[BenL]

As with Zerbie's post, these items are not ranked in any particular order ... just the order in which I thought of them.

- I consider myself a liberal/progressive Christian. The Episcopal Church happens to be where I find myself on Sunday mornings, but my spirituality is wider than the denomination to which I pledge. I grew up a Roman Catholic, but found it too restrictive and moved to Anglicanism more than 35 years ago. That's my religious background.

- Because of that background, I know very little about evangelical/fundamentalist (I know they're different!) theology or culture. So many of the discussions are couched in this idiom, and I often read them with interest but don't comment on them. Conversely, I find that not as many people have been in interested in the threads I have started, so have shied away somewhat.

- I retired at the end of August ... more accurately I allowed my company to buy me out. Now, it might seem counterintuitive, but while I have more disposable time, I have less time to spend online. I was online all day at work, so checking in at SF was easy. I'm more involved with the non-digital, 3D world in retirement, and only check email and groups like SF once a day ... and some days not at all.

- I'm working on a book project. I don't know if it will come to fruition, it's in the research stages. It is very time-consuming. I'd love to bounce some of the topics off of some of you, but I don't know if that's appropriate here. The working title is Gospel Meditations from the Margins. I am discovering that the margins aren't only on the fringe but exist at the core of every society as well, just as what we consider marginal to our personality or psyche can often be found at the core of our beings after the kind of careful self-examination that happens in therapy or meditation. It is not specifically LGBT in focus except where the gay/bi/trans community has been marginalized by the majority culture. My goal is to show that all sorts of people are marginalized and that the good news is that God loves them and cares about them more than they can even imagine.

- Some people love a good argument. Most of those threads have moved to the foyer, but occasionally an old thread will be bumped and will get a flurry of activity. I usually don't jump into those because I feel like everything has been said that needs to be said.

- I would love that the reason for lowered activity is that more people are ho-hum about other people's sexual orientation and/or gender identity and expression. Of course, we care about those things, so there's no excuse for us not to post.

My 2-bits worth.