Entering any campus that is welcoming is always a personal paradox in my heart: relief that these administrators recognize that this is an appropriate conversation, but angst in preparing for the rebuttals, passive condemnations, and the dint of going where no group has gone before by challenging thousands of years of tradition in institutions that breed conservative leaders. This is often a taller mountain to scale then the institutions that choose to arrest us rather than have this dialogue.

As we pulled up to George Fox University, we were greeted by a cluster of faculty, administrators, student hosts and one sign that read FREE HUGS. Misgivings immediately rushed through me as I anticipated an affected group of people just looking to get through this day and “appease the rabble rousers.” No one wants to arrest young gay people, right? Despite my immediate apprehension coupled by my lack of sleep, I was able to lighten up and settle into my mission before introductions began.

We were immediately paired or tripled with our host(s) and began a day of shared meals and deep discussions. For the first time since the ride began, the Equality Riders were formally dispersed throughout the campus. We called on our knowledge, intuition, and stories to address concerns and answer questions. Some Riders served as panelists in formal discussions, some were invited guest speakers in classes, some met with administrators and boldly addressed issues of LGBT inclusion, and some just mingled with the George Fox student body by attending pottery classes and telling their stories of faith and sexual orientation.

Often times, Riders were alone in knots of students who seemed to be drilling for answers. My first two one-on-one conversations happened in succession as one gentleman shared his ex-gay testimony and challenged my stance, followed by another gentleman who shared his story of being abused as a child, and challenged me with logic and scripture. After taking in their accounts, I began to sit with them and listen. I listened with peace and an open mind and did not attempt to defend myself. Throughout the conversations, they kept asking me (indirectly, of course) to reevaluate my position on being gay and Christian, and as the conversations ended, I walked away having heard one request: please help me find peace on this issue. I was called to George Fox University for these two men, to show them that God affirms a gay man and uses a gay man for good. I think every Rider had at least one moment like this. After six Equality Riders shared their coming out and faith stories with a class, one student shared that she saw them as incredible models of what Christians can and should be.

As the day ended, hosts and Riders gathered back into a debriefing room. I sat near a professor who, earlier in the day, cried in front of his Human Development class as he realized the struggle that LGBT Christians experience. During debriefing, we received continual thanks and blessings. One faculty member said that he has been changed by our visit; another student felt overwhelmed with love for us and privileged to have been in our company today. A consensus throughout the hosts was the intention to continually grow in understanding of this issue.

If dialogue was the mountain to scale, the west bus Equality Riders finished the day standing atop Mt. Everest, exhausted, contemplative, triumphant, challenged and satisfied.

We are midway through this colossal road trip. I have heard it said over the last couple of days, “I finally feel like I am actually on the Equality Ride.” We are five stops into the ride and the feeling of surrealism is beginning to dissipate with every real and meaningful conversation that we have on campus.

As many of our friends are silenced and arrested on the East Bus, we speak on their behalf. We act as the collective voice. We make connections with students and faculty; we exchange phone calls, text messages, and emails; we find those who are hungry for this conversation. We are ready, willing, and prepared to engage. Our hearts burn with passion for equality for all humanity. Each person who “comes out” to us or who genuinely thanks us for coming to their school keeps our fire steadily burning.

Namaste… This word resonates in my mind. It resonates for my friends and also for my adversaries. It makes it possible to truly love my neighbor whether they think favorably of me or not. Namaste all you who are LGBTQ. Namaste all you who are ally. Namaste all you who are skeptic. The Divine in me sees the Divine in you.

I close with the words from Galatians 3:28, which read: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

In God’s grip for all eternity,

Jillian Nye in Portland, Oregon (missing my little Jubal-lee)

The past 14 hours in Fresno, CA have been a whirlwind of emotions ranging from joy to frustration. We have been on the campus of Fresno Pacific University (FPU) where we have engaged in some of the best dialogue of the ride thus far. The conversations with students, staff, and faculty have been both challenging and productive. I for one feel as though I understand even more fully what it is to be an Equality Rider–what it is like to be barraged with questions, misconceptions, and Bible verses taken out of context.

