Camille is a twentysomething working in the LGBT nonprofit industry. She runs an LGBT news blog at gaywrites.org.
This week, NPR published a profile of Taylor Muse, the leader of an Austin-based indie rock band that got their start when they left Christianity. Now, members of Quiet Company pride themselves on music that encourages questioning, or even rejecting, faith and opting for a life of Humanism instead. Muse, 31, told NPR his adolescence revolved around his Southern Baptist church in Texas. But after he moved away, got married, and discovered Kurt Vonnegut, among other big life changes, he realized he couldn’t participate in Christianity anymore. Read more
A United Methodist minister has been suspended from his position for presiding over a same-sex marriage back in 2007 — his son’s. Rev. Frank Schaefer, the pastor at the Zion United Methodist Church of Iona in Pennsylvania, officiated his son Tim Schaefer’s wedding to another man in Massachusetts in 2007. Marriage equality had already been legalized in the state, but Methodist doctrine does not permit same-sex marriage (though it does allow LGBT people to worship in churches — gee, thanks). Read more
As a newly adopted Illinoisan who is also super gay, I was overjoyed when my favorite state finally passed marriage equality earlier this month. This was long time coming for Illinois, historically one of the nation’s more liberal states, and many legislators and citizens alike were getting antsy and jealous as states around us began passing their own laws at a record pace. When the votes were finally counted, I had no qualms about running tearfully through my workplace to tell everyone the great news that minute. That’s why it bums me out that, almost immediately, Christian groups started flailing left and right about how terrible same-sex marriage is for Illinois. For one, Bishop Thomas John Paprocki of the Diocese of Springfield is actually holding an exorcism tomorrow, the day the marriage bill will be signed, as a means of condemning same-sex marriage. So there’s that. But while some folks might write the bishop off as a little bit extreme, people may just listen to Francis Cardinal George, the Archbishop of Chicago, who found it necessary to pen a letter to the state’s Catholics about why marriage equality is so bad. Unfortunately for him, like most pieces of Catholic PR lately, his letter doesn’t actually make much sense. Rather, it proves that now is exactly the right time to pass marriage equality in Illinois and hopefully nationwide. Let go piece by piece, shall we? Read more
Myrtle Grove Christian School in Wilmington, North Carolina says its “students thrive in a nurturing Christian environment,” but apparently that only applies to straight students with a mommy and a daddy. A new school policy, announced Wednesday via a letter sent to parents, reserves the right to deny admission to any student whose “home life” opposes or counters biblical principles — for example, any practice or support of homosexuality. Here’s the portion of the official statement from the school barring any child with gay “influences” from attending. First, the “moral reasoning” behind such a decision: Read more
Conservative pundit Pat Robertson this week had shocking words for a mother who wrote to him distressed because her 16-year-old son had just come out as gay. First reported by Right Wing Watch, on an episode of “The 700 Club,” Robertson suggested that the parent of a gay son should try to find out if her child was gay due to molestation. Robertson answers the woman’s question by essentially suggesting that her son is gay because he was sexually abused, one of the most common — and most harmful — myths perpetuated about LGBT youth by anti-gay religious extremists. Read more
