Sexual diversity and faith are quite frequently at odds with each other. Religion is often used as a justification for discrimination and exclusion. There are religious leaders all over the world who incite hatred and violence against LGBT people, bringing many LGBT people to view faith as an enemy. But our partner Global Interfaith Network (GIN) shows that things can be different. In a special project made possible by Hivos donors, GIN identifies successful methods that can bring the two closer together.

Toni Kruger-Ayebazibwe from South Africa is at the helm of Global Interfaith Network, a global LGBT network of hundreds of people and organizations of different religions. She herself grew up as an atheist. “That was a bit of a shocker in the 80s in Africa. I became of person of faith later, as a lesbian person in my late twenties. For me, religion was a source of freedom. I think for many people this would be counterintuitive. But that’s what it is for me and that’s what drives me,” she explains.

But Toni’s positive experience is not a matter of course. Often there is little or no room for diversity within religions. In the Netherlands, for example, this became painfully clear in 2018 when supporters of several churches signed and distributed the Nashville declaration. The document, authored by the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW) in Nashville, Tennessee, rejects LGBT sexuality and same-sex marriage, among others. It was signed by tens of thousands of Christians in the United States, the Netherlands, and other countries. Read more via Hivos