Arriving on campus, we enjoyed a continental breakfast seated at various tables intermixed with administration and faculty. The conversation started almost immediately as FPU representatives were very interested in hearing about our backgrounds and stories. I had the pleasure of sitting with Rod Reed, a Pastor at FPU who had been the contact person who helped plan our visit to the campus. Myself and several other Equality Riders sat and talked with him for hours as we each told our own personal story of faith and identity and then asked him to address our concerns with regard to the FPU policy. Pastor Reed responded to each of our concerns but often provided disappointing answers.

The Mennonite Brethren is a denomination for which I hold great respect. They are active in the community and concerned about social justice and gender and racial equality, and it saddens me to realize that a group of people so enlightened and concerned about those topics could have such a long way to go in terms of LGBT equality. I respect Pastor Reed and FPU for their willingness to have this conversation, but could not help wanting to cry out as the conversation led in circles. I was sitting before a man who showed more love and compassion than most people I have met, and yet I could not lead him to understand that I am not a disease, or a mistake, or a curse, or a sin; I am a person, created wholly and fully by God and affirmed by God as a gay man.

As the conversation with Pastor Reed came to a close, dozens of other conversations similar to it continued throughout the day. We met people of various backgrounds, in terms of both their faith and their upbringing. One woman came to the room that had been provided for us and simply asked for the ability to pose questions. She said she didn’t understand anything about being LGBT or even what those terms meant. Her questions were genuine, and we were able to have real dialogue regarding faith and sexual orientation. At the end of the day, she came back and found me again, but this time she brought three friends with her, hoping that they too might be touched by our stories in the same way that she had been.

Many great conversations also occurred in the classrooms that we were invited to visit. Equality Riders participated in class discussions on the Biblical history of Leviticus, Corinthians, and Romans, facilitated conversations on creating safe spaces for LGBT people, and made a variety of presentations in other classes at the invitation of FPU professors.

Unfortunately, not all of our encounters were so friendly or respectful. A pair of students spent about an hour sharing with me their belief that I could not possibly have accepted Christ into my heart because if I had, he would have cured me of this disease. Shortly thereafter, another student shared his belief that being gay was a curse placed upon me because of sins committed by members of my family. It was frustrating and painful that in a community so obviously committed to education, social justice, and Christian values, people could actually believe that my love for another man was a curse placed upon my family and me.

At the end of the day, we all joined together again–the faculty, administration, students, and Equality Riders. We shared our experiences on campus and talked about where we go from here. One professor shared her own story of having many gay Christian friends and wanting to see safe spaces and equal treatment for the LGBT community at FPU. Another professor shared his desire to expand this conversation and express his concerns not just at FPU but within the greater Mennonite church. We exchanged hugs and expressed our gratitude to one another for a great day of dialogue.

At this final meeting, I felt sorrow and pain that in a room of such amazing and intelligent people, I was unable to fully express the damaging effects that their policies have on LGBT people; sorrow and pain that despite a great day of dialogue, there was still a separation of our two communities; but mostly, sorrow and pain at knowing that while I had a good day, was well fed, and had the opportunity to have my voice heard, so many others around the country and even on FPU campus had not.

Dialogue is a great step, and it’s commendable to be open to conversation, but regardless of the dialogue that is happening, people are still dying. I commend FPU on being open to this conversation and for showing us Christian hospitality, but I remind FPU and all of those reading this blog that real people–your friends, relatives, family members, acquaintances, and co-workers–are suffering, some even dying, every day because they are not allowed to live the life that God has intended for them.

I can only hope that the dialogue that occurred at FPU will lead to the creation of a space for LGBT students to be true to themselves.

March of 2007 marked the Equality Ride’s second visit to Brigham Young University. The administration again refused to negotiate on-campus dialogue. Stop organizers Matt and Kourt knew that students were ready and waiting to talk about issues of faith and identity that are literally life-or-death for many LDS people. They organized presentations, dinner meetings, and discussion groups for our three days in Provo, UT. I would estimate that over a hundred people participated in the events while we were there. The Equality Ride brings a much needed conversation to campuses unwilling to have such a conversation on their own.

On our last day there, we moved our events closer to campus: a six-hour march around campus to make ourselves readily available to students, a press conference at the main gates of the school to let the community know of BYU’s refusal to dialogue, and an evening rally in nearby Kiwanis Park to give a voice to the Brigham Young students.

