23 years preserving LGBTQ religious history

LGBTQ-RAN News        June 25, 2025  

History is written from the perspective of those who preserve their records.

LGBTQ-RAN has just released an updated, video-rich Archiving Toolkit, informed by years of experience in historical preservation. This toolkit offers concise “how-to” information about the overall process of donating records to an archives as well as in-depth information about archiving digital records, paper records, and social media. 

Sections on oral histories, archival terminology, finding an archives, and protecting privacy answer the most frequently-asked questions. Video clips feature administrators explaining how they approach and organize the process, and gain the confidence to make wise choices for the long-term preservation of their heritage and history.

Please take a couple of moments to look through the Toolkit and share it with your friends and colleagues.  Archivist Doris Malkmus welcomes your feedback, and is available to answer any questions about archiving your historical records. Contact Doris at doris@lgbtqreligiousarchives.org.

Join historian Gillian Frank, Ph.D. in this interactive workshop and discussion that will offer information about and reflections on methodological and ethical approaches to undertaking queer and religious oral history research.  Topics will include: queer oral history theory and methods; best practices for interviewing religious and LGBTQIA narrators; different technologies for recording oral histories; and asking strong initial and followup questions. Find more information about the workshop and presenter at this link.

Sign up here to get the link to join this Zoom meeting on Tuesday, July 15th, at 10:00am Pacific/11:00am Mountain/12:00pm Central/1:00pm Eastern.  

Join Heather White and author Brian Blackmore in a discussion of the newly published To Hear and to Respond: The Quakers’ Groundbreaking Push for Gay Liberation, 1946-1973. In this book, Blackmore tells the story of Quaker support for gay rights in the mid-20th century as demonstrated through experiments in criminal justice reform, challenges to Christian moral codes, advocacy for the decriminalization of homosexuality, and efforts to instigate attitudinal change both within and beyond the Quaker world. Quaker initiatives during this era included: the first social service organization for gay people in the U.S.; the first public and positive statement on homosexuality from a religious perspective; and the first public statement in support of bisexuality from a religious assembly. Find more information about the workshop and presenter at this link.

Sign up here to get the link to join this Zoom webinar on Thursday, September 11th, at 5:00pm Pacific/6:00pm Mountain/7:00pm Central/8:00pm Eastern.  

Jessica Barshay Papers contains the correspondence, journals, newsletters, subject files and professional papers of this lesbian feminist psychotherapist (1940-1998) who identied with Jewish and Buddhist faith traditions and lived in northern California and Arizona. 

Robert M. Falls Interview is a videocassette of a March 10, 1976 interview with Rev. Robert Falls about the founding of MCC Houston.

Martin Koehler Papers includes extensive records from the MCC of the Sierras in the late 1980s when Koehler was an active member there. Also includes information about Koehler's trip to the National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights on October 14, 1979.

Cees Van Aalst Papers is a folder of papers documenting the consecration of John Darcy Noble as bishop at Church of the Beloved Disciple in 1980 and the MCC Pillars Dinner, an annual fundraiser beginning in 1989.
 

At its meeting earlier this month the LGBTQ-RAN board of directors elected Selisse Berry and Ve'Amber Miller to serve on the board.  Berry is the retired executive director of Out and Equal who was an activist in Presbyterian LGBTQ networks.  Miller is a public historian at John Hopkins University and past intern with LGBTQ-RAN.  The board expressed great appreciation to Brendan Fay and Joel Kushner who completed their terms of service on the board.

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LGBTQ Religious Archives Network
P.O. Box 408565
Chicago, IL 60640
United States

lgbtqreligiousarchives.org