Whew! It’s been a LONG day working for PinkMenno at the Pittsburgh MCUSA convention, but a lot of progress has been made. We’ve been equipped with bracelets, scarves, stickers, and roughly 400 folded shirts bearing four fabulous designs. The hospitality room – located on the third floor of the Mariott Courtyard – is currently set up, so anyone is welcome to stop by at any time. We had some representatives from EMU Safe Spaces come in and help fold shirts and generally put things together, and we’ve had a huge variety of other volunteers as well. Tonight we had a hymn sing before the joint worship session, which I was unable to attend but heard went just swimmingly. There was also a rehearsal for the  “Choir for Inclusion,” which again, I didn’t attend but was told went marvelously. Tomorrow we have planned an early morning meditation, two open worships, and three hymn sings. Please continue to keep us all in your prayers!

– Kerry Bush, PMPress

Dear Pink Mennos,

Hi! I just arrived in Pittsburgh and I’m writing with a quick introduction. My name is Stephanie Krehbiel, and I’m a doctoral student at the University of Kansas in the Department of American Studies and the Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. I’m here in Pittsburgh because my dissertation research is on the experiences of LGBTQ Mennonites, and more broadly, on the role sexuality-related issues play in Mennonite identities. I’m an ethnographer, so I choose to do my research in conversation with the people who shape and are shaped by the issues I’m studying. I decided to come to Pittsburgh two years ago, when I was preparing to start my PhD and reading all the dispatches from Pink Mennos at the MCUSA conference in Columbus. Clearly, important things happen at these conferences that have ramifications in people’s lives for a long time afterward.

I don’t think it’s ever fair for an ethnographer to go around studying people without giving back some of her own story, so a bit about who I am and why I’m writing about this: I don’t go to church, but I did grow up Mennonite, in North Newton, Kansas. I was baptized as a teenager at the Bethel College Mennonite Church, and later attended and graduated from Bethel College. My husband and I were married in BCMC a few years later. For both of us, the church’s treatment of our Mennonite LGBTQ friends and family members has been instrumental in our gradual drift away from Mennonite churches and institutions.

So it feels a little weird to be here. In fact, I’ve never been to a Mennonite conference before. And while the conference registration form wouldn’t allow me to label myself “other” or “anthropologist” or “none” rather than choosing a congregation, Ervin Stutzman and the other moderators know why I am here and have given me their official permission to be a fly on the wall at conference events. I’m most interested in the folks of Pink Menno, Menno Neighbors, and BMC, however, and part of how I’d like to thank you for letting me learn in your midst is to help you chronicle the events of this week. It helps me record what’s going on, and it lets you respond to and amend my accounts of the days’ events if you choose to, be that in writing or in person. I hope that between me and the other Pink Menno Press volunteers, we create a record of this week that is useful to all of us.

I’ll be around Pink Menno events all week, so please come introduce yourself. I’d love to speak with as many of you as I can. I’m the one with the brown ponytail and the HRC messenger bag, probably looking slightly intimidated. (I haven’t been around this many Mennonites in a long, long time!)

Pink Menno is happy to announce the release of the first installment of the One Voice project. For more info and previews of the songs, check out the One Voice page. To buy the album, go to the Pink Gear Page.

Abigail was fussy. It was raining again and it didn’t look like she and her older sister, Amanda, would be going with their grandparents to the beach that morning. The North Carolina weather was unpredictable this time of year and it looked like this might be another day of playing games inside.

But Grandma Rose had a different idea. “Let’s look at some old photos,” she suggested. “Why don’t you bring me my computer? It’s on the dining room table.”

Abigail carefully lifted the laptop off its charger and brought it to her grandmother. She waited patiently as her grandmother logged in and then brought up the web albums.

“Okay, “ mused Grandma Rose as she scrolled through the albums. “What sounds interesting? How about your baby pictures? Your parents’ wedding? I even have some old photos of your dad!”

“What about pictures of Dad in high school?” suggested Amanda, who had just walked into the sitting area with a towel wrapped around her wet hair.  Abigail quickly agreed. She would be starting sixth grade next month, but knew many of Amanda’s high school friends.

Grandma Rose found the album she wanted and pointed to a slender blond boy. “This is your dad as a sophomore—just the same age that Amanda is now.”

The girls bent over the photos, exclaiming at the funny hairstyles and clothing fashions from twenty years earlier. “What’s with the baggy shorts?” asked Amanda. “Ewww, is that Dad’s underwear?”

“Oh yes!” chuckled her grandmother. “I just hated that those boys went around with their shorts hanging down so low and their underwear showing. I guess I got used to it after awhile. In fact, I had forgotten all about that silly fashion!”

“Well, here’s another silly fashion,” declared Abigail. “Look at this picture. All these kids are wearing pink! Even the boys! Yuk! Since when do boys wear pink?”

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