Yesterday morning in Mass I was thinking about mothers. Officially, I have two: The one who brought me into this world, and the one who raised me. But I really have many more mothers than that. Early on, there was the foster mom who shepherded me to innumerable doctors’ appointments to care for my various congenital health problems. As an infant, I was adopted into a large, close-knit Catholic family, mothered not just by my adoptive mom but also by my godmother, grandmothers, and many aunties who were so close that their children were like siblings to me. Then there were the innumerable family friends who were surrogate mothers too.

My mom is fond of quoting Hillary Clinton’s adage about the village it takes to raise a child. I saw her live that out throughout my childhood. In addition to raising my brothers and I, she and my dad fostered other kids at various points and ran a day care in our home for several decades. They played a big role in caring for hundreds of other people’s children, and were incredibly grateful for the friends, family, teachers, doctors and counselors who did the same for their own kids.

At seventeen I reconnected with my birthmother (and then with even more family.) She’s a delight and I am so grateful to have her in my life again. My adoptive parents were thrilled to meet her and have taken her in as part of our ever-expanding family.

My Catholic faith and my experience of family have taught me that God has more than enough love to go around for everyone and that it really does take a community to raise a kid. So it’s mystifying to me to see fellow Christians using children to justify their bigotry against gays and lesbians, insisting that gays and lesbians can’t be good parents because “children need a mother and a father.” Well, what children really need is LOVE, and a whole community: parents, sure, but also grandparents, aunts, uncles, neighbors, friends, teachers, social workers, doctors … etc. And there’s nothing about a person’s gender or sexual orientation that makes him or her any less capable of caring for a child. If anything, same sex couples are more prepared parents than their straight peers, since so many have to go to such great lengths to become parents, just like my own mom and dad did.

Furthermore, where in the Gospels are these “traditional families” we hear so much about? Wasn’t Jesus himself raised by a teenaged mom and a foster dad? When he was recruiting his disciples, he actually asked them to give up their families to follow him. (Jesus did have some harsh words to say about divorce and adultery, which makes me think that the defenders of “traditional” heterosexual marriage might want to take a closer look at the log in their own eye before poking sticks in other people’s. But I digress.) I’ve done my fair share of reading the Gospels, and I’ve seen nothing in there condemning two women or men who want to commit to one another or raise a family together.

The central tenet of our faith is that we are supposed to love one another as God loves us. LOVE. Legitimizing same sex relationships is just affirming more love in the world – and affirming those couples who want to extend their love and commitment for each other by raising a family together. Since many couples choose to adopt, that just means more loving, stable homes for kids who need them. Regardless of how they get started, these families deserve all the same legal recognition and protection that anyone else would get.

I hope that on a Mother’s Day not far in the future, we’ll look back on the current debates about legitimizing same sex relationships and say, “remember when we thought that was a problem?” I don’t expect the institutional Church to change its attitude overnight. But I have high hopes that the Catholic laity will “evolve” at a quicker pace, if the love and inclusiveness that I felt growing up is any indication of the Spirit at work in our community.

An Open Letter to Catholic Religious Women

May 1, 2012

Dear Sisters,

We write to you as sisters in faith who may not express our vocation in the same particular community of faith, but who share much in common—as believers, as advocates, and as peacemakers.  We write in a spirit of solidarity and as witnesses to the authenticity of your ministries, particularly the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, in a time when the integrity of your witness has been questioned by Catholic leadership.

While we are not all from the same particular Christian community, we, as women, share a common story. The struggle over women’s authority is an age old question for Christians. Christian churches have long been ambivalent about us. Women’s roles have been embraced in private, not public forums. Women leaders are affirmed as long as they are seen, but not heard (at least not too much). For centuries, women have been seen as prophets, dreamed new realities, but have been dismissed too often and affirmed only
when their visions didn’t contradict the beliefs held by those in positions of power. We are aware that even when churches will ordain us to serve in positions of leadership, we are often not trusted to identify the most urgent needs our congregations should address or to design the shape of our own ministries.

