Fri 31 Mar 2006
My boss went to a CEOs meeting of UnitingCare agencies in Brisbane this week and came back with her head and heart full of great passion and resolve. Discussions with her and the coordinator of our Diversity program led to the commitment to produce a new resource.
The new package will be education for youth workers, church workers and ministers who want to support young people who are, or who are thinking about, coming out as not straight, but who want to hold on to their Christian faith. Already we’ve established what the resource will contain and how it will (kinda) look. Naturally, it will have to have stuff on Christian sexual ethics and homosexuality in the Bible, because those discussions are always played out in our chruches and affect the mind of every young person going through this process. Yet our main focus should be on managing a queer identity while maintaining a solid Christian one, which means more focus will be placed on dealing with relationships in a young person’s faith community, dealing with stereotypes, embracing a new path of life with God.
I’ve found some resources on the net to help us, such as Soulforce, and, of course, the United Church of Christ in Canada. If anyone out there knows of any other resources, I’d love an email.
And if you’d like to help Cutting Edge develop the resource, you are really really welcome. I mean, really.

April 1st, 2006 at 00:42
i like how phil daughtry spoke about sexuality in his book “sacred life of us” of course the uca has a bucketload of sexuality studies including a study series titled “beyond the fig leaves”
April 1st, 2006 at 23:19
I’ve heard about The Sacred Life of Us and the title had put me off, but I’ll look at it again. We have most of the UCA stuff on hand including that one. Thanks for the tips, Darren – you’re always a good help.
April 2nd, 2006 at 22:28
paul, this really interests me. I did a lot of looking at sexuality education a number of years ago. I’m not offering to help write, but perhaps help think and edit.
it seems to me that there are a range of identity, faith, relational and ethical issues – the ‘scope’ will be the question.
please keep me in touch
craig
April 3rd, 2006 at 08:39
Hi Craig,
Will do. Good to hear from you.
Paul.