Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries

With great joy and gratitude, Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries announces that the Rev. Asher O’Callaghan (he/him/his) is our new Program Director!

Additionally, Christephor Gilbert (he/him/his) has been promoted to Development & Communications Coordinator. We are thankful for these outstanding leaders!

As Program Director for ELM, Asher will build and support community through the Proclaim program, walk with and equip leaders through the Accompaniment program, and connect with and uplift congregations through the Ministry Engagement program. Asher will work alongside volunteer program conveners and in partnership with other ELM staff on strategic work and communication for these programs. Asher begins on August 15 and will work from his home in Long Beach, CA.

Asher writes,

“Getting involved in the work of Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries has gotten me to where I am today. I’ve come to find that my gender identity and sexuality are gifts for ministry rather than burdens because ELM helped me find my voice as an LGBTQ candidate. ELM gave me the boldness to be fabulous. The network of colleagues that Proclaim helped me develop has been a constant source of joy and inspiration. The Accompaniment Program was a steady support throughout the turbulence of candidacy. And the work of Ministry Engagement is preparing more congregations to call LGBTQ pastors like myself. As ELM’s Program Director, I’m excited to help others get involved and experience this same fabulousness.“

Before becoming a Lutheran pastor, Asher fancied himself spiritual but not religious. He thought he was done with organized religion after growing up transgender and bisexual in a fundamentalist church. But then he stumbled into a church called House For All Sinners and Saints in Denver, Colorado where God messed up all his plans. There he heard an invitation he couldn’t help but share. From Christ’s open table he heard: “Behold who you are. Become what you receive.” Becoming what he’s received has led him to earn a Master of Divinity from Luther Seminary, to pastor a small mountain congregation called Zion Lutheran Church in Idaho Springs, Colorado, and now to serve as ELM’s Program Director. Asher is a member of Proclaim and served on the ELM Board of Directors until March of this year.

Development & Communications Coordinator: Christephor Gilbert

We also announce the promotion of Christephor Gilbert to the newly created position of Development & Communications Coordinator. Christephor has served as Operations Coordinator for ELM since February this year. The position contains Christephor’s current role and has been expanded to include  communications and development responsibilities. Christephor will work two days a week at our Chicago home office at Resurrection Lutheran Church.

Christephor is a member of Proclaim, a student in the Master of Divinity program at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and is in candidacy with the ELCA toward Word and Sacrament ministry. 

We’re thankful to you, our wonderful supporters, who make it possible for ELM to invest in strong leaders who can guide and direct ELM’s ministry. ELM believes that the extraordinary gifts of LGBTQ ministry leaders enrich and transform our church. Your support allows us to live out that belief through Proclaim, Accompaniment and Ministry Engagement. Thank you! 

By Michael Price Nelson
Guest Blog

In this post, Michael Price Nelson reflects on his friend and colleague, Joel Workin, and on this year’s Workin Scholar Christephor Gilbert’s essay on grace.

Grace.  As Lutherans, we talk about it, read about it, and some even preach about it.  It’s such a part of our theology that I wonder if we really pay attention to it the way we ought to.

Thirty years ago this week, I first met Joel Workin at a Lutherans Concerned meeting at St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church in North Hollywood.  While many of the faces there were new to me, Joel stood out – not least of all because of his 6’4” frame. Joel was immersed in his internship at a church in LA, and like most seminarians I’ve known, he radiated with an eagerness and joy about being something greater than himself, about living into his “call” of Christ in his life.

Less than 18 months later, however, after being certified for call by Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary, two church officials summoned him to Los Angeles, along with Jim Lancaster and Jeff Johnson.  In that meeting, the three were presented with a  document outlining how they were to behave as openly gay candidates.  Jim had prepared a list of specific questions: “Are we allowed to touch? Can we hold hands? What about kissing?”  At this point, he was stopped by his inquisitors and told, “Look, we don’t know how to define it. We just know we don’t want you to do it.”

“Don’t you call unclean what I call clean.”  

