(I was so proud to hear Fenya deliver this sermon, her very first, on Pride Sunday. She asked me for help, but my edits and suggestions were all minor tweaks; her first draft had all the structure, 99% of the wording and all of the heart. She got a few tears rolling (not just mine) and many, many compliments afterwards.)
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I want to start off by saying Happy Pride everyone! When I think of Pride, I think of happiness. I think of parades, music, beautiful colours, and I envision the joy on people’s faces as they get to celebrate being their full and authentic selves at events like the Edmonton and St. Albert pride festivals. Many people think of Pride month and Pride Sunday as a time of celebration, and while it is that, I’m glad that we also recognize that historically, Pride started as a protest. What some may not realize is that it remains a protest today. Stigma and social injustice are still a reality for members of the LGBTQ2S+ community. We are still seeing the persecution of our queer siblings across the globe, and here in our own western and North American communities, we have been seeing a startling increase in anti-LGBTQ sentiments, especially transphobic ones, over the past few years.
According to the Globe and Mail, In the US, there are now more than 650 anti-LGBTQ bills that have been introduced in state legislatures. These are designed to roll back the human and civil rights of LGBTQ communities. Currently, 18 states have passed bills or legislation banning life-saving gender-affirming care to anyone who isn’t a legal adult.And Canada is not exempt from this increase in prejudice and intolerance. Hate crimes based on sexual orientation have gone up by 60% over the past 3 years in Canada. Last August we saw protests outside of the Edmonton Public Library against a drag queen storytime, even though that same event has been well received in previous years. When Premier Smith tweeted support for Pride and inclusion earlier this month, she received numerous angry and homophobic replies. And just over 2 weeks ago, the steps of the Ponoka United Church were vandalized with tar and eggs after having been painted in rainbow colours for Pride month.
This is why pride is still a protest today. Even though we have made so much progress in legislation and policy in this country, more work still needs to be done in order for us to see a complete cultural shift away from hate and discrimination towards this community. These examples go to show that even in Canada, being an open member of the LGBTQ2S+ community still comes with a price, and that allyship - like the kind provided by St Albert United Church - can still be met with backlash as well. I think back to a few months ago when some very angry people interrupted bible study here at the church, arguing that our pride flag contained a coded endorsement of pedophilia.
Unfortunately, so much of this injustice and discrimination is being done in the name of Christianity. We hear so-called “clobber passages” from the bible that people often use in order to argue that certain sexual and gender identities are blasphemous, or don’t or shouldn’t exist. These verses are almost exclusively from the Old Testament, usually taken out of context, and always overlook the larger overall message of the New Testament: to love one another.
When we review the reading we heard today from Acts, we hear that God treated the outsiders the same as the insiders, and didn’t require them to change who they were in order to receive the Holy Spirit. It wasn’t God who wanted the pagans to change, it was other people. It feels as though the apostles and leaders wanted the pagans to conform to their way of life in order to be a part of the community. But Paul and Barnabas understand that it isn’t external characteristics like circumcision that makes someone a Christian, it’s about what they believe, and who they are inside.
In the New Revised Standard Version’s translation of this text, Acts chapter 15 verse 9 says “and in cleansing their hearts by faith he has made no distinction between them and us.”. God makes no distinction between them and us to the point that there is no “them”, and as a result, “us” means everyone. Considering a group of people as “them” automatically others them. It automatically labels them as someone who belongs outside of the community.
This story from Acts feels like a lesson on recognizing that everyone is a part of our community, and that it’s not up to us to decide who’s in and who’s out. It’s about people wanting to become part of the Christian community, but in today’s context we can look at it from the perspective of an even bigger community, the community of humankind. Because at this point, it feels like not everyone is interested in treating our LGBTQ2S+ siblings as human beings, who deserve the right to live free from discrimination and violence.
But God has made all of us in God’s own image, and God is everything! (which is why I use lots of different pronouns to refer to God!) God isn’t binary, God isn’t just male and female, they are everything in between and outside of that binary as well. God is cisgender, transgender and intersex, heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, and everything else! God isn’t just the “boy” colours or the “girl” colours, she is the whole rainbow. God transcends gender and sexuality; who are we to put what God’s image can look like into a box? Who are we to limit what it means for God to create someone in their own image? And if we consider God to not be exclusively male or female, why should we consider people that way?