The plight of the powerless is familiar to the women of the church.  We, however, do not believe that authorities in any church should take away women’s power to determine for ourselves a vision for our ministries and vocations.  Many, many women have raised similar questions as those raised by the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.  Is it God’s design for there to be an exclusively male priesthood?  Are not economic justice and access to health care not only issues in greatest need of being addressed in our society today, but also concerns at the core of Catholic faith as well as the good news of
the gospel message? What we see in this struggle is not a lack of our sisters’ integrity and authentic witness to Christian faith, but a struggle that has been too familiar for all women of faith—a struggle over authority and who should have the power to define true faith.

Women in the churches have dedicated their lives to serving the needs of people in the world for centuries.  Today, our Catholic sisters live in community and serve the church thoughtfully and creatively through countless acts of love, hospitality, and social advocacy. Our Catholic sisters are often strong advocates for people living in poverty, people who are in prison, people who lack access to affordable health care, people who are unable to access clean water, people who are sick, and people who have been victimized by the violence of others. Their service and advocacy is similar to that of so many of us who because of own experiences as women find it critical to place the needs of people who are impoverished, cast aside, and powerless at the focal point of our own ministries.

We have all been challenged by the wisdom of learned Catholic sisters who are scholars teaching in college, university, seminary, and church classrooms. Our sisters have taught us to engage our imaginations about the Christian tradition which we share.  We are particularly thankful for the wisdom of Sister Elizabeth Johnson and Sister Joan Chittister.  Our sisters have often carried the stories of many, many women and the wounds of the disenfranchised in their prayers and into their writing.

Religious women have long recognized the need to care for the whole human person. There are many faithful sisters who help us to remember the humanity of people who are shut away in prison or deemed untouchable. There are many faithful sisters who refuse to accept the legitimacy of an economic system that allows the few to become fabulously wealthy while the many remain submerged in perpetual want and poverty. Some of the names of our sisters who have become known for their advocacy are easily
recognized—Sister Helen Prejean, Sister Jeannine Gramick, and Mother Teresa come to mind. We are also well aware that the names of many of our sisters in faith and members of Catholic communities of religious women are not etched in our memories.  And, yet our sisters live authentic lives of faith and witness to our common belief that God is still creating a vision for a new heaven and a new earth.

Where would any of our churches be without women leaders? Where would the Catholic Church be without women’s religious communities? How will the social witness of the larger church on issues of poverty and economic justice be hindered by not honoring the authority of these women of faith?

We join hands with you, our sisters. We are grateful for your willingness to take risks to engage in advocacy and peacemaking.  We stand with you in solidarity and will continue to walk with you as witnesses to our common struggles and our common faith on this journey.

In the peace and steadfast love of Christ,

Advocacy Committee for Women’s Concerns of the Presbyterian Church USA (ACWC)
The Ad Hoc Group on Racism, Sexism, and Classism (RSAC)
Anglican Women’s Empowerment
Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests
Auburn Theological Seminary, New York, New York
Baptist Women in Ministry
Blessed John XXIII Faith Community, Barrington, Illinois
Catherine of Siena Virtual College
The Feminist Sexual Ethics Project, Brandeis University
Jeff Street Baptist Community at Liberty, Louisville, Kentucky
Lutheran Women in Theological and Religious Studies
Metropolitan Community Church, San Francisco, California
The Namaste Community of East Bay of San Francisco
New Visions Faith Community, Mt. Prospect, Illinois
Pacific, Asian, and North American Asian Women in Theology and Ministry
Presbyterian Women in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A), Inc.
Southeastern Pennsylvania Women’s Ordination Conference
Sophia Inclusive Catholic Community in Sussex County New Jersey
Sophia in Trinity: A Roman Catholic Community of Celebrants, San Francisco, California
Starr King School for the Ministry, Berkeley, California
Woman Spirit Ireland
Women’s Center at Louisville Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky
Women of the Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy, PC(USA)
Women Faculty of Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, Austin, Texas
Women of Chicago Theological Seminary, Chicago, Illinois
Women Faculty of the Department of Religion, Dominican University of California
Women Faculty of Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky
Women Faculty of Meadville Lombard Theological School (Unitarian Universalist) Chicago, Illinois.
Women Faculty at Union Presbyterian Seminary, Richmond, Virginia
Women Faculty at Vanderbilt Divinity School, Nashville, Tennessee
Women of the Social Ethics Network of the PCUSA
Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics, and Ritual (WATER)
Women Theologians (Protestant and Roman Catholic) from the “Workgroup for Constructive Theology”

Many individuals, women and men, also expressed their willingness to endorse this letter.  The endorsements of the communities, groups, and organizations were gathered through women’s networks and by women’s groups and organizations over a period of about five days. 

