By Darian Aaron

Stellar Award winner and Grammy nominated gospel recording artist Tonex has dealing with rumors regarding his sexuality for most of his musical career. Steeped in the church, the son of the late Rev. Dr. Anthony Williams and himself a minister, the accusations of homosexuality have posed a threat to his livelihood, ministry, and future as a leader in the Black faith community of his native San Diego, CA.

 

With the release of The Naked Truth in 2007 and the infamous YouTube video, which has since been removed, where Tonex use of profanity and secular posturing shocked gospel music fans; it seemed that inside this talented singer was a ticking time bomb ready to explode. In that video Tonex emphatically denied being gay; that was two years ago. In a recent interview with The Lexi Show produced by The Word Network, Tonex' boldly opened the closet door in a way that no one in the gospel music industry had ever had the courage to do. In his openness, Tonex' refused to blame his same-sex attraction on his childhood experience as a victim of sexual molestation, as are many of his contemporaries who "struggle" with homosexuality, such as gospel singer Donnie McClurkin, who reputedly once corrected an interviewer when an attempt was made to frame a discussion in this way.

"It wasn't a struggle. And then people like to blame the struggle on molestation. No. Just say you were attracted to men and be honest and quit blaming it on that experience", Tonex' says. His coming out, he felt, would not be complete if he had not addressed the blame, hypocrisy and homophobia which persists in the Black church.   "The church has completely "faggotized" everybody who's gay, sends them to hell over the pulpit and the church literally screams hooray and are happy about that. And yet, we celebrate the pastor who has a clean record and a clean look, but yet he is still doing the same thing that the same-gender loving people are doing. I believe that there's Holy Ghost- filled fire baptized gay people," he added.

Tonex' currently writes for Janet Jackson's upcoming CD and can be seen in Maurice Jamal's Friends & Lovers. See Tonex' explain the man he is today in the videos below:

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Peace and Inclusion service marks watershed in claiming right to faith

By Colin Robinson and Nadine Lewis Agard

(Curepe, Trinidad and Tobago) - Several dozen, mostly ordinary-looking gay men and lesbians, and a smaller number of their supporters, gathered in inclement weather last Friday, Sept 18 in Curepe, with a quiet, yet eager sense that they were making history. Most had come from work. A handful had dressed up for the occasion.

 

"Today I'm proud to be Trinidadian," a 23-year-old wrote on his Facebook page earlier in the day, before he travelled in pouring rain and traffic from Chaguanas to a modest Christian church, a stone's throw from the Eastern Main Road, to sing a solo, Don Besig's song "Flying Free." At about 6:00 pm the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community ecumenical service at the Holy Saviour Church began that evening, celebrating peace, human rights and inclusion. Archdeacon Rev. Steve West, a senior Anglican clergyman, along with one of the diocese's youngest women priests, Rev. Shelly-Ann Tenia, welcomed the people and the clergy representing other Christian denominations. Together the church celebrated an hour-long candlelight mass steeped in the starchy traditions of the Anglican Communion. During Tenia's sermon, in which she lapsed into "Trini," -a Trinidadian creole dialect, on more than one occasion, admonished worshippers, "each of us needs to recognize our gifts" and "be prepared to live out our identity."

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By Victor Kerney

Folks were concern about Obama extending the Faith based initiatives Bush started years ago. However, there could be a new twist to that. The President just named Fred Davie to serve on the Policy Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

But what's so special about this? Well, Fred is openly gay and the president of Public/Private Ventures, an organization that creates and strengthens programs to improve the lives of residents in low-income communities.

In this role, Davie will provide objective, nonpartisan advice to the President on public policy matters, including strategies to strengthen the social services and community- and faith-based organizations, and their potential as part of long-term economic recovery efforts.

