Rev. Crumpler:
Well, I am the Reverend Michael Crumpler, the LGBTQ and multicultural programs director. It’s a lot. I just do the LGBTQ stuff, is what I hear people say. It’s a privilege to be here with you and a pleasure as well. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to join you at the beginning. Yesterday, I was in DC for the SCOTUS hearings. So I’ll weave in a little bit of that if you’d like or if you wouldn’t like. I’ll do it anyway. I’ll talk a little bit about that, because I think that it’s very…
Audience:
[crosstalk 00:00:47] hope.
Rev. Crumpler:
Oh, there’s hope. I mean there’s hope, there’s hope, there’s hope. There’s a lot of hope. The activists who were there and a lot of the folks who were in DC were very, very optimistic. That doesn’t mean that the decision will be positive. It just means that there’s hope. I think that the crux of the work that we’re involved in, beginning with what we were talking about today, and what changes culture are people living lives and telling their stories, people living their lives and telling their stories. So as King, Dr. Martin Luther King once says, “The arc of the universe bends towards justice.” It’s long, but it bends towards —
Audience: Theodore Parker also said that.
Audience: Theodore Parker.
Audience: Theodore Parker said that.
Rev. Crumpler:
And Theodore Parker [crosstalk 00:01:40]. The arc of the universe is, I don’t know. Who is Theodore Parker, since we have brought them into the space? Theodore Parker …
Audience:
Was a Unitarian minister from the 1850s, very much anti-slavery, put himself at risk and a hero. [ 00:02:00].
Rev. Crumpler:
Good. So Theodore Parker, 1850, Martin Luther King, 1960, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.
Audience:
Moral universe is long but it bends towards justice.
Rev. Crumpler:
Hopefully, we won’t have to wait 100 years. But what changes policy and what is changing minds, changes policy. I know that yesterday, Gorsuch, a part of what he was saying, what his concerns were that should we decide this case broadly, which is what we want, that that could be a big social uprising or something along the lines of what he said. Not so, because they are states that already have these laws in place and there’s people are just going to the bathroom and going to work, and not necessarily in that order. So it was a good time.
So I’ll say a little bit more about that. But why don’t we begin with a gathering. Blessed are the trailblazers and there’s a … Where it says one, you may not be able to see this, so I think I’ll just read it for you. Would that be helpful? Can you see it?
Audience: [crosstalk 00:03:24].
Rev. Crumpler:
Great. Well, those of you who can see it say, read it loudly so that the rest of us can feel it. Blessed are the trailblazers.
Audience:
Who brought us this far, and are still trailblazing, still celebrating.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the drag queens and kings.
Audience:
Who remind us to not take life too seriously.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the gender benders, non-binary, gender fluid and third gender folk.
Audience:
Those who challenge us to reframe our gender paradigm.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the young ones.
Audience:
Who present fearlessly from the start.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are their parents.
Audience:
Who make space for freedom, and love their children fiercely.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the siblings and relatives.
Audience:
Who educate, support and love us as we are.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the gender queer youth.
Audience:
Those who are fabulously flourishing and those who are struggling and persist.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the 90 year olds just coming out.
Audience:
And those who have been out decades.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are those whose lives were cut short.
Audience:
May their stories live on through us.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the survivors.
Audience:
May they keep on living.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are the allies.
Audience:
Learning to be accomplices.
Rev. Crumpler:
Blessed are those gathered here today, witnessing learning, celebrating. May we all commit to continue showing up, fighting for justice, celebrating all the genders in life.
Audience:
May we all commit to continue showing up, fighting for justice, celebrating all the genders in life.
Rev. Crumpler:
Amen. Ashe. May it be so. So the next slide is introductions. This presentation by the way, is a presentation that I am giving monthly as I present the new program around welcome, which is the five practices of Welcome Renewal. So I just basically am sharing a presentation, engaging you in a presentation that I offer regularly. So if you’re excited about this and going back to your congregations and your communities and you want folks to hear what’s new with Welcoming Congregations, you’ll have my contact information so that anyone in your communities can hear what you get to hear.
