Accent on Acceptance

Many other churches would argue that they preach the same thing. But most fundamentalist churches--and even those in many more liberal denominations--approach homosexuality with the message that "God loves a sinner."

For 30 years, the Metropolitan Community Church, where Wilson preaches, has been offering a far different message that avoids any firm definition of sexual sin. It is a message that at times has sparked angry confrontations.

In 1973, an irate man rushed the altar as she was celebrating Communion in Boston, kicked over the sacred symbols and punched her in the face.

Another incident occurred one night in West Hollywood Park, where a group of fundamentalist Christians was taunting lesbian and gay Christians. Wilson said she was urgently summoned to the scene and managed to defuse the confrontation.

"Jesus never preached in ways that make people who are poor and outcast feel worse," she recalls telling the crowd. "What would Jesus be doing here in West Hollywood Park tonight?"

Since its founding in Huntington Park in 1968 by the Rev. Elder Troy Perry, the MCC has grown from a small house church with 12 members to a worldwide denomination reporting 42,000 members and more than 300 churches in 15 countries, mostly in North America.

MCC churches baptize in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They affirm the Old and New Testaments as the word of God. They celebrate Communion using traditional Christian formulas. Their liturgy and prayers reflect Roman Catholic and Anglican influences, and their preaching borrows from the style--but not always the content--of evangelical Protestant churches.

Musically, the churches blend traditional hymns familiar to worshipers elsewhere with the kind of contemporary music found in growing Pentecostal and evangelical churches, complete with drums and electric instruments.

"We identify ourselves as a Christian church," said Wilson, who is senior pastor of the MCC's mother church in West Hollywood. She is also one of seven elders, a bishop-like position, who oversee the denomination.

But clearly, what makes the MCC stand out is that it is a church run by and for lesbians and gay men, many of whom Wilson calls the "religiously wounded."