Sing, Sing, Midnight!

I wanted to introduce you to a wonderful book written by my friend, Emily Gallagher:

click above to purchase

Maya is one of the nearly two million American children with an incarcerated parent, and she has a question for her Daddy. “Who takes care of you?” A simple question with an unexpected answer. Sing, Sing, Midnight! celebrates finding your voice, singing out loud, taking care of one another, and family.

We used this book at Grace Camp this summer- a real grounding moment for kids with someone in their family who is incarcerated. Also a great tool for helping kids understand friends who may have parents in jail or prison. I can’t recommend it enough!

Christmas Sermon 2014

Dec25 by D Gregory Smith

I wonder how many of you remember Art Linkletter. He originated this program called Kids say the Darndest Things. He would get a child or two or even a small group and ask them questions and the responses (at least the ones we saw) were truly hilarious. I remember two interviews in particular. The first was a little girl about five or six with a heavy Brooklyn accent:

Mr Linkletter: How do you feel about being in school?

Girl: I LOOOOVE School!

What do you think of your teacher?

I LOOOOVE my teacher!

Well what do you think of your mommy and Daddy?

I LOOOOOOOOVE my Mommy and Daddy!

Do you like ice cream?

I LOOOOOOOOVE ice cream!

You seem to love everything I ask you about.

Well, I’m a very loving person!

I love that story because it’s really true, isn’t it? Deep down we’re very loving people. There are things that we love, people that we love, animals that we love, places that we love, foods that we love, seasons that we love, books that we love, movies that we love music that we love- and the list goes on and on.

We love what speaks to us.

The other interview was with a group of kids and Art Linkletter asks them:

Have you ever been in love?

And this boy, who’s probably again five or six says “Oh Yes!”

Mr Linkletter asks “With whom are you in love?” He was very correct in his grammar.

And the little boy, without missing a beat, says pointing to a girl in the group “I’m in love with her!”

The little girl memorably shrieks and starts crying.

Whereupon Mr Linkletter says to the little boy “I’m not really sure, but that little girl doesn’t seem to share your love.”

The little boy says “Well, I’m In love with her, I don’t just love her. And I don’t suppose she can do anything about that.”

Out of the mouths of babes….

Today we celebrate Christmas- The feast of the birth of Christ. The Christ Mass.

The celebration that God’s love for us became manifest in a baby born in a barn. Not a palace or the suburbs or a gated community or a hospital or even a house.

He was born in a barn.

In a country occupied by a foreign power.

To poor parents who probably didn’t really know what they were doing- as most parents of their firstborn will attest.

Born also to a people who yearned for God’s light. And to the whole world as well.

I love the Christmas story because it’s so simple.

And because it’s so filled with complicated richness.

For centuries the Jewish people had walked in anticipation of Isaiah’s words “you who walk in darkness shall see a great light”.

I’ve known a few Rabbis in my life and one of the things they have taught me is this:

For hundreds of years The Jewish people had cultivated a relationship with this God who delivered them from oppressors and violence and injustice and who asked them to wrestle with theology- to get down and dirty with questions and curiosity- because if anyone can take a question God can.

Being an Episcopalian means using our heads as well as our hearts. We get to question things. We get to wrestle with things, just like Jacob wrestled with the angel.

Today, I’m going to ask you to wrestle with this: God is in love with you.

God is in love with you.

And there’s nothing you can do about it.

Who’s been in love?

When a person falls in love, the world changes, does it not?

And if that love is returned- well, we might even say that we’ve experienced the Divine.

Being in love is not about doing the right things, saying the right things, wearing the right clothes, showing up at the right place, ordering the right food…. Love is much simpler than that.

True love is delighting in the presence of the Other- and knowing that they delight in the presence of me.

This is the essence of Christmas: God delights in us.

I’ll say it again- God delights in us.

Yeah, I know we don’t always get it right, but we’re trying.

And when someone is in love with you, they forgive when you apologize, right?

So does God forgive us.

God delights in us so much that that delight became a person.

It became Jesus.

He is the manifestation of God being in love with us.

Which is pretty amazing if you stop to think about it.

God is in love with you. God is in love with me. Are you wrestling?

We celebrate it in the words of scripture we hear and in the Eucharist- the ultimate sacrifice of someone in love.

Listen to the words “This is my body broken for you- this is my blood shed for you”-

Words of love from a parent to a child. “I give my life for you.”

Words of the lover to the beloved “All that is mine is yours.”

I also want you to remember something else:

God is in love with the people we find it hardest to love- that’s the most important thing to remember.

When you find a person hard to love remember this: God not only loves them, God is in love with them.

God is in love with some “miserable people”.

And sometimes those “miserable people” is us.

And when you have a bad day and feel unloved and find it hard to believe that anybody loves you, remember this: God not only loves you but God is in love with you.

And I don’t suppose there is anything you can do about that.

Except to try and love back.

Like Jesus did.

Amen

Making A Difference In Montana: Interchange Kickstarter Campaign is Here!

May12 by D Gregory Smith

Interchange Kickstarter is now live. Show your support now!

Whether you’re able to financially support Interchange or are still considering, know that our festival moves forward each year, evolving with the changing issues of human rights and equality.

But when you take that extra step with tangible support, you help Interchange set new standards for creativity and continue to share progressive ideas by standing up- and standing proud.

Supporting Interchange shows you care about the important challenges we champion- ending social trauma and creating human equality.
Starting right here.
Right now.
Inner change + Outer change = Interchange

PLEDGE NOW AND SHOW YOUR SUPPORT!

BZN NDO 2NITE!

