A Brief History of the Pride Movement

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. Welcome to Pride Month! Each year June is dedicated to celebrating the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (or Questioning), Intersex, Asexual (LGBTQIA) individuals who make up our society and their long fight for equality, respect, and freedom. And though, give the unfortunate language of some Christians, you might think followers of Jesus are opposed to pride month—this priest is here to tell you that’s not accurate. There are literally millions of Christians who are either members of the LGBTQIA community or who are allies, including me. To help break the myth of the way Christians view Pride Month, this week I’d like to take my time to tell you the history behind this month and why celebrating it is important for all people—especially those who came to follow Jesus Christ. The observance of Pride Month dates back to events over half a century ago. In the 1950s and 1960s, many forces in our country were trying to return the United States to a version of America that they believed existed before World War II. A national paranoia about communism, fueled by figures like Joseph McCarthy, had infected out country, leading to the U.S. Army and other government institutions labelling various groups as un-American and subversive security risks—including gay men and lesbians. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the police, and even the United States Postal Service kept records on known homosexuals, their friends, and the establishments they frequented. States soon followed suit, and eventually even local cities were performing sweeps to rid neighborhoods, parks, bars, and restaurants of gay people. Every state in our country criminalized same-sex acts during this time, with penalties ranging from a light fine to five, ten, or twenty years in prison—or even life. In 1971, twenty states even had what are known as “sex psychopath” laws which permitted detaining suspected gay or lesbian people for that reason alone. In Pennsylvania and California, they could be committed to a psychiatric institution for life and in seven states they could be castrated. On June 28 1969, the police raided the Stonewall Inn, located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan in New York. Owned by the Mafia, with an agreed-upon payout to the police to leave it alone, the bar catered to many of the most marginalized people in the LGBTQIA community, including drag queens, transgender people, and homeless youth. It was the only bar for gay men in New York where dancing was allowed. When a raid occurred, identification cards were checked but generally only trans women and drag queens were the ones arrested. During that raid in 1969, some of those detained refused to go into bathrooms and let the police check their genitalia to confirm their sex. Some of the lesbians reported the police were feeling them up instead of professionally frisking them. A crowd began to grow outside ethe door and within minutes over one hundred people were gathered outside of the club. As the police began loading people into patrol wagons, a bystander shouted “Gay power! And someone else started to sing the Civil Rights anthem “We Shall Overcome.” An officer pushed someone in drag who then hit the officer with her purse. The cop then clubbed the suspect over the head, raising the anger and frustration of those in the crowd. A lesbian complained that her handcuffs were too tight and was beaten over the head with a police baton by an officer. She looked at the crowd of bystanders and shouted, “Why don't you guys do something?” That’s when the riot began. They lasted for six days as people stood up, claimed the streets as their own, and refused to continue to be subject to inhumane abuse and discrimination. A year later, to mark the first anniversary of the riots, Gay Pride marches were staged in New York as well as Los Angeles and Chicago. From there they spread to other cities, and the modern gay rights movement was born. In 1999 the U.S. Department of the Interior included several parts of Christopher Street and Greenwich Village as a part of the National Register of Historic Places—the first time this was done for a place meaningful specifically to the LGBTQIA community. At the ceremony, Assistant Secretary of the Department of the Interior John Berry said, “Let it forever be remembered that here—on this spot—men and women stood proud, they stood fast, so that we may be who we are, we may work where we will, live where we choose, and love whom our hearts desire.” That’s something worth being proud of. Thanks for being with me. To find out more about my parish, you can go to sjegh.com. Until next time, remember, protest like Jesus, love recklessly, and live your faith out in a community that accepts you but also challenges you to be better tomorrow than you are today.