In our scripture reading today, we hear that God treated the pagans the same as the Jewish people who believed in Him. Who are we to go against what God has done? We don’t get to decide for God who is in and who is out, and we don’t get to decide for God what people have to do in order to be part of the community or to be accepted by God herself. Let’s let God be God, and take a moment to understand that he has not ever called us to cast hate onto others. Our job has never been to decide who does and does not get to receive our love and acceptance, our job has been to accept and love each and every beautiful person that God has created.
God is love, and made us with the intent to love whoever we love and be whoever we are. When people try to out-God God by discriminating against the LGBTQ2S+ community, it keeps this love from happening, it keeps others from receiving that love, keeps them from feeling God’s love, and keeps them from feeling safe to love who they want to love or even from loving themselves.
Transgender author Katie Leone has some very insightful points in her article titled God Made Me Transgender, And God Does Not Make Mistakes, and I’d like to share a portion of it today.
“God doesn’t make mistakes.”...“being transgender does not mean that I was born in the wrong body. Being transgender means that God has placed me in the body that looks like one gender while I identify as being another. It is neither right nor wrong that I am a female in a male body, as much as it is neither right nor wrong that I am six foot tall and left handed. These things just are.
Katie’s affirmation of faith points to why it is so critical to remind those who use scripture to shun or discriminate against our LGBTQ siblings that they are not the only voice within the Christian community; that there are Christians who oppose using scripture to hurt and not to heal. And we see this mentioned in our passage today as well. The Reverend Dr. Davis Chappel notes that after Paul and Barnabas report on what happened on their journey, it is written that some of the Pharisees objected to the pagans not becoming circumcised. In other words, the group that objected did not represent the whole, and were speaking for themselves rather than on behalf of all those of the faith. The same holds true today. Those who are opposed to the acceptance of the queer community do not speak for all Christians. Which I’m assuming you already know…because you’re here, on pride Sunday, in the “gay church on the hill” that flies the rainbow flag right over their door! Talk about preaching to the choir!
It might be a hard truth for some Christians to swallow, but God in fact made people who are transgender.
The amount of data leaves no doubt that transgender people are well aware of their situation even before the concept of sexual orientation enters the mix. When a Christian says that being transgender is a sin or an abomination, they are really trying to tell God that He made a mistake and that flies in the face of all that they say they believe.” …
…“It is common for people to question why and to act out of their own frame of reference. We want things to operate in ways that we understand and process. The problem is that we are not omnipotent, we do not have all knowledge, and we operate more out of assumption than we do on fact. Though I would like to understand why I was born transgender, why God would put me in one vessel instead of another, it is likely that I will never understand until I am in His presence.”...
…“God made me transgender for a reason, and when I try to fight against my own nature is when I leave the path that he had laid out for me.
Likewise, good meaning people want transgender people to conform to their assumption of what God intended for their lives. Since some cannot comprehend what being transgender is, they have a hard time accepting that it is ordained by God. Instead of aiding transgender people along life’s journey, some try to deter them down a path that the Lord never intended them to travel. Since we do not understand why God made a person transgender, who are we to question?
God doesn’t make mistakes.
God made me transgender; that is the way that it is. He did not make a mistake, for it was in His plans that I am who I am.”
Following a lot of personal reflection, I came out to my family and my now-fiancé Bobby a couple of years ago as a bisexual woman. As a recently out member of the LGBTQ2S+ community myself, I am extremely blessed to have grown up in a church where I knew that I would be accepted regardless of my sexuality, and I have never lived with the fear of being rejected by my faith community because of it.
But we are the exception. Far too many individuals have experienced so much hate in the name of God.
We as an affirming faith community have the opportunity to have our voices heard too, and to share the message with all LGBTQ2S+ folks that there are Christians who love and support them for being exactly who they are. That being a Christian and being an ally (or a full member of the LGBTQ2S+ community) is not mutually exclusive. That we believe they can be who they are, and do not have to change anything about themselves in order to be accepted by the Christian community or the rest of humanity, for that matter.
Pride is still a protest today, and we as an affirming ministry are part of the movement to continue this path forward towards justice, freedom, and safety for people of all sexualities and gender identities.
So let’s advocate for our LGBTQ2S+ siblings across this country and across the globe. When people say “there are only two genders” or that transphobia, homophobia, racism and discrimination don’t exist anymore, call them out on their disinformation! Put those pronouns in your email signature! Let’s fly our Progress Pride flags, and attend pride marches (and parades) and drag queen storytimes to show everyone that we are here to support and love this community.
