Next Wednesday Americans will wake to a brighter future – those whose presidential candidate won of course.

That will not be the case for gay and lesbian teenagers. Neither Sen. Barack Obama nor Sen. John McCain fully embraced them as equal before God.

Looking back on an election that in one cycle had an African-American running for president, a female running for her party’s presidential nomination and a woman on another party’s presidential ticket, news pundits no doubt will reflect on the significance of 2008 as a year that history truly was made. [Read more →]

The Focus On The Family  ”letter from a Christian in 2012″ that was sent just days now before the Nov. 4 2008 election is a fictional account that compares gay marriage and the prospect of the Boy Scouts accepting gay youth into their ranks as similar to incidents of global turmoil - with the implication that a vote for candidate Barack Obama will bring about the end of Christian life.

The letter condemns gay and lesbian individuals as people we should fear and loathe. It is the supreme example of a so-called “religious organization” promoting hostility and prejudice to influence your vote as a person of faith.

Such a solicitation should find no appeal among communities of faith and it certainly holds no appeal to the future of America. [Read more →]

Guests Judith Light, Tipper Gore say book is transformative.

West Coast launch event to be held Tuesday in L.A.

Washington D.C – Close to 1,000 people last week attended events in Washington, D.C. and New York, N.Y., which launched longtime advocate and businessman Mitchell Gold’s unique expose on the pain of growing up gay in America.

The book, “Crisis: 40 Stories Revealing The Personal, Social and Religious Pain of Growing Up Gay In America,” asks Americans to awaken to the pain being inflicted on gay teens by a society that has been led to believe that such affliction is somehow morally or religiously justified.

Judith Light and Tipper Gore, were special guests for the New York and D.C. launch events. They described the book as transformative and having the potential to change the way America treats its gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender citizens.

The D.C. event, held at the Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams furniture store in Washington, followed the first launch event held in New York, N.Y., on Monday. Both events drew similar attendance.

Gold said the D.C. launch was particularly significant in terms of the book as he described how the project received its impetus in May 2007 while meeting with Cox News’ National Reporter Scott Shepard at the Center Cafe in Union Station.

During the interview, he said Shepard asked him why he had founded an organization that is dedicated to helping people better understand the harm caused by a societal climate of rejection and condemnation – which is most often promoted and justified with misguided religious belief.

“Without giving it a lot of thought, I simply stated how I did not wish to see one more gay teenager go through the horrible experience that I did when I was young,” Gold stated. After explaining his own personal experience as a teen – and that of thousands of teens today, Gold said he witnessed the impact it had on those at the meeting.

“From that I realized that there are many good people who identify with the varying faith communities but they simply do not realize the harm that is being done,” he said.

Light, special quest for the N.Y. event, said the book has the potential to change the way people treat gay and lesbian Americans by helping them realize the harm being caused by a societal climate of rejection and condemnation.

“I think this book is so important in putting a face and a name o the pain and to begin a conversation about why it is still happening in this country,” Light told the 400 guests gathered at the New York event. Gore, special guest at the D.C. event, said the book will help give voice to those who face discrimination.

“The stories are very compelling,” Gore stated. “The book itself is extremely significant and can be transformative in our society and I know that is the hope – that we can give voice to people here and around the world who feel their voice hasn’t been heard and who have felt the sting of discrimination and being unwelcomed in their places of worship and many other places in our society.

“I think that Mitchell in his inimitable way, which is always compassionate and loving, points out that people don’t really mean to do harm but he lets them know that harm is being done to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender teens and that it is still happening.

“This book, I think, is going to change people’s minds.”

Gold, who co-wrote the book with Mindy Drucker, noted proceeds from the book were going to seven nonprofit organizations that work with gay youth. He encouraged attendees to help in the effort to get the book into the hands of those people who need to read it.

Numerous individuals who contributed narratives for the book were present at the New York and D.C. launch events, including U.S. Rep.Tammy Baldwin, Ari Gold, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, Hilary Rosen, Jody Huckaby, Lane Hudson, Dan Karslake, Alexander Robinson, Joe Solmonese, Robert Wrasse, Kevin Jennings, Bob Williams, Jim McGreevey, Jimmy Creech and Brent Childers.

