Lots of Feels as EDS’ St. John’s Chapel is Deconsecrated Today

The Philadelphia Divinity School and the Episcopal Theological School merged in the 1970s to become the Episcopal Divinity School. EDS had diverse faculty (Episcopal, Presbyterian, Jewish, Asian, African American, Caucasian, men, women, gays, lesbians, lay, ordained) and a diverse student body (Episcopal, Catholic, Lutheran, UCC, Unitarian Universalist, MCC, Seventh Day Adventist, Baptist, Anglicans from Kenya, Uganda, Jamaica, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, etc), and it was part of a world class consortium (The Boston Theological Institute) which included Boston College, Boston University, and Harvard.

EDS was a special place dedicated to anti-oppression work, to an inclusive gospel, to sharing the all-inclusive and unconditional love of God.

And, more than a school, it was a community. One never really was graduated from EDS. One was degreed, but never felt the need to “leave.” One to three times a year, every year since I earned my DMin there, I would go “home” to EDS.

EDS lives on in the ministry of the church I pastor and in parishes, Cathedrals, Chaplaincies, service organizations, the diaconate, classrooms, and hearts all over the world.

Last year, EDS was closed down (unnecessarily, in my view, and in ways that many of us resisted). EDS’ name and money still exist as EDS@Union (basically the Anglican house of studies at Union Theological Seminary in NYC, my other beloved theological alma mater). If the merger had been done more transparently and honestly (by EDS trustees), and if EDS could have retained a degree program (MATS or DMin maybe), I think it would have been something I could have celebrated (two great schools joining forces), and/or if they had kept one or two EDS faculty (they sacked them all) that would have been at least kind (and bridge building). Instead, the merger feels more like loss and has caused grief for many.

These thoughts are with me as St John’s Chapel on the campus of what was EDS in Cambridge, MA is deconsecrated today. God bless the EDS diaspora and the EDS energy that still flows through so many ministries.

Happy Brthday MCC

Oct. 6, 1968: a young, gay, defrocked, Pentecostal minister (Troy D. Perry) held a worship service in his living room. 12 people showed up (a powerful symbol). The coffee table became the communion table/altar. An album of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir provided the service music (adding a bit of camp and irony to the momentous occasion). Gay and straight, male and female, Christian and Jew were some of the labels of the people in the room. More than 9 months before Stonewall, this worship experience meant to welcome and affirm and celebrate LGBTQ people (known by various terms over the years) occurred and launched an ecumenical, body positive, sex positive, LGBTQ affirming, joyous, justice seeking, ridiculously optimistic, evangelical (and sometimes charismatic), Eucharistic, over time theologically progressive (which only makes sense as it began by challenging old assumptions) religious movement known as Metropolitan Community Churches (MCC).

MCC is not the powerhouse it once was, but it’s still around, and many churches are now welcoming and affirming of LGBTQ folk and their allies and loved ones.  But before they got there, MCC was doing the work. 

MCC’s early, provocative, and courageous witness led the way for mainstream churches to become more accepting and appreciative of the Queer children of God. MCC was also a leader in the inclusive language movement and was way ahead of most churches in compassionately responding to the AIDS crisis. 

Whatever becomes of MCC, the world will always be better because Troy Perry started a movement that said the LGBTQ members of the human family were part of the divine diversity of creation and were fully embraced and loved by God, and that movement helped change hearts and minds and bring hope and healing to countless lives. 

Many of us in ministry today are in ministry because of MCC. When we didn’t have other options, MCC was an option. MCC blessed our unions, performed our funerals, visited us in hospitals, debated the fundamentalists, spoke to city councils and state legislatures, and prepared and ordained us for ministry. In time, for a variety of reasons, some of us left MCC for other communities, some of us embraced dual or even triple affiliations, remaining in MCC but not exclusively. But wherever we ended up, we know MCC gave us our start, and for that, let us always be grateful. 

49 years ago, a prophet was raised up, and he spoke the word of God’s all-inclusive and unconditional love, and the Church and the world would never be the same again. God bless you Troy Perry!

Sunshine Cathedral: More than an MCC

     Sometimes people will refer to Sunshine Cathedral as “MCC” (which stands for Metropolitan Community Church). But Sunshine Cathedral is so much more than a Metropolitan Community Church!

     Sunshine Cathedral is currently affiliated with Metropolitan Community Churches (a denomination founded by and for LBGT people in 1968), and  is also affiliated with the Divine Science Federation International (Divine Science is the oldest of the New Thought schools of thought; New Thought emphasizes the power of positive thinking, the unity of all life, and the omnipresence of God).

     Additionally, Sunshine Cathedral is an affiliate of the Global Justice Institute, an independent ministry housed at MCC New York that focuses on social justice throughout the world. Sunshine Cathedral also participates in the pension plan of the American Baptist Churches USA (which is also used by the International Council of Community Churches), and Sunshine Cathedral is in the process of applying for affiliation with the Progressive Christian Alliance (and other ecumenical organizations). In the past, Sunshine Cathedral has held affiliations with The Center for Progressive Christianity and the International New Thought Alliance.

     Sunshine Cathedral’s staff ministers hold licenses and ordinations from MCC, Interfaith organizations, Divine Science, the Assemblies of God, a Baptist denomination, and Centers for Spiritual Living. The Samaritan Institute at Sunshine Cathedral is the religious education program for the Sunshine Cathedral, the diaconal training school for Sunshine Cathedral members who wish to pursue ministry as a deacon, and it is also a ministerial training school for the Divine Science Federation International!

     Sunshine Cathedral members and friends come from New Thought, Protestant, Roman Catholic, Old Catholic, Unitarian Universalist, Jewish, Muslim, and Humanistic traditions. So, while Sunshine Cathedral began as a Metropolitan Community Church, it has become so much more! Please do not refer to your deeply ecumenical church as just “MCC”…we are Sunshine Cathedral, a different kind of church!

A Prayer for Metropolitan Community Churches in a Time of Great Need

My prayer for the movement (Metropolitan Community Churches) to which I have given half my life so far. It represents my heart only. The movement has barely more than half the churches it had a decade ago, and morale within the movement seems to me to be at an all time low. This is a pivotal moment for the movement; all heart-felt prayers are needed at this time:

Goddess of Justice, Lord of Love, Healing Presence, Guiding Light:

In this blessed moment we pause to give thanks for MCC Founder Troy Perry's vision, his courage, his willingness to affirm the sacred value of all people. Through him, you opened doors that had been closed for far too long; through the movement he launched, many of us found a home, a family, a purpose, and a reason to celebrate who you called and created us to be.

