From AxiosUSA@aol.com Sun May 14 21:53:54 1995 Received: from qrd.rdrop.com (qrd.rdrop.com [199.2.210.245]) by abacus.oxy.edu (8.6.10/8.6.11) with ESMTP id VAA05924 for ; Sun, 14 May 1995 21:53:33 -0700 From: AxiosUSA@aol.com Received: from mail02.mail.aol.com (mail02.mail.aol.com [152.163.172.66]) by qrd.rdrop.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with ESMTP id VAA12837 for ; Sun, 14 May 1995 21:36:08 -0700 Received: by mail02.mail.aol.com (1.37.109.11/16.2) id AA219613570; Mon, 15 May 1995 00:52:50 -0400 Date: Mon, 15 May 1995 00:52:50 -0400 Message-Id: <950515000822_118863848@aol.com> To: submit@qrd.org Subject: A.N. Jan.-Feb. 1995 Status: RO Content-Length: 22508 X-Lines: 466 New York Chapter Plain ASCII Online Edition N E W S L E T T E R Vol. 12, No. 1 AXIOS USA Inc. February-March 1995 Eastern & Orthodox Christian Gay Men and Women +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ In this issue: Cover: Icon of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple. ----- General Information.....................p. 2 NCC, MCC, and NOLA......................p. 3 Chapter News............................p. 4 General News............................p. 5 Prayer Book, Vespers at the OCA Cathedral of the Holy Virgin Protection, St. John Maximovitch, Homophobia in St. Sophia Quarterly =========================================================== [begin page 2] A X I O S ------------------------ \ _|_ / \ __|__ / \ | / \ \| / \ |\ / \ / Eastern & Orthodox Christian Gay Men & Women The Axios Newsletter is published every two months by Axios USA, Inc., a nonprofit organization of Eastern and Orthodox Christian Lesbians and Gays founded 1980 in Los Angeles, CA. The New York and other chapters were then founded on the same principles. This year our New York chapter newsletter enters its 12th year of publication. Submissions are most welcome and encouraged; for example, articles on theology, Orthodox spirituality, homosexuality and the Church, as well as news of relevance to the Eastern and Orthodox gay and lesbian community. Please send also your letters, comments and suggestions, so that we may better serve our membership. Axios meets in New York on the second Friday of each month (the next meeting will be March 10, 1995) at the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center, 208 West 13th Street (near Seventh Avenue), in Manhattan, at 8 p.m. Meetings begin with a Vespers service, followed by the particular program or topic for that month's meeting. Special events are also scheduled from time to time. Dues are still $18 per year, which includes a subscription to this newsletter, and voting privileges in our elections. As all of the funds from 1994 have been used up, it is essential for members to send in their dues for 1995 without delay. The next issue will contain a different view of the New Orleans NCCC conference by Fr. Damien, our New Orleans representative. Also, there will be an update on the postponed OCAMPR homosexuality symposium at Hellenic College/Holy Cross. With this issue we return to a multipage format. Printing costs have been reduced by designing and printing all copies on a home computer (though the rise in postal rates more than offsets this). We hope you enjoy the format, and again, please send us your comments and suggestions. Our mailing address is: Axios P.O. Box 990, Village Station New York, NY 10014-0990 Telephones: (718) 805-1952 (voice/fax/modem) (212) 989-6211 (voice) (718) 463-2901 (voice) E-mail: AxiosUSA@aol.com The appearance of the name or likeness of a person or organization in the Axios Newsletter is not an indication of such party's sexual orientation unless explicitly stated. =========================================================== [begin page 3] NCC, MCC, AND NOLA Smaragdinopoleos K. Pasisozis N November 9-12,1994, representatives of most churches N N N constituting the National Council of Churches N N N met in New Orleans, LA. The Universal N N Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches organized a meeting of gay and lesbian affirming Christian leadership which assembled simultaneously. Both meetings were held at the same hotel. I was not sure just where the gay group was meeting. When I asked at the desk, they could not find an answer either because it was not identified on their schedule. We finally found it listed merely as "Meeting: 2-6 PM", where the room number was given. (Hmmm ... why the generic title?) I was the first one to arrive and there I met the Reverend Kittridge Cherry, ecumenical of- ficer of the MCC, moderator of our meetings. Representatives of other gay caucuses and ministries eventually arrived, and we introduced ourselves. I found this occasion, on one level, to be comforting and empowering. (After all, I just started coming out barely a year ago.) But on the other hand, my Orthodox conscience kept questioning the basic issue: Why do we Orthodox want to have anything to do with the NCC (or WCC, for that matter) in the first place? Key beliefs and dogmas, which I (and all other observant Orthodox) embrace and which energize my existence are either peripheral to or denied by so many liberal Protestants, be they gay, straight, or sideways. After a rather lukewarm opening devotion that did not have a drop of Jesus anywhere in it, Kit gave an overview of MCC's frustrating relationship with the NCC. While this peaked with its being granted observer status (along with Jewish and Moslem groups!), the status is now threatened with the move to abolish any relationship with the NCC other than full membership. The more conservative mem- bers of