Video Interview, Ralph Carter, October 20, 2012

KEVIN INDOVINO: The first thing we need is for you to,

on camera, just give me the correct spelling

of your first and last name, how you want it actually

displayed on screen.

RALPH CARTER: OK.

My name is Ralph Carter.

R-A-L-P-H. C-A-R-T-E-R.

KEVIN INDOVINO: And a title for you?

If we would give you a title, what would it be?

RALPH CARTER: I have a couple of different hats.

KEVIN INDOVINO: Give us both, because I might actually just

put both of them on.

RALPH CARTER: Well, I'm an engineer at Xerox Corporation

and I'm an elder and member of Third Presbyterian

Church, Rochester.

KEVIN INDOVINO: So let's just kind of start out a little

generally here.

We'll focus on the church right now,

and we'll get to corporate leader.

You've been a member of Third Presbyterian church since 1979.

Talk to me about where the church was at in the 1970s in

regards to the gay community, and in

regards to having gay parishioners in their church,

and how they were recognizing them, or not recognizing them.

What was the church like that you first stepped into?

RALPH CARTER: Well, I moved to Rochester in the summer of 1979

after attending Georgia Tech in Atlanta, Georgia.

While I was in college I was trying

to determine whether or not, as a gay Christian,

whether I could integrate my sexuality and my spirituality.

KEVIN INDOVINO: OK, hold that thought.

And stop rolling for a second.

Because I just realized something.

(pause in recording)

Let's go back to that, just kind of talk to me about the church,

and particularly as a gay man, coming into the church

environment back in the late seventies.

RALPH CARTER: I moved to Rochester in 1979

to accept a job at Xerox Corporation.

I grew up in Shipley, Florida, and went to Georgia Tech

in Atlanta, Georgia.

While in college, as I was finding myself and starting

to come out, church had always been an important part

of my life, because it was a place where I could be myself,

and a place where I could ask questions and explore

the spiritual side of my life.

But as I came out, I began to wonder,

can I be myself as a gay man in the church?

I explored that a little bit in Atlanta.

There was a Metropolitan Community Church.

And I remember going to a Bible study group

where they were speaking positively about gay people.

And I had a really hard time with that,

because my internal tapes as a kid

told me that you can't be gay and be Christian.

So when I moved to Rochester on my own,

didn't know anybody in town, that

was a question in the back of my mind.

Should I completely reject the church as a gay man,

or is there a place for me in the church?

And I think that's true for a lot of people.

Very early on I saw the Empty Closet,

and there was a little advertisement.

There were two ads that I saw, one

for Dignity Integrity, which met at then

St. Luke Episcopal Church on Fitzhugh street.

It met on Sunday evenings.

So I started going to Dignity Integrity

And then I also had seen an ad for Presbyterians

for Gay Concerns, which soon became Presbyterians

for Lesbian and Gay Concerns, the chapter in Rochester that

met for a monthly potluck supper.

So I went to both events.

So a lot of my friends actually today,

my oldest and dearest friends, are from the Dignity Integrity

weekly gatherings.

So those gatherings really became like a safety net for me

as I began to explore congregations.

And so I went to several churches

that summer of 1979, several Presbyterian churches,

and I happened upon Third Presbyterian Church

where Ted Hollenbach, who I didn't

know at the time was openly gay in many circles,

was the organist and choirmaster.

And I really liked the music, and I liked the preaching,

and it was a large church, and so

I joined that congregation on that basis.

Meanwhile, within Dignity Integrity in the fall of 1980,

I met my current partner Van.

Van Zandten, in October of 1980.

So this year is actually our thirty-second anniversary.

And he was starting to attend Calvary St. Andrew's Parish,

which was a at that time combined Episcopal Presbyterian

congregation in the south wedge.

That church was already formally open and accepting

of gay and lesbian people, and then eventually of transgender

and bisexual people.

But I hadn't discovered them until after Van and I met.

