don't--any of us--have the whole truth.  And we all have a lot to learn.

      Another dynamic that has an effect on our faith community is the troubled and uncertain nature of our common life as a nation and a global village as we approach the millennium.  We each experience this uncertainty.  We have fears about our jobs, about what will become of us as we get older, about our children and what sort of future is before them, about our relationships, about the erosion in standards of ethical conduct for public officials and private persons.

       The uncertainty of our times makes many of our members look  to the church as a bedrock of stability, unchanged and unchanging.  But, let us remember, God did not promise there would be no change.  God promised to be with us THROUGH change, THROUGH uncertainty, through the flood, through the desert, and in the wilderness.

      A development in our common life, which I believe is based on some of the dynamics I have just mentioned, is very troubling to me.  Driven by both upset at some of the issues that we are addressing, particularly sexuality, and also by the difficult economic times, there are those who feel that withholding funds from the national church program is an appropriate response.  This, to me, is not what the church is all about.  It is not what good stewardship is all about.  It is not what living together in a faith community is all about.  I hope and pray that those who have considered such a response will have second thoughts.  I believe we have a sacred responsibility as members of this church to meet as best we can our common responsibility while we work out together how we are to serve Christ. ...

      In Phoenix I spoke to the General Convention of my visions for our church.  After a summer of thought and prayer I am more clear than ever that we are on the right path.  I am more clear than ever that God is leading us.  I am more clear than ever that God will continue to be with us, as we work and pray and, with joy and steadfastness, carry out God's holy will. ...

      I would like to close with the words of a woman in a religious order on the holy island of Iona, Sister Dorothy Stella.  She said:

      "A vision without a task is a dream.

      A task without a vision is drudgery.

      When we have a vision and a task--it is the hope of the world."

      My friends, I think this says something about what it means to be one of the saints of God.  We have a vision -- a very clear and challenging vision.  We have a task, a very large task.  And we -- members of one fellowship in the mystical body of Christ the Lord -- are the hope of the world.  Let us be about God's plans for us.

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Courtesy of Episcopal News Service

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AIDS FUNERAL:

IT CAN HAPPEN WHERE YOU LIVE TOO

by Jim Collie

      I attended a funeral Tuesday, another AIDS death.  But in the grace of God another birth as well.  It was held at the First Church of the Nazarene in my community -- very much an established congregation of that tradition here, strong in the community and in the denomination.

      It was exceptional, because Richard had been rejected by his congregation, years before.  His call to ministry had been denied by the Nazarene seminary, and they had forced him out.  He had risen to a position of responsibility in the Dean of Students office at a Nazarene College until his 'secret' got out.  No hanky panky with students, no videos or pictures or magazines -- just gay.  Terminated.  Bitter, angry at God, at his church.  Betrayed.

      Richard was diagnosed HIV positive and chose to find his ministry within that community.  Eighteen months ago the Oklahoma congregation that had driven him out in disgrace when he was a student in their midst asked him to come tell the Sunday morning congregation of his experiences.  Frail, accompanied by his mother and aunt, Nazarene ladies of the old school, walking with a cane and pausing often, he addressed the 2,000 member congregation.  He asked for their forgiveness for the years of bitterness and hate he had directed at God and at his church.   And he told them he forgave them for what that congregation had done to him as a young man.

      Last year Richard was the "Volunteer of the Year" for the Community Outreach center.  He was one of the Food Pantry folks -- he directed the process that used the enormous savings in store and merchant coupons to increase the buying power of the center.   Even when he was unable to eat, Richard had all his neighbors bringing him the Thursday papers to clip the food coupons for the Food Pantry.  

      Richard had asked me to teach a Bible study for HIV/AIDS folks.  He became too frail to organize one more thing and that idea slipped away.  He felt strongly that HIV/AIDS folk have some very real questions about scripture that don't get handled in many church Bible studies.

      We stood around after the service, before the trip to the cemetery, telling each other we had been in too many of these funerals.  Liz was there.  She had just buried her husband, Wally, who had died with AIDS -- she was dry-eyed, maintaining composure with every ounce of her strength.  Barbara, an elder in my church, who is in her sixth year of leading an AIDS support group -- struggling for control for the first time in years of attending funerals like this one.  Sandy, wife of the GOP candidate who tried and failed for Jim Wright's congressional seat, a food pantry volunteer with Richard at the Outreach Center, and Mike and Eddie and Geoffrey and all the support group guys -- all of us saying that we're not too sure we can do this many more times.

      Except this one was a victory of sorts, a birth in the midst of death.  Here we were at the Nazarene Church, with the new pastor of the congregation actually glad to be there, and a Cumberland Presbyterian lady preacher and a high church Episcopal hospital chaplain participating in the service.  Richard's hospice nurse was a Catholic priest, and Geoffrey, a Mormon, was one of the pall bearers.  But most of all we didn't glide over anything in the service.  The prayers and preachers all said the word AIDS (the Fort Worth Star Telegram will still not use the word) -- and spoke of God's marvelous gift of life to Richard in the midst of his terrible struggle with death -- and spoke of the gifts of life Richard shared with all of us:  the honesty of his anger at God and most of all the gift of forgiveness.

      Maybe we were crying because it was so nice to go to a funeral and not have heart-felt grief compounded by lies.

      And if this can happen in Arlington, TX, in a Nazarene Church, in the heart of Southern Baptist country, it can happen where you live too.  Thanks be to God.

-----

This article first appeared in "More Light Update," the newsletter of Presbyterians for Lesbian and Gay Concerns, April, 1991.

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*THE NATIONAL AIDS MEMORIAL*

AT THE CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE

112th Street & Amsterdam Ave NYC

*Integrity New York* helped to found the Memorial in the fall of 1985, and it has been one of our major outreach ministries.  The Memorial's motto has been "To honor the dead by serving the living."  *The Book of Remembrance*, which we understand as a "liturgical Quilt," has more than 4,000 names of those who have died of HIV related causes.  Since 1986 we have given out small grants to organizations fighting AIDS and its effects totalling more than $50,000.

*Integrity New York* would like to invite you to send in names to the National AIDS Memorial using the form below.  You do not have to send a contribution to have a name enrolled in *The Book of Remembrance*.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

SEND COMPLETED FORM TO:  The National AIDS Memorial

                         P.O. Box 5202

                         New York, NY 10185

Please inscribe the following names in "The Book of Remembrance"

1. __________________________________________________

2. __________________________________________________

3. __________________________________________________

4. __________________________________________________

5. __________________________________________________

I enclose a contribution of $ ________

Name ___________________________________________________________

         (Title)   First name         MI        Last name

Address ________________________________________________________

            street                               apt. #

City ______________________________ State _______  Zip _________

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HIGHLIGHTS OF FALL BOARD OF DIRECTORS' MEETING

by Loudene "Gil" Grady, Secretary

      Your Board of Directors met over the weekend of October 11-13 at St. Margaret's Retreat Center near Mendham, New Jersey.   Early Saturday morning we looked at the proposed agenda, made some minor adjustments and heard Bruce Garner pronounce, "We can get through this easily by Sunday afternoon."  Sunday night around 8:30 p.m. a gentle nun came along to ask how much longer we'd be so they could close the building.  I mention this, not so much to impress you with our diligence, but to let you know we really work hard when we are together.

ACTIONS TAKEN:

      Three Chapters-in-Formation were certified as full chapters:

Integrity of the Sierras, Integrity/Middle Tennessee, and Integrity/Brooklyn.  Integrity/Berkshire's Chapter-in-Formation status was extended for one year.

      Three chapters were decertified since they were no longer meeting:  Integrity/Harrisburg, Integrity/Ann Arbor, and Integrity/Spokane.

      The special Board positions for Director of Communications and Director of Development were extended until the conclusion of the fall 1992 Board meeting.  Kim Byham was named to continue as the former, and Dorothy Beattie, currently Western Regional Vice President, will replace Paul Woodrum as Director of Development.

      Scott Helsel was confirmed to continue as Executive Secretary through the end of 1992.  In recognition of his service the board voted Scott a token increase in salary. 

REGIONAL REPORTS

      The status of each local chapters was reviewed by its Regional Vice President.  Common concerns ran through these reports including chapter burn-out, how to get more women involved, and that big city chapters are not flourishing.

1992 CHAPTER QUESTIONNAIRE 

      A requirement of the National By-laws, questionnaires will be sent to all chapters in December to be returned by February.  This is the same procedure as last year.  *All chapters must submit a completed Questionnaire!*

INTEGRITY CONTACT GROUPS -- PILOT PROJECT

      A two year trial project was instituted to allow groups of Integrity members to meet and serve in areas where a chapter does not seem viable.  Contact Groups will be made up of three or more Integrity members who have no immediate goal of becoming a full chapter but wish to meet regularly.

      Requirements:  1) three or more current Integrity members with one person designated as the contact person; 2) a permanent mailing address (not a home); and 3) complete a simplified annual report giving meeting times and information about activities, group address, and address of contact person.

      National Responsibilities to Contact Group:  1) list group in national directory and 2) Regional Vice President contact group regularly as with regular chapters.  A Vice President may request a strong nearby chapter to take on the contact group as a mission.

      For further details and special procedures related to this Project, contact your Regional Vice President.

TASK FORCE ON CHAPTER DEVELOPMENT

       A new committee is in place, chaired by Bryant Hudson (Integrity/Dallas).  Committee members are Jim Goodell (Integrity/El Camino Real), Sharon McDonald (Midwest At-Large), and Scott Helsel (Integrity/New York).  Regional Vice Presidents will serve as consultants.

      The purpose of this task force is to explore the needs of chapters and chapter officers as they work to live out their ministry within their Dioceses and to develop resources and mechanisms to meet those needs.  Watch and listen for further information on the work of this task force.

CONVENTION 1992 - JULY 9-12 - HOUSTON, TEXAS - MARK YOUR CALENDAR!

      The Rt. Rev. Edmond Browning, Presiding Bishop, will be with you - a FIRST.  The theme will be "All God's Children."

      Integrity/Houston is hard at work.  The general Diocesan climate is not an open, positive one.  Our brothers and sisters are creating a special place for us.  They look forward to your presence to make that place real.  Plan now to be in Houston and help celebrate our presence there.

      There will be special Eucharists, outstanding speakers and multiple workshops on topics of particular interest to each of us.

      AWARDS - From the nominations submitted the Board selected the recipient of the Louie Crew award for outstanding service to Integrity.  The selection will be announced at the Convention.  K. Byham, Director of Communications, with other special consultants will select the winners in the chapter newsletter competition.

OTHER ORGANIZATIONS, SPECIAL COMMITTEES, AND PEOPLE  

      CHRISTIAN LESBIANS OUT TOGETHER (CLOUT)  Networking with this group is important.  A representative to their next meeting will be appointed.

      THE REV. VIRGINIA HERRING, founder of Integrity/Charlotte, is an object of Ku Klux Klan activity due to her association with Integrity.  She is engaged in legal action against the Klan at this time.  Board approved $200 to help with fees.  The Regional Vice Presidents set forth $50 each from their budgets for this purpose.

      THE COMMITTEE ON THE STATUS OF WOMEN [Interim Body of National Church] TASK FORCE ON VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN.  Dorothy Beattie attended the first meeting of this group which is established in response to General Convention Resolution B-052 to look at clergy violence.  The committee discussed at length how to get issues of violence against women into the church - national through to local.  A paper will be forthcoming.  Dealing with this issue is perhaps the most important thing the church will do in the next decade.

PUBLICATIONS

      "A Book of Revelations" is available only through bookstores at this time.

      Integrity Brochures - New ones were printed and distributed at the General Convention and are available through S. Helsel.

      Integrity Directory - A 1992 edition is forthcoming with up-to-date information.  They will be distributed one copy to a chapter with others available on request.

      Integrity Handbook containing national by-laws and other relevant information will be coming in 1992.

1992 BUDGET APPROVED

      Based on an estimated income of $92,963 from Interest, Contributions, Dues, Pledges and sale of materials, the following percentages reflect how the funds will be expended.  This figure includes funds set aside for Regional expenses and program.

      *1992 Budgeted Expense*

General Convention 8%    Consultants 15%

Data Processing 2%       Committees 3%

Dues 1%                  Advertising 5%

Postage 8%               Travel 15%

Printing 36%             Phone 1%

      *1992 Regional Budget by Category*

Chapter Development 43%

Travel 31%

Phone 5%

Postage 8%

Printing/Office 14%

      *1992 Program Budget* (not including Regional Expenses)

Administration 21%

Development 30%

Coalition 19%

Public Education 30%

      Gloom turned to bloom at the end of the General Convention.

Thanks to your generosity, the current cash on hand reflects a positive balance.

POSTSCRIPT

      The Integrity Board met with the Presiding Bishop on Monday, October 14, following the conclusion of the Board meeting.

      This second meeting served as a follow-up to the General Convention and revolved around some of the roles Integrity could take to implement the actions of that body as well as some inquiries into what the national church is doing in this regard.  The Bishop's presence at our own 1992 Convention was also a highlight of our discussion.  It might be said he seemed pleased to have this opportunity to meet and celebrate with us in his home state.

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MORE ON INTEGRITY OF THE SIERRAS

Integrity of the Sierras was formed only last summer in the tiny town of San Andreas, California, population under 2000.  They were certified as an official Integrity chapter in October and now have 31 members.  Although banned from meeting on church property in the Diocese of the San Joaquin, they have just announced that they will form a mission group in the southern end of the diocese, in Bakersfield.

*A Meeting with Bishop Schofield*

by Brian Jones, Convener, Integrity of the Sierras

      On September 10, 1991, Ian Snider, our Chapter Treasurer, and I met with Bishop Schofield at his office in Fresno.  The meeting was a total joke!  What was supposed to be a private meeting between the Bishop and us turned out to have nine witnesses for the Bishop's benefit.  Prior to our meeting, the Bishop had met with the deanery leadership, and chose to let these men sit in on our meeting.  They didn't speak at any point;  the Bishop totally controlled the conversation.  We got a ten minute lecture on how evil Integrity, Inc. is and another thirty minutes on sexual behavior and how we should all be celibate as is the Bishop.  He made it perfectly clear that Integrity would never be accepted in this diocese, no matter how charitable the work is that we do.

      Bishop John-David Schofield is not the loving Christian person he projects himself as being in public.  He should get an Academy Award for his acting ability.  The Bishop wears the mask of a Christian in public, and that is what most Episcopalians see when they see him.  If you cross the Bishop or disagree with him, then you see the real Bishop Schofield for what he is:  sneaky, underhanded and, in general, not a very nice person.  One of the impressions I got of the Bishop at this meeting was that he is self-loathing and resents gay people who are comfortable with themselves.  I got the impression that he wants us to go back into the closet and hate ourselves in the same manner that he hates himself.  If I have gotten anything out of life it is this:  God does not create junk!  God created me as a gay man, and I'll be damned if I'm going to become self-loathing in the name of Jesus to justify a self-destructive need that the Bishop has.  Integrity need no longer worry about what Bishop John-David Schofield thinks; he made himself clear enough on how he feels about us and I say to you out there, Bishop Schofield isn't worth the dust on our shoes.  I don't respect anyone who tries to make me feel less than himself.  As usual, Integrity will go on; we have to and we will grow as an organization, with the power of God's love and support from our brothers and sisters in the community.

*At Diocesan Convention*

by Brian Jones

      For me, Diocesan Convention in October was a positive experience.  Integrity of the Sierras had applied for a booth in the exhibit hall with the other church organizations, but our application was denied by Bishop Schofield.  It worked out to our benefit to instead have our booth outside on the sidewalk in front of St. Paul's Church, Bakersfield.  We had several people, both clergy and laity, visit us and take pamphlets and buttons, which they wore both days of convention.  The support was overwhelming.

      On Saturday, someone at the Convention called the police to have us arrested.  It backfired!  The Rev. Robert E. Fosse, Rector of St. Paul's, graciously decided to move us in front of the parish hall on church property.  While the police were there (we did, of course, have a permit from the city) several people from the Convention gathered around our booth and stood there, and some of them even started singing with us.  One of the moderate priests came up to me at that point and said, "If you're removed, the moderate priests in this diocese will walk with you."  That, to me, made all the difference in the world.  Finally a group of priests were willing to take a stand for us.  That made me truly feel that there is love and support for us out there.

      Another priest told me at the end of Convention that he and others were pleased with our behavior, that we were not like ACT-UP, as they had been led to believe.  I told them we were a Christian group and ACT-Up is not, and thus behavior that would be appropriate for them wouldn't necessarily be appropriate for us.  We even had a few Episcopal Synod of America members come to our booth and calmly discuss their differences with us.  We did have some common ground and I trust we gave them some food for thought.

      The best thing about Convention was that there were representatives from every church in the diocese and Integrity was able to give them all the same accurate information in one place.  The only thing that bothered me about Convention was that Bishop Schofield appointed a committee to study human sexuality, specifically homosexuality, and there was not one gay or lesbian person appointed to that committee.  Is that fair? 

