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MCC Elects
Florida Lesbian Leader
By 365Gay.com
from the Web, July 25, 2005
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Calgary, Alberta -- Delegates
to the annual General Conference of the Metropolitan Community Churches have
confirmed the election of Rev. Nancy Wilson as the denomination's new leader.
Wilson, of Sarasota, Florida, comes the second Moderator of MCC, the worldwide
movement of predominantly LGBT Christians. She succeeds the Church's
founder Troy Perry, who stepped down on the weekend.
The MCC is holding its annual meeting in Calgary, Alberta. More than 1,000
church leaders from 23 countries are attending the conference, which runs July
21 to 26.
Wilson has had a distinguished career within Metropolitan Community Churches.
In 1976, she became the youngest person ever elected to the MCC Board of Elders
and has served as an Elder since that time.
She attended Boston University School of Theology with a Rockefeller Fellowship,
also holds an M.Div. from SS. Cyril and Methodius Seminary, served as
Vice-Moderator of MCC during 1993-2003 and has pastored MCC congregations in
Florida, Massachusetts, Michigan, and California.
Wilson is the former senior pastor of Metropolitan Community Church of Los
Angeles, the Founding Church of the MCC movement. She currently serves as
senior pastor of Church of the Trinity MCC in Sarasota.
From 1979 to 1999, she served as MCC's Chief Ecumenical Officer, representing
MCC at the National Council of Churches and the World Council of Churches.
In 1987, she represented MCC as an ecumenical observer at the Bilateral Dialogue
of the Roman Catholic and Lutheran Churches in Columbia, South Carolina, where
she met Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, becoming one of the first LGBT leaders to
meet the man who is now Pope Benedict XVI.
Wilson has also been active on behalf of HIV issues, prisoner treatment
programs, and women's rights. She is the founder of the MCC Conference for
Women in Professional Ministry.
In 1979, she participated in the first-ever meeting of gay and lesbian religious
leaders at the U.S. White House during the Carter Administration.
She is also the author of several books and is a contributing author to Poems
and Prayers in Race and Prayer edited by Malcolm Boyd and Chester Talton
(Morehouse Press).
Wilson resides with her partner of 27 years, Dr. Paula Schoenwether. They
both actively work for same-sex marriage equality.
Prior to beginning her MCC ministry, Rev. Wilson was active in the United
Methodist Church.
She will be formally installed as the new MCC Moderator at a ceremony at
Washington National Cathedral, Washington, DC, on October 29.
The denomination was founded by the Rev. Troy Perry in Los Angeles in 1968.
Today there are over 300 Metropolitan Community Churches throughout the world
with more than 40,000 members.
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