So I felt, in some ways, moving to Rochester,

I felt like I was coming into the middle

of a movie at that time.

Because for the Presbyterians in the mid-seventies,

there was a lot of national discussion going on

about how and whether gay and lesbian people

could be members of the church.

And some of that leadership of that national conversation was

facilitated by a member of the downtown Presbyterian church,

just down the street from Fitzhugh, on Fitzhugh street,

Downtown United Presbyterian Church, the member

Virginia West Davidson--

KEVIN INDOVINO: Let's pull it back a little bit, let's

not rush through this.

Let me first pull it back, again, coming to Rochester.

Your first impressions, or those first feelings of realizing you

were coming into a community that

has these congregations that are actually

starting the conversation.

Or they've already gone beyond conversation

and are starting to accept gays and lesbians,

being more vocally, more visible with them.

What were your first thoughts on what you were finding here

in Rochester?

RALPH CARTER: You know, as I began to explore congregations

in Rochester I came to understand that rather

than being something that was not spoken of, that there were

a number of congregations they were actually starting to have

adult education programs that began speaking out on behalf

of and with gay and lesbian members

of the community, many of whom were actually

members of their congregations.

So it was quite a surprise for me,

because I grew up south of the Mason-Dixon line

where you didn't talk about these things.

And so it was really refreshing.

And it was really only later that I

came to realize that the conversation about civil rights

and the place of gay and lesbian people

as a minority group within the community

was continuing a long tradition of Rochester

and upstate New York, with Susan B.

Anthony as a contemporary of Frederick Douglass, you know,

on women's rights and anti-slavery efforts,

and the similarities between the two.

Following then to Walter Rauschenbusch who

was a faculty member of what was then Rochester Seminary when

it was on Alexander Street, and is now on Goodman

as Colgate Rochester Crosier Divinity

School, who became the voice against the rise

of fundamentalism around the country.

So Rochester has got a rich tradition

for civil rights advocacy.

And so as I came to know gays and lesbians who were a part

of the '69 Stonewall, bringing all of that energy back

to Rochester, we were part of that whole nascent effort

of finding ourselves as a gay and lesbian community.

So this is continuing a longstanding tradition.

So even though Rochester may look

very staid and conservative, it sets

this deep, rich undercurrent of radical nature.

Radical in the best sense of the word, radical as in rooted.

KEVIN INDOVINO: So let's move forward a little bit then.

You became a member of the Third Presbyterian Church,

and you found a church that you wanted to be a part of.

But you made the decision to be more than just a member.

You made a decision to start advocating

for gay and lesbian rights, or gay and lesbian acceptance,

put it that way, within the church environment.

Talk to me about the beginnings of that,

the beginnings of that thinking for you,

becoming somewhat of an activist within the church environment.

RALPH CARTER: I would call myself a reluctant advocate,

and a reluctant activist.

When we would have our meetings with Presbyterians

for Lesbian and Gay Concerns on a monthly basis,

that was a safe place.

And I think it's a rare activist that doesn't

know where their safe place is.

Otherwise you're going to get slaughtered.

Or it could be very dangerous.

So PLGC, from a religious perspective, PLGC and Dignity

Integrity were places of solace, places to go and lick

your wounds, and so forth.

So within those communities, I began

to wrestle with, OK, I love the church of which I'm a part.

My partner is in another congregation.

Do I move from my church to his church, or what?

And they don't even know who I am.

Can I even come out?

I don't know.

I don't know where they are on the whole gay issue.

Fortunately for me, there were members of PLGC

who had thought, they deliberately

were very intentional about approaching ten congregations,

and spoke to the leadership of ten Presbyterian congregations

in the five county region, including Third Church,

and said, "We would like you to formally consider

welcoming gay and lesbian people as members

of your congregations."

And after a year of sitting on that,

the session, or governing body, of Third Church

agreed to form a private study group.

Wouldn't even tell the congregation,

they were so afraid to talk about the issue.

