For Some Black
Pastors, Accepting
Gay Members Means
Losing Others
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John Nowak for The New York Times
The Rev. Dennis Meredith, center, pastor of
Tabernacle Baptist Church in Atlanta, began a change in his
preachings against homosexuality five years ago when his son Micah
told him he is gay |
By NEELA BANERJEE,
NYTimes on the Web, March 27, 2007
ATLANTA — When the Rev. Dennis
Meredith of Tabernacle Baptist Church here began preaching acceptance of gay men
and lesbians a few years ago, he attracted some gay people who were on the brink
of suicide and some who had left the Baptist faith of their childhoods but
wanted badly to return.
At the same time, Tabernacle Baptist, an African-American congregation, lost
many of its most loyal, generous parishioners, who could not accept a message
that contradicted what they saw as the Bible’s condemnation of same-sex
relations. Over the last three years, Tabernacle’s Sunday attendance
shrank to 800, from 1,100.
The debate about homosexuality that has roiled predominantly white mainline
churches for years has gradually seeped into African-American congregations,
threatening their unity, finances and, in some cases, their existence.
In St. Paul, the Rev. Oliver White, senior minister of Grace Community Church,
lost nearly all his 70 congregants after he voted in 2005 to support the
blessing of same-sex unions in his denomination, the United Church of Christ.
In the Atlanta area, a hub of African-American life, only a few black churches
have preached acceptance of gay men and lesbians, Mr. Meredith said. At
one of those congregations, Victory Church in Stone Mountain, attendance on
Sundays has fallen to 3,000 people, from about 6,000 four or five years ago,
said the Rev. Kenneth L. Samuel, the senior pastor.
Some black ministers, like their white counterparts, said they had been moved to
reconsider biblical passages about same-sex relations by personal events, like
finding out that a friend or relative is gay. Some members of the clergy
contend that because of the antipathy to gay men and lesbians, black churches
have done little to address the high rate of H.I.V. infection among
African-Americans.
“The church has to come to a point when it has to embrace all the people Jesus
embraced, and that means the people in the margins,” Dr. Samuel said. “It
really bothered my congregation when I said that as people of color who have
been ostracized, marginalized, how can we turn around now and oppress other
people?”
It is hard to know how many ministers who lead the country’s tens of thousands
of African-American congregations are preaching acceptance of gay men and
lesbians. Some leading African-American religious thinkers and leaders —
like Cornel West, the Rev. Peter J. Gomes and the Rev. Michael Eric Dyson — have
called for inclusion of gay men and lesbians. But other leaders are
convinced that the Bible condemns homosexuality and that tolerance of gay men
and lesbians is a yet another dangerous force buffeting the already fragile
black family.
“It is one of several factors that are taking away the interest in traditional
marriage in the African-American community,” said Bishop Harry R. Jackson Jr.,
the president of the High Impact Leadership Coalition, a black conservative
Christian group. “I see the growing gay movement in the black community
and our culture as almost evangelistic in nature, with what’s on television,
with their legal agenda, all those things that have made homosexuality more
acceptable.”
In the 13 years Mr. Meredith has led Tabernacle Baptist, he has presided over
cycles of fraying and mending, this last time because of his preaching “love and
acceptance,” he said. When he arrived in 1994, the congregation at
Tabernacle had dwindled from several thousand members to about 110.
A compelling orator with the voice and showmanship of a stadium-rock star, Mr.
Meredith quickly began to draw more new members. He preached against
homosexuality. Then, five years ago, his middle son, Micah, told him that
he is gay. Mr. Meredith and his wife began to read liberal theologians
like Mr. Gomes and to look at Scripture again. What matters most in the
Bible, Mr. Meredith said, was Jesus’ injunction to love God and to love your
neighbor as yourself, and that includes gay men and lesbians.
As he preached greater acceptance of gay people, Mr. Meredith saw the face of
his congregation change.
About three years ago, many older members, those who had hung on through the
church’s waning, and who drove in from the suburbs because they had attended
Tabernacle as young people, gradually began to leave. They took with them
their generous, loyal tithing. The 90-year-old church had money to cover
salaries and utilities but had a hard time paying for properties it had bought
nearby. In September, Mr. Meredith held a commitment ceremony in the
church for two lesbian couples. More people left after that.
As attendance dropped, the church cut back to one service on Sunday, from two.
On a recent Sunday, the pews were filled with some older people like the deacons
and deaconesses, though the head deacon had left recently after telling Mr.
Meredith that he had turned Tabernacle into “a sissy church.”
Under banners that read “Kindness,” “Peace” and “Love,” there were young
families with babies. And there were transgender people like Stacy Jackson
and Nikki Brown. There were also lesbian couples like Angela Hutchins and
Stephanie Champion, sitting together in the front rows.
Mr. Meredith preached about Moses, about the vision God gave him to do the right
thing. He told congregants about holding on to that vision, regardless of
who they were.
“Don’t let anyone tell you can’t do it because of your lifestyle, because of
your sexuality, because you don’t have an education, because you’ve done time,”
he said. “Because God knew you before you were born, when you were still
in your mother’s womb. If God loves everybody, who am I not to love
everybody?”
“Amen,” people called out. “Preach it; preach it.”
Afterward, when the sanctuary was mostly empty, Ruth Jinks, a deaconess who has
been at Tabernacle since 1969, sat in a pew, cane by her side, waiting for the
church van to take her home. Gay men and lesbians do not make her
uncomfortable, Ms. Jinks said. They have always been in black churches,
under something of a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. But she seems to have
tired of Mr. Meredith’s mention of them. She hears from acquaintances that
she goes to the “gay church.”
“I don’t think you need to be speaking about it from the pulpit all the time,”
said Ms. Jinks, who is in her early 80s. “I joined this church; I support
this church. I didn’t join a minister. I’m planning on staying here
and will not let people run me away.”
One of the junior pastors is the Rev. Chris Brown, who grew up in a black
Pentecostal church in Montgomery, Ala.
“My pastor in Alabama said gays had three rights: to redeem themselves, to
repent or to die of AIDS,” said Mr. Brown, 32.
He added, “The African-American church thinks AIDS is a gay disease, and that
everyone who got it deserved to.”
DeMarcus Hill, 32, said he admired Mr. Meredith’s “ability to embrace those
people who everyone had rejected.” Mr. Hill once attended and worked at
Tabernacle Baptist, and he is still friends with the Meredith family. But
after reading the Bible closely, Mr. Hill, who is studying to be ordained as a
Baptist minister, said he could not stay at Tabernacle because sex outside
heterosexual marriage was not countenanced.
Mr. Hill said he agreed with Mr. Meredith that God loves everyone, including gay
men and lesbians. “But God corrects you because he loves you,” he said,
explaining that for gay Christians, such a correction would probably mean
lifelong celibacy or eventually being with someone of the opposite sex.
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