Lorin Cope by Ashli Miller

Interviewer: Ashli Miller

Narrator: Lorin Cope

Location: Zoom

Time: April 28th Thursday, 2022

AM: My name is Ashli Miller. I'm at UMSL'S campus right now. It is April the 28th 12:37 on a Thursday. And can you state your first and last name for me.

LC: I'm Lorin. That's L-O-R-I-N. Cope C-O-P-E.

AM: Ok and your date of birth:

LC: July 7th, 1955.

AM: Ok cool. Okay so just kind of some opening reflection points. How would you define yourself?

LC: Um... I. That's a very- what a way to start. I um. I like to have a good 00:01:00sense of humor. I love good restaurants. I love to travel. Sometimes if I think about my life, I think I haven't had the most straight trajectory in my life. And so hopefully I learned from my mistakes. And I remember when I was little there was a television show on and the star of the show- It was set of him knew a little bit about everything but not everything about anything. And I kind of thought that was sort of me. I know a little bit about everything but not everything about anything. So, there's always something more you could learn.

AM: Right. So, I guess moving forward from what you've just said. What do you 00:02:00think are like some key turning points in your life that you can remember?

LC: Um. Well, I suspect if I go clear back over the last 66 years or so I think- one of those turning points was when my parents decided to divorce. One of those turning points probably was the decision about where to go to college. What to major in. Another one was probably when I decided to run for public office and diverted from what I thought would be a solid career in nonprofits, nonprofit organizations to going into politics. That I'm taking these in order of course. 00:03:00The decision to get married to a wonderful woman and then the decision about 27 years into that marriage that I was gay. The decision to come out and to end the marriage. And I- Then when I accepted a position and moved to Colorado. And when I decided to come to Saint Louis. Probably that. There are jobs and career decisions and things all in that. Sometimes my jobs has been a mosaic of part-time jobs. Rather than one position- but you know- I guess those are kind of highlights if I think about it.

AM: Okay. So, are you- so you are not a saint louis native?

LC: No.

AM: Okay cool. So where did you like-

LC: I moved-

AM: grow up yeah.

LC: Ohio. I lived nearly 50 something years northeast Ohio. Where my family has lived since 1793. They came to Ohio in 1793 from Virginia. Because my side of our family had grown to understand that slavery was wrong, and they were slave owners in Virginia. And the family split- in a big split. And they left southern Virginia and Pennsylvania and went across Pennsylvania and finally settled in Ohio because it was a free territory. It would become a free state and they would free those that they had in bondage and which they did. And that was how we came to Ohio.

AM: Wow

LC: So, I am the seventh generation. I think I'm seventh to own the land that they came to in 1793. We don't own as much now as they did then lots of it has 00:05:00been sold off over the centuries. And so- I'm part owner with my brother of a little over a hundred acres in Ohio that's part of the original tract of land that came to my family in 1793.

AM: Wow. So, what was it kind of like growing up in Ohio?

LC: Well, um- it was great. I'm a proud native of the state of Ohio. Very proud of that background and all the stuff that Ohio has down in the history of the United States. It was fine we have a farm. We still have- I don't obviously farm it. It's all rented out. It was cattle. We- it's called finish beef cattle. We would buy beef cattle a hundred or so. In the spring fatten them on corn and 00:06:00grass. And then sell them in the fall to be butchered and prepared. And then start it all over again for the next spring. And then eventually we gave that up and started to have soybeans, wheat, hay, corn that we sold. And then when we stopped actively farming the land, we rented it out. So, there are other people who are farming that land.

AM: So, it sounds like you have a lot of experience with labor- like labor intensive working. Especially with family and on land. So how long did you spend time in Ohio before you moved to Color-Colorado? I don't know why I can't say that.

LC: Colorado.

AM: And then St. Louis?

LC: Let's see I left Ohio in 2009. No 200- Well- in about- depends on how you 00:07:00count the time. In about 2007 I actually sort of relocated to Wisconsin and worked in Wisconsin for two years. And then was invited to take a temporary position in Colorado for March 1st, 2009, until June 1st of 2010. So, from 1955 until um April 1st of 2007 I was in Ohio. And then I went to Wisconsin. But I was actually- I was kind of living in both places at the time. And then ultimately relocated to Colorado for that specific position with a specific goal that was on a time limited thing. So, I lived in Colorado for about a year and a 00:08:00half before I moved here.

AM: And when you lived in Colorado was that so was that still correlated to that work in public office? Or was that something different?

LC: No by then the political bug had left me. No, I had- most of that time I worked on behalf of and in setting of the United Church of Christ. So about ten years I worked in the president's office of the United Church of Christ in Cleveland working for the general president of the United Church of Christ and then from there I did some work with a local church in Wisconsin, with a local church in Colorado. I came here with the understanding that I would do fundraising for a couple of church related institutions. Those position changed and ended. And then I started work on the staff of Eden seminary in Webster 00:09:00Groves. And that position lasted until the pandemic happened and then a whole group of people were laid off because of the pandemic and the impact of the budget. And so- excuse me- I've been the church administrator here in Saint Paul United Church of Christ in Tower Grove South.

AM: Okay. So, I kind of want to back up a little bit so with you kind of mentioning the United Church of Christ. So how would you say- So how long has faith been a part of your life? And where did you initiate that into like vocational- like career, I guess?

LC: Back in my local church Beloit. I was always a very active member of the Bethel United Church of Christ in Beloit. It's a rural church. Strong rural congregation in Northeast Ohio. I often say that whole thing started in Sunday 00:10:00school. I went to Sunday school one morning and we had a vacancy on our governing board at church. And this was in the 60's late 60s maybe early 70s. When there was a lot of energy around young people getting involved. And our youth group leader said I think one of you ought of be in charge of you know- taking that empty seat. And so, the youth group voted which one of us should do that. And I won the election because then I was the one nominated [indistinguishable words] when I was in high school. So, it was a chance to see things not from the pews. From the operational side and I just loved it. I'm kind of an organizational I don't know animal. I like how you put organizations together to accomplish goals. And so, I've done that. I've got a degree from 00:11:00Beloit University in nonprofit management and organizational development. And I've generally put that to use in churches. So, I'm not ordained, I've always be a lay person. I've not-Lots of people think I should've done seminary and that kind of stuff. I didn't do that. I've been a lay person and so here I'm the church administrator. I love it I have to deal with anything from falling plaster to toilets that get plugged up. But I also have found ways for this church which is a huge building and a tiny congregation to have the building open and used by people in the community 24/7. So, we're a home for a theater group, a musical group, a community group that's concern about public safety. We're a shelter for winter outreach here in Saint Louis in the wintertime. We're going to be a center for food distribution soon that's a new project we're taking on. We used to be a polling place. But now instead of the building open one or two hours a week it's open a lot. The twelve step tonight. So, the 00:12:00nurturing of it happened back in that local church when somebody said you should go. By the way the guy I beat, is now married to a justice of the Ohio supreme court. His wife is a justice of the supreme court. He went on and got really involved and got big in big time politics. He was secretary of state in Ohio he was her campaign manager and everything. He got the political bug. He married the political animal and a wonderful woman that served in those places now. And I ended up taking the career in church. And we're still friends. We're Facebook friends and chat often. I asked him about how his wife is doing in the political world and try to get the inside scoop on things. So, and he's very very professional. He never breaks confidences.

AM: Wow. So, what was like faith like in your family then, was it like something that was taught to you early on growing up or did kind of come to faith around 00:13:00the time in high school?