the NCC (led by the Orthodox caucus) are totally opposed to MCC's membership, even though, as Kit pointed out, they have more gay and lesbian members in their churches than MCC does. On thc other hand, not all members of MCC -- including the clergy -- are members of sexual minorities. A curious thing about requirements for mem- bership in the NCC: The confessional unit must be self-governing. With the exception of the OCA, all of the Orthodox jurisdictions in NCC are, as we know, responsible to Mother Churches elsewhere. I pointed this out to the General Secretary of the NCC (who is kindly disposed to MCC), and she found it most interesting. Later we met with the Counselling Committee of the NCC, who came dribbling in as we introduced ourselves. Just as I did so, in came Fr. Leonid Kishkovsky, who is in the National Chancery of the OCA. During this meeting, he gave a pious little speech, hinting that if gay issues are forced, the Orthodox and other conservative Churches would leave the NCC. It took all the self-control I could muster to forbear from responding with a list of Orthodox bishops I know who wear rainbow mitres and lavender vestments. Outing these hierarchs at this meeting would have accom- plished nothing at this time. And I am not ready to be publicly out yet. (Please forgive me, brethren. May God hasten the day when I can be publicly out.) Thursday and Friday were dedicated principally to observing business sessions and lobbying. Many factors kept me from these. Saturday's session was devoted to dealing with the so-called Religious Right in a seminar called "Our God, Too." It began with the leader, Rev. Ms. Cherry, giving the usual "Us versus Them" rhetoric that the Religious Right uses against us, the very rheto ric that I find so distressing; do not both sides believe in Jesus? After this, two other people spoke in a maddeningly condescending tone which was nothing but ideology and rhetoric and had nothing to do with God. The latter was a man who finally shouted, "And all I can say is, if you are gay or lesbian and vote Republican, you must be brain-dead!" At that point I got up and stomped out with all the dignity, noise, anger, and attention-getting I could muster. (The illness of my host's husband was in the background of this; this is one of the things that interfered with my participation in Thursday's and Friday's activities) In the hall I started shaking and crying. Kit and Rev. Dexter Brecht, local MCC pastor, came out and listened for a while; one of them did an autodiscloseting as a secret pro-lifer! I calmed down and returned to the meeting. When questions from the audience were solic- ited, I stood up, and without being recognized began to speak. "I understand how the reli- gious right feels about us, and I know why. It's based on ignorance. I know, because until a year ago, when the Lord showed me that I was gay, I would have been saying the same things! And I look at what they say about us, and I look at myself, and I know that they are just not true. I agree with the religious right on almost every issue but one. I passed through the charismatic movement. I sympathize with many charismatic and Pentecostal positions, and I am on the mailing list of the National Gay Pentecostal Alliance. I was a pro-life activist in my home town. I was named in a $39 million lawsuit for merely praying outside a clinic. So much for First-Amendment Rights! I am a member of PLAGAL, the Pro-Life Alliance of Gays and Lesbians. I am willing to bet that half of my new gay and lesbian acquaintances are pro-life. They were all pleased to hear about PLAGAL. And those who picket the clinics are too. They are sur- prised and thrilled to hear that we exist after assuming that if you are gay, you are auto- matically pro-child murder. And seeing that not all of us are alike, seeing that there might be something in common, makes them more open and understanding. I was involved in the arts. Among other things, I have been an operatic stage manager. The rule in the arts is, `Whoever gives the money can run the show.' And anything the government gives money for, the government can control. So the only way to have true artistic freedom is not to have government funding of the arts, and therefore the NEA should be dismantled. For the same reason, I am against education vouchers. The only way that church and other alternative schools can be free is not to take government money. And have you ever heard of the Log Cabin Foundation: gay Republicans? I vote Republican. But I also understand how a Christian can in good conscience vote Democratic, Socialist, or any other way. To para- phrase the Psalms, "Put not your trust in political parties, in whom there is no salva- tion." But in any case, name-calling, and saying that I'm brain dead because we dis- agree accomplishes nothing. I've seen the motto "Celebrate Diversity," but it seems that you can be diverse, as long as you are not different from anybody else. I resent the idea that there is just one correct way to think as a gay man. And finally, the name of this seminar is "Our God, Too!" But He is God over all, even the Religious Right. I think the best way to deal with them is to emphasize the most important thing we have in common: namely love for and devotion to our Lord, God, and Saviour Jesus Christ . . . Whose holy Name, I might add, I have yet to hear invoked in these meetings! Everything so far has sounded like a political convention. I was hoping to hear more about how Christian gays and lesbians can live for Christ! My impassioned little outburst was well-received. One of the audience