At the time, this was a eighteen hundred member congregation

on East Avenue, very visible regionally, nationally.

And so they were very conservative about how they

were going to approach things.

Meanwhile, I had come out to the pastors,

and was asked to join this cloistered study group.

Instead of being framed as a group

to talk about homosexuality, it was

reframed to talk about human sexuality in the larger

context.

Because at the time, there were gender issues,

there was sexuality among older adults.

What happens when your partner dies and you find love

and you've got grandkids?

What do you do?

What about abortion rights?

So this task force was to talk about all of that.

I was on that task force as a closeted gay man

for almost the first year, all of the first year,

even though I was called on to facilitate the discussion

on homosexuality, which I did, and then came out to the group.

And it was a wonderful event.

It was a wonderful experience.

And so I became more brave, and more open, and more of myself,

as the time went on.

So we were so excited about the kind of freedom

which comes from being open and being able to ask questions

no matter what the topic.

And some of these quote unquote taboo topics

that we recommended to the church

that they invite a theologian of national note

to come and to lead a weekend conversation about sexuality.

And it was Peggy Way from Vanderbilt who came,

and she left some very important thoughts

with this large congregation, one of which

was, never label one another, but recognize that,

depending on the topic and where we are in our lives,

we're conserving and we're also liberating.

We seek liberation, and we seek to save those things which

are valuable to us.

So she advised us to avoid labels,

but to really try to listen to one another

and to hear each other out, and to above all, be in community,

regardless of where we happened to be on particular issues.

Out of that study group, one year long,

in the early eighties, formed two groups.

One was a support group for gay and lesbian people, which

actually continues to meet till this day, twice a month

on Monday evenings.

It's now called Born This Way, but it used

to be the LGBT Support Group.

And when it first started, the big debate

amongst the session was, well, do we want

to call this a support group?

Because that means that we actually support gay people.

Or shall we call it a discussion group?

And of course we were livid about the very idea of not

calling it a support group.

Ultimately a support group it was.

Then they were concerned about well, you can't publicize it.

And we knew they were uncomfortable as a session

talking about these issues.

So we ended up saying, well, we'll develop a model for it.

And we had certified counselors facilitating the support group,

and it was just going to be for members of the congregation.

And then after six months of meetings,

we were going to come back and report

to you how we were progressing.

So we knew that that way we would

get a second hearing with them.

And it was a very good group.

And because the church newsletter went out

to the Democratic and Chronicle and City Newspaper and other,

they tended to put things in the paper

about things that were going on.

So we got publicized without our realizing it, in the press.

It was a very good gathering.

We had, at one point, we actually

had some nuns coming from the Catholic Diocese who

were trying to figure things out in a safe environment.

And it's been very successful.

KEVIN INDOVINO: Let me ask you this, because I know this all

started before you even got here,

but from your point of view, why did they bother?

It would have been so easy for any of the churches,

like some of them still do, to say, you know,

we're not going to talk about that.

We're just going to stick to the scriptures,

and this is what we're going to preach,

and this is how we're going to operate.

Why do you think that some of the Presbyterian

churches here and some of the Episcopalian churches,

and even Colgate Rochester of Divinity,

it would have been so easy for them

to just put the blinders on and not even address gays

and lesbians.

RALPH CARTER: Well it is true that it's easier

not to rock the boat.

But when people are not able to be themselves fully,

then the whole community suffers.

And if you're suffering in silence, then you're suffering

is just going to continue.

And so it's important for people of faith,

and people who are of goodwill toward various minorities,

whether they're gay or people of color or different abilities

or disabilities, to speak out on their behalf,

and to speak with them and to speak in solidarity.

Because it's the only way things are going to change,

is when people speak out.

I think a lot of people in congregations, in faith groups,

don't realize how important their voice is in the larger

conversation, and what healing they can bring for people who

are struggling to accept their brother

or sister, or their child.

