Gay activists conduct vigil at Fort Worth’s Baptist seminary
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
By Terry Lee Goodrich, The Fort Worth Star-Telegram
FORT WORTH — About 30 gay-rights advocates lined Seminary Drive outside Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s entrance Monday after a private meeting with seminary representatives, saying they hope that the dialogue was a first step in wiping out discrimination.
Two members of the Soulforce Q Equality Ride, which has been on a national bus tour of faith-based colleges and seminaries this month, stood with their mouths taped inside a clear plastic structure they held upright.
The structure was symbolic of a “glass closet,” said Caitlyn MacIntyre, director of the 17-person group. She said some gay and lesbian students at Southwestern used that term to describe their feeling that “they cannot speak about who they are.”
The riders were gay, lesbian, transgender, bisexual and straight people.
Across Seminary Drive, a few community members held signs to show their opposition to homosexuality.
Bill Bool of Fort Worth said the “sole issue is Christ and that we’ve all sinned. God never intended homosexuality. . . . If a person receives Christ, there is going to be a change.”
During the hourlong private meeting, seminary representatives used Scripture to explain their stance on faith and sexuality, Southwestern officials said.
“There’s a difference of opinion, but it was a cordial and kind dialogue,” said Thomas White, the seminary’s vice president for student services and communications.
During Soulforce’s presentation, they likened the seminary’s stance against homosexuality to its discrimination against African-Americans in the 1940s and 1950s. In 2004, Southwestern President Paige Patterson apologized at a commencement to a 100-year-old black man and awarded him an overdue master’s degree he had earned at Southwestern decades ago.
During the private meeting, MacIntyre said, Soulforce members asked, “How long do we have to wait for it to be made right for us?”
Another gay-rights advocate at the meeting was Lauren Parke, a graduate of Texas Lutheran University in Seguin.
“I went to the front of the room and opened my Bible and said I’d like to share the words of Jesus” about homosexuality, she said. She flipped through the pages of the four Gospels in silence for seven minutes because, she said, Jesus said nothing against homosexuality.
Among those who turned out to support the riders was Liz Cumpton, 20, a religion major at Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth.
“This is very important to me, because I’m planning on going into the ministry for the Methodist church, and I’ve had friends kicked out of faith-based universities based on their sexuality,” she said.
White said that when students apply for admission to the seminary, they sign a document that they will abide by the seminary’s code of conduct.
He said that the Bible condemns all forms of sexual immorality — including adultery, lust and homosexuality — but that it also offers hope of forgiveness to those willing to repent.
Seminary representatives, among them students, faculty, staff and administrators, “acted out our beliefs by considerately sharing the Gospel,” but “our position remains unchanged,” White said.
The original article is available on The Fort Worth Star-Telegram website:
http://www.star-telegram.com/metro_news/story/1001185.html