Not too long ago I was at a community meeting when the subject of gay marriage came up. One of the people there, a man a little older than me, told me that all the young people he knew were tired of hearing about gay marriage, that to them it was a no-brainer, that young adults already accept gays as equal, so why do we need to keep talking about gay rights? Why indeed?

Child Dedications are one of the best parts of my job. What a joy it was to dedicate little baby Alice this morning; to welcome her into the embrace of our faith and to witness the pride and love in her parents’ faces. But I want to ask us all a question about Alice and I ask us all to search our hearts and be truthful. How many of us, looking at that beautiful little girl, automatically assume she is straight? How many of us when we project Alice’s life into the future automatically assume that if she has a partner in life, that partner will be male? I realize I do, that this assumption happens outside my conscious control; and that it takes conscious effort to stop myself and not make this assumption because it is such an automatic response. It’s deeply ingrained, maybe even hard wired. Now, I know Jonathan and Michaela well enough to believe that if it turns out that Alice is lesbian, her parents will not love her any one iota less, and that they will be as accepting and supportive as they can teach themselves to be. But would that be everyone’s reaction to a lesbian Alice? Would everyone see her as just as much “somebody”, just as much a beloved child of the universe, as if she were heterosexual? Maybe all her Unitarian Universalist age cohort would. Maybe even all old coot Unitarian Universalists such as myself would, too. And maybe, by the time she is grown up enough to choose a life partner, all of U.S. society would also. But that’s a huge maybe. And in the meantime, she—and we—do not live in some UU utopian cocoon. And as accepting as we may be, as much as gay marriage may be a no-brainer to our youth, the world we live in is by no means so hospitable.

Why do we need to keep talking about gay rights? That man is not the only person who’s ever asked me that, not the only person to say, “Enough, I got it already!” Well, even if it’s true that all of us here have “got it,” how could that possibly be enough?

Would “I got it” be enough for the son of Otto Odonga, a member of the Ugandan Parliament, who stated publicly this past February that if he discovered his son were gay, he would personally be his son’s hangman? Homosexuality is already a crime in Uganda but are you aware that there is a bill before the Ugandan parliament that would introduce the death penalty for people convicted of being homosexual who’ve had previous convictions, or who are HIV-positive, or who have sex with people under 18 years of age? The bill also includes stiff penalties—up to seven years in jail—for any individuals or organizations that support LGBT rights or who fail to report violations of the act. In other words, this bill would require friends and families of gay Ugandans to turn them into the police and this bill would make criminals of all our fellow Unitarian Universalists in Uganda, supporting as they do LGBT equality. Would our saying “I got it” be enough for them?

Would “I got it” be enough for Steven Monjeza and Tiwonge Chimbalanga, the young gay Malawi couple who were arrested last December and sentenced to fourteen years in prison for attempting to marry? Would “I got it” be enough for Malik Khan, and Kashif Rani who were arrested in Pakistan two weeks ago for allegedly trying to enter into a gay marriage and who face life imprisonment if convicted? Or what about the family of Eudy Simelane, the South African lesbian soccer player and homosexual rights activist who was gang raped, beaten and stabbed twenty five times in April of 2008, murdered by four men in an extreme example of what is called “corrective rape” —the practice widespread in South Africa, whereby gangs of men rape lesbians purportedly to "cure" them of their sexual orientation. Would “I got it” be enough for Eudy’s parents or for the victims of the 10 new cases of "corrective rape" reported every week in Cape Town alone? And I emphasize “reported.” Even though South Africa has one of the world's most progressive Constitutions and became the first country in Africa to allow gay marriage in 2006, homosexuality is still so widely reviled that police rarely investigate crimes against lesbians let alone proceed to conviction and thus many go unreported.

Now I imagine that some of you are thinking that these cases are pretty far afield, pretty extreme, that things like that don’t happen in 2010 in America. Well, in 2008, the most recent year for which statistics are available, 1,617 hate crimes based on sexual-orientation were documented by U.S. law enforcement agencies. Do you suppose it’s suddenly all that better in 2010? Violence against LGBT people does happen in America and it happens close to home. Just last month, two gay men in Dallas were attacked by four other men and beaten with baseball bats, in an area of Dallas less than three miles from First UU Church. Such hate crimes happen in Houston, too. Last November, in Northwest Houston, in Copperfield, a gay teenager was assaulted by other teenagers, beaten with a pipe and told "You are going to quit being gay." In January, Myra Ical, a transgender woman, was found murdered in a field in Montrose, dead from strangulation. Is “I got it” enough for those two Dallas Men, for that Copperfield teen, for Myra Ical?