MCC told LBGT people that they mattered. MCC was the embodiment of healing love during the worst of the AIDS crisis. MCC let people in the pews realize that "God" is not a boy's name. MCC changed the world.

But somewhere along the way, we collectively stopped believing that we were uniquely called to do a new thing. Somewhere along the way, we decided we wanted to "fit in." We were tired of fighting, especially after surviving and even winning so many battles. We longed for validation from the "mainstream." And increasingly, we got it. Our righteous indignation which fueled holy Queer activism softened, and as our passion waned, our effectiveness began to wane as well.

In a time when religion is being questioned and old attitudes are being challenged, we had a chance to be something different, fresh, beautifully radical. But instead, we turned our fears, frustrations, and uncertainties into internal battles. We fought for internal recognition. We fought for privilege within our diminishing ranks. We fought to protect the status quo. We fought for the thrill of fighting rather than to achieve any noble purpose, and when the thrill was gone, we continued to fight out of sheer habit. And now, the once compelling vision is buried and we see no angel to roll away the stone to let the vision rise to new life again.

The question so many ask today is, "What shall we do?" And that question seems to have many answers. Some will stay in a declining movement. Some will become radically ecumenical and join multiple organizations, not giving 100% of their devotion and support to any. Some will simply slip away. Some will end their relationship with MCC and start new relationships. We see these options being embraced already.

We have worshiped the deity of the past, the golden calf, Apis the bull-god of yesterday, and now our dreams and hopes are scattered; our tomorrows will be beautiful, but also dispersed. What we have known and devoted so much of our lives to is fading before us, and it is impossible to go back, and we seem to lack the courage and vision to be new again as a movement, so we must be new as individuals and as separate parish communities.

Where we failed, forgive us.
Where we allowed fear to win, forgive us.
Where we allowed personalities to trump possibilities, forgive us.
And whatever the future holds, help us to make the most of it and to thrive in the new day.

Bless Troy, your anointed prophet who changed, and in many cases, saved our lives. Bless those who will continue moving forward. We may never again be the MCC slaying the Giants of homophobia, parting the waters of terror in the age of AIDS, turning the water of discrimination into the wine of marriage equality, and showing the world that worship can be prophetic, energetic, empowering, and ridiculously fun, but let us also never forget that we were that MCC, and whatever we do or become next, that history is part of us and will be part of all future successes.

The days ahead cannot be known to us today, but what we can know is that individually, we still have work to do, and in our communities of faith, we still hold a sacred vision, and we know that as we remain faithful to our highest and best understandings, to our deepest and strongest hopes, to our truest longings to be your love in action and your healing hands touching people in this world, you will continue to work through us and lives will still be changed and blessed, and the world will be better because of our faithfulness.

In your good time, heal our grief, but let us not wait so patiently to do good in the world. We'll embrace healing as and when it comes, but we can't wait for healing to continue to build communities of hope, celebration, and Justice-love. So, let us be about our divinely appointed work, help us do it well, and fill our tomorrows with blessings that are better than any we've known so far. That will be a great miracle, but we believe in miracles. And so it is.

Holiday Wishes for the LBGT Community

The Holiday Season is meant to be joyful.

During Hanukkah, we recall the story of a limited amount of oil keeping Temple lights burning for eight days in a row. The Hanukkah miracle reminds us that during our times of uncertainty, there is an inextinguishable light of hope within us.

During Christmas we imagine the innocence of baby born in humble circumstances but celebrated by angels; that baby reminds us that we are each a child of God.

Kwanzaa honors African heritage and celebrates the gifts, skills, and contributions of descendants of the West African Diaspora. Kwanzaa challenges us to affirm and appreciate our diverse global family.

And the New Year is a time for releasing the past and looking with hope and expectation toward the possibilities that lie ahead.

No wonder the holidays are filled with gift giving, feasting, prayers for peace, and songs of wonder and joy. It is a sacred season.

However, for LBGT people, it can also be a lonely season. We’ve made many advances in recent years and we’ve overcome many obstacles, and yet there are those who do not celebrate our legal and cultural victories with us. The Right Wing of both politics and religion threaten at every turn to do all that they can to reverse recent advances for LBGT rights and equality. Christian fundamentalists have doubled down on their anti-gay rhetoric. Municipalities have proposed ordinances that would deny many people the protections they need if LBGT folk are included in the mix. And some families, influenced by the worst of politics and religion, have abandoned their LBGT family members, or told them they are welcome home for the holidays only as long as they don’t mention their sexual orientation.

For LBGT people, the holidays can bring up old wounds, or subject them to new insults, new experiences of rejection, or fill them with remorse for not having supportive, loving families that embrace them for they are.

So, to LBGT people who have formed strong, healthy families of choice: Congratulations and Happy Holidays! You are demonstrating the healing power of love.

To LBGT people who remain in the closet, or attempt to return to the closet at least in part in order to spend time with relatives during the holidays, my heart goes out to you and I beg you to affirm your own sacred value. You may never persuade your relatives that you are who are meant to be, but please don’t let them persuade you that you are not. You are part of the beautiful rainbow diversity of humanity.

And to all allies of LBGT people, loving parents and siblings, cousins and friends, aunts and uncles, grandparents and godparents who love your Queer family member not in spite of who they are, but who love them exactly for who they are, let me tell you that you are heroes and your love and compassion will enrich lives and touch hearts in profound and life-giving ways.

The Holidays are meant to fill us with hope, joy, and goodwill. As LBGT people often need those very blessings at this time of year, my wish for our entire community is that the best of the Season will fill our hearts and bring healing to our world, or at very least to our experience of it.

Rev. Dr. Durrell Watkins is the Senior Minister of Sunshine Cathedral in Fort Lauderdale.