The West Coast launch event is scheduled for next Tuesday, Sept. 23, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. in Los Angeles at the Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams furniture store at 7960 West 3rd Street.

Openly gay furniture designer Mitchell Gold is most well-known for lush and plush home decor, but what some in the LGBT community may not be as aware of is his longtime advocacy on important issues- his generous philanthropy to the community and his work as founder of Faith in America, a non-profit organization dedicated to countering religious-based intolerance and clearing up the record about what it really means to be a person of faith and compassion.

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By Pam Kelley - Reading Life Editor - Charlotte Observer

As a teenager, Mitchell Gold lived a dual life. One minute, he’d be talking and laughing with family or friends. The next, he’d feel a black cloud descend, reminding him of his enormous, unsolvable problem: He was attracted to men.

He vowed to himself that if he couldn’t change by the time he turned 21, he’d commit suicide. He never changed, but his outlook eventually did.

Today, Gold co-owns the Taylorsville-based Mitchell Gold+Bob Williams, one of the country’s most successful furniture companies.

Now he’s editor, with sister-in-law Mindy Drucker, of a book aimed at sparing gay teens the pain he suffered: “Crisis: 40 Stories Revealing the Personal, Social, and Religious Pain and Trauma of Growing Up Gay in America” (Greenleaf Book Group Press, $23.95).

The new book includes stories from actor Richard Chamberlain and U.S. Rep. Barney Frank as well as area contributors – Charlotte’s Matt Comer, editor of Q-Notes; Hickory’s Brent Childers, a straight evangelical Christian who has renounced his anti-gay views; and Myers Park Baptist Church Minister Stephen Shoemaker, whose church was booted from the Baptist State Convention for welcoming homosexuals.

It also includes a range of painful stories – told by actors, ministers, business leaders, students – who’ve been bullied at school, condemned by churches, disowned by parents. Many describe self-hatred, depression and suicidal thoughts.

Mary Lou Wallner, who runs a ministry to educate people about the consequences of homophobia, tells of her daughter Anna’s suicide. Before her death, the young woman had cut off contact with her mother because Wallner refused to accept her as a lesbian.

“What would I do now? Grab my toothbrush, credit card, and car keys, jump in the car, drive to where she lives, and tell her I love her no matter what,” Wallner says in the book. “I did not do that, and now I never can.”

Americans split

A new poll finds Americans split on homosexuality, with 48 percent believing it’s a sin, while 45 percent do not.

Charlotte’s First Baptist Church Minister Mark Harris, who believes it is a sin, doubts conservative Christians will buy Gold’s arguments.

While many contributors to Gold’s book describe knowing they were gay from a young age, Harris and others argue homosexuality is a choice, and the Bible says it’s an abomination before God.

“I just don’t buy that it’s a natural inclination,” he says.

Still, Harris says he’d welcome anyone featured in the book to worship at his church. “We love the person caught in the sin of homosexuality. It’s the sin we hate.”

Gold, however, remains optimistic.

“Where I live,” he says, “so many people say to me privately, ‘I don’t know what to believe.’ We think there’s a big crack in the wall.”

He plans to donate 1,000 books to churches to reach people with anti-gay views. “One thing I know: These are good people…. They don’t realize the harm they’re causing.”

Harris says he’d pass up any free books. “I would most likely not become a distributor of that philosophy.”

Largest employer

Gold, 57, moved from New York to Alexander County in 1989 with business partner Bob Williams, then also his life partner. The two men bought a house in Hickory.

With more than 700 employees, their company is Alexander County’s largest employer. Its comfortable furniture, sold by Pottery Barn, Restoration Hardware and others, is widely sold and imitated.

Mitchell Gold+Bob Williams has also won acclaim for family-friendly business practices, including an on-site day-care, a gourmet cafeteria and an indoor walking track.

Gold is a vocal advocate for gay rights. In 2005, he created Faith In America, a nonprofit aimed at ending religion-based prejudice against gay people. In 2007, the group ran an ad campaign documenting how some churches had used the Bible to justify slavery and oppose voting rights for women and blacks.

