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| Bea Chun - The group received five calls this month in ELCA. Mark Schroeder and Joel Hochmuth should write another letter. See below. |
St. Francis Lutheran installs lesbian pastor
NEWS
Published 04/10/2014
by David-Elijah Nahmod
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Church leaders, led by the Reverend Susan Strouse, dean of the San Francisco Conference, and all in attendance lay hands on the Reverend Beate Chun during her installation at St. Francis Lutheran Church March 30. Photo: Jane Philomen Cleland |
ADVERTISMENT |
It was a packed house at St. Francis Lutheran Church for the recent installation of the Reverend Beate Chun as its new pastor.
Chun, 54 and an out lesbian, was accompanied to the service by her fiancee, Alex Popova. The couple plans to marry soon, they said.
Some congregants noted that such a move wouldn't have been possible before the historic changes within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, with which St. Francis is affiliated.
Clergy from other congregations came to join in giving praise and asking God to guide the new spiritual leader.
The installation of Chun was particularly meaningful for St. Francis, which was founded in 1964. In 1982, the then-escalating AIDS epidemic inspired the church to reach out to the LGBT community. Soon, half of the congregants were gay men. In 1990, St. Francis ordained one gay male and two lesbian seminarians after the local bishop had refused to ordain them. This led to St. Francis being expelled from ELCA. St. Francis continued worshiping as an independent Lutheran congregation until 2011, two years after ELCA reversed its position on out LGBT pastors. Chun comes to St. Francis as an accepted member of the Lutheran Church.
"I was hoping and praying for this," Chun told the Bay Area Reporter, as Popova stood by her side. "I'm grateful to the people of San Francisco, of California, and of the Lutheran Church who took a leadership position for equal treatment of sexual minorities in every way. It feels like heaven has come down to us. Five years ago I could not have imagined that same-sex marriage would be legal."
Born in the Black Forest of Germany, Chun came to the U.S., leading Lutheran congregations in Texas, Wyoming, and California. Once married to a man, she now fully embraces her lesbian identity. In addition to leading services, Chun is enthusiastic about her involvement in church programs that benefit children and seniors, as well as St. Francis' Sunday morning meal, which feeds an average of 125 people.
The March 30 installation filled the sanctuary with joy, and even a few tears. There were numerous speakers.
"You have responsibilities," said the Reverend Lyle Beckham of San Francisco Night Ministry. "To the poor, the sick, the weak and the marginalized. And to the healthy and the wealthy, who in this city can be as isolated as anyone else."
Colleagues also urged Chun to be herself.
"Do not neglect the gift that is you," said the Reverend Marjorie Pearson of San Jose's First Presbyterian Church.
As Chun knelt down for the final portion of the installation, the entire congregation stood around her. They were all connected as one as they created a human chain by touching each other's shoulders.
The Reverend Susan Strouse, the installing pastor and dean of the San Francisco Conference, asked Chun if she accepted her new responsibilities.
"Yes, and I ask God to help me," replied a smiling Chun.
The new pastor of St. Francis stood up and addressed her congregation. "Peace of Christ be with you always," she said.
"And also to you," replied the congregation in unison.
There was hugging and handshaking as Chun began her duties.
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Gay Face launches
crowdfunding campaign
NEWS
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Ashley Kolodner is taking her Gay Face project on the road again. Photo: Courtesy Ashley Kolodner Photography |
ADVERTISMENT |
Queer Brooklyn-based photographer Ashley Kolodner is at it again, photographing LGBT people for her Gay Face project, but this time she's taking it national and adding an Ally Face component.
Kolodner, 26, visited the Bay Area last June and took portraits of 35 people. What differentiates her photos from similar campaigns is that she photographs in front of colorful paper that is used as the background.
She began the ally project in response to her straight friends who wanted to participate.
"The allies are just as important as the community itself," said Kolodner.
To fund the next chapter, she launched the Gay Face First Class Kickstarter campaign April 8 to raise $46,720.