So by way of introduction, again I’m still Michael Crumpler, the LGBTQ and multicultural programs director at the UUA. Much of what I do is Welcoming Congregations, but the Welcoming Congregation is really an engine that kind of keeps on going. And I give credit to all of you who, if you didn’t create the program, you at least carried the program so that it is a household or a congregation hold name within your faith communities. So I’ve had the baton passed on to me in the next, I guess lap of this race that we’re on is the five practices of Welcome Renewal. But other work that I do is organizing and strategy team, which is the newest staff group at the UUA, which oversees organizing and movements and campaigns and those sorts of things.
There’s a four pronged strategy with that. We do immigration, we do electoral justice reform, climate justice and LGBTQ and I support and I’m responsible for the LGBTQ person, which is a lot of why I was in DC yesterday. I also am responsible for planning and executing. I imagine the finding our way home retreat, which is a retreat now that’s been going on for I think more than 15 years. The religious professionals of color. Last year was the largest conference and it was the first one that I had the opportunity had the privilege of leading. It was a lot, but it was a beautiful, beautiful time. We had over 130 folks who were engaged. When I say religious professionals, we mean ministers, religious educators, administrators, musicians, seminarian, and we say distinguished guests. So retirees and so forth. So we’re always trying to make sure that everyone knows about the retreat. In the past has been sort of word of mouth.
So if you have religious professionals of color in your communities and congregations, please share with them about the finding our way on conference, because we want everyone to know that it is open to them and then put them in contact with me as well. I do other things, but I won’t bore you with that. But we’re really, really excited about the five practices of welcome and I’m really, really excited to have been invited to talk to you about it. And let’s get started. So what have you learned about the following areas? Identity 101. So anyone, when it comes to identity 101, what have you learned about identity 101 by being in a Welcoming Congregation? Or what has Welcoming Congregations taught you about identity 101? Anyone just call out.
Audience:
Let people name their own identities.
Rev. Crumpler:
Amen. Let people name their own identities. Identity 101 is again identity is something that we want people to own for themselves and believe who people say that they are. Great. Welcoming Congregations has taught us about identity 101. What else? When you hear identity 101.
Audience:
Don’t make assumptions.
Rev. Crumpler:
Pardon?
Audience:
Don’t make assumptions.
Rev. Crumpler:
Don’t make assumptions. Don’t make assumptions. Right? Hear what people are saying. Does that mean that you walk up to people and just ask them what they are?
Audience:
No.
Rev. Crumpler:
Exactly. So there’s an art, less of a science than art to identity 101. Don’t make assumptions, but don’t force people to define who they are, right off the bat. Identity 101, one more.
Audience:
There’s [crosstalk 00:09:54] a status in a wider community.
Rev. Crumpler:
Say that one more time.
Audience:
There’s a status in the wider community.
Rev. Crumpler:
Say more.
Audience:
Who identify as being LGBTQ friendly and not all the churches around are.
Rev. Crumpler:
Yes, exactly, yes. So I hear what you’re saying. Being a Welcoming Congregation that identifies with LGBTQ, gives Unitarian Universalism standing in the wider community. It’s not always good standing, depending on what community you are probably in, more progressive spaces, yes. Less progressive spaces, no. But I think, Identity 101 gives us a basic understanding of what queer experience, LGBTQ experiences are. We know at least the letters. You know you’re in a friendly space when folks can just rattle LGBTQ right off the bat. Right? They don’t get the G first or the B. It’s just like, it’s just one of those things, it’s very, very small that queer people or people who are lesbian, gay, bi, transgender, it just feels good. You’re just, “Ah, they got it right. They can kind of sing it. It just feels good.” That’s something that I credit to having a legacy of Welcoming Congregations within our faith. Sexuality and gender. What has being or worshiping in a Welcoming Congregation taught you about sexuality and gender?
Audience:
It’s complex.
Rev. Crumpler:
It’s complex. It’s complicated, right? That you just can’t assume that just because someone is trans, that they’re gay, right?
Audience:
I didn’t know. [crosstalk 00:11:35].
Audience:
They’re separate.
Rev. Crumpler:
They’re separate. Right? We certainly know that just because someone is gay and lesbian, they may not be trans. We’re safe to assume that. So the two are separate and so a trans woman comes into your congregation with a cis partner. Are they a gay couple or are they a lesbian couple? It’s complicated. You don’t know. Probably best not to ask. Don’t ask. It’s actually a little easier for you. But so at least we know within our Welcoming Congregation ethos that sexuality, who people are sexually attracted to or how people are sexually attracted and how people present gender-wise, it’s different. So it’s a different conversation. The reason why that’s important is because, I mean behind the politics of all of this and how we engage folks and what we expect them to know and what we assume about them is very important. I believe that the reason why we in this room are comfortable having this conversation is because of Welcoming Congregations. Yes ma’am.