And so when the church says that, it's not our place

to judge, that's what God is supposed

to do we're here to love one another,

and to care for one another, and support one another.

And when we do what we're supposed to do,

then the world will be a better place.

KEVIN INDOVINO: But within that, we'll

just focus on the Presbyterian churches right now.

Not all of them were jumping on board here, were they?

RALPH CARTER: Oh goodness.

When Third Church became an open church,

we just said, OK, we want to put down on paper

and to say publicly what we've been doing for years, which

is to welcome gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender

people into the full membership of the church,

and the full ministry, including ordained offices

within the church.

We're putting that on paper and we are communicating that

to the world.

Less than a mile down the street on East Avenue

is Brighton Presbyterian Church, right across from Whiteman's

on East Avenue, and they took umbrage to that,

because they had started a whole national ministry.

I remember they had a national speaker, Colin Cook,

who was the director of Homosexuals Anonymous.

And they formed the national Presbyterian group

for advocating that gay people become ex-gay people.

And so when Third Church made its statement in January 1987,

after six years of study, deliberate study,

we were brought to court.

We were taken to court for making what really

was a statement of conscience.

And so it went through the judicial process,

the church courts, from the presbytery permanent

judicial commission, to the synod of the Northeast,

and then to the General Assembly.

And we prevailed.

That a statement of conscience--

in Presbyterian parlance, we are proud to say that God alone

is Lord of the conscience, and that people

should be able to speak their mind because only God has

the truth.

Everybody else is seeking the truth, but we don't have it.

Only God can claim the truth.

So with that, it's been a very interesting thing.

I remember a number of people from the Brighton church

and from other congregations would,

when the city of Rochester was considering nondiscrimination

policies for the city, and people would go to City Hall

and so forth.

There were a number of anti-gay congregations would go,

but then also a number of pro-gay congregations

would go, as well.

KEVIN INDOVINO: So it was the culmination of More Light?

Is this how Third Presbyterian became a More Light church?

RALPH CARTER: Of how we did it?

KEVIN INDOVINO: Of how you did it?

RALPH CARTER: Well, there was a lot of reticence

to say publicly that which we were

doing more in-house, privately.

We had one of our adult education gatherings,

and the widow of an esteemed senior pastor,

Dr. Hudnut, his wife Betsy, was her first name, Hudnut,

would never speak, but she would come to the adult forums.

She got up one day.

And everybody was like, oh my gosh, this women is speaking,

she never speaks.

And she looked at a painting of Lilian Alexander,

and pointed to it, and says, do you

remember in the 1950s, when we were talking about

should women be able to pastor congregations?

And we are so proud that we authored,

as a congregation, that overture to Rochester Presbyterian,

then ultimately to the national church,

to bring that about by 1957, which

was the year after I was born.

But if you remember, at the time, we were terrified.

What are we doing, stepping out?

What are we doing, saying what we believe

and moving Rochester and moving the country

to a different, more inclusive, more welcoming place?

That's where we are now.

We are terrified of saying what we believe.

But ten years from now, twenty years from now,

if we don't say what we believe now

and step out in faith that the world can be better

for all of our members and for our whole community,

and to make the world a better place,

if we don't take that step now, then we

won't be able to look back on that effort years from now

as we look back on accepting leadership gifts of women

in the church.

KEVIN INDOVINO: So define for me the premise

of the More Light church.

What is its core mission?

Its core value?

RALPH CARTER: Presbyterians are a very egalitarian group.

The Presbyterian Church does not have bishops.

It's the gathered community which serves

as the office of the bishop.

We don't have popes.

It's the gathered community, representatives,

commissioners from presbyteries around the country that

serves as the office of the pope, if you will.

We also have ideas that I mentioned.

God alone is Lord of the conscience.

And we speak truth with humility,

because God alone has the truth and everybody else

is seeking it.

So in terms of being a More Light congregation,

the underlying issue is, are we going

to continue to be a place where all voices can be heard?

