Below is the letter I wrote to the leadership above me after walking with Liz Garcia through her process of coming out, coming into her own, and leaving Young Life staff. Most of it still resonates with me and rings true. As you can guess, I didn't last too much longer after choosing this level of honesty.
I’ll never forget the day I sent this. Senior leadership of YL were all in a multi day meeting discussing sexuality and its role in YL. I was unaware that this was going on, but the timing was impeccable. That was almost three years ago. THREE YEARS. Nothing has changed despite all of the “conversations” going on.
Two years after leaving my position of Camp Manager of Lost Canyon I can more clearly see the toxicity of Evangelical Chrisianity and it's dispensational and escapist theologies (that I never believed in). I wasn't raised in the church. I was always there to try and walk in the radical footsteps of Jesus, and I thought most others and I were like minded. I was relying on the idea that YL was a parachurch ministry. That it was somehow over, or separate than the dogma, control and religiosity of the church. I was incorrect.
Evangelicalism is built upon the idea that you are not good enough, and that you never can be. That's one of the several destructive and oppressive powers it has over people. Sin, fallen nature, Substitutionary Atonement, blah blah blah...
I used to think that Young Life would be ok if it were to become publicly affirming. Now I know that to be untrue. The root problem runs so much deeper than its‘ lack of affirmation of LGBTQIA people. Young Life would have to look radically different in order to cause me to want to be a part of it again, or to let me children be involved.
Will YL change? Do I want YL to change? Do I want them to “Do Better”? I definitely want them to do better. But if I am being realistic, “better” probably looks like more like becoming publicly and clearly non-affirming, which would be a helpful warning sign for queer youth. It would send a clear message to queer kids and their allies, that this is not the place for you. This level of clarity would be light years better than luring kids in, under the false guise of a community that is welcoming and in support of “ALL“ people, when it actually excludes those that identify as LGBTQIA.
Young Life, say who you are. It's ok. (maybe it’s not) Honesty and clarity would go a long way here. You can't sit on the fence on this for a decade or more, like you have. You can't wait on the rest of the church and all of your donors to get there first. Your inaction is the result of fear. Fear of who you will publically alienate. But you are already silently alienating people at a much greater cost.
Choose kindness through clarity. It will hurt either way, but it's the right thing to do.
Clarity is the bare minimum.
Concluding rant. Commencing with letter:
Over the course of the last 6 months I have been placed in a position where I have felt forced to live and work in a way that is at odds with who I am, what I know to be true and what I believe. In the role of camp manager I have been asked to be many things, wear many hats and uphold the tenets of this ministry.
I have done this, and done this well.
I have enjoyed the many hats I wear. I feel called to this role, in the sense that I feel gifted in these roles and that my gifts are being used well in creating a space where people, guests, and staff can have a transformational encounter with Jesus.
However, recently my actions and obedience to YL's policies has created unjust pain and hurt, and division within the community and within myself.
This is not a conversation or a letter about wrong and right. That is not a helpful conversation at this point. These concepts are so heavily influenced by experience (and we have not all had the same experiences in life), tradition (we all come from different traditions) and Scripture (and we all hold scripture in different ways that dramatically affects our image of God and our worldview). These three pieces of our faith are all important and essential. However, if we believe in Spirit, and Trinity and a God that IS relationship, we must recognize that experience is the front wheel that steers the tricycle that is our faith, as it should be.
This is a conversation about experience and my experience with the Sin of our certainty and the lines that we have drawn in the sand and what it is doing to people and communities.
Several years ago I came to terms with the differences between my beliefs and experiences, and the statements of Young Life regarding the topic of Homosexuality. I knew that at some point I would be placed in a position where I would be asked or expected to help a staff person leave because of their sexual orientation, or gender identity. Within this internal monologue I have always told myself I would not do it, I would not fire anyone or ask someone to resign because of their sexual orientation.
Side note: Right now you might be reminding yourself that we do not ask people to leave staff because they consider themselves as gay, we only ask staff to leave if they express their homosexuality by being in an intimate relationship with someone of the same gender outside of the context of marriage which is to be strictly heterosexual. This is correct. We only ask staff (or volunteers) to leave if they can muster the strength to deny themselves partnership and intimacy, commit to celibacy, and live a life full of self shame that implies that they are made differently and that this difference should deny them the type of life partnership that all of humanity desires. End side note.
Six months ago, this inevitable situation occurred. Six months ago one of my staff shared with me that she was gay. This did not come as a surprise to me. I always knew or I at least always suspected. I was so excited for her honesty with me but mainly with newfound honesty with herself. Knowing this person for a long time and seeing how hard certain aspects of her life and faith were because of this suppression, I was confident that this was the beginning of something new, and something healing and transformational in her life. She was on her way to being whole. In no way am I trying to say that the expression of one's honest sexuality is the path to wholeness, but I can confidently say that when people are forced to hide who they are out of fear of rejection in a faith community, it has a profound impact on their personal health, their faith and their definition of (and therefore experience with) God.
I knew that this person would need to leave staff, not because it would be bad for the mission if she were to remain, (on the contrary we lost someone who is great and committed) but because it would be unhealthy for her if she were to remain in the mission. She wanted to make this change and transition in a healthy and whole way. However, she was confident that she wanted to find companionship at some point in her life. We both knew that this was in conflict with what Young LIfe expected from her and myself. We both knew that she could not live in conflict with herself and what Young life says about her.
I am a bridge builder. I am an optimist. I wanted to believe that this transition off of Young Life staff would happen well (Both for her and myself). I knew I didn't feel good about the situation as a whole, but I have for a long time chosen to believe that YL is a very good ministry, and while YL isn't where I want it to be on this topic, I have chosen to put faith in the "conversations" that are happening, and hope that we would someday be on the right side of history in how we care for this group of people (like we care for all other people). Talk of these “conversations” are what staff people like me (and all the rest of us who are ready to move on from this) hold on to. Staff people like me who are so ready to join much of the rest of the church (and those outside of the church) who have been able to love and embrace our LGBTQ brothers and sisters for a long time now.
If I were removed, aloof or disconnected I might be able to tell you that this transition went well, and that I still have hope for change in the mission during my time here. But I am not removed or disconnected. This was a member of my camp staff family, so naturally we talk and see each other often. Currently, the same empathy and compassion that landed me in this role in Young Life is now tearing me away from this mission. The bridge that I feel that I have been building is crumbling under my feet. It is not going well. I just exited a committed staff person whose entire faith journey has been tied to this ministry for the last 10 years. Perhaps she should hate me right now, but she doesn't. Maybe she should despise YL right now, but she doesn't. All she wants, is to come back to work. She wants her job back and her community back. She found a beautiful life in YL, one that so many people are looking for and we took it away from her, and not because of any choice she has made.
Needless to say, at this point I am not doing well. I have betrayed who I am, and who I feel I have been called be. I am watching someone go through an incredible amount of pain because of the enforcement of a policy I am at odds with.
What do I do? Where do I go from here?
I could leave and it would probably be good for my soul in regard to this situation. But I don't want to. I am good at my job. I love my role. I love this imperfect ministry. It isn't just. It isn't fair. I know with great certainty I am not alone as a staff person who shares this viewpoint. We are living in tension, but we can only hold on for so long. I know that leadership is scared to make the transition to being affirming (to getting us back to being a ministry for all kids and people), I am concerned for what will happen if we don't. We are using our own truth and belief systems to keep kids, staff and volunteers out of the "Kingdom" we are simultaneously trying to create with a message of assimilation instead of transformation.
I need help.