Audience:
I was going to say sexuality and gender is not age-tied in terms of the person’s self-awareness. It could be anything from very young to 90.
Rev. Crumpler:
Exactly. Which is addressed in our whole lives curriculum, correct. So now we have our own lives as adults, we had our lives as children. But like again, when we speak about them, like just because when you’re speaking about sexuality, I think there’s a way in which we’re constantly amplifying the voices of middle-aged and young adults in a way that where the conversation is different when folks are aging. I believe that what’s beautiful about this space talking about this is that it is a space of older folk. So it’s so important to continue having these conversations.
Audience:
I would like to say it also gives folks new categories or new names that they didn’t know before that may change their own personal identity.
Rev. Crumpler:
Thank you so much for saying that. These are very fluid. Sexuality and gender and what you learned today is going to be old next week. So there’s like a need again for continued openness to these concepts. Anti LGBTQ legislation. What is the hallmark anti LGBTQ legislation that we all were a part of and know about and celebrate?
Audience:
Same sex marriage [crosstalk 00:14:43].
Rev. Crumpler:
Same sex marriage, marriage equality. We invested so much time and so many resources in marriage equality only to learn that most people aren’t getting married anyway. But it’s important to be able to, but side with love.
Audience:
[crosstalk 00:15:03] neither are heterosexual couple.
Rev. Crumpler:
Pardon?
Audience:
Neither are heterosexual.
Rev. Crumpler:
Exactly. Yeah. People in general. [crosstalk 00:15:08]. So we created an entire movement standing on the side with love, which is now side with love out of marriage equality. Marriage equality is the largest, again, anti LGBTQ legislation that we’ve won. But as we know, it is not the only one and it’s only… for many people, it’s irrelevant. Whereas what happened yesterday applies to all of us and it impacts all of us in a way that marriage equality never will. The right to work, to get married on Sunday. The fact that you can get married on Sunday and be fired on Monday is a big deal or married on Sunday and evicted on Monday is a big deal. But again, Welcoming Congregations gives us a space to be able to engage that. Then lastly, HIV AIDS, as one who is HIV positive, I really, really appreciate the story that was shared this morning because it is important for us to realize that HIV and AIDS is not happening in another space.
This happening in this space and Unitarian Universalism along with other liberal progressive faiths in the ’80s and ’90s should be credited as just important to getting us to where we are today as the CDC and pharmaceutical companies and activism. I believe that people had spaces that would bury those whose lives were lost, that people had the spaces that they could be supported, amid going through things like having to register with the public health department. Having to work in jobs where you were depending upon the healthcare, but concerned about whether or not your place of employment would hear about your status.
Unitarian Universalism and the Welcoming Congregations, which was birthed right along the same time as the HIV/AIDS movement epidemic took off, shouldn’t be missed. I think that is something that we should name and be proud of. While we’ve learned a lot and Unitarian Universalism as I just named, there’s so much more to learn. So as we think about Welcoming Congregations and where we’re headed and what we need to know, there is a need for programming and space for us to continue to grow our knowledge in these areas. Because as I named, what we know today is not enough, will not be enough next week or next month or next year. So what might we still have to learn about? Identity 101, we mentioned this before, like one thing that we’ve learned is like don’t just go up to someone and begin engaging them about their identity.
However, there is a conversation to be had about our identity in general, all of our identities. So how to ask someone about their identity? How to guide children and youth into healthy identity formation? How to create faith environments that is inclusive of all identities? And how does one’s nationality, ethnicity and race impact identity? I love the ask for someone to… that you’re looking for stories around intersectionality. Because we know that ones sexuality and gender identity impacts them differently based upon nationality, race, ethnicity, class, all of these things. Black trans women, we’ll see a video here shortly are impacted differently during this time of like, high transgender visibility. We’re excited to be seen, but in a community where someone’s able to walk out of their house after having watched the news or followed some story on social media and then see a black trans woman walking down the street, that creates a certain level of risk that we’re all celebrating.