Brigham Young University stop organizers Kourt Osborn and Matt Kulisch collected over 55 pages of concerns and grievances regarding LGBT students at BYU. Many students personally know LGBT people who have suicided or attempted suicide because of the fear and disconnection generated by BYU and LDS policy and doctrine around sexual and gender identity. These concerns are very real.

Kourt Osborn and his mother decided to bring these concerns to campus when university administrators refused a meeting to discuss them. In the following video, Kourt speaks about his experiences during the events planned around the Brigham Young University campus.

One of the constant companions of the Equality Ride is the sense of anticipation. With the exception of the west bus co-directors and me, this two month adventure is a giant unknown for all of the west bus Riders. Where will we sleep tonight? What’s this church that is hosting our dinner tonight going to be like? Will we get to meet students and make new friends today…or, will we be greeted by a contingency of police and threatened with immediate arrest? It’s not unlike a day in most of our lives…it just feels like there are hugely different implications.

It’s with that sense of anticipation that we boarded the bus in Calabasas, a small town just over the mountain from Malibu, CA and Pepperdine University. We’d had a wonderfully satisfying two days at Pepperdine and were now headed up to the San Francisco Bay area, specifically Berkeley, home of the Free Speech movement of the ‘60’s and so many other movements for the liberation of oppressed people, for two days of group work, tweaking our presentations, addressing our strengths and weaknesses in how we interact with the college and university communities with which we’re meeting. Everyone feels the responsibility of doing our very best as we have unique opportunities to connect with students at our upcoming “dialogue” schools.

Fresno Pacific University, with a student handbook statement which states ”The University is opposed to homosexual, premarital and extramarital sexual relations” is our next stop. With such an exclusionary statement as this, there’s no safe space for LGBT students at FPU. We are determined to bring with us, some way, some gift from God, that will create a more open and safe atmosphere for FPU’s LGBT students.

So, our work here in Berkeley feels really vital. Hosted by long time Soulforce friend Pastor Jeff Johnson at the University Lutheran Chapel (located just a few short blocks from University of California Berkeley campus), we spent nearly eight full hours reaching even more deeply for the stories and presentations that will effectively communicate the life or death nature of our visit. We know that suicide is too often the chosen response to the condemnation and intolerance of many of these Christian schools and everyone of us are radically committed to bringing this confused and dangerous system of religion based oppression down. Like David standing against Goliath, we have our sling loaded with pebbles of truth and of new thought and we’re determined to “slay the giant.”

We broke into groups and self analyzed our behavior on past campuses…how did we interact with students? Did we approach them with a loving spirit? Were there too many of us in the groups? How can we represent LGBT people with integrity and genuine love? Back in the larger group of all 26 Riders…we shared where we thought we were effective and where we needed to work to improve.

Then, we repeated the process looking specifically at our language. Stories. Verses. Tone. Slang. Everything we could think of that just might make a difference between inclusion and exclusion of LGBT students. I think all of us carry a huge burden of representing LGBT people in a positive way. While none of us are alike, it feels vital that we show up in a manner that doesn’t get in the way of our message–that neither our appearance nor our words would take away from the possibility of enlightenment.

On Friday, our second day in Berkeley, we had time for the everyday chores that accompany a tour such as this. Some of us washed clothes or traveled to a grocery store to “re-stock” our traveling mini-pantries. And at noon, we boarded the bus for a short but exciting afternoon/evening in the city…San Francisco! The City by the Bay! And more! We started the afternoon with a tour of the GLBT History Center on Mission Street. Tucked away unobtrusively on the third floor of a downtown office building, the Center has a huge archive of GLBT history…everything from Harry Hay to the Daughters of Bilitis are chronicled here–history that many college age LGBT people haven’t had the opportunity to learn.

And then…folks set off for an all too short tour of one of America’s great cities. The bridge…the Haight…the Castro…the Wharf. So much to see and so little time! But the Equality Ride isn’t really about touring or shopping or having a good time. Our first commitment is to bringing down this system of religion based oppression that is stifling voices and causing so much pain in our lives and the lives of our families. I hope we can all come back to San Francisco and Berkeley in a few short years…when the truth of every LGBT person’s worth is unquestioned, and when every human being is respected for the intrinsic value within each of us.

