For All the Saints: R.I.P. Louise Emerson Brooks

 

 

There are so many people who have labored in the movement of bringing equality to God's LGBT children particularly in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion.  Rev. Susan Russell (left) and her wife, Louise Emerson Brooks, are just two of those champions.  Today, Louise ascended into  God's realm beyond the earth to be among the departed saints.  She had been undergoing chemotherapy for stage four renal cancer.  And this past week, she underwent surgery for what had been hoped would be a life-saving operation.  Many followed the updates from Rev. Susan on Facebook.  Some were tense.  Some were more hopeful.  And then back into another cycle of tense-to-hope-to-tense-to-hope.  In the end, there was only so much fight left in a body that had undergone a 15-hour surgery with spikes in her overall post-op condition. 

 

I have never met either Rev. Susan or Louise.  But in this world of blogging and Facebook, there are many who I have never met, and yet feel I share a common bond in Christ as well as bits and bytes with them.  And Louise had touched my life through her amazing work with the group, Integrity USA, specifically the Voices of Witness video series.  I have used the video about Africa to educate people in Tallahassee about why they need to care what is happening to the LGBT community on a continent half-way around the world.  And the latest offering, Voices of Witness: Out of the Box about the transgender Christian community, is an outstanding tool for any church wishing to explore the need for widening the circle of inclusion.

 

R.I.P. Louise Emerson Brooks.  Alleluia and may light perpetual shine upon you as you enter eternal rest.