If we don’t understand that right, then it becomes complicated. So Welcoming Congregations give us a space to have these conversations. Sexuality and gender. How to use language that separates the two. They’re not the same. What are the diversities of transgender identity and sexual identity and how to create a faith environment that is inclusive of all identities. So much of the air that we breathe in our faith spaces, even as Unitarian Universalists is gendered. So much of how we engage one another. So much of how we create categories is gendered and so like how can we continue to think about how we relate to one another?
Where are the underground community situations? I love adding this line in here because while we talk a lot about the differences, lesbian, gay, identity or what’s really impacts folks is where they live. And what they bring when they come into a faith community is a deep, deep need for spiritual connection. Most people are very, very comfortable with who they are. They know who they are, they know how they identify, they share their pronouns when they come into our spaces, our fixed spaces, they’re looking for connection. A lot of that comes out of relationship conflicts. How do we engage people who are in open relationships in our faith community? How do we engage folks who are deeply connected in the BDSM community and how do we talk about that in spiritual space? The chem party scene, the heroin epidemic, the crystal meth epidemic are a huge, huge spiritual indicators as to where our community is.
So while there is a lot of progress, there’s a lot of pain, a lot of pain. I don’t have statistics for you, but see, suffice it to say that addiction is rampant in the LGBTQ community. And when folks are coming into your space, how are we… rather than just waving a flag, they’re looking for a little bit more. We’re looking for a little bit more. Kiki Ball Culture. How many of you have seen the show Pose? Yay. Excellent, excellent. Very, very important show, very engaging. It’s essentially a show about black and Latino queer culture in the 1990s.
Audience:
What’s the name of the show again?
Rev. Crumpler:
Pose, P-O-S-E.
Audience:
What channel? What is [crosstalk 00:22:54]?
Rev. Crumpler:
It’s on, is it Bravo or…
Audience:
FX.
Rev. Crumpler:
FX and if it’s always a season behind on Netflix. So right now season one is on Netflix. Great time to go back and watch that [crosstalk 00:23:09]. But what’s the beauty of Pose and the experience that pose is exposing are the underground communities of homeless black and Brown queer and trans folk in the ’90s. And like how they created community out of performance culture for survival alongside of sex work and other means of survival. It’s important for you to know that when you’re watching Pose that Pose it’s really not about the ’90s, it’s really about now. So this is what’s going on. But it shows us how to share space. It talks to space and again, what is the need as it relates to LGBTQ inclusion? And that’ll connect to what I’ve mentioned what we talked about a little bit around marriage equality.
Audience:
And it is created by transgender and gay people too?
Rev. Crumpler:
Yes, it is. So Janet Mock is one of the firsts around black trans theme [inaudible 00:24:20]. So Janet Mock is very heavily in the production. It’s won awards and —
Audience:
Billy Porter
Rev. Crumpler:
So Billy Porter got an Emmy. There was the first trans Emmy nominated actress this year, so there’s a lot. What were you going to say, ma’am?
Audience:
Let me take you back BDSM, what…?
Rev. Crumpler:
It’s —
Audience:
Bondage.
Rev. Crumpler:
… bondage culture, 50 Shades of Gray, that kind of bondage. So I’m not in the BDSM community so I want to be careful about how I define the BDSM community. However, along with the Kiki Ball Culture, the BDSM, the leather community has been a community of survival for several decades. And we don’t talk about it in faith spaces because we just don’t have the language, just it’s not taboo. I would imagine that many folks here are much more familiar with the leather community than I am. However, I think that there is space to talk about these things in Welcoming Congregations, in Unitarian Universalism in a way that it’s not possible in other faith communities. Anti LGBTQ legislation, what laws are on the books in your state? Legislation happens community by community, state by state. Welcoming Congregations gives us a great opportunity for movement and activism, how to organize against them and who is most impacted.
We know that anytime legislation is concerned, those most impacted are black and brown bodies and we’re very well at the intersections of immigration and racial justice and making those connections, seeing that Welcoming Congregation isn’t just another thing that siloed off. Welcoming Congregations, Immigrations, Black Lives Matter, Climate Justice, where are these connections? How do these things intersect? When you’re doing Welcoming Congregations [inaudible 00:26:23] you’re doing Climate Justice, you ought to be doing racial justice. So all of these things connect. Then finally HIV AIDS. What are the most modern prevention and treatment options? HIV/AIDS is a death sentence for many people, not for me, but for many living on the margins, particularly for heterosexual black women and black and brown queer men are still dying from HIV and AIDS. How to address survivor syndrome in congregations? Raise your hand if you know someone who died of AIDS in the ’90s or ’80s.
