Pioneer of faith: Escondido woman was first straight minister to gay flock

By: GARY WARTH - Staff writer | Thursday, January 18, 2007 6:53 PM PST ∞

June Norris of Escondido was one of the first hetrosexual pastors in the Metropolitan Community Church, established in the 1960s to serve homosexuals.
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From the moment she stepped into the old church in Los Angeles, June Norris felt a calling.

"I walked in that building, and I just can't explain it," she said, relaxing in her small apartment in an Escondido senior complex. "I felt like I was on holy ground. I can still feel it. I can still feel that shock."

Norris also felt welcomed, which may be understandable. She had walked into the first Metropolitan Community Church, founded in 1968 as the first Christian church to welcome everybody, and specifically homosexuals.

Norris was a straight, middle-aged mother of three who had never met an openly gay person until getting to know her nephew, who brought her to the church that day in 1971. But she also was an independent, open-minded and spiritual woman in search of a new life after leaving her husband and moving to a new state.

She would soon become one of the first three heterosexuals to join the church, and in 1974 at age 50, she became the second woman ever to be ordained a minister in the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, the denomination's full name.

Her affiliation with the church would cost Norris her job. She would serve at a time when church buildings were being burned for reaching out to gay people. She would more than once speak up for gay rights, sometimes leading demonstrations for the cause. And, most tragically, she sometimes would preside over as many as two funerals a day during the AIDS crisis in the 1980s.

From innocent to advocate

Born in Colorado and raised a Baptist in Southern Illinois, Norris was married at 15 and had three children by age 20.

"I know, I know," she said. "But back in those days, kids did get married young, especially in Southern Illinois. That's the kind of country place where I lived."

After 28 years of marriage, she left her husband and their Florida home. "I decided I wanted to become whoever I am, because he wanted me to be just his wife," she said. "He wouldn't leave me alone, so finally I decided to come out to California. I decided I wanted to go to college. I got my GED in Florida when I was 46."

As an adult, Norris attended the Seventh-day Adventist Church, and she took a job at the church's White Memorial Hospital in Los Angeles, attending East Los Angeles College at night. New to the city, she looked up her only relative in the area, her sister's son, Ted Sweet, who had moved to Los Angeles after a divorce.

One night at dinner, Sweet told his aunt he was gay.

"I thought he was happy," she recalled. "He said, 'Aunt June, what I'm trying to tell you is I'm homosexual.' I said, 'Oh.'"

After her nephew left, Norris began doing research.

"I was trying to find out why he thought he was gay, because I didn't think he was," she said. "I didn't know very much about them. I'd heard there were people like that, but I didn't think I knew anybody who was gay. I didn't think I'd ever met anybody like that. And here he looked normal to me. You know what I mean?"

Although naive, Norris had not been raised to think badly of homosexuals.

After taking her nephew to church one Saturday, she agreed to go on Sunday to a new church he had been attending.

"It was the first building they had bought," she said. "It was a church on Union Street in Los Angeles. When I approached it, there was this beautiful stained glass window, with Jesus and his hands outstretched. I thought, 'Oh my gosh, this is really a church.'

"I had always had a strong spiritual life," she said. "I had never felt the same kind of feeling about a church that I had in that building. I think it was God speaking to me. I think I was being called to this ministry at that moment, but I didn't know what it all meant."

How it started

The church's first congregation was founded by the Rev. Troy Perry in Los Angeles in 1968 as a reaction to the hostility many homosexual Christians felt in their own churches. Because its congregation comes from many denominations, the church does not follow any one Christian theology, yet it is traditional in many ways, Norris said. The Eucharist is celebrated weekly, and Norris said the early days of the church were very formal.

The denomination has grown to almost 300 churches in 22 countries, according to a fact sheet at the church's Web site, www.MCCchurch.org. The only Metropolitan Community Church in the county meets at the Center in Hillcrest and has about 300 members, Norris said. Worldwide, the church has 43,000 members.

Once Norris joined the church, she started attending Perry's classes about what the Bible actually says about homosexuality. One day after class, she told him she felt a calling to become a minister. Perry told her he knew she had the calling from the first day he met her.

Norris entered the church's seminary in 1971 to begin her studies, and two years later she was an associate pastor at the church.

Baptism by fire

One night in 1973, as her nephew was getting ready to settle in for the night on a church cot after working the evening shift on the crisis hotline, he noticed all the lights on the phone were lighted, but the lines were dead. Before he could investigate the problem, he heard someone screaming about a fire. He ran outside. Somebody had thrown a burning torch into one of the stairways, and the building was ablaze.

The next day, the mother church that Norris had loved was a charred shell. It could not be rebuilt, and was one of seven Metropolitan churches in the country that were torched that year.

A few years later, Norris said she experienced more hostility toward the church, this time on a more personal level, at her workplace.

