Growing up in the Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans way back in the late 70’s - early 80’s looked just like any other inner city neighborhood. Like many of you, my neighborhood also had a church on just about every other block, but there was something going on within my local church that impacted a few young men in a very damaging way.
Our local church was known for having some of the best preaching in the city, and the choir could go toe to toe with some of the more famous mass choirs of its day, but one of the ills of a mass choir is they attract masses of gay men.
Directly next door to me lived a very close and dear friend that I will refer to as Kerry. The interesting fact about Kerry was he was just a normal teenage boy, up until the time he joined 1st Thessalonians Baptist Church on Caffin Ave (in the Lower 9th Ward).
First Thessalonians Baptist Church featured the fiery preaching of Rev. Edmond G. Prevost, Sr, a very active, approachable, and humble servant of our Lord. His passion to grow this neighborhood church into vital resource for my Lower 9th Ward community came with a very unfortunate compromise; the choir director was a flamboyantly effeminate man.
My childhood friend joined 1st Thessalonians Baptist Church and became a very active member of the choir. After a while, he stopped playing touch football with the crew in the middle of the street and opted to only attend non-stop choir rehearsals. This strict regimen of rehearsals was a mandate of choir director Mr. Reuben, and my buddy simply fell in line.
We began to notice a gradual change in Kerry’s behavior and mannerism, from that of typically masculine, to the appearance of soft and reserved. His style of clothes changed, his friends changed, and the way he sported his hair dramatically changed.
The Chicken Or The Egg?
On my block we had a term called getting “turned out” which translated to say that someone had molested you, and now you’re gay. Someone in the choir had “turned out” my friend, but who was responsible?
Fast forward the clock from 1985 to 2011 and I now report that my friend Kerry is a very openly gay African American Man.
The reason why I wanted to share this story is because Kerry started out the same as all the other young men in my neighborhood, but I can place my finger on the exact moment he detoured down the path to a gay lifestyle.
Some would even argue that Kerry was already gay before he joined the choir at 1st Thessalonians Baptist Church, but I would present a very strong rebuttal to that thought process. He was just as normal as I was, I would know, because he was one of my closest childhood friends. Despite those who would discount the fact that a young impressionable man can be influenced by an openly gay man then please allow me to present my friend, who was introduced to a world of homosexuality.
Once again, I state that Kerry was a normal teen until he joined the choir that was under the direction of an openly gay man. It is my firm belief that when my friend embraced his new choir members over hanging with me and the crew, he also embraced the lifestyles of the gay men within that choir. He also decided at that moment to adapt the mannerisms of someone whom he considered to be a mentor, the gay choir director.
I don’t believe that Kerry was gay first; I believe that he was straight first, and then became gay. He submerged himself in a sea of feminine men, and as a direct result, he became one of them.
Maybe it’s The Choir Robes?
As you can image, I was very upset at losing my buddy to the lifestyle of “Church Gay” so in a last ditch effort to understand it I turned to my brutally honest uncle. This was a big mistake because his entire theory centered on the notion that there must be something in choir robes that made them gay. Then he progressed to his second offset theory that it must be something in the organ bench that made them gay. Like I said, turning to him was a very big mistake. It’s a good thing that I never accepted his theory of “Gay-volution” or I would have really missed the real issue of why straight teenage boys are getting turned out in church.
Our church choirs have always featured gay men regardless of the anti-gay message preached from the pulpit. Long before the debate over gay marriages, we as the people who sat in the pews have witnessed the marriages of ambitious pastors and openly gay choir directors on a routine basis.
In a quest to grow the congregation into a “Mega-Church” by exploiting choir members, pastors have existed in a visible contradiction by ignoring the life style of their choir directors.
In the City of New Orleans we had very famous, but yet obviously gay choir directors; some even went on to receive national acclaim.
Alvin S. Hadley - Gospel Soul Children
Phillip Britton – Greater St. Stephens under Bishop Paul S. Morton
Raymond Miles – Served as both a choir director and renowned gospel recording artist.
Alvin Hadley and the Gospel Soul Children changed the entire presentation and sound of gospel music in the 1980’s. This dynamic choir was loaded with some of the best voices in the city, which only aided in the spreading of the HIV virus that infected the group and took the life of its founder, Alvin S. Hadley.
