President’s Message for January

Winter greetings!

I am writing this from Kirkridge Retreat Center in Bangor, Penn., where I am attending my annual gay Christian men’s gathering. I had forgotten all about the newsletter deadline until I happened to check in for e-mail messages this morning and saw a reminder for the board to show up early on Monday evening for a stuffing-and-licking party—that is, to prepare the newsletter for mailing. I hope this makes it into said newsletter!

I’ve been pondering all day what I would write to you. Whatever your faith tradition is, I highly recommend this sort of event—and all faith traditions have them. At the very least, it gets you out of your usual daily routine, which in and of itself can lead to breakthroughs of insight. But any gathering of gay men has its own electric energy, which only gets intensified when there is a common purpose or belief at the core.

The way this event works is that there are two main presenters (this year they are Chris Glaser and Terry Flynn, for those who might have heard of one or the other). The whole gathering assembles in so-called plenary sessions at various points throughout the extended weekend (Thursday dinner through Sunday lunch), at which general announcements are made, and the presenters each speak twice and have one workshop. There are also breakout sessions into preassigned small groups, where we get to decompress together from time to time throughout the event, processing what the two main presenters had to say in the plenary sessions, but also discussing any topic that happens to come up. I have received huge quantities of love and support from the seven men in my own small group, and I already feel energized to return to the Seacoast tomorrow and see great things happening for me this year.

Last evening one of the presenters did a workshop on centering meditation as a way of revealing one’s true self. The final exercise was an “angel walk.” The only other time I did an angel walk was at Gay Men Together a number of years back, and it was wonderful then as now. For the benefit of those who have not yet been to GMT, allow me to describe how an angel walk works. The men form two lines facing each other. (Last night a participant playfully observed, “Oh, it’s like the Virginia Reel!”) The lead “angel” starts by taking one of the men closest to him (whether from the left or the right line), hugs him from behind, and then sends him forward between the lines with a message of love and support. As the man proceeds slowly between the two lines of angels, they caress him lovingly with their hands and offer their own words of love and support as they guide him down the walk. At the end he is embraced by the last angel and then takes his own position in one of the two lines. Meanwhile the lead angel hugs the next man from behind and sends him down the walk. This continues until everyone has experienced the angel walk, including the lead angel, himself. It is profoundly spiritual and affirming.

Perhaps we can do some variation of these activities at SGM, so you don’t have to wait until the next spring GMT event to experience them. Despite meeting in a Unitarian-Universalist church, SGM is not affiliated with any religious denomination, so there would certainly be no religious dimension to these activities. But SGM already has a wonderful sense of loving community; these sorts of bonding exercises could only enhance that.

Until next month, be out, be proud, and be aware of the many angels that surround you!

Carl