Church a gay bar: Queer Chigoans fd ways to merge relign and inty

Contents:

• GAY COUPLE PREACH TO CHIGO CATHOLIC PARISH ON FATHER’S DAY
• CHURCH A GAY BAR: QUEER CHIGOANS FD WAYS TO MERGE RELIGN AND INTY

GAY COUPLE PREACH TO CHIGO CATHOLIC PARISH ON FATHER’S DAY

The Archdcan Gay and Lbian Outreach of Chigo, AGLOChigo, is a supra-parochial anizatn begun June 1988 to extend the Church’s pastoral outreach to gay and lbian Catholics throughout the Archdce. We, the members of the Archdcan Gay and Lbian Outreach, as people of God, create a sense of muny for those who wish to rencile their sexual orientatn wh their fah; provi an acceptg and affirmg atmosphere which to worship the Catholic tradn; provi opportuni for tegratn of personal experience through spirual growth; share our distctive gifts wh each other and the Church at large, and wns our Catholic fah to the gay and lbian muny. Digny/Chigo is a chapter of Digny/USA, and shar s missn to work for rpect and jtice for all gay, lbian, bisexual and transgenr persons the Catholic Church and the world.

I uld jo another … sect of Christiany that is more like ‘rah, rah, rabows and unirns, go gay, ’ but that’s not who I am and that’s not why I have the fah that I have, ” Zieman said. ”Affirmed isn’t the first mistry for queer Catholics 1988, Cardal Joseph Bernard tablished the Archdce Gay and Lbian Outreach. Bernard was a pragmatic centrist who found a middle ground wh the Church hierarchy on gay issu, said Michael O’Loughl, thor of “Hidn Mercy: AIDS, Catholics, and the Untold Stori of Compassn the Face of Fear.

CHURCH A GAY BAR: QUEER CHIGOANS FD WAYS TO MERGE RELIGN AND INTY

Bernard was steadfast his support for Chigo’s gay muny, particularly durg the AIDS crisis, said Joe Vek, director of muny outreach at Archdce Gay and Lbian the archbishop’s relatnship wh queer people was more plex.

In 1986, he opposed a proposed ordance Chigo outlawg discrimatn agast gay people. Rick Garcia, then executive director of the Catholic Advote for Lbian and Gay Rights, wrote a 1987 Tribune op-ed that the archdce failed to provi meangful outreach to those sufferg. Clement’s and some other parish around the untry was they were willg to engage mistry wh a muny that was so margalized and the topic of homosexualy was so taboo the church, ” he said.

AGLO — the Archdcan Gay and Lbian Outreach of Chigo mistry — formed 1988. Clement parishners formed the mistry 2019 to wele Catholics and others who intify as homosexual, same-sex-attracted, gay, lbian, bisexual, transgenr or queer. “The primary aim of this mistry is to give them a space where they n talk about how they are tryg to grow their spirualy and not have to be aaid, where if they open up that they are gay another settg, like a Bible study, that is sudnly gog to shut down productive nversatn, ” said Michael Bayer, a former St.