Later this summer three predominantly black Bay Area churches will try out a new Bible study course aimed at fostering LGBT acceptance.
Called the Umoja Project, after the Swahili word that means unity, its goal is to help African American faith leaders provide pastoral care to their LGBT parishioners.
The congregations have agreed to test the five-week curriculum in August. In the East Bay, Richmond's Sojourner Truth Presbyterian Church and Berkeley's New Revelations Community Church are on board, while in San Francisco City of Refuge agreed to take part.
The program is the brainchild of openly gay Reverend Roland Stringfellow, 42, who directs the Coalition of Welcoming Congregations, a program of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies in Religion and Sexuality on the campus of Pacific School of Religion and works with California Faith for Equality.
"The purpose of this Bible study, the main point is this is not going to argue the clobber passages �" those passages normally used to speak against same-sex activities. That is not what this is about. The Bible study really focuses on affirmative passages that highlight relationships," said Stringfellow, who will be a community grand marshal in Sunday's Pride Parade.
Stringfellow received $25,000 in funding to develop the course material and a corresponding film from the Horizons Foundation. Once the material is finalized, Stringfellow plans to travel throughout California starting in October to sign up what he referred to as "tipping point congregations" willing to take part.
"A tipping point congregation has in a particular community a black pastor who is very prominent in his or her community. If you get them on board there are other congregations that will say if such and such is involved then this must be good," said Stringfellow, who had a private marriage ceremony with his husband, Jerry Peterson, last summer in Indiana and is hopeful they will be able to legally wed soon in California.
The concept for the Bible study evolved out of a lunch Stringfellow organized in the summer of 2010 with five black ministers. The quintet was "undecided," he said, about marriage equality and LGBT inclusion in their congregations.
"They came and we had open and honest dialogue. Many of them have openly gay parishioners. However, the question the majority of them have is how do I provide pastoral care for my parishioners but still be true to what the scripture teaches on homosexuality," said Stringfellow. "That helped me to craft this Bible study to answer that question. I really, honestly see it as a positive challenge."
The very fact the ministers were willing to discuss the issue with him is a step in the right direction, said Stringfellow.
"For some people them even meeting with me, an openly gay minister, is a huge step. If we can get them to not condemn or take a side, that is a huge step," he said.
Bishop Yvette Flunder, 55, an ordained minister of the United Church of Christ and senior pastor of City of Refuge UCC, believes the Umoja Project can also benefit LGBT affirming churches such as her own. Flunder, who is African American and identifies as a same-gender loving woman, said LGBT parishioners should to be educated on the subject.
"Primarily, I want my folks to have some real basic understanding of what our struggle is really about. You cannot do justice work if you are not really informed," said Flunder, who is this year's Lifetime Achievement Pride grand marshal and will be marching with Stringfellow in the parade.
Flunder is the founder and presiding bishop of the Fellowship, which she started a decade ago to unite urban LGBT affirming churches. To mark its anniversary, Flunder is changing the name to the Fellowship of Affirming Ministries.
Stringfellow, who is already licensed by both UCC and the Metropolitan Community Churches, will be ordained this summer into Flunder's ministry alongside 28 other new ministers, some from Mexico and various African countries. Six new churches are also joining, bringing the number of member congregations and affiliate ministries to 120, she said.
"These are inner city churches and ministers who are either LGBT or affirming of LGBT people," she said. "Roland has done extraordinary work in preparing for the ministry and in preparing to engage in the fight for freedom."
She believes the new Bible study classes will be successful because Stringfellow is behind it.
"What will be critical is the messenger. Not the message but who will teach it" she said.
Fight for equality
For Flunder and Stringfellow, watching California's fight for marriage equality, particularly the losing battle in 2008 against the same-sex marriage ban known as Proposition 8, opened their eyes to the need for faith leaders to become more engaged. While the anti-gay backers of the measure wrapped their arguments in religious terminology and recruited Mormon and Catholic leaders into the fight, LGBT groups were not as proactive in utilizing LGBT faith people and straight allies during the campaign.
"I believe that what was missing from the struggle for marriage equality was the opportunity to meet religion with religion. This was a religious fight, for lack of a better word to say it," said Flunder. "We were conspicuously absent and, in many ways, not invited to be a part of the struggle. I think religious people speak religion and we needed to be able to sit at the table with folks and talk about justice and equality and civil rights in religious language."
Their exclusion was hardly surprising, said Flunder, considering the anti-gay messages LGBT people have heard promulgated by various religious leaders.
"In many ways, gay folks who survived religion often don't want to have anything to do with it," she said. "Even our own people forget there are tons of gay and lesbian people in religious institutions, whether they are undercover or not, you see."
Having been hired in 2008 to promote LGBT inclusion in faith communities, Stringfellow used the Prop 8 fight to his advantage.
"I quickly realized this is the venue to talk about LGBT equality with faith communities because everybody was talking about marriage equality, whether you were for or against it in California, especially with congregations of color," he said. "This has been the watershed issue to open the door to have these dialogues. It is on the evening news; people are talking about it in the church."
He hopes to demonstrate through the Bible study course that the marriage equality fight is part of the civil rights movement and benefits families of color, not just wealthy gay white men.
"You are having a different shift of how gays and lesbians are being viewed in the church. It is being changed from sexually permissive individuals into people in loving, committed relationships with children," said Stringfellow. "It is hard for people to wrap their brains around. I hope the Bible study and film ushers in this understanding. We are in your churches, we are in your community."