Emory’s Candler School of Theology recently bestowed a Distinguished Alumni Award on Reverend Eddie Fox.

In response to this decision, the Interfaith Health Program chooses to stand in solidarity with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students (LGBT) and allies at Candler just as we do with our LGBT partners and friends and their allies who are part of diverse religious traditions in the United States and around the world.

We are eager to be part of ongoing efforts to build a community at Emory characterized by inclusion, access, and equity for all people.

• Read IHP Director, Sandra Thurman’s, response>>
• Read the article by Dr. Blevins published in Religion Dispatches>>

The Prayer Offered by Dr. Blevins at the Rally

Dear God,

We thank you for loving us.  For loving us through the faithful witness of your church and her long tradition of standing in solidarity with those who have known rejection.

For loving us through people and institutions outside the church who have often given human face and form to your love when the those in the church have been most vocal in their outright hatred or have acquiesced to silent complicity when intolerance reveals itself because they fear institutional reprisals.  Most of all, we offer our deep thanks that you love us and continue to draw us closer to you, surprising us at every turn at the ways in which your Spirit shows up.

We trust that you are a God of justice. A God who displays both mercy and anger as you love and bring your children into fuller relationship with you. We come asking that you channel our anger through your justice and love. May you lead us in using the power of that anger to stand firm in a vision of justice while remaining open to reconciliation with those who have sought to deny us a place at Your table.

At the same time, dear God, we confess that we have too often settled for easy expressions of toleration rather than committing ourselves to the hard work of true reconciliation. Give us the courage to step out in public witness in ways that lay the framework for that reconciliation.

Give your queer children the courage to name structural sins of exclusion and to stand up against those sins by calling them out for what they are.

Give our allies the courage to move beyond private affirmations of support that too often turn into awkward silence when queer lives become subject of debate in the public square.

We pray for those inside of Candler and your broader church who choose not to be in this circle today, dear God.  May your Spirit reach them through other ways and relationships, as you reconcile us to one another and to you. Keep us open to the ways in which we might be instruments of that reconciliation.

We pray especially for those inside of Candler and your broader church who desire deeply to be in this circle today, but who are locked in fear. Fear that who they are is not truly loved by you because they have heard this lie repeated so often in their churches.

Fear that institutional officials—bishops, district superintendents, pastors, mentors, professors, or administrators—are watching and will punish them for their participation.  Pour your Spirit on them that they may know your perfect love which casts out fear.

Convict us all with your love for our failure to stand up and be heard when any of your children suffer. We confess that have all failed in that regard at times because of fear or contempt or ignorance or pride. Help us as we commit ourselves to be part of ongoing efforts to build a world rooted in justice.

We pray for Eddie Fox. We give thanks for the ways in which your Good News has been spread through his imperfect efforts and through ours. Make us all instruments for living out better expressions of Your good news in our common lives so that our best efforts and his may find common purpose. We acknowledge at the same time, dear God, that we deeply disagree with his intentional actions to keep LGBT people from being fully part of your Church. Help us to find ways to relate to him and others who hold similar views to him. In all honesty, dear God, we don’t really know what that looks like. We don’t have very good models for it. So we ask that you help us in our efforts as we seek to respond both in truth and in love.

Bless this gathering, dear God, and renew us for your ongoing work of justice and reconciliation. We know that this rally is not the end; it is the beginning. Guide us in the next steps. Guide us always, we pray.

Amen