Apr28 by D Gregory Smith

Be at the City Hall hearing room by 5:30pm to show your support! Here’s my testimony:

I am a native Montanan (4^th generation).

I am an ordained priest with 3 degrees in theology and scripture.

I am a licensed Mental Health Counselor.

I am also a gay man, and Bozeman is my home.

Despite the prejudice and discrimination I have experienced in Bozeman, I choose to live here. Despite the stories and concerns I hear from parishioners and counseling clients who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender- I choose to live here. Why? Mostly, because I am now an adult, and I am supported and loved by my family, friends, neighbors and my church.

And I want to ensure that no kid repeats my Montana childhood here. Not anymore.

As a 15 year-old, I attempted suicide because my church and my community called me “disordered”, “unnatural” and a “pervert”. Not to my face- but they didn’t have to. The climate of my community and church and school – where there were no protections against discrimination- did it for them.

I think we forget how sensitive kids are.

But if nothing else happens tonight- I want you to remember just how sensitive kids are.

Thankfully, my suicide attempt failed, but every time I see the obituary of a teenager, I wonder, “Did sexuality have anything to do with this? My God, did a church have a part in this”?

I’m reminded of this verse from Matthew (18.6): “Whoever causes one of these little ones to lose faith in me, it would be better for them to have a great millstone hung around their neck and drowned in the depths of the sea.”

Well, the behavior of discriminatory churches is causing a lot of these little ones to lose their faith.

I know. I’m one of the ones they call, in tears and pain, wondering how they can be a Christian if God hates them so much. They wonder what they did.

They did nothing.

And I always tell them God loves them very much- even if God’s people don’t seem to.

Sexuality is NOT a choice. It is a fact. Gender is NOT a choice. It is a fact.

We have to trust the experience of others to help us to see them clearly.

WE HAVE TO.

That’s what civil societies do. We encourage people to tell the truth about themselves- because it sets them free- and maybe the rest of us as well.

This ordinance provides Bozeman with a chance to speak loudly in favor of truth.

Allowing even the perceived sexuality or gender of a child- or an adult- to be the cause of bullying, pain- or even suicide is inexcusable.

It still happens. Right here. There are too many examples to list in the available time.

If any of you would like to speak to me about it, I am available.

Please pass this ordinance.

Thank you.

MT World AIDS Day Award Acceptance Speech

Dec3 by D Gregory Smith

Once upon a time, there was a boy who grew up in a small town- in a time when things were said to be simple- but they were not.

For him.

He was unlike the other kids in ways that weren’t always noticeable to the people around him. He felt things a bit more keenly. He noticed things that other kids didn’t. He wasn’t great at sports, he wasn’t big and strong.

But he was smart.

And sometimes that meant he got picked on even more than other kids.

So he used that.

It made him tough. His parents were good, loving people. His church provided comfort. His books helped him escape.

Maybe it was God, maybe it was chance- it doesn’t really matter what made him different. He just was.

The fact remained that this boy- indistinguishable from a million other little boys- just wanted to be loved, even though he was different.

And when he grew up, he still wanted to be loved – sometimes desperately. Sometimes he trusted people who weren’t trustworthy- simply because the promise of love is often enough to make us overlook danger and potential tragedy.

The promise of love.

That’s what brings us here today.

That’s why I got infected. That’s how I got infected.

The promise of love. Not what you think about when you think of AIDS.

But I want you to think about it.

When I moved back to Montana almost seven years ago, I made a promise: that no gay kid would ever be so starved for love and support- would not be so handicapped by shame- that they couldn’t stay here and have a happy, successful, healthy and safe life if they wanted to. I would do everything in my power to make it happen.

So I came out as gay- and HIV positive- just to show that there is no shame in having a disease. It’s a virus, it’s not a judgment.

A microscopic being that happens to live in my body. And I want to keep it from living in any one else’s.

And so do you, I hope.

This disease has been around for over three decades. And yet the state of Montana has never allocated state funds for its prevention. Not a penny.

Which begs the question- why?

Is it because of the shame at how the disease is transmitted?

Is it because we might have to talk about sex, needles, addiction and shame and fear?

Isn’t thirty two years long enough to avoid having this hard conversation?

In the Montana that little boy grew up in- that I grew up in- we prided ourselves on helping out where it was needed. We filled sandbags, we stopped when it looked like people were in trouble on the road, we ran to the fire house when the siren rang.

But not for HIV. Not for AIDS. Well, let me correct that.

A few very brave people did stand up. They braved ridicule and stigma to hold candlelight vigils and to hold the hands of people whose parents were too afraid to touch them. I know. I was there. I held some of those hands. And so did Laurie Kops and probably a few others in this room.

I’m not trying to toot my own horn here, but it’s important that we get back to something very basic here in the state of Montana.

Caring for our people.

ALL people.

It’s time to recognize that all people deserve the promise of love in their lives. Deserve the dignity and respect that I believe God gives everyone simply by being born. Deserves the respect of having information and materials at their disposal provided by the state that is charged with enabling public health and well-being. It’s what I want out of my taxes- I hope it’s what you want from yours.

There are a few legislators here you can tackle on the way out….

My life is good. I have family that love me, a partner who is always there for me and more friends than any man ever deserves.

But it could be better.

Somewhere in the state of Montana there is a kid who doesn’t believe that he’s worthy of love.

And he’s part of our responsibility. Because he does deserve love. And he deserves help to be healthy about it.

Shame is keeping us from health.

Kinda crazy, isn’t it?

It’s time to have those hard conversations.

It’s time to stop shame in its tracks.

It’s time to return the promise of love to all Montanans.

Thank you for listening- and for this awesome award.