LC: No, it was always something about my grandparents. We were raised with my grandparents. My mom and dad built are house on the farm next to my grandparents' house. So, I was always around my grandparents and faith and church going. And involvement in the church community was always something my grandmother did. And my mother did not take us to church. We went to church with my mother. So, it was important to my mother. I do remember though sometimes flaking out of the sermon and the worship and finding a place in the church to sit read. Or I used the excuse that they piped the worship into the parlor. So, I could sit in the parlor on the soft sofa and listen to the service. So, I mean I took it seriously and I remember leaving my high school graduation on June 3rd 00:14:00of 1973 and getting in an old truck we owned driving three hours west in Ohio to attend a regional meeting of the United Church of Christ that happened every year. And so that was important and other people along the way who saw gifts from ministry in me. And invited me to do things or take roles or go places and do things. And so, part of it I suppose was a willingness. My dad was always willing to take me to where I needed to go and time to do whatever needed to be done if that was three hours away in Columbus or in hour away in Canton. You know make sure that I got on the planes and on the road and all that stuff. So there was a lot of encouragement to become involved and to do those kinds of things.

AM: So, did you- was it usually you? Do you have any other siblings that were involved as well?

LC: Um they had always been faithful church goers but not beyond their own local 00:15:00church involvement. My brother is hopelessly committed to zoom and cause of pandemic. Now he watches where his daughter went to church in Connecticut. He watches his service, and he watches our service here in Saint Louis. He goes to church three times a Sunday. And my other brother, he and his wife and family I believe their still member of an Episcopal congregation in Virginia so yeah. But I mean I suppose our family was very faith- faith supportive and so we all have pretty active church lives. That kind of stuff so yeah.

AM: I feel like I'm hearing that um even though your siblings and things like that just kind of were involved to kind of their own limits or whatever. It seems like what you were more interest in and maybe what kind of like excelled 00:16:00your involvement was the communication aspect and like event planning and organizing more things. So, I guess I would want to ask um let me look at my questions here. So how did your faith practice kind of transform and grow into different spectrums as you got older and as you travelled? Did it always- was it always specifically Christianity or did it every change into other thing?

LC: No, it's always been centered around Christian faith. I mean I- we're part of the United Church of Christ which has great avenue towards ecumenism both within the Protestant world but also within a reaching out to Jews, Muslims others of faith. We have stand where we have recognized other faiths other than 00:17:00Christian as being valid. And we don't ever put ourselves at odd with those other faiths while still affirming our Christian beliefs. So, I think you know the environment of the United Church of Christ is being a very open congregation and a very open denomination and very inclusive. You know we talk about for ourselves extravagant welcomes. We talk about no matter who you are or life's journey you're welcome here. We talk- we have a big poster downstairs in our fellowship hall which gets referenced by people who use it that says "Jesus didn't reject people and neither do we". You know we have a seventh day adminissed congregation that worshipped here of people who have just migrated from Africa. Most of them are from Congo or from- I can't think of- I can never 00:18:00remember the name of this coun- Ghana. They've just recently come so their worship is not in English. Their music is not our music although some of their hymns- well the words in their music are not our words the tunes are the same. For instance, we have- well the food distribution program we're going to start doing, when they came they said- we had this in another churches parking lot. And I said okay and they wanted to come out and hand out literature. And they were upset that Muslims were getting food. I said okay first of all we are not going to be handing out literature and secondly Muslims deserve to eat too. And it just happened that that week on the back of our denominational bulletin was a message about reaching out in partnership with Muslims. And I sent it off to 00:19:00this woman and I said I know the rest of the worship is in the bulletin and I just didn't take the time to separate it all. But given our conversation about our welcome to anybody who wants to come here and get food here's a statement from our denomination about our extravagant welcome to all. So, I think that's probably been me, I've pretty much been a reflection of the United Church of Christ in some ways.

AM: and do you- I know you mentioned earlier about your family coming to- coming into realization that they owned slaves and making amendments with that. Do you feel like your family history and the relationship with slavery impacted the way that you kind of came into Church of Christ and its statement on accepting anybody?

LC: Just a small correction that's a different between the Church of Christ and the United Church of Christ.

AM: Okay.

LC: There two separate denominations. They're not related. So, it's United 00:20:00Church of Christ. And it makes a big difference because the theological foundations for the United Church of Christ are very different for the Church of Christ.

AM: Okay.

LC: But that's real easy for people to do and they do it all the time. I remember years when I was little in the sixties when you know the nation was struggling with segregation and the nation was struggling with race issues all over. The United Church of Christ as always been at the forefront of race issues among Christian churches. For instance, you may know about the Amistad incident where the slaves on the slave ship Amistad revolted took over tried to sale the ship back to Africa and landed in Connecticut. It was the forerunners of the United Church of Christ that paid for the attorneys to defend their case in 00:21:00court. Housed the Africans in Connecticut till their trial could be completed and then helped pay for their way back home. And we have place in our national office in Cleveland called the Amistad chapel. Where we memorialize that piece of our history. So, I remember in Ohio my family um stutteringly so maybe fumbling so to try to speak out live out better relations with everybody and not get sucked into the segregation and the hate of their day. And I say that because I don't think that- I don't think we ever do it right all the time. The best you can do is try to do it right as much as you possibly can, and I think that was true about my family. I don't remember that the family was um- mean 00:22:00spirted I think probably because of that history and knowing why it was that we came to Ohio. It was yeah probably something part of our family DNA I suspect. I don't think it was overt, so it was probably more something like I said just part of our nature as a family.

AM: So, how is living in Saint Louis like shaped your experiences with faith and like your identity?

LC: Well, let's see Saint Louis, there's always been a lot of meetings that I've attended in Saint Louis, and I've never really expected that I would live here. Because of love I ended up moving to Saint Louis. If you had asked me twenty years ago if I was going to live in Saint Louis, I'd of probably said no. In fact, I was pretty certain that when that little journey in Colorado was over, I 00:23:00was going back to the house in Ohio but that didn't happen I came here. And- I don't know it's really hard to say. I mean I experienced some really early on I experienced with an individual some of the racist attitudes that exist in Saint Louis today. And I- you know that's always in my in the fore front of my thinking when I'm think about race relations in Saint Louis. And I'll just tell you we had a woman who came here an African American woman who needed help. We did as much as we could online to find the ways to help her. But it ultimately ended up that I needed to go downtown. I needed to go downtown, and I jokingly said to her if you trust me driving downtown, we've got to go downtown we can't 00:24:00solve them online and she said sure. So, we got in the car and drove to downtown and she would walk into offices into city hall and city hall employees would come up and walk right to me. Now I'm male and I'm white and I'm aware of that and they would come right to me. Not go to her even though even though she would come through the door first. They would come right over to me and ask if they could help me. I was just the driver, and I'd just say I would say no you're here to help this woman. One office employee turned around and went back and sat back down. And I was just appalled. I just I came back, and I said Well you know I've just seen what it's like to be black, female and poor in Saint Louis when you go downtown to get help. And a couple of places I just had to say this is the woman that you're dealing with not me talk to her.

AM: So, I know you talked about earlier to your trajectory of like your 00:25:00education. So, and you know said something else about kind of like a big key turning point in your life was about your decision to go to college? So how was your education, where did you attend college and what was that decision like?