Because if you're going to seek wisdom,

and to seek truth, and to seek justice,

you need to have an open table, and voices need to be heard.

And so if voices are being stifled,

then you're only seeing dimly what

you could see more clearly.

So you need voices of gay and lesbian people

around the table, and you need people of color,

you need people with different abilities,

need people of different educational backgrounds.

You need as many people as you can

get to talk about how do we make the world a better place?

How do we make our lives better?

How do we care for those who need our help?

KEVIN INDOVINO: OK, so let's step back a little bit,

because we kind of bypassed the formation of CREATE Justice.

Let's talk a little bit about that.

Define for me what is CREATE Justice

and how did that come about?

RALPH CARTER: CREATE justice is an acronym

called Church's Responsibility to Educate and Advocate

Toward Equality, that's the create, justice for lesbian

and gay persons.

And it started as an idea that came about in a Presbyterians

for Lesbian and Gay Concerns meeting, probably

at Keith Hirschberger and Lee Fisher's home,

in a potluck supper.

There had been national fundraising for mission,

millions of dollars being raised,

I think about maybe three hundred

thousand dollars that was going to be kept locally in the five

county region around Rochester.

And this was in the early 1980s.

And this was after Virginia Davidson

had brought the report on the church's concern

with homosexuality to the national church.

It was rejected, but what was part

of the final accepted report was that the church

was firmly committed to civil rights

for lesbian and gay people.

So we were crushed by that national statement, however

we were encouraged by a member of the staff of the presbytery.

How can you turn something bad into something good?

Take the good, ignore the bad, and go with it.

And so we said well, there's this civil rights advocacy

commitment, and the church has always been very supportive

of civil rights for people.

So we formed a proposal and took it

to the presbytery to fund for five thousand dollars

a three year civil rights advocacy network,

an ecumenical network, for upstate New York,

Buffalo to Albany, and down the Pennsylvania line.

And so we met.

We had members of the Unitarian Church, the Episcopal diocese,

the Roman Catholic members, Methodist, Lutheran,

so there were a number of denominations involved.

And we met at the Episcopal diocesan house on East Avenue.

It's really cool place, if you've been inside of it.

And I think we developed a network,

I think it was about fifteen hundred people in this mailing

list.

This is prior to email.

And it was really a good thing.

And a lot of those connections ripple even today.

That was from the eighties.

So some of those friendships that were made then

morphed into interfaith advocates

for lesbian and gay people.

And also some of those friendships

continued on, even recently, a couple of years ago,

in terms of the marriage effort.

KEVIN INDOVINO: But initially with CREATE Justice,

what was the core mission?

What were you hoping to achieve by starting up this group?

RALPH CARTER: CREATE Justice was basically taking

some of the national and statewide issues

in terms of civil rights for lesbian and gay people,

and encourage people of faith to enter

into the conversation, especially

those who were traditionally progressive people who

had experience in working for migrant worker justice,

for African-American civil rights, voting

rights in the sixties, Voting Rights Act, and a number

of different women's gender issues,

and to bring those people of faith

to open up the conversation, to speak with

and to work with and on behalf, and to speak out

as allies of the lesbian and gay community.

KEVIN INDOVINO: And I need to backtrack a little bit.

I need you to set up for me just very quickly about Virginia

Davidson proposing the legislation to the General

Assembly.

Just very quickly set that up for me,

what that was all about, and then

how that drove you, locally, to develop this group.

So I need a little bit more about Virginia Davidson.

Who she was --

RALPH CARTER: Yeah.

KEVIN INDOVINO: She was from Rochester, right?

I think that's significant, that here's

this woman from Rochester, going to the national General

Assembly, putting forth this proposal.

RALPH CARTER: Virginia Davidson was

this tall, regal, statuesque, Pittsford housewife.

White hair, just absolutely gorgeous woman.

When Virginia entered a room, voices would stop,

heads would turn, who is this woman?

Just a really neat personality.

