From the Jun 21 – Jun 27, 2001 issue

Pullout

Affirm Homosexuals

Who Was it That Said, "Love One Another"?

by Peter Drury

I'm not quite sure when it first occurred to me that churches ought to be welcoming and affirming of lesbian, gay, transgendered, and bisexual people. I honestly don't recall if it was when I learned that Jesus said, "Love your neighbor as you love yourself," or when I noticed that Jesus attended dinners where he told the hosts to ignore the wealthy guests and to invite to the table those who had no status within the dominant culture.

I didn't learn to welcome gay and lesbian people in the Presbyterian Church of my childhood. At least not officially. But the Bible stories they told me in Sunday School kept pointing me to timeless truths such as "This is my commandment, that you love one another." I didn't learn to affirm transgendered and bisexual people by listening to TV preachers. And it didn't help that I grew up playing "smear the queer" at school.

But somewhere along the line I felt deeply convicted, in my spiritual life, to seek the Holy (in my tradition, the Christ) in the face of every person I encounter. And when I began to take the Bible seriously--which is different from taking it literally--I realized that many people, over many years, have heaped personal prejudices upon the Bible. I grew confounded by the practice of quoting the scriptures, removed from their context, in order to affirm hatred, prejudice, or injustice.

At its heart, my faith is rooted in Love.

Last October, the (in)famous Fred Phelps came to Broadway to protest the church where I serve as pastor. He verbally assaulted both me and the congregation with statements like "God hates fags!" and "You're going to rot in hell!" The crowd at whom he was yelling--almost entirely heterosexual--responded by singing songs about God's love. When we entered the sanctuary, we found that we were joined by Jews, Catholics, and other Protestants, all of whom had come to stand in solidarity with us. Perhaps most moving to me, personally, was the statement by one group of Jewish visitors who said, "We have come to stand in solidarity with you because, at times of our victimization, you have also stood in solidarity with us."

Quite literally, the only day our sanctuary has ever been packed was the day Fred Phelps came to town. When hate became articulate, love required a response. Perhaps that is when it occurred to me that churches ought to be welcoming and affirming of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered people.

Peter Drury is the pastor of Seattle First Christian Church (www.seattle-fcc.org) on Broadway in Capitol Hill. He is a heterosexual.