A few weeks ago, I had the joyful opportunity to offer the annual Affirming LGBTQ+ Student Lecture at Hope College in Holland, Michigan.
I attended Hope for undergrad from 2012 - 2016, and while I was a student there, queer-affirming student organizations were not allowed on campus. It was an interesting and challenging time to be a young person finally accepting my sexuality as a gay man.
Simultaneously, however, while at Hope, I kept meeting Christians who expanded my understanding of who Christians were, and how people responded to the call of Christ on their life for the love of all people.
It was a time of rapid personal growth, and a huge expansion of my understanding of the love of God. I entered Hope College as an angry atheist, and I left a Christian. I never would have thought that transformation would happen, but of course, our God does infinitely more than we can ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:20).
In the lecture, I weave together my strong belief that the Holy Scriptures present us with a strong ethic of inclusion, which is critical for our life in faith. I also relate how orthodoxy, credal orthodoxy, helps us to draw an ethic which sanctifies the physicality and lived experience of all human beings - particularly, in this context, queer people.
If you’d like to listen to the lecture, you’ll learn a bit more about both my personal story with faith and sexuality, and why I believe inclusive orthodoxy is so important for the future life of the Christ’s holy church.
The lecture can be viewed here!
Yours in Christ,
Alex+