Tuesday, March 27 was our second day at Pepperdine University. After sharing breakfast with Pepperdine representatives, we had time to walk through campus and talk with students. The Pepperdine campus is absolutely beautiful. It sits on a mountain in Malibu, CA. As we ate breakfast, we looked out the windows at the vast Pacific Ocean. At night, it was so beautiful to see the lights dot the mountain landscape. My eyes played tricks on me, as the night sky was indistinguishable from the gentle waves of the Pacific.

In the afternoon, we partnered with students from Pepperdine for a trip to the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles. The museum was an amazing experience. Through a variety of exhibits and interactions, we saw the effects that intolerance can have on the world. Remember Oklahoma City, September 11th, and Matthew Shepherd…these are some of the events that we re-lived through our visit to the Museum of Tolerance. At the end, many people were in tears. I truly feel that this was an important experience to share with the students and faculty of Pepperdine University.

When we returned to Pepperdine, we shared dinner and some closing remarks, then headed up to Heroes Garden. Pepperdine created the Garden in remembrance of an alumni who died on United Flight 93. Looking out into the Malibu night, and gazing out across the ocean, we sang songs of peace as the Equality Ride visit to Pepperdine came to a close. This visit was special for many of us because we built lasting new friendships with the students.

Please keep the LGBT student group at Pepperdine in your prayers. They are currently working to gain official recognition from the administration.

Following an afternoon of community gatherings in southern California, the Westbound Equality Riders rested up and prepared for our fifth school stop. We left our hotel at 6:30 on Monday morning to drive to Pepperdine University in Malibu. As we approached the campus, I reflected on this school’s choice to welcome us into more than twenty-four hours of conversation and fellowship over a period of two days. We spent significant time in Las Vegas and Long Beach reworking our four core presentations, but I had no idea what to anticipate from the presentations given by Pepperdine faculty and staff. Nor could I directly translate our experiences at MidAmerica Nazarene, the only other welcoming campus so far, into expectations for Pepperdine.

Listening to co-organizers Jillian Nye and Brian Murphy explain the schedule, I noticed with appreciation the many signs of active welcome: the inclusion they sought by integrating parts of our visit into existing campus activities; the good faith they exhibited in allowing us to travel their campus unescorted; the hospitality they generously extended in the form of six meals; the atmosphere deliberately set by beginning the visit with prayer, the breaking of bread together, and a sermon against homophobia. I grew full of nervous anticipation.

When we finally arrived on campus (a bit late—there’s LA traffic for you!), I was able to experience these promises of welcome lived out. As we exited the bus, we were greeted by key staff members and a host of student leaders, many of whom were also members of the LGBT community at Pepperdine. The campus was veiled in fog, everything in the distance muted. On a campus renowned for its beautiful location, I decided this weather was a disguised blessing, narrowing our awareness down to those people whom we had come to visit and freeing us from superficial distractions.

During the short prayer service, two things stood out. One: In contrast to other visits where we could not even hold hands to pray with church members, here we were invited to offer the opening prayer. Two: the emphasis Churches of Christ place on worship through vocal music carried over into a beautiful call-and-response prayer in which, without books or accompaniment, we Equality Riders could easily participate.

After a catered breakfast, we attended a sermon entitled “Why Homophobia is Not a Christian Value.” More affective than Mr. Durham’s talk was his willingness to walk to the student lounge with us afterwards, talking about language choice and points he might include in his future delivery of this speech. This genuine interest in how he could better serve the LGBT community would be valued enough ordinarily, but his interest was particularly impressive when we discovered he was supposed to be headed to his own birthday party.

Over lunch, Pepperdine administration granted us free use of a microphone and stage. We shared stories, video and poetry about our experiences. Several key staff members were not only present and observing, but reactive to our informal presentations. With some trepidation, we returned to the chapel for a presentation on “What Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality?” given by Rick Marrs, Associate Dean of Seaver College and Professor of Religion. Despite a written synopsis offering a balanced dialogue, I admit I feared a one-sided lecture on what the Bible says to Pepperdine. I heard, instead, a brief overview of traditional and non-traditional hermeneutics across the passages most commonly used to condemn people in the LGBT community.

