A Date Worth Noting

I have some thoughts brewing and stirring in my head. But above all else, I am thankful on this day for the nineteen years that I have shared with my partner, the French-Texan Isabelle. As one friend noted on Facebook:

"Pas une petite affaire dans l'adversité, félicitations" (No small affair in adversity, congratulations)

To celebrate, we ate lunch at Waterworks... a place I used to frequent when it was at its previous location a few blocks from the state capitol building. It was a treat to have the Capri (an eggplant sandwich with fresh basil and mozzarella). Isabelle had fish 'n chips. And all was good!

Tonight is Erev Shuvuot at Temple Israel... commemorating the day the Jews received the Torah at Mount Sinai. Isabelle is facilitating a discussion, so we won't have an evening together. But we'll have some tea before she heads off... and I'll take advantage of the quiet in the house to finish composing my thoughts for a couple more entries. In the meantime, happy 19 years of unmarried, non-state-sanctioned bliss to us!

Blown Open

It happened again.
I'm in church, minding my own business, paying attention to the readings, and then--WHAM-- a portion of the lesson from Acts grabs me by the shirt collar and makes me sit up and take notice.
When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, "These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe." The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods. After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely. Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.
About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were unfastened.--Acts 16: 20-26

We go on to learn that the jailer, who was so distraught by this freeing act that he was going to kill himself, instead has himself and his family baptized and became believers in "The Way".

The part that caught my attention was this idea that Paul and Silas, who were praying and singing hymns to God as they sat bloodied and in prison, witness the earthquake that was "so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken". And, in that moment as I sat in the pew, it was as if there were a thousand bells ringing. Had my ears just heard what I thought I had heard? Two faithful guys were trapped in a prison. They turned their hearts and minds over to God... and God responds full-force to free them from their bondage. And in that process, makes a new believer out of the very person in charge of keeping them held hostage. The scene reminded me of the Easter hymn:

He is risen, he is risen
Tell it out with joyful voice
He has burst his three days' prison
Let the whole wide earth rejoice:
death is conquered, we are free,
Christ has won the victory.

And while this moment is related as a physical breaking of bondage, I couldn't help but see this as a metaphor for the freeing of one's mind. So many of the "prisons" we find ourselves in are ones of our own making. And as I sat with that thought, along comes the reading of the Luke gospel from Ascension Day... which was last Thursday...

Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and he said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised; so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high." --Luke 24: 45-49

Here again--WHAM--"he opened their minds to understand the scriptures". And why? Because he is about to leave them, this time really leave them, and he needs them to be ready to carry on the work which he began, and he can't afford to have them held prisoner to believing that it is not within their ability to go on, and teach others "the way".

This remains true to this day. As we get closer and closer to Pentecost, the time when God appears for Act III as the Holy Spirit, we are (or should be) preparing to take all that we have been given, all that we have been taught, and get out there in the world knowing and living as people of freedom, people who have known, touched and tasted Love, who can offer those things to other people. At its root, this is what the twelve apostles who knew Jesus, and Paul who knew the resurrected Christ, were really doing. They were being the embodiment of "the way". And that embodiment means that their minds and hearts were blown open... and will be filled with "the love and knowledge of God and of his Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord."

Let's try to live in the same way.

There Are NO Outcasts

Diane Bruce and Mary Glasspool share a moment of mutual support. From the LA Times.

The Diocese of Los Angeles made history with the consecration of its first two female bishops, one of whom is a partnered lesbian.

And, as predictable as the Tallahassee summer being unbearably hot and humid, the heat and humidity of stupidity is rising elsewhere in the Anglican Communion. There are forecasts of frogs and plagues coming from those who describe themselves as "Anglo-Catholic, Evangelical, Orthodox, Charismatic, Mainstream" (aka Anglican Mainstream) who see this as the death knell for the Anglican Communion. And I say, "Blah, blah, blah."

Reports from the service in Long Beach are that some 3,000 people were in attendance to witness this new life in the Church. Two people had to be removed from the arena, a man and a young boy, both of whom decided to use the moment to spout off the 1 Corinthians 6:9 passage about "homosexuals shall not inherit the kingdom of Heaven." My bible doesn't actually say that, but apparently some have decided to translate Paul's Greek to reveal that he acquired a term that didn't appear until centuries later. When the official moment in the service came for people to raise an objection, the arena was silent. And LA Diocesan Bishop Jon Bruno could continue.

