The Rev. Brandon C. Ashcraft
A Eucharist Commemorating LGBTQIA+ Pride
1 Samuel 18:1-5 / Matthew 22:34-40
June 11, 2025
Trinity Church in the City of Boston
Proclaiming the Gospel with Pride
People of Trinity Church: Happy Pride! It is good to be together for tonight’s Pride Eucharist! Because this is our first celebration, I want to begin by answering two important questions: what is a Pride Eucharist, and why are we celebrating one? We recently resurrected an LGBTQ+ ministry at Trinity, which has adopted the name “OUT@Trinity,” and its mission is to foster a culture that wholeheartedly embraces the LGBTQ community at a time when our world sorely needs this message of inclusion. This Pride Eucharist reflects that effort, and Trinity is not alone.
Each June, more and more faith communities are celebrating Pride Eucharists, and as we were planning this service, I researched several of these offerings online. One memorable service was from Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. Their recent service ended with rainbow confetti raining down from the ceiling as the procession left the church to “I’m Coming Out” by Diana Ross!1 Grace Cathedral (San Francisco). “June 4, 2023: Sunday 6 p.m. Pride Mass.” June 4, 2023. Video, 01:27:00, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60f-CnneNEc. And while we have neither rainbow confetti nor Diana Ross, we do have what truly defines a Pride Eucharist:
- Readings of scripture that affirm queer people’s place in the story of God’s people,
- Prayers that focus on the needs and concerns of LGBTQ+ folks, and,
- A community to gather around this table as one family in Christ to receive the sacrament of Communion.
Friends, we are celebrating this Pride Eucharist because we are called to proclaim the gospel and to participate in Christ’s ministry of reconciling the world. It is our very mission as the Church to repair what has been broken by sin and “to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.”2 “The Catechism,” in The Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments and Other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church Together with The Psalter or Psalms of David (New York, NY: The Church Hymnal Corporation, 1979). For many in the LGBTQ community, their relationship with the Church has been broken. Many have been deeply wounded by churches that have denied their humanity and continue to exclude them from full participation. Indeed, just yesterday, the largest Protestant denomination in the county voted overwhelmingly to call for the overturning of the Supreme Court decision that legalized same-sex marriage in this country.3 Southern Baptists call to overturn Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage – The New York Times, June 9, 2025, https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/10/us/southern-baptist-obergefell-same-sex-marriage.html.
This service is our chance to speak with voices loud and clear that we know LGBTQ+ people to be beloved children of God created in God’s image. This service sends the message that at Trinity Church in the City of Boston, LGBTQ+ people are welcome to participate fully in our common life. To be washed in our baptismal font. To be nourished at Christ’s table. To use their God-given gifts to God’s glory. Many of us who have been at Trinity or part of the Episcopal Church for a long time might take it for granted that we are welcome at church. But many queer people have no concept of that welcome. They can’t imagine being part of a church community because they have no reference for what that looks like. And this dilemma resonates with my own experience of coming out.
Growing up in the 80s and 90s in Mississippi and Tennessee, I could not imagine my life as a gay man. I had no examples in my life of gay people living openly. I had no flesh-and-blood reference points. It was not until my early 20s when I arrived on the magical island of Manhattan that I discovered gay people living joyful lives in the light of day. I’ll never forget the first time I saw two men walking down the street holding hands. It positively blew my mind! Here, finally, was a public witness. Gay people loving who God created them to love, embracing who God created them to be. I finally had living, breathing, incarnate examples of the life I never knew I could have. Then, I met Christians who told me that I could be gay and love Jesus. They even suggested that the story we heard moments ago – the one where “[Jonathan] loved [David] as his own soul”4 1 Samuel 18:3 (NRSVUE) – meant that God had been blessing queer love from the very beginning.
This Saturday, we will have two ways to offer a similar witness by participating in the Boston Pride for the People celebration. Some of us will gather on the Clarendon lawn to cheer on the parade, while others will walk in the parade alongside Episcopal parishes from across the diocese, led by our new bishop. By cheering from the lawn, and by walking in the parade, we will be, in the words of St. Paul, “ambassadors for Christ,”5 2 Corinthians 5:20 signaling our desire to celebrate LGBTQ+ people and to welcome them into our communities of faith. This Sunday, on the same weekend as Pride, we will also celebrate our title feast: Trinity Sunday. And the doctrine of the Trinity, from which our parish takes its name, also has something to say to us tonight.
In the Genesis creation story, we are reminded that humankind was made in the image and likeness of God.6 Genesis 1:27 And the doctrine of the Trinity tells us that the God in whose image and likeness we were created is a community of three in one. A community that embodies unity and diversity. Created in the image of this Triune God, our diversity of gender expression and sexual orientation is affirmed as good, even as we are bound together in love as members of one family. By embracing LGBTQ+ people to be a part of our community, we become a more perfect reflection of the Triune God.
This, my friends, is why we celebrate a Pride Eucharist. Right now, we have neighbors who are bereft of the knowledge that God loves them. Neighbors who need our public witness. Neighbors who need us to show them Jesus. As we heard in our Gospel, Jesus gives us very clear marching orders. We are to love God and to love our neighbor.7 Matthew 22:37-39 To love our neighbor is to show them God’s love, as the body of his Son, extending our arms to welcome them. This Pride Eucharist is our message that we’re saving a seat for them here. In this community where they can meet Jesus in the words of Holy Scripture. In the waters of Holy Baptism. And in the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, gathered around this table as one family, created in the image of God. Amen.