Audience:
We all do [crosstalk 00:27:11].
Rev. Crumpler:
Exactly about we all do and we usually don’t get to talk about them until like world AIDS day maybe. You’ll be asked to have… Ironically I don’t or at least I don’t know that I do. There were alive that we lost in our family, but it wasn’t named that. That’s what it was. So what survivor syndrome in the AIDS community or the AIDS activists community is basically you living in reality without naming the grief that you’re still experiencing for people that you lost to the epidemic 20 and 30 years ago. Many of our ministers just aren’t equipped to help you talk about that. Particularly because a lot of the trauma, a lot of the folks that died in the early AIDS were white gay men. I will say that lately, we’ve not been so well or listened to white grief. So share that pain, talk about it. Make space for people to talk about it beyond world AIDS day.
HIV criminalization, in many States, I want to say approximately 30 States, there are antiquated laws on the books that still means or makes it illegal to transmit HIV even with consent, even with… not consent because no one consents to… that’s not the best word. Disclosure, [crosstalk 00:28:56] disclosure, disclosure. A lot of them are on the books because they just haven’t been revisited because it’s just not an issue anymore. But usually when these things come about it’s when it’s being weaponized particularly against black men. So these laws are still on the books and so we need to talk about modern treatment methods, what living with HIV means that there are treatments available. Those treatments need to be made to everybody. Yesterday California celebrated the fact that prep and pep are now available or will be soon available without a prescription. So prep and [crosstalk 00:29:40] pep.
Audience:
What are they?
Rev. Crumpler:
Prep is preventative medicines to prevent you from contracting HIV. So it’s a regimen that you can choose to take, similar to like a vitamin that you have to be consistent with that will prevent you from contracting HIV. Prep is pre-exposure, pep is post exposure. Post-exposure is if you suspect that you might have contracted HIV the previous day or night or hour, you are able to go to your doctor and like have that conversation and then take medications. What communities are most impacted? Again, I named this like anytime criminalization is in the picture black and brown bodies are most impacted.
Audience:
Michael.
Rev. Crumpler:
Yes.
Audience:
[inaudible 00:30:39]. So pep you can go to your doctor, you can also go to an emergency room.
Rev. Crumpler:
Thank you.
Audience:
[inaudible 00:30:49] because if you catch it within 72 hours you can [inaudible 00:30:52].
Rev. Crumpler:
72 hours. You can go to our [inaudible 00:30:57] emergency room and hopefully again in California and hopefully in more States you can even get it sooner than that. So thank you. But most importantly, how do we meet the spiritual needs of the LGBTQ community? Many of whom are already in our congregations. But have been sacrificed to other work that we’re going and have been basically taught in not so many words that we’ve celebrated you, we’ve accepted you, now let’s get to work together and not talk about you. However, there are spiritual needs that come with anyone, like we all are living in bodies. So those our spiritual needs are as a result of living as lesbian, gay, transgender, bisexual folk.
Video: [inaudible 00:31:55].
Rev. Crumpler:
That’s going to get some volume on this.
Video: [inaudible 00:32:16] walking down the street [inaudible 00:32:16] in my car and it seems as just because I’m trans [inaudible 00:32:20].
Video: Savannah Bowens is a black trans woman —
Rev. Crumpler:
Can you hear.
Video: [crosstalk 00:32:26] where three black trans women have been murdered this year.
Video: How many [inaudible 00:32:33]. I believe that number is so like bigger.
Video: [inaudible 00:32:37] transgender community.
Video: Transgender woman was found dead.
Video: [inaudible 00:32:41] transgender woman in Jackson Walker is killed inside [inaudible 00:32:43].
Video: Another transgender woman.
Video: Jacksonville have been solved yet and they’re actually part of an alarming crisis. Since 2015 at least 85 trans women have been murdered across the country. Most of them black trans women and gender non-conforming people.
Video: It’s like if I was searching for a place to move to [inaudible 00:33:13]. You know what I mean?
Rev. Crumpler: I don’t think the sound is on.
Video: [crosstalk 00:33:16] turns out a lot of these cases have something in common.