commented =========================================================== [begin page 4] that he felt for the first time there was real communication going on at this meeting. After this, Dr. Mel White, former ghostwriter for leaders of the Religious Right, from Jerry Falwell to Pat Robertson to Billy Graham on down, and author of the moving book, _Stranger at the Gate: To be gay and Christian in America_, gave a presentation full of the same ideological _skatoulakia_ that I had just gotten through complaining about. However, he opined that MCC was wasting its time in dealing with the NCC, and said it should direct its energies elsewhere. While I found conversations with individuals enjoyable, and sharing with them an enriching experience; as an Orthodox, I feel very uncomfortable with trying to work with established religious liberalism, as represented by the NCC. We Orthodox have nothing to gain by this, and a lot of time, effort and energy is wasted in being unequally yoked with them. Matriarchy is not the answer to patriarchy. "Misterogyny" is not the solution to misogyny. Male-bashing does not cure male chauvinism (The religious equivalents of these propositions apply as well). Rather, looking to Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith, and seeking to follow Him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life is the only solution to these and other ills. For when we are in right relationship with Our Lord, we are automatically in right relationship with each other. CHAPTER NEWS New Orleans: Our Pennsylvania representative attended the NCCC convention which was held there November 9-12, 1994, and which is reported on in this iss ue of the Axios Newsletter. While in New Orleans, he stayed with Fr. Damien, who wishes to start a new Axios chapter in that city, along with another member who just moved there from Minneapolis. For further information on the progress of Axios - New Orleans, call Fr. Damien at (504) 394-9043. San Francisco: Last year, Mother John and Bishop Seraphim started the Icon Orthodox Fellowship. Soon after, upon learning of the existence of Axios, the fellowship became Axios - San Francisco. Though Bishop Seraphim is no longer with the chapter, Mother John continues to run the chapter out of her apartment, which also has a chapel room. She is named after the late John Maximovitch, who was Archbishop of Shanghai and San Francisco and was glorified last July. She finds St. John to be a great intercessor, as for example during the 1989 earthquake when all the apartments around here were destroyed, while her apartment sustained only a few hairline cracks and no actual structural damage. St. John served under the Russian Church Outside of Russia (Synod-in-Exile) during his life, but was adamant in opposing division and hatred among his flock. He was criticized for excluding neither Synod-in-Exile nor Moscow Patriarchate Russian Orthodox from his church, and was even denounced as a Communist sympathizer in the "red scare" of the 1960's, not because there was any factual basis for this, but because his conviction against cutting off any of his brethren because of jurisdictional disputes went against the grain of contemporary attitudes. Even though the Orthodox hierarchy in the Soviet Union of the 1960's was thoroughly infiltrated and compromised, parroting Communist party lines regardless of their incongruity with Orthodoxy (this, of course, is the reason why the Synod-in-Exile went into exile; though one could argue that they then went to the other extreme at times), this was not going =========================================================== [begin page 5] to deter Archbishop John from the pastoral care of his flock. His example is just as important today, as we grapple with disputes over jurisdiction and calendar (and, as in St. John's time, for some these are more important than, in Our Lord's words, to "feed My sheep"); not to mention issues of gender and sexual orientation, which the late Archbishop was no stranger to either. It is suspected that he was poisoned by an opponent; his incorrupt body is on display at the Cathedral of the Holy Virgin -- Joy of All Who Sorrow, at 26th Avenue and Geary Boulevard, San Francisco. An account of that saint's life was recently published in The Orthodox Word, No. 175-6 (Platina, CA: 1994). Los Angeles: Our original chapter, dating back to 1980, is planning a number of new projects which, however, depend on the support and involvement of members in the Los Angeles area. Among these projects is an Axios choir, and the release of a rehearsal cassette which can be used by individual choir members in a parish ro rehearse their part individually. Tapes are planned for both Greek and OCA choirs. Those who are interested may call George B. at (213) 851-2256 (fax 213-851-2372). He is also running the online Axios database for the West Coast which can be accessed via e-mail as well as via Internet utilities such as FTP. Chicago: This chapter, only a year old, is nevertheless enthusiastic and has well-attended meetings. Their Labor Day party was a success, and they had their First Anniversary party on January 14, 1995, the day after the New York meeting and party. Other events they have held include the traditional Axios meeting with Vespers, and socials at church picnics across Chicago. The chapter began last winter when its current president, Michael, went to New Yor k and saw Axios' listings. Within several months, the chapter had drawn 50 members through advertising and word-of-mouth. Washington, DC: This chapter, aside from their well-attended monthly