"Today, as we pray over these two magnificent women, bring into your hearts those things that you bear against any other human being and cast them away... For we cannot be separated from each other if God is for us and with us. . . . There are no outcasts."

It was former Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning who originally used that phrase "there are no outcasts." And the Episcopal Church has been battling, struggling, crying, and praying its way to actually live into those words for the past several decades. Saturday's ceremony was another growth spurt as the whole Church moves more and more in the direction of seeing Christ in each other, whatever "other" that happens to be.

Bishop Suffragan Mary D. Glasspool, the lightening rod in all of this, didn't speak to the media on Saturday, but did take part in a news conference the day before. She notes that the inclusion of women and gays in the hierarchy of the church is a sign that the Episcopal Church isn't about lip service.

"We are being the church we say we are," Glasspool said. "We're not just saying it, we're doing it and there's something very powerful about that."

Amen, my sister in Christ! And congratulations to you and +Diane Bruce!

Reflections on Victory And The Journey Ahead

People waiting in the Leon Co. Commission Chambers for HRO hearing. Photo by Phil Sears.

Many of us are just coming down from Cloud Nine after the achievement of passing a Human Rights Ordinance that covers many people who work, live and play in our county, including the LGBT community. As I reflect back on Tuesday night, and look forward into the fall, there are some things that keep rising to the top of my "stuff we still need to work on" list.

As noted at our PFLAG meeting last night, we all must be concerned about the upcoming elections in August and November. Three of our majority (John Dailey, Bob Rackleff, and Cliff Thaell) all face opposition in the coming months who are determined to crush them and repeal the ordinance. I mean, our foes bought a private plane to circle around the County Courthouse Tuesday afternoon flying a message: "Dailey and Thaell: Vote Yes and You're Out!" Now's the time for people standing on the side of love and freedom to not quibble amongst ourselves, but to put the power of our feet, our wallets and our votes into the singular effort to retain these three members of the commission. And if we can pick up another sure vote by unseating the ones against us, great!

For me, the next bit of education has to begin with ending the use of the term "lifestyle" or "lifestyle choice" to describe someone who is openly-gay. Being a person of lesbian orientation is NOT a lifestyle or lifestyle choice: it is my life. My lifestyle choices would be that I prefer to drink my coffee black, to wear 100% cotton clothing in summer, cut my hair short so I don't melt in the Tallahassee heat, attend church regularly, act with a troupe of adults who are silly and wear balloon ears and call themselves Faustkateers, etc. etc. My life is that which I believe began at my birth. The knowledge and the understanding of that life I believe began well before that. And it is the essence of my being. Dismissing my life as a lifestyle, as if it were something I tried on one day and thought it fit well, is insulting. Sadly, it is not just my opponents who use that term, but a number of my friends... even LGBT people... who have succumbed to using that term. Let's practice: it's a life, not a lifestyle.

In that same vein, I heard a disturbing trend threading through the testimony on Tuesday night. Many of the speakers in favor of the ordinance wanted to take on our opposition full force and in their face. Since the opposition was claiming and proclaiming their "christianity", some of our proponents took the bait, and fired back: "If you think homosexuality is a choice, how about your religion?! That's a choice, too, and you're protected. You chose to be religious." Trouble is, fighting with fundementalists over whether they "chose" to be religious goes nowhere. Some believe that they did NOT choose Christ; Christ choose them. Another way of saying it: God knew us from the beginning, and we were made in the image of God. So trying to make that kind of "choice" argument is pointless... especially with folks who don't want to listen to you anyway.

And it raises for me that feeling of loneliness of being an "other" within my own "other" set. I left religion out of my comments Tuesday night because it wasn't pertinent to what I was going to say. Instead, as with most things in my life, I kept my religious beliefs in my heart... and was routinely tapping into them to keep from becoming mean. I don't think religion and faith of any sort, and particularly faith in Christ, is bad. It is actually very good. But it can become bad in practice.

The whole reason I started this blog two-and-a-half years ago was to deal with this weird awakening I was having as a member of the Body of Christ... and to square that with being gay in an LGBT community that was hostile to Christianity. During this ordinance process, I was again seeing the same struggles of "us" vs. "them" and feeling pained that neither side could see past the labels. That's why when Commissioner Cliff Thaell in his closing comments noted that we have an environmental disaster looming in the Gulf of Mexico, and it would behoove us to be thinking as "We" rather than "us and them" to deal with a serious and big issue, I was glad. I couldn't agree more! But beyond that, I find myself having to recommit to being the incarnation of a Christian to my queer community and the queer in the pews for my Christian community.