LC: Well, I postponed it. I finished high school in June of 73 but I didn't start college in that fall like most people did. I took some time in summer and fall and most of the spring and worked for my dad. My dad had a steel business, he built machinery for the steel mill. So, he had a business that was connected to the steel mills and built the machinery that makes the steel. He didn't make the steel, but he built the machinery that made the steel. And so, I worked for him and drove a truck for him which gave me an even bigger appreciation that I 00:26:00didn't want to do that for very long cause I didn't like doing it. But he paid me, and I learned a lot of stuff driving the truck and delivering things and getting along with customers. When some of our equipment failed, I had to be the person that represented it when I had to go pick up whatever broke and make them feel nice. And say nice things "I'll get this taken care of" that kind of stuff. Um but ultimately, I started out in pre-law. I was going to go to law school, and I met some people in the United Church of Christ and some staff people. Folks who were doing some great stuff around organizational development. Talking about how organizations are built functioned, accomplish goals. And I was- there's just something- I thought that was just great and I loved doing that. You know friends will laugh they say you sleep with the constitution of the church under your pillow don't you. You just pull that out and you can read 00:27:00stuff to us about how things are supposed to function. Well so after a while I changed from pre-law to business and organizational development. And when there were- I had a lot of people who of course because I was involved in the life of the United Church of Christ all throughout high school who thought I should go to school to become- ready to become seminary. And there were a couple of schools were not officially from anybody in admissions. But lay or I mean alumni of those schools said, "oh you should come to our school and said oh you should come to our school" and ultimately, I decided to go to Bowling Green State University in Northwest Ohio because that had a great business school and so many people from my high school went there. When I went to visit the campus I kept bumping into people that were familiar faces. It made me feel better to be there and to know that there would be some people from my town from my high school and I kind of admired him. And he came around the corner and gave me this 00:28:00warm greeting. And I thought okay if this is good enough for Sean, I'm going to come to college here. So, I went to Bowling Green and I changed my major from law to business and organizational development and enjoyed it immensely with the exception of maybe calculus. Calculus was a challenge I loved English and history but calculus was not my ball game. And we were doing computer programming not with the help of Bill Gates. Cause Bill Gates and I are the same age but Bill Gates hadn't developed all the stuff in computer programming I was doing was very old and it was on punch cards.

AM: wow

LC: And you had to program something with punch cards and if you made a mistake, 00:29:00you had to go find the punch card you made a mistake on to change it. Yeah, it was in the dark ages.

AM: wow.

LC: Your grandparents might remember this.

AM: So, it seems like the work you did with your dad kind of like- do you feel like that kind of influenced how you deal with customer service and knowing how to kind of like be in conversation with people in like a professional setting?

LC: Oh yes. When my dad died my brother, and I initially took over the company. My brother is the engineering person he has degree in [indistinguishable word] engineering from the University of Cincinnati. He can tell you over Sunday dinner why a piece of metal in a bridge failed and why the molecules didn't hold hands with each other nice. And not just- you know I can't tell you a darn thing about why the bridge collapsed, it just fell. It got tired and collapsed so I don't know. But Brian so Brian really kind of took over the technical side of 00:30:00things but he- didn't and I said well let me do this which is if somebody is upset I'll deal with the people who are mad. You deal with building stuff and build it right, so they don't get mad. But my brother did my brother was really on the tech side of things and well and I thought you know make people feel better about things when they don't go quite right. So, I think part of that was there probably another place of relationship- trying to do the customer service stuff.

AM: So, what is your- I don't know if you've already said it but what is your title right now?

LC: My current title is church administrator. I'm the church administrator here at Saint Paul United Church of Christ in Tower Grove South. But this grandiose 00:31:00office with a lot of wood on the walls and everything actually is the pastor's office.

AM: So, what is a usual day at your job look how? How does it kind of like function if you could explain?

LC: Well, I think it's coming in the office and it varies because I'm trying to- you know I'm trying to get quotes all the time for repairs that need to get done here, for painting, for plaster, for plumbing. It's an old building that was- part of it was built 99 years ago and another part of it was built 85 years ago. So, it's an old building and you know it's thinking about being prepared for whose ever going to be coming in next to make sure that excuse me the room is 00:32:00set up the way they want it set up, that the floor is clean and lights all work excuse me. And that whoever uses the restroom hasn't used up all the toilet paper and paper towels. And you know I mean and it's just this holy week for instance was just you know we have three services. Monday, Thursday, Good Friday and Easter. So, I'm doing three bulletins and we're doing stuff to get ready for those three services and getting tables set up and getting communion set up and all that kind of stuff. This week because we're gone next week it's getting the bulletin ready for this week and next week getting them out. Working with people we have a person coming in to fill in on Sunday to preach. So, making sure that she has a bulletin and that she knows what's going on and there's adequate people here to support her. Next week I have to get people to come in and do my job of opening and closing cause I'm not going to be here. So I have to find 00:33:00people and you know or the folks upstairs in the theatre want the floor mopped so I'm trying to get our maintenance person to out that on his radar to come in and mop the floor. So, it's hard to have a daily description because you're responding the challenge is responding to the latest crisis to go from one crisis to the next. This window got broken into overnight and a leak developed to somebody put toilet paper or put paper towels down the toilet instead of the toilet and it's jammed up the toilet and that kind of stuff. So, I mean there's that but I'm still struggling to get to the point where I'm doing any kind of future planning like here's all the things that we- I got a list of like twenty different things that need to be done. Where do I start first how do we plan for those kinds of things. There's not been a lot of good plan about on going 00:34:00preventative maintenance. It's always been responding to whatever is not working now. The only exception that is we are not handicap accessible and we know that's a problem and we're exploring putting in an elevator. So, that's kind of a future future exciting thing. The other thing Ashli is simply I'm trying to always look for- I mean we have extra space, I'm always trying to find somebody that will pay us to use it. For office for nonprofit community based organizations because as the congregation has gotten smaller the financial resources have gotten tighter. So, rental income the use of the property generates rental income and helps support the church. And we are greatly indebted to the generosity of the debt here that means that people in the past 00:35:00have left us bigger stakes that we have tried to invest wisely to keep the- keep the necessary resources. And if you've been watching the stock market lately after the war started and everything our stock market has steadily gone down so access have steadily gone down. We know that's short term because people in the stock market bounce back and we'll be back and in better shape. You know I'm cautiously trying to hang on and not spend very much right now because our source of funds is down. So this is not the right time to take money out of the stock market because now would be a good time to buy more but now would not be a good time to take out so.

AM: So, you do a lot. So how long have you had this title then?

LC: It started on- well I left Eden on July 1st of 2020. So almost two years, I've been in this role which is a much more expanded role. I was working here 00:36:00before but not in this kind of expansive everyday kind of role. I was only here for a few hours. And then after I left Eden, I opened up time and the congregation decided that I should be here more often to keep things rolling.

AM: and is Eden another location?

LC: Eden is the theological seminary is one of the seven seminaries of the United Church of Christ and it's in Webster Groves.

AM: Okay. And did you have that-

LC: So, I worked there. I worked there first as an assistant of the president of the seminary and then I moved over to the development office where I worked as a relation- as the relation manager between the seminary and local churches around the country. So, the job changed because I knew a lot of people all over the 00:37:00country and the United Church of Christ and David [can't make out the last name] the president thought I could be helpful over there, so I did.

AM: And do you do a lot of volunteering work with your and just being a part of the church as well?

