Where Are the Faces of Queer and Liberal Christianity?

“L iberal-Academic-Methodist-Midwestern-Public School Proud-Steel Mill Salary Educated-Lesbian Mom-Tell Me Again About My Bubble.” This was my sign at the 2017 Women’s March in Chicago. I grew up Methodist in a southern Illinois steel mill town, the kind where my wife and I still don’t really feel comfortable holding hands. Nonetheless, I was amazed to discover that following the United Methodist Church’s 2019 vote to affirm a proposed “Traditional Plan,” one which kept in place and strengthened bans on LGBTQ clergy and same-sex marriage, the vast majority of young and middle-aged parishioners abandoned my childhood church in protest. Perhaps less surprisingly, simultaneous to that small-town exodus, the social justice–driven, queer-inclusive Chicago churches I’ve called home — ones I chose for their rainbow flags and pink triangles — railed against the UMC machine in the face of an institutional decision they saw as antithetical to their very beings. Read Full Article »