The Church of God in Christ (COGIC) is the largest African American and largest Pentecostal church in the United States. This church is renowned for its charismatic worship style and its loud rebuke of homosexuality. Despite this, many of its gospel music industry mega-stars are forced to go back into the closet, denouncing their sexual orientation at the church’s annual convocation.
At the 102nd Holy Convocation International Youth Department Worship Service on November 7 held at the Memphis Cook Convention Center, Pastor Donnie McClurkin, a poster boy for African American ex-gay ministries, spoke. He told the audience: “God did not call you to such perversions. Your only hope is Jesus Christ. Were it not for this Jesus I would be a homosexual today. This God is a deliverer.”
McClurkin attributed his homosexuality to being raped twice as a child, first at age eight at his brother’s funeral by his uncle, and then at age thirteen by his cousin, his uncle’s son. He claimed that his cure was done by a deliverance from God and a restoration of his manhood by becoming the biological father of a child. This story, written by the Rev Irene Monroe in November of 2009, has become a pattern in several black churches across the US.
In his book “Eternal Victim, Eternal Victor”, Pastor Donnie McClurkin espoused his ex-gay rhetoric, castigating former gospel industry worker Tonéx (Anthony Charles Williams II). Tonéx is a talented singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, rapper, dancer, producer, and preacher, who has won six Stellar Awards, a GMA Award, and received a Grammy nomination for Best Soul Gospel Album for his 2004 gold album “Out The Box.”
McClurkin suggested that black males, like Tonéx, are gay because of sexual molestation, an absentee father, or a lack of strong male images around them. However, Tonéx is the son of the revered late, Dr. Anthony Williams, Senior Pastor and District Elder in the Truth Apostolic Community Church in suburban Spring Valley.
In response to McClurkin’s comments, Bishop Yvette Flunder, an out lesbian who is a third generation preacher with roots in the Church of God in Christ, wrote an open letter to the Convocation. She stated that Tonéx is more the ‘rule’ than the exception to the rule, and that he is unique for telling the truth about his sexuality, while not claiming to be delivered.
The Church of God in Christ (COGIC) is home to a culture of homosexual ministers and bishops, with the “blaquebigayministers” website boasting 787 members since July 2000. This fellowship is for support and encouragement of black Christian ministers and friends who are “family” (bi or same-gender loving).
COGIC was formed in 1897 by a group of disfellowshipped Baptists, raising the question of whether they were disfellowshipped because they were gay. It appears that COGIC is content to remain silent on this issue, despite the presence of an organized culture of homosexual ministers and bishops within its pulpits.
