Saturday, September 29, 2007

Our gift to the Episcopal Church

Since the Episcopal Church, USA House of Bishops met in New Orleans last week , there has been news story after news story describing the current tension between the Episcopal Church, USA and the larger Anglican Communion as a “schism,” “rift,” “chasm,” or “split.” This imagery, suggestive of a kind of a cataclysmic “continental divide,” is troubling on a number of levels.

First and foremost, in such stories LGBT people are regularly seen as the culprit, the outside force tearing the Church apart. Even in credible news sources we are bombarded by headlines such as “Gay Issue Looms over Episcopal Church,” “Episcopal leaders act to avert a schism, vow restraint on more gay bishops,” “Anglican rift grows over gay row.” The suggestion is always that LGBT people are responsible for the breakup of the church. Yet, we are not the ones threatening to leave the church, suing for Church property, or refusing opportunities for dialogue. A more appropriate headline would be “Bigotry issue looms over Episcopal Church.” Despite every attempt at an honest conversation about the Church’s stance on full inclusion, powerful players in the Anglican Communion and the Episcopal Church, USA have made as much trouble for the Episcopal Church as they can. Indeed, as of Friday the 28th a group of ultra-conservative Episcopalians voted to take the first formal step to leave the Church. If there is a schism in the church, they are the cause.

Second, the regular suggestion of a cataclysmic breakup of the Anglican Communion creates a sense of fear and doom that obfuscates history. As with most institutions, the Episcopal Church’s past has been checkered and its future has always been uncertain. The House of Bishops in the nineteenth century refused to choose sides in the Civil War and Episcopal priests used Scripture to argue for slavery and against it. Indeed, for the entire nineteenth century the House of Bishops refused to discuss race relations at all for fear of political fallout. Yet the real fallout from such cowardliness was an exodus of African Americans from the Episcopal community. The struggle for women’s equality in the Church has been equally hard won. It took a full 50 years after women’s suffrage for women in 1970 to be allowed to serve as deputies at the National Convention, and it wasn’t until 1976 that women were finally allowed to be ordained as priests. Throughout its history those marginalized by the Church have pushed hardest to help it achieve its potential glory. LGBT folks are just the latest in a long list of brave people working to make the Church more accountable.

Third, when LGBT people are perceived as threatening the future of the Church, even those of us working for full inclusion can loose sight of the tremendous gifts we bring to the table. Because of our efforts the Church is beginning to have long overdue conversations about sexuality, and not just LGBT sexuality. We have opened the doors to honest and open discussions in our faith communities about sexuality and sexual morality for all of us. Thanks to us, Church members are also looking deeper at Scripture. It is no longer okay to say, “God condemns gay people” and quote a few Bible passages out of context. Our advocacy demands that the Church take a closer look at the biblical text and contemplate the rich language of justice, compassion, and love for the neighbor in addition to the passages so often used to oppress us. Finally, through example we are teaching others the courage to stand up to bullies. In particular, the ministry of the Rt. Rev. Gene Robinson, the Bishop of New Hampshire, exemplifies the mighty power we can have when we speak with heartfelt conviction for justice.

Change never happens without a struggle; our struggle will in the end make the Episcopal Church more honest and more accountable to the Gospel and the community for which it serves.

Thursday, September 27, 2007


We Won!

Today was a historic victory for LGBT people. The Mathew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act passed today by a vote of 60 to 39 in the Senate! This is the farthest a national LGBT piece of legislation has gone. Such a victory would not have happened if it were not for the work of justice-minded people of faith. As late as 11 pm last night HRC's legislative department asked for help finding scriptural references that would give support for the Hate Crimes bill. On the floor today, Senator Kennedy quoted from an interfaith,Clergy Against Hate letter, that went out with over 1,400 signatures. Faith leaders standing up for justice are making a difference.

People shouldn't have to live in fear simply because of who they are and today's victory is a step away from fear and a step toward justice. Below is a copy of the HRC press release that went out today.


Senate Passage of Hate Crimes Bill Moves Bill Closer Than Ever To Becoming Law Bill Signifies Major Victory toward Equality for GLBT Community

WASHINGTON— In an historic step toward equality for GLBT Americans, the U.S. Senate voted to pass the Matthew Shepard Act, which updates and expands the federal hate crimes laws to include bias motivated violence based on a victim’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender, and disability, and provides new resources and tools to assist local law enforcement in prosecuting vicious crimes.