The money will fund another tour of the U.S., visiting 28 states to add to the 230 portraits of LGBT people that she's taken and the roughly 50 photos she's taken of allies. At the end of the adventure the images will culminate in a book, she said.
"The goal is to travel, collect stories of people, to photograph them all over so you can really see the faces that are in Tennessee, Utah, or whatnot," said Kolodner, then putting it all together "so people can have a beautiful book that is not just full of images, but also stories."
The Washington, D.C. native graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in commercial photography from the Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara in 2011. That same year, Kolodner began Gay Face as a personal project, to escape the narrowness of the focus of her lens in art, fashion, and music photography, but in 2012 it began to gain traction, she said.
Funding the estimated $80,000 project herself through donations from her parents, friends, and her work as a freelance photographer shooting corporate portraits, musicians, and fashion spreads in New York she began taking photos of LGBT people with elaborate colorful paper backgrounds created by the subjects.
Outside of traveling, the paper used in the backgrounds is expensive, said Kolodner. While she might have rethought the paper it has now become an act of creative expression by her subjects, who often take the paper home with them after the photo shoot.
"It's been a wonderful thing," she said about how people take the paper and create coasters and pin boards, "all kinds of things."
While she loved Adam Bouska's NoH8 photo project, where images are taken against a bright white background, and 50 Shades of Gay, black and white portraitures of LGBT subjects, Kolodner doesn't perceive the community so starkly. In her project the individuals get to create their own backgrounds and express how colorful they are, she said.
"It's been a humbling kind of thing. It's been a great thing," said Kolodner.
For more information, visit https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1878936840/gayface-1st-class-1st-edition-portrait-book orwww.gayface1stclass.com or contact gayface1stclass@gmail.com. The campaign ends May 7.
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| Maundy Thursday, 2014 listing for Joel Hochmuth, even though he is in the slammer for man/boy porn swapping. |
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Aug. 21, 2009 Contact: Joel Hochmuth Director of Communications Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod joel.hochmuth@wels.net
http://ichabodthegloryhasdeparted.blogspot.com/2012/06/more-wels-news-light-sentence-for-joel.html
WELS president expresses regret at ELCA decision on gay clergy
Milwaukee, Wis.—Rev. Mark Schroeder, president of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS), is expressing regret at the vote of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) convention regarding homosexual clergy. Friday, delegates approved a resolution committing the church to find a way for “people in such publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships” to serve as professional leaders of the church.
“To view same-sex relationships as acceptable to God is to place cultural viewpoint and human opinions above the clear Word of God,” says Schroeder. “The Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, along with The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, the Evangelical Lutheran Synod, and other smaller Lutheran synods, maintains and upholds the clear teaching of the Bible that homosexuality is not in keeping with God’s design and is sinful in God’s eyes.”
At the same time, Schroeder says WELS congregations stand ready to support those struggling with same-sex attractions. “As with any sin, it is the church’s responsibility to show love and compassion to sinners, not by condoning or justifying the sin, but by calling the sinner to repent and by assuring the sinner that there is full forgiveness in Jesus Christ,” Schroeder says.
WELS, with about 390,000 members and nearly 1,300 congregations nationwide, is the third largest Lutheran church body in the United States. In Wisconsin alone, there are more than 201,000 members and 417 congregations. “It’s unfortunate that many headlines have referred to the recent decisions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America as something ‘Lutherans’ have decided,” Schroeder says. “In fact, the ELCA is only one of many Lutheran denominations. We are saddened that a group with the name Lutheran would take another decisive step away from the clear teaching of the Bible, which was the foundation of the Lutheran Reformation.”
Schroeder says that WELS is firmly committed to upholding God’s design for marriage as outlined in Scripture—a design intended for one man and one woman. “We believe, and the Bible teaches, that God designed this relationship to be a blessing for men and women and for society. Any departure from what God himself has designed does two things: it denies the clear teachings of Scriptures and it undermines God’s desire that the man/woman relationship in marriage be a blessing.”