This column was originally written for the Florida Agenda

You Don't Need to be Saved from Your Queer Reality

Yesterday Franklin Graham invited LBGT people to visit his Facebook page today (Dec 1). Who am I to refuse such a gracious invitation? So, I did visit the page today. The message was not anything new from Mr Graham. It was the same old "I love you enough to tell you the truth" bit, and his "truth" is that same-gender love and attraction (as well as gender non-conformity) is a sin and Jesus can save you from sin if you confess and abandon it (there's always a catch). Anyway, the language was a bit softer than it sometimes is from him and his followers, but the message was the same, insisting that LBGT people are flawed and in need of being "saved" from who they innately are.

That is such a soul crushing message that has literally ruined and even ended lives (and torn families apart). I feel a passionate responsibility to offer people, especially young people, a counter-narrative. So, as an invited guest to Mr Graham's thread (I'm Queer and he invited the whole Q-verse, so that includes me), I have spent the day posting a different message. I'm sure i've been accused of party crashing/trolling, but I don't care. Lives are at stake. And every post I've made (the same 6 over and over, plus 2 or 3 more once each) has earned a plethora of condemnations, people telling me I don't know the bible (as if they just forgot to mention it in seminary), that I serve "satan", that I'm leading people to hell, that God loves me "but" (ain't there always a "but"?), that i'm a false prophet...whatever, I know who I am so I don't care. I did crash the Haters for Jesus party, so I have to take whatever they throw out. But there's a 16 year old Pentecostal kid in South Carolina, a 14 year old Baptist kid in Tennessee, a 20 year old Catholic kid in Indiana, a 56 year old Seventh Day Adventist in Oklahoma who has struggled with self-loathing, guilt, fear and shame for a lifetime...and these victims of LBGT bashing shouldn't have to hear that poison one more time.
So, yes, I poked the bear today. Yes I was invasive, confrontational, and relentless in sharing a counter narrative in desperate hope of reaching at least one tormented person in order to offer them a word of hope. While literally dozens of people spewed their most toxic venom at me, there were others who "liked" my posts and who thanked me for sharing a more inclusive, kinder, more inviting gospel. But again, my deepest hope is that someone somewhere is daring to hope tonight that they are God's miracle and not God's mistake.

Below I share my various messages to the FG community. If any of them appeal to you, please share them. Simply credit the author (Durrell Watkins) and hashtag Sunshine Cathedral (#SunshineCathedral @suncath). The work for LBGT equality, and the healing work to rescue those who have been taught to hate themselves is not yet over.

A. "To all LBGT people who are told you are a mistake, that your love is wicked, that God isn't big enough to embrace you as you are...I know that such a message has tormented many of you and caused division in your families. I know that you have tried to date away, pray away, and deny away the truth of who you are. I know you have languished over rejecting religion which seems to have rejected you or hating yourself so religion would accept you. But there is another narrative for you to consider. Progressive religion, science, and human compassion are all on your side. God is love and is present in YOUR love. You are as you were created to be. Your life is not a sin. Your sexual orientation is god's gift to you. On this issue FG is wrong. Pray this prayer: God help me accept myself and let me know that your love will never and can never let me go. Help me to love myself. Heal my heart from the pain inflicted by those who have used your name in vain. Heal the wounds of homophobia in my heart, in the church, and in the world. Amen.
Share this message and prayer with someone today."
#DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

B. "I'll atone for many things but never for who I love. I would not choose to go to a homophobic heaven or serve a homophobic God. If I must choose between an invisible God and my flesh and blood husband I choose the love that has given me joy in this life. Any God that would make me give up the love of my life is a monster. I wonder how many self righteous fundies would give up their wives or husbands for a deity (and how could they ever love or trust such a deity?)"
#DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

C. "You guys get that your 'theological argument' is just a well rehearsed opinion (however much you try to blame it on God), right? and your opinion is not supported by science, nor will it ever trump one's lived experience. I know my relationship with God, you don't. I know my heart, you don't. And I know the joy and the blessing of my relationship, you don't. So your opinion means not a darn thing compared to the life I live, the spirituality I experience, and the love I share. You will never have an argument that will make me not know my sexuality to be a gift and a blessing, and my love to be a source of joy. And no threat of an imaginary after life hell would make me accept a hell on earth, the hell of shame and fear that you are trying to impose on others."
#DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

D. "Jesus touched the untouchable, loved the unlovable, confronted injustice, and affirmed those that religion had condemned (Deut says that Canaanites should be destroyed, but Jesus healed the Canannite woman's daughter and praised her faith...Samaritans were told they weren't 'real Jews' - like fundamentalists tell others they are not real Christians, but Jesus told a story of a GOOD Samaritan, the one who showed kindness when religious types were being legalistic without caring for hurting people...Jesus taught the golden rule and I promise that Graham and his followers would not want to be dehumanized and demoralized and demonized the way the way LBGT folk are by them...Jesus told the rich young ruler that generosity/kindness was the way to be in eternal relationship with God [sell all you have and share it with the poor]...Jesus healed on the Sabbath even when religious traditions and rules forbade it).
Jesus wasn't about rules, legalism, condemnation, shame, or hurting people. He gave people their dignity back. He saw goodness in everyone. He even prayed for his persecutors at the end of his life. That is my Jesus...the embodiment of compassion, kindness, and unconditional love.
I have two favorite stories about heaven:
1. Everyone when they die winds up in the same banquet hall. Catholics and Protestants, Muslims and Jews, Atheists and Buddhists, Nice people and mean people, Gays and Straights, Men and Women...the people who think that is a beautiful scene are in heaven, those who think it is a disturbing scene are in hell. We are all embraced by the one Power and Presence, but those who need to be better than others, saved while others are lost will be miserable while those who rejoice that there is a Love that excludes no one for any reason will be very happy - in heaven.
2. People approaching the Pearly Gates have to deal with Peter. Peter grills people to see who is acceptable and who isn't. Peter turns 2/3 of the people away. While he is dealing with people at the gate, in the background is Jesus helping those Peter rejected climb over the wall into Paradise. Religion wants to keep people out...Jesus won't let anyone be excluded.
That is my Christ, my Way Shower, my Anointed One, my Example, my model of how to live as a Child of God."
#DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

E. "Gay (or str8) is not a choice, but accepting ourselves and loving ourselves and rejecting homophobia is a choice. Same-gender love and mutual attraction is not a sin; homophobia is. Repent of your sin and be saved from your myopic, outmoded views of a wrathful god who can't see or appreciate sacred love that two people share regardless of their gender identities."
#DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