And it’s not just overt violence against LGBT people that happens here; but also the more subtle violence of a legal system that does not recognize full equality. Take the story of Harold and Clay, a California gay couple, partners for twenty years. They had done everything they could to protect their legal rights, had their legal paperwork in place—wills, powers of attorney, and medical directives—all naming each other. Harold was 88 and in frail medical condition, but still living at home with Clay, 77, who was in good health. One evening, Harold fell down the front steps of their home and was taken to the hospital. Clay should have been consulted in Harold's care right away based on their medical directives, but instead county health care workers refused to allow Clay to even see Harold in the hospital and placed Harold in a nursing home. And then the county confined Clay to a nursing home—a different one—against his will! It gets worse. Without authority, without determining the value of Clay and Harold's possessions which they had accumulated over the course of their 20 years together, the county took everything Harold and Clay owned and auctioned them off and terminated the lease on the home Clay and Harold had shared for many years. Three months after he was hospitalized, Harold died in the nursing home. Because of the county's actions, Clay missed the final months of his partner’s life. On top of that, Clay has literally nothing left of the home he shared with Harold or the life they were living up until the day that Harold fell.

Is “I got it” enough for Clay? Is “I got it” enough for any committed same sex couple? If that can happen in California(!), you know it can happen anywhere in the U.S. It could happen right here; it could happen to us—yes, to beloved members of our church. Is “I got it” enough for us?

People say what is the sense of our small effort. I’ll tell you what is the sense of our small effort. Tremendous progress has been made in this country in the years since June, 1969 when the Stonewall Riots began the modern gay liberation movement. Did you read in the Chronicle Belief section a week ago that now in 2010 for the first time a majority of Americans view gay and lesbian relations as morally acceptable? Admittedly it is just a slight majority—but that still represents a steady increase in acceptance over the last several years. And just in the last few months, new milestones have been reached. In October President Obama signed a hate crimes law that makes it a federal crime to assault an individual because of his or her sexual orientation or gender identity—the first major federal gay rights legislation. In April President Obama ordered that hospitals that accept Medicare and Medicaid payments must let patients choose which persons, including same-sex partners, can visit them and help make critical health decisions. Early this month, Obama ordered government agencies to extend benefits which apply to heterosexual couples to same-sex partners of federal employees, such as child care services and expanded family leave. And “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is finally, finally, on the verge of repeal! Yes, a lot of this is piecemeal and a long time coming—and that’s why it is so important that there be full marriage equality. If we have to wait on piecemeal legislation it will take forever—there are 1138 federal rights enjoyed by heterosexual couples which are denied same sex couples.

But even so, there has been tremendous progress from the days when homosexuality itself was a crime in the United States. And do you think for a moment that such progress could have been made if LGBT people had not stood up for their rights, marching and protesting and fighting in the courts, willing to come out, to expose themselves to harassment and bullying and loss of jobs and violent retribution, and said we’ve had it; we’re tired of waiting, we demand to be treated fairly? And do you think for a moment that such progress could have been made if there had not been straight allies also willing to stick their necks out, to confront their homophobic friends and neighbors and family members and work alongside their GLBT brothers and sisters for what is right? Do you think for a moment such progress would have been made if those who cared had said, “I got it. Isn’t that enough?”

