Prayers for Bobby - Leroy Aarons [110]
“What has made it such a combustible issue?” I asked her. “It’s the outgrowth of the increasing outness of gay people. It’s been brewing for a long time, and came to a head with the rise of the religious right, which has poured fuel on the debate. AIDS has been a factor. It has put the church smack up against its ministry of health care, forced it to deal with the issue. Some of their own congregants are ill, and it’s become very hard not to see the connection. AIDS outed people and forced the church to choose between its commitments.”
It is fascinating to compare the experiences of Mitzi Henderson with those of Mary Griffith. They both had four children. They both found out around the same time—1978–79—that their sons were gay (although Jamie Henderson was a junior at Harvard at the time, Bobby Griffith a high school student). Both women were intensely involved with their Presbyterian churches, Mary in California and Mitzi in the small community of Winona, Minnesota.
Bobby was struggling with his sexuality; Jamie was self-accepting. In each case, however, their families went into hiding. Both Mary and Mitzi were too mortified and fearful to discuss it with their ministers. (When Mitzi finally dared to bring it up, she was rebuffed.)
Both Mary and Mitzi began their “coming out” process around the same time, under very different circumstances. Bobby Griffith had died. Mitzi Henderson had moved to Palo Alto, California, a far more progressive environment. Mary’s transformation, spurred by a tremendous loss, turned her away from the traditional church. Mitzi Henderson, struggling with her fear of rejection by the church that had nurtured her family for generations, found the courage to confront her religion from within.
In late 1985, while a few miles away Mary Griffith was taking her first hesitant steps toward advocacy, Mitzi Henderson “came out” to her church in a speech to the San Jose Presbytery. She said, in part: “It wasn’t only our son who was at stake. It was and is fifteen of us in the immediate family, five of us elders who sit in Presbyterian pews…but outside it’s love and care…. You as pastors and elders…can change that not only for us, but for other gays and their families who sit in your congregations, silent and afraid…. Until we are willing to listen to our gay members and learn about their lives, their dilemmas, their hopes and problems, we will never be able to minister effectively to them…. What counsel would you give our son, my husband and me, our other three children? What spiritual direction? What support group would you refer us to inside or outside the church?”
That was 1985. A year later her hometown church, First Presbyterian, in Palo Alto, became a More Light church. The enlightened congregation incorporated gay references into its liturgy and committed to ordain its gay or lesbian members elected to lay leadership. Simultaneously, Walnut Creek Presbyterian—Mary’s old congregation—retained its traditional stance. The two institutions exemplify the modern schism that wracks the church.
As Mary Griffith became a spokesperson for P-FLAG, Mitzi Henderson rose in its ranks to become national president in 1992. Today they both continue to work tirelessly for the dignity, worth—and lives—of hundreds of thousands of children like their own.
APPENDIX
Help Organizations
P-FLAG (Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays)
1101 14th Street NW, Suite 1030
Washington, DC 20005
phone: 202-638-4200
fax: 202-638-0243
E-mail address: PFLAGNTL@aol.com
Where to Get Information on Lesbian and Gay Topics Confidentially
If you have access to America OnLine, e-world, CompuServe, Prodigy, or the Internet, you can receive a customized listing of lesbian and gay resources in your area by sending an E-mail to the National Coalition