“For over a decade our community has worked tirelessly to ensure protections to combat violence motivated by hate and today we are the closest we have ever been to seeing that become a reality,” said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese. “Congress has taken an historic step forward and moved our country closer to the realization that all Americans, including the GLBT community, are part of the fabric of our nation. The new leadership in Congress fully understands that for too long our community has been terrorized by hate violence. And today, the US Senate has sent a clear message to every corner of our country that we will no longer turn a blind eye to anti-gay violence in America.”

The Senate in a bipartisan vote of 60 to 39 accepted cloture which ended debate on the bill and then moved to approve the Matthew Shepard Act by a voice vote -- attaching it as an amendment to the Fiscal Year 2008 Department of Defense Authorization bill.

On May 3rd, the House of Representatives passed a companion bill, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act (H.R. 1592), with a strong bipartisan margin of 237 to 180. Twenty-six state Attorneys General, including 23 from states with anti-hate crimes laws already on the books, as well as 230 law enforcement, civil rights, civic and religious organizations support the Matthew Shepard Act and the LLEHCPA because, despite progress toward equality in almost all segments of our society, hate crimes continue to spread fear and violence and local law enforcement often lack the tools and resources to prevent and prosecute them. Some of these supporting organizations include the National Sheriffs Association, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, 26 state attorneys general, the National District Attorneys Association, the NAACP, the Episcopal Church, the League of Women Voters, the Anti-Defamation League, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the YWCA of the USA and the United Methodist Church.

The President has threatened to veto the legislation, calling it “unnecessary.” According to the FBI, 25 Americans each day are victims of hate crimes—that means approximately one hate crime is committed every hour. One in six hate crimes are motivated by the victim’s sexual orientation. It’s time to update the law to protect everyone, and this year marks our best chance yet to get it done.

“Hate crimes terrorize entire communities and violate America’s core democratic principles that all citizens are created equal and are afforded equal protection under the law,” continued Solmonese. “On behalf of the millions of Americans who have waited too long for these critical protections, we urge President Bush to sign the bill when it arrives on his desk.”

The hate crimes amendment was introduced by Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR). It confers authority on the federal government to investigate and prosecute crimes committed against victims solely because of their real or perceived sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, and disability when local officials are unwilling or unable to do so. It also expands existing federal hate crimes law to improve prosecution of bias-motivated crimes based on race, religious, national origin and color and provides additional resources to local law enforcement.

The Human Rights Campaign is America’s largest civil rights organization working to achieve gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality. By inspiring and engaging all Americans, HRC strives to end discrimination against GLBT citizens and realize a nation that achieves fundamental fairness and equality for all.

Monday, September 24, 2007

Hurricane Katrina

The Washington Post reported Sunday that enduring depression is at a crisis point among residence living in New Orleans. According to the article, “the most thorough survey of the Gulf Coast’s mental health recently showed that while signs of depression and other ills doubled after the hurricane, two years later, those levels have not subsided, they have risen.”

Unlike most traumas, people tend to get better over time but in New Orleans many are living without hope that they’ll find work, that their homes will be restored, or their neighborhoods repaired. The loss is not only devastating but it lingers without any sign of change.

It strikes me that as a country we are now burdened with the task of facing honestly the psychological effects of devastation. Churches and other religious and secular institutions have been going to New Orleans regularly since the devastation hit. This is critical work. But it is equally critical that we pay close attention over the long haul, and without easy solutions, to the effects such disaster will have over the long haul. Just as with the war, those of us who have not faced combat or natural disaster are challenged now more than ever to listen to the pain of those whose lives have been forever changed.

Sunday, September 23, 2007

The Pain of War

British historian Martin Gilbert observed, “the greatest unfinished business of the Second World War is human pain.” If this was true for World War II it is even truer today. This weekend I watched Paul Haggis’s remarkable new film, In the Valley of Elah, a film everyone ought to see. In it, Haggis tells the story of Hank Deerfield's (Tommy Lee Jones) search for his son Mike who, after a tour of duty in Iraq, is first reported missing from Fort Rudd in New Mexico and then discovered dead--burned and dismembered in a field near the army base.