Civil Rights Icon Says Churches Should Welcome, Not Vilify Gays

By D. Kevin McNeir

Before a packed crowd at Atlanta's Tabernacle Baptist Church (475 Boulevard NE), the Rev. Al Sharpton delivered a sermon that was both fiery and at time controversial as he officially aligned himself with a newly-formed group of churches and non-profit organizations who say it is wrong to discriminate against gays and lesbians. In addition, the Atlanta-based group, known as The Alliance of Affirming Faith-Based Organizations, says it fully supports the inclusion of the lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender community [LGBT], vowing "to be an alternative religious voice and to show up wherever discrimination occurs."


  

"I am offended, insulted and disappointed with the hypocrisy and misuse [of power] of some of my colleagues in the ministry," said Sharpton, who founded and spearheads the National Action Network, a civil rights organization that promotes one standard of justice and decency for all people. "Some of them have fostered a climate where people continue to be harassed, abused -- even killed, as they preach hatred and intolerance. As I have said to several women who have called in to my radio show, "Keepin' it Real," the problem is not that we have so many down low brothers but that there are so many low down preachers that have been inspired by the right wing to scapegoat gays and lesbians instead of standing up to take the courageous view."
Sharpton, never one to mince words or sugar coat his views, added that the hypocrisy of some of his fellow ministers extends to their own clandestine activities, often performed under the cloak of darkness. "I am tired of preachers preaching homophobia by day and then after the lights go off, they go out cruising for trade by night," he said.
"Some of you know them far too well -- and it's this kind of hypocrisy that has divided our community. One could say that the real problem is that we have a lot of ministers who are hiding from themselves to protect themselves. They can't even look themselves in the mirror." In a style reminiscent of the Black church, Sharpton went on to ask why churches in California remained silent when a young Black man was recently shot by police officers while handcuffed, why no voices of protest were raised when affirmative action was shot down or when Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans leaving many of its citizens on rooftops begging for help.

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By Ron Grossman and Margaret Ramirez

W. Deen Mohammed, one of the most prominent African-American Muslim leaders in the nation and the son of the late Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad, died Monday, sources told the Chicago Tribune.

"Brother Imam," as he was affectionately known, was 74. There was no immediate confirmation of his death by his family. The Cook County medical examiner confirmed that a Wallace Mohammed was pronounced dead at his home in the 16100 block of Cambridge Drive in Markham, a spokesman said.

Muslim community leaders said Mohammed was scheduled to speak Tuesday in Chicago, and many grew concerned when he did not appear. His last speaking engagement was at Navy Pier on Saturday at an event sponsored by the Inner-City Muslim Action Network.

Mohammed inherited from his father the Nation of Islam, a religious movement crafted out of black nationalism and bits and pieces of Muslim practice. He immediately tried to move its followers toward mainstream Islam, eventually leading to a split between those who agreed with Mohammed's approach and those who joined a revived Nation of Islam under Louis Farrakhan.

Mohammed was a spiritual wanderer who was banished several times by his father for filial impiety--once for remaining close to Malcolm X, Muhammad's prized disciple who turned into a critical voice within the Nation of Islam before he was slain.

In 1961, Mohammed refused to serve in the U.S. military and went to prison in accordance with his father's teaching that African-Americans shouldn't defend a land of lynching and segregation.

While incarcerated, Mohammed studied the Quran and found its teachings at considerable variance with his father's. In 1976, a year after he succeeded his father, Mohammed made a public appearance carrying an American flag. He proclaimed the time had come for black Americans to celebrate America.

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By Niraj Warikoo

Thousands of African-American Muslims from across the United States are gathering in Detroit this weekend for an annual convention that's returning to Michigan for the first time in more than a decade.

 

They are followers of Imam Warith Deen Mohammed, a Hamtramck native who now lives in Chicago. He is the son of Elijah Muhammad, the former leader of the Nation of Islam, founded in Detroit almost 80 years ago. Given metro Detroit's sizable Muslim and African-American communities, the convention has special significance for many locally.