LC: Yeah, my church secretary said okay so what we're paying you to be here and how much of all the stuff in your office is actually related to St. Paul as opposed to the life of the Saint Louis Association of the United Church of Christ or the Missouri South Conference of the United Church of Christ. I'm on a church related historical society and I'm the vice president of that group which has its primary archives it Lancaster, Pennsylvania. But we're in the process of exploring a possibility of moving them to Saint Louis and housing them to Eden seminary. So, well that might be a possibility we haven't brought that to 00:38:00fruition yet. We're just talking about that so that's part of what the lawsuit is. The guy I mentioned earlier- the archives located in Saint Louis are the ceiling fell a couple of weeks ago and we've determined that there's a level of asbestos in that ceiling and so now we're in a kind of conversation about how were cleaning up the asbestos, how we're keeping people informed about that. How we're safeguarding our visitors that are staff and working in an environment where there's asbestos in the air. So, who knew that he would end up doing that kind of stuff.

AM: Yeah.

LC: When I worked in Cleveland, the general minster for- he said when I go down the hall to talk to him about something and I listen to him talk about something on the farm or something about the oil well that are on the farm or something that has to do with fertilizer and cows he said I don't know what I'm going to here when I walk down the hall to ask you something.

AM: So, I kind of want to ask some questions about faith as well since a lot of 00:39:00your work is based in a faith-based space. What does faith mean to you?

LC: I- For me it is that there is a purpose bigger than ourselves. There is a sense that what we're doing on earth is building for lack of a better word the kingdom of God. We're trying to improve people's lives, we're trying to bring that wholeness, love and health to the world now. I think changing lives I mean you know- if you think about a theatre group for young people, a group of singers that are LGBTQ, folks who have just come here from Africa who are looking for a home to worship in and in a language and in a style that's their own. For people who get food that's taken from grocery stores right before the 00:40:00expiration date and are given to them free in our parking lot. Whatever it is I think we're trying to create a better world here for everybody when you see everybody as children of God and equally eligible for those kinds of things. That there's no eligibility with God everybody is a child of God.

AM: Has that same perspective been a part of the way you worshiped or practiced faith when you were growing up?

LC: Yes

AM: Okay and how would you say that faith growing up influenced your understanding of like sexuality and gender?

LC: Well, since the United Church of Christ was the first denomination to ordain a gay man in 1972, I think that happening and the understanding that Bill 00:41:00Johnson is a child of God just like anybody else and when the Golden Gate Association decided to authorize his ordination it was affirming who God made him and what his gifts were for ministry and that made perfect sense to me. I didn't quite no why that was a why-but I know it was a huge issue and in 2005 when the United Church of Christ nationally took a vote to affirm marriage equality that was a very moving time that was a very moving vote and that happened in Atlanta. And I think because of who we have been over the years. A church that was on the forefront- we were the first denomination to ordain women, we were the first denomination to ordain an African American, we were the first denomination to ordain an out gay man. They didn't call him that they called him an avowed homosexual. That was how they called it in 1972, I don't 00:42:00know why the avowed homosexual is but that's what they wrote. It would be an out gay man. It's kind of the history of those kind of things first you know. So yeah I mean it has influenced and I'm grateful because when I made the decision to come out I'm glad I was a part of the United Church of Christ and not a host of other denominations that would've been more problematic.

AM: Mhmm yeah. Okay let me look at my questions here. You've been covering a lot of good stuff.

LC: Okay.

AM: So I guess. I don't know if you're comfortable speaking about anything. If you have any discomfort or anything or if you don't feel like speaking you don't have to. But what was different sexual orientations and gender something that you learned about early on in your life, in like childhood like where did that different development of like knowing that like not straightness was a thing?

LC: I will say for me personally very early on I knew that I was attracted to the same gender guys men very early on. You know I'm not sure if that what my community or you know we didn't live in a place where I was exposed to have a conversation with anybody who was gay and so I think I remember being very supportive of those position and stances that affirmed gay people but I was say no no I'm no. and I said that for so long that I kept thinking would probably be true and I want to say I deeply loved the woman I married. I very much admired 00:44:00her for her guts and stuff when she ran for public office and her work and the life she did. I am always sad about how our marriage ended. It was rough and rocky and I'm always sad about the pain I caused her. And I have to admit that I got married to because I wanted figure out how a way to marry the gay away. Just because I thought that was the way to do it, it wasn't I never did I don't think. But so ultimately it had to change.

AM: So how would you say that, or would you say that your decision to come out impacted your religious standing or faith in anyway? Were there any struggles?

LC: Well, no no. I think in my case because of the position the United Church of Christ has taken over the years. I was affirmed. When I came out and we had to I. When I came out, I was on the staff of for the president of the United Church of Christ in Cleveland. So, I went in, and I told him what was going on because I had an ongoing professional relationship with ministers across the nation. That were a part of the United Church of Christ without getting into a lot of history about this. He felt that it would be helpful for him to send out a letter affirming me and my decision and the future impacting my relationship with Nancy. Because all knew all of us, Nancy had gone with me to meetings. They 00:46:00love Nancy, Nancy was a staff person in Ohio in the United Church of Christ, so he crafted a magnificently beautiful message went out to people that said I need to let you know of this development and he captured the spirit and the essence and sent it out. And I think somewhere in my files I don't know exactly where there's a whole folder of letters from people who commented and affirmed me in that decision. Supported Nancy and sent their best wishes. And all that you know it's tough when things like that happen and your friends with both people involved you try to find a way to be supportive of both. And a lot of our friends were good at that. No, it was a very affirming kind of thing. In my local church there were some people who took sides. There were some people back 00:47:00in Beloit in our church who were very very found of Nancy and felt bad about what had happened. In a way she stayed at that the church I went and joined another neighboring congregation after a while just to not have awkwardness and uncomfortable encounters and stuff and kind of respect that. I know there were people who were. I was not who they thought I was for the first forty-five or fifty years that they'd known me and knew that I was Lauren Helen and Stanley's grandson and merch son and all of the things kind of you bank on got kind of shook when that happened because of that. I will say there were a few people- there was a fella who wasn't at Bethel during those times we grew up together. 00:48:00He's a couple years younger than me and when we connected on Facebook he said to me my mom knew you were gay a long time ago, I don't know what took you so long. My mom knew it and Ashli when I told my brother he said well thank god that you finally figured that at. The rest of us had that figured out a long time ago.

AM: Wow.

LC: So yeah.

AM: So was it- had it, had anybody in your church or community or in your kind of awareness, had anybody else came out before you had?

LC: Well my my- my brother he married into a large family, in the same area and his family has had either professionally employed in some way at our church. They weren't always necessarily members but it's funny because when he was talking to me, he said you think you're the first. I said what do you mean, I 00:49:00said well yeah I'm the first and he said oh no no no. and he name two or three other people in his wife's family and said well she's lesbian, you didn't know that. No so here's the funny thing when I moved here- well lots of funny things. When I moved here June 1st of 2010, not long after that I got a text from my cousin who said you and I need to talk because you've already taken the journey that I'm about to embark on and I need to talk to you about this. And I thought what are you talking about. Come to find out married two kids living in Virginia that time then. And he was about to come out to his wife and I had no clue. I mean he's a cousin and I had no clue. Another one was a real big surprise was my niece. My brother's daughter came out to me and then said you need to help me 00:50:00find a way to tell me dad. And I said uh I don't know about that. So ultimately, I pushed her I said you're dad's going to be fine. Your dad was fine with me he's going to be fine with you. you just need to tell him. So she would call me, talk about it what was she was going to do. and then she was at home with her mom, and she told her mom and her mom said you need to go and tell your dad. And she said ohhh I think I need to go home now. I think I need to go back now to she was working some place I forget where. And my sister-in-law said no you need to go in and tell you're dad. Your and she said no I don't think I want to tell dad and she said no he'll be fine. She called me and I said you're dad will be fine just go in and tell him. So my brother was sitting at the kitchen table reading the paper and she came in walking and she said dad I have something serious to talk to you about and he said okay and he put the paper down and she 00:51:00said well this is really serious and I don't know where to begin. And he said do you have cancer are you dying. She said no I'm not dying I don't have cancer. He said Well that's the only thing that could be serious enough for this conversation what do you want to tell me and she said well I'm lesbian. And he said okay I mean he never missed a step in affirming her and being supportive of her and now she's married to wonderful a woman. They got married in a boat the Connecticut harbor. In the midst of the pandemic, none of the family was invited. We all had to go by zoom to the wedding. Now they live in Ohio a few miles from my brother. But that was also- I think well of course I've learned there were a lot of other people around me in the area people that I recall being supportive of LGBTQ people who were themselves struggling with it. Now in 00:52:00the environment that didn't exist in the 70s now the environment we got have found love and life and we sometimes chat about what that journey was like.