On one level the story is a classic detective piece recording a father’s attempt to find out what happened to his son. On another level, as Dennis Denby points out in his excellent review in the New Yorker, the film documents the father's painful but unflinching search to learn what kind of person his son became in Iraq. He discovers the capacity of his son and his son's friends to commit unspeakable violence both against the Iraqis and each other.

Based on a number of true stories, the movie reveals the damage the Iraq war is having on the psyche of individuals. While I see in my neighborhood more and more people with prosthetic arms and legs, what I don't see is the emotional trauma caused by the war. Yet it is the effects on the mind and the spirit, as much as the effects to the body, with which we all now have to be prepared to deal.

As Haggis’s film makes poignantly clear, the aftermath of the Iraq war has already begun. The onus is on us to listen as openly and honestly as we can to what people faced. We need to get busy advocating not only to end to the war but to make sure those who served have the mental health services they need to begin the long, slow process of recovery. It is the human pain, pain that turns so quickly into violence, that is our burden now.

Jena 6: Standing on the Side of Love

In the soon to be released movie For the Bible Tells Me So, Rev. Irene Monroe talks about the real sin of Sodom and Gomorrah:

I know a lot of towns that are like Sodom and Gomorrah…you can walk into these towns and they don’t show any sign of hospitality simply because you are black or simply because you are gay or lesbian or just because you are an outsider. . . .That’s the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah.”
Jena Louisiana is a modern day Sodom and Gomorrah kind of town for the young African American men sentenced unfairly for a schoolyard fight. Yet the larger social ill exposed in Jena extends well beyond the six accused men. On a moral level, their story exemplifies how inhospitable so many of our cities are to African Americans. When we incarcerate nearly 1/3 of our black men, we are in a very real sense declaring open hostility on the entire African American community.

To date public outrage against the racial disparity in our criminal justice system has not been strong enough to effect change, which is why the recent protests in Jena are so heartening. They are a sign that people are finally demanding that we as a country act better.

On a personal note, I was encouraged that my organization, the Human Rights Campaign, stood in solidarity with the protesters in Jena as well. Quoting Martin Luther King’s famous line, “injustice against any of us is an injustice against all of us,” Joe Solmonese, the President of the Human Rights Campaign, spoke at the Washington, DC rally about the need to stand with others in the fight against injustice just as others have stood with us.

In Jena, Unitarian Universalist pastor, Meg Riley from Minnesota wore a tee-shirt imprinted with the UU slogan for marriage equality, “Standing on the Side of Love.” I’ve been thinking about how that marriage equality tee-shirt worked so well for the Jena 6 protests. Whether working for Marriage Equality or for racial justice in our criminal justice system, when we stand on the side of love we address the real sin of Sodom and Gomorrah and create communities built on expansive hospitality and welcome.

Sunday, September 16, 2007

The Power of Analogies

A teacher of mine used to argue that all analogies are faulty. Analogies always reduce the difference between two terms and cheapen at least one in the process. Analogies erase history. In the LGBT world we have learned from experience that to compare, for instance, the Civil Rights struggle directly with the human rights struggle of LGBT folks is a recipe for disaster. Issues around “passing,” around the different forms of economic and political disenfranchisement in each community are minimized by analogies. While LGBT activists can speak to learning from the work of the Civil Rights movement this is much different than making a direct comparison.

That said, analogies are made all the time and politically speaking they are extremely effective. When people hostile to marriage equality compare marriage between a woman and a woman to say marriage between a woman and her cat, I for one am left dumbfounded without knowing where and how to begin to address the faulty comparison. I want to scream, "that's insane." Not exactly an effective rhetorical response!

So when I read the piece on marriage by Geoffrey R. Stone in the Chicago Tribune I was happy to see his proposal of another paradigm, of “choosing wisely among competing analogies.” He doesn’t argue that analogies are perfect but instead gives us a way to challenge the validity of the controlling analogy. This seems to me to be a useful strategy for starting a conversation that moves beyond using language to score political points and easy rhetorical "gotchas." Here is an excerpt from the piece:


So is Mollie's marrying Andrea more like Mark's marrying Alice or John's marrying his cat? The very asking of this question might be taken as insulting (indeed, very insulting) to Mollie and Andrea. That is precisely the point.