This was a favorite passage of Joel’s from the story of Cornelius. I can remember him preaching on this as he struggled with his own sense of call in the face of the ELCA’s “no” to God’s “yes” in his life. In the end, Joel was never ordained.   Instead, he made a loving home with his husband Paul Jenkins and channeled his own sense of ministry into service for AIDS Healthcare Foundation, helping to establish the country’s first free standing AIDS hospice.  He also served as newsletter editor for the local Lutherans Concerned chapter and wrote many essays about LGBTQ people in the church, which are the basis for his posthumous book “Dear God, I’m Gay. Thank You!”

In the years since he passed away, I’ve often struggled with how to make sense of all that happened to Joel. With his friends, I helped establish the Workin Scholarship in the hopes that would make sense. But on a deeper personal level, I’ve still wondered how anyone could go on once a calling is stolen from you because of who God made you to be. How do you go on? How does anyone go on after being rejected by family and friends for being LGBT?  How does anyone go on after losing a job because of sexual identity? And why, why would you even want to?

Then I read this line, written by this year’s Workin Scholar, Chistephor Gilbert, in his beautifully crafted essay on grace: “And in the dark falling, in the everlasting emptiness, the grace is there saying, Get up and follow me.”

Even though I’m an every-Sunday-Lutheran, I need to be reminded of this, to have grace presented to me in new images, to re-engage me with its true nature. Christephor Gilbert’s essay has done that for me.  He challenges me – and I hope all of you – to look anew at what Joel called “grace unbounded.”

You can read Christephor Gilbert’s essay here – 2016 Workin Scholar Essay. And you can learn more about Joel and the Workin Scholar program here.

Michael Price Nelson serves as chair of the Joel R. Workin Scholarship Committee. He was a colleague and friend of Joel’s and was the editor of both editions of “Dear God I’m Gay. Thank you!” Michael and his husband, Dale von Seggern, are members of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Santa Monica, CA.  

Guest blog by Larell Fineren, ELM Synod Assembly Display Coordinator

When Ministry Engagement Convener Margaret Moreland called to ask me about volunteering to coordinate for the Table Display Hosts and Hostesses I imagined a bevy of Vanna Whites seductively pointing to various Tupperware items on kitchen tables across America.  Err…no…She meant hosts and hostesses for those myriad information tables that decorate the way to the Cookie Table at Synod Assemblies.  “Oh, that kind of host,” I said, feeling somewhat deflated.  But being a good queer Lutheran, I quickly said yes and resolved to make it a success.  

We managed to surface seven volunteers for the job.  Diane Linden-Johnson at Rocky Mountain, Lois Voss at Minneapolis, Jerry Vagts at St Paul, Terry Krueger at Metro NY, Michael Nelson at Southwest CA, Bob Goldstein at Metro Chicago,  the diversity team in Southeast Michigan, and me, Larell Fineren at Sierra Pacific, all rose to the hosting challenge.  My job also included making sure the supply boxes made it from Assembly to Assembly between our first one on April 28th and the last one on June 11th.  

We all reported good “table exposure” (no closets for us anymore!) which meant many visitors stopped by to talk and get resources.  In general, we felt about 50% of our visitors were well aware of ELM and Proclaim.  The other 50% got an earful when they stopped long enough to chat!  I talked to two young LGBTQ folks who felt called to ministry and wanted to go to seminary.  I was able to talk to them about our Candidacy Accompaniment program, of which they were unaware.  Other hosts also reported talking to potential ministry candidates.  Surprisingly, one host talked to two seminarians who didn’t know about ELM!  That was a shocker to me.  I imagined I was there mainly for the straight folks, to pitch our Ministry Engagement program.  But it made me realize how important it is to continue to get our message out there to EVERYONE—over and over again.  

One funny thing was how our clearly marked “Display copy only” booklets of Treasure in Clay Jars  and Enrich & Transform were slyly taken when we either weren’t at the table, or weren’t looking.  It was a bummer to have our materials disappear before others could see them.  But the Spirit blows where and how She wants–I had to assume they went where they needed to go.  

We all felt that hosting was enjoyable, worthwhile, and something we’d do again.  Would you like to host a table at your Assembly next year?  We’d like to at least double the number of Assemblies we’re represented at next year.  If you’d like to give it a go (and store some treasure in Heaven), please contact ELM Operations Coordinator Christephor (operations@elm.org) and let him know.

By Larell Fineren. Larell lives in Petaluma CA and attends Elim Lutheran Church.  She’s a member of the Sierra Pacific Synod Council, where she happily provides a queer perspective on issues.

