The cast of characters runs deep in this life play: 

Rev. David Thomas - he denied me the opportunity to join Centenary United Methodist Church, unless I was willing to say that homosexuality is a sin. Click here for the complaint that I filed. 

Rev. Al Gwinn - he was designated by Bishop Morgan to talk with me.  When I sat down and explained the situation to him, he committed to staying in touch and having ongoing lunches together.  It was the last time I ever heard from him, though I followed up with phone calls, letting him know I was willing to meet.

Bishop Robert C. Morgan - the bishop for Kentucky at the time; he retired shortly after writing the official response to my letter of complaint, essentially letting me know that Rev. Thomas had the right to do what he did, and that he supported him.

Bishop James King - the bishop for Kentucky after Bishop Morgan's retirement.  It took me six months to get a lunch meeting with him.  Having just obtained this position, he wasn't going to make waves, and did nothing. The last time I saw him was at a restaurant, eating with Rev. Gwinn.  They both tried to pretend that they did not see me, but I walked right over to their table, shook their hands, and looked dead into their eyes.  I let Rev. Gwinn know that I was still available for lunch.

The irony of all of the individuals being part of a patriarchal institution, that at various times in history has systematically short-changed and harmed both women and people of color, is not lost on me.  My friend, Rev. Phil Lawson, a retired African-American United Methodist minister and advocate for equality and justice for all people, reminds me to tell Bishop King that, had the church not changed its stance on people of color, he would not be in the position he is in today. Let's face it. Bishop King did not make it to that position in this patriarchal system by making waves and speaking out on difficult issues.  I would discover that my situation, representing the issue of inclusion for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons, was one that would cause him to support the very kind of spiritual violence that had impeded the inclusion of people of color in the church for many years.

This is not an indictment of either men or the United Methodist Church, though both of part of this situation of spiritual violence that continues.

I have never regretted having filed my complaint.  I filed it "for," the UM church, to awaken the church to live in a way consistent with the spirit of God.  It was not a complaint filed "against" the UM church.  I filed it in hopes that it would save the church from its descent into self righteousness, and that this situation would never happen to another person.  That it happened again in 2006 is a tragedy to me, and an indication that the UM church is no longer a church with a conscience for social justice.  It has veered so far from its roots that founder John Wesley probably wouldn't recognize it.  Rev. Larry Hollon, chief executive of United Methodist Communications, says that the new UMC.org is about "community," noting that the site reflects denominational founder John Wesley's belief that the world was his parish.  That term is an interesting one to use, since a definition of community in the dictionary is "sharing, participation, and fellowship." That is exactly what I wanted to do when I attempted to join Centenary United Methodist church.  And yet, enjoying "community" is exactly what I was denied.  Writing this response has caused me to put a link on the home page of Gay Into Straight America.  Previously, someone would have had to find it in our information under "family" beneath the "Two Women & a Poodle" navigation tab at the top of the home page.  Arriving on the family page, a person then had to click on "Dotti & Family" before discovering a link that goes directly to the complaint.  No more!  It is visible and available on the home page.

Frank's initial call presented a different scenario than the times on our year-long journey, Gay Into Straight America, where I was prepared for how my memory would be engaged when we spoke at a United Methodist Church, or at a PFLAG meeting that meets at a UM church. His call caught me by surprise.  Though I share about my experience, particularly with United Methodists, and also have a link to the complaint on our website, nobody has called me to discuss this situation in years.

On our journey, I always shared what a paradoxical delight and opportunity it is to speak at a church which is part of a denomination in which I was denied membership.  Now, as then, people's mouths usually dropped open as they exclaim, "That's not possible." It seems incredulous to them.  I explain, "I understand, but it is a fact that happened." 

Most agree that the Book of Discipline has become a schizophrenic document, inserting parts to keep GLBT persons in their proper place in the church.The Book of Discipline affirms homosexuals as people “of sacred worth.” It also holds the practice of homosexuality incompatible with Christian teaching, and it bars the performance of same-sex unions by the church’s clergy and in the church’s sanctuaries. 

Please tell me how the latter can make a gay person feel they are of "sacred worth" when an avowed homosexual in a committed relationship can't even enjoy the sanctity of a holy union or marriage within the church. (Heaven forbid that the church should sanction and create support systems for monogamy!).  And what is this "practice" to which they refer?  More diminishing of our "sacred worth" and our relationships, by referring to our loving one another as a "practice" that is incompatible with Christian teaching.  Wrong.  It is incompatible with what a patriarchial insitution has decided it wants to teach.  In other words it is incompatible with "their" Christian teaching.  It is arrogant to state anything other than that.

In no place, however, in the Book of Discipline does it remotely suggest that a person be denied membership. Yes, indeed, the UM church's response to our community has been characterized by the coexistence of disparate or antagonistic elements. 

I also recognize and appreciate that there are many wonderful United Methodist folks working within the church to transform this situation.  As with most big institutions, the United Methodist church (and also other denominations) have become behemoth dinosaurs that, like the real dinosaurs, will soon become fossilized if they continue to resist change. Change will occur from the bottom up, not vice versa. It will happen when the majority of people speak up and say, "No more!"  That is why it is so important for those in the movable middle, who are silent allies, to speak up.  Until they do, the vocal minority will seem like they are the majority, and nothing will change. 