*From a Heterosexual Member of Integrity of the Sierra*

by Joyce Mandeville

      I have been asking myself lately why I have become active in gay rights issues.  Although I've always supported gay rights issues as a straight I didn't feel compelled to put my energies into the movement until very recently.  As a member of the Bishop's committee at St. Matthew's, San Andreas, I was one of the first to know of Fr. Woody Peabody being called before  Bishop Schofield about the issue of Integrity.  First of all, I couldn't believe that this was happening in this day and, secondly, I became angrier than I could recall being in years.  I also felt a sense of betrayal.  This was not the church I knew or the fine liberal traditions I wanted to pass on to my children.  I want to see my children, grandchildren, and even my great-grandchildren growing in the love and the freedom of the church.  I want to know they will be accepted for themselves and their desire to know God, not rejected if they fall too far from convention.  I want to show others that Integrity includes a broad cross-section of the church and I want our gay and lesbian members to know they haven't been abandoned.  I also felt very drawn to Brian Jones.  His sense of mission, his willingness to build bridges under attack, and his humor are all things I wanted to support and aid if I could.  I would like to thank all the members of Integrity for including my family in yours.

-----

The first and third of these articles are taken from the October, 1991 issue of *The St. Aelred Gazette*, newsletter of Integrity of the Sierras.  The second article is from the November, 1991 issue.

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NOMINATING/ELECTION COMMITTEE

Nominations for President, Secretary, Treasurer and four Regional Vice Presidents are being sought.  Nominations must be submitted no later than March 1, 1992.  Please submit nominations to the Nominating Committee:

Midwest Region:

Dr. Sharon McDonald

6001 11th Avenue South

Minneapolis, MN 55417

Northeast Region:

Mr. Hansheinrich Franzen

P.O. Box 666

LaGrangeville, NY  12570-0666

Southern Region:

Ms. Jennie Johnson

Austin, TX

Western Region:

No Representative at Press Time.  Please send nominations to another members of the committee.

Their slate will be completed by April l and the election will be held May 1-15, 1992. 

PROPOSED BY-LAWS CHANGES

Two proposed revisions were approved unanimously by the Board.  These changes will be voted on by the membership in the spring election.

1)  An Article 5 would be added to Chapter l, Membership.  That article would provide the option for related organizations, such as diocesan lesbian/gay ministries, to affiliate with Integrity.  This would not mandate such affiliation nor the exact form it would take, but it would give the Board flexibility to establish such a relationship.

2)  Article 8, Chapter 2, Sections 1, 2 and 3 would be amended to change the term of office of Regional Vice Presidents to two years.  This will avoid annual elections.  This change was originally proposed as part of the major by-law revisions of 1990, but was deleted by the Board.  On further reflection, the Board reversed itself and recommends this amendment.

In the Proposed Revisions which follow, *Additions are bold* and [Deletions] are bracketed.

THE BYLAWS OF INTEGRITY, INCORPORATED

                         Draft Revisions

CHAPTER 1.  MEMBERSHIP

*Add a new:

*ARTICLE 5. ... AFFILIATED ORGANIZATIONS*

      *The Board of Directors may establish provisions for the affiliation with Integrity, Inc. of other organizations which support the purposes of Integrity, Inc. as set forth in the Preamble.*

CHAPTER 2.  BOARD OF DIRECTORS.

Amend:

ARTICLE 8. ...  ELECTIONS OF OFFICERS.

Section 1.  Terms of Office.

            The President, the Secretary, [and] the Treasurer, *and the Regional Vice-Presidents* shall take office on the last Sunday in June *of even-numbered years* or immediately upon their election, whichever is later in the calendar year, and shall serve for two years or until their successors are elected.  [The Regional Vice-President shall take office on the last Sunday in June or immediately upon their election, whichever is later in the calendar year, and shall serve for one year or until their successors are elected.]

Section 2.  Time and Manner of Election.

            Officers shall be elected by a majority vote of the members in a preferential ballot-by-mail, returned in timely fashion.  Balloting for the election of Officers shall occur between May 1 and May 30 each *even-numbered* year, in accordance with the provisions of this Article.

Section 3.  Nominations.

            A.  A Nominating Committee, consisting of one representative of each Region, shall be appointed each year by the President not later than November 1 *in odd-numbered years*.  In years in which a National Convention precedes the appointment of the Nominating Committee, the President shall act upon the advice of the members assembled at the Convention by Region.  In years when there is no convention preceding the election of Officers, the President shall appoint a Nominating Committee in consultation with the respective Regional Vice President.  The members of the Nominating Committee shall designate a chairperson.

*It is proposed that the amendments become effective prior to the installation of new Regional Vice Presidents and, if approved, that those elected this spring will serve two-year terms.*

*EFFECTIVE:  June 15, 1992.*

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DISCIPLES OF CHRIST NARROWLY REJECT PRO-GAY PRESIDENT

by Kim Byham

      On October 29, the General Assembly of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) narrowly rejected the Rev. Michael Kinnamon's nomination as head of the denomination after Kinnamon said congregations should be free to ordain sexually active lesbians and gay men.  It was the first time in the 1.1-million-member church's history that a nominee for General Minister and President had failed to secure the required two-thirds majority.  Kinnamon, Dean of the Lexington Theological Seminary in Kentucky, won 65.1 percent of the 5,651 votes cast by delegates, meeting in Tulsa, OK.

      After the ballot he insisted that the  vote was not a referendum on how the Bible should be interpreted.  "Our tradition has never been literalist," he said.  During the  nomination debate, Kinnamon had come under fire for allegedly  "reflecting the humanistic philosophies that are rampant in the church today."  The church's Administrative Committee appointed the Rev. C. William Nichols as Acting General Minister and President to serve until the next General Assembly convenes in 1993.

      Immediately after Nichols was presented as Acting President, the church delegates approved a resolution to conduct a two-year period of reflection on the ordination of lesbians and gay men.  Because of the study, Nichols declined to give his views, saying only he would try to "effect some understanding and agreement on this issue.  Many people have suffered over it," Nichols said. "We need a time of reflection and research.  There is a need to remind ourselves of who we are and why we are a church."

      The church, based in Indianapolis, was founded on the American frontier in the early 19th century to surmount divisions among Christian denominations by concentrating on what its first leaders considered essential beliefs and tolerating differences on other matters.  It is the only mainline denomination which originated in the United States.

      The church's 36 regional units in the United States and Canada, along with local congregations, determine fitness for ordination.  Some regions prohibit the ordination of gay men and lesbians; others leave the matter up to individual congregations.

      Dr. Kinnamon was nominated by the Administrative Committee last February and was endorsed by the church's 164-member General Board in July.  Some church officials initially thought that Dr. Kinnamon's credentials as a theological leader rather than an advocate of political or social causes would prove reassuring to the denomination's traditionalist members.  Hailed by supporters as a brilliant theologian, prolific writer, forceful preacher and an ecumenical leader who is deeply committed to Disciples' traditions, the 42-year-old dean had been chosen from 97 candidates during a long selection process.

      But by spring, his candidacy had met opposition from some church members, who said his views on homosexuality denied the authority of the Bible.  The lead was taken by Disciple Renewal, a group organized by Floyd Legler, an Indiana trucking executive.  Mr. Legler circulated a statement saying:  "We believe homosexual behavior is a sin.  We do not want a leader who refutes orthodox Christian doctrine and the primacy of the Bible as a Christian's guide."  "He feels that homosexual behavior is acceptable before God, and that's not true," Legler said in an interview.

      Concerns were heightened by the ordination in May of an openly gay member of GLAD -- Gay, Lesbian and Affirming Disciples -- at Park Avenue Christian Church in New York.  Dr. Kinnamon openly proclaimed that he is a member of GLAD.

      Answering questions from delegates, Dr. Kinnamon argued that the Bible did not offer a blanket condemnation of homosexual acts and that Christians should support gay and lesbian persons, particularly at a time when they were the victims of hate crimes.  "Homosexuality is by no stretch of the imagination a major biblical theme.  There are five or six references, and some of them have been misinterpreted," he said.  Asked his own position, he said, "I think to be honest, I would advocate ordination of any persons called of God, whether heterosexual or homosexual, who are prepared to carry out the tasks of ministry."

      After his defeat, Dr. Kinnamon praised the church for carrying out "a churchwide theological conversation," and called for reconciliation.  "I am no less excited about the future of this church and no less committed to being a part of that future than I was an hour ago or a month ago," he told the gathering.

********************

IT COULD BE WORSE, WE COULD BE BAPTISTS

      "A Statement of Concern Addressing Homosexuality and the Church" was affirmed by a vote of 1,124 to 539 with 46 abstentions at the biennial meeting of the American Baptist Churches in June.  The American Baptists are the less conservative "northern Baptists."  The statement read:  "We do not accept the homosexual lifestyle, homosexual marriage, ordination of homosexual clergy or establishment of 'gay churches' or 'gay caucuses.'"  A different statement, developed in response to the anti-gay statement, was defeated 1,026 to 534 with 44 abstentions.  Entitled "Let Us Learn to Love One Another," it called on delegates to "learn more about our sexuality, its responsible expression and God's gift of sexuality in others," "to discover avenues of healing" and to refrain from acting, speaking, voting on or embracing statements "that might express bigotry or might be based upon our cultural values rather than the values of Jesus."

      Also present at the Charleston, WV convention was the denomination's lesgay caucus, American Baptists Concerned, which had a booth and drew angry reactions from many delegates.  In response to this Daniel Weiss, General Secretary of the American Baptist Churches, wrote a letter in which he said:  "I am saddened that controversy over some groups in the exhibit area of the Convention has been given such high publicity."  Speaking of American Baptists Concerned, Weiss said:  "This organization is made up of members of American Baptist Churches across the country who are concerned about the gay and lesbian people who are part of the American Baptist family. ... American Baptists Concerned is not an outside group of agitators.  They are our 'sons' and 'daughters.'  They have grown up, come to know Christ as savior, and been baptized in our ABC churches.  Many of them are the children of devout and committed American Baptist clergy and lay people. ... From our very beginnings, we have been champions of the rights of people to express minority or unpopular viewpoints.  Since there are many things distributed, sold and said at every biennial that do no necessarily reflect the official positions of the ABC/USA, the issue at hand is less what is said than the essential right of American Baptists to say them. ..."

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ALTERNATIVE VIEWS OF GAY ORIGINS

This article is reprinted from *The Christian Challenge*, October, 1991.  *The Christian Challenge* is the magazine of the schismatic Anglicans.

      A recently, widely publicized study which seems to lend support to the claim that male homosexuality is biologically determined has prompted mixed reactions from organizations directed at gays, as well as about how the study may affect the ongoing discussion of sexuality issues within the Episcopal Church.

      In late August--shortly after the Episcopal General Convention tangled with the homosexuality issue--it was reported that a study done by Simon LeVay, a neuroscientist at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in San Diego, found that a cluster of cells in a homosexual's hypothalamus--the part of the brain governing sex drive--typically resembles a woman's rather than a heterosexual male's.  It showed that this region of the hypothalamus was "more than twice as large in the heterosexual men as in the women ... and homosexual men," according to *The Washington Times*.

      The finding gives credence to the frequent claim of homosexuals that their orientation is biologically based rather than the result of some combination of upbringing, choice and/or environment.

      But the study, though viewed by other scientists as having real merit, is seen as inconclusive, even by LeVay himself, due to questions arising from the means by which the study was conducted and its limited findings.  LeVay reportedly compared the brains of 19 homosexual men who had died of AIDS with the brains of 16 heterosexual men, six of whom were intravenous drug abusers who died of AIDS.  Six heterosexual women also were included in the test, one of whom had died of AIDS, though evidently these were not used comparatively to produce any findings about lesbians.

      Questions about the study focus not only on the particular control group used but include whether the findings could have been affected by the disease AIDS or by drugs, whether the brain structure could have been affected by homosexual behavior rather than the other way around, and the lack of data to determine when the differing condition of the hypothalamus came into being--whether it was present at birth or developed later.

      If there's a difference in the brains, the study "doesn't tell you how, when or why it got there," said Dr. John Money, professor of medical psychology at Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions and an expert on sexual disorders.

      But for the moment the findings represent the second report of a "difference between the brains of homosexuals and heterosexuals ... though the first to find such a difference in the hypothalamus," said Marcia Barinaga a correspondent for Science magazine, in which the report of LeVay's study appeared.  "That connection raises the possibility that this difference not only correlates with homosexuality but may also play a role in causing it."

Reactions from Integrity, Regeneration

      But while the LeVay study has brought a certain amount of reinforcement to the claims of homosexuals, it has also brought a measure of anxiety and resentment--because of indications in news reports that the condition, if it *is* biologically based, might be viewed as an abnormality which could be treatable.

      Robert Bray, spokesman for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, was quoted as saying that "used ethically, this information, combined with other data, could help prove what we have known all along: that homosexuality is not a choice,"  But he expressed concern that there might be "calls from homosexual opponents to 'cure' gays ... by changing their biological makeup."  He said the group's response would be "Why fix something when it's not broken?"

      "People already think we're ill.  This is all they need to jump on a bandwagon and say we have some kind of brain deformity," Gene Riendel, 43, a volunteer office worker at a San Francisco-area Metropolitan Community Church, was quoted as saying.  "I feel that my lifestyle is the way I was created by my maker.  This is the way God made me.  I'm satisfied and happy with it.  Those who aren't, that's their issue to deal with."

      But the *Times* article indicated that the Rev. Louis Sheldon, head of the California-based Traditional Values Coalition, thought homosexuals should seek any cure available for their own good.  "The problem with homosexuals is that they have multiple sex partners and engage in high risk sexual behavior.  The consequences of anal and oral copulation are high health risks.   The body parts don't fit."

      Kim Byham, communications director and former president of Integrity, told *TCC* he felt the Episcopal homosexual group would be unlikely to concentrate on the study because "I think most people who are gay and lesbian knew [of the biological basis for homosexuality] ... from their own experience."  It is something "pretty innate," he continued.  "It merely confirms what we thought."  Rather, he said, "it's surely the fundamentalists and others who are anti-gay who are going to have to do some thinking about these developments." 

      Still, Byham, speaking personally, said he felt further testing and peer review were needed in relation to the LeVay findings.  "But that's true of everything when it first comes out," he added.

      Byham also rejected the idea that homosexuality is an abnormality or aberration, and questioned whether any medical correction which may be possible is necessarily right.  "We've known it's possible to change a man into a woman for years," he said.  "Does that make it right or desirable [just because] sex changes are possible?  Does that all of a sudden mean it's something that should be done? ... As Christians we would want to ask more than just if it's possible.

      Homosexuality, in Byham's view, is "more comparable to a natural variation ... like some people being left-handed or [having a particular eye color]," and is "God-given ... just like there are different species of birds and other animals ... .  It is not comparable to being born with a severe birth defect ... .  To try to thwart that--it's like the old thing of forcing people to be right-handed.  But was that good for that person ... for society ... was that God's plan?  I would say no to all three of those.  That may sound presumptuous but I just don't see that changing a natural pattern of society would be a desirable thing."

      Byham believes no contravention of Scripture is implied in his views because of newer interpretations and insights or pertinent passages offered by modern scholarship.

      Moreover, he claimed that all attempts up to now to change sexual orientation have failed.  Though he said he is "a great believer in the power of God's healing," Byham denies that there has ever been a documented case of a homosexual "cure."  Eventually all those who supposedly overcome their homosexuality admit they still have some of the old desires, he asserted.  All that's changed, he said, is their activity, not their basic makeup.

      Byham said he thought the LeVay study had the potential to affect deliberations on the homosexual issue in the Episcopal Church "if it becomes widely known ... .  I have said for years that once we got over the false claim that homosexuality is a matter of choice that the Episcopal Church would change almost immediately."

      But he added he hoped the church's continuing discussions would focus not just on homosexuality, but on sexuality in general.  "We are in a position in which at least 90 percent of couples being married in the Episcopal Church are living together" beforehand, he said.  "Nobody says anything about that."

      On the other side of the spectrum, Alan Medinger, head of the homosexual healing ministry Regeneration, said the possibility of biological factors in homosexuality could not be excluded, but that it should not change the church's basic approach to the condition.

      "I don't think we can, biblically or any other way, totally [discount] the possibility that there can be biological contributors to homosexuality or to a vulnerability to it," said Medinger, who himself claims he was healed of homosexual by God more than 15 years ago.  Yet, he said, "there's all sorts of disorders and birth defects that are not God's will, but they happen."

      Moreover, "This one study could hardly be conclusive, and Dr. LeVay himself said it is not.  They don't know how many changes take place in our brain from other causes during its life.

      "But if this test were to be made credible, and it was determined that there was a biological contributing factor, I don't think that should change the Church's approach to homosexuality.  It might change [Regeneration's] a bit [in treating homosexuality].  Most men are born natural adulterers, but we still believe that it is to be resisted" in light of God's law, which Medinger believes has been given for the best welfare and happiness of humanity and not to be arbitrary.

      Homosexuality is "not just a quirk, like left-handedness," Medinger said.  "Our bodies were created to be heterosexual, if we can't function that way, it's a disorder."

      Asked about plans following the recent Episcopal General Convention, Medinger said Regeneration will be focusing in the immediate future on parts of its ministry neglected while attention was given to convention's sexuality debate in Phoenix--mainly helping individuals and keeping treatment programs going.

      Medinger expressed no surprise that the convention--having adopted a compromise sexuality resolution which affirms traditional church stands on sexual behavior but will not prevent local actions to change them--refused to endorse his homosexual healing ministry.  Politically, liberals were so much stronger than in the past at the convention, he said.  "On the other hand, the believers, conservative people, were much stronger also, but not politically--more [in the way of] knowing what they are about."  There was more despair among conservatives at the last convention, but this time Medinger noted greater spiritual confidence and sense of identify among them.

