BLOGGING-THOMAS

The third guest preacher and celebrant at St. Thomas’ Parish at Dupont Circle on January 23, 2011, as part of our series, “Voices of Wisdom – Radical Welcome,” is the Rt. Rev. Michael W. Creighton, Bishop Retired of the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania (1996-2006). He is a 1968 graduate of Episcopal Theological School and served parishes in San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle before being elected Bishop of the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania in 1996.

Bishop Mike, as he is affectionately known, is the son of The Rt. Rev. William Creighton, the Bishop of the Diocese of Washington, DC from 1962-1977.  While his father shepherded the Diocese of Washington through the turbulent period of Prayer Book Revision and the first ordinations of women to the priesthood, Bishop Mike arrived in the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania the year that charges were dismissed, after years of controversy, against retired Bishop Walter Righter who had ordained the first partnered gay man to the Episcopal priesthood in the Diocese of Newark, the Rev. Barry Stopfel.

Bishop Mike later welcomed Barry as an instructor in the Diocesan School of Christian Studies, where Barry assisted Wayne Floyd in teaching lay courses on human sexuality.  And Bishop Mike also invited Wayne to co-chair the Bishops Commission on Human Sexuality that laid the groundwork for laity and clergy throughout the diocese to engage together in respectful conversation and disagreement about issues of sexuality among people representing the whole spectrum of opinion.

Based on a growing consensus in the diocese in support of the full inclusion of gays and lesbians into the life of the Episcopal Church, Bishop Mike and the diocesan delegation from Central Pennsylvania courageously voted “yes” to consent to the election of Gene Robinson as the Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.  And then Bishop Mike spent much of the final three years of his episcopacy providing strong and unswerving pastoral leadership with parishes and clergy who disagreed – sometimes quite ungraciously – with his decisions.

Bishop Mike is one of those inspirational “heroes” in the lives of me and Nancy Lee.  Wayne served as Canon Theologian for the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania for six years under Bishop Mike, and Nancy Lee was ordained by him to the priesthood at the Cathedral Church of St. Stephen in Harrisburg, PA.

His clear sense of faithfulness to the traditions of the Episcopal Church has been combined with a generous-hearted pastoral sensitivity that has made Bishop Mike a quiet, yet deeply effective, leader in our church during difficult times. Without the leadership of bishops like Mike Creighton, and his father before him, we would be living in a very different Episcopal Church today.  We owe him a debt of gratitude before he even arrives on our doorstep.

Bishop Mike and his wife Betty are living in Annapolis, MD, during their retirement.  We are thrilled to have him with us to lend his own powerful voice of wisdom, and his example of the integrity of radical welcome, to Sunday worship at St. Thomas’ Parish.

VOICES OF WISDOM – RADICAL WELCOME

Beginning this past October 31^st, St. Thomas’ Parish initiated an exciting guest preaching/presiding schedule for Sunday mornings.  This initiative is an expression of the high value we have long placed on providing a generous pulpit of welcome and hospitality.  It also embodies our commitment to greater diversity in the faces of leadership in our community.

Our first guest preacher/celebrant was on Oct. 31^st, The Rev. Janice Robinson, former rector of Good Shepherd, Silver Spring and the current chaplain of the Bishop’s Search Committee.   She was followed on November 28^th by The Rev. Bill Doggett.

The 2011 lineup of guest preachers and presiders at the Eucharist are:

• January 23^rd – The Rt. Rev. Michael Creighton, Retired
• January 30^th – Canon Charles LaFond, Canon for Congregational Min. (NH)
• February 27^th – The Rev. Simone Bautista, Canon for Latino Ministries
• March 27^th -  The Rev. Preston Hannibal, Canon for Academic Ministries
• May 29^th – The Rev. Kim Baker, Chaplain – Washington Episcopal School
• June 6^th – The Rev. Mpho Tutu, Director of Institute for Peace & Reconciliation
• June 26^th – The Rev. Mary Sulerud, Canon for Deployment & Vocational Ministry

More information will be provided about each preacher prior to their day with us.  We are proud to give worshipers at St. Thomas’ Parish this chance to hear some of the best preaching that can be heard today in the Episcopal Church.  Please join us and bring a friend (or two!).

On behalf of the Rector, the Rev. Dr. Nancy Lee Jose, the Wardens, and the entire Vestry of St. Thomas’ Parish, I am thrilled to announce that Joe Zuniga has accepted the appointment to fulfill the remaining term of the irreplaceable Mike Bell. Joe has participated in his first Vestry meeting and has already contributed valuable insight and expertise to St. Thomas’ Parish leadership. Joe’s name will be put forward for a full Vestry term in March, 2011. Please join me in thanking Joe for his willingness to serve in the important ministry of parish leadership. – John Johnson

José (Joe) Zuniga has been attending St. Thomas since July 2009. He has served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the International Association of Physicians in AIDS Care (IAPAC) since December 1999. Before this, he served as IAPAC’s Vice President-Program. Prior to IAPAC, Joe served as Director of Communications at the AIDS Action Council in Washington, DC, from 1995 to 1997, following four years in the U.S. Army, including tours of duty in Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm.