'I was called into the administrator's office and was told, 'Go clean out your desk,'" she said. "They told me it was behavior unbecoming of a Seventh-day Adventist hospital because I was ... involved with a church that had homosexuals in it."

In 1980, Norris was assigned to lead a congregation in Raleigh, N.C. Challenges and victories were great and small, and the grandmother stood up to authority more than once. During her time there, Norris debated a university professor, led a protest outside a college campus, spoke before the state assembly against a bill restricting homosexual rights and recorded radio announcements countering comments made by televangelist Jerry Falwell.

She also stood up to Southern Bell after it notified her that the church could not identify itself with the word "gay" in their phone book.

"I told them it would be on their heads if someone committed suicide because they couldn't find us," she said. She won the argument.

Before gay and lesbian resource centers, the church was sometimes the only crisis help for the homosexual community, she said. By the mid-1980s, Norris found there was just so much the church could do, and she found herself too often at the funerals of her friends.

"It's still hard to talk about," she said, tears welling in her eyes. "I lost people I loved."

By the end of the decade, Norris said, she was weary. She took a year off but led another congregation in Des Moines, Iowa, for four years. The activist spark she had felt in Raleigh, however, had dwindled. She retired in 1992 and moved to Mira Mesa, where she lived with her daughter and son-in-law. She moved to Escondido eight years ago.

The neighbors in her retirement complex might be surprised to see a box of memories in her apartment that include photos of her being honored in a Gay Pride parade, newspaper articles about her battling authorities, and plaques that honor her for her work, and Norris isn't quick to brag. But her pride in helping her church in its early days, and her love for the congregations that accepted her as an outsider, are obvious.

"They welcomed me," she said. "I never felt as at-home in any place as there. It was like, 'Oh my gosh, this woman accepts us.' They just loved me. I never felt out of place. I belonged there."

-- Contact staff writer Gary Warth at (760) 740-5410 or gwarth@nctimes.com.

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23 comment(s)[-]Go to Top

Neil wrote on Jan 18, 2007 9:51 PM:This is a great article and I appreciate the honesty and compassion that is expressed through Reverend Norris' testimony and love. Reverend Norris is a pioneer and has led the way for other heterosexual pastors who have come to know the truth that God loves all of God's children, including homosexuals. Before it was fashionable, Reverend Norris led the way. Thank you, June

Mary wrote on Jan 19, 2007 2:24 PM:What June says about others is the way she made me feel. I was always at home with her, accepted, and just felt loved. June is a very, very lovely lady.

Sad wrote on Jan 19, 2007 4:02 PM:It's sad when people like this claim to be Christians, in direct defiance of everything the Bible teaches against that lifestyle. You can choose to be gay, but it's hypocritical to deny that the Bible DOES NOT support that choice of lifestyle. Those people she lost were lost because they engaged in risky sexual behaviors that spread AIDS and infected them. That was their choice. It wasn't unavoidable. It's sad to see anyone die needlessly like that. Very sad.

To SAD wrote on Jan 19, 2007 4:54 PM:I agree. This lady has led many astray by her teaching that homosexuality is OK when indeed it is not. What did she teach happened to the Sodomites? How does she explain Romans 1:27-32 when it says, "...Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due..." She needs to tell these people that God loves them and that He will forgive them if they repent and turn from their sin. She will be harshly judged in the end for leading these people to eternal death by condoning this sin.

Johnny wrote on Jan 19, 2007 5:37 PM:I really enjoyed this story. Thank you so much for featuring a woman as inspiring as June Norris.

Rev. Yvette wrote on Jan 19, 2007 6:02 PM:To the SADS of the world I would ask, "When did you choose to be heterosexual?" Sexuality is not a matter of choice. Too bad that those who want to quote Scripture to others don't apply it to their own lives. Matthew 7:1 tells us not to judge others. Too, the quoted scriptures don't have anything to do with homosexuality. Ezekiel 16:49 tells us why the Sodomites were destroyed--nothing to do with homosexuality, and Romans 1 is a condemnation of idolatry. When the subject is well researched one discovers that there is no condemnation in the bible of homosexuality as we know it today. God bless Rev. Norris for having the courage to stand up for God and God's love for all people. Even the ignorant ones.