Very interesting person.

Virginia's husband, Davey Davidson I think

was a vice president at Kodak.

When they retired in--

KEVIN INDOVINO: Sorry.

One second.

Apparently, they can't read signs.

OK.

So, yeah let's pick it up from the husband.

RALPH CARTER: When Davey and Virginia's children

left the nest, Virginia and Davey

built a townhouse on Gibb Street near the Eastman Theater.

And I think it was the early seventies,

a very dear friend came out to her who

was a Presbyterian minister.

Virginia loved this man, and realized,

I know nothing about what it means to be gay.

But she heard his story, she began to read up on it,

and she began to speak out.

Virginia was asked to be the Vice Moderator

of the national church.

And at the time, as a Vice Moderator,

sort of like the Vice President of the US,

you know a lot of times there's nothing to do.

But there was a big national conversation

about the church's concern with homosexuality.

Virginia was asked to convene that group,

and to chair that national group.

And as a budding feminist, she was

really interested in having community settings

where people in the community could come and speak,

and so forth.

It was remarkable conversations for the first time,

for many people around the country.

So they brought their report to the General Assembly

in San Diego in 1978.

The majority report became the minority report.

Minority report, which is anti-gay, became the majority.

And then they had to reconcile the two.

So in the notes about the majority report, which

was ostensibly anti-gay, the gay people

could not be welcomed in the church

but they instead needed to recognize their sin,

and whatever kinds of stuff.

In the midst of all that was a very clear statement

about the church's commitment to civil rights

for lesbian and gay people.

And from that, then, we subsequently

talked about well, how do we turn a bad situation

into something good?

And that's how the conversation about forming a civil rights

advocacy network in upstate New York came.

KEVIN INDOVINO: Let me go back then a little bit,

because it seems to me it's a little hypocritical.

This majority report about OK, we've

got this anti-gay language in there,

saying we can't accept gays and lesbians in the church

unless they accept their sins or something,

but we're also advocating civil rights for gays and lesbians.

How did they argue the two?

Having both of those two statements in the same report,

how did they justify it?

RALPH CARTER: Well, it's very difficult

to justify what the church does sometimes.

But there were very opposing forces

in the national conversation, some of whom would say,

who are the people who are also anti-gay,

would say basically the church has no role in speaking

about any civil issue at all.

That the sole purpose of people of faith

is to save souls, but not be concerned about whether people

can have bread on the table, whether they're starving,

whether they have a place to stay, a place to live,

and so forth.

So there's that group.

And then there's the other whole group which marched on Selma,

there were people involved in registering people

to vote, ensuring that African-Americans had access

to the ballot box, that when Native Americans were marched

across the country there were Presbyterians that marched

with them in solidarity.

As a number of other denominations as well.

So there were these two opposing forces.

And there was no way that the pro-inclusion people were going

to allow a report to not have some aspects of what

they were about.

So it was adopted in.

So there was this tension for decades,

and still continues to this day.

This pro-, anti- forces.

So it's important to continue to speak out.

No matter what.

You can't rest on your laurels.

KEVIN INDOVINO: Let's talk a little bit about Janie Spahr,

and that incident, as though I'm someone who really

doesn't know anything about it.

Tell me about Janie Spahr, who she was,

what the controversy was and the impact that it had, not only, I

think, on the church, but also on the community as a whole.

RALPH CARTER: Janie Spahr is a remarkable woman.

Janie grew up in Pennsylvania, and her first pastorate

was working with a historically African-American congregation,

very rural congregation in Western Pennsylvania.

She moved to California, and she married a wonderful man,

and they have, I think, three children.

She came to Rochester in the early eighties,

still in her marriage, and spoke to Presbyterians

for Lesbian and Gay Concerns folks in a weekend conference.

We had a wonderful time together.

Very spiritually gifted woman.

And then she started coming out, a couple

of years after that conversation here.

Her husband, Jim, when Janie came out to him,

fully supported her.

