Part   I - Firmness in Truth - Nonviolent Response

Part  II - Jerry Falwell's friend Michael Johnston

Part III - Love Your Children,  Love Won Out

Part  IV - Matthew 5:38-48, Romans 12:14-21

Part   V - SoulForce Principles & Bridges-Across

Epilogue - From a Ministry Director to Chuck Colson

In early September, Steve Schalchlin, Randy Thomas, and I established a cross-divide website Walking on the Waterline as a place to upload our discussion of the SoulForce principles and the Lynchburg event. 

Steve's musical "The Last Session" won a media award from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD). Randy is the director of Living Hope Ministries, an exgay ministry in Dallas. The Reverend Bob Stith is chair of the Living Hope Board of Directors. Randy and Pastor Bob came to Lynchburg. They talked with the anti-meeting demonstrators from both sides and attended the worship services which were a part of the weekend. Steve, Randy and Pastor Bob have written Lynchburg reports with from-the-heart accounts of the impact the event had on them.

In my opinion

I subscribe to the SoulForce principles as set forth at the "SoulForce Seminar on the Web," a site which systematizes the nonviolent theory of Gandhi and King abstractly in a way that can be applied to any conflict between adversaries. 

I was pleased at the commitment of the Lynchburg200 to those principles during the weekend with Reverend Falwell. 

However, my participation in the Lynchburg event, which I viewed as directed toward dialogue and trust building, does not necessarily imply endorsement of other activities and actions of SoulForce Inc.

I need to explain the difference between the agenda of Bridges-Across and the agenda of SoulForce, Inc.

Bridges Across the Divide

Since the ultimate purpose of SoulForce is to convince the world that being gay is not a sin, it must take the position that religious people who believe being gay is a sin are adversaries. 

Bridges-Across takes the unusual step of including gays and conservative Christians as equal partners in the dialogue. Because of this, participants from both sides have been criticized for lending "legitimacy" to the "opposition" by entering into a mutual endeavor undergirded by respect, justice, dignity and trust. 

The mission of Bridges-Across is to provide models and resources for building respectful relationships among those who disagree about moral issues surrounding homosexuality, bisexuality and gender variance. [See: How We Agree]

We do this through a website, webforums and an email list. 

People assume the only moral issues are about gay sex or handline gender noncomformity. Not so. There are many moral issues, for example the immorality of forcing people to become liars. 

Our steering committee is balanced. Half of us believe that homosexual relationships have the same value as heterosexual relationships, and the other half believe that only a male/female relationship in marriage is the Creator's intent for our sexuality. 

B-A is seeking primarily to foster respectful relationships across the divide. Hearing one another's stories causes us to question perhaps fearful assumptions we have made about one another as people. The relationships, while not aimed at changing one another's minds about the moral disagreements which caused the divide in the first place, do bring healing and peace in a culture war that destroys people of both sides. With different understandings of what equal rights means, we are painfully united in holding the rights of the other as important as our own. 

If there is any goal of "conversion" it is not from one side to the other, but from harmful ways of responding to those with whom we disagree towards ways that uphold the worth and dignity of each in justice and respect. 

While Mel has shown himself willing to change harsh rhetoric (e.g. regarding the journeys of those who have chosen to forsake gay identity and relationships), his goal is ultimately one of converting conservatives from one side of the divide to the other. In view of this, relationships are a means to an end. For Bridges-Across relationships are the end. 

Bilateral Guidelines for Dialogue

When dialogue is an equal partnership, then dialogue guidelines must reflect that equality. These bilateral guidelines are derived from the unilateral SoulForce guidelines. For example:

SoulForce Guideline #1: Before any negotiations begin, I will investigate my opponent’s position carefully, trying to understand exactly what my opponent is saying or doing and why my opponent is saying or doing it. 

Transforming SoulForce guidelines to a bilateral version yields:

Bilateral Guideline #1 As we begin to engage each other, we will investigate the other's position carefully, trying to understand exactly what the other is saying or doing and why the other is saying or doing it. 

Bilateral Guideline #2 Before (during, and after) our discussions we will work to earn each other's trust and friendship. 

