Date: Mon, 26 Apr 1999 00:46:34 -0400 From: Chris Ambidge Subject: *Integrator* volume 99-2 INTEGRATOR, the newsletter of Integrity/Toronto volume 99-2, issue date 1999 04 21 copyright 1999 Integrity/Toronto. The hard-copy version of this newsletter carries the ISSN 0843-574X Integrity/Toronto Box 873 Stn F Toronto ON Canada M4Y 2N9 == contents == [99-2-1] DECIDING ON THE PROPER QUESTION / A Grateful Response to Dr Reginald Stackhouse, by Eric Beresford [99-2-2] BORN IN SILENCE / A Reflection on the Murder of Matthew Shepard by the Rt Rev Steven Charleston [99-2-3] A WOUNDED PROPHET: Henri Nouwen / Sister Thelma-Anne ssjd's regular column "Ways of Prayer" [99-2-4] THE MURDER OF BILLY JACK GAITHER [99-2-5] PILGRIMAGE TO SYLACAUGA / Marshall Johnson, of Integrity/Alabama, visited the murder site of Billy Jack Gaither ======== [99-2-1] DECIDING ON THE PROPER QUESTION A Grateful Response to Dr Reginald Stackhouse by the Rev Eric Beresford From where I sit, I have to confess that I am happy when anybody suggests rephrasing the debates concerning the Church's pastoral response to gay and lesbian persons and their relationships. Such a contribution is particularly welcome when it comes from a person as widely respected as Dr. Reginald Stackhouse. (see *Integrator* article [99-1-4]) It is surely obvious by now that a lot of what has passed for debate has consisted of different parties talking past each other. Each side repeats the questions that they have found helpful and illuminative. All too often, however, those same questions do not appear to address the concerns of those with whom we claim to be in conversation. Indeed, so complete has the incomprehension been, that I would suggest that until recently there has been no real debate at all. Rather what happened in the mid 1970's when this topic appeared on the church's agenda was that each side dug the trenches from which it has tossed occasional rhetorical grenades at the other side. What I find helpful about the article that appeared in the last *Integrator* then, is that it draws attention to the need to rephrase this debate if we are to make any progress. Of course, this is a task that is easier named than accomplished. Part of the problem is that we need to achieve some consensus about what the questions should be before we can begin to answer them. Indeed, put this way, it is surely obvious that the discussion cannot proceed unless we do two things. First, we must answer the questions that are put to us by those with whom we disagree in a way that shows that we have understood the reasons for the position they have taken. Second, we must frame our questions in such a way that it becomes clear to those with whom we disagree why their position is inadequate even if taken on its own terms. This approach assumes that there is in fact some common ground, an assumption echoed in various recent initiatives including the Diocese of Toronto's own dialogue group. An interesting example from a more partisan perspective might be the Saint Andrew's Day Statement from England which addresses itself to, "all who do not intend a decisive break with orthodox Christianity." I believe that this statement, and Dr. Stackhouse's recent article, despite their different perspectives, suffer from a similar problem. In both cases there is an attempt to redefine the debate outside the context of actual engagement with those with whom we disagree. I think that one result of this is that the alternatives are defined in such a manner that conversation partners will not recognize a fair and accurate statement of their position amongst the alternatives proffered. Further, to define the question is to shape the answer. For example, many would argue that the Saint Andrew's Day Statement includes claims that are questionable on the basis of the "biblical orthodoxy" that it seeks as the common ground for debate. These claims so limit the debate in advance that it would be foolish for anybody who disagreed with the authors of the statement to enter into the debate on those terms. The shaping of the questions for discussion, as much as the discussion itself, must take place in the dialogue. Turning to the article by Dr. Stackhouse, I think we would all prefer to focus on our "common human characteristics" rather than "depravity." The difficulty is that the alternatives Dr. Stackhouse offers us do not really capture the differences between the two sides. I know of no serious participant in the current discussions who believes that our sexuality is, "part of original sin," rather than a "part of our being created." To understand createdness and fallenness as opposed to each other in this way is unhelpful because in the classic use of the doctrines of creation and the fall, createdness and fallenness are not separable in such a neat bi-polar way. The more common