01-05-2007, 08:31 PM
|
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Posts: 590
|
|
Boston area ride
Bay Windows, the Boston-based New England LGBT newspaper, had an item in its Jan. 4, 2007, News in Brief column about a Soulforce Equality Ride coming up in March and April.
http://www.baywindows.com/ME2/Audien...304EC2F5BDA8DC
Quote:
Ride for equality
This coming March and April two busses will travel across the country filled with about 50 young people on a mission to draw attention to religious intolerance against LGBT people. One stop on their trek will be Boston, where they will visit Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Soulforce, an organization focused on fighting religious anti-gay bigotry and the organizer of the second annual Equality Ride event, chose Gordon-Conwell because of its official policy condemning homosexual behavior, outlined in the evangelical seminary’s community life statement, which “renounces” homosexuality and condemns it as “sexual immorality.”
Jacob Reitan, co-founder of last year’s ride and one of the organizers of this year’s ride, as well as a student at Harvard Divinity School, said he hopes the Equality Riders can prompt dialogue on the campus about the seminary’s stance on LGBT sexuality. This year will mark the Equality Ride’s first stop in the Bay State.
“It’s a school that’s fairly conservative and it’s right in the heart of Boston, and it’s sort of uniquely placed in this area of the country,” said Reitan. “And so it’s going to be interesting. I’m going to bring some of my Harvard folks along with us and we’re going to have an interesting day there. I would hope they’ll allow some robust conversation.”
One might not expect a conservative evangelical seminary to welcome a busload of LGBT activists onto their campus with open arms. And in fact Reitan said last year six schools, including Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University and Pat Robertson’s Regent University, arrested riders either for trespassing or holding unscheduled events while on campus. But he said most of the 19 schools the riders visited last year, most of them religious schools but also some military schools, were at least somewhat welcoming; a few even scheduled events where Equality Riders could dialogue with students about homosexuality and religion. Reitan said the riders were given particularly warm welcomes at some of the country’s most stridently anti-gay religious schools; Chicago’s Wheaton College and California’s Azuza Pacific University, which both have official policies condemning homosexual activity, both worked with riders to organize speaking events on campus for their visit, as did other schools.
That’s not to say that any of the schools backed down on their official positions on LGBT sexuality. But Reitan said the opportunity to have the conversation with students was the most valuable part of the experience. Reitan said he was inspired to help create the first Equality Ride last year after speaking with a student from Wheaton at a gay bar who said he believed homosexuality to be sinful.
“This represented the failure of the gay rights movement … His whole life he’s been taught this notion that being gay is sick and sinful, and he’s internalized it,” said Reitan. He said he felt it was crucial to get a pro-gay message out to the places where some of the most virulent anti-gay sentiment is being taught.
Soulforce hopes this year’s ride will reach even further than last year’s, using two busses instead of one and sending them along different routes to reach a planned 30 schools. The final route for the ride will be set later this month, and Reitan said that while his studies prevent him from attending each visit, he will attend many of the stops along the way for both routes, including the Boston stop. He also said Soulforce is planning a local fundraiser when the Soulforce bus comes to Boston in March, although the details have yet to be finalized.
Reitan said he believes it is crucial for the LGBT movement as a whole to confront the anti-gay messages put out by the schools targeted by the Equality Ride.
“As I see it the movement isn’t done until places like Gordon-Conwell and Wheaton are reconciled to this issue,” said Reitan.
— Ethan Jacobs
|
Last edited by BenL; 01-05-2007 at 08:32 PM.
Reason: add publication date
|
)
Linear Mode