My experience as a sexuality educator (finishing my doctorate in Human Sexuality) is that in dealing with understanding/lack of understanding from people regarding their support of justice and equality for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons, it cuts across political lines and denominational lines.   When an individual's own sexuality is whole and healed, they find no need to disparage mine and make me "wrong, perverted or sinful" for who I am.  I know many people, lay and theologians alike, who have been confronted with the fact that what they were "taught" about homosexuality bore no resemblance to the homosexual individuals they knew.  Rev. Dr. Lisa Davison, a professor of Old Testament at Lexington Theological Seminary has written "What the Bible Says/Doesn't Say about Homosexuality," having come to a new and different understanding after an indepth exegesis of the Greek and Hebrew texts regarding homosexuality.  We are fortunate to count Lisa and her husband Michael (also ordained) as both friends and allies.  Lisa officiated at our wedding on July 31, 2004.

Looking back, it seems that things I do are often ahead of the curve, and thus every attempt is made to keep them hidden.  It reminds me of when I stood in Leadership Lexington in 1985 to say to the man who shouted out during Minority Issues Day, (Stewart Perry, a member at Centenary United Methodist Church), "I hear what you say about those homosexual people, but I don't want them teaching my children."  (Keep in mind that this was years before I attemped to join the church where Stewart attends). I rose from the first row to say, "I am a gay person in this community, and I won't be held by fear.  I was a teacher, and I was a damn good teacher.  If you would not let your child be taught by me, it would be their loss, not mine."  And then I sat. That led to many consequences, but it was before the internet and before people paid much attention to the injustices perpetuated.  Worst of all, I discovered that there was nothing legally I could do about being kicked out of Big Brothers/Big Sisters, not for being lesbian, but for simply admitting that I am lesbian.  Many people in Big Brothers/Big Sisters knew that Barbara Anderson, a board member and the "next" President (until I stood to educate my Leadership Lexington class) and I were partners at the time. My experience with filing a complaint with the United Methodist Church, regarding being denied membership (with the bishop supporting Rev. David Thomas's right to do so), felt similar.  Interestingly enough, Rev. Thomas never asked me if I was in a relationship.  Ironically, my 15 year relationship had ended, with Barbara today being a victim of the same misinformation that keeps many in our community from believing they can be both "gay and Christian."  To Rev. Thomas, all that mattered was that I openly acknowledged that I am lesbian, and rufused to call who I am a "sin." For that reason, he denied me membership in his church.  The sad part is that it sent a specific message to the other gay people who actively participate in Centenary United Methodist Church.  The message?  If you want to participate, lie about who you are.  There is something wrong with a church that would nuture and encourage deception in its members.

Before Frank contacted me, I had been preparing a letter to send to Bishop King.  Why? I was spending time with my Aunt Dot in Corbin, Kentucky and saw in the bulletin that laid on the end table that Bishop King had spoken on Sunday, October 22, 2006, the week before I visited. There's more to the story. I wanted to spend some time with Aunt Dot because Uncle John had died in July one day shy of his 94th birthday.  When they married 7 years ago on Valentine's Day in Gatlinburg, TN, they decided they would attend her Presbyterian church one Sunday and his United Methodist Church the next.  When I decided to file the complaint, I wanted to sit down and tell them face-to-face and give Uncle John a copy of the complaint.  We went to lunch after going to his United Methodist church.  I took a deep breath as I prepared to share my news.  Before I could speak, Aunt Dot spoke up.  She said that she knew Uncle John wouldn't mention it, but that he had given the church $350,000 to help complete the new sanctuary.  I looked at him, and with sincere enthusiasm said, "That is great, Uncle John.  How nice that you can do that and enjoy seeing the fruits of your contribution."  And then, I shared with them what had happened with me being denied membership, and about the complaint I had filed.  I did not want him to hear it from someone else. That bulletin was another experience that took me back in time.  That bulletin made me realize that it was time to again contact Bishop King. 

I recently finished putting the package together, explaining about my uncle's contribution, along with a note on that bulletin that I found lying on the end table, saying "Sorry I missed you!  I was in Corbin the next week after you spoke."  A copy of the Soulforce video, "Dear Dr. Dobson," along with a copy of my complaint (in case he wants to review it) accompanied the package.  Last, but not least, I also enclosed a picture of Aunt Dot, Uncle John, and me. 

(L-R) Dotti, Aunt Dot & Uncle John

This was the last picture ever taken of Uncle John, and it was taken on the porch as Roby and I were leaving after visiting them on our Gay Into Straight America journey.  They were the only ones in my family who had allowed us to stay with them. My mother, the sister of Aunt Dot, had asked us to leave after one night in my childhood home, negating what I thought was going to be my first trip home with a partner for the holidays in over 20 years (not by my choice).  Click here to read that newsletter and discover "why" we didn't get to stay."