Said Janie, "I'm so glad you have found yourself."

He saw that she was being authentic,

and discovered that she is, in fact, a lesbian.

Her whole family embraced her as she went on this journey.

And I remember going to West Hollywood Presbyterian

Church when Janie received an award, and she spoke.

Virginia Davidson went to that gathering.

I met Jim, and Janie and Jim's children.

And it was just amazing to me that a family could love.

He says, "The only way I can continue to love you

is that you be who you are.

And that means that we need to be divorced

so that you can find love in your life, a true love

in your life."

So Janie had intersected with the lives

of many people in Rochester over the years

in her gay civil rights advocacy.

Civil and ecclesial rights advocacy.

And she was called to be a co-pastor

of the downtown Presbyterian church.

And it was very clear from the reports being

given by members of the nominating

committee to the presbytery that she was

the best candidate for the job.

And so they felt they had to ask her to come,

even though she's openly lesbian.

When that was challenged, the presbytery

endorsed her, and said that everything was in order,

the congregation did a very good job reviewing candidates.

That was challenged.

It was reaffirmed.

It went to the synod.

That was then affirmed by the synod,

and it was a challenged to the national church,

and it was turned back.

So the downtown church then went through a--

KEVIN INDOVINO: (unintelligible).

OK.

RALPH CARTER: Is that-- am I going

too much detail you think?

KEVIN INDOVINO: Yeah, I think you could be a little more

concise with it.

Let's pick it up where the national assembly turned

her back.

RALPH CARTER: So the primary judicial commission

of the national church rejected the decisions of the synod

and of the presbytery in supporting the congregation's

call to Janie to be a co-pastor.

Everybody was devastated.

And so there was a couple of months

after that decision, a gathering in Rochester

of key leaders of the gay movement from around

the country and they said, well, if we can't call her

as a pastor, why don't we call her as an evangelist?

Because what the church really needs, obviously, are stories.

They need to hear stories of people.

They need to see people who are lesbian

and gay, bisexual or transgender,

because when they see us, of course, they'll love us.

So there was nothing in our governance, called

the Book of Order, which said well, you

can't be a lesbian and gay if you're an evangelist.

So she was called as an evangelist,

as a mission project of the congregation.

So the downtown church commissioned

Janie Spahr to serve them as an evangelist to the whole church.

So she traveled across the country

and has done a remarkable job.

KEVIN INDOVINO: Is she to this day still an evangelist?

Did she ever become a pastor?

RALPH CARTER: Janie, she retired.

When she stepped down as evangelist for That All May

Freely Serve, which was the mission project of the downtown

church, she then retired.

But prior to accepting the call, she

had been a director of a nonprofit organization

north of San Francisco.

What's that area called?

I forget what that area's called.

But, anyway.

KEVIN INDOVINO: (unintelligible).

RALPH CARTER: But that is to say, she retired.

KEVIN INDOVINO: So, we have just a short time.

We haven't even covered corporate world yet.

We'll get a little bit into that.

Before we get to that, I want to just get a feel from you

about your perception of how to advocate

for gay and lesbian rights through the church.

You saw this as a place that you could

create change for gays and lesbians in the community,

in the country, possibly in the world.

RALPH CARTER: There are many different types

of congregations.

And how they view themselves and how they work for change

it differs by congregation.

Some congregations call themselves--

I would call them tall steeple churches.

If there's a problem or something needs to be solved,

call the mayor.

Let's get the mayor's office in here.

Let's get the leader from the Center

for Governmental Research here.

Let's talk about the systemic issues

and figure out what needs to be done.

We can solve this thing with a simple phone

call, or small conversation.

There are other congregations that approach change

by hearing a story.

They need to see, experience their neighbor.

So in the case of LGBT civil rights advocacy, or advocacy

in general, getting to know members of their congregation,

getting to know people in their immediate community,

is crucial to help people commit to be on the journey

and to speak out on behalf of their friends and neighbors.