Video: She was a transgender woman, police identified as a male when she was killed.
Video: Just in past 90 minutes, Jacksonville police released that victim’s birth name was identified initially as a man by the Jacksonville Sheriff’s office.
Video: Referring to the victim as a black male in his 20s who appears to identify as a female.
Video: The way, cops are investigating these crimes. Transgender people are more likely to face violence and discrimination than the average US resident. One of the reasons they’re often at risk is their ID. A simple document that many might take for granted. When the gender marker on state issued ID doesn’t match the outward appearance of a transgender person. It opens up a world of harassment and sometimes violence.
Video: When it comes to getting a job, this could be the best job ever, and now all of a sudden [inaudible 00:34:20].
Video: They can be afraid to show their ID while driving, at a bar or to vote for fear of someone finding out that they’re transgender.
Video: The scary part is being stopped by the police, you never know who’s stopping you. Some of these people are homophobic, you just don’t know.
Video: [inaudible 00:34:47]. (music).
Video: According to a 2015 survey of transgender people, nearly a third of people with mismatched IDs reported being harassed, denied services or attacked. They can also lose access to medical care, become homeless, or be forced into sex work.
Video: A lot of times our trans women, they’re resorting to things such as prostitution because society has made it so hard. Every girl may not be as feminine as others or they or look passable as we love to say in our community. What do you do when you’re hungry? What do you do when your rent is due and your lights are about to be cut off. Like you can’t work because you don’t fit into the norm, because your friends they’re in the same situation as you and your family wants nothing to do with you. So you walk the streets in unsafe environments, just so that you could feed yourself.
Video: And discrimination trans people face in life can continue after they die. In Jacksonville during murder investigations, the police often identified victims by names they no longer used instead of their preferred names. In the trans community, whether this happens in life or death. It’s called deadnaming. The police have also systematically denied the victims identities by incorrectly describing their gender.
Video: If they were known as a woman and that’s what they live their life as, they’re refusing to do that.
Video: In addition to the disrespect, deadnaming can slow down a murder investigation in its most critical hours.
Video: You don’t get to choose what gender I am. Those people that know me in the streets or whatever, they knew me as a woman. So you’re saying I’m a man and you’re misnaming me and giving my biological name. How do you expect to solve a case [inaudible 00:36:48] nobody knows that. What if I was murdered in the hotel and people saw a woman going in and you’re saying aman, that’s not what they saw. That’s not who they are.
Video: This is part of a national pattern. ProPublica contacted all law enforcement agencies in locations where trans people have been killed since 2015 and found that 87% of victims were deadnamed or mis-gendered by authorities. Many police departments, site and internal policy to go with the name and sex listed on a victim state ID.
Video: By name transgender [inaudible 00:37:21] reflect what it is so that I can be respected. I feel like it’s a prison. It’s like it’s a prison and I haven’t a release date, but I have no keys to get out myself. [Inaudible 00:37:33].
Video: Savannah has recently started the process of legally changing the gender marker on her ID, but turns out switching that tiny M or F can be incredibly hard. There are no federal policies to address gender marker changes on documents like driver’s licenses. So it’s left up to the States. Some are generally more trans friendly than others, while others require a court order, an amended birth certificate or proof of surgery.
Video: [inaudible 00:38:04] The laws across the United States from state to state and it does not make any sense. It’s supposed to be United, right?
Video: Treslin Barber lives in Georgia and has been in the process of changing her ID, but it’s not been easy. Georgia law requires proof of gender reassignment surgery, which is a high barrier for most people.
Video: The cost of gender reassignment surgery at the low end that I’ve seen in research in the United States is $15,000. The problem is getting health coverage to cover something like that, to be hit with a solid wall of not being able to move forward is heartbreaking. It can destroy people.
Video: But she later remembered a crucial detail.
Video: I wasn’t born here. I was born in New York.
Video: The state of New York with a less restrictive policy required only a doctor’s note stating she was transitioning. They sent her a corrected birth certificate within a month, which she’s used to update most of her documents.
Video: Here it is. That’s a certified copy raised seal with my name, my changed name, and my correct sex. And I was halfway back from the mailbox when I opened this up. I had other mail on my hands. Everything else fell from my hands. I fell on my knees and started crying in the middle of the grass right out here. It’s okay. After thinking I was not going to ever get it done. [inaudible 00:39:53], I’m sorry. It’s the most amazing feeling.