AM: Mhm. Yeah I kind of want to ask too is there- how do you view the LGBTQ or queer community in Saint Louis? Is there differences from what you've know if Cleveland or other places? Compared to what the scene is in Saint Louis when you first came here too.

LC: I really don't have a good comparison about that in Saint Louis. It's been awhile since I lived in Cleveland and it's been a while since I've lived in Beloit. And I really didn't- I've learned more about the community, the community groups, the community activities mostly around music. Like the gateway 00:53:00of men's chorus, Philip, and all being groups. So a lot of it has been the music groups here in Saint Louis and the LGBTQ community. But most of what I was doing in Ohio was trying to come to terms with myself and probably that continued. So I didn't get to experience what the community was like. In those places. It's been more experienced here in Saint Louis with folks here.

AM: Do you feel as if there is a large LGBTQ community in Saint Louis?

LC: Oh I think so. I think so it's hard to figure out. I am told that I live and given what I know about people around my own home here I'm told one of the centers is here in Tower Grove South. We have a lot of folks here and the two 00:54:00guys who moved in across the street are my cat sitters. They'll be coming over to pet sit my cat during the next week to make sure she's fed and safe and everything. But I have to say one of them knows everything that goes on on all streets over here. So, somebody moves in and I call him and I say so what do we know about the new people that moved in. Oh well they moved here from Albuquerque and blah blah blah. So we were standing out on the street talking about stuff. We were out on fourth of July we were standing out looking at fireworks and he starts telling me oh yeah moved in and his husband's coming later, the guy over on the other street you know he blah blah and I said I drove by, and they were in their car headed to the Muney. So, any way when I looked at 00:55:00the number of people involved in things and I know they don't all live in Saint Louis some are from Illinois and some live outside of just immediately Saint Louis. There's certainly the size of some of the groups here. Yeah I think it's a very good place for that. We're trying to think about what we're going to do for retirement and all my LGBTQ friends here in Saint Louis because we have a lot of family in Alabama, we said well maybe we'll move to Alabama and go oh you don't want to move to Alabama not if you're gay. Don't move there to Alabama, don't move to a red state stay here. Stay in Saint Louis where it's I don't know.

AM: Yeah I remember you saying you're either having hesitations or you didn't think you would live and move to Saint Louis?

LC: Yeah right.

AM: And why was that?

LC: I don't know Saint Louis was just- I didn't have anything against Saint Louis. But I didn't imagine that my life would get involved with someone who was in Saint Louis that would then say to me will you move to Saint Louis. So when the job was going to wrap up in Colorado, which was not a surprise I knew it would end that was our agreement. I was beginning to look around at what I might do and kind of putting out resumes those kinds of things. And then he suggested that maybe I could do the work from Saint Louis. And so, he was here, and I wasn't sure where the relationship was going. You know he probably had better vision that I did. My wife used to say I was low slow and cold. I had a low body temperature; I a low heart rate and I was a little slow on picking up on things. She said you don't do very well on clues; you need a billboard and a blaring 00:57:00horn to get your attention. So, maybe he had a different vision about the future that I had got a hold of yet and so when I was about to move here, he asked the church council if they had a problem moving in with him in the parsonage, he's the pastor. They said Well is he a better housekeeper than you are, and tom said yes and then they said well will he sing in the choir. And they heard me singing and he said I won't commit to having him sing in the choir. You're going to have to ask him that. And that was the only two questions they asked about whether or not if I should move in here or not. And when Tom and I decided to get married we were in a church council meeting and one of the lady looked over and said well I'm a little upset that you're having your wedding here. and I said Carroll why and she said well we've been talking and none of us have been asked to be a flower girl or ring barrier in your wedding and we want to know who you're 00:58:00asking to do that. And I said you're all off the hook there's first of all not going to be a flower girl and my brother is going to have the rings. And I said don't worry there will be lot's of things for you to do and she laughed. And you know I think I had never felt anything except loved and affirmed here and this church with Tom. And I also want to say we've had a number of reasons to have health issues in the last 13 years and we've mostly gone to MOBAP for those. And I've never felt the least bit of discrimination from people in the healthcare field about us being a gay couple or a married couple and that's been really nice. You know you've got a lot other stuff to be worried about when a loved one not's feeling well and Tom's had a stroke some other things than to have a bad attitude at a hospital or something like that.

AM: So where are you-

LC: So, I don't know

AM: Okay. So do any of your siblings- do you have any close family members that live in Saint Louis? Or are they still kind of spaced out in different places?

LC: Yeah no my- I have a brother that's in Ohio. I have another brother that's in Virginia Yes. I forget where he is. I have a stepbrother that's in Virginia. Toms got a sister in Texas and a brother in Indianapolis. Tom's son and daughter 01:00:00in-law lived in Florissant for a while. They pursued their dream and moved to Orlando and thought they would enjoy living in Florida and realized that Florida wasn't the answer to everything they hoped it would be. So, they moved to Huntsville. Now Tom's daughter and son-in law and two grandchildren and son and daughter in-law and one daughter all live ion Huntsville. So, their all in Huntsville. So, where might be a normal place for us to think about retiring too might be Huntsville. That's where might LGBTQ friends say oh you don't want to move to Alabama. Not as a gay person.

AM: Mhm yeah. Okay I wanted to ask a few more questions about kind of like activism. Have you been a part of any LGBTQ activism in Saint Louis or like have you attended any pride events?