Bilateral Guideline #3 We will confront the other's untruth on the basis of truth alone (without resorting to half-truth, exaggerations, unsubstantiated claims, or lies). 

Bilateral Guideline #4 We will confront the other's untruth in love (without resorting to physical, spiritual, or psychological violence). 

Bilateral Guideline #5 We will confront the other's untruth (the idea), not the integrity or the motives of the other the person who holds that idea. 

Bilateral Guideline #6 We will join together to confront untruth relentlessly, refusing to give up or to compromise our position (or any portion of it) unless the other proves us wrong. In that case, we will admit error gratefully, seek forgiveness, and continue to work together so that we can live in peace with each other with justice for all.

"Truth" and "untruth" in these bilateral guidelines refers to little-t-truth. On BA we have agreed to disagree about Big-T-Truth. Together we can be vigilant about little-t-truth: accuracy of reporting, not misquoting people, not misrepresenting research findings.

In Bridges-Across, friends across the divide are not "adversaries" but teammates. In developing cooperative cross-divide relationships we are problem solving how people who disagree about important issues can live together with justice and respect in a pluralistic world. 

Demonizing Fundraising Letters

In my opinion, not all the little-t-truth statements on the SoulForce site are accurate. I will expound on these in later memos to Gary and Mel. They include, for instance, the perpetuation of the Bussee/Cooper myth. We've already uploaded a short paper on that. 

Our experience with three years of cross divide talk have given us unique opportunity to assist the SoulForce goals of pursuing the truth relentlessly as we've created the relationships that SoulForce demands as a prelude to negotiation. 

The SoulForce website has a list of 25 untruths from a D. James Kennedy fundraising letter for the Truth in Love campaign. The fundraising letter certainly demonizes gay people and gay activists, but there's also a problem in that the list of 25 untruths isn't a completely accurate representation of the letter. 

We will develop a paper analyzing the statements about the Coral Ridge fundraising letter, the letter itself, and also its mirror, the Human Rights Campaign fundraising letter for the Ray of Light Project. As an interesting exercise we are going to try to develop model fundraising letters for both Truth in Love and Ray of Light which present the case for those campaigns without demonizing the opposition. 

Meanwhile, at Christianity Today

Christianity Today's recent forum on homosexuality and public policy [10/4/99] more deeply discusses the issues that were only hinted at in the Lynchburg event, which was as much intentionally symbolic as it was issue oriented.

Richard Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary, said, "[Gays and lesbians] are too real to me as human beings, and in some cases as Christian human beings, for me to stereotype them and to treat them as less than human. At the same time, I have a sense that many people in the secular gay/lesbian community haven’t seen a very human face of evangelicalism. They need to be as caught up short by the human realities of the people that they disagree with, as many of us have when we’ve befriended homosexual persons or found out that many of our good friends are in fact homosexual."

The CT forum closes by emphasizing Mouw's earlier statement, "Simply reaching out and saying, 'Can we talk?' would be a wonderful gesture."

A person, not "the opposition"

After the weekend in Virginia, a professor at  Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University wrote to Steve Schalchlin:

Steve, I was glad to get your email.  I certainly remember you - meeting you was a high point of the event.  I was struck by the earnest way in which you reached out to those of us from the other side.  And I was grateful for the way in which you gave us the benefit of the doubt.  I was powerfully moved by your family's story, your interest in mine, and your counsel regarding where my sister is coming from.

In my classes the next couple of days my students were very interested in what happened at the event and my reflections on it.  I indicated that I was impressed by the sacrifices your side had made to be a part of the event.  I had been a reluctant participant.  You participated willingly.  I was scarcely inconvenienced (living less than a mile away).  You traveled great distance at great expense.  And I was impressed at the many tokens of friendship that you extended. 

Unless I'm mistaken, most of our people had to be impressed by these things.  I really felt that you wanted to get to know us, understand us, and build a bridge to us.  It's hard not to respond to that, and I think that many on our side felt a bond of friendship.  Naturally, our respective views on lifestyle haven't changed.  But, for my part, my views about the people who practice your lifestyle have.  You have a face, a story, and I relate to you as a person, not as "the opposition." So, I think that a lot was accomplished...

Let’s stay in touch.