F. "People quoted isolated, ancient texts written by people who thought the earth was flat to justify denying women ordination, to justify child abuse, to justify wars, to justify slavery, to justify decimating native cultures, to justify condemning people of other religions, and to demonize and demoralize same-gender loving people. Every time people use the bible to shame, vilify, and manipulate others, to label them sinners or threaten them with damnation for being different, they are using God's name in vain, they are making religion seem cheap and petty, and they are
hurting people.
LBGT people, you are part of the creation that God calls very good. You are, just as you are, made in the divine image. God's love, to be love at all, is all-inclusive and unconditional. And if God condemned anyone, it wouldn't be for who they love.
LBGT people, I am an ordained minister with two seminary degrees and I promise you that you will not be rejected by a loving god for any reason, least of all for being honest about who you are or for loving another person, regardless of his or her gender identity.
God is infinitely better than those who insist that their prejudices are God's.
You may make mistakes for which you will need to make amends, but being gay or lesbian or transgender is not among them. Your ontology (your "isness") is simply what you are by accident of birth. There is no sin nor shame in that. And mutually shared love can never be wrong. Reject any religion that says that God rejects you." #DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

G. I feel a passionate responsibility to offer people, especially young people, a counter-narrative to the homophobic rhetoric disguised as "the gospel.". So, I have spent the day posting a different message on Graham's thread. 

I am not trying to change those who insist their prejudices are God’s own, and that God cannot figure out a way to be in relationship with same-gender loving people…that makes God seem mean, petty, and bigoted, but we each are entitled to the god we choose. I have no hope of changing one person who is committed to her/his homophobia, but I hope with all that I am that same-gender loving people (and gender non-conforming people) will hear that the anti-gay message spewed today is not the only religious message; it’s not even the only Christian message.
I am aware that my presence and my thoughts are not welcome on this page, but I was willing today to be an unwelcome presence for the sake of LBGT people. God loves you and wants you to be happy. Your love is sacred. You will not be rejected by God, and certainly not for being honest about who you were born to be or for loving anyone genuinely, no matter what their gender may be. Mine is a minority view on this thread (but a majority view in contemporary biblical and theological scholarship, social science, medical science, and behavioral science) and I offer it today in love for those who feel unloved and unlovable. And even for those who persecute LBGT people with the language of religion and threats of eternal torment (for love yet!), I thank you for engaging me today. A very few (not many) were kind and gracious about it, but even those who didn’t know how to be still heard me out, and I appreciate it.

Blessings to all (and especially to my LBGT sisters and brothers and our allies, among whom we can count the Divine). #DurrellWatkins #SunshineCathedral @suncath @DurrellWatkins

October Calls Us to be Angels in our World

Holy October

             October has become a month that encourages us to celebrate human potential. October challenges us to remember heroes so that we might discover heroic qualities in ourselves. October even calls us to work for justice where justice has been denied. October is a very special month!

            There is a national holiday in October: Columbus Day. However, we now know that it is problematic to celebrate Christopher Columbus as the “discoverer” of North America, since Leif Ericson reached our continent 500 years before Columbus did, and the continent had been inhabited by indigenous people for thousands of years. So, Johnny-Come-Lately Columbus was the second European to visit a long inhabited continent. Worse than the inaccuracy of calling Columbus the discoverer of North America, is Columbus’ own brutality. When Columbus landed in the Bahamas he and his crew were treated well by the native residents. Columbus rewarded their decency by seizing their land and enslaving them.

Now many of us call what has been known as Columbus Day, “Indigenous Peoples Day” to honor the peaceful people Columbus first encountered and soon betrayed and tormented. Indigenous Peoples Day reminds us to honor the peace lovers, to value kindness and generosity, and to speak out against injustice.

October is also LBGT History Month where we celebrate heroes from our beautiful and diverse Queer community. We honor such luminaries as lesbian Jane Addams (co-founder of the American Civil Liberties Union and first American woman Nobel Peace Prize winner), Miriam Ben-Shalom (discharged from the Army in the 1970s for being gay but she won a long court battle which resulted in her being reinstated in the 1980s), bisexual Grammy winner and Rock & Roll Hall-of-Famer Clive Davis (who helped the careers of such superstars as Aretha Franklin, Jennifer Hudson, and Carlos Santana), Arthur Dong (Academy Award nominee, Peabody Award winner, gay film-maker who features gay and Asian themes in his work), Orange Is the New Black star Laverne Cox (transgender actress, producer, and activist), and Richard Blanco (the youngest, first Latino, and first openly gay U.S. presidential inauguration poet – Blanco read one of his poems at President Obama’s second inauguration). We should be very proud of the many achievements that members of our community have shared with the world!

October also gives us National Coming Out Day which encourages us to leave behind closets of fear and shame and to live out loud as the gifted, wonderful members of the human family we are. October 6, 1968 is the founding date of Metropolitan Community Churches (MCC). October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, reminding us to honor those who battle cancer, to remember those who lost their battle, and to wish and work for a cure. And sadly, October is the month in 1998 when Wyoming college student Matthew Shepard died from being attacked simply because he was gay.

October gives us a lot to think about, and opportunities to renew our commitment to make a difference. So, I call October holy, because in many ways it reminds us that we can be and ought to be angels of healing in our world.

Rev. Dr. Durrell Watkins is the Senior Minister of Sunshine Cathedral in Fort Lauderdale.

written for the Florida Agenda

What I Hope the Pope Learns About Family

Pope Francis recently visited the United States. He did what good pastors do: he “comforted the afflicted and afflicted the comfortable.”

The pope challenged greed, as the Gospel demands. He also called for an end to violence among nations. “Blessed are the peacemakers.”

In the spirit of compassion, the pope advocated for more welcoming treatment of immigrants and refugees.

At an inter-religious service, he prayed not only with other Christians but also with Jains and Buddhists, Jews and Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs, thus demonstrating that we need not believe all the same things in order to care about humanity and to work together to achieve noble goals.

Everywhere Francis went he blessed children, he showed kindness to the disabled, and he electrified crowds with gentle tones and words of love.

I applaud His Holiness for each of these sentiments and actions. He called us all to a more generous way of living. I certainly find value in that message.

