Category: LGBT rights

Reflecting on our identity as LGBT people of faith and as an LGBT faith community

BY POPULAR REQUEST, members of the community that meets monthly at St Bride’s Church, Liverpool for the Open Table LGBT service spent a day away again this month, six months after our first away-day last October. Following the theme of identity and individuality we explored in last month’s service, we developed and deepened this at …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2015/03/23/reflecting-identity-lgbt-faith-community/

LGBT History Month: What’s your story? #LGBTHM15

FEBRUARY is LGBT History Month in the UK – marked every year in the UK since 2004 to remember and celebrate the lives and achievements of LGBT people past and present. It was set up by Sue Sanders, founder of Schools Out, a group for LGBT teachers since 1974. LGBT History Month is a wonderful opportunity to …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2015/02/21/lgbt-history-month-whats-your-story/

WATCH: Project Triangle – LGBT youth visit Auschwitz

TODAY is the seventieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, the Nazi concentration camp in Poland where around 1.5 million people died because they were different. In September 2009, I accompanied ten young lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people from Merseyside on a five-day cultural exchange trip to Auschwitz and Warsaw working with a group of young …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2015/01/27/watch-project-triangle-lgbt-youth-visit-auschwitz/

2014: A big year for UK marriage equality

2014 was a big year for marriage equality in the UK. Same-sex marriage is now possible in the United Kingdom, with the exception of Northern Ireland. As marriage law is devolved to the governments of each country in the Union, the status of same-sex marriage is different in England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The UK …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2015/01/01/2014-uk-marriage-equality/

Loving from the bottom of the heap – A gay Christian reading for Christmas

At a carol service last Sunday, hosted by Open Table, an LGBT Christian community in Liverpool, I read one of the readings, which I found moving, inspiring and too good not to share: The most powerful place from which to renew the face of the earth is the bottom of the heap. I often think of …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2014/12/24/loving-from-the-bottom-of-the-heap-a-gay-christian-reading-for-christmas/

Diversity Role Models – Challenging prejudice one story at a time

A YEAR AGO I trained as a volunteer with Diversity Role Models, a charity which offers workshops in schools featuring positive LGBT or straight ally role models who speak directly to young people about their experiences, to challenge bullying by promoting empathy. They began in London in 2011 and are now expanding across the UK, including …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2014/12/22/diversity-role-models/

Speak OUT: Fight back against homophobia and transphobia

Wednesday 10th December is Human Rights Day. In celebration, the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission is launching Speak OUT: 5 ways to fight back against homophobia and transphobia. Watch and share the video with your friends and family. Unchecked prejudice often leads directly to discrimination, violence and the denial of basic human rights to lesbian, gay, …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2014/12/10/speak-out-fight-back-against-homophobia-and-transphobia/

Would Jesus save the railways?

The name Jesus in graffiti on the side of a train

LAST WEEK a YouGov survey won the booby prize for the most stupid question in an opinion poll: Do you think Jesus would support or oppose renationalising the railways, so they are run in the public sector rather than by private companies? It’s unlikely Jesus would have held a view, given that public transport had not been …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2014/12/05/would-jesus-save-the-railways/

‘You gotta have faith’ – Diva magazine debate on faith & sexuality

Tonight in Liverpool, Diva magazine editor Jane Czyselska chaired a debate between veteran human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, Christian commentator and musician Vicky Beeching, Rose Neelam, a muslim and Faith Communities Officer at UK Black Pride, and lesbian Rabbi Ariel Friedlander, as part of the annual Homotopia LGBT arts festival. Read Peter Tatchell: My journey to Humanism Read …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2014/11/12/you-gotta-have-faith-diva-magazine-debate-on-faith-sexuality/

A very extraordinary synod

Early in the morning of Sunday 19th October I received a text message from the lay reader at our Anglican parish church, who was away for the weekend. This was unusual – what could be so urgent that she would text so early in the morning while she was on holiday? The text read: ‘Dear …

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Permanent link to this article: https://abravefaith.com/2014/11/10/a-very-extraordinary-synod/

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