After recently returning from a month on the road, having continued to speak and Talk with America as we prepare for next Stand UP Speak OUT project, The Great American Roadcast, the package is ready to mail to Bishop King.  The timing of all of this coninciding with Frank's recent call seems somehow synchronistic. 

I also sent Rev. Thomas a package after I returned from our year long journey back in October, 2006.  His package consisted of a copy of a note thanking me for my wonderful contribution (I had done something anonymously for the church during the time I attended).  I thought it was time he knew that the person he and his wife had so graciously and profusely thanked was the same person to whom he had denied membership.  As well, I sent an embroidered vest with the church logo that I still had, and asked him to give it to his wife, Karen.  I had an embroidery business in Lexington, and had given Rev. Thomas and Karen various pieces of apparel when I attended there before being denied membership.

There are so many little pieces that continue to connect with this situation that it is hard to decide what to share.  As I was searching for the address to mail the package to Bishop King, I noticed on the Kentucky United Methodist website that a conference is coming up in June, 2007.  When neither Rev. Thomas or Bishop King will comment, even with repeated attempts by Frank to contact them, it makes a person wonder how serious they are when it says at the top of their website above the the flash program about the conference,

Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors 
The People of the Kentucky Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church

Their theme for this year's conference? "Never alone." It is shown as part of the conference logo that has people holding hands with a dove flying above. How can people make such a claim when they are so pointedly are not actively expressing open hearts, open minds, open doors when they are continuing to exclude?  How much more "alone" do people have to get for them to realize that "Never alone" is a mirage? It would be like people telling Bishop King that they honor and value him, and then adding, "Would you mind sitting in the back at the conference?" He would find them most insincere.

As Rev. Gilbert Caldwell, an African-American minister from Dever who retired in 2001, says,

"The United Methodist Church is an accomplice in the spiritual and physical violence gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender American are experiencing today. Suppose Rose Parks, wo sat down on the bus in Montgomery and changed history, said, 'I will abide by the law.' We would not have made the changes we did to end discrimination against blacks using mass transit.  Again, we are compelled to challenge the law by either breaking it or getting the law changed to try to end discrimination against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans."

Click here to read what else Rev. Caldwell has to say regarding the importance of connecting the struggles of racism and heterosexism, as different as they are.

I hope that one day the conference theme for the national United Methodist Church will be a saying by Joseph Kinnebrew:

DIVERSITY MAKES WHOLE CLOTH

DIVERSITY MAKES CLOTH WHOLE

My dream?  That they will mean it and show it by inviting me to address the conference.  That will be progress!

When there is an opportunity to share what happened and educate someone in the United Methodist church, making them aware that there still appears to be an inconsistency between "what the church says" and "what the church does," I take the time to write a note.  Below is an example of an email to Tim Tanton, managing editor for United Methodist News Service. As usual, however, I heard nothing back.  The interesting part is that in writing this, I went to www.umcom.org so that I could recall Tim's title.  While on the website, I discovered a "new feature."  The heading said:

Church’s new Web site fosters online community

I will admit that I was curious and decided to read what was happening. I discovered that "The pioneering site is home to the first large-scale social networking community developed by a mainline denomination for people of faith." It went on to say,

I wonder if a post containing the official complaint that I filed "for" the United Methodist church would be found to be "inappropriate." I wonder if the word "gay" would be filtered out if I listed our website. 

My email below to Tim shares more about the impact that being "denied membership" has meant to my life.  As difficult as it was at the time, that experience has moved me to places emotionally and spiritually that would most likely remain unknown to me had it not happened.  For that, I feel grateful.  Some of my life situations that have evolved me to a higher understanding and consciousness are not ones that I would have willingly chosen, but I feel truly blessed for the end result.  In that respect, I am living the life that I always imagined, one that is far richer than the religious box within which I was raised and within which the United Methodist church as a whole exists even today. 

As I said previously, I know that my journey has taken me deeper into my relationship with the divine nature of God, because I have not allowed anger and disappointment with the United Methodist church to steal what is most precious to me...a deep and abiding faith in the goodness of people, life and God.  I understand in ways that were previously unknown to me how interconnected we are.  I cannot hold onto to anger without harming a part of myself in the process.  I deserve better and so do others who have harmed me. I often call upon my understanding of Jesus and what he faced when friends and family betrayed him, knowing that I am capable because he and others like Gandhi, King, Alice Paul and Rosa Parks paved the way for me.  In the end, Jesus went to the cross because He wouldn't shut up.  He was one of the first "radical activists," acting from a place of love that few understood then or now. My kind of man, yes...Jesus is my kind of man. The impact from my involvement with Soulforce and non-violent process since 1999 is indisputable, and has much to do with the difference between where I am today and where I was then. My desire is neither to humiliate or diminish the United Methodist Church.  I hope that I am a person with ubuntu. 
 
Ubuntu:  " A person with ubuntu is open and available to others...affirming of others...and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished."  Archbishop Desmond Tutu

My email to Tim follows:

From: GISA [mailto:gayintostraightamerica@earthlink.net]
Sent: Friday, February 23, 2007 2:34 PM
To: 'newsdesk@umcom.org'
Cc: 'roby@standupspeakout.com'
Subject: Attention: Tim Tanton