Guest blog by Proclaim member Rev. Caleb Crainer

I’m not a morning person, but on the morning of the LA Pride parade, I was in our line-up spot with donuts, t-shirts, buttons, and feather boas promptly by 7:30am. Soon after, the rest of our contingent trickled in and our friends from Hollywood United Methodist Church joined us for our annual Street Eucharist before the parade. Have you ever had the Psalm overshadowed by Jennifer Lopez’ new song? Have you ever had the words of institution covered up by revving motorcycles? It was kind of amusing, kind of annoying, and entirely holy.

Each year our Southern California Reconciling In Christ congregations (socallutherans.com) gather to volunteer at the various LGBTQ Pride events in the area. Originally we just marched in the Pride parade in Los Angeles, but now we also have a presence at parades and festivals in Long Beach, Orange County, Ventura County, and San Diego! It’s easily one of the most visible witnesses for the Lutheran Church in the state. This year we decided to do some Reformation education with our theme “500 years of FABULOUS posting!” Raul, a member at Hollywood Lutheran, totally hammed it up as a mohawk wearing Luther as we strolled down Santa Monica Boulevard lined with thousands of folks.

But Sunday’s celebration wasn’t like the others.

Young Latino Queer folks at Orlando’s Pulse Night Club had been viciously massacred just hours before. We didn’t know details or how many had been killed as we stepped off…but we knew that we would march for them. In the wake of the recent shooting at UCLA, our city was already on alert, but this was a level of evil we didn’t expect. The Police Department contacted the festival and parade organizers and asked them if they should cancel the celebration…their response: “You must not know who we are.” We are a movement born from the violent attacks of bigots, forged in the fire of scorn and ridicule, scarred by neglect and prejudice…and we are STRONG.

We waved our rainbow flags for our family who had been killed the night before, our friends who had died of HIV/AIDS, our neighbors who lived in closets and fear, and for ourselves.

Los Angeles’ Pride Parade was started in 1970, on the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. The parade became known as “Christopher Street West” after the location of the drag-bar where our trans/drag/queer siblings had had enough with police brutality and oppression. Our west-coast parade, started by local clergy and leaders, was intended to display our pride in the midst of crushing hatred. We would remember, we would persevere.

I kept getting text messages from people all morning wanted to express their sorrow and solidarity and some said “I’m glad you’re safe.”  Little did I know, that the threats we were under were even more real and near than I even imagined.   Later while I was working at the booth one person said, “I’m glad they caught that guy in Santa Monica.”  A young man had been caught that morning with a vehicle full of guns and was reportedly headed for the parade. Who knew we had all been in mortal danger the entire time we’d been frolicking so gayly?

The truth is we never know what’s coming. We can be prepared, but our LGBTQ community is strong and defiant and passionate. We know that in order to find safety, we must risk everything. We dare to love and that is the gospel of Pride. We have strength in our vulnerability and promise in our uncertainty. It’s a gospel that resonates with our Christian tradition and it’s a gospel more people deserve to hear.

I’m so proud of members of Proclaim. I feel like every Sunday is like a mini-pride-parade for us, for God, and for love that brings us through. Happy Pride!

Rev. Caleb Crainer serves as pastor of St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church in Los Angeles, California where he enjoys group costumes, passing out buttons, and walking in long lines. Photo by Emily Ann Garcia.

You have multiplied, O Lord my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you. Were I to proclaim and tell of them, they would be more than can be counted. Psalm 40:5, NRSV

Dear ELM Community,

As I move toward my last days on staff at Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries, I want to share a few reflections and numerous thanksgivings – more than can be counted.

I first got connected to ELM in 2004. I was a seminary student wondering if I was wasting my time as an LGBTQ person in the Lutheran Church when I was introduced to an Extraordinary community.  I met living witnesses of possibility, faithfulness, courage and hope.  This seed of a connection led me to ELM gatherings with LGBTQ pastors and seminarians, receiving the Joel R. Workin Scholarship, being extraordinarily ordained, serving on the ELM board, and in 2013 joining the staff team as program director.  