Since becoming IAPAC President and CEO, the association’s membership has grown to more than 13,000 members in over 100 countries, and its geographic reach has expanded in Europe, the US, and Africa. Since December 1999, IAPAC has hosted 27 regional and national conferences ranging from clinical management to public policy. The association launched its peer-review clinical journal, JIAPAC, in 2001, which is edited by Joe and indexed in the National Library of Medicine’s Index Medicus.

Joe has immediate past experience serving on the Board of Directors for the capital campaign that led to the construction of Chicago’s Center on Halsted, the most comprehensive LGBT community center in the Midwest. The silent phase of a $20 million capital campaign was launched in 2003 with a new Board of Directors formed to envision the Center and make it a reality. Four years later, in June 2007, the Center opened and has been serving Chicago’s LGBT community as well as its straight allies. The capital campaign goal was surpassed by almost $5 million, which was invested in an endowment for the Center’s operations.

Joe’s academic credentials include a Masters of Public Health (MPH) in International Health Policy, and a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Human Development and Social Policy. He lectures at various academic institutions, has been published in various journals, authored thematic chapters for several books, and served as a Contributing Editor for numerous books.

Joe serves on a number of advisory bodies, including the IAPAC Board of Trustees; the Humanitas Foundation Board of Directors; the JIAPAC Editorial Advisory Board; and the Secure the Future Technical Advisory Board. And he is a technical consultant for various public policy institutes, including the Collaborative Institute of Virology and the Jonathan Mann Institute on Health and Human Rights. He also routinely advises intergovernmental agencies, including the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

In addition to this HIV/AIDS-related work, Joe has been active in efforts to repeal the 17-year-old Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. Joe served in the US Army for four years, including in Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm with the 1st Cavalry Division, where he earned the Combat Medical Badge and numerous other distinctions. He was named 6th US Army Soldier of the Year in 1992, and came out at the 1993 March on Washington as a highly decorate gay soldier in an effort to provide then President Bill Clinton with further ammunition to dispel notions that gay and lesbian service members should not serve in the US military. Zuniga has written and spoken extensively about DADT, and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Servicemember’s Legal Defense Network (SLDN).

Joe resides in Washington, DC, with his husband, Mr. John Charles.  They were married at St. Thomas’ Parish in 2010.

I’m not even going to entertain the temptation to recount the depths to which civic discourse has plummeted in America this past few years. To the contrary, I’ve been thinking a lot about how we not only resist incivility, but give civility a persuasive and effective voice again in our personal, social, and societal lives.

Civility needs a voice. That’s an important part, at least, of what we at St. Thomas’ Parish are seeking when we talk about ‘sanctuary’ — the church as a place ruled by respect, governed by generosity, a refuge from needing to guard constantly against attack –sometimes verbal, and sadly, sometimes still physical– for just being who we are. And “who we are” isn’t just lesbian and gay, single or partnered, blessed by children or not. St. Thomas’ Parish is a refuge for people tired of defending themselves against those who disparage them for being religious — however understandable this can be in the face of ‘representatives’ of religion like Fred Phelps. Civility is the mark of a community, or nation, that intentionally assumes responsibility not just to keep destructiveness out, but to create a space where justice, respect, and dignity reign.

Civility needs a voice. But it also needs flesh. It needs to have space in the world, and it needs to create space in the world, where the voice of civility can be heard.

Civil discourse is the language of a community, and it is the language that builds community — the civitas, the city — especially in a country that would speak of itself as a shining “city on a hill” that is a “light to the nations”.  In-civility not only invites violence in, but it does violence within society, taking away the very quality of life that binds people together in community, as a society, or a nation.

Civil rights are not a thing of the past; for without civility — and the civil rights on which civility is founded — no community can last.  Human rights are a compact between a person and a community that says that within that community every human being will be treated with all the dignity, respect, and compassion that community can muster.  That is why we’re still striving for both.

Civility, meanwhile, will begin to flourish if we can but give it voice.  Yet civil discourse needs to be loud enough to be heard if it is to be effective.  But civility dies when we confuse violence for volume, disrespect for disagreement, and attack for advocacy.

Civility needs a voice, a loud voice that is the voice of advocacy for human dignity, respect and rights, a voice

• that can disagree with opponents of tolerance without disrespecting them,
• that can advocate for justice without unjustly attacking those who disagree,
• that can courageously speak above the fray at a volume loud enough to be heard, while refusing to let even the language of violence be used as a strategy for justice.

To be God’s people at St. Thomas’ Parish right now can be, if we choose it, an opportunity to give civility a new and stronger voice.  And then to act in the space it provides to create a more just and loving and compassionate world.   That’s one way of saying why I belong there, and what I’m trying to help come about by remaining.