JayJay74 wrote on Jan 19, 2007 6:40 PM:I must admit that sister Norris beyond any doubts, did a work that was needed. All the same, the Scriptures I read, tell me throughout the Old and New Testaments, that sexually active homosexuals, cannot be saved "in their sins"! You see, I am a heterosexual, and have known nothing but, yet, if I have a girlfriend, or if I am married but we have an understanding, or if I have no girlfriend, but many with whom I sin, God cannot save me, until I fix my present sinning! In order to be saved, I must stop my sexual activity, and either marry someone I love, who as well, sees Christ as do I, or failing that, I must stop my sinning sexually! Whatever my sin, unless I stop my sinning when the Holy Spirit shows my sin to me, I cannot be saved! You see, in Matthew chapter 1, we learn that "His Name shall be called Jesus, for He shall save His people 'from their sins,'" not "in their sins." Christianity is a way of life, whereby after baptism, you leave "self" under the baptismal water, allowing the Spirit of Christ to have full control of your sinful flesh, which is done, because when self and sinful flesh are together, sin is always the result, simply because self because it has a penchant for sin, is selfish, and selfish people cannot be saved, but rather only selfless people! This truth of course, isn't being preached, and so most feel they can be saved while they are still sinning, but this is not according to the Scriptures!

JUDY wrote on Jan 20, 2007 7:36 AM:I HAVE KNOWN REV JUNE NORRIS SINCE 1980 AND SHE HAS BEEN AN INSPIRATION TO ME SINCE I MET HER IN FAYETTEVILLE N.C. SHE IS A WARM LOVING SPIRIT THAT GOD HAS PUT ON THIS EARTH FOR PEOPLE SUCH AS MYSELF,WHO WAS RAISED SOUTHERN BAPTIST IN ALABAMA AND I FELT I WAS MISUNDERSTOOD UNTIL GOD PUT HER IN MY LIFE. I THANK GOD EACH DAY FOR HER AND HER MINISTRY THAT CONTINUES EVEN AFTER HER RETIREMENT. I WILL ALWAYS CONSIDER YOU A STSTER IN CHRIST. LOVE AND PRAYERS WITH YOU ALWAYS

Still Sad wrote on Jan 20, 2007 8:31 AM:If you believe that sexuality isn’t a choice then you must also believe that men who want to have sex with children are just doing what they are born to do. Jesus was not saying in Matt, that we should not judge the actions of others, otherwise why would we have any laws? Murder, robbing banks, killing children would all be ok because we wouldn’t want to judge anyone’s actions. Come on, people who have never read the Bible, are always using that scripture to condone their sin. Romans 1 is NOT only talking about idolatry. It clearly says, “Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due...". Could this penalty be AIDS?

Harry wrote on Jan 20, 2007 12:42 PM:Sad, go back and read your Bible; Jesus didnt say a mumbling word about homosexuality. If you literally follow the old testament--you had best not be wearing any blended fabrics or eat off non kosher dishes or break the dietary laws. How about stoning--have you participated in any good stonings lately. If you want to follow new testament--have you given away all your possessions yet; when did you last visit those in prison? I suggest you pray for forgiveness for trying to limit God's Love.

AIDS??? wrote on Jan 20, 2007 1:04 PM:Are you serious? Since when is does this horrible disease discriminate (AIDS I mean, not Still Sad) People of ALL walks of life suffer through AIDS and you try to say it's a penalty? Your ignorance disgusts me. And you still conveniently have not addressed Rev. Yvette's education on Matthew 7:1. Not a bible scholar myself, but does it not go "Let he without sin cast the first stone"? Sir/ma'am, are you so pure?

JUDY wrote on Jan 20, 2007 8:02 PM:Still sad truly you are using the correct title. You must be very unhappy to believe that child molesters are born to be that way. As a survivor of sex abuse for many years I can assure you that this is a choice that one makes I chose to stop the chain. As a lesbian I did not choose to be God created me. It is people like Rev Norris that helped me realize this. I am a very happy,content,lesbian Christian. Tonight as I get on my knees to pray I will remember you . God Bless you and May God Show you the error of your ways.

Judy wrote on Jan 20, 2007 8:05 PM:Harry you remind me of a fine pastor I met in N.C. who also was a true blessing in my life.

Even sadder wrote on Jan 21, 2007 6:59 AM:As God has delivered me from the sin of alcoholism, I will pray that he deliver you from your sin of homosexuality. This is the difference...I drank excessively, I repented, I no longer drink. Forgiven. If you are a practicing homosexual, repent, and do not act upon those "feelings" and God will forgive you as well. As long as you are practicing you are IN sin. I will pray that you are brought to a Bible believing Christ centered church where the truth is taught. I ask you too, please pray and seek God in the name of Jesus to show you the truth. Just pray and earnestly ask Him to reveal the truth to you. What have you got to lose?

To Judy from sad wrote on Jan 21, 2007 8:12 AM:You misunderstand. I am saying that neither child molesters nor homosexuals are born that way. We are all born into sin but we choose our sin.