Musicians Include Members of the Bands Alabama Shakes, Dead Confederate, Drive-By-Truckers, Pearl Jam, R.E.M., The Civil Wars, The Roots, The Minus Five, and The Posies, as well as singers Alicia Keys, Daniel Bedingfield, Ken Stringfellow, Lera Lynn, Rosanne Cash, Scott McCaughey, and Talib Kweli

NEW YORK CITY – A group of leading musicians announced their support today for a campaign calling on Village Voice Media to shut down the Adult section of its Web site Backpage.com where children and teens have been advertised by others for commercial sex.

Members of the bands Alabama Shakes, Dead Confederate, Drive-By-Truckers, Pearl Jam, R.E.M., The Civil Wars, The Roots, The Minus Five, and The Posies, and as well as singers Alicia Keys, Daniel Bedingfield, Ken Stringfellow, Lera Lynn, Rosanne Cash, Scott McCaughey, and Talib Kweli have added their names to a growing list of individuals demanding Village Voice Media cease publishing advertisements of minors for sex.
 
“Village Voice Media has a history of being a strong advocate for the arts, reporting extensively on musicians and their work in its 13 weeklies across the country. That musicians are now speaking out against Village Voice Media’s refusal to take down the Adult section of Backpage.com where pimps advertise the sale of girls for sex is significant and should send a clear message to the company that it needs to take action to ensure no child is sexually exploited through use of its site,” said Mike Mills, bassist, keyboardist, and singer for Grammy Award-winning rock band R.E.M.

“The Adult section of Backpage.com provides a space for pimps to advertise the sale of minors for sex and johns to prey on children. It’s time to shut it down. Once the majority of Americans have fully connected with this terrifying and growing trend in their own backyards, the anti-trafficking movement can gain significant momentum. The effort to put an end to Backpage’s Adult ads is a first step in what needs to be a monumental effort,” said singer/songwriter and human trafficking advocate Daniel Bedingfield. In 2006, Bedingfield launched STOP THE TRAFFIK, a global coalition to combat human trafficking around the world, with a particular focus on children on young people.

The chorus of calls for Village Voice Media to shut down the Adult section of Backpage.com, which services nearly 400 markets, has been mounting since last August when 51 of the nation’s attorneys general called on Village Voice Media to close the section. Today, 600 faith leaders from different religious traditions, 53 leading anti-trafficking experts and organizations, 19 U.S. Senators, state and city lawmakers around the country, and over 225,000 citizens who have signed a petition on Change.org have called on VVM to exit the adult ad business.
 
Last week, Groundswell, the social action initiative of Auburn Seminary and convener of the clergy coalition, and four U.S. Senators launched separate campaigns to educate the top advertisers in Village Voice Media’s publications about the sex trafficking controversy surrounding Backpage.com. Several national brands, including AT&T, American Airlines, and REI, have decided to cease advertising with VVM. Additionally, at least two firms with investments in the privately-owned Village Voice Media – Goldman Sachs and Trimaran Capital – have pulled out of VVM, citing discomfort with the direction of the company.

This past Tuesday, ABC’s Nightline did a story on Backpage.com that featured interviews with a former teenage sex trafficking survivor and Village Voice Media counsel Elizabeth McDougall.

The first hand up after the Love Free or Die screening two nights ago in South Florida was a blond woman’s – middle aged, all in turquoise and baby blue to bring out her eyes. She said she needed the film – that she had to give it to someone who otherwise won’t talk about gay stuff, but is struggling. She’s going to say to him, “Here. Just watch this.”

Three people to her right, another woman raised her hand, wearing a darker palate. She said that though she’s heterosexual, she goes to Metropolitan Community Church, what she called “the gay church,” because every Sunday it’s so full of life and passion and laughter and tears. That’s where she finds God.

