Christian and queer isn’t a common combination, but a small group of University of Idaho students and staff met Tuesday evening to discuss that topic.
The event, called “Queer Identities and Christianity,” brought students together to discuss their trials of navigating both worlds.
Director of the UI LGBTQA Office Julia Keleher co-hosted the event. She said her aim was to provide a place for people to talk and find support.
Karla Neumann Smiley is the ministry director at the Campus Christian Center and co-hosted the event with Keleher. She said she’d observed similar things as Keleher and wanted to organize a discussion.
People talk about their experiences with religion and the LGBT community during the Queer Identities and Christianity discussion Tuesday evening at the Campus Christian Center.
“I came to the same place from the opposite direction, hearing Christianity being presented as anti-LGBTQ and saying, ‘But not my Christianity. Not the church I’m a part of,’” Smiley said. “So that same, ‘Well, how do we get that message out that you don’t have to make that choice? That there are Christian communities that are open and affirming and welcoming?’”
All the students who attended had a connection to faith, and multiple also identified as queer.
UI senior Paul Chase said he hasn’t been very involved with his faith since coming to terms with his sexual orientation, but this discussion was his first step to seeing where things stand.
“I’m not too connected to either right now, but I am in a position where I’m not going to deny either side with either community,” Chase said. “Because love me or hate me, this is who I am.”
Keleher said the two communities don’t have to be exclusive.
“I know there are LGBT people of all faith backgrounds, and I want to make sure people feel they have a place where they can come and speak out and have a community where they feel like they don’t have to hide it or they don’t have to choose between the two,” Keleher said.
Lindsey Lynch graduated from UI last year and is now a peer minister at the Campus Christian Center. She said she feels self-conscious talking about LGBTQA issues because she doesn’t want to accidentally send the wrong message and hurt someone’s feelings.
“I just want gain more insight into the topic and kind of see where everyone else is coming from who has lived a different life than I have,” Lynch said.
Keleher reassured her.
“It’s really hard to hurt people’s feelings if you’re coming from a place of kindness,” Keleher said. “Don’t worry about that. I always tell that to folks, especially when it comes to asking questions.”
Smiley shared a similar experience of being uncomfortable talking about LGBTQA topics with members of the community. She said she was fortunate to be around kind people who knew she had good intentions, and she was willing to be corrected and learn the best ways to phrase things.
Chase said he’s always been bugged that some churches cling to certain biblical verses and seemingly ignore others. Other attendees agreed.
An hour into the discussion, Lynch said she felt more comfortable talking and asking questions now that people had opened up. She said people sometimes want to connect with a community and then find themselves in a box where they are being told how to act simply because they belong to that community.
“So many of us are having a hard time being like ‘I’ve got some attributes of this, but at the same time I have attributes of this,’” Lynch said. “I feel like some people or things say we can’t do that, we can’t mix. But I feel like that’s just what we are as humans. We are meant to expand and learn throughout our entire lives, and you can’t do that if you’re in a box.”
Jack Olson can be reached at [email protected]