Sermon transcript:
It’s been quite a journey! For me, faith has been interconnected with both politics and with music. So we get to explore all three here.
I grew up in the small town of Listowel, about 45 minutes northwest of here. Much of my youth was spent at my grandfather’s grocery store, and also singing in the choir at Christ Anglican Church.
I’ve been drawn to sacred music – so many beautiful works – over the course of my life. Our school system focused on vocal music and choirs, but we also attracted a lot of great talent as school teachers and as local church music leaders. Although I confess that I haven’t always done my Bible readings, I’ve absorbed quite a bit of the message through the many musical works that I’ve been exposed to over my life.
The faith of a child is often a simple one – to love and to do what is right. It gets shattered when we see people doing what we perceive as wrong. I certainly felt a great deal of hurt from bullying where I felt I should be safe, and hypocrisy from those I was taught to admire as they openly committed adultery. It took a long time to learn the lesson of forgiveness.
Our church was a study in the tension between the old and the new. Our prayer book was the Book of Common Prayer, published in 1549 (about 450 years ago), which then gave way to the Book of Alternative Services. We also ended up moving our altar out from the wall, so the minister could face the congregation, and let me tell you, that was a fiery discussion at that meeting!
Our first reading was something repeated in many of our services. “Love God with all your heart, mind, and strength, and love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments hang all of the Law and the Prophets.” That is, the old Testament of the Bible. The second reading has Jesus summing up the Old Testament in a similar way, with what is known as the Golden Rule, which is the one teaching shared by many religions of the world. Those words have percolated with me for many years, and are of key importance when challenging those who would hate in the name of religion.
When I left home and attended the University of Waterloo, my love of good music and good food brought me to Conrad Grebel, the Mennonite church college, where I studied vocal music as my second major, and ate a lot of wonderful homestyle cooking! I was heavily influenced by their faith as well. They are a pacifist religion, with a lot of focus on service in the world. Their tradition of 4-part congregational singing did my heart good as well.
It was also good to see people trying to make the “Sunday-Monday connection.” That is, taking our learnings and beliefs from faith, and applying it in daily life. As the third reading says, “where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” Sometimes we get caught up focusing too much on job demands and wealth acquisition, and get to the end of our life, lamenting that we didn’t make time for those pursuits that are the most important.
One of the more interesting courses I took there was Sects, Cults, and New Religious Movements, where the prof invited a number of people from various spiritual groups to come and give a talk and answer questions. It was a great experience for learning about other religious and spiritual perspectives!
Community was a major focus of residence life, and even though I only lived in residence for my first year, I was part of their associate program, which brought together a larger part of the community for community supper, also called “commie supper,” and we were invited to other events as well, and felt comfortable with Grebel as our home away from home.
It was in this environment that I started my journey into progressive activism. When the Gulf War started, I travelled with others down to Washington DC for an anti-war protest, which was my first, but definitely not my last. I continued to learn from progressive thinkers, mostly in online forums at that point.
With the election of Mike Harris, I felt that I needed to get involved in community activism. I volunteered at a global education organization in Waterloo called Global Community Centre, and got involved in various grassroots social justice and anti-poverty groups. It felt good to work with others trying to achieve a better community and world.
You may be saying — ok, this is Pride Sunday. When is he going to talk about coming out?? Well, here we are! I was a late bloomer. I had a girlfriend in university, but only really came to terms with who I was at the age of 27. I had a huge crush on a male friend for years, and at that point I was looking at possibly having a boyfriend. That relationship did not last, but was certainly an inflection point on my journey. In the end, I think the hardest person to come out to was myself.
My favourite hangout at that time was the Robin’s Nest, a gay club in Cambridge. It played an eclectic range of music – pop, country, line dancing, polkas – you name it! And it drew a huge crowd from afar, sometimes by the busload. I recently attended the funeral of the founder Annie Nixon. It was a small funeral, but if everyone came whose life she touched, they would have had to book the SkyDome.
A friend introduced me to my next regular church around that time as well. It was Olive Branch Mennonite Church, which was a small lay-led congregation that was also one of the few affirming Mennonite congregations at the time. It was great to have this little congregation, but it was also a convenient place for the other churches to send any of the rainbow community, who weren’t as accepted at their church.
I was 32 when I met Patrick, who I was common law with for 15 years, and it was then that I came out to my family and more broadly. Patrick became part of the Olive Branch family, and later we also got involved with a group called the Brethren Mennonite Committee for LGBT concerns – which shortened to BMC.
We had annual winter camp retreats at Silver Lake Mennonite Camp near Sauble Beach. (Yeah I’m not sure why there are so many lakes named Silver Lake, and at least two that have church camps at them). Anyway, it was a fun time, usually over the Valentine’s Day weekend.
The parents of the BMC members created their own group to advocate within the church. Even though many of the children got frustrated and left the church, the parents persisted, and there are more affirming congregations today as a result. As always, it is the personal stories that engage people and bring them around.
Unfortunately, Olive Branch ended up dissolving in 2006, and we were without a church. But then came the three signs pointing us to Parkminster. One was a conversation Patrick had with Allen Switzer at Hopespring. Second was going to Pride and seeing the Parkminster table there. Third was talking to Roger Snyder at the BMC group one year.
The last 15 years have been a wild ride. There are so many people who I’ve learned from, been supported by, and sung with. Some are still here, and some have journeyed elsewhere, but many thanks to all!
Some things have come full circle. I met my friend Nancy at Olive Branch, and she attends Parkminster now as well. I’ve been asked to be part of a conflict resolution team here at the church, and our trainings come from – you guessed it – Conrad Grebel College! I’ve also started a group, Lead by Love, in response to yet another right-wing figure, Donald Trump, being elected, and the son of one of the activists I knew from years ago was at one of those meetings. And just this weekend, I returned to the US Consulate in Toronto, and marched to Queen’s Park for the “No Kings” protest against Donald Trump.
These Bible passages we’ve read continue to resonate for me, but my heart is most deeply moved, as always, by the music, so now we will sing. In this age where people are fired, arrested, and forcibly removed for who they are, let us continue to build a house where all are welcome! Amen.