Other types of congregations, it's like the suffering servant

kind of a model, where you need to really clearly understand

the injustice, clearly see what the negative impact

is of what's going on and why that needs to be changed.

And once they understand that, oh my gosh, watch out.

Not that everyone is the neat categories,

but there are different ways to approach congregations

to get them to engage in helping to change the world.

KEVIN INDOVINO: I don't want to miss this point with the story

that you shared with me, your first mailing

for CREATE Justice and having envelopes returned.

Just tell me about that.

Tell me about becoming official with official letterhead

and sending it out, and then some of the response

that you got from it.

RALPH CARTER: CREATE Justice, as a committee,

said, well, we have to come up with our own branding.

So at that time, nationally and internationally,

there was a lot of conversation about the persecution of gays

and lesbians during the Holocaust.

So there's a Holocaust Remembrance Day that

was starting to happen locally.

And so we took the pink triangle,

the inverted pink triangle, as a logo.

So we had the pink triangle, and then

CREATE Justice for lesbian and gay persons.

And we put it right there on the envelope,

right there on the top of our letterhead of our letters.

And so I think for our first mailing

we had maybe two to five hundred people.

We actually collected a lot of names of people from Rochester

to Buffalo to Albany.

This wasn't our first letter, but I

think about maybe our fifth or sixth one.

Everything was going fine, and then

we finally got our letterhead printed,

and our envelopes printed.

So we said OK, this is great.

Let's send this letter out.

So we sent the letter out, and then we got twenty or thirty

angry letters in response.

And in the case of some, return to sender, unopened.

And we hadn't had that before.

And then we had this crisis.

How can we be a civil rights advocacy network

if we're unwilling to say that we're advocating

for gay and lesbian people, even though it

is on the front of an envelope.

At that time in the early 1980s, even talking

about lesbian and gay civil rights

was a risky proposition for many people,

especially people in the church.

They felt very vulnerable about that,

because they hadn't really articulated,

we hadn't articulated as a community, what it means

to be a lesbian or gay person.

And what does it mean to be a person of faith who

is concerned about the welfare of neighbors

who may be gay or lesbian?

So we were shocked at all this returned mail.

So we began using Presbyterian envelopes,

and used the letterhead on the inside.

So that was necessary at that time.

KEVIN INDOVINO: In retrospect, people looking back at the work

that you've done through the church for gay advocacy, what

do you want them to know most about what you've done?

What are you most proud of?

What is the greatest impact do you think that you've

had that you really want people to know about,

in what you've done through the church for gay advocacy?

RALPH CARTER: I'm a reluctant advocate,

as I mentioned earlier.

And it's not so much what I do, it's what we do,

and what we have done.

Everything that I've done is always

in partnership with other people.

Probably the biggest discovery, if you will,

is by speaking from your heart, people,

even though they might be terrified,

we're talking about sex, oh my gosh, they resonate with that.

If you speak truly, speak truthfully,

and speak honestly and openly, there

is tremendous strength in vulnerability.

And doing that, people begin to see themselves,

and they see how--

if you're comfortable in your own skin,

people are comfortable with you.

More comfortable, or likely to be.

So most of my fears about working for change

have been unfounded.

The fears have been my own fear, internalized fear.

Because once I speak with people,

or in a group of people, in a conversation,

then we move forward.

And it's an amazing thing how that happens.

But there is tremendous strength in vulnerability.

Truth leads to power.

I mean, truth can speak to power.

Truth is power.

So I'd say, that's the biggest discovery for me.

KEVIN INDOVINO: One more question comes to mind.

Then I'll have to stop thinking of questions here.

(unintelligible).

The Presbyterian churches here in Rochester, Downtown, Third

Pres, whatever.

They became More Light churches, they've

become more accepting of gays and lesbians,

become advocates for gay and lesbian rights,

march in the gay and lesbian--

RALPH CARTER: Pride parade.