THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, March 6, 1995 TAG: 9503060050
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY STEVE STONE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 136 lines
As Mel White, the minister and gay rights activist, prepared to enter the fourth week of a hunger strike today in the Virginia Beach city jail, hundreds of his backers gathered Sunday to rally support.
White, 54, was arrested Feb. 15 for trespassing outside the Christian Broadcasting Network compound. It was his second attempt to meet with Pat Robertson, his former employer, to discuss gay issues.
White's stand has sparked the gay and lesbian community in Hampton Roads as nothing has in two decades.
In a turnout Sunday that surprised the event's organizers, more than 300 people filled the pews of the Unitarian Church of Norfolk. More people watched the event on a television monitor in an adjoining room.
The participants covered the spectrum - from young, single gays and lesbians wearing T-shirts adorned with buttons and pins supporting gay rights, to gray-haired couples in suits and ties.
The group, which also included many nongay supporters, heard words of encouragement and protest from more than 15 speakers. But it was an unlikely participant who drew some of the strongest applause - a straight man, the Virginia Beach police officer who handcuffed and arrested White.
``Three weeks ago I wouldn't have imagined that I'd be standing here today,'' Lt. Wray Boswell, 42, told the crowd. He related how, about 25 years ago, his parents decided he was old enough to learn the family secret: His older brother was gay.
Boswell was at first surprised. ``All my life I just thought he was very artistic,'' he said, drawing understanding laughter. ``Everything now made sense. He wasn't strange; he was just gay.''
Boswell came to be very proud of his brother, John Boswell - an award-winning historian and writer on gay issues who died in December from AIDS.
Boswell, whose precinct includes CBN, decided that if someone would have to arrest White, it would be him.
As White first approached the CBN headquarters on Feb. 14, Boswell told the audience, ``I remember thinking what a noble ideal and what a useless one. Here is a man (Robertson) who has not yet accepted evolution, and (White) is going to try and change his mind on gays and lesbians.''
Boswell said he has since visited White in his cell and has watched the daily, noontime march of a dozen White supporters to the doors of CBN, where the letter they carry - asking that Robertson meet with White - is routinely refused.
``It's not just the Rev. White who is making a difference,'' Boswell said. ``It's all of you who have been walking across that road every day. You have shown you are not the same as everyone else. You are a little better.''
White, a leader in the Metropolitan Community Church, a 32,000-member Christian denomination for gays and lesbians, began his fast in hopes of winning a meeting with Robertson. He wanted to discuss his former boss' often-voiced negative views of homosexuality.
Robertson has refused. In a letter to White - his ghost writer for the book, ``America's Dates with Destiny'' - Robertson said homosexuality ``is the last stage in the decline of a population.''
CBN officials have labeled White's fast and his voluntary jail stint a ``publicity stunt'' and a ``desperate media campaign'' intended to help sell his autobiography.
But in the local gay community, White's acts have galvanized support.
While the gay pride festival draws more than 1,000 participants annually, the last political event to bring the community together in such numbers was the June 1977 appearance in Norfolk of Anita Bryant - anti-gay activist and then-queen of orange juice. At that time, 600 people marched downtown in opposition to her statements.
White's efforts also are slowly beginning to gain national attention, evidenced Sunday by an article in The New York Times and a letter from the son of a former president.
``I admire courage and you seem to possess it in abundance,'' Ron Reagan Jr. wrote White. ``Gay rights equal human rights and, as such, must be the concern not only of homosexuals, not only of Christians, but of all people of conscience . . . Keep fighting the good fight!''
In separate letters to Robertson released Sunday, both of White's parents - who have been longtime members of CBN's Thousand Club - asked that he grant White a five-minute meeting.
``I do not condone his lifestyle. I do not understand it, but he is my son,'' White's father, Carl, wrote from his Scotts Valley, Ca., home. ``He believes your propaganda has resulted in the murder of many gay people. . . it is difficult for me to understand your attitude. It seems you are either afraid of him. . . or your pride and arrogance refuses to let you be Christian.''
Marvin Liebman of Washington, D.C., a prominent conservative strategist and fund-raiser who worked with Ronald Reagan and write the book ``Coming Out Conservative,'' told the audience that White ``is a truly gracious man'' and that Robertson ``is a truly evil man.''
Liebman once supported Robertson and other prominent conservative preachers like Jerry Falwell in their fight against communism.
``But the (Berlin) Wall fell and communism was defeated and they needed some enemy to keep them powerful and rich,'' he said. That enemy, he said, is homosexuals. ``The same rhetoric used against communism is used almost word-for-word against homosexual,'' he said.
Patrick Heck of Virginians for Justice, a statewide lobbying group based in Richmond, said evidence shows that hate crimes against gays and lesbians have risen in Virginia as has the rhetoric against them.
Heck said his group has documented 30 attacks in the past year against homosexuals or people perceived by their attacker to be homosexual. Those include four murders.
Don Davis of Williamsburg, a member of the board of directors of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, said such violence ``will continue happening as long as the majority believes those crimes don't happen and a minority believes it's OK when they do, because, after all, those of us being bashed are `just fags.' ''
As for White, he sent a long message of appreciation to those at the vigil. Their work is paying off, he said.
``Keep on working and praying,'' he wrote. ``And in the next days, you're going to see even greater victories for truth and for justice and for God's children who suffer.''
As the nearly three-hour vigil concluded, the church lights dimmed, replaced by the glow of hundreds of candles held aloft.
And the audience, some with tears rolling down their cheeks, joined in song: ``. . . deep in my heart, I do believe, we shall overcome some day. . . ILLUSTRATION: DAVID STERLING color photo
Fay Spence, right, sings "We Shall Overcome" with supporters for the
Rev. Mel White Sunday at the Unitarian Church of Norfolk. Spence,
White's attorney, read a letter written by White from his jail
cell.
Color photo
St. Wray Boswell...
David Sterling photo
More than 300 people attended a vigil for the Rev. Mel White at the
Unitarian Church of Norfolk on Sunday. The gay-rights activist is
being held on trespassing charges and is on a hunger strike until
CBN's Pat Robertson agrees to speak with him about his position on
homosexuality.
by CNB