After the screening, I confused them. I said to the woman in blue, “Tell me about the MCC church you go to.” She laughed but it felt more like crying. She said, “Oh no. That’s my sister. I go to a big old Megachurch, 22,000 people – lots of young people. It’s great but we are not so great on this issue. My husband is really not great on this issue. And my daughter just came out as a lesbian.”

After we spoke, I talked to the sister in darker colors. She said, “Yes, I go to the gay church, but I am not even Christian. I’m Baha’i, which has not gone over so well with people around here. My sister and can’t even talk about it.”

Then she thanked me, a tear rolling down her face. “Tonight was the night my sister came around. She walked in one way. She’s walking out another. The movie and conversation have opened her up and she sees why I love my gay church. She gets me and she gets this and now she’s ready to help her daughter and her husband work it out. She got it tonight. Thank you.”

One sister as a conservative Christian who has a lesbian daughter she loves, and the other sister as a straight person who goes to a gay church even though she’s Baha’i.

It is exquisite to witness people muster the vulnerability and strength it takes to come out.

Click here to learn about the Groundswell of Courage and the campaign for LGBT equality.
Find Macky Alston on Twitter, @mackyalston.

To watch this video on MSNBC, click here.

For more information about the Groundswell of Responsibility, Groundswell’s campaign to help end child sex trafficking, click here.

Today I am in Durham, NC, where I lived until I was 8. If I lived here, I would not be married in the state’s eyes, and yet I am married. My children would be told by the government that their parents are not in fact wed – that their marriage is illegal.

I sit in a pew in a Methodist church, a church that cannot marry a person like me to my husband of ten years. The people have gathered in the pews this morning to fight the constitutional amendment being voted on in 20 days to cement my oppression into the law of the land. It was just said that the last time prejudice was written into the constitution, it took a civil war and a civil rights movement to get it out.

I moved away from this town and so I have a husband and children and they have me. I have returned with my film Love Free or Die, about people who risk everything for freedom to love for all. It is time for us who have been freed to join the fights all over this nation in small towns and home towns for freedom for all.

_________________________
 

_________________________

Click here to learn about the Groundswell of Courage and the campaign for LGBT equality.
Click here to read “Filmmaker takes on subject close to home: Gay clergy and marriage,” coverage of the event in Durham’s Herald-Sun.
Find Macky Alston on Twitter, @mackyalston.

Rev. Vaughn is the Vice President of Auburn Seminary.  This piece was originally published on March 28 on The Huffington Post 

I am a black man, a member of the clergy, and the father of two black boys. My wife and I and our sons (ages 10 and 6) live in New York City, where, over the last few years, we have seen our share of killings of black men and boys — from Abner Louima to Amadou Diallo to Sean Bell to Ramarley Graham. I fear — and I know — that blacks and whites experience those killings very differently.

In his book, “The Rage of a Privileged Class: Why Are Middle-Class Blacks Angry? Why Should America Care?” author Ellis Cose refers to the many experiences of racism that mainstream white communities observe and dismiss as “isolated incidents.”

He observes that as black Americans, we spend our lives seeing and experiencing “isolated incident” after “isolated incident” after “isolated incident.”

A colleague forwarded me a blog last weekend that asked, “Where’s white church outrage over Trayvon Martin?”

My answer to my colleague, quite simply, is that many of my friends in Christ and my religious brothers and sisters see this as yet another “isolated incident.”

There comes a point for many black Americans when the “isolated incidents” are no longer those, but symptoms of deeper expressions and manifestations of racism. The killing of Trayvon Martin comes as yet another “isolated incident.”

Yet this one seems even more unbelievable, where Trayvon is actually followed, and then killed. It is easy to state that Mr. Zimmerman was just crazy, that the police officer who spun this crime as “self-defense” was just a racist, or that Trayvon just should not have been wearing a hoodie. For me, it is impossible to see this crime disconnected from the not-so-long-ago history of lynchings, the extralegal (and sanctioned) killings of black people that continued into the 1950s.

People of Faith, this is one of our many “wake-up call” opportunities to understand: these are not isolated incidents. This is what racism looks like today. The choice before us is: Are Americans ready to do the hard work of holding Mr. Zimmerman and others accountable? Are we prepared to proactively reduce such tragic events?

Or will we be content to dismiss this tragedy as yet another “isolated incident”?

