Last Updated on January 12, 2024 by Kittredge Cherry
Hands Around the God Box was an interfaith prayer vigil to end religious homophobia. It was held at the Interchurch Center in New York City on June 24, 1994 as part of Stonewall 25 events.
More than 500 people from 15 LGBTQ religious groups joined hands and were linked by a rainbow ribbon that completely encircled the Interchurch Center at 475 Riverside Drive. The box-shaped 19-story building housed the headquarters of the World Council of Chuches, the U.S. National Council of Churches (NCC) and many other religious agencies. Q Spirit is honoring LGBTQ history by highlighting this liong-forgotten landmark event here.
“I came up with the idea for Hands Around the God Box and organized it as national ecumenical officer for Metropolitan Community Churches (MCC),” said Q Spirit founder Kittredge Cherry. “I will never forget the solemn power of our combined prayers as LGBTQ Christians and our allies joined hands at the God Box. The building is huge, covering an entire city block, and our group of 500 barely managed to surround it — with help from a super-long rainbow ribbon. The prayers we prayed back then made an impact, and there has been progress over the past quarter century. The need for all churches to welcome LGBTQ people is just as true now as in 1994, so our prayers continue.”
Hands Around the God Box was coordinated by Cherry and Kim Byham of Integrity, the Episcopal LGBTQ group. It was held on the 25th anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion that launched the modern LGBTQ liberation movement.
Kittredge Cherry speaks at Hands Around the God-Box, a prayer demonstration to end homophobia in the church. Photo by Audrey Lockwood.
The peaceful demonstration began at noon Fri., June 24, 1994, with a short worship service. Speakers included Cherry and Nancy Wilson, who was MCC’s chief ecumenical officer at the time.
“Today 475 Riverside Drive is our Stonewall Inn. We need to turn the tables on the religious ‘police’ of our day, and fight back,” Wilson proclaimed.
Demonstrators then joined hands around the building in silent prayer for full inclusion of LGBTQ people in religious life. They represented the full range of Christian traditions — Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox.
NCC General Secretary Joan Campbell and many NCC staff members joined the demonstration, even through the NCC refused to grant membership or even observer status to MCC, which ministers primarily in the LGBTQ community.
The event concluded with tying a rainbow ribbon around the God Box to symbolize continuing prayers for the church to honor the diversity God created.
After the prayer vigil ended at 1 p.m., smaller groups of demonstrators attempted to meet with representatives of church-affiliated agencies housed in the building to express their demand for justice for LGBTQ people within individual denominations and ecumenical organizations.
Later Wilson rose to become moderator of the entire MCC denomination. She chronicles the history of MCC and some of her ecumenical activism with Cherry in her book “Outing the Church: 40 Years in the Queer Christian Movement.”
Calling the church to repentance
Wilson’s speech at Hands Around the God Box was quoted extensively in an article titled “Protestors demonstrate at InterChurch Center: ‘Out of the Box and Into The Street’” in the July-August 1994 issue of Second Stone. It is available online at the LGBTQ Religious Archives Network. The article reports:
Wilson said it was time to Wilson’s speech at Hands Around the God Box was quoted extensively in an article titled “Protestors demonstrate at InterChurch Center: ‘Out of the Box and Into The Street’” in the July-August 1994 issue of Second Stone. It is available online at the LGBTQ Religious Archives Network. The article reports:
Wilson said it was time to call the church to repentance and conversion. “Not the repentance that sounds like an abusive spouse that keeps saying ‘I’m sorry’ while continuing to repeat the abuse,” said Wilson. “I’m sorry isn’t going to cut it anymore. Change is the only meaningful currency of repentance.”
