Dyan Abena McCray, pastor of Unity Fellowship Church of Washington in D.C., said that she has received threatening phone calls, emails and had a brick thrown through the window of her car for calling Rev. Willie Wilson (r) to task for his homophobia. (Photo by Rudy K. Lawidjaja)
These unbelievable quotes came out of the mouth of a man of the cloth:
“But … women falling down on another woman, strapping yourself up with something, it ain’t real. That thing ain’t got no feeling in it. It ain’t natural. Anytime somebody got to slap some grease on your behind and stick something in you, it’s something wrong with that. Your butt ain’t made for that.”
“No wonder your behind is bleeding. You can’t make no connection with a screw and another screw. The Bible says God made them male and female.”
–The Rev. Willie Wilson, pastor of Union Temple Baptist Church in Southeast D.C. (and a former mayoral candidate) during a recorded sermon.
The political schism over gay rights in the religious black community is real, and now, vicious. Those outrageous statements deserved a response from other religious leaders in the community, and one stepped forward to say something. And she’s paying for it.
Rev. Dyan Abena McCray, pastor at Unity Fellowship Church of Washington, D.C. This is what she said in a column for the Washington Blade.
After hearing news reports, and reading hundreds of e-mails about the toxic words spewed from the pulpit of Rev. Willie Wilson in the nation’s capitol, I felt compelled to make a statement.
…As a woman who is African American, a lesbian and a pastor, I am troubled by the malicious remarks made by Rev. Wilson on July 3. I am glad to learn, however, that some in his congregation were offended by his words and courageously shared the recording with the community at large.
Wilson’s hateful speech is strikingly inconsistent with his past actions. Several years ago, he invited members of the African-American local GLBTQ community into his sanctuary for a healing discussion around inclusivity. After much debate, it was the elder women of the church who stood and brought order to the situation. I am deeply troubled by any spiritual leader who will say one thing today and do something very different tomorrow. It is difficult to comprehend how someone who professes to be created in the image of God would promote such repulsive speech.
…What Wilson has done is set himself up for divine judgment and criticism from colleagues and the community. God has a way of revealing who and what a person is. The reality is that Wilson has shown that his leadership skills and hatred for some people would never make him a suitable politician for our city and make him a questionable member of the clergy.
Speaking this truth has apparently generated enough hatred to threaten the safety of this minister. Tell, me, will the Dobsons, Falwells and Bauers of the AmTaliban stand up for Willie Wilson and his minions — followers that have now placed Dyan Abena McCray in jeopardy? (Washington Blade):
Since the article was published, McCray said, she has received numerous threatening phone calls and e-mails. “One of the calls said, ‘One who ministers to lesbians and punks should watch their backs,’” McCray said. “Someone else said, ‘Your voice needs to be shut up.’
“A couple days before the window was smashed, I got a call saying I needed to watch my back, and then the phone slammed down.”
How can this be happening and there is nary a word in the mainstream media or on big dog blogs? It’s as if there is a complete blackout on this topic. It’s radioactive. Dems won’t touch it. Most progressive blogs are basically MIA on the political ramifications of this divide in the community, and the GOP’s attempt to exploit black homophobia and turn them into votes.
Why? They don’t have a good answer, because they don’t know how to talk to the black faith communities about this and think this base of the party will always “come home” on election day.
As I’ve said many times before on my blog, the GOP doesn’t have to win over a huge chunk of black votes; all they need is to shave off a few points here and there and that will determine many close races. Between that, and the lack of a compelling argument by the Democrats as to why civil rights for gays and lesbians are nothing to fear and everything to encourage, you get other black voters that will just stay home.
Plus, you’ve got the faith-based cash flowing into the coffers of these mega churches — morally bankrupt pastors don’t mind being bought off by The Dark Side when the Democrats just show up the week before the polls open.
Only the head of the Congressional Black Caucus, Rep. Mel Watt (D-NC), has made the case that the Dems are making a big mistake by ignoring this schism. He addressed this in an article in the Independent Weekly, a local progressive paper here in the Triangle area of NC. “Framing gay rights for the black community” was my post on the topic.
First of all, we allowed Republicans to say we were advocates of gay marriage rather than framing it as a personal liberty issue or standing up and saying we don’t believe in it. We ran away from that; nobody wanted to talk about it, we knew it made people uncomfortable. Instead of having our community engaged in open discussion about it and moving on to other issues or seeing how it related to pocketbook issues, we let the Republicans control the message…You can’t avoid these issues. For us to bury our heads in the sand and say these issues aren’t to be discussed, that’s just unrealistic. We need to be talking about them in our own terms and not allowing [Republicans] to define themselves as the moral arbiters of what’s right and wrong.
…I never really talk about it in civil rights terms. I talk about it in civil liberties terms, respecting the individual. It’s really a personal freedom issue more than a civil rights issue. It’s the ability of a person to be who he or she is…. I have cautioned gay groups not to talk about it that way to black people. Black people tend to think of that as the right to vote and have jobs and things they have fought for over the years. I don’t want to get into an argument about whether this is a civil right, human right or individual right. It’s, Do you believe an individual has a right to be respected?
Watt has set the stage for discussion, but no one is participating. I am hoping that good, smart minds here will be willing to speak frankly and help strategize on how to approach this instead of putting heads in the sand.
Fellow blogger The Green Knight added this insight on the discomfort the Dem establishment — and white bloggers — have in addressing this vital issue.
White bloggers like me often feel awkward talking about black issues — partly because we’re afraid of getting things wrong. And the Democratic Party often just fails to talk about black issues — mostly because it figures it’s got the black vote locked up anyhow.
But one thing that’s unambiguous here is that the culture war is not exclusively a white thing anymore. In recent years the GOP and the big religious right organizations have been making some noise about race. Realizing that the 1970s Southern Strategy of success through racism is pretty much tapped out, they’ve decided to replace it with a new anti-gay strategy, one that can cut across racial lines.
They mean it. You don’t start targeting women of the cloth if you don’t mean it. Therefore, we who oppose them have to get serious. They want to rip apart another community — the black faith community — in their never-sated hunger for more power. The Democrats mustn’t let them do this, and lefty bloggers and media mustn’t turn a blind eye to it.
Please, folks, get the media and other blogs to start talking about this political divide. Make the AmTaliban answer questions about whether they support of men of faith like Willie Wilson. Hold the Dem establishment (and the black faith communities propogating this) responsible for answering hard questions.
Ultimately, this is about Dems clarifying where they stand on civil rights for gay citizens in this country.
This should not be a third rail topic.
More needs to be done to bolster the case that this shift is occurring. No polling or research will be done until the mainstream is convinced this is occurring.
We need data on what the religious black community is doing in terms of translating this homophobia into vote shifts.
I believe it will show up, but in smallish numbers. That still matters in close races. What those smallish numbers won’t address is the willingness for blacks to vote Dem, yet still pull the lever for marriage amendments and attempt to quash the extension of civil rights for gays and lesbians at the local level (anti-discrimination measures, domestic partnership policies, etc.).
To combat that potential problem, it means Dems would need to actually take a public affirmative position on gay rights that the party was willing to defend. I haven’t seen that Party. It’s MIA.
Earlier posts:
* DC pastor – lesbianism is “about to take over our community”
* Homo-bigot DC pastor gets skewered by rights groups
* DC Rev ‘apologizes’ for outrageous sermon attacking gays
* Homo-bigot reverend flaps his lips over lesbianism – again