“Hear a Just Cause” (Psalm 17,1): opening speech to LGBTIQ Catholics at Global Network of Rainbow Catholics event

The following speech was delivered by Wielie Elhorst, Co-President of the European Forum of LGBT Christian Groups, at the second assembly of the GNRC (Global Network of Rainbow Catholics) in Munich, Germany, on 30 November 2017. It was written by Wielie and theologian Michael Brinkschröder.

Good afternoon/good evening to you all,

It is my pleasure and my honour to bring you greetings on behalf of the Board of the European Forum of LGBT Christian Groups. My name is Wielie Elhorst and I am one of the Co-Presidents of the European Forum. The European Forum was founded in 1982 and member groups with a predominantly Roman Catholic background have been part of the European Forum since its very foundation. I myself am a Reformed minister both in a village parish near Amsterdam, The Netherlands and I work as the LGBT-minister of the Protestant Church of Amsterdam on a voluntary basis. I am also a project manager for projects that aim for the social acceptance of LGBT people in their Christian communities. For the first time in my 30 years of Christian LGBT activism I had the honour to meet with Monseigneur De Korte, who is the bishop of the biggest Dutch diocese in The Netherlands, the diocese of ’s-Hertogenbosch. I was invited with a few roman catholic LGBT activists and their allies. The current attitude of Mgr. De Korte is a sign of hope for change. In the spirit of pope Francis, he has been showing interest in meeting with roman catholic LGBT people and their organisations. I am very happy he was present at the annual meeting of the Dutch association of roman catholic pastors. Real dialogue and change I think begins with shaking hands, looking each other into the eyes and speaking heart to heart. Mgr. De Korte seems to possess this gift and for this we are very grateful. We know it takes courage for a bishop to take these steps.

Allow me to share a little bit of history with you to make clear why I am speaking to you as the Co President of an ecumenical LGBT organisation. When the first Family Synod of the Roman Catholic Church was announced to take place in October 2014, the European Forum was in the lucky situation to have planned a Catholic LGBT conference in Rome for this month anyway. The European Forum already had some funds available and the Roman Catholic Working Group was mentally prepared to organise an event together with some Italian LGBT groups. The announcement of the Family Synod by Pope Francis was a huge gift, because Catholic LGBT persons from other continents got interested in our work. Some of them like Sr. Jeannine Gramick and Francis DeBernardo from New Ways Ministry and James Alison from Sao Paolo at that time joined us in our preparation. Others like a group from PADIS in Santiago de Chile had travelled to Rome for this event and just happened to be at the first ‘Ways of Love’ Conference. One of the speakers of this conference was the Australian Bishop Geoffrey Robinson. The next day after this public conference a get together of approximately fifteen people took place where the plan to form the Global Network of Rainbow Catholics was actually born.

The European Forum made another effort to speak out during the Family Synod in a conference that highlighted the criminalisation of LGBT people with two speakers from Africa: Frank Mugisha from Uganda and Jules Eloundou from Cameroon. This conference took place in one of the most exquisite places the European Forum ever had: The Capitoline Museum on top of the Capitol hill in Rome. Within a few weeks, a global network of LGBT Catholics and their parents had emerged.

As the Family Synod was to be continued in the following year, the European Forum decided to invest a large part of a grant from the Arcus Foundation in the foundational meeting of the GNRC in October 2015. The preparation for this 1st Assembly was from the very beginning in the hand of the global team that emerged from the get together in Rome. It was the first time that 70 LGBT Catholics from almost 30 countries could come together. I was very honoured to be present there as well presenting the English publication of And GOD Saw It Was All Very Good. Catholic LGBT People in Europe Telling Their Stories, also supported by the European Forum.

As I already mentioned, the European Forum of LGBT Christian Groups is an ecumenical organisation. Our members and member groups belong to different denominations: Reformed, Lutheran, Anglican, Waldensian, Old Catholic, Metropolitan Community Church, Eastern Orthodox, Evangelical churches etcetera. After 35 years of being together at our annual meetings, we have developed an intense longing of working and celebrating together as an ecumenical community of Christians. Our common spirituality is deeply characterised by different liturgical traditions that are blended together in our prayers and liturgies. Dogmatic subtleties about the Eucharist have turned out to be less important for us, than the sharing of tears and emotions as well as the solidarity in critical times. I know that not all of you have the same experience with ecumenical or even interfaith togetherness, but I as a pastor of the Protestant (Reformed) Church in the Netherlands hope that the GNRC can also move forward with an open heart for everybody who is not a member of the Roman Catholic Church, not the least because working together in the recent past has proven to be so efficient and worthwhile.

I am very happy there will be again opportunities for cooperation in future activities. The European Forum will give space for young LGBT Catholics during its next assembly to form a network and to articulate their message to the Youth Synod. The RCC Working Group of the European Forum is planning to hold a training on dialogue with the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in the second half of 2018. And another working group is monitoring the anti-gender movement in Europe, which has deep roots in the policy of the Vatican for more than twenty years and will publish a report as well as a booklet on gender.

Let me end how I started: I am deeply honoured to be with you and show our solidarity to your cause. In whatever way we will be connected to the Global Network of Rainbow Catholics in the nearby future, be assured that we will do what we can to stand side by side and support your cause. If we are not able to be sisters and brothers in bringing closer the Kingdom of God step by step, who would be?

Thank you very much for your attention. I wish you very fruitful, uplifting and inspiring Conference. Be all that you can be: proud LGBTs, proud members of the Roman Catholic Church and true followers of Jesus Christ.

Thank you.

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Learn more about the European Forum of LGBT Christian Groups here, and the Global Network of Rainbow Catholics here.