Julie is a writer, speaker, and advocate for LGBT people in Christian communities. She has served as an advisor to religious leaders, college administrators, and LGBT students at Christian colleges. She has also survived the culture war. Read more about her here or watch a recent talk she gave here.
A new website called Church Clarity launched today with the goal of encouraging churches to be clear about their policies about LGBTQ people. They don't advocate for churches to be affirming of same-sex relationships or non-affirming; they simply want churches to be transparent about their policies. Here's why this is so important....
18 October, 2017
I don't know a single person who isn't exhausted by our political crisis at the moment. Everyone I know (conservative, progressive, and moderate) hopes we live for a time when we won't feel the threat of nuclear war or racially-motivated violence every day. We are grasping for strategies to preserve our mental health without disengaging from critical conversations that have enormous consequences in our communities....
29 September, 2017
Students are back in school now and, as always, LGBTQ students are on my mind. College is an exciting and terrifying time. These are the years when you admit things to yourself that you had to suppress before. It's when we question everything we previously assumed to be true and discover new language for our principles. For some of us, the college years were a time when we thought we were the only person in our entire dorm who was too depressed to make it out of bed for afternoon classes....
22 September, 2017
I first heard about Amanda Hite in the Fall of 2015. My friend Dave and I were scrolling through Instagram over lunch when he suddenly squealed, "Oh my gosh! I have an Insta-crush on this super hot lesbian named Amanda Hite and she just wrote the most adorable article about coming out to her grandparents. You HAVE to read it."...
09 August, 2017
If you’ve served in leadership at a church or a Christian organization, policies about LGBT people have surely come up. It comes up when a lesbian couple asks to have their baby dedicated or baptized. Policies are questioned when a boy in the youth group begins to experiment with eyeliner. Leaders in the organization want to provide clarity, so they move to create policies that articulate exactly how LGBT people are allowed to exist within the community...
15 March, 2017
I was on a panel at Calvin College earlier this week to talk about sexual orientation change efforts. The stories are heartbreaking and, sadly, they're about a movement that's still very much alive. Young people are still sent to Christian conversion organizations, and many churches continue to encourage LGBT Christians to hope and pray for "healing"....
10 March, 2017Julie connects with those seeking a fresh vision for community as we become more diverse (and often more divided). She speaks with humor and candor in a variety of settings, including universities, LGBT events, women’s events, and leadership conferences. Sometimes conversations about sensitive topics are more fruitful in smaller settings, so Julie also consults regularly with Christian leaders and college administrators to discuss practical ways organizations can nurture the kinds of communities where everyone feels wanted.