I look forward to the day when I can be a human with both groups!

MY Question About "The" Consecrations...

Integrity USA sent out a call for its membership to feed them one question, any question, we'd like to see asked and answered at a news conference before the scheduled consecrations of Rev. Canon Diane Bruce and Rev. Canon Mary Glasspool as the first female Bishops in the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles. Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and Bishop Jon Bruno will be on hand at the news conference.
Donning my reporter cap, I posed the following thought-provoking and urgent question:

What took you so long?!


Congratulations to Rev. Canon Diane Bruce and Rev. Canon Mary Glasspool, and to the Diocese of LA. I will raise a glass in your honor on Saturday.

Ascension

Grant, we pray, Almighty God, that as we believe your
only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ to have ascended
into heaven, so we may also in heart and mind there ascend,
and with him continually dwell; who lives and reigns with
you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
--Collect for Ascension Day

COMMENT: I think this is the essence of the idea: "And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil." May we strive to treat one another as the incarnation of the Divine, and continually being stewards of our world. In this way, our hearts and minds remain lifted up and not mired in the muddiness of meanness.

VICTORY!!!

What a night!! After almost five hours of public testimony, attempts at last minute changes, and many years of hard work... the Leon County Commission voted 5-2 Tuesday night to adopt a Human Rights Ordinance that bans discrimination on the basis of traditionally protected classes such as race, sex, disability and religion... and now adds to it gender expression, gender identity and sexual orientation.

I cried. I didn't think I would, but as this reality hit me, that a growing majority of the Leon County Commission was willing to go on record to support an ordinance that protects minority persons from discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodation, I couldn't help but cry a little. Times have changed from when I first moved to this community twenty years ago. We used to have to beg to have a proclamation from local government for Gay Pride Week... and even when we finally got it, the city commissioners would only agree to call it "Pride Week" because to call it "gay pride" would somehow cause a problem. Our Gay Pride committees would plan our big celebrations to occur in remote locations because the LGBT community was afraid to be seen. Hell, art students didn't want the local paper to photograph their paintings because then "people at the FSU Art School will know I'm gay!" (Freakin' art school?!?! Are you serious?!?!)

Luck of the draw had me testify early in the evening. And, as prepared as I thought I would be, all the back and forth... threats of new language and delaying the public hearing to the next month... not to mention the nagging voices in my head about what I should or shouldn't say... I was totally unprepared. Thank God I had taken time in the hour before the meeting to go to St. John's, light a few candles, and pray aloud the words of Psalm 35. Coming from that place of being centered, I spoke my truth. Yes, I knew what it meant to experience discrimination because in my prior life as a reporter, I almost didn't get a promotion due to a manager who was concerned about "the way I dressed" (a popular euphemism at the time for "lesbian"). I was careful not to use names, but I am still well-known in this community, and people could figure it out.

Commission chair Bob Rackleff had called for civility in the debate. By and large it was civil. There were a couple of people who obviously missed that request as they launched into talks of "bestiality" and having a feces fetish. And there was one man who was highly disrespectful and awful about my friend, Margeaux, who is a transgender transsexual hair stylist. ("That man or whatever it is, I don't know what to call he/she"). I still had my Book of Common Prayer with me, and a few times, made a point of opening back up to the "Prayer for our Enemies" to keep me from losing it.

But probably the most stunning part of the evening came during the preliminary discussion of the ordinance. Commissioner Bill Proctor, who came in for a good deal of earned criticism on this blog, calmly talked about how he has felt under attack... and maintained the attacks were unfair because he "has always been in support of anti-discrimination"... and he felt the Human Rights Ordinance had a 'blood line from the 14th Amendment' of the United States Constitution. In a seven minute statement, the Commissioner told us (a) I want to vote on the ordinance tonight (b) I'm for it and (c) this is a legitimate civil rights issue. What a HUGE change from two weeks ago where he was talking about "homosexual church people". I don't know what changed in two weeks. Perhaps the furor in the wake of his letter about another friend, Terry Galloway, and her deafness, made Proctor do a turnabout.

The reasons for the change aren't as important. The important part was that he finally saw this as a civil rights issue that would benefit all people, not just gay people.

And so, I go to bed tonight happier with and prouder of my local government officials. You done good!!