      But he said he did not see much hope ultimately for the direction of the Episcopal Church "unless the Lord intervenes.  All the processes are negative," he said, citing particularly discouraging trends in seminaries and among bishops: 14 of the last 15 bishops consecrated, for example, voted against the unsuccessful "Frey amendment" which would have given explicit expression to the expectation that clergy refrain from sex outside marriage.  "The whole political process is the realm of the liberals.  They're better at it.  We ... don't have the heart for that" because "we see things in terms of our relationship to Jesus Christ."

********************

INTEGRITY CHAPLAIN ATTACKED BY KKK

*A Letter to the Clergy of the Diocese of North Carolina from the Suffragan Bishop*

                                                August 26, 1991

Dear Friends:

      I have become aware of an attack on one of our clergy by the Klan and those who respond to their message of hate.  I'd like to share the information with you and ask for your help.

      The Rev. Virginia Herring, the assistant at St. Luke's, Salisbury, was the recent recipient of a number of hate calls.  They came from people who had gotten her name from a Ku Klux Klan taped message.

      The Klan, operating out of Huntersville, has a weekly phone message for anyone willing to dial 704-875-0514.  I would advise each one of you to call that number and listen to the hateful racist message that seems to be appealing to more and more people.

      Ginny got singled out by the Klan because of her visibility around AIDS and her support of gay men and lesbians.  Because of that, she was called "a whore of satan" and the Episcopal Church "a tool of the devil" on one of the taped messages.  Her phone number was given on the tape, and a number of people have been calling her at home with harassing messages.

      Ginny has seen a lawyer and is determined to fight back through a legal suit.  She has received, as well, the encouragement of the Southern Poverty Law Center, Montgomery, Alabama.

      I have been in contact with Ginny about how we can stand with her against this attack, an attack not only on her but the entire Episcopal Church.  We can give her our support through our prayers, attentive presence to Ginny, and some financial help to pay legal fees.

      Because Ginny will need good legal assistance she will need money.  One way to do that would be to support a fund, administered from my discretionary account, to meet the legal needs.  Checks may be sent to me and made payable to "Suffragan Bishop Disc Fund."  A designated gift for this purpose will not be tax deductible to the donor.

      At the 1986 Diocesan Convention, we passed a strong resolution pertaining to the activities of the Klan.  It speaks to our concern for Ginny and the rise of racism and hate activity throughout our nation.

      This may well be a good time to educate around this issue among the parishes and missions of the Diocese.  The Klan must be exposed for the racism they embody.  I hope you will share the information with the lay people you serve.

      At the recent General Convention in Phoenix, Episcopalians were called upon to face the growing racism in our midst.  Here is a very visible and tangible example of racism.  I hope that you will take this opportunity to resist it and support our sister.

Faithfully,

Huntington Williams, Jr.

*A Letter from Virginia Herring to the Presiding Bishop*

                                         September 17, 1991

Most Rev. Sir:

      I enclose a copy of Bishop Williams' recent letter to our diocese regarding a lawsuit in which I am involved.  His letter explains the details of my situation succinctly.

      I write to apprise you of the situation, and to ask for your prayers and support.  The work of Integrity in Charlotte, NC has been small, but important.  The gay community here suffers much at the hands of Christians of less tolerant congregations.  It is criminal for them also to be attacked by such a group as the KKK.  This tape message line which published my name and phone number has a different "message" each week.  Most are primarily racial, with a few slurs thrown in for women, gays, and "foreigners."  The phone number is simply a local one, which means that children and young teens can access this outpouring of hatred easily.  I hope to expose this obscenity and end its presence in my community.  Surely this is part of the church's fight against a resurgence of racism in our society.

      I am most grateful to Bishop Williams for his strong support.  Hopefully, raising this issue publicly will help educate our people to the ongoing presence of this particular brand of evil.  Certainly the bishop's letter has already opened some eyes here in our own diocese.

      Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

The Rev. Virginia Herring

********************

"HOW TO FORM AN INTEGRITY CHAPTER" COMMENDED

*The Big Gay Book* "A Man's Survival Guide for the 90's" by John Preston, just published and available everywhere, includes the following item in its section on religious organizations:

"Integrity, the gay Episcopal organization, has a publication on how to form an Integrity chapter.  The lessons and advice are applicable to anyone wanting to start a local denominational organization.  For a copy, write to Integrity, Inc..."

********************

*CLAUDIA'S COLUMN*

I heard whispering

Like the flow of wind from mouth to mouth

That under each arm pit I am marked,

The size of an open hand.

     But in childhood I learned

     Through cruel heavy winks, how instinctively to hide.

What was it I so naively wrapped with rags,

And hidden, dragged through dark months and years?

     In these concealing rags, I had hid my heart,

     When re-found it was sorely bruised

     Shrivelled red from stigma I sought to lose.

Without some fresh exposure, my songs would end in lies'

Tightly bound bruises but increase the inner plight.

     Who marked my sides?  For what unknown cause?

     Why such a brand upon my very self and soul?

     Even today my ebbing thoughts,

     So pale and cold, transparent as glass,

     Hold me awake.

          --"Let Come the Day to Say 'Once it was So'"

      Several weeks ago my partner and I were fishing.  As the sun began to set and we pulled up anchor, we became aware of a boat with mechanical problems unable to return to shore.  As we approached this large recreational boat and its crew of five family members, we asked if we could put our 12 foot fishing boat to the test and tow them.  The scene is best left to the imagination as we secured their boat to ours and headed nearly two miles to their boat landing.  As we began, I turned to Susan and asked, "Honey, do you imagine this would be considered a homosexual act?"

      Our conversation later that evening raised the question of what is meant by "homosexual acts."  "Who marked our (actions)?  For what unknown cause?"  A theology has evolved around the process of naming:  people, places, objects, and actions, dating back as far as Adam in the Garden of Eden.  Naming implies not only being given a designation, but also being kept in control by the one who has assigned the name.  Thus, the name "homosexual acts" given by non-lesbian and gay persons, implies a means of control over our lives and actions.  This disparaging label caused many of us "Through cruel heavy winks, how instinctively to hide....  In these concealing rags, (we) hid our hearts, when re-found (they) were sorely bruised.  Shrivelled red from stigma (we) sought to lose."

      What was it "we so naively wrapped with rags, and hidden, dragged through dark months and years?"  What are "homosexual acts?"  Imagine for a moment, a dozen gay men and lesbians gathered at the open grave of a friend as the Rabbi solemnly reminds them of their duty as friends and mourners to fill in that grave.  Each one present places several shovelfuls of earth on top of the lowered casket.  Many of those same people then assume the responsibility of reciting the mourner's Kaddish every day for the next eleven months in memory of the one who has died.

      Consider also a lesbian who teaches high school.  One of her students is visually impaired and unable to read the standard text.  This teacher regularly has class material copied and enlarged on her way home from school because the school copy machine does not have enlargement capacity.

      Remember the countless life partners sitting at the bedsides of their sick and dying partners; holding hands, speaking words of comfort and encouragement, listening to fears, frustrations, and witnessing pain and sorrow.

      Imagine a gay male couple traveling to another state where one of them has been called to a new job.  For hours on end, they drive around the city stopping at open houses and looking for just the right place to settle and begin a new phase of life and relationship.

      All of these, my sisters and brothers, are "homosexual acts."  Those who seek to control us, for the most part only intend to label our intimate sexual acts as "homosexual" as if they are to be despised and rejected as sinful and worthless.  The reality is that all of these are "homosexual acts" because they are actions of gay and lesbian persons.  Rather than sinful and worthless, they are giving, caring, and loving actions (as is most of our intimate sexual activity).

      "Without some fresh exposure, (our) songs would end in lies, tightly bound bruises but increase the inner plight."  How do you and I as lesbians and gay men expose our bruises not only that healing might begin but that no further bruising need be hidden.  The answer, my sisters and brothers, is found within the very name of our organization.  "Integrity: 'the quality of state of being complete or undivided'" (Webster).

      Terms such as "homosexual acts" are meant to divide; to set one group of people against another.  Rather than having "our songs end in lies" let us reclaim our integrity by openness and acknowledgement of who we are and claim our "homosexual acts."  Doing so need not be blatant declarations of our sexual orientation.  It may, rather, take the form of reference to "my partner" or use of the terms gay/lesbian in conversation, or wearing an Integrity membership in, a pink triangle, or lambda on a lapel.  The possibilities of reclaiming our integrity are only limited by the number of us determined to do so.

      We must totally reclaim our integrity.  This necessitates doing so both in the heterosexual community as well as our own.  I heard a wonderful story of this last week that illustrates this well.  Two teachers met one another in a city high school.  Neither had ever acknowledged their homosexuality to the other, yet each "suspected" the other.  George approached Nancy as she stood outside her classroom and asked, "What are you doing here?  Are you the homecoming queen?"  "No," she replied, "Are you?"  Both understood the implication of "Queen" and appreciated no longer needing to hide their identities with one another.  In fact, George was so relieved by his new found integrity that he continued, "I hope you can attend my organ recital on Sunday, I'll be wearing my taffeta!!"  This was the beginning of the "fresh exposure" and honesty necessary in healing the bruises incurred by each of them in silence and hiding.  Our individual experiences need not be so dramatic nor our comments so overt.  The only necessary element to regaining our integrity is honesty: both with ourselves and others.

      Let us begin this new triennium of the Church with the determination to proudly acknowledge our homosexual acts in order to reclaim our integrity.

********************

*SING US A NEW SONG, BUT NOT THIS ONE*

The following song was discovered by an Integrity/Houston member during one of their meetings at Autrey House.  Autrey House serves as the Episcopal Chaplaincy at Rice University in Houston, Texas and this song was in a songbook used in that ministry.

Gentle Jesus meek and mild,

Came to earth though heaven's child

He taught peace and turned the other cheek

But our God ain't no pansy.

For He has cast down many great Kings

And crushed the hairy heads of his enemies

Like Sihon king of the Amorites and Og

A faithful God and tender dad. 

He weeps with us when times are bad

But watch out for our Great God's wrath

Cause our God ain't no pansy.

Ask Pharaoh, Sodom, Og or Al. 

Elymas, or Annani -

Ask Saphira, Baal or Jezebel 

No our God ain't no pansy.

********************

INTEGRITY PRAYER CALENDAR

The Integrity Prayer Cycle, originated by The Rev. L. Paul Woodrum and updated by Kim Byham, is commended for private as well as public, liturgical use.  The red or black letter day governing the dates is indicated in parentheses.

JANUARY:

5   Dignity-Integrity/Phoenix

12  (Aelred Patron of Integrity) Integrity/Dallas, St. Aelred Chapter

17  (Antony) Integrity/San Antonio

18  (Confession of Peter) Dignity, Inc.

19  Gay Religious

20  (Martin Luther King) Persons of All Colors Together

23  (Philip Brooks) Integrity/Western Massachusetts

27  (Chrysostom) Axios (Eastern and Orthodox Christians)

30  Integrity/Kennebec

FEBRUARY:

3   (Anskar) Lutherans Concerned-Integrity/Southwest Minnesota

5   (Martyrs of Japan) Integrity/Portland

13  (Absalom Jones) Union of Black Episcopalians

15  (Thomas Bray) Integrity/Northeast Region and its Vice President

16  Editors of *The Voice of Integrity* and chapter newsletters

20  Integrity/Charlotte

23  (Polycarp) Dignity-Integrity/Wilmington

27  (George Herbert) Integrity/El Camino Real

MARCH:

2   (Chad) Dignity-Integrity/Tulsa

3   (John & Charles Wesley) Affirmation (United Methodists) and "Reconciling Congregations"

7   (Perpetua and her Companions) The Oasis

9   (Gregory of Nyssa) Integrity/San Francisco Bay Area

16  Integrity/Kansas City

18  (Cyril) Integrity/Brooklyn

21  (Thomas Ken) Integrity/Berkshire, Lesbian & Gay musicians

23  (James DeKoven) Integrity-Dignity/Madison

27  (C.H. Brent) Integrity Canada: Edmonton, Toronto & Vancouver

29  (John Keble) Episcopal Society for Ministry in Higher   Education

APRIL:

1   (F.D. Maurice) Unitarian-Universalists for Lesbian and Gay Concerns

2   (J.L. Breck) Integrity/Western Region and its Vice-President

3   (Richard of Chichester) Gay, Lesbian and Affirming Disciples

4   Integrity/San Diego

11  (G.A. Selwyn) Integrity Australia: Adelaide & Brisbane

13  Integrity/Colorado

27  Integrity: Members at large

MAY:

1   (Philip & James) Integrity Chapters in Formation

4   (Monica) Integrity/Puget Sound

8   (Dame Julian) The Consultation and Integrity's    Representatives

11  Integrity/Central Indiana

18  Integrity/Tucson

24  (Jackson Kemper) Integrity/Midwest Region and its Vice-President

26  (Augustine of Canterbury) Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, United Kingdom

30  The Standing Commission on Human Affairs

JUNE:

1   (Justin) Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights Organizations

5   (Boniface) Lutherans Concerned and Reconciled in Christ Congregations

8   Integrity/Bloomington

9   (Columba) Lesbian and Gay Health Organizations

15  Integrity/Central Ohio

22  (Alban) Integrity, Inc. Founders

23  Integrity/Chicago

24  (John the Baptist) American Baptists Concerned

28  (Irenaeus) Integrity/Central Florida

    (Gay Pride Week) Integrity, Inc. and National Officers

JULY:

1   Integrity/New Hampshire

6   Integrity/Northwest Ohio

12  Episcopal Peace Fellowship

13  Friends for Lesbian and Gay Concerns

17  (William White) Integrity/Philadelphia

20  Integrity/Detroit

26  (Parents of the BVM) Federation of Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays

29  (Mary & Martha) Episcopal Women's Caucus

30  (William Wilberforce) Dignity-Integrity/Charlottesville

AUGUST:

3   Integrity/Greater Cincinnati

5   Integrity/Southland

10  (Laurence) Integrity/Austin

11  (Clare) Coalition of Hispanic Episcopalians

12  Integrity/Northeast Ohio

14  (Jonathan Daniels) Lesbian and Gay Seminarians

17  Integrity/Southern Region and its Vice-President

18  (W.P. DuBose) Episcopal Church Publishing Co., *The Witness*

20  (Bernard) Appalachian Peoples Service Organization

24  Integrity/Middle Tennessee

28  (Augustine of Hippo) Church and City Conference

29  Episcopal Urban Caucus

31  General Convention and the Triennial of the Women of the Church

SEPTEMBER:

1   (D.P. Oakerhater) Dignity-Integrity/Oklahoma City

2   (Martyrs of New Guinea) Integrity of the Sierras

7   Integrity/Iowa

9   (Constance & Her Companions) Integrity/Memphis, Council for Women's Ministries and Integrity/s Representatives

12  (J.H. Hobart) Integrity/New York

13  (Cyprian) Dignity-Integrity/Mid-Hudson

21  (Matthew) Integrity/Albany

    (Yom Kippur) World Congress of Gay and Lesbian Jewish Organizations

25  (Sergius) Integrity/Baltimore

29  (Michael & All Angels) Integrity/Pittsburgh

OCTOBER:

1   (Remigius) Integrity/Northwest Pennsylvania

4   (Francis) The Parsonage

6   The Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches (Founded this date, 1968)

16  (Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer) Dignity-Integrity/Rochester

18  (Luke) National AIDS Memorial at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, New York

24  (UN Day) Lesbians and Gay Men of all nations

26  Integrity/Westchester

NOVEMBER:

1   (All Saints) Aelred and all Lesbian and Gay saints

2   (All Souls) All who have died from AIDS or as a result of homophobia

5   Integrity/Mississippi

9   Integrity/Washington

11  (Veterans Day) Gay Veterans

12  (Charles Simeon) Evangelicals Concerned

14  (Samuel Seabury) Integrity/Hartford

15  Urban Bishops Coalition

16  (Margaret) Lesbian and Gay bishops, priests and deacons

    (Thanksgiving Day) United Church of Christ Coalition for      Lesbian/Gay Concerns and "Open and Affirming" Churches

30  (Andrew) Presbyterians for Lesbian/Gay Concerns and "More Light" Churches

DECEMBER:

2   (C.M. Williams)  Dignity-Integrity/Richmond

3   Asiamerica Ministries Advocates

7   (Ambrose) Integrity/Atlanta

8   Lesbian and Gay professional organizations

14  7th Day Adventist Kinship International

21  (Thomas) Integrity/Triangle

28  (Holy Innocents) Integrity/Houston

Chapters and individuals are invited to add appropriate local concerns.  For chapter liturgical use, intercessions may be gathered for the period (week, month, etc.) and offered in the Prayers of the People.

********************

*A CHILLING WIND FROM CANADA

by Kim Byham

      Meeting November 8 and 9, the House of Bishops of the Anglican Church of Canada reaffirmed its 1979 resolution which provided:

     1)  Our present and future considerations about homosexuality should be pursued within the larger study of human sexuality in its totality;

     2)  We accept all persons, regardless of sexual orientation, as equal before God; our acceptance of persons with homosexual orientation is not an acceptance of homosexual activity;

     3)  We do not accept the blessing of homosexual unions;

     4)  We will not call in question the ordination of a person who has shared with the bishop his/her homosexual orientation if there has been a commitment to the bishop to abstain from sexual acts with persons of the same sex as part of the requirement for ordination.

      Ironically, the 1979 resolution was titled a "Pastoral Guideline."