But when it comes to the pope’s rather myopic understanding of family, I find that I must disagree with him.

The pope left unchallenged the sexist and homophobic notion that only the heternormative, nuclear family can be healthy, wholesome, or sacred. I hope the pope will come to consider and declare that love, not biology, makes a family, that grandmothers can raise their grandchildren, that single parents can be good parents, that two mommies or two daddies can provide as much love, nurture and stability as any other caregivers. It is better for children to be loved and well-cared for than for their family model to resemble a 1950s sit-com. It is better for children to see people loving each other honestly and treating others with respect than it is to simply reinforce heteronormative prejudices and assumptions.

Also, I should think that a man who has chosen a life of celibacy would be able to understand that family is more than child-rearing. Some of us are blessed to have or to be loving parents; but, all of us need close bonds, people on whom we can depend, and these groupings are also families. Even a loving and devoted couple, whether gay or straight, whether or not they have children, have started a small but precious and life-enhancing family. All of these family models can be healthy and divinely blessed. The pope is correct in saying that “family” is very important, but I believe the definition of family can be broader and more inclusive than he seems to realize.

The pope appears to be gentler and more welcoming than his most immediate predecessors and I appreciate that; but I also hope he will be open to seeing same-gender loving people not simply as those who should not be harshly judged, but as persons created by God in the image of God to be exactly who they are.

I hope this pope who puts such value on love will come to see the beauty of love genuinely shared by persons regardless of their gender identities.

I hope this pope will come to speak out against violence done to LBGT people, will consider that gender is more complex than simple binaries, and will discover that it is love that makes a family and not dogma or biology.

I do not hesitate to praise this pontiff for the good work he is doing, nor do I hesitate to lift my voice in encouraging him and all religious leaders to become friends, allies, and advocates of the LBGT children of God.

Rev. Dr. Durrell Watkins is the Senior Minister of Sunshine Cathedral in Fort Lauderdale.

Published in Florida Agenda, Oct 2nd, 2015

What Religious Freedom Is...and Isn't

Dr. Durrell’s Spiritual Prescriptions

What Religious Freedom Is…and Isn’t

     Freedom of (and from) religion is a primary American value. American history is religious history. From Native American Shamanism to Catholics seeking freedom from Protestant persecution, from Quakers seeking freedom to practice their quiet worship and courageous pacifism to Jewish people fleeing persecution and pogroms in Eastern Europe, from new religions such as Christian Science and Latter Day Saints (Mormons) experiencing and expressing religious devotion in ways that differed at the time from the mainstream to the birth of Pentecostalism, from Eastern gurus coming to the United States to teach meditation, reincarnation, and the unity of the human family to the beginning of the predominantly LBGT Metropolitan Community Churches…our nation has been a place where religion has flourished and religious people have been able to form strong communities.

     This heritage of religious freedom, religious experimentation, and religious living is one that I think we should honor. We aren’t a Lutheran nation or a Catholic nation or an Eastern Orthodox nation or a Muslim nation (or even officially a “Christian” nation), but we are a nation where all of those religious experiences and so many more can be found, shared, and practiced openly. That really is quite wonderful!

     But lately, we are hearing a lot about “religious freedom” in a different context. The term isn’t used as much recently to describe our freedom to be religiously diverse, to be religious or not, to worship at home or synagogue, church or coven, mosque or shrine, but rather, “religious freedom” is now being used as an excuse to limit civil liberties and equal opportunity; as long as one claims one’s prejudice against another group is a religious value, then he or she (according to the flawed argument) should be able to use business or even government positions to deny members of that group service. Those who would use “religious freedom” as a weapon against gays and lesbians (or any other group they dislike) aren’t celebrating our freedom to worship as we choose; they are insisting that their prejudices should have the weight of religious devotion, and their religion should trump all other religious convictions, social institutions, and public contracts. They don’t want religious freedom; they want the power to deny freedom and equality to others and they want religion to be the unquestioned authority that gives them the power to do so.

     World history is littered with battles between kings and popes, Catholics and Protestants, Muslims and Jews, Muslims and Christians…each side insisting they had the divine authority to call the shots. And the current “religious freedom” argument is but one more attempt to use a myopic and tribal understanding of religion in a way that denies the full humanity of others.

     I value and celebrate religious freedom, but very simply, using religion as an excuse to marginalize gays and lesbians has nothing to do with religious freedom; it’s just one more attempt to demonize and dehumanize “the Other.” Religion at its best will resist such oppressive ideology.

     Religious freedom is the freedom to worship as we wish; it is not a gay-bashing license. 

Rev. Dr. Durrell Watkins is the Senior Minister of Sunshine Cathedral in Fort Lauderdale.

9/16 issue, Florida Agenda 

From Defense to Decision

Dr. Durrell’s Spiritual Prescriptions

From Defense to Decision

     In my evolution as a Queer spiritual leader and activist I have experienced three phases so far.

     Phase One:  Defense. I spent the early part of my ministry deconstructing the bible passages that were used to promote homophobia and to demonize and dehumanize same-gender loving people. I passionately pointed out that the biblical narratives never condemn same-gender love or attraction. Every time the bible seems to be critical of homosexuality (and there are only about half a dozen verses in the entire bible that can be given a homophobic spin) it is always in the context of prostitution or rape (behaviors that exploit or abuse someone). People in love, choosing to be together, enjoying each other’s company (and each other’s bodies) is never condemned in the bible.

     Phase Two:  Offense. I moved from trying to de-fang the apparently venomous verses used against gay people to playing a version of “Find Queer Waldo” in the pages of Holy Writ. With glee I would discuss the vow of devotion that one woman makes to another in the story of Ruth, a vow that has often been featured in heterosexual wedding ceremonies, “Ask me not to leave thee or to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go and where thou lodgest, I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people and thy God my God. Where thou diest I shall die and there I will be buried…”

     Similarly, I would beam with joy as I told the warrior love story of Jonathan and David (who made a vow to one another). Jonathan affirmed that he loved David as if David were his own soul; and David declared that he loved Jonathan in a way he could never love women.

