Episode 4: LGBTQ+ Spiritual and Secular Inclusion and Inspiration

Demystifying Diversity

In the fourth episode of Season 2 of the Demystifying Diversity Podcast, host Daralyse Lyons explores the ways in which multiple communities are coming together in ways that amplify love and inclusion. By exploring how the LGBTQ+ community, various faith communities, and assorted secular communities are working to increase LGBTQ+ safety and visibility, this episode focuses on effective inclusion practices, while also shining a light on the ways in which there is still room for growth.

In this episode, you will learn about:

• The critical importance of intersectionality, what it is, and how it can support in creating inclusivity not just for LGBTQ+ folks, but for anyone.

• The importance of partnerships between the LGBTQ+ and faith communities, and how both can be driving forces of identity.

• Ideas for how to do the deep work of fully realizing your own, unique identity.

• How championing people to honor and embrace all of who they are creates the most inclusive spaces, and prioritizes individuals over their isolated identity markers.

• The importance of Pride, and other festivals that celebrate humanity in creating safe, inclusive and joyous spaces.

• That there is no, one, singular experience of “identity.”

Our guests in this episode include:

Kasey Suffredini - CEO & National Campaign Director for Freedom For All Americans, a bipartisan organization whose mission it is to secure full nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ people nationwide. Kasey is a nationally recognized campaign strategist and expert in LGBTQ issue advocacy.

Cathy Renna - Kathy is the Principal of Target Cue and Communications Director at the National LGBTQ Task Force. Cathy has played a central role in shaping nearly all major issues affecting media representation of the LGBTQ+ community, from the beating death of Matthew Shepard in 1998 to the fight for marriage equality to working with the team that coordinated historic coverage for the 50th Anniversary of Stonewall.

Patrick Sammon - one of the co-authors and co-directors of the documentary CURED, which is an in depth illumination of the struggle between LGBTQ activists and advocates and the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from its manual of mental illness.

Britt East - Inspirational Speaker and Award-Winning, Best-Selling Author of “A Gay Man's Guide to Life: Get Real, Stand Tall and Take Your Place.”

Robyn Ochs - Educator, speaker, grassroots activist, and editor of Bi Women Quarterly and two Bi+ specific anthologies: the 42-country collection “Getting Bi: Voices of Bisexuals Around the World” and “RECOGNIZE: The Voices of Bisexual Men.”

Yuval David - Award-winning actor, host, filmmaker and advocate whose most recent work, a full-length documentary entitled “Wonderfully Made,” specifically engages with what he refers to as LGBTQ+R - which means, “LGBTQ + Religion.”

Reverend Naomi Washington-Leapheart - Director for Faith-Based and Interfaith Affairs for the City of Philadelphia and former Faith Outreach Director at the National LGBTQ Task Force,

Angel Gravely - Bisexual educator, writer, speaker, and advocate based in the Philadelphia area. Since 2013, she has worked to bridge opportunity and knowledge gaps between marginalized and privileged communities by addressing LGBTQ+ issues from an intersectional lens.

Jen O'Ryan - the founder of Double Tall Consulting, and the author of “Inclusive AF: A Field Guide for Accidental Diversity Experts.”

Rayceen Pendarvis - "Queen of The Shameless Plug, the Empress of Pride and The Goddess of DC" is a father of five, grandfather of two and mother of many.

Reverend Rebecca Seely - Becca Seely is the executive director of The Vine NYC campus ministry network and its parent organization, Lutheran Ministries in Higher Education. She graduated from Yale Divinity School in 2012 with a Master of Divinity and also holds a Certificate in Advanced Theological Studies from Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary. She is an ordained pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Currently, she serves students directly as co-pastor of LaMP, pastor of PRiSM, and as a chaplain at New York University.

Kelly Inviere - the author of Where the Light Shines Through: A Memoir in Poetry. She is a poet, author, and artist living in the greater Washington, D.C. area.

Click here for a full transcript of this episode.