      Over 40 bishops met in Mississauga, a Toronto suburb, in an *in camera* session.  Although the official press release stated the bishops had "reaffirmed" their 1979 position, in an interview with *The Voice of Integrity*, the Most Rev. Michael Peers, Primate of Canada, characterized the bishops as simply having maintained the status quo.  The topic was discussed briefly during a single morning's session since the agenda was very full.

      The Bishops, of course, called for more dialogue.  They have named a task force to collect material for study and have set two days or more aside for discussion at their November, 1992 meeting.

      Sandy Tipper, Co-Convener of Integrity/Toronto was paraphrased in the November 12 *Toronto Star* as saying "the 'internal inconsistency' in the 1979 statement is hard to understand, especially the unequal treatment of heterosexuals and homosexuals seeking ordination.  Tipper added, however, that Integrity welcomes and encourages the bishops' commitment to further study homosexuality if that commitment is sincere."

      Tipper was quoted as saying, "We are available as resources to assist in any way we can."  Whether the bishops will take Integrity up on its offer remains to be seen.

      Archbishop Peers told *The Voice of Integrity* that he hoped the House of Bishops would live up to its promise in the first paragraph of its 1979 statement and discuss homosexuality "within the context of a wholesale discussion of human sexuality.  The narrower the basis, the less chance for any kind of new perceptions or implications of new perceptions to surface."

      The Primate also shared a comparison he has made in the past.  He cited the filing in 1896 of a minority report recommending an open attitude toward the remarriage of divorced persons in the church.  It was 1967 before General Synod gave second reading to a canonical change allowing that to happen.  The church had to wrestle with Biblical texts and eventually produced a canon that is the only one in the Canadian Church to include scriptural references.  He said for him, the most important immediate question is how the Church as a Christian community will handle the issue of inclusion of gays and lesbians.  As with remarriage after divorce, "the difficulty is integrating scriptural standards with pastoral concerns."  Although he hopes the issue will be resolved in fewer than 71 years, he does not expect to be concluded during his tenure as Primate.

*Bishop Removes Gay Priest*

      The Canadian Bishops had not addressed human sexuality since 1979.  What prompted the November action was the peremptory removal by the Bishop of Toronto, the Rt. Rev. Terence Finlay, of the Rev. James Ferry, as Rector of St. Philip's-on-the-Hill in Unionville, a Toronto suburb, because Ferry had admitted to his bishop that he was gay and living in a committed relationship.  Finlay also inhibited Ferry from functioning as a priest.

      *The Toronto Star* on September 14 reported Ferry as blaming a "hateful smear campaign" by two or three of his parishioners as having led to his being removed as rector.  With "only speculation" about his private life, the parishioners were attempting to force him to resign under the threat of exposing him to the bishop, Ferry said in a statement.

      Ferry, 38, stated that publicity surrounding the case has made it appear as though he decided, "in a fit of honesty, to go to the bishop and tell him I was gay and in a relationship.  This is simply not the case.  I feel compelled by the massive publicity that has resulted to set the record straight."

      According to the Rev. Tim Foley, Diocesan Director of Communications, Ferry went to see Finlay and told him he was living in a gay relationship and that he did not want to be a hypocrite.  Foley said that after explaining the church's discipline and guidelines, Finlay told Ferry he had the choice of ending the relationship or resigning.  Ferry refused to resign and was removed and inhibited.  In fact, the meeting included one of the Assistant Bishops and a St. Philip's warden, in addition to Finlay and Ferry.  It was initiated by Ferry because of the rumor campaign in the parish.

      St. Philip's congregation was notified of Ferry's removal and the reason for it the following Sunday, July 14, when one of the Suffragan Bishops of Toronto, the Rt. Rev. Douglas Blackwell, read an explicit statement prepared by Finlay during service.  Two weeks later, while Ferry was vacationing, the diocese issued a press release on the matter.  The dismissal immediately became a major item in the Ontario press.

      "It's been a nightmare from beginning to end," Ferry said in an interview with *The Toronto Star*.  "I've been disappointed, every step of the way, at the way the whole business has been handled."  Ferry said Finlay's handling of the situation will send other gay and lesbian clergy in the diocese "diving for cover" because it sends a message that "it does not pay to be honest with your bishop."

*Integrity Service*

      In what may be the first instance of an Integrity service anywhere in the world receiving major media attention prior to its occurrence, *The Toronto Star* on August 3 did a story focussing on the upcoming August 28 Integrity/Toronto Service of Prayer in support of Fr. Ferry at downtown Toronto's Holy Trinity Anglican Church, where the chapter normally meets.  In another first for Integrity, the *Star* article extensively cited Integrity/Toronto's newsletter.  The summer issue of *The Integrator* was devoted almost exclusively to the Ferry dismissal and warned that the bishop's action would probably precipitate a "long, public and ugly battle," with the Anglican Church losing many members, regardless of the outcome.  Finlay was accused of polarizing the church, causing panic among gay and lesbian clergy, and affirming the suspicion that the church is anti-gay and not to be trusted.

      The August 29 *Star* reported 400 people attended the service, which included a collection in aid of Ferry's legal costs.  The service in the packed church, on a sweltering hot Wednesday evening, began with The Service of Light.  The church was dark and the procession was led with the Paschal candle.  From it, candles were then lit throughout the church and a prayer was offered:  "Enlighten us in times of darkness by the light of your Christ and the presence of your Spirit.  May your word of justice, mercy and love be a lamp to our feet and a light to our path."

      Integrity/Toronto Co-Convener (the Rev.) Norm Rickaby welcomed the congregation, finishing by saying: "We come to pray. We pray for Jim, a man called to minister the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that God may continue to direct him and work through him.  We pray for the parish of St. Philip's, a community traumatized and injured by the Bishop's sudden removal of their spiritual leader.  And we pray for Bishop Finlay.  We do not see him as our enemy.  He is also a man called and beloved of God.  We pray for God's continued direction and work in and through him also."

      In a statement released just prior to the service, Finlay acknowledged the right of Integrity to hold the service and said he hoped it would promote healing and enlightenment within the church.

      "I understand people wanting to express their feelings and concerns around the inhibiting of the Rev. Jim Ferry," Finlay said.  "In spite of the difficulties that Jim's decision has placed on me, I continue to be pastorally concerned for him as a priest of the diocese."

*Ferry Initiates Law Suit*

      On September 12, Ferry filed legal action against the bishop and the diocese, seeking reinstatement as a priest in the diocese, his rectorship back and financial damages exceeding $500,000.

      In a statement of claim filed on his behalf, Ferry seeks compensation for lost salary, a housing allowance and benefits or $100,000 for wrongful dismissal.  In addition, he is seeking damages of $250,000 for the bishop's alleged breach of confidence and trust and $250,000 in other damages.

      Ferry claims that both the diocese and Finlay have demonstrated a "flagrant disregard of their legal obligations, including the church's own canons," and a disregard for Ferry's health and well-being as a member of the diocesan clergy.

      The handling of his firing and the public disclosure of his being gay have caused him public humiliation, personal embarrassment and damage to his reputation, Ferry contended.  He said he has suffered, and will continue to suffer, mental anguish, anxiety and depression.

      The Diocese declined comment on the lawsuit, but on September 23, Ferry received an official Letter of Deposition of Office from Finlay, confirming his termination as a Diocesan employee.  On the 24th, just two days before the beginning of the Diocesan Synod and knowing the issue would be debated there, Finlay issued a press release announcing that Ferry was restored to the Diocesan payroll, though still inhibited, pending a decision by a Bishop's Court.  The Bishop's Court had not been formally convened as of press time but is expected to be held in late January.

*Toronto Diocesan Synod*

      In his opening address to the Synod on September 26 at St. James Cathedral, Bishop Finlay said the Ferry dismissal had been "one of the most agonizing decisions of [his] episcopate."

      "There are some who fear homosexuality and to them I say I will not tolerate homophobic 'witch hunts' nor 'gay bashing.'  Instead, I hope that the Church can be a meeting place for people to address the issues of homosexuality.  I would encourage parishes to provide safe places where people will take time in the next couple of years to listen carefully and try to understand each other.  I suggest beginning with the gay/lesbian stories and resource kit available from Church House ["Our Stories/Your Story"].  This may encourage you to move on to a study of medical information and scriptural scholarship.  Is it possible for the Church to be a place of reconciliation in this area?"

      Although it did not appear on the agenda for the business sessions of Synod (which is mostly prepared in June), a resolution was introduced requesting an investigation into the Church's ability to welcome lesbian and gay people in light of Finlay's action.  This was referred to committee and there was no debate on it.  However, there was considerable discussion at the Members' Hours of both days of convention.  These are times when any member may speak for up to five minutes on any issue.

      The second Members' Hour speaker was Chris Ambidge, immediate past Co-Convener of Integrity/Toronto and editor of *The Integrator*, who was a delegate from his parish.  Ambidge introduced himself as a long-time deputy to Synod, a life-long Anglican, a Christian and a gay man.  He said he spoke for the many Anglicans unable to speak, especially after the Bishop's outing of Ferry.  Norm Rickaby, in an *Integrator* article, noted, "The sincerity, eloquence and 'guts' that Chris demonstrated in his five minutes before Synod [and CBC television news cameras] were much commended by other speakers in Members' Hour and by many people personally to him and to those of us at the Integrity table."

      Most other speakers supported gays and lesbians.  The Rev. Canon Vincent Goring, retired priest and Synod delegate, asked the church to bless "loving and faithful" homosexual relationships as valid and moral.  By so doing, the diocese would provide leadership for the national church.  Present church guidelines force gay and lesbian priests into hypocrisy, he said.

*Press Support*

      In a "Dear Terry" open letter, *Anglican Magazine* editor John Bird criticized Finlay's suspension of Ferry in the September issue of that magazine.  Bird also said he was ashamed of his own church for its handling of the homosexual ordination issue and paid tribute to the United Church of Canada for its courage in opening its ordination process to lesbians and gay men in 1989.

      "Anglicans pay great costs for avoiding the issue," Bird wrote.  "Our church doesn't seem to realize it's living a debilitating lie that poisons all aspects of our corporate life."

      "On reflection I realize it is the whole church I feel angry with -- myself included.  I am upset that we have not more strongly opposed this 'standard' of the bishops that allows us to self-righteously remove a person from a vocation to which he must feel called by God, simply because he is in a loving, committed, monogamous relationship with someone of the same sex.

      "I think we have strayed untold miles from the spirit and teachings of Jesus when we can punish someone in this manner."

      "To me, [the House of Bishops' willingness to ordain gays and lesbians, but only if they are celibate] is analogous to the government of the Soviet Union saying it allows people to be Christians, but then not allowing them to gather for worship or study, a policy the Western Christian community complained about vociferously during the years it was in force."

      "The odor of fear is all about this church when it comes to sexuality. ...  Love and caring do not appear to be issues in this church when it comes to sexuality, just hidebound adherence to a restrictive norm."

      Bird's two-page editorial generated more letters than usual to *Anglican Magazine*.  The negative letters predominated.  Some readers, however, praised Bird's eloquence, integrity and personal faith.  "Your compassionate and courageous editorial brought new insights to a complicated and unavoidable issue," one reader said.  "I congratulate you not only on your excellent magazine, but on your tolerance and patience in printing the antagonistic rantings of your tormentors."

      Bird has had no formal response from Finlay or the diocese over his open letter.  He says that, as a friend of the bishop, he showed the letter to Finlay before publication.  While there was some discussion there was no attempt by Finlay to influence his decision to publish, Bird says.

      "I thought this is sticking my neck out a bit," Bird told *The Toronto Star* about his decision to write and publish the open letter.  "But from my point of view that is why we publish:  to say what we believe and to encourage people to engage in dialogue."

      He makes no apologies for weighing the magazine toward minority viewpoints.  "I am weighted toward one point of view in that our mandate is to provide a forum for people we see as being marginalized," he said.  "And I see gays and lesbians as being marginalized in society as well as the church."

      Although his open letter sparked strong and passionate disapproval in some of the magazine's readership, Bird told *The Star* that, as of late October, there were no subscription cancellations, which is encouraging for a magazine struggling to survive.

      *Anglican Magazine*, a publication of Anglican Church Women until the early 1970s, is published seven times a year.  It gets some revenue from advertisements and subscriptions but is mainly funded by the national Anglican church.  The circulation is 8,000.  Because of financial restraints, there was talk of closing the magazine last year but its supporters argued successfully that there is room for a "minority position" magazine within the church.

*Contributions*

      If you are interested in contributing to the Rev. Jim Ferry's legal expenses, you can mail your check to Integrity/Toronto, Box 873, Station F, Toronto, ON M4Y 2N9, CANADA, or to Integrity, Inc., P.O. Box 19561, Washington, DC 20036-0561.  In either case, please clearly indicate that it is for the Jim Ferry fund.

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KEEPING INTEGRITY'S PATRONAL FEAST:

ST. AELRED OF RIEVAULX

JANUARY 12

by Paul Woodrum

      The feast of Integrity's patron, Aelred of Rievaulx, is January 12.  Every chapter is urged to observe it at a January liturgy as well as to regularly remember Aelred in the Prayers of the People and in the Great Thanksgiving.

      This fulfills a pledge made by Integrity's 1987 Convention in St. Louis to "regularly observe [Aelred's] feast, promote his veneration and seek before the heavenly throne of grace the support of his prayers on behalf of justice and acceptance for lesbians and gay men."

      Why Aelred?  Because he's gay and his sexual orientation was openly acknowledged when the General Convention of the Episcopal Church approved the addition of his observance to the liturgical calendar at its 1985 and 1988 meetings thereby recognizing that lesbian and gay Christians are not only "children of God," but are even capable of achieving sanctity with the capital "S".  Also for lesgay people in general, Aelred is an exceptionally attractive, intensely human, serenely assured exemplar who accepted his sexual orientation and used it to build earthly community and to seek heavenly delights.

      Born in Northumbria in 1110 into a Saxon priestly family, Aelred was a contemporary and friend of Henry II and his consort, Eleanor of Acquitaine (of "A Lion in Winter" fame); the blessed, holy martyr Thomas a Becket; Peter Abelard and Heloise with whom he shared a common humanism; Bernard of Clairvaux, his spiritual mentor and ecclesiastical superior; and King David of Scotland, son of St. Margaret, at whose court he served as a steward from 1130 to 1134 and with whose son Henry he records having had an exceptionally close relationship.  David's stepson Waldef followed Aelred into the Cistercian order and rose to Abbot of Melrose.

      Aelred himself entered the Cistercian order in 1134 at Rievaulx.  From 1143 to 1147 he was Abbot of Revesby and in 1174 was called back to Rievaulx as abbot.  There he remained until his death in 1167.  The Cistercians promulgated his feast in 1476 and his fellow countrymen proudly hailed him as the "Bernard of the North."

      Aelred accepted the monastic discipline of celibacy with difficulty.  While novice master at Rievaulx he cooled his fleshly ardor by standing in a well with cold water up to his neck.  He had two special friends in the order.  The first was Simon and after his death a young monk whose name is unrecorded but who remained with Aelred until his death.  Aelred described his latter companion ar "the refuge of my spirit, the sweet solace of my griefs, ... a foretaste of blessedness thus to love and thus to be loved."  As abbot, he encouraged special friendships among the monks, even physical expressions of affection and, while he didn't encourage carnal relationships between those committed to celibacy, he believed, according to John Boswell, that even these could "afford the joy felt by lovers, and they could be used as stepping-stones to a loftier relationship involving the two lovers and God."

      Aelred accepted his order's discipline of celibacy, abandoning sexual love not because it was evil or unsatisfying, but because it is transitory and he sought the eternal love which comes only from God.  To those who argue that all lesgay people should follow Aelred's example and be celibate, the answer is that all are called to seek God's love and that the options of seeking it through a monastic vocation and celibacy, or through holy orders and/or through marriage, should be equally as open to lesbians and gay men as it is to avowed and practicing heterosexuals.

      On receiving word of Aelred's death, his friend and eulogist, Abbot Gilbert of Swineshead, summed up the abundant nature of his friend by exclaiming, "What a rich honeycomb has been taken from the world!"  Aelred's life, his self-acceptance and his acceptance by the church reminds the whole church both of the contribution of gay men and lesbians to its life and thought and of the rich tradition of inclusive pluralism which has always characterized Christian community at its best.

PROPERS FOR THE FEAST OF AELRED

Collect: Pour into our hearts, 0 God, the Holy Spirit's gift of love, that we, clasping each the other's hand, may share the joy of friendship, human and divine, and with your servant Aelred draw many into your community of love; through Jesus Christ the Righteous, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.  *Amen*.

First Reading:  Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 6:14-17

Psalm:          36:5-10 or 145:8-13

Epistle:        Philippians 2:1-4

Alleluia Verse: Psalm 25:9 "All the paths of God are love and

                faithfulness* for those who keep God's covenant

                and testimonies."

Gospel:         John 15:9-17 or Mark 12:28-34a

RESOURCES

      "Lesser Feasts and Fasts," 4th and later editions, Church Hymnal Corporation.

      "The Integrity Handbook 1988."

      Aelred, "Dialogue on the Soul," trans. C.H. Talbot, Kalamazoo, MI, Cistercian Publications, 1981.

      Aelred, "Mirror of Charity," trans. Adrian Walker & Geoffrey Webb, London, A.R. Mowbray, 1962.

      Aelred, "On Spiritual Friendship," trans. Mary Eugenia Laker, Washington , DC, Cistercian Publications, 1974.

      John Boswell, "Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality," pp. 221-226, Chicago, IL, Univ. of Chicago Press, 1980.

