Ecumenical Group "Homosexuals and Church"

Ökumenische Arbeitsgruppe Homosexuelle und Kirche (HuK) e.V.

Home Page (English version)

Welcome to the Internet Web Site of the Ecumenical Group Homosexuals and Church (HuK). We are a free alliance of men and women that are interested in a critical and constructive examination of the subjects of homosexuality and church, for most of us because we are gay or lesbian ourselves, for some of us because of our pastoral work or for reasons of solidarity.

Our web pages can be searched for key words or phrases: Simply fill one or more words into the following line and click on "Go".

What's New

• Updated continuously, last time on April 12, 2009: The HuK Program at the "Deutscher Evangelischen Kirchentag" in Bremen (20.-24.5.2009). Traditionally, HuK has a strong presence at this biannual all-German meeting of Protestants. A registration form can be found via the same web page.
  In case of last-minute changes, this web page is updated continuously; please take a look regularly.
• Linked at April 12, 2009; the text is already older: A satirical text describing the impression made by the Christmas address of Pope Benedikt XVI. in the Vatican: "The pope has spoken. Now, what did he say?"
• New on February 14, 2009: In our collection of Web Hints (texts from others) links to (German-language) Texts covering discussions about remarks made by the candidate for a bishop position in Linz (Austria). His statements that there is a cure for homosexuality are shared by a minority only, even within the Roman-Catholic church hierarchy.
• New on October 5, 2008: HuK press statement with an open Letter of Christian lesbian and gay groups in Germany (05.10.2008, together with "David und Jonathan", France): "What did you do to my brother? - Christian lesbians and gays on the occasion of the bishops synod in Rome - It's not about words, it's about persons" (text en Francais: http://www.davidetjonathan.com/spip.php?article482)
• New on March 13, 2008, because of the increasing interest in attempts/therapies to change sexual orientation:
  Can the sexual orientation be changed? How many "unsuccessful attempts" exist, and what was the experience of these people? Report on attempts to change sexual orientation (Shidlo/Schroeder). German-language summary of an article in the US journal "Professional Psychology: Research and Practice" (2003).
• New on March 10, 2008:
  Update of the web page Aufbau der HuK (orgnizational structure of the HuK), after the HuK annual meeting 2008 (new board member elected).
• New on January 20, 2008: HuK statemement and background information concerning a workshop planned for the evangelical event Christival 2008, with the title "Understanding homosexuality – Chances for change". After protests from the public, the workshop was cancelled by the Christival organizers and the DIJG (the homophobic "German Institute for Youth and Society", where the speakers were to come from); protesting critics were charged with "prejudice". Aren't prejudices rather to be found with those responsible for the planned event?

Information / Contents

The HuK web pages are constantly updated. Currently, we have information on the topics shown below.

English-language pages

• Our Group - Our Goals - Our Activities English translation of the HuK's position statement, in revised form adopted Nov. 2000.
• 3 Questions Concerning Homosexuality. Text from a flyer intended mainly for church congregations.
• World Youth Day 2005, English-language information for gays, lesbians and bisexuals. Events for gay and lesbian youth at the World Youth Day, August 2005, in Cologne.
• Taking each sentence of the bible literally - Questions to Laura Schlesinger. A text that has been circulating in the Internet for a while. A German translation is available as well.
• Sometimes, our web hints (texts written by others) contain references to English-languages texts.
• Sometimes, our list of upcoming events contains links to English-languages texts.
• We still have the text of a sermon from Oct. 11, 1998, one day before Matthew Shepard died after a brutal assault, which was made upon him because he was openly gay.

French-language pages

• Notre Groupe - Ce que nous voulons - Ce que nous faison (Français) French translation of the HuK's position statement.

Bilingual pages

The following pages contain mainly organizational material (addresses, links, etc.) and have enough English-language annotations that an English-speaking reader probably can understand them.

• Addresses of the regional groups, including a list of special church services for gays and lesbians inb various cities (32 KB).
• Links to other Web sites: HuK, gay/lesbian groups, churches, groups in other countries (54 KB).

German-language pages

All other pages contain German text only. For the case a reader wants to try his/her knowledge of German, or knows someone who can translate the text, we give here an overview of the various sections of our web site. Each section has an index page (in German) listing the individual web pages in this section.

Who we are ("Wer wir sind")

General texts about the HuK: Position statement, texts about bible and homosexuality (one of them translated from an English-language paper by Prof. Walter Wink), texts for church congregations, an in-depth literature list, position statement of of the gay priest groups in Germany, etc.

The HuK's National Activities ("HuK bundesweit")

Organization of the HuK, national board and committees, addresses on the national level, bylaws, etc.

HuK Regional Groups ("HuK regional")

Addresses of all regional groups, links to their web pages where applicable (many groups have their own web pages), information about church services for gays and lesbians in various cities.

Calendar ("Termine")

Calendar of HuK events and of other events that may be of interest for us.

HuK Texts on Current Events ("Aktuelle Themen")

In the years 2000/2001, the topic of church services asking God's blessing for gays or lesbian partnership stood in the center of interest. Other recent topics are "Healing" / reversion of one's sexual orientation, HuK resolutions regarding other topics, regarding gay priest groups, etc.

Texts from the Churches ("Kirchliche Texte")

Mainly official texts (not HuK texts) from various church bodies. This collection is intended mainly for documentary purposes, it contains official texts from church governments, synods, and also some text from the grassroot level of the churches.

HuK Press Releases ("Pressemitteilungen")

Press Releases from the HuK (since 1997).

HuK Archive ("HuK-Archiv")

Interesting texts from the HuK archive: Selected texts, rules for use of the HuK archive.

Links

Internet Web References / Links: Large collection of links, covering

• HuK and related groups and web sites in Germany
• other national lesbigay groups,
• web sites of national and regional churches,
• lesbian and gay christian groups in other countries
• miscellaneous other links.

Guest Book ("Gästebuch")

Here, guests can leave comments and exchange opinions.

Counceling via email ("Beratung")

Members of our councelling team answer personal questions via email.

Addresses

Main Address (Post Office Box):

HuK
Postfach 500 437
D-52088 Aachen
Germany

Permanent phone number: +49-241-12346

This leads to an answering machine that gives the actual phone numbers (which may change over time) of the national board members and the national office

Main Fax number: +49-30-78711753

Electronic Mail: webmaster@huk.org

There is more detailed address information available for addresses at the national level and addresses of the regional groups.