"Taking The Pulpit to Pride"

There has been much concern among the GLBT community and its allies in recent years about the positive impact Pride parades and festivals still had, and was it possible they did more harm to the public perception of GLBT people than good.

Here is an essay by Rev. Rebecca Voelkel, the Institute for Welcoming Resources and Faith Work director for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force offering the view that these events are not only worth having, but they are an appropriate and effective place to celebrate one's faith.

For years now, I have donned my brightest T-shirt with my congregation’s logo, my shorts, my sensible shoes and my liturgical stole in preparation for my participation in the local Pride parade. Inevitably, the religious contingent is placed behind a local bar’s float that is playing fun, danceable music with beautiful men and women frolicking with obvious joy. When we approach, our a cappella singing of “Jesus Loves Me, This I Know,” or our chanting of “Two, Four, Six, Eight, God does not discriminate” seems to pale in comparison. But the joy and power of our presence is no less revolutionary.

It used to be, in the early history of Pride parades, that they would include the few faithful from the local Metropolitan Community Church and, perhaps, a smattering of courageous leaders from other religious traditions. This illustrated two important factors — the chasm between secular LGBT folk and religious ones, and the nascentness of the pro-LGBT religious movement. For many it was less safe to be religious in the LGBT movement than it was to be queer in religious circles. (And it was darn hard to be queer in religious circles.)

But we have seen a lot of change over the years. As I’ve participated in Pride parades in Seattle, Minneapolis, Hartford, Dallas, Atlanta and elsewhere, the religious contingent is larger every year. There are Pagans and Buddhists, Roman Catholics and Protestants, Jews, Muslims and Hindus. Recently, Affirmation, the pro-LGBT Mormon group, created a float that was a replica of a horse-drawn wagon. The proud gay men on top were clean-cut, dressed in period clothing and waving with joy to the crowd — a moment for them, that I can only imagine was a rare confluence of spiritual and sexual identities.

Although the chasm between the wider LGBT community and the religious pro-LGBT community still exists, it is smaller and there are many bridges being built to traverse it. And, although there yet remains a long way to go, much progress has been made within religious communities to change the homophobia, heterosexism and gender phobia. For example — many of the major LGBT organizations now have programs devoted to religious work. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, GLAAD, HRC and the National Black Justice Coalition have all recognized that advancing LGBT work means working with pro-LGBT movements within different religious bodies. And those pro-LGBT movements have done amazing things.

This widening and broadening within religious communities of the support for LGBT people is a critical part of our LGBT movement. In particular, almost all of the work that has been done in religious circles has involved large numbers of allies. For example, of the nearly 3 million members of welcoming and affirming Christian congregations, the vast majority of them are straight. This building the base of allies is a hugely important asset the religious movement brings to the larger LGBT movement.

Click here to read the rest of the article. It might help you take a different approach toward Pride this year.