      "The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church," 2nd ed. "Aelred, St.", p. 27, F.L. Cross, ed., New York, Oxford Univ. Press, 1990.

      David Hugh Farmer, "The Oxford Dictionary of the Saints," "Aelred of Rievaulx", p. 7, Oxford, Oxford Univ. Press, 1983 ed.

      Amedee Hallier, OCSO, "The Monastic Theology of Aelred of Rievaulx," Spencer, MA, Cistercian Publications, 1969.

      F.M. Powicke, ed. "The Life of Aelred of Rievaulx by Walter Daniel," Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1950.

      Aelred Squire, "Aelred of Rievaulx," London, SPCR, 1969.

SHIELD OF ST. AELRED

Designed by the author, July 1987.

On a blue field: surmounted on a crossed silver pen and abbot's staff for Aelred's pastoral treatises and office, a gold beehive for community and Aelred's industriousness and sweet disposition surmounted by clasped hands for his theology of friendship. Motto:  *amari et amare*, "to love and to be loved."

ST. AELRED'S PRAYER

Sweet Lord, release wisdom from the seat of your greatness that it may be with us, toil with us, work with us, speak in us; may it, according to your good pleasure, direct our thoughts, words, and all our works and counsels, to the honor of your Name, the profit of the community, and our salvation; through our friend Jesus Christ, to whom with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory throughout all ages.  *Amen*.

(adapted from St. Aelred's Pastoral Prayer by L. Paul Woodrum)

HYMN STANZA HONORING ST. AELRED

For use as 2nd stanza with Hymn 231, King's Lynn, or Hymn 232, Nyland, (The Hymnal 1982).

     All praise for Abbot Aelred,

          our Patron Saint and gay,

     who found through joyful friendship,

          the path to Jesus lay.

     Like Aelred, may we mirror

          love, human and divine;

     and, clasping hands together,

          God's blessed communion find.

                          L. Paul Woodrum, 1987

RIEVAULX TODAY

      In modern Yorkshire, one can visit the place where Aelred lived and loved.  Located only two and a half miles from the village of Helmsley in the North York Moors National Park it is visited by numerous tourists, including an increasing number of Integrity pilgrims [See "A Visit to Rievaulx" by James M. Rosenthal II in *News & Notes*, Winter 1991].  In the words of *English Medieval Monasteries 1066-1540* by Roy Midmer (University of Georgia Press, 1979):  "Superb ruins - 'the majesty of the huge wreck at Rievaulx' (Braun).  The church, presbytery and transepts are unequalled in Gothic perfection, once hidden in gloom beneath a roof.  Extensive, well-preserved monastic buildings include refectory hall, parts of dormitory and infirmary; and in the lower-level walls of the chapter house is the shrine of the first abbot, St. William." 

********************

ELIZABETH CARL APPOINTED TO SEMINARY BOARD

      It was announced in the Fall 1991 issue of *Union News* the newsletter of the Union Theological Seminary, that the Rev. Elizabeth Carl has been elected to the seminary's Board of Directors.  Ms. Carl's ordination as an open lesbian just prior to General Convention was described in *The Voice of Integrity*, Fall, 1991.  The seminary newsletter describes Ms. Carl as follows:

      "Assistant Minister at the Church of the Epiphany, Washington, DC, Ms. Carl graduated from Occidental College.  She earned as M.S.L.S. degree from Catholic University of America and an M.Div. from Union where she was awarded the Hudnut Prize and the Maxwell Fellowship.  She serves on the Educational Policy and Seminary Life Committees of the Board.  Her professional and civic affiliations include work with the American Library Association, Integrity, the Washington Episcopal Clergy Association, and service on the Board of the Kirkridge Retreat Center. ... Ms. Carl and her partner, Victoria Carey Hill, live in Arlington, VA."

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MORE REACTION TO GENERAL CONVENTION

by James Solheim

      When the 1,100 deputies and bishops packed their bags at the end of last summer's General Convention and returned home, they faced a task almost as awesome as the 10 days of deliberations -- trying to tell the folks back home what happened and why.

      Bishop Alden Hathaway of Pittsburgh wrote in his diocesan newspaper that the General Convention didn't resolve the issue "but rather now it is clearly described.  It is the root issue that complicates so much of our common life and even threatens to divide us.  At best, it seems, we are in for a paralyzing standoff at the heart of our life; at worst, the breakup of the Episcopal Church as we know it."

      Bishop David Ball of Albany, like many of his colleagues, is worried that the "we are adrift, we are wandering, we have strayed from the foundation, from our roots."  Ball is convinced the church is facing a "crisis of belief" and that an alternative worldview is contending for the heart and soul of the church.

      Many expressed a sense of relief that things were not worse, that the church showed no signs of self-destructing over the issue of sexuality.

      "This convention demonstrated that there is still a middle ground to be occupied by our church," Bishop Coadjutor Hays Rockwell of Missouri said in a newspaper interview.  "It looked for a while as though the zealots were having their way with us, but we rejected the blandishments of the radicals on both flanks.  We have boldly occupied the middle ground that had been abandoned by so many -- and this gives me heart."

      The Rev. Stephan Klingelhofer, a deputy from Western Michigan, said that some were disappointed over the actions of the convention and "saw the absence of clarity as a sign of weakness." Yet he said that he believes that the church is "healthier than I could have imagined, filled with such a breadth of gifted, wise, and caring disciples of the Lord -- humble enough to know that we cannot conclusively read or speak the mind of God on all mysteries of life, but brave enough to seek faithfully and prayerfully God's guidance as we struggle."

      Bishop Mark Dyer of Bethlehem said that the convention gave a pastoral response to a challenge of history, and did so in "a thoroughly Anglican way.  We looked deep within our tradition to find a clearly received principle that we affirmed.  Then we acknowledged the historical challenge to this principle, i.e., that the way some followers of Jesus live constitutes a legitimate challenge to the traditional teaching.  Finally, we formulated a pastoral response."

      Bishop Herbert Thompson of Southern Ohio pointed out that the response was not adequate for some, that many were disappointed that the church did not speak "with a definitive response."   Yet he counted himself among those who were "encouraged that a strong center position held."  By reaching a compromise at the General Convention, "we may have prevented a rupture of the church and the alienation of many people at either end of the spectrum."  He said that he hopes the diocese will  take seriously the General Convention mandate to study sexuality issues before the Indianapolis General Convention in 1994.

      Dr. Germaine Hoston, a deputy from Maryland, said that the convention "took the hard way out -- it chose to continue to live with tension.  The convention said that we have the courage to face one another, the courage to realize that there aren't any easy answers.  It pushed our leaders to try to come up with answers."

      That may be difficult because of the design of the convention itself.  Bishop John MacNaughton pointed out that the General Convention "is not a theological symposium designed to exchange ideas and to seek the truth."  Instead, it is a legislative body much like the U.S. Congress, constituted "to seek consensus and often compromise on which the whole church may act."  As such, it is "subject to the pressure of special interest groups and lobbies whose influence far exceeds their  membership numbers in the church."  Admitting that it "may seem to some to be a funny way to run a church," MacNaughton said that he hasn't seen a better alternative.

      Many participants credited the morning Bible sharing and Eucharist with keeping the tone of debate civil and promoting tolerance and even trust.

      First-time deputy Kath Burn from Ohio said that "many people came to realize that the real business of the convention was done at these tables, not during the debate on resolutions.  The real business was done as the word was opened and the bread broken in each small diverse community.  As different as we are, we can all be fed at one table by a Savior who sees us as we are, with all our imperfections."

      "Those times of personal dialogue are not the subject of newspaper headlines, but they set the tone for our speaking the truth in love, with patience, forbearing one another, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace," said the Rev. Randolph Dales, a deputy from New Hampshire.

      Dales came away from General Convention "proud of our church's honesty and compassion, our refusal to give simple answers to complex issues, but rather committed to the idea, in the words of the late Bishop Stephen Bayne, that `our unity lies not in our thinking alike but in our acting together.'"

      Bishop John Howe of Central Florida said that he hopes the church can maintain that spirit even while being painfully divided on some of the issues.  "As we continue to talk, study, and sometimes argue with each other, may it please God that we do so without personal attack, without invidiousness, with love, care, and respect for one another."

      "I am not in the Episcopal Church because it is perfect.  God called me to it.  No matter what stupid thing it does, I'm not leaving it," Howe said.

-----

Article courtesy of Episcopal News Service, of which James Solheim is News Director.

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BILL BUCKLEY AND COMPANY ATTACK INTEGRITY

"God and Man in Phoenix," an article by H.N. Kelley which appeared in the *National Review*, August 12, 1991.

    The Episcopal general convention, a ten-day triennial affair, began this year as a masterpiece of damage control carried out by the bishops in multiple closed-door executive sessions.  As a consequence, the early days were marked by serenity and extreme politeness, though with an undercurrent of tension.  This tension was not lessened by the sanguine press releases of the Episcopal News Service, which reported fully and frequently on everything, stating outright that the one subject on everyone's mind was sexuality.  But in the final days, the controlled serenity began to break down.  The end brought the very real possibility of there becoming two Episcopal churches, one traditional and one freewheeling radical, as many participants, both lay and clerical (including bishops), signed a declaration of conscience stating that they could not go along with some of the convention's decisions.

    In one of the attempts at damage control, the Presiding Bishop had decreed "a new shape" for this convention.  In essence, it aimed at keeping delegates so busy with spiritual matters and with discussion of racism that there would be little time left for disputation.  Instead of one spectacular Eucharist which would include everyone, there were four of these carefully choreographed affairs and ten daily services, as well as special Bible contemplation groups and racism studies.

    A bizarre request was sent in advance to hotels serving the convention to "remove all amenities, such as shampoo, conditioner, and other toilet articles except for soap" and to donate the money saved to the Diocese of Arizona to support shelter programs.  Our hotel posted the notice, but the dish of "amenities" was larger than ever.  The delegates themselves received pre-convention instructions that "peripheral receptions and parties [be] eliminated or toned down" and that the delegates should shun expensive meals and alcohol and eat in the common-meal section in the convention hall.  The most incomprehensible request was that exhibitors (booksellers, groups like the Prayer Book Society, and so on) reduce the size of their exhibits, preferably to a single 10 x 10 booth.  This proved impossible and the exhibit hall looked about as it has always done.  There were interesting side attractions such as a two-hour American Indian memorial rite, with drums, chants, and audience participation. There were also occasional serenades by members of Integrity,  the organization for homosexual Episcopalians.

    After a great deal of pre-convention huffing and puffing, and amid rumors of a threat to reveal names of gay clergy who were still in the closet, Integrity continued to keep a high profile during the entire ten days of the convention.  Its members had declared they would force a flat yes or no vote on the many items on the agenda relating to their problems, but though they retreated from this position, they and friends from other gay organizations were conspicuous in the lobby, and they made certain they were represented on all committees dealing with sexual issues.  Bishop Spong appeared to make the Integrity booth his headquarters, and had a man march through the aisles of the hall (against house rules) bearing a very home-made-looking sign announcing that the bishop would autograph copies of his book in Booth 10.  The Integrity people were often visited by their friends from the gay-oriented Metropolitan Community Churches, holding their convention just down the street.  They caused a bit of a dust-up among employees in their hotel, and city newspapers reported the bedmakers would wear rubber gloves.  However, a medical advisor counseled that gloves would be necessary only if there was blood or "other bodily fluids" on the sheets.

    Anti- gay-rights types were not so visible, although there was a tall man in a two-foot-high green hat marching outside the hall (in the 109 [degrees] heat) with the words on his hat reminding us: "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve or Madam and Eve."

    While sexuality had all the headlines (the hearing open to the public drew more than three thousand people), it was far from the only item on the legislative agenda.  There were several hundred resolutions passed, usually unanimously, on every known human ill.  Remembered were the homeless, the American Indians, abused children (and wives), African and Chinese struggles for Democracy.  There were scolding resolutions to be sent to President Bush.  He was told he must not back off on sanctions against South Africa, that the Gulf War was intolerable, and that he must do something or another about agriculture.  Undoubtedly the most ambitious resolution of them all was the directive to the President that he eliminate poverty.

    The other critical topic under discussion as "inclusive language" - *i.e.*, the proposals to rewrite the Bible and Prayer Book in feminist terms in which God is no longer "our Father" and all of us are generally desexed.  There was some bitterness on the subject, but resisters were dealing with a fait accompli:  the committee that has been working on this for the last six years has put its work to date into the hands of parishes all over the country, and much of it is already being used, and undoubtedly would have continued to be used however the convention voted.  (In the event, the issue was returned to the committee for another three years' "study.")

    The sexuality controversy, which has been receiving international publicity for many months, was broken down into many facets.  At stake, practically speaking, are same-sex marriages and the difference between inclinations and acts, summed up in the word "practicing."  There are today many fine priests and bishops who are homosexual, but is it permissible for ordained clerics to engage in homosexual practices?  In the endless arguments, the central meaning of the legislation often seemed to get lost.  Some of the speakers appeared to feel that sexual pleasure, at will, was a human right, even a human necessity, and that only pain and sorrow would result from frowning on sex as entertainment.

    In the final days, hostility began to show as Integrity forces raised a row in the traditionalist Church Army booth, it was claimed that some bishops had received threats, and both houses, bishops and deputies, became packed beyond capacity.  After hours of passing the sex resolutions back and forth between the two houses for the necessary unified approval, as quibbling amendments accreted, the resolutions ended up so ambiguous that Integrity was able to claim them as victories.  An attempt to pass a canon (church law) stating that clergy "must abstain from genital sexual relations outside of holy matrimony" was rejected, and there went morality down the drain.  The resolution forbidding ordination of "practicing homosexuals" was defeated, and there went a million or so church members out the door.  Reluctance to make some of the hard decisions resulted in delaying tactics, and parish priests were instructed to take careful pulses of their congregations and report back by the 1994 convention.  On convention Thursday, however, it appeared certain that the two great pressure groups, the gays and the feminists, had won the day, and the declaration of conscience began to circulate.

    Oh yes, reports on budgetary matters caused much unhappiness, as headquarters reported still more painful drops in income.  But then, cause and effect were never one of headquarters' strong points.

-----

Mr. Kelley has purportedly written of Episcopal Church matters for NR and a number of other publications.  He is not listed in the Lay Leadership Directory so we have no information about where he lives.

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INTEGRITY RESOLUTIONS WHICH PASSED, SORT OF

*Pension Plan to Study Beneficiaries other than Spouses and Children*

D015s

      *Resolved*, the House of Bishops concurring, That the Church Pension Fund is urged to study allowing all plan participants to name joint and survivor adult pension beneficiaries and report back to the 71st General Convention.

*Educational Materials to be Produced*

D049s

      *Resolved*, the House of Deputies concurring, That the 70th General Convention of the Episcopal Church call on the Church including its theological seminaries to acknowledge and reexamine its attitudes about sexuality through seminars, conferences and one-on-one conversations with persons of differing sexual viewpoints and orientations; and be it further

      *Resolved*, That all dioceses be requested to have continuing education courses in the area of human sexuality in general, and homosexuality in particular, and make these available to the clergy and laity of this Church; and be it further

      *Resolved*, That the Department of Education for Mission and Ministry be directed to acquaint diocese with appropriate materials for the training of clergy and laity to deal with issues of human sexuality in general, and homosexuality in particular, by January 1, 1993.

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FORWARD MOVEMENT DISAVOWS PRO-GAY ISSUE

      The Episcopal Church's most popular devotional guide was recently embroiled in the continuing controversy about the full inclusion of lesbians and gay men in the church.

      The Cincinnati-based quarterly "Forward Day By Day" received several critical letters and telephone calls from readers, who  charged that four meditations in the August-October issue endorsed a permissive attitude toward homosexuality and an attack on those who hold more legalistic views.

      "This reaction is understandable, and should have been anticipated," said the Rev. Dr. Charles Long, editor of Forward Movement Publications.  "The pages in question, written long before  General Convention, revealed the depth of feeling and disagreement in the church on issues of sexuality.  The material was hastily edited in order to meet deadlines."  Under any circumstances, he added, "the author's confrontational style is self-defeating and inappropriate in a devotional guide."

      Long has responded promptly to all questions and protests --  including some subscription cancellations -- with an apology for the pain caused by the editorial lapse.  He vigorously denied that the incident signals a change of policy or an endorsement by Forward Movement of a particular viewpoint.

      "We have always been sensitive to the fact that Forward  Movement exists to serve the whole church," Long said.  "We enjoy  an unusual degree of trust and loyalty from our readers because our  authors reflect the diversity that actually exists in the Episcopal  Church."  Long noted that writers reflect a variety of backgrounds and viewpoints, and that all contributions are written anonymously.

      "Forward Day By Day" has never intentionally avoided mention of controversial matters in the past, according to Long.  "But the policy has been -- and will continue to be -- to encourage mutual respect among Christians who disagree.  And, above all, prayerful reflection on the Word of God."

-----

Courtesy of Episcopal News Service, based on a report by Michael Barwell, director of communication for the Diocese of Southern Ohio.