     Boaz (from the Ruth story) seemed a little gay to me. Ebedmelech who rescued a prophet from a well seemed a little gay to me. Lydya (who was central in a women’s community) in the book of Acts seemed possibly lesbian to me. It was interesting to me that the Apostle Paul went to Mytlene (Lesbos!) where he might have had friends. In fact, Paul seems pretty gay to me! I even had questions about at least one of Jesus’ disciples.  Gay people know one another, and I had a great time finding my gay and lesbian sisters and brothers in the stories of my leather bound bible.

     Phase Three:  Decision. I am now at a point in my life where I don’t need to be defensive nor do I need to go on the offensive. I don’t need to persuade fundamentalists that they are wrong about homosexuality nor do I need to find affirming tidbits in scripture or loopholes in the so-called “clobber passages” to justify my existence. I love the bible, but I don’t depend on any particular interpretation of it to give my life value. I have decided to celebrate my sacred value and to insist that all people be treated fairly and with dignity regardless anyone’s religious belief (or prejudice masquerading as religious belief). I have decided that I won’t play biblical tit-for-tat and that I will simply trust my experience of life, which includes who and how I love. And I invite other spiritual seekers and persons of faith to do the same.

Rev. Dr. Durrell Watkins is the Senior Minister of Sunshine Cathedral in Fort Lauderdale.

9/2 edition of the Florida Agenda

What Scholars Say About Homosexuality & Christianity

"A new consciousness has arisen. A decision has quite clearly been made. Inequality for gay and lesbian people is no longer a debatable issue in either church or state. Therefore, I will from this moment on refuse to dignify the continued public expression of ignorant prejudice by engaging it. I do not tolerate racism or sexism any longer. From this moment on, I will no longer tolerate our culture's various forms of homophobia. I do not care who it is who articulates these attitudes or who tries to make them sound holy with religious jargon." Bishop John S. Spong

"Homosexual orientation has no necessary connection with sin, sickness, or failure; rather it is a gift from God to be accepted and lived out with gratitude... Human beings do not choose their sexual orientation; they discover it as something given." John McNeill, PhD

"Not even the strictest fundamentalist or Biblical literalist gives the same authority and moral weight to every word of scripture. Few of us would hold Paul’s injunction against women appearing in church with their heads uncovered to have the same moral weight as Jesus’ injunction to forgive our enemies. Few of us are willing to be bound by all the commands given to us in the Biblical text – otherwise, we would give all we have to the poor to follow Christ, redistribute all the land every 50 years, refuse to charge any interest on our loans/investments, share our worldly possessions communally as did the early Church, and refuse to support our nation’s defense budget in accord with Jesus’ commandment not to resist evil. We have come to understand certain things as acceptable in the Biblical culture and time, but not in our own – among other things, polygamy and slavery – which few Christians would promote despite their acceptability in Biblical times. As we approach the Biblical texts about homosexuality, we must not conveniently change our stance to one of asserting that every word of scripture is inerrantly true and universally binding on all people for all time." Bishop Gene Robinson

“…the Bible does not discuss committed gay relationships…[and] the Bible condemns numerous activities that today have social sanction, such as divorce, while it speaks in favor of slavery…

[Some] argue that just as Christians need not abstain from pork or prawns, so they need not abstain from same-sex sexual encounters - in other words, the Levitical codes are utterly irrelevant. The story of Sodom in Genesis 19 condemns lack of hospitality and the threat of rape, not homosexual love (see Ezekiel 16:49).

Scholars still debate exactly what Paul intended by "unnatural" relations in Romans 1, and what the Greek term arsenokotai in 1 Corinthians 6 and 1 Timothy 1 actually means…it appears in the context of crimes against others: adultery, kidnapping, murder, greed. Clearly the loving gay couple does not fit into this context…

[We need to realize that] all readers interpret. Nobody takes everything in the Bible literally. When Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, "If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off" (Matthew 5:30), most readers, appropriately, conclude that he is not advocating self-mutilation. We decide what to interpret literally and what figuratively. Similarly, we determine what to practice and what to ignore, we decide what is time bound and what is universal. Many churches that do not ordain women on the basis of 1 Timothy 2:12 ("I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man") have no problem with women wearing "gold, pearls, or expensive clothes," which is decried three verses earlier. Likewise, the Bible condones slavery; today we do not.

We read biblical texts on sexual practices selectively. For example, again from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus begins by citing Deuteronomy 24:1-3: "Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce." He then continues, "But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity (the Greek is porneia), causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery" (Matthew 5:31-32). Offering no such loophole for unchastity, Mark 10:11-12 makes the statement harsher. And yet the divorce rate in industrialized countries hovers near fifty per cent.

In order fully to understand the Bible, there must be attention given to the cultural context in which it was written…

The biblical discussion is ultimately one of how we manifest love of neighbor … thus giving the "love of neighbor" the quantitative edge over passages possibly concerned with same-sex relations). This love means we cannot demonize people. It means we have to address all humanity as in the image and likeness of the divine, with the same needs for a helper and the same hopes for a welcoming community. It means, for those of us who find the Bible to be important in our lives, we stand before it in some humility, as we try to figure out how to interpret it in our own lives…
The conservative probably will not be convinced by my suggestions…[but] both [conservatives and liberals] can recognize that the Bible should be a rock on which we stand, rather than a rock thrown at others.” New Testament scholar, Amy Jill-Levine, PhD

A message to a well known evangelical leader

On Facebook today, the Reverend Billy Graham's son (a well known opponent of marriage equality and gay rights) posted a lovely tribute to his parents. His father (Billy Graham) is still alive; his mother died a few years ago. It was actually touching to see him celebrate his parents' lifelong love and devotion. I responded on his wall as follows:
"A lovely tribute to a loving couple; I hope you will one day speak as fondly of all loving couples who are enriched by their bond and shared commitment. Same-gendering loving couples also love deeply and truly and they painfully miss their departed spouses. When we recognize that all mutually shared love is sacred, love will begin to heal our fractured world. God bless your father and his precious memories and God bless all loving, committed relationships." (dw)

Another spirited exchange

A Planned Parenthood opponent (who was responding favorably to a meme calling abortion "infanticide") said, "We need to call things as they are and stop being 'politically correct'. God says abortion is MURDER. He says gay is HOMOSEXUALITY."

