Date:         Tue, 19 Jul 1994 22:55:36 -0600

Sat. & Sun, July 16th & 17th, 1994


Colorado Springs, CO -- At sunrise, Saturday morning, city employees
began to erect a bright, orange, net fence to protect Mel White's Fast
For Understanding site in front of James Dobson's Focus on the Family
world headquarters.  For three hours the previous afternoon, on a local
Limbaugh-like talk show, representatives from Focus and from Colorado For
Family Values, the group that authored Colorado's unconsitutional
Amendment 2, had been protesting Dr. White's fast, questioning Dr.
White's motives, and denying the charges that both organizations were
misleading the public with their false and inflammatory rhetoric against
gay and lesbian Americans.  More threats and various calls to march on
the site "to take care of those creeps" were made by the angry listeners.
Early Saturday morning, all roads leading to Mr. Dobson's
multi-million-dollar facility were blocked.  Just one lane of traffic
was left open for Coloradans in solidarity with Dr. White's fast who
would be arriving for the 12:00 noon Pro-Family Rally. Police officers
wearing bullet-proof vests were parked in place or patrolling the grounds by
foot, on horseback, and in at least a dozen squad cars.

"I didn't think anybody would come," Dr. White confessed as he sat in the
Ground Zero RV watching dozens of Coloradans make their way through the
police barricades and up the hill to the fast site just yards from the
Focus "Welcome Center."  He went on to explain that just the night
before, only 150 people showed up for the Pride Film Festival's screening
of "Living Proof," a prize-winning documentary on courageous and loving
people with AIDS.  "More than 600 people had purchased advance tickets,"
White continued, "but because of the wild charges and angry threats
cluttering the airwaves, people called Ground Zero's office cofessing
they were afraid to attend.  And that was in a public auditorium in
downtown Colorado Springs," White added. "I was expecting only a handful
of folk to attend the Pro-Family rally here at Focus."

But by noon, this reporter counted almost 200 Coloradans, straight and
gay together, walking up the grassy hillside towards the fast site. They
came alone and in family units, adults and children, hand-in-hand,
carrying flowers or balloons as a sign of their peaceful approach to
building understanding.  They wore brightly colored t-shirts or waved
hand-made signs with their messages of reconcilliation:  "We are family,
too,"  "Straight but not narrow," "I love my gay son. . .lesbian
daughter," "Better gay than grumpy," "Jesus loves us, this we know!"

The local sponsors of Mel's fast, including Ground Zero, P-FLAG (Parents,
Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays), La Quida (the Latino Caucus)
and Pike's Peak Metropolitan Community Church were surprised and pleased
when several TV camera crews arrived to video tape their pro-family
rally. Lyn Boundreaux, Betty Lynn Mahaffey and friends sang and played
guitars.  Romanovsky and Phillips, gay life-partners whose best-selling
duet albums have led to sold-out performances across the nation, called
to dedicate their song, "Love Is All It Takes," to Mel White and his Fast
For Understanding.  The song was played before White spoke.  Hosted by
Bobby Mone, the rally's other speakers included  Franklin Whitworth,
Altresa Williams of the Colorado Springs Minority Council, Cahuilla
Margaret Red Elk of the American Indian Movement, Gerda Fletcher, a
P-Flag mon, Joe Zuniga, America's 1992 "Soldier of the Year," who was
discharged for being gay, and Micheal Busse, a founder of Exodus, the
movement that would "cure gays," which he now rejects as "a well meaning
but terrible deceit."

End of Part 1 of 3

[The additional parts may not be ready for posting until July 21.  If you
haven't found or received the remaining parts after the 21st, send a
request for them to cendo@spot.colorado.edu]