CONVERSION
I grew up
in the slavery-and-racism drenched delta of the Mississippi River on the
Arkansas side. I learned that slavery
and racism and Christianity could go well together, because all God really
cared about was my conversion to claim Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior in
order to go to heaven when I died. I
wanted so much to find that conversion, and even though I was a believer in
that tapestry of race and the white Christ, I could never get the feeling –
there was always something nagging at me.
As I look back now, I’d like to think that it was the ragged black
Jesus, lurking behind the trees, to borrow from Flannery O’Connor’s powerful
metaphor in “Wise Blood.”
I’ve come
to believe that I have had many conversions and will yet have more. For me, that term describes where I am opened
up to a new reality that I had previously missed – missed because of my
captivity or anxiety or inattentiveness.
I want to describe one of those conversions in this week’s blog. I had begun to be converted on race and
gender, but I was still feeling unsettled on sexual orientation. As I began to move away from the
individualistic, repressive Christianity of my youth, I had adopted a “don’t
ask, don’t tell” approach to sexual orientation – just leave the bedroom as a private
issue. But, then I went on the road to
Damascus, even though I did not know I was on the journey.
In 1975, Caroline
and I were the first clergy couple to serve as pastors of a local church in the
former southern Presbyterian church (PCUS), and our church, St. Columba
Presbyterian, was in Norfolk, Virginia.
It was a 12 member church in a low-income apartment complex and was a
mission project of Norfolk Presbytery.
We began to build the congregation and the community ministry, and we
had new folks show up for worship and work.
One of those was an impressive woman who embodied
Christian leadership and love and a commitment to justice and mercy. After a couple of years of her being a member
of the church, the Nominating Committee decided to ask her to serve as an elder
in the church. I called her up to ask
her to allow her name to be brought to the congregation, and she responded by
asking to come talk to me about being an elder. One of her great qualities was humility, so
I assumed that I would only need to convince her to say “yes.”
She came in
to my office to give me a shock: “Nibs,
I can’t be ordained as an elder because I am a lesbian, and I know that is not
approved in the Presbyterian Church. I don’t even think that God approves of
me.” All my stereotypes flew before me –
she was married to a man and had two children;
she looked like a regular “housewife,” and she did not fit my idea of lesbians
at all. I asked her when she first
decided to be attracted to women, and with her usual sense of humor, she
replied: “About the same age as you did.”
I replied to her, “Well, I didn’t decide to be attracted to women – it
just came over me...." and I caught myself
in mid-sentence. She was wired that way,
and so was I. And, like the apostle
Paul, the scales fell from my eyes. I
thought to myself: “if God would reject
someone like Amy, who is one of the few saints that I have ever met, then I
have the wrong idea of God and the wrong orientation on this issue.” So, I changed in my heart, right then and there,
and I then replied: “Amy, we’d be glad
to have you as a leader of this congregation, if you will say “yes.” She said “yes,” and the Session ordained her
in 1978, and we’ve been doing it ever since then. No second-class church membership allowed.
I still
don’t understand same gender attraction, but I don’t understand electricity
either, or my opposite gender attraction.
That is to say that Amy’s witness made it clear to me that God had
created her to be attracted to the same gender, and if that was the case, who
was I to say “no?” This idea has become
much more complicated with LGBTQ issues, but I am glad to be in the middle of
those also, and I am glad that we have been supportive of those seeking to
affirm that they are children of God when the church and so many others have
told them that they are an abomination.
As the
popular phrase now goes, this is what conversion looks like, and I’m still on
the road, but I’m glad to be on it.
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