Category Archives: Church leaders
Meditation on a Theme
Constance Merritt’s brilliantly crafted villanelle has great resonance at this moment we are living in. It invites reflection that will empower us for the work of resistance and renewal. Her poem teaches us that we must create a world …
Becoming Love Medicine
I stood there in the Norman Manley Airport of Kingston, Jamaica. My small 11-year-old palm connected to my lanky brown hand held tightly on to my mother’s full warm palm center. What do you do when your home and …
For Freedom’s Sake: Ending Child Sexual Abuse in Black Churches
I am a freedom fighter, writer, minister, scholar, and survivor of child sexual abuse. I am also the founder of Children of Combahee, a newfound project through the Just Beginnings Collaborative that mobilizes against child sexual abuse in Black church …
Treading Water: The United Methodist Church’s Latest Plea
As I watched the business of the 2016 General Conference of the United Methodist Church, my mind flashed back to my childhood. I remembered being a lifeguard. I used to teach people how to tread water. This was …
Some LGBTQ people don’t or can’t embrace Christianity
God’s love is for everyone; Christianity is not, and that is okay. As people who believe that Christianity has room for the LGBTQ community, we can be zealous about our efforts to win people to our side. We want people …
Meet me at the intersection of love & justice
Contrary to popular belief, there is power and hope at the intersection of race and LGBTQ life. As a Black, same-gender loving woman who is a pastor, Bishop and activist, I can solidly say that my wife, children, grandchildren, and …
The Black church: Bold and bad enough to accept and affirm
The Black Church has been a strong pillar of the community. I pray that it will have the courage not only to accept, but affirm its gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender children. The recent VH1 segment, Out in Hip Hop: …
CeCe McDonald: Finding Myself, Finding My Spirituality
Crucial in my journey was this learning: Our communities’ internalized teachings and fear mongering tactics are inflicted upon black bodies to keep us oppressed. We too often uphold traditionalism and bible binaries without interrogating our own internalized hatred (racism, homophobia, …
Maybe Same Sex Marriage IS God’s Will
We are not the same America. We are not the same America that we were 20 or even 10 years ago. For decades, civil liberties framed the discourse about lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) justice. Now marriage, a union …
Praying While Black
Even as the Confederate flag is removed from the South Carolina Statehouse grounds, shock waves are still echoing off the walls of our institutions after the June 17 Charleston Massacre. The funerals are over and people will carry on, but …