A Brief Guide to Ministry with LGBTQIA Youth. Updated Edition (Cody J. Sanders) - Review
Like many clergy my age, there was
a time when I assumed that to be gay or lesbian was a choice, and a bad choice
at that. I didn't even know what it meant to be transgender. It wasn't until
members of my family started coming out that I actually started thinking about
what it meant to be gay. I look back to when I was a youth minister, young
adult minister, and even college professor and realize that I was truly
unprepared for conversations about sexuality. What if one of my students at the
Christian College where I was teaching had come to me with questions about
their sexual orientation? How might I have responded? Truth be told, I was
already considered liberal by many students, and I had not yet come to terms with matters of
sexuality. But, as time passed, family members came out, and I began to
encounter people who identified as LGBTQ, providing me an opportunity to
rethink my views. So, during the course of my ministry as a pastor, I became
fully open and affirming, even helping my last congregation move into being
officially open and affirming, welcoming people who are gay, lesbian, bi,
trans, and questioning. During those years of ministry, I didn't have the
opportunity to provide pastoral support for LGBTQIA youth. I wonder if during
that period of my ministry life, I would have been prepared to provide the kind
of support needed.
As I ponder my own journey toward
an inclusive posture, I recognize that there are still many folks in our
churches and larger society who have not reached a point of being open or
affirming. In fact, we are living at a time of significant backlash against the
gains made by the LGBTQIA community. This is especially true of people who are transgender.
The high-water mark of acceptance seems to have been in 2015, when the Supreme
Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that same-sex marriage should be legal across the
nation. With this ruling, support for families was provided to those who had
been denied the benefits and protections that my wife and I have been granted
by our government. In this period of backlash, it is Trans folk who have become
the fulcrum of political attacks, attacks that have been supported/lead by the
current administration in Washington, DC. So, how should the church respond,
especially when many of the most vociferous opponents of equality are
Christian?
Fortunately, we have this resource,
A Brief Guide to Ministry with LGBTQIA Youth, written by Cody J. Sanders.
Sanders is Associate Professor of Congregational and Community at Luther
Seminary and an ordained Baptist pastor. This book is an updated version of the
guide originally published in 2017. Since I did not read/review the original
edition, I cannot speak to the changes, though much has changed in our society,
and not for the better, since 2017, so it makes sense that he would revise it
for this current situation. While things have gotten better over the last
several decades, this is not true when we compare today with where we stood a
decade ago. An increasing number of churches have indeed become more open and
more affirming, but as we navigate the current climate, I wonder whether our
churches and their leadership are truly prepared to provide the kind of
ministry needed at this time. Even though many youth are looking for support as
they seek to understand their sexual orientation, they may not be sure where to
turn. When it comes to churches, are they both safe havens and prepared to provide
the required support? As Sanders writes in the preface to the new edition,
whereas he once asked churches and denominations if they are ready to embody
their love and affirmation of queer and Trans folk, now he asks: "What
will you risk to stand in solidarity with queer and trans people?" (p.
xiv). This is a question to answer, but one we need to face.
In the Preface to this new edition,
Sanders explains why he decided to prepare a new edition. Then in his Introduction,
he not only lets us know about the intended audience and why he wrote the book,
he introduces us to terminology connected to the LGBTQIA reality. Even as he
introduces us to all the important terms, he also points out that terminology
is constantly changing. This is an important point to take notice of because, for
example, the word "homosexual," which was once the primary term for
Gays and lesbians, is no longer considered an appropriate term. In fact, no one
term covers everyone or is accepted by everyone. Thus, the acronym of LGBTQIA
is increasingly common.
After he introduces the topic and
the terminology, which by itself is an important contribution, Sanders begins his
discussion of the different elements involved in ministering to LGBTQIA youth.
He starts in Chapter 1 with "A Brief Guide to Gender Identity and
Expression." This is probably a good place to start since most people
assume a male-female binary. However, the truth is there is more to the story
than this traditional binary. For example, some people identify as Transgender
such that their biological gender does not match how they understand themselves,
while others are intersex. What we discover is that there is fluidity when it
comes to gender identity. Since this book is focused on ministering to youth,
Sanders recommends that leaders, including pastors, should be careful when it
comes to giving advice and guidance. Sanders offers guidance as to how to
proceed when engaging in such conversations and in approaching the topic with
youth.
The second chapter is titled "A Brief
Guide to Sexual/Affectional Orientation." This is a different area of
consideration from gender identity, since people can be attracted to people of
the same gender or an opposite gender or to no one at all. This is a helpful
chapter because many in the open and affirming community and in the Gay and
Lesbian community have been arguing for some time that one's sexual orientation
is innate, not chosen. It is a position that I
had adopted. However, more recent studies suggest things are more fluid
than we've been led to believe. As with terminology, we must keep up with
changing understandings. This doesn’t change how we approach the way churches
welcome and affirm people who identify as gay or lesbian, but it is a reminder
that orientation is not necessarily fixed.
After Sanders addresses gender identity
and sexual/affectional orientation, the next three chapters focus on forms of
ministry. The first of these three chapters addresses ministering to youth who
understand themselves to be LGBTQIA (Chapter 3). The following chapter addresses
ministry with parents and family (Chapter 4). The third and final chapter, dealing with
forms of ministry, focuses on pastoral and mentoring relationships (Chapter 5).
Central to each of these chapters is the question of welcome and affirmation.
The relationships are different, with questions as to how those who are involved
in youth ministry engage with LGBTQIA youth on the one hand and, on the other hand,
engaging with their families, especially parents. This requires a lot of
thought, patience, compassion, and wisdom. Sanders walks the reader through
this.
Finally, Chapter 5 is titled
"A Brief Guide to Queer Neurodiversity." Although being queer and
neurodivergent are not the same, they may overlap, since a significant number
of LGBTQIA persons also identify as neurodivergent. As we know, even as there
is backlash against LGBTQIA people, there is increasing pushback against
dealing with neurodiversity, both in terms of funding and provision of support.
Some of this is due to the current Secretary of Health and Human Services'
long-standing efforts to blame autism on vaccines. At the same time, the
current administration has attempted to end programs that support
neurodivergent people due to their opposition to DEI. Thus, we are living at a
time when the progress made in welcoming LGBTQIA people in the larger society is
being wiped out. Whether this changes for the better remains to be seen, but
churches that understand themselves to be open and affirming can provide
important support if they know how to minister to/with people who identify as LGBTQIA.
After we reach the end of the five chapters, we come to an Appendix that lists
National and Local Resources for Supporting LGBTQIA Youth, as well as providing
space to list local resources.
I wish I had read Cody Sanders' A Brief Guide to Ministry with LGBTQIA Youth thirty
years ago. In fact, it would have come in handy to pair with David Gushee’s Changing
Our Mind (3rd edition, Read the Spirit Books, 2017), when our
congregation was undergoing the process of becoming an Open and Affirming
congregation. Although this book is not lengthy, it is very informative and
accessible to any reader. While Sanders addresses those who are engaged in ministry
with LGBTQIA youth, I believe that the information he provides will benefit
clergy, youth leaders, parents, teachers, and others who interact not only with
youth but with persons who are included in the LGBTQIA community, remembering
that this is not a one-size-fits-all ministry.
Copies of Cody Sanders' A Brief Guide to Ministry with LGBTQIA Youth. Updated Edition may be purchased from your favorite retailer including my Amazon affiliate and my Bookshop.org affiliate.
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