********************

CHAPTER CONTRIBUTIONS TO GENERAL CONVENTION PRESENCE

Responding to a call in 1989, the following chapters contributed to Integrity's presence at General Convention, 1991:

Midwest Region:

     Greater Cincinnati                $1,200

     Central Ohio                         850

     Chicago                              100

     Madison                              200

     Northeast Ohio                       700

     Kansas City                          100

                    TOTAL              $3,125

Northeast Region:

     Albany                           $   100

     Hartford                             600

     New York                           9,250

     PhiladelphiA                         750

     Rochester                            500

     Western Massachusetts              1,283

     Berkshire (Chapter in formation)      25

     Northwest Pennsylvania (in formation) 50

                    TOTAL             $12,558

Southern Region:

     Atlanta                          $   500

     Austin                               500

     Dallas                               590

     Houston                              500

     Middle Tennessee                      75

     Oklahoma City                         25

     San Antonio                          500

     Washington                           500

                    TOTAL             $ 3,190

Western Region:

     Colorado                         $    50

     El Camino Real                       500

     Puget Sound                          200

     San Diego                            685

     San Francisco                      1,000

     Southland                            375

     Tucson                               600

                    TOTAL             $ 3,410

     Toronto                          $   100

                    GRAND TOTAL       $22,383

      The Board of Integrity, Inc. thanks all the chapters which joined in the General convention effort last year.  This represented both more chapters participating and more money received than for any previous General Convention.

      This does not represent individual contributions received from chapter members in response to Integrity fund appeals.  If there were some way to include those, virtually every chapter would be represented in the above list.

      Starting in 1989, numerous chapters pledged whatever they felt they would be able to raise for General Convention in 1991.  The purpose was threefold:  1) to set a reasonable goal for the chapter, which would also help with planning at the National level, 2) to spend two and a half years raising funds to meet that pledge so that it need not come out of the general funds of the chapter, and 3) to give the chapter a variety of projects to do together.  As is obvious from the list above, many of Integrity's smallest chapters gave extraordinary donations, chiefly through fundraising ventures.

      Unfortunately, a few chapters failed to meet their pledges and two chapters whose pledges were listed in the Summer 1990 issue of *News and Notes* gave nothing at all.  However, the total received was almost twice that listed as pledged in that issue.

      The Board calls on all chapters to make a pledge early in 1992 for General Convention 1994.  As was the case in 1989, there are no prescribed amounts (some Regional Vice-Presidents chose to give a challenge amount to their chapters, however), so the Board hopes each chapter will consider an appropriate amount that it can *raise* over the next two and a half years, not what it expects to have as a surplus in its treasury in 1994.  Please let your Regional Vice President know about your chapter pledge as soon as possible.

********************

A GOSPEL FOR GAY PEOPLE

by Dr. Buddy Truluck

      Gary Cooper and Mike Bussee helped to start a nation-wide religious attack on homosexual persons 15 years ago.  This movement was called Exodus.  Groups were organized in over 80 cities to use religion as therapy to "cure" gay men and lesbians of homosexuality and turn us into heterosexuals.

      After five years of intense work with hundreds of homosexual persons, Gary and Mike could not name even one who had changed from homosexual to heterosexual orientation.  They could name many, however, who had been severely damaged emotionally by the false hopes and unrealistic demands of Exodus.  To complicate things even further, Mike and Gary fell in love with each other and realized that they themselves were gay.  It was a shock!

      Gary and Mike left Exodus and retreated into their own private lives as a gay couple.  They left the church.  For years they sealed up their Bibles for fear that God would do something terrible if they tried to turn to God as gay men.

      Then suddenly last summer in July 1990, Gary and Mike came out as both Christian and homosexual.  They began to work as hard to help homosexual persons accept and love themselves before God as they had previously worked to teach lesbians and gay men to hate and reject themselves.  First they told their story of new life and hope in Christ as openly gay lovers at the regional meeting of Evangelicals Concerned in San Francisco.  This was the beginning of a year of public appearances throughout the US.

      They were interviewed by Joan Rivers and many other TV and radio shows.  They led workshops and preached in many churches including the Golden Gate MCC in San Francisco last winter.  They were part of a film "The Ex-Gay Movement" made last spring to be broadcast this fall on PBS.

      Mike and Gary led workshops last July for the general conference of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches in Phoenix, Arizona, where this writer had the privilege of performing a holy union for them.  But this time, Gary was confined to a wheelchair by the ravages of HIV infection that was rapidly bringing his life to an end.

      In just one year Gary and Mike had a positive impact on thousands of gay and lesbian people both in and out of the churches.  The article on their ministry written by *Sentinel* Editor Frederic Millen and published in *Advocate* last winter brought them national attention in the gay, lesbian and bisexual community.

      A book is being written about Mike and Gary that will tell their story to many more people who are hungry for the liberating truth of the real gospel of the Bible that God loves homosexual persons and that the Bible nowhere says that gay men and lesbians can or should change their sexual orientation.

      Gary Cooper died on September 30.  Mike Bussee will continue the battle that they began together to bring the healing good news of self esteem and hope in Christ to our oppressed and wounded community.  I personally thank God for Gary and Mike.  Many of us will miss Gary.  But the truth that sets people free and that Gary gave his life for goes marching on and cannot be stopped.

-----

Buddy Truluck is Pastor of Gold Gate Metropolitan Community Church in San Francisco.

Copyright 1991.  *San Francisco Sentinel*.  Reprinted with Permission.  This article first appeared in the October 10, 1991 issue.

********************

"EX-GAYS" INVADE CHURCH OF ENGLAND

BUT WITHOUT CAREY'S BLESSING

by Kim Byham

      On September 15, 1991, *The Times* of London revealed that an Anglican Bishop in London was sponsoring a so-called ex-gay ministry in his diocese, and encouraging its spread to other dioceses.

      Forty-three "counsellors" have been undergoing training at Oak Hill Ministerial College, an evangelical seminary in northern London where the Most Rev. George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury, used to teach.  They are reportedly now preparing to set up a network of "sexual wholeness" groups at churches throughout Britain.

      The stated aim is to persuade lesbians and gay men that their sexuality is a "blockage" to becoming mature (*i.e.*, heterosexual) adults.  By putting their faith in Christ, gay men and lesbians can be "freed" of their sexuality.

      The "ex-gay" program is sponsored by the Rt. Rev. John Klyberg, Bishop of Fulham.  Fulham is part of the Diocese of London; Klyberg is Suffragan Bishop of London, but with greater independence than American Suffragans.  The Bishop has appointed a south London vicar to inaugurate a London-based program.  The Rev. Christopher Guinness, a member of the brewing family, who will work from St Michael's Church, Belgravia, has enrolled 26 homosexual persons already.

      Fr. Guinness told *The Times*:  "Those outside the Christian fellowship will say we are interfering with people's rights and that we are brainwashing.  But God gave us brains and we all have the ability to think through the issues."

      Bishop Klyberg said he believed that his new "ministry" would help "a lot of people who are in a complete fix," adding, "It is very difficult to justify homosexual practices from biblical teaching."

      The training program, called Living Waters Sexual Redemption in Christ, was devised by Andrew Comiskey, 33, a former President of Exodus International, the umbrella organization for the "ex-gay" movement and pastor of the Vineyard Christian Fellowship, a non-denominational evangelical church in Santa Monica, California.  On September 14, Comiskey, author of a therapy manual called "Pursuing Sexual Wholeness: How Jesus Heals the Homosexual," told *The Times*:  "I am now a heterosexual man but in the past I took a major detour.  The gay community will quake at the thought that people can change, but they can.

      "We don't want this to be the work of fringe dwellers but part of the ministry of the church.  Our goal is not to be a militant presence but to quietly go about the business of saving lives."

      Comiskey is a highly controversial figure.  He has repeatedly condemned what he calls the "ludicrous pro-gay tenet that homosexuality is innate."  His own "change ministry" is known as Desert Stream.  They have been active in attempted conversions of AIDS patients in California hospitals, which was the subject of an expose in the *Los Angeles Times* on December 6, 1987.  In the September issue of the Desert Stream newsletter, Comiskey wrote, "In the case of a Christian who refuses to submit his homosexuality as a sin that requires confession and repentance, as well as spiritual/psychological wounding that requires healing, admonishment is in order. ...  For the person who is very sick (with AIDS), repentance is obvious.  They have already felt the physical consequences of sin and death is near."

      In the same article about Desert Stream in the *Los Angeles Times*, the Rev. Connie Hartquist, Episcopal chaplain at San Francisco General Hospital, said she considered such "ministries" to be "just lethal, inappropriate."  She said her staff asked representatives of "change ministries" to leave the hospital unless the patient has invited them to his bedside.

      Both Guinness and Comiskey have been involved in the training sessions at Oak Hill seminary.  The new group is the first Anglican-sponsored "healing ministry" in Britain, but there have been others run by evangelical groups outside the Church of England.  The Courage Trust offers a residential course in the Watford area.  A second organization, the True Freedom Trust, has study groups in London, Glasgow, Bristol, Plymouth, Reading, Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester.

      Many who have attended courses are openly critical.  Brian Smith, 43, an art school lecturer in Chelsea whose orientation was not changed, said:  "It is so dangerous because it parades as an answer to the problem, and if it doesn't work somehow it's your fault because you're being sinful and you're not giving yourself to God."

      Dr. John Money, an American psychologist who has made a study of "ex-gay ministries," said:  "I would consider it as a kind of brainwashing.  It's similar to a religious cult."

      Happily, there was not widespread support within the Church of England for "ex-gay ministry," and even some sharp criticism.

      The Rt. Rev. David Sheppard, Bishop of Liverpool, chair of the Church of England's Board for Social Responsibility and a leading liberal within the church, called the so-called therapy potentially dangerous.  He said in *The Times*:  "I would be extremely unhappy about saying that if you have enough faith Christ will alter your sexual orientation.  For some homosexuals, it could be extremely damaging and misleading to come up against this."

      In an interview with *The Times* on September 14, the Rt. Rev. David Jenkins, Bishop of Durham, and often called Bishop Spong's British counterpart, described the new "ministry" as manipulative and exploitative.  "They do not face up to the serious probability of science that there are a number of homosexual people who are so by their very nature, and so they could be inflicting real violence on people.  It's in danger of interfering with nature and it's exploitative, and has nothing to do with Christian grace."

      In an article in the *New York Daily News* on September 18, the Rev. Richard Kirker, General Secretary of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, Integrity's British counterpart, charged that Bishop Klyberg's program is "a cruel deception leading vulnerable people to believe that praying more and having deeper faith can change your genes, your hormones, your libido and your emotional framework."

      The Archbishop of Canterbury was unwilling to endorse the "ex-gay" ministry established by Bishop Klyberg.  A spokesman for Dr. Carey told *The Times*:  "The Archbishop would be appalled were the church to indulge in any victimization of those of homosexual orientation or refuse to welcome them into their worship, and welcomes a greater acceptance which is taking place."

********************

FINDING OUR VOICE

Carter Heyward's Sermon at the Ordination of Barry Stopfel

      "When they deliver you up, do not be anxious how you are to  speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of God speaking through you."  (Matt. 10:19-20).

      There is a bishop, about ten years retired, who has helped me learn to speak.  This bishop, known in various quarters of the church simply as "DeWitt," lives today with his spouse on an island off the coast of Maine about six miles, as the crow flies, from the little place that Bev and I have on Deer Isle.  For the last few years, Bishop DeWitt and I have met for breakfast each summer in one of the island dining spots to talk about what's happening in the world and church and in our own lives.  Sitting with this lovely, justice-seeking, good humored man is always a spiritual high for me because, paradoxically, it never fails to secure my grounding in this world, its people and other creatures, and the sacred character of our physical, sensual, daily lives in relation to one another.

      Like Bishop Spong, Bishop DeWitt and three other bishops were (to their credit) censured by the House of Bishops for doing the right thing: in their case, for ordaining women to the priesthood in 1974 before the church authorized it.  With DeWitt, I am reminded that whatever is most genuinely human and creaturely -- most fully just -- reveals whatever is most fully divine among us.  And this Sacred Power is sacred because it is shared.

      Indeed, Bob DeWitt has been a spiritual mentor to me not primarily because he was and is a bishop, or even simply because he ordained my sisters and me at a time when few others would, but rather because all along he has stood with us as his sisters.  Bob DeWitt saw in us, and responded to, that which he shared with us:  that which is most deeply human, most down to earth, most adamant about justice in this world as God's own special passion.  He saw, and called forth in us, that Spiritual Power which we are born to share, generate, celebrate, and pass on!  He believed this to be at the very heart of Christian vocation -- the essence of lay and ordained ministry.

      When someone sees and calls forth this sacred power in us, we often respond by growing into our full spiritual stature as sisters and brothers who are here on the earth, by the power of the Spirit, to participate with one another in creating, liberating, and blessing the world.This, I believe, is what the priesthood is all about: this seeing and calling forth -- this speaking, in which it is not simply we who speak but the Spirit of God speaking through us that calls us forth, paradoxically, more fully into ourselves.

      And yet, the fact is, Barry, this priesthood into which you are being ordained today is a theologically and ethically dubious order that you, I, Jack Spong, Bob DeWitt, and others here and there co-inhabit.  The priesthood, historically and still today, is an order cluttered with spiritual, moral, economic, sexual, and other abuses intrinsic to the exercise of an unchanging power-over others in the name of a god who is no god at all but a man-made image.

      That you are a gay man, Barry, open and unashamed, delighted and radiant in your vocation, and that I am a lesbian in no way removes us from the spiritual, moral, and political clutter of the ordained priesthood as a hierarchical order of ministry.

      What our openly gay and lesbian identity as priests does signal is that we have a special opportunity to help move the church from its hierarchical power-over basis toward becoming a more truly sacramental, pastoral, and prophetic community of sisters, brothers, and friends.

      We are theological deviants and spiritual resisters less because we are gay and lesbian than because we are out.  We are celebrating, making visible, bearing public witness to the connection between power-over relationships and abuse; between fear and hatred; between our sexual lives and our spiritual commitments; between our politics and our worship.  We are making connections between our passion for sexual and gender justice and our insistence that racism -- including our own; class elitism -- including our own; and the many other structures of injustice in which we wallow, usually unaware, be resisted and transformed with the same spirit that moves us to declare that heterosexism, homophobia, sexism, and misogyny have no place at the Christian table.  This holy spirit compels us to declare that, as priests of the church, we will not tolerate these sins against gay men, lesbians and (if the truth be known) against all women, especially those who dare to share, claim, and celebrate our creative, liberating power as the power of God.

      And if we do this, if we make these connections, and declare our faith in such a God, we will be transforming the church at its roots, just as we ourselves are being transformed by the One who is calling us and speaking through us.

                           **********

      For some time, we Christians have been in the midst of a second Reformation which many of us now are beginning to realize.  And this Reformation is not only about whether the churches will ordain sexually-active homosexuals and bless our relationships.  It is also about whether women and men priests, bishops, laypersons and deacons will continue to acquiesce to the patriarchal structures, language, and theologies of the church and whether we as women will continue on as "female patriarchs"  -- mothers and daughters of a father who alone knows what's best for his world.

      We are in a Reformation with roots in a shared realization that patriarchal religion, with its origins in unchanging power-over relationships, will not do, even when the power is being exercised benevolently and with good intention, as is the case with church leaders, ordained and lay, who mean well and want to do what's right -- people like all of us here, I assume.

      Structures of power-over -- in which certain people, usually (not always) white, straight (or closeted) affluent males, shape the destinies and control the lives of others -- will not do, even when they are set in place to serve the common good.  This was presumably the case in the Soviet Union.  Perhaps it is the case also in our own White House and in the military, economic, and technological structures of our lives that leave us increasingly numb with powerlessness and fatigue.

      Lay and ordained ministers in this second period of Reformation should embody, with every breath we take, a strong compassionate challenge to this sense of powerlessness that hangs over us like a pall.  The danger we are facing may be finally less that of nuclear war than that we women and men, we children and old people, we lighter and darker colored earth creatures, we whales and eagles and sparrows, we willows and roses and chickweed will have no more air, no more food, no more voice, no more capacity to keep on keepin' on, to smile, or even to weep.  Hear the poetic voice of our gay brother Louie Crew, himself a saint among us:

      The tree, the sky and the water were ours

            we presumed, for us to use as we pleased

                  as if we had a Visacard or Mastercharge account

      in God's name with no payment to make in our generation.

      It may be that George Bush and Clarence Thomas represent, each in his own individual way, the pinnacle of the so-called "American dream", of each white man (and, once in a while, someone else) being able to make it if he or she tries hard enough.  But at what cost, we must ask! Jesus asked what it actually profits anyone to gain the world at the expense of his soul -- his right-connectedness to other creatures as his brothers and sisters.

      We priests need to raise and to hold up before our sisters and brothers the serious moral question of what has happened to the soul of this nation -- our sacred connection with, and shared responsibility for, one another's well-being -- especially those most cruelly and contemptuously cast aside as expendable to the dominant social order:  poor people, homeless people, many people of color, lesbian and gay men, sick people, people with AIDS, the elderly, women and children of all colors, especially poor women and children of color, and of course, other earth and sea and air creatures.

      We Reformation priests, ordained and lay, need to be helping shape the soul of a nation that has lost it and that, in fact, has never had a soul as deep and broad, as expansive and courageous, as inclusive and compassionate, as the one we so badly need today in the United States.

      This Reformation is occurring today because folks who haven't been nourished physically, emotionally, mentally or spiritually are breaking the silence and speaking words that often are hard to hear because they call us all, every one of us, not just the Episcopal Synod or the leadership of the Republican Party, to a spiritual "turning", a conversion, the work of personal and social transformation.  Our own lives must be toppled!

      We Christian priests are being called to speak these words carefully and caringly, to be "wise as serpents, and innocent as doves," we are told, in such a way that we are giving God a voice in this world.