LC: oh yeah and here again it goes back to the connection with the United Church of Christ. We have annually every year that I've been here it's been started before I came here but now, I chair the committee they had a huge tent at pride every summer. We will be deciding tonight for what we're going to do for this year's pride we we're cautious. You know the pandemic we agreed to do this and 01:01:00put eight hundred dollars in and then when the committee decided to do a modified one last year, they wouldn't give us our money back. So, we lost our eight hundred dollars. Which kind of upset some of our folks in the committee. But we have a group called Gateway opening and affirming those are representative of the twenty opening and affirming congregations here in Saint Louis and includes Eden Seminary. And it originally got started because two churches Epiphany and Soulard and was Evangelical now Peace in Webster Groves. Started out as the first opening and affirming churches in Saint Louis and they went together to put a tent up and have a booth. And other congregations have voted to become opening and affirming churches in the United Church of Christ. We have this group that it's an all come group. We don't have membership requirements, anyone who wants to come on the fourth Sunday of the month can 01:02:00come in it's a pretty freewheeling and open discussion and our secretary does not put everything that said in the meeting in the meeting minutes and thank goodness. And the only time we ever talk about voting is when we're going to spend money and then the vote has to be made by designated delegate by the church to give money to the treasure. So, but yeah, we always have a tent at pride. We've had a tent at Tower Grove pride we it started a few years back. A tent at the pride downtown, we've tried to have a presence at Saint Charles pride in cooperation with the churches in Saint Charles at Metro East pride and because some congregations related to this area are in Memphis. We've had in the past some involvement with the Memphis pride event. So, trying to locate the United Church of Christ in those places we've gone together and do it together 01:03:00rather than individual congregations as doing their own thing we've. We've done a collective thing of all those congregations and because those churches have contributed to the treasury, we pay for it. So, we pay for the tents and the tables and chairs. When they would let us hand out cold water, we would hand out cold water and we covered the cost for that. We hand out literature at black pride. When black pride happens, we try to have a presence there too. Most of my time here has been spent in connection with that group called gateway opening and affirming. And what we have tried to do is to encourage local churches to start on a journey of conversations leading to them taking a vote to become opening and affirming. In the United Church of Christ every congregation is 01:04:00self-governing. So, every congregation if they're going to declare themselves to be opening and affirming of persons. They need to take that vote and we have a consultant that works with churches around that and answering questions for them and helping them go through a process of conversations and as she says the process is not supposed to be divisive. It is supposed to bring people together and understanding. Because lots of churches will say oh we're welcoming but you know are they really are they really affirming. Are they really wanting LGBTQ people to be fully engaged in a full life at that church and so when I -- during the time that I've been chair of the group we've tried to work on to try to help our churches come to terms with that from community stand from a theological 01:05:00stand, from a biblical stand and in regards to biblical stand we're bless to be having the resources of Eden Seminary because you can get seminary professors who have Ph.Ds. in biblical studies to come lead those discussions in churches. Those are generally very good conversations and so trying to get resource are local churches to be opening and affirming and welcoming. And so me- Tom's been here for 16 years and only in the last couple of years of this church even though they had an out gay minister and they had an out gay church administrator. And the church administrator was married to the minister had never really voted to become opening and affirming. They kind of behaved like they were but they never really were. So they voted we have it out on the sign out front. We have four rainbow flags out in front of the church and again having the -- we had the Gateway Chorus concerts here. We've hosted their concerts in our building. We've hosted other LGBTQ groups here. We have a study 01:06:00group of lesbian women who are here. So I mean we've been trying to live into that welcoming. And that's really been the extent of my involvement with any type of activism, has been around how we help anybody. Our churches talk about becoming welcoming places for people.

AM: Okay, I have some follow up questions. So, with your presence at these different pride events. Have you ever seen I guess pre-covid do you ever see an influx in your congregation? And do you feel like your presence at these different events kind of initiated conversations about faith with LGBTQ people that might have had hesitations or more questions?

LC: Yes. Yes, to both, so are congregations by large it would be rare for at 01:07:00least for all of them to at least see visitors. We hand out literature about each local church. Each opening and affirming local church. So, if you come up and say I live in Kirkwood is there a church near me and I would say absolutely and here's the brochure. So we've done that and people have seen folks church out because they've heard about it. We've had people here come and talk to us at pride and who will come to St. Paul's. On the other matter, what we've tried to do is that every shift at the pride fest we try to make sure that there's an ordained minister on the volunteer staffing the tent at that point. Just to be able to engage with people in the deeper theological conversations that they bring to those encounters. And it's often that people don't know the United Church of Christ exists, don't know about our history and our welcome. And we've 01:08:00had people come up surprised that we're there and affirming. We've had people come up and say I've been looking for a church like yours, we've had people -- one story was that a mother brought her daughter who was coming out as lesbian to the booth and her mother said see I told you there's a church you could go to, and you'd be welcomed. And one or two of our pastors were there and kind of descended on her to affirm that. So how we've tried to address those conversations that happen at pride is to have a theologically trained person present at each shift. So that there's someone there and sometimes that becomes intensely deep counseling not intentionally that's not where we were we just do information. And a couple of times it's even led to weddings. Somebody whose found a pastor and liked him so much at the booth they'd say can we talk to you about arranging a wedding. And we watch on Facebook too if somebody says there's 01:09:00a couple looking for a affirming congregation that will officiate our wedding Tom and I raise our hand pretty quick on Facebook and say you're welcome here. We did dynamite weddings.

AM: So have you ever- with I guess the Gateway opening and affirming stance and they also kind of the signage have you ever experienced protesting or kind of backlash from any local churches or any people within the community that are against what the church stands for?

LC: We don't get that here. There is somebody in town right now or in the area who is writing to a lot of the opening and affirming churches hostility and very nastily telling them the errors of their ways and one of our pastors just posted 01:10:00Facebook and said well we must be doing something right cause we've made this man and another friend of mine wrote back maybe you should write back and introduce him to Jesus. Anyway so we had -- it doesn't very often happen at pride. I mean if you come to pride and going to be anti-LGBTQ you're probably not going to go to pride fest. I think there are skeptics there are people who have been hurt by church who have thought there was a welcome there and found out that the welcome only goes so far. Or you know we started a crisis line not too long ago because we heard a family that their daughter had come out and it 01:11:00wasn't in a UCC church it was in a different church and the leadership in the church went to the parents and said as long as you're daughter's a lesbian you're not welcome here. and so because of who their friends were and they connected with somebody who connected with our pastors. And now there a member of the church were that person pastors because she reached out to talk to him about that. Church hurt is very real people who have been hurt by church is incredible. People who are in church now like here don't know the extent to which some people have been kicked out and hurt. To find a place where that's not part of the operation and building that tough is because they've been hurt so many times by that church, church hurt is real.

AM: Okay. So going back to when you said local churches, what is that conversation -- and you said something else about self-governing and the voting process to be opening and affirming. Can you say more about that?

LC: So, in the United Church of Christ we have a structure that's called congregationalism it's part of who we are. So, every congregations is owned by the congregation, insured by the congregation, governed by the congregation we have paragraphs in our governance documents that preserve the local churches autonomy to govern it's own affairs. And so, nothing that the denomination would do is binding on the local church unless the local church decides to bind in on itself. So we can offer a process that invites people to be in conversation with 01:13:00each other that has models and it's ultimately to invite a church to adopt an opening and affirming covenant that they covenant with each other who welcome you know all and it gets focus on LGBTQ people, it really could be LGBTQ it could be persons with different abilities, making our buildings handicap accessible, race, gender a variety of issues. Churches are asked to adopt a covenant that they work on and the biggest thing about this I think is Barb who is the coordinator for this would who would say it's not supposed to be divisive you work at it until you can get to a consensus of people. And then they can 01:14:00affirm this. Here that was relatively easy because the church pretty quickly enveloped us and put it down on paper was a pretty easy process until we got into the proofreaders and the congregation who were worried about crossing I's and dotting t's it pogged down a little there. So, they vote to adopt that then the resources will say you need to be vocal about that. You can't just be opening and affirming and not tell people that. So that's why we put it on the sign out in the front an opening and affirming congregation. That's why we have three four rainbow flags in front of the church. Why welcome- we started to live into those kinds of things. And now I forgot the second part of your question.

AM: I think I did to. I have another question an alternative question. Do you 01:15:00think that your church's location in Tower Grove has helped impact more willingness of like opening and affirming than other locations that are not centered in an already LGBTQ community?

LC: I don't know because. You know St. Mark UCC in Arnold is an opening and affirming church is north Jefferson County. Kirkwood, Parkway, Emanuel in Ferguson, Epiphany You know so really, they are all over the geology of the metropolitan area. So, I don't know that this location had anything to do with the decision of the congregation to take that vote. I think just because of who we have welcomed formally and informally in terms of visitors. We've welcomed the Gateway of Men's chorus and black tulip chorale. We've been living into it, 01:16:00but I don't know that our geography influenced that particularly.