After Elijah Muhammad's death in 1975, Mohammed took over and reformed the black nationalist organization into a group that preached a more orthodox Islam that opposed any racial or ethnic divisions. A few years later, Minister Louis Farrakhan broke off and formed a new Nation of Islam he felt was more in line with Elijah Muhammad's teachings.

While Farrakhan is the leader who gets more media attention and is most often associated with Islam among African Americans, Mohammed is thought to have more followers. In contrast to Farrakhan, Mohammed is low-key and speaks more like a scholar than a preacher.

"He's a superb leader," said Nadir Ahmad, 58, of Detroit. "He has a sober message of good morals, but also a commonsense approach to life and religion."

On Friday in the Cobo Center, the imam spoke to a packed crowd at the start of the three-day convention. He urged personal responsibility and praised Jesus and Muhammad, Islam's founder, saying both were great teachers.

He stood on the podium slightly hunched over, a compact man with glasses and a modest brown suit who spoke in measured tones.

"We all ... should be trying to be Christlike," he said.

Ahmad said Mohammed "has always called for cooperation between faiths."

Imam Gary Alkasib of Detroit was eager to hear his words and glad that the convention is in Detroit this year. "It's the return of a native son," he said.

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By Christopher Landau

Davis Mac-Iyalla is an Anglican from Nigeria - nothing unusual about that - but he is also gay and the death threats he has received since being open about his sexuality led him to seek asylum in the UK.

Now he is campaigning at the Lambeth Conference, hoping that bishops will face up to the existence of gay Christians in Africa.

I met him just before he began a demonstration at the conference venue on the Kent university campus, joined by lesbian and gay Anglicans from six African countries.

With dancing accompanied by traditional drumming, the campaigners held a banner proclaiming, "We're here!"

Many gay Anglicans around the world still feel that the church would prefer to deny their existence.

Mr Mac-Iyalla's message is simple.

"Homosexuality does exist in Africa - it's not a Western thing, as our African bishops would want people to believe," he says.

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By Entertainment Correspondent, John Frazier

New York City based Pastor of Grace Tabernacle Christian Center, Rev. Timothy Wright and family are going through an extremely difficult, sad and trying time as his wife, Betty Wright, 58, (not to be confused with the R&B singer) was killed along with their 14 year old grandson, D. J. Wright, who died later from injuries, in a wrong-way driver car crash. The Pastor was critically injured as everyone is praying for his recovery and feel his pain.

We offer our continued prayers and to The Wright Family, as our faith reminds us that you and your loved ones will be together again in the hereafter.

The driver, John Pick, who drove in the wrong direction was also killed. And our prayers go out to his family as well.

You read it here at GBMNews.com

The Bishop of Durham has attacked the Anglican traditionalists behind a new movement against what they consider liberal views on homosexuality.

Dr Wright says most traditionalist bishops do not support Gafcon

Dr Tom Wright, a traditionalist himself, said Gafcon's plans to let parishes break from liberal bishops were ridiculous and "deeply offensive".

"The idea they have a monopoly on Biblical truth won't do," he said.

It comes as the Church of England's ruling body, the General Synod, gathers for a five-day meeting.

The meeting, being held at the University of York, is set to be dominated by the issue of women bishops

'Global sledge hammer'

The Global Anglican Future Conference (Gafcon) attracted about 300 bishops to a gathering held last month in Jerusalem.

It called for the creation of a council of primates and said the Archbishop of Canterbury's authority over the Communion should end.

Many of the 300 attendees plan to boycott this month's Lambeth Conference - a meeting of the Anglican Communion held every 10 years.

Speaking to the BBC's World at One programme the Bishop of Durham said Gafcon was "taking a global sledge hammer to crack the American nut".

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African American Muslims are a people that have faced discrimination and fear before and are equipped to play a significant role in pushing back against a new incarnation of cultural discrimination and misunderstanding – Islamophobia

By Faheem Shuaibe

Oakland, California - African American Muslims have a role to play when it comes to the widespread Islamophobia (an irrational fear of Islam) that is prevalent in the West. The unfortunate fact is that some Americans see Muslims as a disease to be rooted out. However, as is the case with immunisation, the "disease" can sometimes also be the source of a cure.