Changing the controlling analogy entails risk. Recognizing that discrimination against women is "like" discrimination against African-Americans opens the door to new and sometimes disturbing questions. What about discrimination against the disabled? The elderly? Gays and lesbians? Similarly, a decision to allow Mollie and Andrea to legally marry might raise unsettling questions about polygamy and Discrimination against women was "natural." . . . But such questions are inevitable and healthy in a robust, ever-questioning, ever-evolving society. They are a fundamental and cherished part of our American history and culture. If we did not ask such questions, we would still burn witches, buy slaves and deny women the vote.

In the end, we must rely on our deepest moral intuitions, our commitment to individual dignity, our belief that all persons "are created equal" and our common sense to draw the "right" lines for our generation.

To what are we escaping?

Like most good lesbians of a certain age, I have a thing for Jodie Foster. I find her androgynous strength, intense focus, and her Clint Eastwood-like aloofness sexy. Consequently, even though I’m not a fan of violent movies and I compulsively read reviews before picking a film, the other night I went to the new Foster flick, Brave One, knowing next to nothing about it except that Foster had a great new haircut.

Foster delivered. The age lines magnified on a too-thin body only added to her appeal. She looks better now at 44 than she did 10 years ago. Walking down gritty New York streets with her phallic signifiers about her--microphone, cigarette, gun--she was simply hot!

Nonetheless, the pleasure of watching Foster was marred for me by a realization that her sexiness was packaging an all too familiar script about violence and commodification. I went to the movie after a long work week. I wanted something easy to digest and pleasurable to watch. I wanted an escape. But I left troubled, wondering what kind of damage movies like this do over the long haul to our collective psyche.

For those who haven’t seen Brave One, it tells the story of Erica Bain’s (Jodie Foster) transformation into a vigilante killer after she and her fiancĂ©e are brutally attacked by strangers. The movie left hanging a number of themes that if explored could have been interesting: the way tragic loss to violence often reproduces violence, or how “righteous” killing offers a sense of power and control after a life-crushing tragedy.

What we get instead is a movie that anesthetizes us to death and relies on stock caricatures of urban criminals to do so. We "know” these victim/victimizers; they make up our country’s collective narrative of “the bad guy.” They are the Latino thugs roaming the parks, the young African-American hoodlums on the train, the greasy elderly pervert/pimp in a beat up car, the mafia man who lives in Park Heights. Their social circumstances are never explored. Their lives are the sum total of their brutality. They are disposable. As Erica Bain continues to kill, we as an audience become anesthetized to her as well. Despite Foster’s good acting, the more she kills the easier it is to focus on her as a film icon—the sexy, slightly butch woman—rather than on the complexities of her character. She in a sense also becomes disposable.

The escapism this film offers up doesn’t take us out of our lives, it simply reinforces uncritical messages we receive daily. From code red warnings, to criminal profiling, to the propagandistic promotion of preemptive strikes, we are told over and over again to be anxious, prepared, on the offensive, and to never forget that it is a violent, lonely world where the vulnerable and soft are sacrificed. I’m not drawing a conspiratorial parallel between Bush’s war propaganda and the movie Brave One, but I am suggesting that so often our escapism—whether packaged through Brave One or Brave Heart, whether staring Jodie Foster or Mel Gibson, whether marketing a lesbian subculture or a heterosexual male demographic—is really only reinforcing old tapes of perpetual anxiety and set stereotypes of what to fear, all made palpable by the allure of a sexy star.

I’ve been intrigued lately by a Quaker pamphlet on the history of spiritual discernment which makes the case that a good way to know if the Spirit of God is with us is to pay attention to the characteristics of “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, trustfulness, gentleness and self-control.” Galatians 5:23. While it may be too much to ask of a Hollywood film to embody all of these characteristics, I think we ought to ask whether, after seeing a film, our humanity has been touched or whether we've been pushed even further away from what makes us vulnerable, requires our engagement in community, and demands a complex and compassionate look at life.

I went to this film with friends and anticipated going for a drink afterwards, but we all ended up just going home instead, a little more tense than when we came.