Gay Methodist on 600-mile prayer journey before LGBTQ vote
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Helen Ryde is a devout, gay United Methodist on a 600-mile personal prayer journey.
Her trip across four states comes days before United Methodists from around the world consider if their denomination should allow same-sex weddings and LGBTQ clergy. Ryde's traveling from her western North Carolina home to St. Louis, Missouri, where she'll attend the UMC 2019 Special Session of the General Conference.
Last Tuesday, Ryde stood on the white-columned porch of East Knox County's 160-year-old Pleasant Hill United Methodist Church to pray a short, impassioned prayer and leave a "letter of love."
She'll repeat that prayer and leave that letter at dozens of churches in North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and Illinois.
Her prayer to a "loving and gracious God" thanks each church for worshipers' "life and witness." It asks God to give every congregation "a holy boldness to stand up for and show your love to all who have been discarded to the margins of their community, whoever and wherever they may be."
The prayer includes a sentence of inclusion, the focus of Ryde's intercession and trip. It asks that lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people at every church she visits "know how fearfully and wonderfully made they are, how beloved by God they are, and may they be surrounded in love and care and kindness."
"That's the piece I really hope people think about," Ryde told USA TODAY Network Tennessee. "Who has been among them? Who is among them? How have they known they are loved and accepted and cared for, by God and by the congregation?"
Avoiding interstates to find churches
Ryde set her path to visit 66 UMC churches, plotting locations on a Google map to avoid interstates. But she may need to skip a few locations; she'd fallen behind her strict schedule by Tuesday.
In St. Louis, she isn't a delegate at the Feb. 23-26 conference. She'll be among those Methodists watching as 864 clerical and lay delegates consider the denomination's stance on human sexuality. Delegates will consider proposals to strengthen the UMC current ban on same-sex marriage and gay clergy or to change the policy to be more inclusive of the LGBTQ community.
The plans come after years of debate among the second largest denomination in the United States. What happens could set denominational policy but fracture the church, causing congregations and individuals to leave.
John Wesley and a Prius
Ryde's road trip companion is a tiny, game-size piece metal statue of UMC founder John Wesley. Wesley's riding a horse. Ryde's driving a Prius.
With Wesley in her pocket, Ryde travels a lot for her job. A United Methodist since 2005, she's now the southeast region organizer for Reconciling Ministries Network. RMN is an unofficial caucus organization of Methodists who seek the church's complete inclusion of LGBTQ individuals.
She says this circuit-riding route is a personal one.
"I wanted to ground my trip in something that meant something," Ryde said. "I wanted it to be a meaningful journey. One of the things that sets United Methodists apart is that it's a connectional, not a congregational, church. So I thought a way to celebrate and remember that would be to stop at all these churches and leave my letter and pray the prayer.
"For me, it was about reminding myself of the importance of this connection and the importance of us being able to continue to influence folks to move in a more inclusive direction."
While she visited Tuesday with friends at Knoxville's Church Street UMC, Ryde doesn't expect to see many people on her route. At most, she's a stranger looking to give a prayer and leave a letter. Securing that envelope can be challenging; not every building's got a mailbox. At Pleasant Hill, she stuck the letter between the church's two double front doors.
She hopes churches will share her message. "I hope they will know they are connected to people who want to stay connected as United Methodists and who also desperately want a church that is inclusive, welcoming, celebrating and affirming of LGBTQ people."
A deeply divided denomination
In St. Louis, delegates are to debate keeping or removing language in the church law book called the United Methodist Book of Discipline. The current language prohibits same-sex marriage and says self-avowed practicing homosexuals" cannot be ministers. The book states the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching.
Among the delegates are 12 ministers and lay representatives from the Holston Conference. The conference includes 872 congregations in East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia and north Georgia.
The general conference is the top policy-making body for United Methodists, which includes more than 12.6 million members worldwide. The long-running debate over human sexuality and Biblical interpretation has deeply divided many Methodists. Both conservative, traditionalist groups like the Wesleyan Covenant Association and the progressive RMN have taken stances. Both groups have representatives in the Holston Conference.
Remaining a Methodist
Ryde joined the UMC as an adult. She grew up in evangelical nondenominational churches in England. From age 19 to 32, she tried to "pray away the gay" with efforts that included therapy, counseling and exorcism.
"It doesn't work," she says. "I always said I never fell out with God about it. I like to say when you come out and decide to be who you are, you don't have to move to America. But I did."
She joined the UMC after moving to Massachusetts and finding she "really missed being in a worshipping community."
Whatever happens at the general conference, Ryde will remain a Methodist. "I feel that until God tells me something different...I feel as though this is what I'm supposed to be doing."
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Information from: Knoxville News Sentinel, http://www.knoxnews.com