Phillip Britton of Greater St. Stephens was very gifted in the art of directing a choir as well as a song writer. He is most noted for a very famous alter call song titled “We offer Christ to you” performed originally with Bishop Paul Morton. Likewise, in 1999 Phillip Britton was a defendant in a case in which the plaintiff (a 16 year old boy at the time of the incident) charged that Britton had sex with him over 50 times.
Raymond Miles, a favorite at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Gospel Tent (also Essence Music Festival) is still considered by most to be one of the most influential gospel artists from New Orleans. Anyone who had the opportunity to see one of Raymond Miles performances came away with two realizations.
(1) Raymond Miles was very talented,
(2) Raymond Miles was very gay.
All three men are now deceased in which two of them (Alvin Hadley and Phillip Britton) both died of HIV. Raymond Miles death was surrounded with stories of a gay quarrel that resulted in his murder and carjacking.The one thing that all three of these men had in common (other than their questionable life styles) is the traditional Baptist church choir.
A Or B Selection Only!
Our young sons are very impressionable no matter if it’s Lil Wayne, Michael Vick, or Tonex, at some point we will have to address this presence of feminine acting men within our congregations. If a young man decides to join the gay life style after he has already reached the age of adulthood then the guardian of that young man is not at fault for his life choices. Fault is only assigned when parents allow gay men in church leadership to seduce their sons into a lifestyle that is clearly banned in the scriptures.
We can no longer tolerate the gay choir director anymore then we can tolerate the masculine prophetess, somehow this has to stop. Within our congregations are men and women with sub-agendas, ulterior motives, and selfish intents, all seeking to devour the innocence of our teens. Our youth are now being targeted and recruited within the one place where they should be free to develop into powerful men and women of God.
Young men will become the options they’re presented, whether negative or positive. As parents, our challenge is to control their exposure, even the environment they’re exposed to within the church. Controlling their exposure does not mean to limit it, but rather to play a major role in the lifestyle and career path of your teenage son.
Choir directors / ministers of music are very luminous personalities by design whom often receive a tremendous amount of accolades and compliments for their performances. To a very impressionable teen who struggles to get acknowledgments and compliments, they can very easily conclude that the flamboyant behavior of the choir director is the best way to get noticed, even if he’s gay.
The intent of this article is to come across exactly how it reads without the sugarcoating. We have to protect our teens from men within the congregation who would like to add to them to the rosters of alternative lifestyles.
As a pastor, taking a stand against gay marriage also means taking a stand against gay musicians. If you would not officiate a marriage ceremony of a lesbian couple, then don’t sign the pay check of your gay minister of music. When you endorse the pay check of one of your down low staff members you are also endorsing his behavior, and his actions.
Sit Him Down!
We are losing our young men because we have failed to challenge those who refuse to change. Yes, it is their right to be gay, but not in my church!
As the pastor, you have to walk right up to the individual that you feel is influencing the youth of your congregation, and sit him down.
There is no gray area or middle ground, if your choir director / minister of music is effeminate then you are responsible for every young man in your congregation that is recruited into the gay lifestyle due to the influence of his position. Sit him down immediately, which means today.
If you’re sitting on the Board of one of these congregations, then you too are responsible for the presentation of your ministry, sit him down!
I will no longer treat the gay choir director as if it’s all too much about nothing; it’s all too little about something extremely important. Church is not a place that a young man should go only to learn how to act like a woman. Before iron can sharpen iron there has to be the presence of iron within your congregation. The examples that our young men need to absorb are those of real men of God or as my grandmother would call them “Manish Men.”
And no, it is not always easy to sit someone down who is committed and faithful to the ministry, but as pastor you’re not planted for the glitz & glamour, but for the grunt. Don't allow your ministry to succumb to the same level of filth as the GMCA (Gospel Music Workshop of America) which has become nothing more then a "hookup" convention for gay choir directors, and choir members.
Do your job, and protect the borders of your church from the gay culture, which is the sole responsibility of the Shepard/Pastor. To Protect!!!
Rom. 1:26-28,
26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural,
27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.
28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper."
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