AM: Another question I had to is do these other locations have the like same signage and like displays of like rainbow coloring on the buildings as well or no?

LC: Well, most of them do First congregation in Clayton had a big banner out front that keeps getting stolen. Peace church in Webster Groves keeps having their banner stolen. There was a time between Peace UCC in Webster Groves and the Kirkwood UCC and we we're trying to figure out who had had there banner stolen more often than the other one. So there is a marvelous I don't know if I can show you if you'll be able to see it. I think it's this week. We put on the bottom of one of the pages for the worship folder. So that's -- we had a banner 01:17:00we still have some banners like that eight foot wide long and four foot wide or something that says God is still speaking and that's kind of a motto of the United Church of Christ. And so Kirkwood had there banner stolen one time and they found it down in the Grove. Somebody had tried to set fire to it down in the grove. The reporter was trying to ask me about it and do you supply these banners to all your churches. No they have to buy them. We can make them but they have to buy them we don't send them out to churches all this kind of stuff. But then the same thing was happening in Webster Groves that banner kept getting stolen and stuff like that so. I forget how that answers your question.

AM: Well cause now I'm thinking about, do you think that the likelihood of the stolen signs is the community or particularly people kind of like taking that as 01:18:00an attempt to go against what the church is affirming.

LC: Sure. Sure. They are people in the community who are not happy that we are affirming, and they would rather not be and I don't know if they ever arrested -- they had some video camera footage of a person who stole the banner and set it on fire down in the grove but I don't know if they ever -- I never head that they prosecuting them or not. We've had these big rainbow flag outside of our church and right after we put them up in the spring one of our neighbors called and said I think your banner is halfway down the street. Well, I hadn't noticed it was missing and here it was down the street leaning up against somebody else's house. But most of the time they've stayed right there in front of the church, and they've not been bothered at all so I don't know.

AM: So has any other actions ever escalated outside of people stealing banners 01:19:00like have there ever been people showing up and making their presence known or has it really just stayed lowkey?

LC: I have not experience -- and I don't have an immediate memory of people in their church experiencing anything. Other than just now recently we received this letter that this person is writing to individual churches and pastors. I don't know if they're threatening anything but there was a neighbor here who thought I drove through the alley two fast and was pretty mad and discovered that the pastor and I were married, and he was going to come to tell the whole congregation about this horrible thing about their gay pastor. At the time we had a gay church council president who said oh I'll take care of him like our gay president is going after the neighbor like this is not going to be a 01:20:00surprise buster. So I mean it didn't happen no fortunately nobody became -- we haven't I'm not saying it hasn't happened and I'm sitting trying to think if this has happened to any of the other congregations have told me. I cant think of a time when there was anything.

AM: So, you kind of mention people kind of saw your presence and your signage and everything at the gay pride events.

LC: Right.

AM: you mentioned that sometimes people were shocked. Why do you think people -- why would you say or why would you think some people were shocked to know that this type of church existed or that you guys have this type of stance.

LC: we don't have -- despite our ability to try tell people who we are we aren't very successful with that I don't think. And because as you have already said we 01:21:00get confused with the Church of Christ which we don't share the same theological point of view that we do in the United Church of Christ. And I think along a lot of LGBTQ people there is that deep seated hurt that they've been told repeatedly that they are not worthy and not being in church those kind of things. I do kind of warn folks when they come here that you're about to be smothered with love. You've never had five grandmothers come up and give you hugs and fall all over you. I try to tell our folks to try not to smother people quite so much but anyway yeah I -- I don't know. I've lost the track on the question again.

AM: No you answered it. I had another follow up question too I guess with which you saying that people do come to the church and there is this big presence of love and acceptance. Do you feel like you've seen a big turnaround or like have you seen peoples presence like their relationship with faith personally or like being a part of the congregation as well.

LC: I probably can't because I've not had in-depth conversations about coming to church and how that's impacted their faith other than affirming them and knowing there welcomed here and they're not going to be kept out of something because their LGBTQ. We had a person who came one time and said I saw on the sign and saw that you were opening and affirming and I saw the flags and I thought are they really. And are they really. And then she said I saw your website and your 01:23:00website talked about the two of you getting married here. and I thought maybe this is really the truth maybe they really are and then she came and she said now that I've experienced you, you are. She was pretty out and we were are folks are pretty affirming and I will say that our folks the challenge for a couple of them has trying to get pronouns right with trans people. That to understand when to use he and she or they and them and I appreciate that some of the struggle that some of our people are engaged in. I appreciate those individuals who are trans are appreciating the people are making an effort. People making a good felt effort to try to respect the pronouns but I think that is an area where we have an area still do to be fully welcoming. To be careful about what pronouns 01:24:00we use and to be respectful of persons where they are and that in a trans journey. The funny this is we've had trans people here and friends of mine come and the folks who have encountered them that have no clue. You know when we were involved in the conversation about what it means to be really welcoming and respectful and I said well most of you did a trying job when we've had trans people here, what do you mean we've had trans people here and I said yeah we've had trans people there friends of mine or friends of Tom's and they've come and some people said I didn't know they were trans. And I said Well maybe that's a good thing. You took them for who they are as people and not because there trans people. And fortunately, the people who were here are thankfully the people who were not -- who understood pronoun challenges for people who have made effort to 01:25:00try to get it right should be appreciated for the good faith effort for trying to get it right. I have a great friend that I try to -- I keep using the wrong pronoun and they say yeah but you're making an effort and you know when you've done it wrong. And I said yeah I try to go do better.

AM: So is there any type of like formal way that the church tries to learn more updated knowledge about different like queer people and people in the community. Especially like with pronouns and just kind of like experiences and how to better solve those people.

LC: Yeah I think that comes from our national office from our -- there's a national organization for opening and affirming churches they do a wonderful job with webinars as well as printed material to help people begin to be on that 01:26:00journey and try to understand trans -- every individuals. Every year except we didn't do it this year, every year for the last eight or nine years we've had what's called an annual convocation it happens the first Saturday of march. And always among the topics that we include in the curriculum for that would be a workshop on trans, transitions, trans language and trans individuals there's a big component of that to help to education in a workshop setting so people who are trans and various places on the spectrum of trans will lead those. The trans group in saint louis has lead those, we've had a number of people in the trans 01:27:00community in saint louis be leadership for that one person said that she had no idea how nice it would be to do that she was dreading to do it. She said folks were so nice and so appreciative of what she was saying, she had no idea that she would have a good time. She wrote on Facebook and said I didn't want to go but when I got there I had a good time. And so those are the kinds of exposure -- what we do is for the convocation tried to design it as information for long term churches that have been opening and affirming and then information for people who are in the process becoming opening and affirming and then the curriculum of course is for people who are thinking about the possibility of being maybe opening and affirming. No there out there still trying to test it to see usually the biblical stuff -- theological workshop is always attended to the 01:28:00max and you know what do you need to think about becoming opening and affirming change your to be -- change your evangelist like flags and sign that we're an opening and affirming and having a rainbow presence that kind of stuff. That helps and then makes it real for people, you've voted it but now you're trying to live into it.

AM: And does that living into also kind of correlate to helping like I guess underserved people who are in the queer community like housing and like food insecurity as well.

LC: We've done some of that. Some of our local churches have done that we've done that here with individuals it's not been a highly structured program about that but we certainly have don't that as individuals have been here with us either through winter outreach or folks who are here because they know the sign. 01:29:00I do get calls from people who say clearly you're a welcoming committee and this is what we need or offer to help.

