wfn.org | [PCUSANEWS] Texas pastor is speaker, honoree at gay-lesbian

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Note #7701 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

Texas pastor is speaker, honoree at gay-lesbian dinner
GA03008

Texas pastor is speaker, honoree at gay-lesbian dinner

by Midge Mack 

DENVER, May 24  Three groups working for the full inclusion of gay and
lesbian Presbyterians in church leadership More Light Presbyterians, That
All May Freely Serve and the Shower of Stoles Project  celebrated the lives
and ministries of homosexuals in the Presbyterian Church (USA) at a dinner
meeting at the Hyatt Regency Hotel.

	Jim Rigby, the pastor of St. Andrews Presbyterian Church, of Austin,
TX, a More Light congregation, spoke on Turning the Page from Pain to Hope,
relating how he and a family in his congregation worked together for the
passage of a Hate Crime Protection Law in Texas.

	The family is that of James Byrd Jr., an African-American who in 1998
was the victim of one of the most notorious hate crimes in U.S. history.
Three white men picked him up in downtown Austin, beat him severely, then
tied him to the bumper of a truck and dragged him along a country road until
he was dead.

	James Byrd Sr. appeared with Rigby in a room festooned with more than
200 colorful stoles symbolizing the inclusion of gays and lesbians and other
minorities in the church.

	A new annual award established in the memory of the Rev. Howard B.
Warren, a founder of the Presbyterian AIDS Network, was presented to Rigby.

	Warren, a former director of pastoral care at the Damien Center in
Indianapolis, IN, was a long-time General Assembly advocate for people with
HIV/AIDS. He died on March 14.

	Another award was presented to Mitzi Henderson, an elder at First
Presbyterian Church, of Palo Alto, CA, in recognition of her service as a
co-moderator of More Life Presbyterians.

	Another More Life leader, Rosemarie Wallace, of Mesa, AZ, was the
recipient of the annual David Sindt Leadership Award.

	Thirteen churches in Hudson River Presbytery who have dissented from
PC(USA) policies on gays and lesbians in church leadership were presented
Inclusive Church Awards for 2003.

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