Video: As for Savannah. She’s working with a lawyer in Jacksonville to get her ID changed.
Video: When that day comes for me, when my gender marker is changed it will be the missing piece of that puzzle. It’s that important.
Video: She hopes it will keep her a little bit safer, but knows that this problem is bigger than a letter on her ID. After we saw her, another trans woman was murdered in Florida, this time, a few hours South of Jacksonville. The Sheriff’s office described the victim as a man wearing a wig and dressed as a female, another case of deadnaming and a murder that’s yet to be solved. In a recent interview with local news Jacksonville sheriff acknowledged that there had been a lack of sensitivity when referring to transgender victims, but so far no new policy has been set. For more of ProPublica’s recording, you can check out their feature piece at the links below. Thanks.
Rev. Crumpler:
So several spiritual needs come to mind as we watch. I know for me, I saw dignity, worship, acceptance, advocacy, community, identification, justice, rest. What else? What other maybe spiritual…?
Audience: Worth.
Rev. Crumpler: Worth.
Audience: Authenticity.
Rev. Crumpler: Authenticity.
Audience: Affection.
Rev. Crumpler: Affection. Thank you.
Audience: Education.
Rev. Crumpler: Education.
Audience: Trust.
Rev. Crumpler: Trust.
Audience: Freedom.
Rev. Crumpler: Freedom.
Audience: Courage.
Rev. Crumpler: Courage.
Audience: Listening.
Rev. Crumpler: Listening.
Audience: Affirmation.
Rev. Crumpler: Affirmation, ma’am.
Audience: Friendliness.
Rev. Crumpler: Friendliness. And on and on and on. So what ministers and social justice committees are hearing in congregations is that we’re already welcoming. We did this work 30 years ago. Our minister is a lesbian. People don’t want a flag flown in front of the congregation. People just want to be left alone and not talked about, which might be true. However, a Welcoming Congregation is more than just a congregation that did the work 30 years ago or allowed a minister or lesbian minister that come out. A Welcoming Congregation is a living, breathing organism that is equipped and agile enough and prepared to receive those who are still coming out, still wrestling with identity. Those who have been out and are still at risk.
So my vision for Welcoming Congregations is a place where we’re ready, where we’re equipped. Where when someone like Savannah shows up at the door, we’re ready. We’re not stumbling over pronouns. We’re not fighting over pews, we have space accommodations that are flexible and free and we have our language and correct and we’re ready to go and welcome folks into our congregations. So Welcoming Congregation started in 1990 when this gentleman was in the white house and when this gentleman had hair. That’s me in 1990s in high school. Long before I’d ever come out or ever thought I’d be doing this work. I loved the idea of faith that was beginning to prepare to welcome me and you a great job. Other things happening around 1990 is the state of New York court of appeals declares that a lesbian and gay couple living together for at least 10 years can be considered a family for purposes of birth control, protection. And similar statutes were enacted in San Francisco and Seattle.
In 1985 the UCC, the United Church of Christ passed a resolution on open and affirming. So open and affirming is the sibling program, if you will, to the Welcoming Congregations program. 80% of our congregations are formerly welcoming. 35% of UCC’s congregation are formally open and affirming. However, their 35% is bigger than our entire faith. So it kind of gives you an idea as to what other faiths are going. Then Presbyterians have a similar program as well. As far as the UUA is concerned in 1970 just to kind of give you an idea as to how the buildup was for Welcoming Congregations. In 1970, there was a general resolution against discrimination. In 1987 a business resolution to rescinding laws governing private sexual behavior between consenting adults and in 1993 resolution of immediate witness to repeal, Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Which is interesting because I joined the air force in 1994 just before Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was official.
It’s just interesting that Unitarian Universalism, I thought I loved it. I was excited about don’t ask, don’t tell, I won’t be asked, nor do I need to tell that I am gay. I think that it’s beautiful that our faith was forward thinking enough to begin activism, movement, work against Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell even before the LGBTQ community realized that it was bad. So this image here shows the arc in which our congregations became welcoming beginning in 1990, your basic bell curve. So you would expect that by about 2006 most congregations that wouldn’t become welcoming had become welcoming and then the rest is just maintenance. So nothing like super wild here except that the purple portions on the bars is when congregations would have renewed they’re welcoming. So not long after Welcoming Congregations began, we created the renewal program, which was like, okay, this isn’t one and done, five years or so after you became welcoming, we encourage you to revisit your welcoming and renew.
