06/01/2026
Happy Pride Month. 🌈
This month, we celebrate LGBTQIA+ people in all their diversity and experience. We celebrate those who are out and proud. We celebrate those who are questioning. We celebrate those who are not yet ready or able to be open about who they are. We celebrate those who have been rejected and those who have found acceptance. We celebrate those who are thriving and those who are simply trying to make it through another day.
No matter where you find yourself on that journey, you are worthy of love, dignity, belonging, and celebration.
As an inclusive and affirming church, we also recognize that Pride Month is about more than celebration.
While many communities will celebrate this month, many LGBTQIA+ people - especially transgender people and LGBTQIA+ youth - continue to face discrimination, exclusion, harassment, and violence. Too many are still told that who they are makes them less worthy of love, belonging, safety, or respect.
As followers of Jesus, we believe every person is created with sacred worth. We believe no one should have to choose between being fully themselves and being fully welcomed in a community of faith. We believe love calls us not merely to tolerate one another, but to affirm one another’s humanity and dignity.
So yes, we celebrate Pride.
We celebrate joy. We celebrate authenticity. We celebrate the gifts LGBTQIA+ people bring to our community, our church, and our world.
But we also recommit ourselves to the work that remains. We recommit ourselves to standing alongside those who are marginalized, speaking when silence would be easier, and building communities where everyone can know they are fully seen, fully loved, and fully included.
Happy Pride Month.
May we have the courage not only to celebrate our LGBTQIA+ siblings, but to stand with them, learn from them, and work for a world where every person can live openly, safely, and with dignity.