Serving as program director with ELM has been a great ministry.  It has stretched me, inspired me and grown my faith.  I love the way our work together lives in the queer spaces of tension: challenging and joyful, thoughtful and creative, focused and flexible, prophetic and pastoral, critiquing and imagining, and most of all Spirit-filled.  

I feel honored to have worked with so many incredible people (like you!).  You, dear friends of ELM, are church to me.  You live out the best of who and what God calls us to be with faithfulness, boldness, hard work and joy.  I have learned so much from you.  I cannot imagine doing this work with a more faithful and fabulous group of people.   

More than a decade after I first “met” ELM, I am even more passionate about our work and filled with joyful gratitude as I think about you, the community of people doing this work.  Our work is still important.  Critical.  Life-saving. Challenging.  Holy.

As I move toward my new call as University Pastor at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, WA, I look forward to my continuing relationship with ELM as an enthusiastic supporter and member of the Proclaim community.  

With a little sadness, much gratitude, and all love,

During these heavy and difficult days, we look to one another for understanding, comfort and direction. We wish to share with you these words from Proclaim member and ELCA pastor, Padre Ángel Marerro. This post was published first on the Huffington Post blog on June 13, 2016. Shared with permission of the author. 

Orlando: A Pastoral Response from a Gay Latino Priest
by Ángel D. Marerro

“A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.” – Jeremiah 31:15 (RSV)

On Sunday, we woke up to the unspeakable horror of the most devastating mass shooting in the history of our country. For the past day, I have sat silently with my husband at home, crying in the face of the impotence of a world that, despite our social progress, still hates us.

In the midst of all this, I believe that Christian clergy in particular need to face an important reality: the church has blood on its hands. From our pulpits, and in our traditions, we have been complicit in fostering the sins of misogyny, sexism, racism, and homophobia. We are responsible for tolerating in our midst a poor, ignorant and murderous scriptural interpretation that leads to death and untold suffering. As a religious leader in the Boston-Metro Latino community, I cannot remain silent about this.

The words my husband Zach spoke to me have also been heavy on my heart all night. As a thoughtful interfaith leader that works primarily with Jews, Christians and Muslims, he eloquently reflected that “this isn’t simply ‘extremist Islam’, as some would like to paint it. This comes out of centuries of many religious traditions systematically demonizing and dehumanizing LGBTQ individuals. This hatred isn’t out of nowhere. It is in parts of Islam, yes, but it is within parts of Christianity and Judaism, as well.”

Facing such a reality, I feel I must apologize for the complicity and silence of the Church. I am sorry for the pain our sinful indifference and self-righteousness has caused, and continues to cause, throughout the world.

And in the midst of all this senseless suffering, I dare to do the only thing that comforts me in times like these. Here is my prayer for our communities today:

I dream of a day when being different is a reason to celebrate and not to fear.

I hope for a day when all God’s children can come together without condemnation.

I pray for a season where justice is not a matter of politics but of humanity.

I believe, like the modern psalmist proclaimed:

We Shall Overcome, We Shall Overcome, We Shall Overcome Someday
Deep In My Heart, I Do Believe, We Shall Overcome Someday

Amen.

Padre Ángel D. Marerro is pastor of Santuario Luterano in Waltham, MA. Originally posted in the Huffington Post.  Orlando: A Pastoral Response from a Gay Latino Priest

In beautiful photos taken by Emily Ann Garcia and words written and sung by Ashley Wai’olu Moore, we now present the 2016 Proclaim Gathering Video Slideshow:

What does the annual Proclaim Gathering mean to LGBTQ leaders?

To find a community of other LGBTQ leaders in which I was welcomed and celebrated was so life affirming. I return to my normal routine with a renewed energy and excitement about ministry. – Rev. Marvin Havard

There are places and times in my life when I am attacked for who I am. The powerful and positive affirmation at the retreat is life-giving. – Nancy Wichmann

For the first time I was in a space with faith folks that I didn’t need to hide or protect my identity.  It was inspiring and helpful to hear that my story and all other LGBTQ+ stories are sacred and have a place in the church. I will now honor my story more often rather than trying to hide my story.  -Laura Ferree

I think this retreat helped me to solidify my calling, challenged me to consider a new way of talking about ministry and provided me with confidence in who God has made me to be. – David De Block

The 2017 Proclaim Gathering will be July 16-19, 2017 in Chicago, IL.