While many congregations have become welcoming, not all congregations have renewed and we’ll talk about why. So as it stands, 810 congregations are welcoming, but only 34 have renewed. The reason for that is many fold. Like a lot of congregations didn’t know that they needed to renew. We haven’t been that good at reminding congregations that they need to renew. Folks have changed this position. Congregations changed all that to say we’re also with single issue congregations doing the thing that is sexy at the time. Welcoming Congregations here, Race Work there, Immigration there, Climate Justice here. So we haven’t been very creative around getting two things done at once.
Here’s the five practices of Welcome Renewal with five minutes left. So I get like a minute of practice. So the five practices of Welcome renewed is a new way of thinking of renewal. In the past we had to do about 18 months of welcome work to become a Welcoming Congregation. Then we were asking you five years later to do another 18 months of work in order to become welcoming. I wouldn’t have done it either. While alongside of that, congregations have been practicing welcome all along. So what I have been hearing from congregation is that, “Why do we have to renew? We’re doing the work already.” Which is very true. So in an effort to meet congregations halfway, we are basically affirming what you’re doing, what you’re practicing in congregational life as Welcoming Congregations, which are Welcoming worship services, Welcoming days of observance, a Welcoming religious education, which I’ve called here Welcoming Congregation module, but Welcoming religious education and supporting a Welcoming project or campaign or institution.
So these are the things that congregations have said matter to them, matter to you around being welcoming. So we’re basically institutionalizing the work that congregations are already doing and we’re going to make that work available to congregations that aren’t doing anything. So the hope is that, and rather than asking you to do it every five years, we’re asking you to do it every year. So every year as you worship and celebrate and educate and support, you will be renewed as welcoming. So a couple of questions, if you’re not renewing, if you choose not to do this, your Welcoming Congregation status will not be revoked. If you choose not to do it every year, you will not be shamed or penalized. Some congregations are small, some congregations are large, some are resourced. Well, the annual aspect of this is an annual commitment for me to create materials and resources that is current so that every year we will create our religious education, webinar and resources.
Every year we will let you know what books are available, what movies are available, what the issues are, what the hot button issues are that you need to do in order to renew. Then every year we will be reviewing institutions that we’re in alignment with to ensure that whenever you’re giving to a particular cause that it’s trustworthy and that it’s doing the actual work. And receiving from you if you choose not to support the projects that we recommend hearing from you every year, what’s going on. So you say, “Hey, we don’t want to give any money to human rights campaign, but there is this little struggling community in our… struggling a bit, a nonprofit in our community we want to give to. And we want other congregations to know about their work.” Then that work will get amplified and so that every year congregations are renewing.
So how do you renew? It’s electronic. So on our website you will getting to the end here, oh here we go. On our website at www.uua.org/LGBTQ you will simply complete an automated form. If you aren’t technologically savvy, there is a print form of that which will basically make us aware of what your congregation is doing. It’s less about a checkbox and more about sharing of resources. So what happens is when you renew, you will upload your worship bulletin so that a congregation that doesn’t know how to do that or doesn’t know what a welcoming worship service is or look like or involved will have access to that. You are uploading your welcoming days of observance, chalice lightings, music, poetry, art that you’ve seen or used on your social media so the other congregations can resource it.
As it stands now, welcome worship web does not have a lot of resources that are LGBTQ or any other marginalization for that matter, but it’s another workshop so that as you certify, we’re receiving resources and co-creating resources as a faith. Same thing with a Welcoming Congregation model module. If you do something in your… for instance, you had an amazing panel discussion that is a welcoming module. If you wanted to, you could make that available to other congregations so that they can host an opportunity like this to get a bunch of people from your congregation in a room, and that would be your way of renewing welcome for the year. So those are the things that we’re talking about.
The only thing that changes is that you’ll receive a certificate that looks like this. Once you renew that you would display in your congregations and perhaps you do it in 2019, 2020 but maybe 2021 you decided not to do it because there was an election and you didn’t get around to it. Fine, you’ll just have the ones displayed that you did so that when folks come into your space, they see what your commitment to this work is obvious.