Though gay rights has been a passion, Gold says he never dwelt on the ordeal of growing up gay until a reporter’s question a few years ago triggered painful memories.

Gold grew up in New Jersey in the 1960s. The only gay people he knew about were a few TV caricatures and a dress designer and beautician viewed as oddities in town. In his book, he recounts nights of crying himself to sleep.

His life may have been saved, he says, by a psychiatrist who told him homosexuality wasn’t something to be cured. Eventually, he and his family accepted that he was gay.

“I often wonder what my life would have been like if, when I was a teenager, there had been laws condemning hate crimes, protecting me in the workplace and housing, and providing for marriage equality,” he writes in “Crisis.” “I would have grown up feeling whole and equal – not marginalized and less than others.”

This week, Gold’s publisher holds book-launching parties in New York and Washington. But the book has already been launched at Gold’s factory. He has made copies available to any employee who wants one.

Recently, Gold says, one employee told him he’d given her a different way to think, and she believed he was going to change people.

“That,” he says, “was worth a million dollars.”

Pam Kelley: 704-358-5271; pkelley@charlotteobserver.com.

Mitchell Gold has made a name for himself as part of the powerful team Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams. In 1989, Gold and Williams created their namesake furniture company in Taylorsville, North Carolina. Just nine years later, Inc. magazine positioned the company at number 57 on its list of the 500 fastest-growing private companies. In April 2005, Inc. named Gold one of its “26 Entrepreneurs We Love.”

A long time supporter of our community, Mitchell Gold is increasingly becoming known not just for amazing furniture, but also for his work as an advocate for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender equality. Gold founded the non-profit advocay organization Faith in America; and has edited a new book, Crisis: 40 Stories Revealing the Personal Social, and Religious Pain and Trauma of Growing up Gay in America, which will surely become a must-read for all LGBT advocates, and has the potential to impact the future of our movement.

Mitchell Gold asked forty gay Americans to share very personal stories about the pain, fear, and rejection that can be a part of growing up gay in America. Contributors include many respected leaders including: Bishop Gene Robinson, H. Alexander Robinson, Jim Hormel, Donna Red Wing, Kevin Jennings, Rep. Tammy Baldwin, Rep. Barney Frank, to name a few.

Many discuss their long-buried feelings here for the first time. Several young adults open up about the depression, fear, and isolation that are still a part of growing up gay in many areas of the country today. Gold calls this a silent epidemic and mental health crisis affecting hundreds of thousands of gay teens. And he emphasizes that this crisis can be solved, with compassion and fair-mindedness - and by getting those whose words and deeds cause harm to stop.

The book’s contributors reveal what made them feel alone and unloved and at times so hopeless suicide seemed the only option. And they suggest ways to help the next generation of teens. These stories are also lessons in perseverance and achievement, showing the inner strength of the contributors and inspiring us all with their triumphs against the odds. Learn the harm religion-based prejudices cause, see the dangers of “cures” like reparative therapy, and get insight into the question of sin and homosexuality that divides many churches and families today. Become better able to help gay kids in your family, congregation, or classroom. Understand the importance of electing candidates who support equal rights and strive to protect all our children.

Mitchell Gold challenges us in a powerfull way to recommit ourselves to fighting what he calls a ’silent epidemic’ of depression, isolation, and fear, that plagues many young gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender young people.

David Mariner
Washington DC

While Faith In America respects this time of loss for former Sen. Jesse Helms’ family, we are compelled to remind Americans that there is a lesson to be learned from Helms’ dark legacy that for years promoted religion-based prejudice and discrimination against those that were different than him.
 
 In a 1995 radio broadcast he remarked, “Homosexuals are weak, morally sick wretches.” 
 
In a 1994 letter to Patsy Clarke of Raleigh, N.C., whose son had died of AIDS, Helms wrote “As for homosexuality, the Bible judges it, I do not.”
 
“These typical statements by Helms clearly demonstrate how he used the Bible to justify a message of hostility, condemnation and discrimination toward gays and lesbians,” said Faith In America Executive Director Brent Childers.
 