Wilson charged the charged the church and other religious institutions with being giant closets of shame, repression, exclusion and rejection. “For 26 years, MCC, and so many other religious movements have lovingly confronted, educated, loved, and prayed for the religious establishment,’ said Wilson. “We’ve been dialogued with, debated about, been the objects of endless studies, and many broken promises. We’ve held their hands, cajoled, pushed, and the results are all too often a continued silence.”
and conversion. “Not the repentance that sounds like an abusive spouse that keeps saying ‘I’m sorry’ while continuing to repeat the abuse,” said Wilson. “I’m sorry isn’t going to cut it anymore. Change is the only meaningful currency of repentance.”Wilson charged the charged the church and other religious institutions with being giant closets of shame, repression, exclusion and rejection. “For 26 years, MCC, and so many other religious movements have lovingly confronted, educated, loved, and prayed for the religious establishment,’ said Wilson. “We’ve been dialogued with, debated about, been the objects of endless studies, and many broken promises. We’ve held their hands, cajoled, pushed, and the results are all too often a continued silence.”
In addition to UFMCC, co-sponsors of Hands Around the God-Box included American Baptists Concerned for Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual People; Axios: Eastern & Orthodox Christian Gay Men and Women; CLOUT (Christian Lesbians OUT Together); the Conference for Catholic Lesbians; Dignity (Roman Catholic); Interweave (Unitarian Universalists for Lesbian/Bi/Gay/Transgender Concerns); Integrity (Episcopalian); Lutherans Concerned/North America and Presbyterians for Lesbian and Gay Concerns.
News media covered Hands Around the God Box
The Washington Post covered Hands Around the God Box on June 25, 1994 with an article by Christopher Herlinger of the Religion News Service titled “Gays Returning to Religion, but Few Arms Open: Little Acceptance of Homosexuals 25 Years After Stonewall Uprising.” The article stated:
“A protest yesterday by a coalition of gay and lesbian Christians at the Interchurch Center here spotlighted what Wilson and other protesters called the ‘exclusion of lesbian and gay people from full participation in the life of the nation’s churches.’
The protest, a ‘human chain’ around the Interchurch Center, was called ‘Hands Around the God Box,’ — a reference to the building’s popular nickname. The building, in upper Manhattan, is home to a number of denominational offices and the national headquarters of the National Council of Churches, the nation’s largest ecumenical organization.
The 32 member churches of the council are divided over the issue of homosexuality.”
Some said that Hands Around the God Box was the spiritual heart of the whole Stonewall 25 celebration in New York. Reaction to the God Box event was summed up later by Mary Hunt, cofounder of the Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics and ritual, in her sermon the next day: “How about those Hands Around the God Box people? What a feat of religious athleticism: holding hands, singing, praying, protesting and talking to the press all at once ought to merit some sort of miraculous metal or actual grace!”
Demonstrators join hands around the God Box to pray for an end to religious homophobia. This photo by William Tom was published in the August 1994 issue of “Keeping in Touch: News and Notes from the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches” and the July-August 1994 issue of Second Stone.
MCC founder Troy Perry is clearly visible in the crowd at Hands Around the God Box. Standing next to him is Otis Charles, Episcopal bishop who came out as gay in 1993. Photo by Audrey Lockwood.
The Washington Post covered Hands Around the God Box in an article titled “Gays Returning to Religion, but Few Arms Open: Little Acceptance of homosexuals 25 Years After Stonewall Uprising” on June 25, 1994.
One of the original news releases promoting Hands Around the God Box is preserved at the University of North Texas Libraries. Dated May 4, 1994, the headline reads, “Hundreds To Demand Justice For Lesbian/Gay Christians At New York City’s Interchurch Center.” The news release is available online through the UNT Digital Library.
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Top image credit:
Hundreds of LGBTQ Christians form a ring around New York’s Interchurch Center to protest religious exclusion in Hands Around the God Box. This photo was published in the Washington Post on June 25, 1994.
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This post is part of the LGBTQ Calendar series by Kittredge Cherry. The series celebrates religious and spiritual holidays, events in LGBT and queer history, holy days, feast days, festivals, anniversaries, liturgical seasons and other occasions of special interest to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people of faith and our allies.
This article was originally published on Q Spirit on Aug. 1, 2021 and most recently updated on Feb. 13, 2023.
Copyright © Kittredge Cherry. All rights reserved.
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