Acts 16:25–28
About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were unfastened. When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul shouted in a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.”
One sure way to boggle the mind is to read the history of the American space program alongside our history of civil rights. Four years before the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Alan Shepard became the first American to reach space, where he spent just over 15 minutes. Four years after the Voting Rights Act, the U.S. successfully landed an astronaut on the moon.
Two Presbyterian sisters offer us a snapshot of another facet of the relationship between aerospace exploration and civil rights. Born and raised in southern California, Sally and the Rev. Dr. Bear Ride grew up in a devoted Presbyterian family. Their parents were both elders at First Presbyterian Church in Encino. In 1978, Sally was selected by NASA to enter spaceflight training, and Bear was ordained as a Presbyterian minister. Bear would go on to serve as the pastor of Claremont Presbyterian Church for roughly a decade. Sally is best remembered as the first American woman in space for her 1983 flight on the Challenger shuttle. Four years later, the General Assembly of the PC(USA) voted to retain a ban on gay ordination.
Sally and Bear were both queer. Sally briefly married fellow astronaut Steven Hawley before reconnecting with Tam O’Shaughnessy, a childhood friend who would become her lifelong partner of 27 years. In the meantime, Bear served for decades as a lesbian pastor in a denomination that refused to recognize her loves and full humanity. Over those many years, Bear was a vocal critic of the church’s policy, and she actively organized and participated in marches, protests and educational events. In 2000, she was arrested during the Soulforce demonstration at the 212th General Assembly. She has also served as co-moderator of More Light Presbyterians, a nonprofit that fought for the ordination and marriage rights of queer congregants. In 2008, Bear married Susan Craig, her partner of 12 years, who is also an ordained Presbyterian minister. Nearly four years later, the PC(USA) finally recognized the marriage and ordination rights of LGBTQIA+ Presbyterians. Sally died in 2012. Bear is a retired Presbyterian clergyperson.
Prayer:
Loving God, you have given us enormous potential: the potential to race to the heavens to behold the immensity of your universe and the potential to make the simplest differences between people into reasons to brutally mistreat one another. Give us the power and the grace we need to become what you would have us be. Amen.
Dr. Andrew Peterson is the representative for Peacemaking and Gun Violence Prevention for the Office of Public Witness. He advocates for the church’s social witness policies before Congress, the White House and the Supreme Court and helps coordinate the PC(USA)’s advocacy with that of our coalition partners.
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