Although Dean Marrs did not own a preference for a single school of interpretation, he implied one through apparent complacence with church and school treatment of LGBT individuals and their relationships. Still, I felt that the clear and brisk nature of the talk inspired the kinds of questions that are useful to continuing dialogue. I would have loved to see our Progressive Theology presenters follow this conversation with a more specific response to the question of hermeneutics, particularly as this issue later resurfaced after our presentation on “In God’s Image: Identity & Scripture.”

At dinner, I found myself seated with several of the top-ranking administrators at Pepperdine. As a continuing sign of his investment in this dialogue and in us as people, Dean Baird remembered our conversation from the morning’s prayer service well enough to introduce me to the room largely by memory, even down to my score on the LSAT (a figure I wish he’d forgotten, in fact). We riders provided solid recommendations for ways to create a more inclusive campus, such as increasing the number of gender-neutral bathrooms and creating optional LGBT-friendly student housing.

We had good turnout for our final on-campus event, the presentation on how best to live out the Christian call to serve as an ally. I was thrilled that Pepperdine incorporated this talk into their Social Action and Justice Colloquium program.

Then we headed to the beach, where we met with current LGBT students to socialize and to dig deeper into life at Pepperdine. It was also a great chance to see Chuck Phelan (chairman of the board of Soulforce) and his partner Steve McIntyre, especially as Chuck and Steve had just received a postcard from me. As we relaxed together, I thought to myself, “What better way to end our sixteen hour day than with hot cider and cinnamon, a fire, the ocean, and a wonderful group of LGBT people?”

I feel very excited about tomorrow and the next few weeks at Pepperdine as this conversation continues. It is important, however, that my enthusiasm and respect for the University’s efforts thus far not be taken as a failure to challenge still further work on their part.

Like Notre Dame, Pepperdine a) earns national recognition for its academic programs, b) is religiously affiliated, and c) admits openly gay students. Unlike Notre Dame, Pepperdine treated the Soulforce Equality Ride accordingly, choosing to live up to the responsibilities entailed by all three characteristics listed above. This willingness to confront head-on the implicated issues, however, does not itself create an environment that affirms the wholeness and integrity of its LGBT members. Pepperdine’s unofficial GSA (Malibu GLEE, Gays Lesbians and Everyone Else) comprises a wonderful group of students who deserve official recognition, particularly if Pepperdine is to stand by the message I heard over and over again from some of its highest administrators: that while further dialogue may be required in this community, Christian love of gay individuals is unequivocal. If this is a starting point on which we can agree, then Pepperdine University, we are calling you to live by your words. Until LGBT individuals can freely exercise full voice and self-representation on this campus, there is division within the body of Christ.

“There might be a few more people than usual,” said Tristan, the BYU student who was walking Brian, Brandon, Jonathan and I to an apartment where other students had gathered for a weekly off-campus discussion group noted for its lively, late-night exchanges about everything from ecological building to the ethics of war. It was already after nine o’clock. The streets of Provo were dark and the sidewalk glinted under our feet, still damp from an early evening rain. Fifteen people, I was thinking, maybe twenty. These were college students after all. How many people had enough leftover energy after a full day of attending classes, writing papers, and taking care of the various social and institutional minutiae that go along with campus life to show up and listen to a handful of activists from out of town? After about six blocks, we arrived at a sweet little two story with red filigreed doors. Tristan brought us down the walk and motioned us inside. Brian stepped ahead of me into the entryway and, as I tried to decide whether or not this was a household where I needed to take off my shoes, he opened the door to the living room. Just as quickly, he closed it and bulged his eyes at the rest of us. “Oh wow,” he said.

I decided to keep the shoes on and followed him into a room absolutely crammed with students. I knew immediately what he’d meant. The six or seven chairs were occupied, often with someone perched on each arm. The walls were lined, and rows of people snaked across the floor, their legs drawn up tight so as not to bump the people in front. I stepped carefully on the few spaces of carpet between bodies, hoping I wouldn’t bang somebody in the head with my bag. At the front of the room there was flurry of motion while a couch was cleared off for us to sit on. Later, a student would tell me that there had been about seventy people in that space, and, as our conversation continued, more and more people kept showing up, inching their way in the door. When we asked if these were all BYU students, the whole room shook its head, yes.