Now, I understand that some of these things might take you out of your comfort zones, but I encourage you to embrace that discomfort. Take a moment to reflect on why you might be uncomfortable, and welcome it instead as an opportunity to grow.
Let’s take a stand even when it isn’t easy…especially when it isn’t easy. And let’s let God be God; let’s let God be the one to create humankind in his own image; let’s let God be everything they can possibly be, limitless and expansive, the holy mystery that is wholly love.
Thanks be to God.
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READINGS
(Written by Linda Hutchinson for use on June 10, 2018 at Sydenham Street United Church, Kingston, Ont. Posted on the United Church of Canada website. Used with Permission.)Acts 15:5–13
The scripture we have chosen for this morning is from Acts 15 in The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language. This reading is a call to “embrace those who are marginalized.” In other words, “to be radically inclusive.”
In the chapters just prior to the 15th chapter, Peter, a devout Jewish person, has a vision of a large sheet coming down from heaven containing all sorts of animals, many of them considered unclean and therefore not to be eaten according to Jewish law. But Peter hears God say very clearly, “Go to it, Peter; kill and eat.” When Peter objects that he cannot eat meat that is not kosher, God says, “If God says it is OK, it is OK!” This happens three times. With the help of others, Peter discerns that God was saying that the Jewish God was for everybody including the Gentiles—non-Jewish people who were, by law, considered unclean. With this background, we come to Acts 15 where, in a church in Antioch, Peter and Barnabas are reporting on their visits with the non-Jewish people.
Acts 15:5–13.
When they got to Jerusalem, Paul and Barnabas were graciously received by the whole church, including the apostles and leaders. They reported on their recent journey and how God had used them to open things up to the outsiders. Some Pharisees stood up to say their piece. They had become believers, but continued to hold to the hard party line of the Pharisees. “You have to circumcise the pagan converts,” they said. “You must make them keep the Law of Moses.”
The apostles and leaders called a special meeting to consider the matter. The arguments went on and on, back and forth, getting more and more heated. Then Peter took the floor: “Friends, you well know that from early on God made it quite plain that he wanted the pagans to hear the Message of this good news and embrace it—and not in any secondhand or roundabout way, but firsthand, straight from my mouth. And God, who can’t be fooled by any pretense on our part but always knows a person’s thoughts, gave them the Holy Spirit exactly as he gave him to us. He treated the outsiders exactly as he treated us, beginning at the very center of who they were and working from that center outward, cleaning up their lives as they trusted and believed him.
“So why are you now trying to out-god God, loading these new believers down with rules that crushed our ancestors and crushed us, too? Don’t we believe that we are saved because the Master Jesus amazingly and out of sheer generosity moved to save us just as he did those from beyond our nation? So what are we arguing about?”
There was dead silence. No one said a word. With the room quiet, Barnabas and Paul reported matter-of-factly on the miracles and wonders God had done among the other nations through their ministry. The silence deepened; you could hear a pin drop.
Listen for Peter’s words as we might imagine them in our theme today:
"Friends, you well know that, from early on, God made it quite plain that God wanted members of the LGBTQ community to hear the message of this good news and embrace it—not in any secondhand or roundabout way, but firsthand, straight from my mouth. And God, who can't be fooled by any pretense on our part but always knows a person's thoughts, gave them the Holy Spirit exactly as God gave the Spirit to us. God treated the outsiders exactly as God treated us.”
We are grateful for the wisdom revealed in these words of scripture, in each other and in ourselves. Amen.
Non-Scriptural Reading:
(Written by Keaton St. James on January 13, 2017.)
when he touches you for the first time,
you will be soft as the inside of a heart
& you will be burning, not in the way of fire
but in the way of dusk, your body so heavy
your soul reaches for the sky–
you expect him to arrive in a specter
of pink marble & gold paint, but his lips
are chapped, his brown hands humanly
blistered. he says, my dear son,
& just like that the words tumble
peach-ripe off your tongue:
my fears are so sharp god i worry
they’ve become fangs & i don’t know
how to breathe in the mornings & god
what if they hurt me & oh what
will be done with my soul my soul my–
he cups your face in his palms. his skin
is blood-hot & he smells of rosemary.
my wondrous man, i can feel each
vibration of the electrons in your atoms
right now. when i built this immense
universe from helium & nitrogen i was
holding the shape of your true name
in my mouth. i am your buckler; i am
your wingbones, & you are a kingdom
of kindness. what need have you of fear,
when there is love for you here
more abundant than all the stars.
this blossoming of yours is mine too.
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