Posts Tagged ‘Religion and Sexuality’
Blessed Are They That Mourn
“Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted” (Matthew 5:4). When I was living and working in Toledo, Ohio, in my mid-20s, I often had lunch at this large, cafeteria-style restaurant downtown. Patrons would load their trays and sit in a large atrium filled with tables, booths, and a lot of potted ferns.…
Read MoreStanding Together To Protect LGBTQ Catholic Church Faculty
homeStand with Catholic high school students this Friday, January 31st for ‘Z-Day‘ to raise awareness for LGBTQ faculty being fired within the Catholic Church by wearing orange and spreading #ZDAY on social media. About a month ago, news broke out from a neighboring Catholic high school that their gay Vice Principal had been fired for marrying his…
Read MoreAwakening Christian LGBTQ Advocacy In Nashville
“So…do people from Kentucky wear shoes?” I sat there, slack-jawed, trying to comprehend the words that had just come out of her mouth. I had recently moved to Nashville for college, and this was a big change for a girl from rural Kentucky. My new classmate was obviously curious. “I mean, I know your own…
Read More“If I Could Straighten Out!”: That’s What He Told Me
My name is Johnie Guerra. I’m straight and happily married with four wonderful boys. I’m the grandson of two pastors and my parents did their best to raise me with a Bible-based upbringing. Recently, I’ve started attending a church with an inclusive ministry for LGBT people, volunteering at a youth group for LGBT kids, and…
Read MoreA Duck Dynasty Christmas
It’s only days until Christmas, and I, like many LGBT people, spent much of the day alternately dodging and engaging yet another “gays vs. Christians” media firestorm. Even if you’ve never heard of him before, by now you’ve probably heard about Phil Robertson. Robertson is the patriarch of A&E’s hit show Duck Dynasty, and he…
Read MoreSharing Our Nativity Stories
We each have our own “nativity story.” Mine is that it was a difficult birth, a prolonged labor, my mother turned blue, my father told the doctor she needed oxygen, I was born feet first, my legs were crooked and doctors wanted to put braces on them, but my mother resisted, choosing another therapy: massaging…
Read MoreOut Under The Rainbow
Have you ever looked into a person’s face and felt truly needed? Sometimes, I look into the face of another person who definitely needs me in some way, but the need itself is unspoken, unfamiliar, uncomfortable—or out of tune with the time and place—and instead of addressing it, I move on to what’s next, feeling…
Read MoreBishop Resigns From Her Pastorate After Revealing Her Same Sex Marriage
I must say that it is truly an experience to be “outed” when you are a community leader and religious figure. I always knew that at some point I would have to share with my congregation that I married the love of my life—and that she is a woman—but I wanted to wait until the…
Read MoreChanging Hearts: A Plea For Christian Dialogue
When I was in college, a friend asked how I as a Christian viewed her as a lesbian. I told her that I didn’t think of her any differently than I did of other non-Christians because I believed any life not based on the Lord Jesus Christ was sinful and destructive. Oof! At least I…
Read MoreFull Of Grace & Truth
I was a junior in high school, it was a week after Christmas, and it was bitterly cold. On St. Stephen’s Day a blizzard of Biblical proportions blanketed Massachusetts in a chrysalis of snow. Peripatetic winds had buffeted those icy banks, sculpting them into miniature topographical masterpieces, complete with condensed peaks and vales. I worked…
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