We gave a very abbreviated version of our presentation about progressive theology, and as people began asking questions about family and the nature of the Celestial Kingdom, I felt both grateful and awed. Here we were in Provo, having been told again and again by BYU that the university was so certain that its Honor Code, which prohibits not only ‘homosexual practice’ (undefined) but also any implied or explicit advocacy or association, was solid LDS policy, that it need not be questioned, that dialogue about sexual orientation and gender identity weren’t appropriate on campus. And still the five of us Equality Riders were sitting amidst seventy students or more students who’d decided to give up a night of preparation for their classes, to give up the desire to simply be comfortable with school policy, to give up any semblance of personal space, just to talk with us.

We were all tired. We’d had a day of giving presentations at Utah Valley University, of talking with students, of attending a panel presentation of current and former BYU students at the Provo City Library. Aaron was in his second day of a debilitating cold, I was getting over an upper respiratory infection, but I am sure there is nowhere any of us would have rather been for those nearly two hours. The students asked difficult questions, and we answered from our hearts. No matter who was speaking, the feeling in the room was one of great respect and deep listening. This is a testament to the women who started this group and the way they have been facilitating it for several years, to be sure. But I think it is also a testament to the fact that when we accept each other’s right to ask questions based on personal experience with the Divine, conversations of incredible richness are possible.

That night, I learned a great deal not only about LDS Doctrine, but also about the possibilities of dissent within the church. I learned that there was already a group of students working on creating a safe space for LGBT people at their university. I learned that, regardless of BYU’s policies to the contrary, there is a great hunger among students to talk about sexual orientation and gender identity in their communities, and that these conversations can be had with deep respect for all the people involved.

When I first started the ride, I was hesitant about my role at BYU and Notre Dame. As a protestant Christian, I thought that conversations at these schools were ones that I could not be a part of. While I have learned about the LDS faith and the Catholic church in school, I have never before had the opportunity to explore these faiths so intimately. What I have found is truly beautiful.

These faiths carry so much wonderful truth about the divine and about humanity. I have met some of the most amazing people who are either Mormon or Catholic. In the days leading up to our stop at BYU, I spent considerable time talking with my fellow rider Emil Pohlig about the LDS Church and his experiences in it. I’ve also been learning more about it from our other LDS riders Mike, Matt, and Kourt.

I had been disappointed with BYU’s response to our visit and our inability to dialogue with students about these important issues. The progressive theology group was scheduled to give a shortened version of our presentation in “Ashley’s Apt”. I was the first person through the door when we arrived, and I literally opened the door, took a step inside, took a step back, closed the door, said “Oh wow” to my groupmates, and then went in (yes, seriously).

The room was about the size of 3 hotel rooms (right now that is my only standard of measure) and it was literally PACKED full of BYU students. I had to wade my way through the crowd–the entire floor was covered, people were standing around the walls, and even opening the door was difficult–that’s how full it was.

Emily, Aaron, Jonathan, Brandon, and I gave a greatly shortened version of our Progressive Theology presentation but then quickly opened it up for questions as we were meeting with a weekly discussion group (their Wednesday meeting will be all about our visit!). I don’t know why I am always so surprised to find that there are students who want to talk about these issues everywhere. Not everyone in attendance was in agreement with us; in fact, I would imagine that most were not. But that didn’t stop them from having questions, from having opinions, from wanting to learn more.

I was completely moved by these students and their faith. In my own experiences, I have seen the great families and good works of people in the Mormon Church. It breaks my heart to think that GLBT Mormons are being forced out of the LDS Church if they recognize the God-given self-worth within them. Rather than being supported in their relationships, they are abandoned. I have a place at this table because my fellow GLBT community members are being denied access to God. They are being denied access to conversations. They are told by their church that they will be denied access to the Celestial Kingdom even if they trust God in their hearts.

Matt, Mike, Emil, Kourt and I know that the Celestial Kingdom would be greatly enriched by their presence there. I have a place to talk at BYU, and later at BYU-Idaho because I know LDS individuals who are GLBT and I need to help tell their story.