African Americans have faced derisive stereotyping before – including public name calling and a complete exclusion from basic human rights. Such behaviour created a marginalised cultural category and position in a pathological culture.  And African Americans have struggled for generations to overcome this categorisation.

So, when some in the United States negatively and aggressively stereotype Muslims as many people once did African-Americans, it provokes a latent hostility in the United States, conjured up by certain talk show hosts and others who use such labelling to garner support with their audiences, and reinforces an ethos of opposition or aggression.

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Ordination ban is overturned, but action must be ratified. Some fear more churches will defect from the national organization.

By Duke Helfand


Leaders of the Presbyterian Church (USA) overturned a long-standing ban on the ordination of gays and lesbians Friday, providing yet the latest example of a religious denomination struggling with how, and whether, to incorporate homosexuality into church life.

The Reverend Dr. Jane Spahr, center, a Presbyterian minister, performs a same-sex marriage for Sherrie Holmes, left, and Sara Taylor, right, at the Marin Civic Center in San Rafael, Calif., Friday, June 20, 2008.

At the same time, the church's national governing body, meeting in San Jose, refused to alter its definition of marriage, calling it a "covenant between a woman and a man." The actions by the General Assembly came the week after same-sex marriage became legal in California. They also follow the decision of a gathering of Methodists from Southern California and Hawaii, who went against their national church by voting to support same-sex couples who marry and the pastors who welcome them.

The Presbyterian Church is among many mainline Protestant denominations struggling to reconcile conflicting beliefs about biblical authority and the role of gays.

Some parishes have left the Episcopal Church, prompting predictions that the issue may tear the denomination apart. In the Presbyterian Church (USA) -- the nation's largest Presbyterian group, with 2.3 million members -- Friday's actions were likely to deepen theological fissures.

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Conservative Anglicans meeting in Jerusalem will create a global network to combat modern trends in the Church like the ordination of gay clergy.

The group has also decided to break its relationship with the liberal wings of the US and Canadian Churches.

It will operate independently of the Archbishop of Canterbury, but will stay inside the Anglican Communion.

Nigerian Anglican archbishop, Peter Akinola (l) leader of the conservative movement confers with the archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams during happier times.

The traditionalists say they are fighting a "false Gospel" and the rift in the Church cannot be patched up.

After five years of trying unsuccessfully to get the American church expelled for its ordination of an openly gay bishop and blessing of same-sex relationships in church, the traditionalists say the international alliance will emphasise a more orthodox reading of the Bible.

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By Kara Becker

Imtiyaz Hussein says that coming out as a gay man who is also a Muslim was never a problem. But for Mohammed El-Khatib, whose parents hoped he would pass on the family name, it was. Saadia Toor, on the other hand, said she feels that gay Muslims face challenges similar to all religious followers — stereotypes, misunderstandings and resistance.

Muslims talk about being gay and religious at a forum at the MFA in Boston.

The three spoke on May 18 about what it means to be “Queer and Muslim” during a panel discussion at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston that was hosted by the Massachusetts Area South Asian Lambda Association. The talk followed a screening of the documentary “A Jihad for Love,” a film about the hidden life of being Muslim and gay.

Hussein, who is the founder of the Massachusetts Area South Asian Lambda Association, said that he reconciled his faith and his sexual preference early on.

“I was always as certain of my faith as my sexuality,” said Hussein, a native of Tanzania who is of Indian descent.

“There were never really any negative messages growing up, I was kind of left alone to see if I could personally reconcile with having the two things as part of my identity simultaneously.”

After he came to terms with his identity, he said, being gay and Muslim was never a problem for him.

Toor, however, said that homosexual Muslims often deal with stereotypes and misunderstanding from others.

