On January 20th, President Trump signed an executive order declaring that there are only two genders. In the days that followed, LGBTQ+ people across the US expressed fear and concern for what this means for their rights, particularly as Christian Nationalists showed high levels of support for the order.
But fear was not the only emotion experienced by LGBTQ+ people last week, particularly by those who ascribe to a different expression of Christianity.
LGBTQ+ Christians gathered in Atlanta from across the country to participate in Q Christian Fellowship’s annual conference. The gathering creates a space where LGBTQ+ Christians can bring 100% of their queerness and 100% of their faith, no matter their theology.
This year’s conference theme was “All That I Am,” inspired by 1 John 3:1-2: “See what love the Creator has given us, that we should be called children of God, and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know God. Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when God is revealed, we will be like God, for we will see God as God is.”
While the theme was chosen more than a year ago, the message couldn’t be more timely to the queer Christians gathered. Speakers and singers alike reiterated that participants were free to worship God with their whole, authentic selves.
Attendees sang lyrics such as “O God of life, we raise a song to you in gratitude,” “I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’ve seen it in my own life. [God] keeps every promise. I’ll never be forsaken,” and even classic hymns, “Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him.”
But the musical moment that captured the resilient sacred-stubbornness in the air was when the worship band stopped, and the vocalists led the attendees a cappella with a simple, well-known refrain: “It is well, it is well with my soul.”
Clearly, it wasn’t only a time of queer celebration. Throughout the conference, attendees, speakers, worship leaders, and others communicated the need to steel themselves for the coming days.
During the opening worship service, QCF House Band worship leader Reverend Dr. Luther Young, Jr. said, “Freedom isn’t free; it costs something.” At a later breakout session on queer spirituality, Team Lead & Minister of Gender & Human Sexuality Justice for the United Church of Christ Rachel Ward echoed those sentiments, saying, “It is a practice to get free.”
The message throughout the conference was clear: The LGTQ+ Christians who gathered believe they have hard work ahead of them to ensure the safety of their community.
Keynote speaker Rev. Dr. Naomi Washington- Leapheart challenged attendees to hold onto what she calls a true resurrection hope. In her address, she discussed how resurrection hope requires the death of something, but she argued that we’ve been putting the wrong things to death. “We have to lay down the parts of our lives that are death-dealing.”
With the executive orders signed last week, it was clear that many gathered felt that the coming days would hold no small amount of risk, especially if they were to eliminate those death-dealing things. Washington-Leapheart asked, “What if we collectivized the risk so no one has to do it by themselves?”
Repeatedly, conference attendees were encouraged to remember they are in community and do not have to face the coming days alone. Keynote Speaker Kevin Garcia echoed the sentiment in a later session, saying, “There’s not a singular entity that can save us, but maybe a collective could … We are the ones who will save us– because we are already doing it.”
As attendees prayed with one another, shared contact information, offered moral support as they came out to family, and too many other actions to name, it’s clear they are up to the challenge.
When asked why he keeps coming each year, a seven-time conference attendee shared, “I keep coming back because this is the only space I’m in each year where I’m convinced God is real.”
The original benediction the house band sang at the close of every worship service artfully captures the resilience found in this LGBTQ+ Christian community:
“May the God of Creation help you find your way.
Now let all us siblings shout out their praise.
Here in the margins, we found our place.
Hear oh hear the song of the saints.
All the reclaimed join this refrain,
All the reclaimed join this refrain:
Amen, amen. Let it be so, amen.”
Next year’s QCF annual conference will be in Portland, Oregon, from January 22-25. The theme will be “Anchored,” based on the scripture Hebrews 6:19-20a: “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf.”
Go to their conference website to learn more.
A bivocational pastor, writer and spiritual director based in Williamsburg, Virginia, she currently works as a Spiritual Director at Reclamation Theology. Cawthon-Freels is the author of Reclamation: A Queer Pastor’s Guide to Finding Spiritual Growth in the Passages Used to Harm Us (Nurturing Faith Books), and a contributing correspondent at Good Faith Media.