The appalling ignorance merited the following response from me:
"If 'he' means the bible (which 'he' didn't write) then 'he' never said homosexuality...that word was coined in the 19th century almost 2 millennia after the last New Testament writings were written...
Instead of fighting to have bodies passed through a birth canal that many then will fight to deny food stamps, free medical care or college aid if it should be needed, maybe we should remember all the women's lives that were lost as they sought illegal and unsafe abortions before Roe v Wade.
And if abortion is really your holy crusade, it is misdirected at Planned Parenthood...only 3% of PP's services involve terminating pregnancies. The majority of their work is providing education, contraception, and cancer screening. In other words, Planned Parenthood saves lives. One may 'believe' that a fertilized egg deserves protection, but surely we can know that a living, breathing woman deserves protection. Reducing the complex and important issue to 'infanticide' is hyperbolic and intentionally misleading." (dw)

Of course I have no hope that my interjections make any real difference, except possibly to the silent seekers who desperately need a counter-narrative. Those are the ones for whom I continuously lift up a progressive voice.

A Christian in Pakistan on trial for her life

Asia Bibi is on trial for her life  (actually is appealing a previous ruling) for the "crime" of blasphemy in a theocratic state. She belongs to a minority religion (which Christianity is in Pakistan) and is accused of blaspheming the Prophet Muhammad during a quarrel. Of course that someone could be killed by the state for their religious views (or even for not holding someone else's religious views in high esteem) is horrifying. I hope that those who insist that ours be a "Christian" nation take note. Theocracy is the enemy of liberty. I want to be free to be religious (or not) and to choose the religion I hold dear; but theocracies cannot (by definition) allow such freedom, and lives are destroyed as a result. I hope our nation is always filled with spiritual and religious people, and I hope as strongly that our government is never a religious one.

My prayer for Asia Bibi and the world is: May she be safe and well and soon freed, and may there be hope and healing for all who have been tormented by the idea that only one religion is right and non-members are to be converted, shunned, or killed. Amen.

Changing the World

I was born in 1966. Shortly thereafter, the LBGT movement in the U.S. was energized as never before and began to change the world.

In 1968, the Metropolitan Community Churches were born as a movement by and with a primary affirming outreach to same-gender loving people and their allies. Today, there are several Christian and Jewish denominations that affirm the sacred value of same-gender loving people, but in 1968 such an affirmation was rare.

In 1969 the Stonewall Riots occurred and the Gay and Lesbian community would never be silenced or completely hidden ever again.

In 1970 the Unitarian Universalist Association passed a gay rights resolution and the first Gay Pride parades were held in major US cities.

In 1972 the world’s first LBGT synagogue was founded, as was PFLAG.

In 1973 homosexuality stopped being considered a mental illness by the American Psychiatric Association.

In 2000 Vermont became the first state in the U.S. to offer “civil unions”, a near-equivalent to marriage for same-gender loving people.

In 2003 Sodomy laws were struck down.

In 2004 Massachusetts became the first state to recognize same-sex marriages.

In 2011 “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was repealed.

In 2013 a key part of the so-called “Defense of Marriage Act” was defeated.

And in 2015 the U.S. became the 19^th country to have nationwide marriage equality. Marriage is now an equal right rather than a heterosexual privilege.

In my life so far, gays have gone from being considered “criminal” and “sick” to being mainstream (in the U.S.), recognized as part of the normal diversity of life, and deserving of equal protection and opportunity (even if we have not yet fully achieved equal treatment in every area and function of society).

            In addition to these hard won and well deserved gains for lesbian and gay folk, the falseness of gender binaries are being discussed openly today and we are learning that not only do we contribute to the world’s diversity, but our own community is more diverse than some ever imagined.

So much change in less than a half a century is staggering; it is little wonder that some people are frightened by the long and growing list of significant changes (a plethora of Right Wing blogs document the angst that many still have about our community). And while I have (some) compassion for those who find their impending loss of heteronormative privilege frightening, I dare not believe that we have achieved enough, that our work is done, that Queer youth no longer need positive role models, that adversaries of equality will accept the changes graciously, that more protections aren’t needed, or that LBGT people beyond our own borders don’t need allies and advocates. We have worked miracles in just a few decades, but we must not become complacent. Our achievements should remind us that we can (and must) collectively continue to change the world.

Originally written for the Florida Agenda for the bi-weekly column, "Dr. Durrell's Spiritual Prescriptions"

Only a Dying God Needs Defense

Those who feel they need to "defend" God, "God's word," God's prejudices, God's hatreds, God's hangups...seem so angry, and of course they are. Who wouldn't be angry to realize they had a God that was so puny as to need human defense?
Of course, what they seem to be angriest about is that blaming their own fears, hatreds, and prejudices on God is no longer persuasive in society at large. We are now holding them accountable for how they treat others and are not giving them a pass simply because they believe dehumanizing and demonizing others is somehow "God's will."
Perhaps their god of wrath and condemnation is on life-support and the plug will soon be pulled. But endless Hope, Compassion, Beauty, Love, and Life-force will remain, and perhaps some of them will learn to call those powerful experiences divine. (dw)

Today's Fundamentalist Confrontation

• Mary: [Read] Romans 1:26 -27. It's not judging someone as doing wrong, it's what the word of God says. If a person believes what the Bible says to be true and it says to love and be kind to one another.. .they should also believe it when it says that exchanging natural relations for unnatural relations is evil and depraved. Read all the Bible and pray for understanding and knowledge.

  
  
• And, here is my response to "Mary":

Durrell: "The word of God" is not the "words of God." 

The bible is the Hebrew canon plus 27 "books" (the so-called "New" Testament) that were included by a "vote" at a council convened by a secular government (btw, "James" and "Revelation" almost didn't make the cut). The Christian bible was "closed" hundreds of years after Jesus, and what we think it says usually has more to do with us than with the text itself. 

Slaves obey your masters, women be silent in church, women being forced to marry their rapists or their dead husband's nearest male relative, Canaanites should be destroyed, etc. are not usually held up as non-negotiables even though they are clearly in "the word of God." No one takes everything in the bible literally (or we wouldn't eat pork and shell fish, we would beat our kids, divorcees would not be permitted to remarry, and everyone would literally "tithe"); so to use one of six isolated verses to justify your own homo-hatred is in fact judgment and it is every bit as much "cherry picking" as those you accuse. 