“He clearly judged and condemned gay and lesbian individuals as morally depraved, while trying to conceal his hostility, bigotry and  prejudice behind his own personal interpretation of scriptual text.”
 
Childers said it may never be known if Helms truly believed gay and lesbians were condemned by God or if he once truly believed the Bible condemned interracial marriages when in 1968 he told Duke University students who staged a vigil in response to Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination that“They should ask their parents if it would be all right for their son or daughter to marry a Negro.”
 
“What we do know is that he was wrong in 1968 to condemn interracial marriage and he was wrong to condemn gays and lesbians,” he said. “Inflicting harm on others in the name of religion is at the heart of Helms’ dark legacy. People like Helms don’t seem to recognize the very real harm they cause, especially to impressionable teenagers.”
 
And while Helms in the past may have promoted bigotry and hatred because of his own personal misunderstanding and prejudices, Childers said it is clear today that many elected officials and those seeking public office promote hatred and bigotry toward gay and lesbians for no other other reason than political gain.
 
“These politicians are writing a legacy far darker than even that of Helms,” he added.
 

“The Anglican Communion may not split decisively after all. This is good news, but only if lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people aren’t asked to pay for church unity with their silence or expulsion.”
    — Rev. Jay Emerson Johnson, Ph.D., National Religious Leadership Roundtable

WASHINGTON, June 30 — Conservative Anglican bishops, who met at the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in Jerusalem this past week, issued a statement yesterday announcing they would create a new movement that will defy historic lines of authority without breaking away from the Anglican Communion. They’ve had divisions with the U.S. Episcopal Church, including the consecration of the first openly gay bishop. The National Religious Leadership Roundtable issued the following statement calling for wider dialogue on diversity among Anglicans and a renewed vision of Gospel hospitality.

The Rev. Jay Emerson Johnson, Ph.D. of the National Religious Leadership Roundtable had this statement:

“The Anglican Communion may not split decisively after all. This is good news, but only if lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people aren’t asked to pay for church unity with their silence or expulsion. I would also add, only if LGBT Christians are willing to continue to bear courageous witness to their own lives of biblical faith and gospel ministry.

“The latest news from the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in Jerusalem renews my hope, not only for a rich Anglican diversity but also for all faith communities facing the prospect of schism over biblical authority and sexual morality. If Anglicans can learn how to stay together in the midst of our differences, surely other Christians can, too.

“I’m hopeful but also worried about the GAFCON proposal to create a ‘church within a church’ of ‘confessing Anglicans.’ The Jerusalem Statement issued by the GAFCON outlines a vision for a ‘purified’ Christianity with neatly drawn biblical and theological lines to determine who qualifies as genuine Christians and authentic Anglicans. This represents a significant departure from historical Anglican approaches to Christianity as it deepens the ‘us versus them’ mentality within the Anglican Communion and threatens to put church unity at the disposal of those who wish to exclude rather than embrace the diversity of God’s people. From the very beginning Christianity has always been multifaceted and diverse, which inspired the Apostle Paul to describe the church as a body with many members: each member is needed; none is dispensable (1 Cor. 12:12-26). For centuries Anglicans have tried to take that expansive Pauline image to heart in a worldwide, multicultural communion where every voice and perspective is needed.

“I worry as well that the Jerusalem Statement will only perpetuate the image of LGBT people as generally anti-religious, opposed to Scripture and uninterested in the life of gospel ministry. That image completely overlooks the faithful witness of thousands of committed LGBT Christians, not only in the U.S. but throughout the world. The stakes are high in this attempt to create a ‘church within a church,’ which cuts to the heart of the Christian gospel. This has been true for centuries regarding race and ethnicity and for nearly as long among Anglicans concerning women. At risk is our shared gospel witness to God’s outrageous generosity toward all people and the extravagant welcome
that witness creates in communities of hospitality.

“Sadly, church unity has too frequently been bought at the expense of this radical gospel vision. Episcopalians in the U.S. learned that lesson in the movement to abolish slavery in the 19th century and in the controversy over women’s ordination in the twentieth. In both cases, the Episcopal Church for too long valued institutional harmony over the call to costly discipleship. The equally divisive questions regarding LGBT people of faith present an opportunity to take those hard lessons from the past and offer a compelling vision of Gospel generosity and communal hospitality.