claim has been that all humanness shares in the goodness of creation *and* in the distortions of the fall at one and the same time, in all of its aspects. We may of course disagree with this claim, but it is clearly different from either of the alternatives that Dr. Stackhouse offers us. Rephrasing the question in the way he suggests is therefore unlikely to bring about a new rapprochement. Having said that, most serious participants believe that certain forms of sexual expression are not merely distorted in practice, but are, by their very nature, inappropriate. Part of the debate consists in an attempt to understand which forms of sexual expression we take to be inappropriate in this fundamental way and why. For me, this is where the first opportunity to reshape the current debate arises, for the grounds offered in the scriptures for making such a distinction in many ways appear quite odd to us. The conclusions reached are sometimes unexpected, even unacceptable. Which of us would think it appropriate to require a woman to marry the man who has raped her? How many of us would suggest that masturbation is more intrinsically disordered than rape? What quickly becomes apparent is that we all share perspectives that are distinctively modern and which tend to distort our reading of the scriptures. This is particularly true if our approach to reading the scriptures does not alert us to the assumptions and presuppositions that we bring to the task. We can't simply apply the scriptures to homosexual relationships unless we are clear about the differences between our understandings of the appropriate settings for sexual intimacy, and the rather different perspectives that we find in the scriptures. Then we can look at the implications of the new context within which we read the biblical narrative for our understanding of a whole variety of relationships, including faithful, committed, gay and lesbian relationships. Shifting the question away from sexuality to marriage, as Dr. Stackhouse suggests, will not help us clarify the discussion unless we have first decided that same sex unions are *de facto* marriage. Actually, this is a matter for debate both within the gay community and outside it, and on both sides of the issue. Finally, Dr. Stackhouse suggests that we should be dealing with the church rather than ordination. This assumes that there are only two alternatives to a full affirmation of the sexual relationships of gay and lesbian people, either (a) the English House of Bishops model, where what is sauce for the laity is quite clearly not sauce for the clergy, or (b) the virulent condemnation of all such relationships. Like Dr. Stackhouse, I too think the position adopted by the House of Bishops of the Church of England is unstable and finally unsustainable. However, I also think that the report of the bishops' makes it clear that they were not adopting a two-tier ethic. More importantly, I don't really think we should be talking about either ordination or the church. We should be talking about whether the relationships of gay and lesbian people are vehicles of grace in such a way that they might be blessed in a manner analogous to heterosexual marriage. If we conclude they are not, I think it is unlikely that we as a church will move to ordain those in such relationships. If, however, we do bless such relationships, I cannot see the grounds in Anglican polity upon which we would then want to deny ordination. The issue here is not to do with how we frame our questions, but the order we ask them in. Dr. Stackhouse has given us a helpful if provocative account of where he would start this discussion from. In my view its greatest strength is its tone. The need at this point is to begin a process where we listen afresh to the ways in which our different experiences have shaped how we hear and seek to be faithful to the scriptures. It's as we do that together that our questions will be reshaped, and new possibilities will emerge. = = = {Author Box:} ERIC BERESFORD is Consultant for Ethics and Interfaith Relations for the Anglican Church of Canada. Before coming to this position he lived in Montreal where he worked as a parish priest and then taught ethics in the Faculty of Religious Studies at McGill. In his work for the national church he provides staff support to committees and other groups working on ethical issues including those that relate to human sexuality. ======== [99-2-2] BORN IN SILENCE A Reflection on the Murder of Matthew Shepard Bishop Charleston, chaplain at Trinity Colledge, Hartford Connecticut, wrote this reflection on the murder of Matthew Shepard in October 1998. It is addressed to the Trinity college community, but it speaks to all of us. + + + + + I saw on the news today that Matthew Shepard died. He was the 22 year old man from Wyoming who was beaten and