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GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE November 20, 1992

First openly-gay minister speaks at Center meeting

by Kevin Beaney

The Annual Membership Meeting of the Lesbian-Gay Community Service Center of Greater Cleveland produced no surprises but did include an uplifting talk by the Rev. Bill Johnson of the United Church of Christ.

The necessary business included the financial report of the Center's $187,000 budget. Summarized by Executive Director Leigh A. Robertson (the board treasurer was unable to attend), revenues were at 75 percent of goal and expenses were slightly higher at 78 percent. The Garden Party raised $21,000. Since this report was nine months into the year, Robertson assured the crowd that the figures were right on target. One area that needed attention was individual donations, which are running lower than desired.

The renovation of the Center is now expected to be completed by the end of November; more than two-thirds of that $15,000 goal has been reached. The Center primarily needs materials donated; the work takes place on Sundays.

Director of Services Aubrey Wertheim gave a capsule review of the programs taking place at the Center, and mentioned that the lesbian and gay archives is now established at the Western Reserve Historical Society. He reported that the Women's Coffee House is back, and that there is a new group at the Living Room on Thursdays for parents and siblings of those in the HIV spectrum.

members Dolores Noll, serving as president; Bruce Horn, serving as treasurer; and new board members Alfred Cowger, Joan Organ, and Bill Tregoning.

Noll stressed that the board still has open positions and people seriously interested in helping the Center are invited to inquire. The qualification process is in multiple steps, since the Center is at a critical point where fundraising experience and extensive time commitments are needed.

As a prelude to the dry meeting activity, the Center had invited Bill Johnson, Secretary for AIDS Programs and Ministries Coordination, United Church of Christ, to speak and show his film Scenes from the Movement. Johnson, as the first openly gay person ordained to Christian ministry in modern times, has become a maverick activist. His early knowledge that he was "different" did not overcome how naive he was, going to seminary in Berkeley for two years and never knowing about anyone or anything gay. It took a "very positive role model," who picked him up in 1970, to open the floodgates of Johnson's gay life.

In November of 1970, he came out publicly in the seminary and began getting

involved in the frenzied gay movement in the Bay Area. By 1972 when he was ready to be ordained, the topic among the UCC was quite heated (and the subject of the film that was shown), but ultimately he received overwhelming support.

Johnson has always seemed to be at the right place, and with the right person, throughout major points of recent gay history. He dropped names and quotes from noted figures all during his talk.

His was an upbeat message, stressing that he was still here, even since 1970, sort of a walking testimonial that "it's possible for people to be open. Vito Russo said, ‘On the day that the first gay or lesbian person came out of the closet, we won.' We could see it is possible to live that way."

Johnson is very much interested in reaching out to the general population and not isolating ourselves. "The best way that people learn about us is through the sharing of our personal stories and the power of the interactive relationship. People need to interact with us so they can learn about us as human beings," he said. He found his calling to be with the UCC, not a "gay" church like the Metropolitan Community

Church, because "the mainline churches needed to be confronted," and he knew the UCC well.

Quoting again from his good friend Vito Russo, Johnson reminded us that "we become free by living freely. By living our lives as though we are already free, we assert a confidence in freedom and a determination to be free." Yes, it is a different perspective when you are "out," but somehow "we allow people who are fearful to tell us how we should behave and how the movement should act. According to Vito, 'We cannot allow people who live in closets to control the movement." He cautioned even those who are completely out that we all seem to save a little bit of that self-hatred, still buying into the shame that is thrown at us.

Even his years of work with AIDS programs has not diminished Johnson's spirit. Working with PWA's has taught this gay minister and certified sexologist that "we are not primarily human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience." As the close to his talk he reminded us all that "our love is more powerful than their hate."▼

Original 55-point platform for 1993 March

Activity with the Maryann Finegan on Washington reduced to seven demands

Project is at a "low level" because of a depleted budget, according to Wertheim. He also reported that the contact within the police department for the Witness-Victim program "came out," although the person's name was not mentioned. The Center is working with the Cleveland Safety Department on a video, which includes Mayor White, that will be shown at bars as part of a safety awareness campaign.

Activity at PRYSM, the Center's youth group, remains strong. PRYSM continues to mail ads to all area high schools twice a year. The feeling is that, even if the ads are not run, the editors and staff of high school newspapers are forced to confront their own homophobia in the decision making process. The November meeting of the Adolescent Consortium of Cleveland, an umbrella group of agencies, will take place at the Center.

After introductions and brief qualification speeches, the five nominees recommended by the nominating committee for the board of trustees were elected by acclamation. These included returning board

The executive committee of the 1993 March on Washington presented a new platform of seven demands for the march at an October 3 meeting in Denver. A previous platform of 55 demands covering a wide range of issues has been recast as "support items." That platform, created by the march's platform committee in Dalas last May, had been criticized for being too broad, and for dealing with issues apart from a narrow "lesbian-gay-bi rights" agenda.

The 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation is set for Sunday, April 25 of next year. Other events are also being planned in Washington for that weekend, including a health-care civil disobediance action at the Capitol on the Monday following the March. A public mass committment ceremony, similar to the one at the 1987 march, is also in the works, along with organized constituent visits to the offices of senators and representatives.

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0000

No. 2

Platform of the

1993 March on Washington

Preamble. The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender movement recognizes that our quest for social justice fundamentally links us to the struggles against racism and sexism, class bias, economic injustice and religious intolerance. We must realize if one of us is oppressed we are all oppressed. The diversity of our movement requires and compels us to stand in opposition to all forms of oppression that diminish the quality of life for all people.

We will be vigilant in our determination to rid our movement and our society of all forms of oppression and exploitation, so that all of us can develop to our full human potential without regard to race, religion, sexual orientation/identification, identity, gender and gender expression, ability, age or class.

Demands:

1. We demand passage of a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender civil rights bill and an end to discrimination by state and federal governments including the military; repeal of all sodomy laws that criminalize private sexual expression between consenting adults.

FAX: 356-4100 (West) FAX: 831-0953 (East)

2. We demand massive increase in funding for AIDS education, research, and patient care; universal access to health care including alternative therapies; and an end to sexism in medical research and health care.

3. We demand legislation to prevent discrimination against Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgendered people in the areas of family diversity, custody, adoption and foster care and that the definition of family includes the full diversity of all family structures.

4. We demand full and equal inclusion of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgendered people in the educational system, and inclusion of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender studies in multicultural curricula.

5. We demand the right to reproductive freedom of choice, to control our own bodies, and an end to sexist discrimination. 6. We demand an end to racial and ethnic discrimination in all forms.

7. We demand an end to discrimination and violent oppression based on actual or perceived sexual orientation/identification, race, religion, identity, sex and gender expression, disability, age, class, AIDS/ HIV infection.

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