“In John’s Gospel Jesus prays that all his followers might ‘be one’ (17:11). In that same Gospel, he also insisted that not a single one should be lost (6:39). These Gospel words extend a challenge as much to me as they do to my GAFCON-affiliated brothers and sisters: Can we agree to disagree and still do the work of compassion and ministry in a world of pain and suffering? Can all of us imagine together a unity that does not require uniformity? Can we embrace each other with the same generosity God extends to us?

“If the life of faith is played like a game with winners and losers, then everyone loses, and the gospel vision is lost. The modern world knows only too well what it looks like for communities to fracture and institutions to dissolve over conflict. Anglicans might now have an opportunity to offer a different kind of vision to a deeply divided world. Avoiding outright schism is not enough. The harder work is rooted in God’s unending love and generosity that does not erase our differences but instead shapes communities of extravagant welcome and hospitality for all.

“The GAFCON bishops have also expressed their own sense of betrayal and abandonment in the Anglican Communion, to which LGBT people, especially in North Atlantic regions, would do well to heed. In my view, the GAFCON urges a long overdue assessment of how Western colonialism has too often excluded non-Western voices and dismissed the rich cultural and spiritual perspectives of the global South. As LGBT people, we know only too well what that feels like, in every call to ordination denied, as our loving relationships are silenced and with every unfounded biblical condemnation of our lives uttered from pulpits. From those experiences we can surely offer compassion to others, even in the midst of our disagreements; indeed, our outrageously generous God is calling us to no less.

“The work before us as Anglicans, and for all faith communities on all sides of this question, will demand a renewed commitment to listen to each other and to share our lives of faith and ministry across deep lines of division. If we can do that, by God’s grace, then there’s nothing that can stop the radical vision of gospel generosity from transforming this world of violence into a hospitable world of human thriving. May it be so.”

About the author: The Rev. Jay Emerson Johnson, Ph.D., a member of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force National Religious Leadership Roundtable, is an Episcopal priest and serves as senior director for Academic Research and Resources at the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies in Religion and Ministry at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, Calif.

The National Religious Leadership Roundtable (NRLR), convened by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, is an interfaith network of leaders from pro-lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) faith, spiritual and religious organizations. We work in partnership with other groups to promote understanding of and respect for LGBT people within society at large and in communities of faith. We promote understanding and respect within LGBT communities for a variety of faith paths and for religious liberty, and to achieve commonly held goals that promote equality, spirituality and justice.

The mission of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force is to build the political power of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community from the ground up. We do this by training activists, organizing broad-based campaigns to defeat anti-LGBT referenda and advance pro-LGBT legislation, and by building the organizational capacity of our movement. Our Policy Institute, the movement’s premier think tank, provides research and policy analysis to support the struggle for complete equality and to counter right-wing lies. As part of a broader social justice movement, we work to create a nation that respects the diversity of human expression and identity and creates opportunity for all. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., we also have offices in New York City, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis and Cambridge.

Faith In America today praised Michelle Obama for connecting the historical dots of discrimination and prejudice for Americans in a speech yesterday in New York.

The wife of Democratic Presidential Nominee U.S. Sen. Barack Obama stated during the speech that African-Americans and gay and lesbian citizens have marched on the journey toward full equality.

“We are all only here because of those who marched and bled and died, from Selma to Stonewall, in the pursuit of a more perfect union,” she was quoted to say in an Associated Press article.

Brent Childers. executive director of Faith In America, today thanked Michelle Obama for recognizing that history holds a valuable lesson for the pursuit of equality in America.

“When Michelle Obama makes that connection, it will eventually lead Americans to recognize religion-based prejudice and discrimination as the commonality of not only injustices against African-Americans and the gay and lesbian community but also women, interracial couples as well as religious minorities.

“The California Supreme Court in its recent ruling on marriage equality made that same connection…that deep-seated prejudice within majoritarian institutions cannot stand as a barrier to social justice.”

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Contact: Lane Hudson, communications director (202) 834-0275