tortured and left to die for no reason other than he was a homosexual. This tragic murder has raised a national debate again, the kind of periodic soul-searching our society goes through whenever a crime of hate startles us into awareness. The burning of Black churches, the bombing of innocent people, the death of a shy young man from Wyoming: these events suddenly shake us out of complacency and remind us that fear, prejudice and rage are always the shadows just beyond the light of our reason. And so people suddenly start to speak out. There are voices of outrage and grief. Voices of sorrow and demands to know why such a thing could happen. And predictibly, there are also defensive voices: the governor of Wyoming trying to explain why his state has no laws to protect people from hate crimes and the leadership of what is called the Christian "right wing" trying to explain why their national ads against homosexuality don't influence people to commit such violence against gays and lesbians. In the days to come, these many voices will fill our media and the cultural consciousness it imprints until we are once again lulled into the more familiar patterns of our lives, dozing off as a nation until the next tragedy rings the alarm of despair. As the chaplain for our own community, I would like to invite us all to consider Matthew's death in another way. Not through the clamour or denials, not through the shouts or cries of anger: but rather, through the silence of his death, the silence of that young man hanging on his cross of pain alone in the emptiness of a Wyoming night, the silence that ultimately killed him as surely as the beatings he endured. Silence killed Matthew Shepard. The silence of Christians who know that our scriptures on homosexuality are few and murky in interpretation and far outweighed by the words of a savior whose only comment on human relationships was to call us to never judge but only to love. The silence of well meaning educated people who pretend to have an enlightened view of homosexuality while quietly tolerating the abuse of gays and lesbians in their own communities. The silence of our elected officials who have the authority to make changes but prefer to count votes. The silence of the majority of "straight" Americans who shift uncomfortably when confronted by the thought that gays and lesbians may be no different from themselves, save for the fact that they are walking targets for bigotry, disrespect, cheap humor, and apparently, of murder. Crimes of hate may live in shouts of rage, but they are born in silence. Here at Trinity, I hope we will all listen to that silence. Before we jump to decry Matthew's senseless death or before we seek to rationalize it with loud disclaimers: I hope we will just hear the silence. A young man's heart has ceased to beat. Hear the silence of that awful truth. It is the silence of death. It is the silence that descends on us like a shroud. At Trinity, as in Wyoming, we are men and women surrounded by the silence of our own fear. Our fear of those who are different. Our fear of being identified with the scapegoat. Our fear of taking an unpopular position for the sake of those who can not stand alone. Our fear of social and religious change. Our fear comes in many forms but it always comes silently. A whispered joke. A glance to look away from the truth. A quick shake of the head to deny any complicity in the pain of others. These silent acts of our own fear of homosexuality are acted out on this campus every day just as they are acted out every day in Wyoming. Through silence, we give ourselves permission to practice what we pretend to abhor. With silence, we condemn scores of our neighbors to live in the shadows of hate. In silence, we observe the suffering of any group of people who have been declared expendable by our society. As a person of faith, I will listen, as we all will, to the many voices which will eulogize Matthew Shepard. I will carry that part of our national shame on my shoulders. But I will also listen to the silence which speaks much more eloquently still to the truth behind his death. I will listen and I will remember. And I will renew my resolve never to allow this silence to have the last word. Not for Matthew. Not for gay men or lesbian women. Not for any person in our society of any color or condition who has been singled out for persecution. Not in my church. Not in my nation. Not in Wyoming. And not at Trinity College. == == == {Author Box} THE RT REV STEVEN CHARLESTON is now chaplain at Trinity College in Hartford. An article of his, "Passion and Dialogue in the Church" appeared in *Integrator 94-2*, when he was Bishop of Alaska. ======== [99-2-3] A WOUNDED PROPHET Ways of Prayer by Sister Thelma-Anne ssjd Today is Maundy Thursday, and I am beginning to read a book I wish I had discovered at