“They have treated the wound of my people carelessly, saying ‘peace, peace’ when there is no peace.” –Jeremiah 6:14

A casual observer of our nation’s current electoral politics might be forgiven for wondering if some kind of nationwide time machine had plunged us a few decades into the past.  Birth control and women’s health care are a national lightening rod – again.   I recently discussed this over coffee with a religious studies professor (and a fellow Catholic) whose courses I took in college.  “Birth control?” he said to me, baffled. “I thought that was something we settled in the sixties.”

So what’s going on? We see some version of this every time there’s an election, of course. Candidates and their supporters exploit sexuality and gender – the so-called “culture war” issues – to score easy points with voters who share their views, and, arguably, to distract from intractable issues they’d rather not talk about.  (Remember the ongoing foreclosure crisis? How about the persistent double-digit unemployment in many parts of the country? Or post-traumatic stress among servicemen and women returning from Iraq and Afghanistan?)

This latest culture-war iteration came to an ugly head when Rush Limbaugh hurled vicious misogynist slurs at Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown Law student who intended to testify before Congress about the need for birth control coverage in her student health plan.  I wasn’t too surprised to hear what Limbaugh said, given his track record of deliberately shocking, crude tactics.   What did – pleasantly – surprise me was the response. Young women (and men) I know who aren’t always public about their political views on social media websites expressed their outrage about Limbaugh’s remarks and their support for Ms. Fluke. Bloggers blogged. Petitions circulated. And dozens of advertisers (and counting) pulled their support for his radio program. 

Rush Limbaugh, of course, is just one hateful voice among many, speaking out in an glaringly distasteful (and ignorant!) way about the personal health decisions facing young women.  But his words matter because he holds a powerful platform, because he gives license to his listeners to repeat what he says – and because he says what a lot of other public figures are also already thinking.   Indeed, in recent weeks we’ve heard remarks about women that are, at best, extraordinarily insensitive and at worst, downright hateful, from state and federal lawmakers and from political candidates.  

As a result, the current toxic discourse is making many young women feel attacked and belittled. Our ability to make the most intimate decisions about our well-being is once again a national topic of debate.  But this moment is also reminding many of us that we have the power to make change, that our opinions matter and that our voices deserve to be heard.  Just look at the protests that women have led at various state capitols and the many, many posts, tweets, petitions, and letters we’ve sent to lawmakers, candidates – and Rush Limbaugh’s corporate sponsors.  If something good comes of this otherwise embarrassing moment in our nation’s political discourse, I hope it is that a generation of young women might become more fully engaged in the political process.

I recognize that, within my own faith tradition, reasonable minds differ about the morality of using contraception.  While the Catholic bishops insist that they cannot be forced to allow the adults they educate and employ to purchase birth control (even though many of those students and employees aren’t Catholic), most Catholics I know in this country quietly adopted an un-orthodox view about contraception many years ago.  (Even the Pope has acknowledged that using contraception is a “lesser evil” than preventing the spread of deadly disease.)

But I have no patience for Christians – particularly those who hold positions of power – who use their faith to belittle, shame, and demonize people who don’t share their beliefs.  We can’t take part in a pluralistic society and simultaneously insist that everyone follow our own beliefs.  We live in a democracy, imperfect as it may be, and decision-making in a democracy is, by design, meant to be messy and complicated.  It requires compromise.  

I’m no theologian, but I have spent most Sunday mornings for the past thirty years listening to excerpts of the Gospels read aloud in Mass.  And it seems to me that the public shaming of women that we’ve seen in recent weeks is the very same kind of behavior that Jesus excoriated in the religious and political leaders of his day.  I think of Jesus welcoming Mary Magdalene into his disciples, of him ministering to the Gentile woman at the well, and of him shaming the Pharisees about to stone a woman who had been accused of adultery: “Let he among you who is without sin cast the first stone.” 

What I also seem to remember hearing a lot about in the Gospels is the call to love our neighbors and care for the poor and oppressed.  I would love to see the Catholic bishops expend the same amount of energy they have been using to fight birth control to demand justice for the jobless, homeless, hungry, undocumented, and imprisoned.  I would also love to see more of my fellow Christians express our shared faith with a little less self-righteousness, and with a lot more humility and respect for everybody’s inherent dignity and self-worth.