                           **********

      Barry asked me to preach because he wanted a gay or lesbian voice to be heard today and he asked me to say something about how we find our voice.  And so, I want, in the time left to me, to name and comment briefly on what I see to be four signs of Sacred Voice, that is, of how we may know it is God speaking through us -- or anyone -- rather than a self-delusion or some pseudo-sacred spirit passing itself off for divine.

      First, the voice of God always calls us more fully into mutually-empowering relationship in which all parties are taken seriously and enabled more fully to be ourselves.  This is what justice-making is.  God calls us into this dynamic relational way of being with one another in which our relationships, whether as groups like different races or as individuals, are never fixed permanently but rather are open to ongoing transformation.  The Revolution truly is never won.

      A common distortion of God's voice, as historically it has been transmitted by the church, is that it is spoken "from above."  It is spoken "down" to us:  the voice of the Pope, the Bishop, the Priest, the Preacher, the President, the one in charge.  Even when spoken as a benevolent voice, this power-over, insofar as it represents an unchanging, static relationship between God and his people, or between the priest and his/her people, is not a sacred voice at all, but rather is that of an idol created to hold patriarchal power in place.

      And this, Barry, is what makes the ordained priesthood such a spiritually precarious vocation.  For, like the church itself, it is a patriarchal institution.  We cannot deny this or pretend it is not so and be honest people, you and I.  I call you, Barry, to participate in reforming the priesthood and the church.

                           **********

      Second, God speaks an embodied, sensual word, its source deep in the earth, our planet home.  It is a voice of honesty and passion when we are most genuinely seeking mutuality, most heartily seeking justice.

      This sacred voice gets erased in the church through the promulgation of a false spirituality that derives much basis from the longstanding anti-female and anti-sexual agenda of all patriarchal religion, Christianity being no exception.         

      It is no wonder that sexuality is such a major issue for the churches these days!  Insofar as these matters of sex, gender, and power are being resolved on the side of an embodied, sensual justice for us all, the theological foundations of the church will be shifting, and we will be discovering what it means that the Holy One is no more a father than a sister, no more a mother than a brother, no more a creator and a redeemer than a passionate lover and a beloved friend.  We will be discovering, as we are, that this is very good.  And we will be meeting, in ways new to many of us, the God whom Jesus loved; the One who shone -- and shines -- through not only the brother from Nazareth but through all who seek justice, love mercy, and are walking humbly in the Spirit.

      The recent publicity about the size of the gay male hypothalamus not withstanding, gay/lesbian life, politics, and spirituality does not originate, for many (much less all of us) in either biology or destiny -- but rather in Kairos:  a willingness, in this historical moment, to respond to a sacred call -- and to respond, insofar as we can, together.

      The theory that gay men, or lesbians, are "born homosexual" is, I believe, a way of keeping the issue of homosexuality small, containable, and safely away from those who want badly to believe that they were born heterosexual.  In fact, our sexual morality, whether we are gay, straight or bisexual, whether we are sexually active or celibate, has as much to do with where we put our lives as where we put our genitals.  Our sexual morality is about how deeply, honestly, and creatively we are connected with the world and how we express this.

      Our morality as sexual creatures is about how committed we are to seeking and finding non-violent, non-abusive ways of relating to one another. 

      The church's expectation that we will lie about our lives, through words or silence, is an ethic of flagrant duplicity, and this ethic is sexually immoral.  For individual gay men and lesbians to go along with this duplicity is, not infrequently, for us to survive, or perhaps simply to buy time to break free later when, we hope, we can move from a position of greater strength and clarity.  But our closeted sisters and brothers need to be aware that the closet is invariably a "container" designed to impede the movement of an erotically empowering Sacred Spirit -- and to silence Her Voice.

      And so the big moral question for lesbians and gay men seeking ordination, or those already ordained (and our numbers are many) is not whether or not we should abstain from sexual activity, but whether we will continue to be silenced by the church's duplicity.

      A woman friend of mine, Mariel Kinsey, who is a psychotherapist in the Boston area and an EDS student, has written a poem in which she says, "it's what we turn our backs on that finally comes and stares us down."

      For many generations, the church has turned its back on erotically empowered and empowering women and on the earthiness and sensuality of who we women, men, and other earth creatures are together.  Today, especially through the lives of lesbian and gay Christians, this sacred power has come to face us.  I call you, Barry, as my brother, and as an openly gay and sexually active priest, to join in staring us down.

                           **********

      Third, the voice of God is not a solo voice.  He sings, she sings, with and through us all.  I suspect the primary reason that 12-step programs have become so important to so many of us is that the healing power sparked and generated in the meetings of groups like AA, NA, and OA is a radically shared power (not really "higher" at all).  No one stands out as having it, or having access to it, more than others.

      A serious problem in modern protestantism is that we have bought theologically into the social and economic basis of capitalism -- a radical individualism -- as the alpha and omega of what it means to be human.  This terribly false, and morally bankrupt, spiritual coaptation needs desperately to be challenged in and by the churches, and it has not been, in any major way, by the protestant churches in the United States or elsewhere.

      Today, in the wake of the collapse of totalitarian-style communism in Europe and the Soviet Union, we western Christians need to be alert to the possibility that our primary mission -- as the church -- may be to discern, teach, preach, and incarnate a common body, ourselves truly as sisters and brothers, we and other earth creatures with us.

      I call you, Barry, to do all you can to help shape a vision of this common good and to do what you can to teach, preach and celebrate creative resistance to the dominant theology of advanced monopoly capitalism that has taught us falsely that we are on our own -- and that such matters as how we make or spend money, what gods we worship, who we sleep with, and what we value are simply our own private business

                           **********

      Fourth, because the voice of God is seasoned in our commonness, our connectedness as a body of brothers and sisters, it is a voice of a strong, relentless compassion.  We are here on the earth to learn with one another how, genuinely, to love our enemies as well as our friends in ways the do not disregard, or deny, our anger at oppression, our passion for justice, and our impatience with duplicity and lies.

      Like love, compassion is not a sentiment.  It is a radical act of seeing our relatedness as creatures, and of attempting to embody this relation in mutually empowering ways.

      Make no mistake: compassionate voices do not suffer fools gladly or pay lip-service to a god of love and peace at the expense of the sacred struggle for justice.  But this kind of morally soft, tasteless, spiritual pablum is exactly what most of us white middle-strata Christians have learned to associate with love and compassion.  It is a spirituality we must un-learn together.

      I call you, Barry, to help us unlearn this false spirituality and to stay open yourself to the Spirit which grounds us in compassion and, in so doing, seasons in us a humility, an openness to being forgiven for the wrongs that we do and to forgiving all who genuinely are repentant.

      And I believe that the hardest part of compassion, which reflects the passion and suffering of God, is to be open to forgiving those who cannot receive this forgiveness because they are not repentant: they do not see, or believe, that they have done anything wrong, anything to hurt, wound, or violate us or others.

      In closing, I want to suggest that this is where we gay and lesbian Christians find ourselves today insofar as the Spirit of God is working through us:

      We do not deny our ongoing need for repentance and forgiveness for such sins as our own greed, our duplicity, our racism, and the harm that we do others through our internalized homophobia and misogyny.

      At the same time, we are ready to forgive those brothers and sisters, in this church and elsewhere, who exclude and patronize, wound and violate, us and others -- and who do not know what they are doing.  They do not know that through their fear, confusion, and often their barely-veiled hatred, they are breaking our body -- the Body of Christ -- which is their own body.

      Is this not what Jesus meant when he asked God to forgive his brothers and sisters -- "for they do not know what they do"?

      This yearning to forgive is, I believe, at the very heart of God.  And it is always the basis of sacred reformation.

      We are called, we gay and lesbian Christians, to share this revolutionary vocation by the spirit of compassion speaking through us.

      And so, here we stand -- we can do no other.  And let us never forget that it is no one of us standing here alone or, except momentarily, out in front of the others.  Various ones of us will be called forth from time to time to lead as best we can:

      Louie Crew, Kim Byham, Betsy Hess, Ellen Barrett, Robert Williams, David Norgard, Anne Gilson, Elizabeth Carl, to name only a few ... and those in solidarity with us too -- Jack Spong, Paul Moore, George Hunt, Jack and Marilyn Croneberger, Barbara Harris, Sue Hiatt, Mary Lou Suhor come to mind ... .

      We individuals will come and go, thanks be to God.  But the real victory is being won even now because we are standing here together, giving voice to a God who was with us in the beginning, and will be with us in the end, staring us down and holding us up.

      Amen.

-----

      Sermon by The Rev. Carter Heyward at the ordination of The Rev. Barry Stopfel to the priesthood, Episcopal Church of the Atonement, Tenafly, NJ, September 14, 1991.

********************

COMMENTS BY BISHOP SPONG AT BARRY STOPFEL'S ORDINATION

      The Rev. Barry Stopfel has been judged by the decision-making processes of this Diocese of Newark operating under the Canons of the Episcopal Church, to be a worthy candidate for ordination to the priesthood.  This means that he has undergone a screening process of more than three years that involved physical and psychiatric evaluations, a testing of his priestly vocation, a rigorous examination of his academic preparation and no less than twelve separate votes taken by such bodies as two vestries, the Commission on Ministry, which is an appointed body of the Diocese of Newark, the faculty of his seminary, and the fully elected Standing Committee of this Diocese.  This means that more than fifty people, appointed and elected, lay and ordained, have stood in judgement on his qualifications to be ordained this day.

      Because of the debate that has raged in our church over the issue of homosexuality, Barry Stopfel has become a unique symbol of the church's struggle.  In response to the personal request of the Presiding Bishop I postponed Barry's ordination to the diaconate in June of 1990 to allow the church to debate this issue without appearing to be provoked in the debate by the action of this diocese.  I then watched in amazement as four other gay or lesbian people were ordained deacon or priest in four other dioceses by four other bishops, with full knowledge of what they were doing and with no media attention at all.  One of those four ordained was the Rev. Elizabeth Carl in Washington, D.C., whose ordination to the priesthood a year later did bring media attention.  Another was the reception into our priesthood of a former Roman Catholic priest by a bishop who three months later voted to disassociate himself from the action of this bishop and this diocese in our ordination of a non-celibate gay man on December 17, 1989.  Following the September, 1990 meeting of the House of Bishops, and with my consent, Bishop Walter Righter ordained Barry Stopfel deacon.

      Once again, in consultation with Barry and acceding to the request of the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, Barry's ordination to the priesthood was delayed until after the 1991 General Convention in Phoenix so that the General Convention could debate and decide the position of our church vis-a-vis the ordination of qualified gay and lesbian persons.

      However, Barry and I, in an act of prayerful confidence, proceeded to set his ordination date for the first free Saturday on my schedule following the General Convention of July, 1991.  The Standing Committee of this Diocese at its June meeting also voted to recommend Barry for the priesthood, subject to the decision of the General Convention.

      The press, not always understanding how ecclesiastical bodies make decisions, did not quite know how to interpret the apparent non-decision made by the General Convention in Phoenix.  So allow me to assist in that process.

      The General Convention in Phoenix refused to amend the Canons to prohibit the ordination of qualified gay and lesbian people.

      The General Convention refused to pass any resolutions that placed hurdles in the path of qualified gay and lesbian persons that are not in the path of any other aspirant for holy orders.

      The General Convention refused to censure those bishops who have honestly admitted that they have ordained homosexual persons.

      The General Convention refused to place a moratorium on the ordination of gay and lesbian people for the next triennium.

      The General Convention also refused to amend the Canons to guarantee that the ordination process is open to all baptized members, but it did so because it was asserted that the Canons already say that the process is open to every man and woman, and that language was judged to be itself totally inclusive, making further Canons unnecessary.

      Finally, the General Convention admitted for the first time in an official Resolution that a discontinuity exists in the church between the traditional teaching of the church on human sexuality and the experience of many of its members.  It was not willing to reject either the traditional teaching or this experience, thereby judging this experience to be valid, and the church agreed to live in and into this ambiguity.  It was the most honest statement our church has ever made on this issue.

      And so today we in the Diocese of Newark act with the authority of our church - an authority we believed we possessed in December of 1989 - but an authority that the church nationally has now publicly acknowledged to have been valid.

      In this public debate my deepest privilege as a Christian has been to experience first hand the hostile negativity that is the daily bread of gay and lesbian people.  In a new and powerful way I now know what it means to take up the cross and to follow the path of the Christ.  I thank God that I have been able to respond to this vocation and I thank so many of you here today for walking with me in that way of the cross that has led to this day of life and resurrection for the whole church.

      Barry, more than anyone else in the Anglican communion, you have been the symbol of the church's struggle on this issue.  I salute you for your courage and your patience.

********************

GERMAN CHURCH SAYS HOMOSEXUALITY NOT SINFUL

The state church of Germany, which is called the Evangelical Church and which is an amalgam of Lutheran and Evangelical traditions (represented in the U.S. by the Evangelical Lutheran and United Church of Christ, respectively) is divided into ecclesiastical jurisdictions coterminous with the German states.  The church in the state of Berlin-Brandenburg issued the following statement on August 2, 1991:

      Marked by the heavy rioting against homosexuals by skinheads at the "Spring Festival of Lesbians and Gays," May 25, 1991, we strongly oppose such violence and the increased discrimination against this group of fellow citizens.  Violence is no method for solving problems of society.

      Presently minorities are not allowed to be pushed aside.  Their human worth is definitely to be affirmed.  Today we know that homosexuality is neither sinful nor a sickness, but a different expression of human sexuality.  The exclusion of homosexual persons has a long, painful history in our society.   We regret that even the Christian church carries considerable guilt in this.  The silence of Christians during the time of the Nazis in relation to the killing of homosexuals in concentration camps is part of this common guilt.  We all have reason to learn from this history.  Tolerance is called for directly in relation to this minority.

      We therefore urge our members to welcome homosexual fellow Christians as sisters and brothers.

      We appeal to people in our land to practice tolerance in relation to homosexual fellow citizens [in order] to take from them fear and disparagement so that they are not obliged to deny their sexual orientation.

      We demand those responsible in society to take measures to protect homosexuals and to prevent acts of violence before they begin.

-----

This article courtesy of Evangelische Information.

*********************

BOSWELL ON BEING GAY IN THE CHURCH

Excerpts from an Interview with John Boswell by Lawrence Mass

*Mass:*  Is John McNeill - who was dismissed from the Jesuits - still a practicing Catholic?

*Boswell:*  Yes, I believe so.  I must say that it amuses me when people assume that "practicing Catholic" means something like the square root of four, that it's absolutely specific everywhere.  Italian Catholics, by and large, don't believe the finer points of the theology of the church.  They're Catholic ethnically, the way many people are Jewish.  They don't go to mass.  They have their children baptized and they get married in church, but if you ask them if they practice contraception, they all say, "Of course."  If you point out to them that the Pope says it's wrong, they'll say, "So, the Pope says it's wrong."  Whereas an American Catholic agonizes over this.  Being Catholic is different all over the world.  Is John McNeill a practicing Catholic?  Well, according to whose definition?  According to the Pope's, he's not.  According to mine, he is.  Am I a practicing Catholic according to the Pope's definition?  No.  I live with another man and have for the past nineteen years.  Am I a practicing Catholic according to my definition?  Yes.  I go to mass every week.  I believe probably as much of the Church's official teaching as the Pope does, to the extent that either of us understands it, but we interpret it very differently.

*Mass:*  In his essay on "Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality," Martin Duberman punctuated his very substantial praise of your study (which he characterized as "revolutionary" and "one of the profound, explosive works of Scholarship to appear within recent memory") with several critical observations, among which was the following:

*In reading Boswell, I now and then got the unnerving feeling that at the top of his own set of priorities is the wish to hold gay Christians to their religious allegiance - that he is more eager to defend the viability of church affiliation for gays than to bolster an emerging gay subculture whose left wing is decidedly - in my view, rightly - anticlerical.  I don't know how else to account for Boswell's curious statement that "It is unlikely that at any other time in Western history have gay people been the victims of more widespread and vehement intolerance than during the first half of the twentieth century."  He may be correct in claiming that "the excesses of the Inquisition are often exaggerated," but after all, the death penalty for homosexuality (a rather extreme form of intolerance) had become legal proscription in most of Europe by 1300 A.D. (from The New Republic, October 18, 1980)*

In defending the viability of church affiliation for gays, are you thereby undermining an emerging gay subculture?  Must one or should on necessarily preclude the other?

*Boswell:*  The simple answer to this is that if by being affiliated in some way with an ideology that has sometimes been oppressive of gay people one is somehow precluding the emergence of a gay subculture, then no one can support any modern ideology, from psychoanalysis to democracy.  Are Marxists precluding the emergence of a gay subculture because some Marxist regimes have been very oppressive of gay people?  (In fact, a majority are still oppressive of gay people.)  Gay people are more oppressed in most Marxist regimes than they are in most Catholic countries.  But I certainly wouldn't say to a Marxist, you can't be a marxist because that's somehow anti-gay.  That's silly.  All ideologies can be turned by bigots against gay people or Jews or blacks and most can be turned by liberal people to benefit Jews or gays or blacks.