Meanwhile, same-sex attraction and love are not "unnatural" affections for those who are gay, and the Romans passage you misquote says that God gave them their "reprobate" minds as a punishment for idolatry...gay isn't the sin in a literal reading of the text, it's the punishment for worshiping idols (and of course, many people turn "the word of God" into an idol, so you better watch out!). 

The bible has been used to justify slavery, segregation, child abuse, wars, the subjugation of women, anti-Semitism (oddly, since almost every person in the bible was Jewish), Islamaphobia, and homophobia. Quoting a verse to spread your hate and then denying that it's hate because you have a verse is circular reasoning which only reduces the bible to a weapon. You are free to be as anti-gay as you wish, but please stop blaming your prejudice on God. (dw)

Q&A: Why Didn't Jesus Say Anything Against Homosexuality?

Q: Why didn’t Jesus say anything against homosexuality? Was it because the Hebrew Scriptures were so clear about it that he didn’t feel the need to say more; did he just assume everyone thought homosexuality was wrong and his silence was basically agreement?

A: Let’s consider what the scriptures available to Jesus had to say about homosexuality.

Many people assume the story of Sodom & Gomorrah condemns homosexuality, but it doesn’t.

The prophet Ezekiel stated the sin of Sodom was inhospitality and lack of compassion and lack of concern for the poor (the Sodom & Gomorrah story includes attempted gang rape and repeated incest; there is not a single mention of same-gender love or mutual attraction...in fact, the story concludes by showing that the Moabites and Ammonites were the product of incest...the story is an ethnic slur against enemies, not a prohibition against gays).

Some will say that the Adam and Eve story where the man is told to “cleave unto his wife and become one flesh” is a statement against same-sex marriage. But the creation myths are just that...origin myths, not dictates about marriage (in fact, the Hebrew word "woman" has too often been mistranslated as "wife" but there is no ritual marriage in the story).

That leaves only two verses in Leviticus from the Hebrew texts that could be considered "homophobic". Two verses....not two stories, not two chapters, just two sentences.

Since Jesus reinterpreted, ignored, or defied ancient texts that called for killing Canaanites (he healed the Canaanite woman's daughter) or keeping a strict Sabbath (saying the Sabbath was made for us, not us for the Sabbath), or killing those caught in adultery (he rescued a woman who was about to be stoned, noticing, no doubt, that her co-adulterer somehow had escaped punishment), there is no reason to believe that Jesus would have been one to enforce two obscure and isolated verses from one book of the Torah. So, from the evidence that I can gather, I believe Jesus didn't mention homosexuality because it wasn't an issue of concern for him.

Secondarily, we know from history that eunuchs were "functionally" homosexual (that is, as slaves, they were often used for male/male sex), and Jesus in Matthew's gospel advocates for eunuchs, and (in his Jesus like way) even broadened the definition of eunuch to include those who are born sexually different.

There is another story of Jesus healing a centurion’s "servant" and the Greek word used for servant was often used to refer to a sex-slave (and a sexual relationship would explain why a Roman nobleman would seek out a Jewish healer to help his "servant"...only romance would explain the desperation of seeking out a peasant magician to help save someone).

So, not only did Jesus never condemn homosexuality (and his scriptures only mention homosexuality negatively twice and he never referenced those writings), but there are times when he seems to have embraced same-gender loving people. That proves nothing about the rightness or wrongness of same-gender love and attraction, but it does suggest that condemning it in Jesus' name is myopic and ahistoric.

The Cross Didn't Work

"The cross didn’t work. The cross wasn’t the result of God requiring human torture; the cross is a reminder that God is greater than human injustice. The cross doesn’t represent God’s plan; it represents Oppression’s failure. It didn’t silence Jesus' message nor did it destroy the movement he inspired. The vision and the hope of God’s kin-dom survived.

Sadly, the vision hasn’t been fully realized yet, but the vision still lives...Jesus’ dream of a world that looks like God would have it is still in us. And we can continue to work together to give greater expression to that dream. We can be the dreamers that dream the dream into reality, or at least, usher the reality closer than it’s ever been.

Jesus lived for that dream. He died for that dream. And the stories of resurrection tell us that the dream could not be killed. We are now Christ in the world, the resurrected and returned body of Christ, and our job is to keep dreaming of and hoping for and working toward God’s kin-dom: a world of peace and plenty, joy and justice, hope and healing.

Will you dream Jesus’ dream with me?" 

Durrell Watkins, from June 14, 2015 sermon, 

"Jesus' Dream" at Sunshine Cathedral 

Being Christian Without Obsessing on Sin or Salvation

I have a high anthropology (you are God's miracle and not God's mistake; or, if you are in the undecided column about a universal Power/Presence, then I would say you are a person of innate dignity and unlimited potential) and a low Christology (you can dig Jesus without seeing him as being uniquely divine...you can see him as a good and noble person inspiring others to live into their potential, or you can see him as letting the divine spark that is in all life shine through him - an Example rather than Exception).

Why should you care about my liberal brand of Christianity that abhors atonement theologies? Well, maybe you don't; but, if you also have difficulties with the idea that people are innately bad and can only be "fixed" (or "saved") by believing that Jesus being tortured to death was part of a divine plan to satisfy a deity who could think of no better way to be in relationship with his (sic) creation, then I do want you to know there are other faithful ways of exploring the Christian faith (without condemning any other spiritual tradition).

I honestly do not believe that Anselm (middle ages aristocrat who gave us the "Satisfaction" theory, i.e., Jesus was tortured to death to satisfy God's warped sense of righteousness) and liberation can be presented at the same time. Jesus died by crucifixion at the hands of a cruel empire; his death was brutal, unjust, unnecessary, and, as Theologian Delores Williams so wisely said, "There was nothing of God in the blood of the cross." YMMV, but that is 100% my view. Jesus died because mean people killed him, not because a "loving" deity demanded it. But, his death didn't end his purpose, his mission, his message, or his community (Resurrection!).

The miracle of Christianity isn't that Jesus (like so many other dissidents) was executed; the miracle is that his execution was meant to silence his message and end his movement and it failed. The miracle of the cross is that it didn't work. That is a message I can embrace and share. Any notion that Jesus died for me (or needed to) is not one that I could ever embrace or share. There is more than one way to be Christian. This is the good news.