HIGH GEAR/JANUARY 1978
Page 17
IORIO ANSWERS
The Board of Home Missions
group
status
within
the
The following article is one of of the Great Lakes District, UFseveral in a series to be shared MCC handed down a decision at with the readers of High Gear its Oct. 28-29, 1977 district conand is prepared in cooperation ference that the existing MCC with the Reverend Anthony lorio. Pastor-Elect, of the newly mission (Then applying for study formed Nativity Fellowship Church of Cleveland, Ohio, which came into being as a resulting split with the Great Lakes District of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches. (Story covered in High Gear. November 1977).
HIGH GEAR: Tell us, Pastor what exactly is Nativity Fellowship Church or "NFC" and what are its goals for the Gay Community of Cleveland?
REV. IORIO: Actually, as we have mentioned, Nativity Fellowship Church was formed over a split with the Great Lakes District of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches.
fellowship) be disbanded and that the name, Metropolitan Community Church, Cleveland, Ohio be removed from its heading.
Worship was offered to the Cleveland community via MCC,
Akron
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the board saying that if individuals wanted to attend worship services, that they should come to Akron. As an official representative of the Cleveland group, I relayed the message to our people when I returned. However, the local, group, meeting in emergency session at the conclusion of the services chose to continue in Cleveland, but this time as an independent body.
PERSONAL FUNDING
Several gay organizations around the country are among the non-profit groups getting temporary funding for added personnel under the federal Comprehensive Employment Training Act (CETA).
Grants are made through states and cities, which set up their own criteria for approval under federal guidelines. The red tape would try the patience of Job, but with yearly salaries of up to $10,000 it's well worth going through. The local regulations vary, but the following are fairly constant: (1) Jobs are for one year only and are rarely renewable; (2) nonprofit jobs are funded under Title VI of the act; (3) applicant groups must usually go through a larger non-profit agency that is designated as the main contractor by a city or state; (4) Individual applicants must be certified (usually by a state agency) as having been unemployed for at least sixteen weeks and must not have earned more than a
specified amount in the previous (5) To get funded year; positions, a group must develop a measurable project for the employees to work on, must give them some skill improving
training and must try to place them elsewhere in the organization at the end of the year; and (6) existing personnel may not be replaced with CETA employees and no CETA workers may be involved in political activities or lobbying.
Sometimes there's flack when a gay group gets CETA funding, but often it just goes through unnoticed. The reai problem is more often the quality of potential workers one gets to choose from, but with careful sifting, it is possible to turn up some really competent people. For more information, check with your local CETA office usually at city hall or the county seat. Be prepared for up to a year's wait after you apply.
-Taken from NGTF Reports Dec., 1977.
We chose a new name by
which to identify ourselves, namely, Nativity Fellowship Church, Cleveland, Ohio. Our Board of Directors, acting in unanimous vote with the entire congregation has called and licensed me to the position of the Church's first pastorate. It was simple as that. The existing membership felt that by all means our ministry to the Cleveland community be continued without interruption.
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Since the resignation of previous leadership back in July of 1977, the church as a local body has seen its organization swing from out of "the red" completely "into the black," that is to say, all existing bills (past and present) have been paid. The church has its own bank account and we continue to meet as a local body. Our membership (which had dipped to as low as six) has taken an upswing to about twenty-two and we continue to grow.
We are currently experiencing infilling of the Holy Spirit. Our members have a testimony and witness of Christ's presence
INSENSITIVE
In an otherwise concurring opinion, Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun felt he had to "disassociate" himself from the other justices when he accused them as being insensitive to the plight of rape victims. "Time, of course, is always a comparative matter," said Blackmun. "But ten to fifteer seconds of observation of the face of a rapist at midday by his female victim during the commission of the crime by no means is insufficient to leave an accurate and indelible impression on the victim. To the resisting woman, ten
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within their lives.
As for our Goals for the Gay community of Cleveland, it is as I have been telling our local members: This is OUR church! It will be what WE make of it.
--and I say this to your readers, who as yet are still "out there" that this church was organized BY the Cleveland community FOR the Cleveland community. It will do great works, if WE are great workers! It will be strong, if WE are strong.
It will accomplish many worth while goals if WE who make up our church set ourselves to the task of accomplishing these goals! It can literally become a light house in the harbor of life's storms if WE, who make up our church set about the task of making ourselves all these things we want our church to be.
Many individuals have expressed a "fear" of coming out to our services. Let me say at this point that such fears are really unwarranted: We are people from all stations and positions in life-United in one fundamental goal, and that being to bring the message to
to fifteen seconds would seem endless. No female victim of a rape, given that period of daylight observation, will ever believe otherwise. I therefore cannot be a party to the court's degradation, and almost literal dismissal, of so vital an observation." The case evoking this response from Blackmun involved a Chicago man who was allegedly denied the right to a fair tria! because he did not have a lawyer present at the time he was identified. The court decided unanimously in his behalf.
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all our Brothers and Sisters that God Loves YOU! Our lives are finding new purpose, new goals, and new direction we have taken on new dignity and dimension. We have received a harmonizing and stabilizing influence, and that being, the Love of Christ, Jesus.
We who make up Nativity Fellowship Church have already exprienced this as a reality. We envision the sharing cf this dream with our people of Cleveland. We hope to work together with all of you "out there" as we build a strong and vibrant ministry within the community. A new day is indeed dawning.
Tomorrow is waiting, eager and ready to burst forth into ths sunshine and happiness of God's love. We pray for you with great anticipation that the Holy Spirit will move upon you to unite with us in this exciting venture. This Cleveland
munity
is Our goal for a unified comsecure in the
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·
this
knowledge of God's love and acceptance as we move ever forward proclaiming message. As the words of a certain hymn go:
"His truth is marching on." Yes, there are forces "out there" that can render havoc and confusion but the scripture tells us: "GREATER is He that is WITHIN YOU than He that is within the world." Our church doors are hand of open and a warm fellowship is extended to those who desire to come and unite with us.
MORE TOLERANT
The Gallup Poll has reported that British attitudes towards homosexuals are generally more supportive than those of their American counterparts.
When asked if Gay people should have equal rights in employment, 65% of the British respondents answered "yes" while 19% answered "no." Americans favored equal rights by a smaller 56-33% margin. Both national groups held similar views on whether Gay people should be elementary school teachers, clergy, doctors, sales-people, and armed forces personnel, however.
On several general questions, British attitudes were much more pro-Gay than those of Americans. 66% of Americans thought that homosexuality was more "prevalent" today than 25 years ago, compared to only
43% of British who agreed with the statement.
Americans, more than the British, tended to attribute homosexuality to upbringing, rather than something that a person is born with. 56% of the Americans agreed with the "upbringing" theory, compared to only 28% of the British respondents. 31% of the British saw homosexuality as an innate condition, while only 12% of the Americans subscribed to that theory.
One of the major differences between the attitudes of the two nations came in attitudes on whether or not consenting sexual activity should be legal or not. Britons opinion backed legal consensual sex by a 58%22% margin, while the Americans were equally divided on the issue, 43%-43%.
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