Christianity has been an ameliorating influence in many areas of the world, as has Judaism.  One could point out about Judaism that it has had regrettable attitudes towards women.  That's true.  But imagine a society in which husbands can just divorce their wives without any obligation to them, in which female children are regularly killed, in which men rape their servants with impunity.  In such a society, the very strict family ethical culture of Judaism would improve the position of women enormously.  That it doesn't improve the position of women as much as we moderns would like is part of the reason I would respect people for abandoning Judaism.  But I think they ought to respect people who stay with it and try to make it better.  It's an ancient force that has been very beneficial to a great many people and been very conducive to loving parent-child relations, and that seems to me a good thing.  So while I respect people who feel that they can do more good outside of it, I also respect the people who think, "This has been very valuable to many humans.  Let's see if we can't make it better."  And I'd say that about Marxism and any other ideology that has ever been used for ill, and most have.

*Mass:*  Perhaps there are parallels here to come of the criticism Martin Duberman has encountered with regard to his monumental biography of Paul Robeson.  In his time and every since, Robeson has been categorically denounced for not speaking out against Stalin and the Soviets.  Some of these critics are, arguably, justifiably disappointed that specific evils of Stalinism were not more outspokenly addressed.  Others, however, are upset that the entirety of Marxism, of Communism, was not altogether denounced and rejected.  In his review of Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality, Duberman states the following:

*I'll leave chief responsibility for evaluating Boswell's central avowal that "much of the present volume is specifically intended to rebut the common idea that religious belief - Christian or not - has been the cause of intolerance in regard to gay people,: to those gay Christians who have insisted on the compatibility of their sexual orientation and their devotion to institutional religion and who have been working through such organizations as Dignity (gay Catholics) and Integrity (gay Episcopalians) to "maintain a dialogue with the Mother Church."*

You are such a gay Christian.  Have the events of the decade since your book was published strengthened or weakened your own evaluation of your book's central avowal about the relationship between religion and intolerance in regard to gay people?

*Boswell:*  At the time I published that book, nearly a decade ago, I thought that the Christian world was generally moving in a more tolerant direction. Since then, some of the Christian communities, like the Episcopalians, do seem to me to have become more tolerant and open.  As everyone knows, Catholicism is going through a period of hostility from the top.  The Vatican issues hostile statements, such as the Ratzinger letter, which must have been aimed mostly at John McNeill and at me and at American Catholics: it was issued in English and obviously directed toward America.  But I don't think that reflects the general attitude of Roman Catholics.  In fact, I think the general attitude of Roman Catholics has become much more liberal.  In dealing with gay couples and AIDS, for example, most priests have become much more tolerant and understanding and sensitive than they were ten or twenty years ago.  That's exactly why the Vatican is so upset about what's going on in America.  They think the American church has become soft on gay people.  Accepting that terminology for the sake of argument, I agree with them.  It is soft on gay people and I think that's nice.  There are still some bigots in the hierarchy, of course, but I do think that by and large the Catholic hierarchy has become much more tolerant in the last eight years.  The Vatican has had to force almost every American bishop to expel Dignity from his diocese.  I don't feel that this vindicates me.  I think it has to do with social forces.  America in general is much more tolerant now, even though there are backslidings of various sorts.  I deplore those and don't mean to trivialize them.  But I think the fabric of American society is more tolerant.

*Mass:*  At your talk on male and female roles in history at The Jung Foundation in New York in March 1989, you alluded to research you've been doing on the history of gay marriages among the clergy.  What can you tell us about this research?  Will it be the subject of a book?

*Boswell:*  Yes, I can tell you that it will be the subject of a book, which will be out in a year or two.  The marriages were not just among the clergy, but among Christians, both male and female, lay and clerical.  And in fact, it was mostly lay people.  It was problematic for the clergy to be married, either heterosexually or homosexually.  That's as much as I want to say about this material at this point, because without presenting all the documentation that goes with it, I'm afraid it will end up like announcements of cold fusion.  All kinds of people will be arguing about it before they've even seen the evidence.  So I'm working as hard as I can, when I'm not being interviewed (laughter), to get this material together.  But this material, on a Catholic marriage ceremony performed by priests for two men or two women, is astonishing.

_____

Dr. John Boswell is chairman of the History Department at Yale University and was speaker at the Integrity Luncheon at General Convention in 1988.  The article from which this excerpt is taken appeared in *Christopher Street*, December, 1990.

********************

1991 DIGNITY CONVENTION

by Steve Warren

      It was purely coincidental that "The Pope Must Die" opened on movie screens around the country the same weekend (Labor Day) that Dignity/USA, the organization of lesbian and gay Catholics, their families and friends, held its 10th biennial convention in Washington, DC.

      Or was it?  Surely Her Holiness would have died at the sight of 500 people, mostly gay and lesbian, simultaneously expressing love for each other and for the Roman Catholic Church, though not necessarily its present hierarchy.

      Another point of similarity between the movie and the convention, each of which was theatrical in its own way, is that both took a strong stand for the ordination of women.  Although Dignity's support has long been presumed, according to incoming president Kevin Calegari of San Francisco, "this time we officially went on record in favor of the ordination of women and in support of the work of the Women's Ordination Conference."

      Listening to the women who make up about 20% of Dignity's membership, the organization also passed an "affirmative action" resolution mandating that women be represented at every level of government.  "The women felt this would give them hope and keep them from leaving the movement," Calegari says.

      There was a decline in Dignity's membership after the infamous 1986 "Ratzinger Letter" that restated the church's opposition to homosexuality in no uncertain terms, and subsequent moves barring Dignity chapters from meeting on church property; but Calegari feels the tide has turned.

      "In the last six months we've seen our membership growing again," he says, explaining that part of the apparent drop from 5,000 to a low of 3,500 came from centralizing record-keeping and eliminating "fuzzy numbers."  He doesn't deny, however, that "a lot of people left Dignity out of anger and frustration."

      "It is clearly the intent of the Vatican and some bishops (in the U.S.) that Dignity go out of business," Calegari continues, "but instead we've seen incredible growth in what Dignity does and how it serves the community; and now numbers (presently 3,800 in 85 chapters) are growing again too."

      Seeking "to reflect the makeup of the Catholic Church in the U.S.," Dignity noted a growing involvement by people of color but pledged to continue reaching out in that direction to encourage more.  In a speech to the convention, Calegari said, "The Dignity message, and the Gospel, for that matter, is not just for white males--it's for everyone, for women, people of color, of different cultures and abilities.  It's not enough to say we're inclusive, we have to learn to model inclusivity."

      The convention voted to hire an executive director, based in the organization's Washington office, for the first time in its 22-year history.  This person "will not be 'Mr.' or 'Ms. Dignity,'" Calegari stresses, but will be hired--hopefully within six months--for their skills in areas of non-profit management, membership and development.

      "It's important to the membership that our leaders are volunteers and are elected," Calegari says.  Elected with him were Marianne Duddy of Boston, vice president; Tom McLoughlin, San Francisco, secretary; and Bob Miailovich, Washington, treasurer.

      In other actions, Dignity voted to endorse and cooperate with the AIDS Interfaith Network' and to oppose mandatory HIV testing, especially for healthcare workers, and the administrations' immigration with regard to the exclusion of seropositive persons.

      After much debate, Dignity adopted an anti-outing policy for the organization as a whole, while recognizing, Calegari says, "the decision of conscience that might lead some individuals to take such a course of action to protect our people....  Our business is ministry, and that includes ministry to people who may have been outed or may be wrestling with their sexual identity."

      The new leaders outlined a five-point program of emphasis for the next two years:

    Building Mature Faith Communities

    Ministering in an Epidemic

    Preaching and Living an Inclusive Reign of God

    Combatting Violence and Advocating Justice

    Practicing Good Stewardship

The first four differ only slightly and semantically from a similar platform of the outgoing leadership.  The fifth was added, Calegari says, "to focus us on our own gifts and resources and how best to use them."  A long-term AIDS survivor, diagnosed in 1987, he obviously practices what he preaches.

      Another long-time survivor of AIDS, Louis J. Tesconi, founder of Damien Ministries, a Catholic community ministering to people with HIV disease, was a guest speaker at the convention, among many other speakers.

      Dignity voted to hold its 1993 convention in New Orleans and the 1995 convention in Los Angeles.

-----

Copyright 1991 Steve Warren.  Reprinted with permission.  This article appeared in *Outlines*, October 1991 and in other publications.

********************

PEORIA DEAN PLEADS GUILTY, RESIGNS OVER CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

This article is reprinted from *The Christian Challenge*, October, 1991.  *The Christian Challenge* is the magazine of the schismatic Anglicans.

      Episcopalians in the Diocese of Quincy (Illinois) were stunned when the dean of their cathedral, the Very Rev. John H. Backus, pleaded guilty recently to a charge of possession of child pornography.  Backus asserted that the materials fund in a search of his home--which included 13 pornographic videotapes as well as literature and photographs of a homosexual nature--had been given to him by a fellow priest and another friend in connection with counseling a troubled man.  Nevertheless, the dean agreed to please guilty to a misdemeanor charge, rather than face trial on felony charges in a Peoria, Illinois, court.  The Peoria *Journal Star* said that police reports cast doubts on Backus's counseling explanation, in that their search found far more than the two videotapes and four photographs Backus mentioned in a letter to parishioners explaining the incident, and that the photographs of naked boys were found in a paperback book ("A Guide for Gay men") found on top of Backus's dresser in his bedroom.  The materials were seized after they were discovered by four women from a cleaning service working at his home.  The Rt. Rev. Edward MacBurney, Bishop of Quincy, said Backus has resigned as dean as of October 1.  His court sentence was 45 days in work release and one year conditional probation.

-----

This article is reprinted from *The Christian Challenge*, October, 1991.  *The Christian Challenge* is the magazine of the schismatic Anglicans.

********************

! A BEST SELLER !

Rave Reviews

Our Own:

A Book of Revelations

Lesbian and Gay Episcopalians Tell Their Own Stories

Edited by Louie Crew, *Associate Professor, Rutgers University*

and Integrity's Founder

With a Foreword by The Rt. Rev. George N. Hunt, Bishop of Rhode Island and former Chair of the Standing Commission on Human Affairs of the Episcopal Church

52 Lesbians and Gay Men, all members of the Episcopal Church, USA, or the Anglican Church of Canada, share their spiritual journeys.  Most of the stories are filled with Good News, but there is much pain in their revelations.  Yours may be one of the stories.

Integrity presents our stories as a gift to the Church so that the commission of the General Convention 1991 to "the bishops and members of each diocesan deputation to initiate a means for all congregations in their jurisdiction to enter into dialogue and deepen their understanding of these complex issues" can be met.  *A Book of Revelations* is designed for Christian Education and parish study groups.  Even unwelcoming parishes can now hear the voices of a diverse and deeply spiritual group of lesbian and gay Anglicans.

220 pages   $9.95

Individual copies are available only at retail outlets.  This book is now in stock at all leading lesbian/gay bookstores in the United States.  Most will be glad to mail you a copy.  Diocesan and other church-related bookstores, insofar as we know of their existence, have been provided with order forms and many have copies in stock.  If your bookstore doesn't have *A Book of Revelations*, ask them to call 201-868-2485 for a price sheet and ordering instructions.

Chapters and individuals may order *a minimum of five copies* for resale.  This can be an excellent fundraiser for your chapter.  Call the number above or 408-484-2326 to place your order.

********************

*PRESIDENT'S PAGE*

A RAINBOW OF DIVERSITY UNDER AN UMBRELLA OF SANCTUARY

      The last year and a half as your president has allowed me to experience the wonderfully diverse rainbow of God's creation that makes up Integrity.  I don't mean just the diversity that comes from geographic differences, political differences, physical differences, and all the other "differences" that our community mirrors in society at large.  We are indeed a part of that rainbow of diversity.  But we also reflect a diversity unique to our community:  where we are on our individual journeys toward self-acceptance of ourselves as gay and lesbian people, gay and lesbian children of God.  I suppose you could also refer to that as the degree to which we are each "out."

      The road we follow in coming out is a uniquely individual one.  Some of us broke the hinges off the closet door many years ago.  Others have opened the door enough for the tiniest shaft of light to enter.  Still others have closed, bolted, and sealed their closet doors with epoxy.  They may never know the liberation of ever being even a fraction of the way out of the closet with their sexual orientation.  And others are selectively out, depending on the circumstances in which they find themselves. 

      No one of us has the right to pass judgment on any one else about how far out of the closet that person might be.  Each of us must personally decide what degree of risk we are willing to take when it comes to being out.  No one else can or should make that decision for us, and no one else can or should decide whether our actions are right or wrong.  For a large number of us, being out still puts us at risk for losing our jobs, our children, our residence.  The list goes on and you know it's litany as well as I know it.  For every one of us who can be fully out of our closet, there is at least one other of us who cannot be out at all. 

      One of Integrity's greatest gifts is to provide an umbrella of sanctuary for ALL:  those who are out and those who are not and those who are in the process.  We need to be very careful to nurture and protect that sanctuary.  Everyone who comes to us needs to know that we are a sanctuary and that they can find safe space within our sanctuary.  We need to make it clear to our sisters and brothers that they can come to Integrity and find a place to grow and develop into the person God created them to be.  I hope, as part of that process, we will provide them with advice, role models, information, and perhaps even sources of counseling to those who might need it.  Above all, I hope we will show them the inclusive love of the Gospel that they may not have seen in some of the other parts of the Body of Christ. 

      I think a lot of us get caught up in our own political correctness and simply forget that there are others who are not yet able to follow in the footsteps of our particular journey.  I know in my own chapter that we will get off onto a politically active tear and sound like we are out to take on the whole world, not just the Episcopal Church.  Our discussions must often scare the literal hell out of some of our visitors and members who still live in fear of being found out.  We then have to regroup and let them know that we aren't about to bulldoze them out of their closet and into a protest march, even though we may be gently urging them out and urging them to answer the call of the Gospel.  We provide sanctuary until it is no longer needed.

      Geographic location often dictates the freedom our chapters have and the freedom we have as individuals.  Some of our chapters exist with the complete approval and sometimes even assistance from diocesan bishops.  Others exist despite explicit orders from bishops to the contrary.  I sometimes think those that struggle under such adverse circumstances tend to be stronger - they've had to work at simply existing.  Those chapters are even more important as sources of sanctuary for our members.  We all need a place to escape the battles we face.

      Our sanctuary must also extend to those clergy who support us.  Once again, we experience a rainbow of diversity in how open they can be about their sexual orientation, and sometimes even about their support of the work of Integrity.  I have visited some dioceses where I had a difficult time finding a priest who *wasn't* gay or lesbian!  In other places, heterosexual priests will not even celebrate the Eucharist for our chapters for fear that the mere association will mark them as either one of us or as one of our sympathizers.  Most of our chapters exist in environments somewhere between those extremes.

      We have an obligation to provide sanctuary to those clergy who do support us, especially those that do so at personal risk.  There are still far too many dioceses where it is neither safe to be out as a gay or lesbian person nor to even be perceived as gay or lesbian, much less to be so as an ordained person.  While we as individuals may not be able to conceive of such circumstances, their existence is well documented.  We must take care not to be so jaded as to think the entire world can exist as we are fortunate enough to exist. 

      Many of us are out, can be out, and live lives that are totally out.  Others are not blessed with such opportunities.  I do understand and appreciate those circumstances.  On the other hand, those who *cannot* be out have certain obligations to the rest of us - that is also a part of the concept of sanctuary.  Those who cannot be out must take care not to work to the detriment of others.  There is abundant work to be done that can be done while remaining in the closet.  There are even times when more can be accomplished by someone who is closeted than by someone who is out.  Sanctuary protects such good work.   Remaining in the safety of the closet, however, doesn't give license to exercise internalized homophobia against one's own people.  I have a difficult time bringing such ideas and attitudes under the protection of sanctuary - I don't feel compelled to protect those who stab their own in the back.

      So let us rejoice in the wonderful rainbow of diversity God has given us.  Let us also rejoice in our ability to provide sanctuary to the entire spectrum of that diversity.  And, most importantly, let us insure that our sanctuary is available to all who need it, regardless of where they are in their journey or regardless of why they need our sanctuary.  Such is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

********************

COURT UPHOLDS DIGNITY EVICTION

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis was legally justified in evicting the Twin Cities' chapter of Dignity from the Newman Center at the University of Minnesota, the Minnesota Supreme Court recently ruled.  The Dignity chapter said that it would not appeal the court ruling, thereby ending its four-year legal challenge to the archdiocese.  According to the Religious News Service, the Rev. Kevin McDonough, moderator of the archdiocesan curia, said that the Minnesota Supreme Court ruling "recognized that churches have a right to regulate their own internal and doctrinal affairs."  Since its eviction from the Newman Center, the Dignity chapter has met at the local Lutheran-Episcopal student center.

------

Courtesy of Episcopal News Service

********************

CHALLWOOD STUDIO

Victor Challenor   Paul Woodrum

Custom designed and made ...

     EUCHARISTIC VESTMENTS

     PREACHING GOWNS - STOLES

     ALBS - SURPLICES - TIPPETS

100 Lexington Ave., Suite 1-L,

Brooklyn, NY 11238

Phone:  718-398-2877

********************

INTEGRITY NATIONAL CONVENTIONS

1975      Chicago, IL

1976      San Francisco, CA

1977      Philadelphia, PA

1978      Minneapolis, MN

1979      Denver, CO

1980      Boston, MA

1981      Los Angeles/Santa Monica, CA

1982      New Orleans, LA

1984      New York, NY

1986      Minneapolis, MN

1987      St. Louis, MO

1989      San Francisco, CA

1990      St. Louis, MO

      *1992  Houston, TX*

     *MARK YOUR CALENDARS:*

         *JULY 9-12*

     with Special Guest, The Most

       Rev. Edmond L. Browning

********************

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