“Being a Muslim queer is always scary because you carry this burden of representation; you’re always in this position of worrying that whatever you say is being represented correctly — you always have to contextualize and qualify everything,” said Toor, who was Muslim but left the faith to become a communist. A native of Lahore, Toor is a member of the Pakistani political-action group Women’s Action Forum and teaches sociology and women’s studies at The College of Staten Island, City University of New York. She said that panel discussions, such as “Queer and Muslim” can overlook the fact that homosexual followers of Judeo-Christian religions can face challenges just like gay Muslims do.

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By Sue Fishkoff

Miguel Segura Aguilo's ancestors were executed as Jews five centuries ago in Spain, but he is not welcome in his local synagogue today.

Gershom Sizomu, who will be ordained this month in Los Angeles as a Conservative rabbi, dreams of setting up the first yeshiva for African Jews in his Abayudayan village in East Uganda.

Rabbi Capers Funnye, spiritual leader of a largely African-American congregation in Chicago, is off to Nigeria to make connections with the Ibo, a community that claims Jewish heritage.

These men, and dozens of other representatives of far-flung communities seeking recognition by the Jewish mainstream, gathered earlier this month in San Francisco at a conference sponsored by Be'chol Lashon (In Every Tongue), a project of the Institute for Jewish and Community Research.

The Ibo, Lemba and Abayudaya of Africa, the anusim and xuetas of Spain and Latin America, Ethiopian Jews from Israel, Indian Jews from New York and Asian-American Jews-by-Choice spent three days networking and sharing information about their struggles to join the global Jewish family, a family that is not always eager to embrace them.

"The Jewish community keeps talking about the crisis of intermarriage and the crisis of declining numbers, but meanwhile you've got people with Jewish heritage, spiritual seekers, Jewish communities of historical significance, and the Jewish community is doing nothing to help them," says Gary Tobin, the institute's president and a longtime advocate of greater openness to those outside the Ashkenazi mainstream.

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Meeting with New Birth Missionary Baptist Church Will Happen on Sunday, June 1

(Atlanta, GA) Steve Parelli is a former Baptist minister. His partner, Jose Ortiz, also studied for the ministry and spent several months as a Southern Baptist lay minister. Since meeting and falling in love at an “ex-gay” support group in Manhattan, the couple has learned a thing or two about faith, family, rejection, and redemption. 

And that’s why Parelli and Ortiz are leading a group of gay and lesbian families and clergy who will meet with members of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church this Sunday, June 1. “At some point, at some place, constructive conversations must begin between the church and the gay son or gay daughter who grew up in that church,” explained Parelli, who was spurned by his family and lost his ministry upon coming out. Parelli has since found a new calling in supporting LGBT-affirming ministries around the world.

Atlanta-based minister Troy Sanders, founder of Preach2me.com, concurs:

“I have a personal investment in this visit, because my family is in New Birth. And when I say family, I mean both kinds.

“I have biological family who are still caught in the conflict between their theology and having an openly gay clergy person as kin, and I have lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender brothers and sisters who—for whatever reason—have chosen to make New Birth their church home,” Sanders explained.

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HARTFORD, Conn. - The Internal Revenue Service says the United Church of Christ did not violate rules when it hosted Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama at its convention in Hartford last year.

The IRS says Obama's appearance at the UCC's national meeting in June 2007 did not violate federal rules governing the appearance of politicians at religious events.

Earlier this year, the IRS had said there were questions that the speech violated restrictions on political activity for tax-exempt organizations. The denomination has denied any wrongdoing.

However, in a letter to the national church the tax agency says it found the UCC had taken the necessary steps to avoid any appearance that Obama's appearance was of a political nature.

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In 2005, 1.2-million-member UCC became first, largest mainline denomination to support same-gender marriage equality

Cleveland, OH- United Church of Christ leaders are affirming today's decision by the California Supreme Court to overturn the state's same-gender marriage ban.