meetings, holds special events such as a Fall Lecture Series and Maslenitza before Great Lent. Their October general meeting appropriately fell on Old-Calendar Ss. Sergius' and Bacchus' feast day. OTHER NEWS Two of our members are working on a prayer book project. It will tentatively contain prayers for first, third, sixth and ninth hours, Vespers, Compline and other prayers. We may also include excerpts from Adelphopoiia. The prayer book is designed to be used by the laity for private and public devotions. Anyone who would like to help or has any comments should contact Nick at (718) 805-1952. Vespers & Lecture at the Cathedral of the Holy Virgin Protection On Wednesday, February 8, 1995 at 6 p.m., after the regular Vespers service held there every Wednesday, there will be a lecture by Ruzica Cupic on "The Life of St. John Maximovitch, in whom heaven and earth met together." The announcement is as follows: Who glorifies God, God glorifies him. St. Maximovitch (of Shanghai) has left us for a short time (d. 1966 in Seattle) in order to come back to us in even a greater glory (canonized as a saint in 1994 in San Francisco). Through the life of St. John Maximovitch, God has not only revealed Himself and the truths about the "other world," but has also revealed the truths of this world. St. John's "life after life," manifested through many miracles and healings, cannot be ascribed to a dead man but to the Resurrected and alive, as the relics of the saint witness. Homophobia Rears its Ugly Head in St. Sophia Quarterly The latest issue of St. Sophia Quarterly, published by the Ukranian Orthodox Church of the USA in Bound Brook, NJ (one of two Ukranian jurisdictions in the U.S.), contained two articles attempting to discredit John Boswell and his research. Considering its tone of smug self-righteousness, one wonders if the authors also timed the article's publication to coincide with his death. It is telling that all that they can draw upon are lame stereotypes and taking statements out of context. =========================================================== [begin page 6] The first article is "Flaming in Byzantium?" by Frederica Mathewes-Green. Despite the fact that she was recently a speaker at a conference co-sponsored by PLAGAL (Pro-Life Alliance of Gays and Lesbians), she seems to be quite ignorant when it comes to the gay and lesbian community, not to mention the topic of Adelphopoiia on which she attempts to speak with authority. However, even the Pharisees of Our Lord's time, with all of their false "authoritative" teachings, did not resort to attempting to discredit by saying that an opponent is ugly. Yet that is precisely what she attempts to do: first she carps about Boswell's face as pictured on the back cover of Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe: counting on the arousal of stereotypical prejudice by describing Boswell as effeminate in several ways while criticizing the Gothic arch in the background, making a sarcastic remark that this implies "Serious Scholarship." Certainly more serious than Frederica, who devotes the first two paragraphs to her opinion of Boswell's personal appearance and the next to a similar criticism of Ss. Sergius and Bacchus' appearance, which doesn't stop her from later trying to take the high ground by praising the saints and implying that Boswell felt they only loved each other and not God. Without providing evidence for her view, she dismisses Boswell's work by interspersing her comments with such excerpts as "United not in the way of nature, but in the manner of faith," their martyrology runs, "always singing and saying, 'Behold how good and pleasant it is for brothers to abide in oneness!'" -- Frederica, not having a clue about the implication of this quote for "against nature" arguments against homosexuality, says Boswell "bent over backwards to prove that homosexuals use the term 'brother' to mean 'lover' [citing ancient and modern sources] including ample evidence from the...so-called gay community. Aside from showing her ignorance and prejudice about the gaiety in our community after enjoying its hospitality, all of the evidence she can present for her view is one quote from a Catholic University professor who said "Here we find disingenuousness opening the door to ingenuity." The other article stoops lower: "In the newest National AIDS Awareness Catalog we have proof once again of Nazi propagandist extraordinaire, Josef Goebbel's, truth about the Big Lie: keep repeating a falsehood and, eventually, it will be believed." The reason for this truly bizarre statement is that the catalog is selling a medallion picturing an icon of Ss. Sergius and Bacchus. Perhaps these writers forget that the Orthodox Church has preserved its faith intact through the ages in spite of, rather than because of, distorters such as them, who would attempt to discredit a large part of the Holy Tradition of our Church based on their own narrow prejudices. (Note: Any readers who would like to comment to Frederica Mathewes-Green should contact her c/o Holy Cross Antiochian Orthodox Church in Catonsville, MD, not at St. Sophia Quarterly). ----------------------------------------------------------- (Advertisement) Konstantinos J. Antonopoulos Orthodox Funeral Director A N T O N O P O U L O S F U N E R A L H O M E, I N C. Available for questions and to advise on pre-arrangements, last will and testament or any other questions one may have. Services are available in all communities. 38-08 Ditmars Boulevard (718) 728-8500 Astoria, New York 11105 1 800 281-8486 ===========================================================