Yew Fook Sam, known as Sam, from Liverpool, Merseyside, has had his request for asylum rejected by the Home Office and fears he will now be detained and deported. Sam is 67 years old, in poor physical health, and facing physical punishment or imprisonment if he is forced to return to Malaysia because he is openly gay. The Home Office… Read more »
SINCE 2010, the third Thursday in October has been marked as #SpiritDay, when millions of people wear purple and change their social media profile pictures to help create a world in which lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT+) young people are celebrated and accepted for who they are. It began in 2010 when Canadian high school student Brittany McMillan created it as a response to… Read more »
IN RESPONSE to a post I shared recently from my blog archive, ‘I am what I am’ – A reflection on identity, Claire, a member of the Open Table ecumenical Christian worship community for LGBTQIA+ Christians in Liverpool, wrote this response which I am happy to share: When I think about my identity, I often remember a dream I had… Read more »
THIS is my reflection at the Post-Pride Chillout Service in the Lady Chapel of Liverpool Cathedral to mark the end of Liverpool Pride on Sunday 29th July 2018: The death of Michael Causer was Liverpool’s Stonewall moment. My name is Kieran, and I’m the coordinator of the growing network of Open Table communities, which began at St Bride’s Liverpool ten… Read more »
A CHRISTIAN community which warmly welcomes people who are LGBTQIA+ (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer/Questioning, Intersex and Asexual), their friends and family, is celebrating its tenth anniversary in Liverpool this month. The inclusive celebration, hosted by the community known as ‘Open Table’, will take place on Sunday 17th June 2018, at St Bride’s Church on Percy Street in Toxteth, Liverpool…. Read more »
LAST WEEK, at the launch of a new charity whose aim is to tackle prejudice and discrimination on the grounds of sexuality and gender in religious organisations, Bishop of Liverpool Paul Bayes spoke of his ‘pain and regret’ at the rejection and harm many LGBTI+ people have experienced personally and institutionally from Christians. More than 100 guests, including leading campaigners for LGBTI… Read more »
This Lent, our inclusive church in Liverpool city centre offered a six-week course to explore the ‘queerness’ of the Christian tradition. Participants read and discussed Queer Virtue: What LGBTQ People Know About Life and Love and How It Can Revitalize Christianity (Beacon Press, 2016), written by the American Episcopal priest Elizabeth Edman. At the launch of the study guide to accompany… Read more »
TODAY, 11th October, is celebrated in many countries as ‘National Coming Out Day’, a campaign to promote a safe world for LGBT+ individuals to live truthfully and openly. This morning I marked the occasion by giving a lecture to around 300 trainee teachers, to raise awareness of issues around gender and sexuality, and to explore these in age-appropriate ways in… Read more »
FIVE YEARS AGO today I began this blog – little did I know then that: having ‘come out of the church‘ in 2011, I would return to a different church where my husband and I would be accepted, encouraged and authorised as lay leaders (though still with limitations because we are married) little more than a year after our civil… Read more »
THIS WEEKEND the Bishop of Liverpool, Rt Revd Paul Bayes, will join the celebration of Open Table, an ecumenical Christian worship community which offers a warm welcome to people who are: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning, Intersex, Asexual (LGBTQIA+) and all who seek a more inclusive Church. It’s not his first visit to Open Table. We originally invited him to join us… Read more »