The Rev. John H. Thomas, the United Church of Christ's general minister and president, based in Cleveland, said he is pleased by the court's decision.

"I am gratified by the decision of the courts in California to reject discrimination and affirm the dignity of same gender couples," Thomas said. "As recent decisions in other states makes clear, until all couples are able to marry, their separate status will never be equal status."

Five UCC congregations in California -- Community UCC of Atascadero, Mt. Hollywood Congregational UCC, Parkside Community UCC in Sacramento, Pilgrim UCC in Carlsbad and United Church of Christ in Simi Valley - as well as UCC-related Pacific School of Religion, joined an interfaith amicus brief filed earlier this year in support of the ban's overturn.

After the court decision was announced, several UCC members in California responded positively to the news.

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PHILADELPHIA, PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The international focus of Equality Forum 2008 is Gays and Lesbians in the Muslim World. Equality Forum presents the largest annual national and international GLBT civil rights forum. Equality Forum 2008 (April 28-May 4) in Philadelphia has 34 panels, 14 parties and 15 special events.

On April 3, 2008, Equality Forum called on Presidential candidates Clinton, McCain and Obama to contact British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to revoke the deportation orders of gays and lesbians in the UK to Iran. There are no fewer than 12 gay and lesbian Iranians living in the UK who are at risk of deportation including 19-year-old Iranian Mehdi Kazemi, and Pegah Emambakhsh, a 40-year-old lesbian whose partner in Iran was arrested, tortured, and stoned to death. Kazemi's boyfriend, Parham, who was the same age as Kazemi, was arrested, tortured, and executed for being gay by the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Equality Forum 2008 presents three programs, which explore the unique challenges faced by gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender citizens in Muslim nations.

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Two senior lack clergy in the United Methodist in the USA, who are also longtime civil-rights advocates, say there are striking parallels between the struggles of blacks in the 1960s and those of gays and lesbians working for full inclusion in the churches today.

At a 27 April rally held outside the Fort Worth Convention Center where the denomination's 2008 General Conference is meeting through to 2 May 2008, retired United Methodist ministers the Rev James Lawson and the Rev Gil Caldwell spoke of the connection between racism and "heterosexism."

The rally was organized by the national, pro-gay advocacy organization Soulforce to take place on the 40th anniversary of The United Methodist Church's dissolution of its Central Jurisdiction, which was defined not by geography, but race - effectively segregating black clergy and congregations.

Caldwell, former chairperson of Black Methodists for Church Renewal and former co-convener of United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church, recalled how his Methodist pastor father came home "with a sense of despair" from the 1939 General Conference that established the Central Jurisdiction. He remembers his father telling him, "We are exchanging slavery for segregation."

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Two leading experts share their diverging views

By Jay Tolson

The recent comments of Rev. Jeremiah Wright have not only complicated the presidential campaign of Senator Barack Obama, who for more than 20 years has been a member of the Trinity United Church of Christ that Wright once pastored. Some of Wright's remarks—particularly his claim that criticism of his more provocative sermons "is not an on attack on Jeremiah Wright" but instead "an attack on the black church"—have also sparked wide a debate on whether Wright typifies the beliefs of millions of African-American churchgoers and their ministers. U. S. News approached two leading experts on the African-American church figures with a single question: "How well does Rev. Jeremiah Wright represent the black church in America?"

Here are their answers:

Dwight Hopkins is a professor at the University of Chicago Divinity School and the author of Heart and Head: Black Theology Past, Present, and Future and many other books.

"I think his theology and his religious perspective are both very representative, especially linking the personal salvation with social justice critique. In fact, those two focii have been the hallmark of the black church in America since the black church was founded in the period of slavery. But unfortunately what has happened, particularly in the past seven and a half years, is that President Bush has promoted a small group of black clergy to represent all of black Christianity. He's promoted a theological trend called "prosperity gospel" which is basically that individuals should use Jesus Christ plus capitalism to get personally rich.

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Rev Wright - Bill Moyers 1 of 4