the beginning of Lent. It is *Walk With Jesus: Stations of the Cross*, by Henri Nouwen. I am arrested by his words in the preface, "I have written these meditations with my eyes on Jesus who wants to break down the walls between the Third World and ourselves, the poor and the rich, the healthy and the sick, those far away and those close by, those who suffer in their bodies and those who suffer in their innermost being. In the heart of Jesus there is no place for anxious comparisons between the degrees and depths of human suffering. Little is accomplished by wondering who suffers more than who, and whose pain is the worst. Jesus died and rose for all people, with all their differences, so that all could be lifted up with him into the splendor of God." As I read, I am aware of an all too common omission. Nouwen seems to mention everyone he can think of except guess who? I would have put this down to the blind spot shared by so many otherwise insightful and compassionate Christian writers, had I not read, a few weeks ago in the Church Times ,some excerpts from a new biography, which revealed Nouwen's lifelong struggle to accept himself as a gay man (*Wounded Prophet: A Portrait of Henri J. Nouwen* by Michael Ford and published by Darton, Longman & Todd). Born into a family of wealth and privilege, Nouwen was aware of his orientation from a very early age, but only started coming to terms with it in his last years. His story, with its to-and-fro movement between acceptance and denial, is all too familiar. In 1973 he contributed an article to a book, *Is Gay Good?* in which he spoke of the need of gay and lesbian people to be themselves in all circumstances, for both their spirit ual and emotional health. Yet during his years at Harvard in the 1980's, he was "ruthlessly unsympathetic" to a number of gay men, taking on Catholic doctrine "in a very Northern European way, interpreting it literally and basically crucifying people on it." Two experiences, living in a L'Arche house and learning to contemplate icons, enabled Nouwen to move slowly from an inner world of fear to an inner world of love. It was a long process of conversion, and he had to pass through a profound crisis, a darkness often so deep that he had no vision of ever surviving it, before he could come to a measure of self-acceptance. Healing came through therapy and with it, a sense of his body as not "mere flesh but an expression of self- identity" and spiritual life as an enfleshed life. At the same time, he became more at ease with his own sexual identity and began to make friends with gay men. He loved his priesthood, but, at some level, felt trapped by its obligations and responsibilities. New possibilities and friendships, affirming the truth of his sexual identity, lay open before him. Should he remain celibate but come out as a gay man? Should he leave the priesthood and be open to a loving relationship? He lived through a "time of confusion, inner pain and joy," from which he never fully emerged. Reading Nouwen's story lets me read his book with new eyes; I pick up hints and clues which enable the book to speak to my heart. The experience of being regarded as an outsider, an enemy, a rebel, a danger to society, is his own. Therefore, the compassion, the solidarity with a suffering world, which he urges upon us is authentic. I am writing on Maundy Thursday. You will be reading it after Easter. Nouwen's spiritual journey, like ours, is surely one of death and resurrection, but death and resurrection walking side by side. We do not live happily ever after. Our Easters do not erase our Good Fridays. From all our deaths and resurrections -- and there seems to be no end of them -- we emerge, like Jesus, with wounds, but it is these very wounds that can open us to the suffering around us. In Nouwen's words, "There is immense pain in the wide world around us; there is immense pain in the small world within us. But all pain belongs to Jesus and is transformed by him into glorified wounds which allow us to ... enter ever more fully, through the passion and resurrection of Jesus, into the presence of God and that of all our brothers and sisters everywhere in the world." (*Walking with Jesus: Stations of the Cross*. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books. Third printing, 1991) ========= [99-2-4] THE MURDER OF BILLY JACK GAITHER Lest anyone think that the murder of Matthew Shepard was a flash- in-the-pan: it is unfortunately true that continue to be assaulted and sometimes killed because of their sexual orientation. + + + + On 19 February Billy Jack Gaither of Sylacauga, Alabama was murdered. Authorities found a badly burned body--later identified as that of Gaither--on a stack of burned tires on a bank of Peckerwood Creek in Coosa County that night. His family buried him not knowing why he had been killed. Two men told sheriff's deputies later that they had abducted Gaither in the trunk of their vehicle, beaten him to death with an ax handle and set him on fire, according to authorities. The men claimed Gaither made a pass at one of them. The two are charged with his murder. Randy Gaither, Billy Jack's younger brother, had to identify the remains. It was Randy who also had to break the news to their father, Marion Gaither, 68 and suffering from emphysema and heart disease. Billy Jack had lived at home helping his dad with yardwork and driving his parents to doctor appointments, the younger brother Gaither said. ..."I saw the remains of my brother," he said, "and I don't see how anyone could do what they done to another human being." The site of the killing, beside a creek, is used by some local churches for baptisms. ======== [99-2-5] PILGRIMAGE TO SYLACAUGA Marshall Johnson, board member of Integrity/Alabama, visited the murder site of Billy Jack Gaither Today I joined Ron Gatlin, the Convener of the Alabama Integrity chapter, and Fr Jim Creasy on a pilgrimage to the murder sight of Billy Jack Gaither today. Ron and I drove from Cullman, Alabama to Birmingham where we met at St Andrews Church. Before we left the church, Ron and I went to the altar and asked God's protection and direction. We ended by praying the Integrity Prayer together. We drove into Sylacauga, about an hour's drive from Birmingham for us, met Fr Creasy, and proceeded down a small country road. The pavement ends and a gravel road leads to a bridge over Peckerwood Creek. Just at the end of the bridge a trail leads back by the side of the creek to the site of the old bridge. We understand this site had also been the scene of baptisms in the past. Today the creek bank is littered with trash and garbage and junk. This part of God's earth had been desecrated by man long before 19 February 1999. A beautiful spot had been rendered no better than a trash heap by uncaring mankind. Down the trail about a half a mile we came to the spot. It was marked with yellow police tape. The access of the old bridge made a place for cars to turn around. But on that night in February it became a place of death for Billy Jack Gaither. It was the place where he was drug from the trunk of an automobile and beat once more with ax handles. His body was drenched with kerosene and thrown on top of burning automobile tires - tires that had been ignited with the same kerosene that now covered his body. The three of us spent a few minutes at the site getting used to the sound of the creek and the wind and the birds. We saw the dead flowers that had been placed on the death spot last Friday by a Birmingham priest, and the MCC minister and a man from Boston. These three had made the same pilgrimage the three of us were making. We got our Prayer Books and stood in silence for a few more minutes. I had been asked to read the 22nd Psalm. I was moved to tears as I read the Psalmist words "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" I could only hear Billy Jack pleading those words in the last minutes of his life as he stood on the same spot where we now stood. The pleading of his cries is still ringing in my ears seven hours later as I write this message. Ron read the story of God's promise to never destroy the earth again and giving us the rainbow as a symbol of his promise. Jim read prayers from the service for the burial of the dead and then blessed a bottle of water we had brought with us. The three of us drank a swallow of this holy water and then we sprinkled the rest on the charred earth where Billy Jack's life came to an end. The sun came out as Fr Creasy made the sign of the cross over the darkened earth and the three of us recited the prayer of St Francis. Ron asked us to observe a moment of silence to remember the hate that had been directed to so many of God's gay and lesbian children and to pray that the hate cease. During this period I once more heard the cries for help and the piercing, agonised screams of Billy Jack Gaither. Again tears came to my eyes as I cried for Billy Jack and for all of my gay brothers and lesbian sisters and for myself. == == == Readers with web access can find the Integrity/Alabama site at: http://members.aol.com/rsgatlin/intgal.htm Pictures taken on this pilgrimage to Peckerwood Creek are at: http://members.aol.com/rsgatlin/pilgrimage.htm ======== End of volume 99-2 of Integrator, the newsletter of Integrity/Toronto copyright 1999 Integrity/Toronto comments please to Chris Ambidge, Editor chris.ambidge@utoronto.ca OR Integrity/Toronto Box 873 Stn F Toronto ON Canada M4Y 2N9 http://www.whirlwind.ca/integrity -- -- Chris Ambidge chris.ambidge@utoronto.ca Integrity/Toronto http://www.whirlwind.ca/integrity Integrity is a member of the Alliance of Lesbian & Gay Anglicans http://www.alga.org