It isn’t enough for individuals to be persuaded; society has to change and laws have to change and such change only happens when people who care move beyond being persuaded to being committed to the cause and then turn their commitments into action. Tremendous progress has been made. And you, we, this church, our faith tradition have been part of that forward movement. Unitarian Universalism has been in the vanguard of the struggle. And we should be rightly proud of that. But there is still work to be done. And forward progress could be eroded if we don’t continue to stand on the side of what is right. The repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, for example, seems to be inevitable - the only question one of when and how. And yet Republican candidates for Congress in Tennessee’s 8th Congressional District made comments against the repeal that make my hair stand on end. Ron Kirkland, a physician and Vietnam veteran, said of his time in the military: “I can tell you if there were any homosexuals in that group, they were taken care of in ways I can’t describe to you” and Randy Smith, who served in the first Gulf war, added: “We took care of that kind of stuff, just like (Kirkland) said.” Kirkland and Smith certainly haven’t “got it”. What if they are elected before Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell comes to a vote? Or what about the editors of Notre Dame’s student newspaper which in January published a cartoon that made a joke of killing homosexuals with baseball bats? The editorial staff has since apologized but how in the world did that happen at a school ranked among the top twenty universities in academic standings? Apparently aspiring journalists at Notre Dame haven’t gotten it either. Or what about the Christian Right political group which masquerades as a highly respected medical organization? They call themselves the American College of Pediatricians in an obvious attempt to be confused with the American Academy of Pediatrics. They have disseminated information to 15,000 school superintendents across the country claiming that homosexuality can be “caught” and that it can be cured and that parents should not be supportive of a homosexual orientation in their children, but do everything in their power to eradicate it—all of which flies in the face of the consensus of the respected scientific community.

Tremendous progress has been made. More and more people really have “got it”. But we have to be willing to do more, so that enough people “get it” to effect the kind of institutional change for which LGBT people have been so long waiting. The forces of entropy have to be resisted. And what we do can make a difference—not only here in the United States but around the globe. Attitudes here effect attitudes abroad; legal protections here effect legal protections in other countries—both positively and negatively. Let me give you an example. That draconian legislation proposed in Uganda? Several news agencies have reported that it was inspired by American evangelical Christians. The legislation was introduced shortly after a two-day conference in Uganda where three prominent American evangelicals denounced homosexuality as an abomination against God and a direct threat to the cohesion of African families. Conversely, support from other U.S. religious groups, including our own, has emboldened Ugandan groups opposing the legislation. In February on Valentine’s Day, 200 LGBT activists attended a conference in Kampala organized by a coalition of organizations brought together by the Unitarian Universalist minister there. Risking arrest and possible imprisonment, delegates to the"Standing on the side of Love" conference focused on religious arguments in support of LGBT rights and they called upon other governments to put pressure on the Ugandan government. Since that time, international reaction—in part generated by that conference—has put such pressure on the Ugandan president that it now seems likely that at least the most heinous provisions of the bill will not be allowed to stand. And it started with the actions of people like our Kampalan UU colleague.

What we do can make a difference here. And what happens here has an impact abroad. In Malawi, Monjeza and Chimbalanga were pardoned and released a week ago as a result of pressure from the UN and a petition backed by Madonna and Elton John. In South Africa, it was pressure from abroad that led to the arrest and trial of Eudy Simelane’s murderers. In all of these cases the attention that LGBT rights groups here and in Europe focus on them is a key factor in generating the international approbation that can lead to an improved outcome.

It isn’t enough for individuals to “get it.” Change happens when people who “get it” move beyond being persuaded to being committed to making sure that other people “get it” and then turn their commitments into action. What we do makes a difference. Do you think for a moment that our Ugandan UU brothers and sisters would have been so emboldened to hold that conference if they did not feel the support of UU’s here? Do you think that the LGBT rights groups in the U.S. that keep the pressure on for marriage equality could survive without help from individuals who know that their “having gotten it” is not enough? Do you think that LGBT activists could keep on keeping on without visible signs of support from their brothers and sisters, LGBT and straight?

I believe that Alice Watson is a beloved child of God, a beloved child of the universe. If it turns out that Alice is lesbian are we going to say to her “you have to wait to be treated fairly and with equality; you have to wait to be considered just as worthy as anyone else.” Are we going to say to her, “I’ve got it. Isn’t that enough?” I believe that all people—gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans-gendered and straight—are beloved of God. And I believe that our God calls us to affirm the full humanity of all people and to work to make that a reality here in this world. What can we do right now, right here to hasten that reality? Your order of service has a list of concrete steps that you can take today and in the next week to make a difference. They may seem like small steps, but collectively they can have ripple effects far beyond our sight. People say what is the sense of our small effort. Our small efforts can change the world. Never doubt it. Let’s take one more step, shall we?