A conversation in a gay bar changed my opinion on sexuality

A conversation on the dancefloor of a gay bar in Chicago challenged much of Christopher Landau’s beliefs about LGBT people and Christianity. But perhaps not in the way you might expect

This is the story of how I changed my mind on theology and sexuality. 

I was visiting Boystown, one of the first officially-designated LGBT neighbourhoods in the United States, while recording interviews for a BBC World Service documentary, later broadcast as God and Gays: Bridging the Gulf. 

The project centred around the work of an evangelical author, Andrew Marin, whose 2009 book, Love is an Orientation: Elevating the Conversation with the Gay Community had prompted widespread discussion about the extent to which orthodox Christianity should engage with LGBT culture.  

Marin’s approach was unusual, to say the least. Several times each year, his foundation would hire out the largest gay bar in the neighbourhood, and host an evening of open conversation which he called a ‘Living in the Tension’ gathering. Anyone, with any perspective on Christian faith and sexuality, was welcome to attend. The only proviso was a commitment to respectful dialogue and careful listening.  

For the purposes of our radio documentary, we were re-creating something akin to the flavour of such a gathering, interviewing a range of people who represented the different perspectives that Marin regularly encountered. And it was at this moment, with a microphone in hand on the dancefloor, that I realised I needed to confront my own prejudice about Christians and sexuality.  

The conversation that changed it all

This was the summer of 2011. On top of making the radio documentary, I was also one year into training for ordained ministry in the Church of England. 

It is probably worth saying that I began theological college with fairly standard liberal views on sexuality. But as we recorded our interviews in the heart of Chicago’s LGBT community, I realised that…