AM: Okay. So, I have a few more questions that touch on politics. Cause I know you kind of said or you kind of like talked about being involved in politics and things correlated to that. Do you think politics have impacted how queer people have connected to like faith-based institutions or just those spaces?

LC: well, if you look at -- the struggle that exist between the evangelical church leaders of the right of the republican party if that's the message that people are hearing that's definitely going to impact message we're trying to 01:30:00share. You know -- well that great speech from that state legislator in Michigan talked about being a straight white cis female that there are other people who deserve just as much as she did. I don't know if you saw that clip after that other state legislator who was being very very hateful and that's what people see. A few years ago the attorney of the United Church of Christ told me that when he goes into court on issues that we have in the church and we do have to go to court every once in a while. He's always dealing with judges of concept of the church is usually the roman catholic church, so because there are a very hierarchical structure with the bishops and the cardinal and the pope and we're 01:31:00a very congregational structure where individuals make the decisions. He said it's hard for them to understand -- part of the time I have to help them understand there is no hierarchal in the United Church of Christ, there is nothing that is telling a local church what they have to do. The local church makes that kind of decision and that's just formal. So you're experience of church is the mega church, the evangelical church, the church that's out there ra ra -- you know if that's what church is for you to come to a church likes this is going to be really different and you've probably been hurt by that church and that hurt -- church hurt then always gets in the way of the trust that needs to built to say you can be yourself when you're here and that's okay. So yeah I think the political climate and the divisiveness of the political 01:32:00climate and the legislation were seeing you know trans bills, bathroom bills, sports bills and all of those kinds of things that are being past in legislation now are often energized by the religious rights and yeah. It's a very divisive time.

AM: I guess -- everything you just said is kind of leading up to my next question which is do you think that politics kind of influences the message that the minister or pastors kind of gives to the congregation? And In like what ways?

LC: Well, let me see since I live with the minister. Yeah I think that's going 01:33:00to happen of course the problem you have is how do you do that I mean okay -- so you have to be the pastor of the whole congregation and in most congregations you're going to have the diversity of -- although I would say this congregation by and large is a blue congregation which is pretty liberal. But we're not one hundred percent that way and Tom's sermon has to be approaching political issues from a theological standpoint and not a political stand point and you can read between the lines or the sermon lines however you want to. But if you're not addressing the issues of the day that are impacting people then you're probably ignoring the application of the gospel -- because what did Jesus do -- Jesus 01:34:00went after the empire went after the roman authority that ultimately resulted in his death, but you know we see it most often particularly around what happened in Ferguson. I mean there are people in a church a few blocks away from the riots in Ferguson they were impacted by that. Tracy Blackman who has been a leader for that is now a national officer in the United Church of Christ she was the pastor at the Christ the Kind United Church of Christ in Florissant. So again engagement of the church in those kinds of struggles seems totally appropriate to me it seems and it others. So the same thing with you know the 01:35:00LGBTQ march that happened on Washington happened 30 years ago or whatever. The United Church of Christ president was there for that march -- marched in that march and took some heat about it but still was there. So yeah, I think you know if you're going to figure out how the gospel applies to your life you got to hear about life can be impacted by the gospel.

AM: Okay. So, I know we're kind of coming down to our time since we started a little bit earlier. I guess I have a question that is what is one lesson you would like to pass down to other generations?

LC: Well you're not always right I don't know how to say it I mean in our 01:36:00society and all you get so entrenched in position that divide that we don't find the ways that people can be united. I'm not saying that right -- recently it was the senator that just that but there was some pictures once of Kennedy and Eisenhower of other past presidents who understood public service was given to the nation not to the party. And we've -- I don't know how you capitalize that 01:37:00in a way that helps answer your question. It's biggen than you I think you know you need to be -- there's no limit to the amount -- there not limit to the amount of good you can do if you don't care about who gets the credit. There's no limit to the amount of good you can do if you don't care who gets the credit. And sometimes I think that needs to be a reminder and you know the picture of these presidents together at the white house or camp David or something and it says this is when they remember when they were engaged in service for the nation not for the party, I think right now we're not there. We're divided by the party loyalty and not by becoming together for what's in the best interest.

AM: Another kind of revision for that very broad question that is there any 01:38:00lessons you would want to pass down to older or younger people who are within the LGBTQ/ queer community are struggling with faith and are kind of trying to figure out that path for them?

LC: You know I want to say there is a place out there for you. you know it might take a little time to find that right place for you but increasingly the Christian community as well as other faith communities, but the Christian community is learning that there's a place at that table for everybody and you 01:39:00need to move over. You know -- there's a great phrase that grew out of the last president's term that said we don't need to build a bigger wall; we need to build a longer table and it's kind of a combination of better and there's a place for you and affirming that that person has a place. I think that's it I meet people who are here for the winter outreach program I see people who are at intersections, and I keep thinking what can we find that would give you fulfillment what can we find a place where you're passionate a place in the world together. There's a famous quote that says that -- that's the search for places for people where the passion in the word need's intersections

AM: I think another question I have thinking back to your life and what we discussed with like your childhood, career and present life, are there any thing that you're proud of?

LC: There are a lot of things that I look back on and think oh I'm glad I think 01:40:00that there all you know little pieces of things in the United Church of Christ that I have done. I think things from years ago trying to get more youth involved in the life denominational life in the church. I worked hard on some of those things and made room for young people to get involved in things. I think supporting this organization of opening and affirming, so that we have resources for churches to help churches talk about becoming opening and affirming and then finding ways for them to live into it. I you know could think about well this church is still here and I glad that we now have an active building that's used by lots and lots of people and that they find this to be a safe place both 01:41:00physically safe and spiritually safe to be here. I'm glad I've survived until I'm 67 years old I guess. I listen to the advice of my doctors and I do what they tell me. I don't know that's a very interesting question and I think about it often and there are moments were I take great comfort in like something will be said that something in our United Church of Christ and I will think oh yeah I helped put that together in a meeting one time and one place where I was present in the room and contributed to that or that I chaired a committee that developed that program that's still going today. You know I have people who come up to me and say my decision to go into social work was based on something that happened 01:42:00at your camp in 1978 or something like that -- you learn that you had an impact on people you you didn't even know you had an impact on. You -- every summer for a week I was a volunteer camp counselor for our camp's in Ohio I would plan these weeks and I would plan these extravagant things like a banquet on a big sheet in the middle of the meadow with food brought in from the kitchen. We planned a walk one time with manner from heaven in the hills and talked about that from the scripture and journey of the exodus and all that. Planning all that on a Saturday morning when the kids are coming home and coming to get them and you think did any of this make any difference and then a few years ago. Out of the blue somebody comes up and says something -- somebody sends you a note. 01:43:00Somebody does something like that oh my goodness I didn't know -- one year the week was perfect the week was like 90 percent a perfect week and I thought I'm not going to do this ever again because I cannot improve on perfection. I'm just going to and I said okay next year I'll come back and do it and I came back the next year and it wasn't quite as good as it was the first year. A week didn't go well maybe a lot of rain and I forget what and at the end of the week when we sat all the kids down before we released them to their parents, I said so what did you learn this week. Oh my gosh they got everything, I didn't think they were paying attention. I didn't even think you noticed that I didn't think that meant anything. So sometimes I'm just surprised.

AM: is there anything else you would like to say or add to what we've discussed.

LC: No, I don't think so. Is there anything else you want to know?