Rev Lee wrote on Jan 23, 2007 8:44 AM:Both Bishop Yevette and Rev Norris are correct. God's love covers a multitude of sin - most importantly the sin of the self righteous. The Bible clearly reveals it's teaching against sex in the service of idolatry and idolatry is the abomination (Hebrew word 'toevah'= idolatry = abomination) referred to in Scripture. 1John4:20 "If anyone says, I love God and and detests, abominates others in Christ, he is a liar..." The Word is equally clear from the mouth of Jesus, "I have this against you hypocrites, You teach the traditons of your fathers as the commandments of God. You lay heavy burdens upon others but do not use one finger to lift their oppression. You do not enter the kingdom but place stumbling blocks in front of blind people." Abe Lincoln was asked why he didn't join a church and he responded, "When I find one whose sole requirement is to live by the teaching of Jesus: Love God and your neighbor as yourself, I'll join." The NT teaches that "All have sinned..." and "God loved us and Christ died for us, while we were yet sinners." Not after we became righteous in our own eyes or were approved by others. Jesus, remains the "Open door, which no human can shut."

Torn wrote on Jan 23, 2007 8:51 AM:It is great to see a woman so undeterred by the unknown that she was willing to devote her life to the care of a people that have been misunderstood and persecuted and ignored. If only the rest of us claiming to know Christ could take hold of this kind of unafraid and unashamed loved. While I can't condone the message of tolerance that June and the rest of her denomination spreads, I am put to shame by my lack of action. A former roommate of mine struggled with homosexuality and I know that her work today with homosexual people is born out of this kind of love and she can speak of healing as well. My prayer is that the rest of us can find example in this article and use it as motivation to intervene in cases where the weeds of life would strangle the seed of the gospel as it does in homosexuality.

To Judy, from Sad1 wrote on Jan 23, 2007 1:15 PM:Is there a chance that your tragic abuse is related to your choice of life as a lesbian? A fear of men? I don't say that to mock, but I've seen that conenction before. Hating sin is not the same as hating a person, and I do not hate sinners (after all, I am one.) But validating someone's sin, whether it be homosexual lifestyles, child abuse, stealing, or anything else, is not doing you a favor, it is just enabling that sin behavior. If you think God approves of sin, you are truly living a wilfull ignorance about sin. As Paul said, in the end times, men would gather preachers around them "to tell them what their itching ears want to hear." People loved this woman mostly because she told them only what they wanted to hear. A true friend doesn't do that. A true friend will, lovingly, tell you where you are wrong, because they care enough to want you to get better. (I am the author of the first 'Sad' note.)

to 'AIDS??' wrote on Jan 23, 2007 1:20 PM:It's not ignorance. Just research the medical facts. AIDs is STILL far more prevelant in the homosexual community (mainly men) because of the nature of the intercourse causes tearing of sensitive membranes (sorry for getting graphic, but it pertains to the discussion.) There was a book years ago caleld "The Myth of Heterosexual AIDS" which was vicously attacked for telling the real story. The hs community fears this book because they fear a decrease in research funding if people see it (correctly) as a disease that is found mostly in the hs community. There is a pretty easy way to stop AIDS anyway: dont have unprotected sex or share needles! The problem is behavioral. But nobody wants to admit that do they?

Jennifer wrote on Jan 24, 2007 3:52 PM:As a beliver of Christ and someone who has struggled with bisexuality out of brokenness, I am not entirely sure what to make of this debate. First off, Rev Yvette said that sexuality is not a matter of choice. A male/male, female/female cannot reproduce (I do realize, however there is in-vitro). It shocks me that as a "Reverend" you would believe that this sin is not a choice. Sin is never forced upon us...surely you have heard of free will?! As I mentioned before, I struggled with bisexuality because of the brokenness I felt from sexual abuse by men. Upon my conversion to Christianity, I came to see that this is not only a sin but a choice! It is a lifestyle, just like alcoholism, drug addiction, etc. There is nothing in this life that has ultimate control over us unless we choose to let it. As far as the article -- I am pleased to see that June Norris embraced those who were homosexuals (by no means should they AS PEOPLE or anyone else be discriminated against) but I don't really see where she brought any light into helping them begin to walk away from their sin. This is such a huge part of Christianity -- hate the sin, not the sinner, as Jesus did.

Rev. Jane wrote on Apr 9, 2007 10:35 AM:June Norris is one of the most delightful, humble and unassuming people I have known in MCC. I am so glad to read this article and read of her graciousness. The world, with more "June's" in it and fewer "sad's", in it, would be a much better place. God bless you June, I remember many happy and blessed times spent together. Love you, (Rev.)Jane

Willie ... Raleigh, N.C. wrote on Jun 28, 2007 2:34 PM:It was great for me to come across the brief article about the Reverend June Norris. I was searching for her through the internet to inform her of the death of another great pioneering individual from Raleigh who just died, when up popped this article. June Norris, while in Raleigh did help to open many eyes of the total Raleigh community to the need for all people to be accepted no matter their sexual orientation, gender, race or national origin. At a time when liberal Raleigh citizens, both homosexual and heterosexual were finally beginning to see one another clearly as beneficial citizens to the whole of society, there stood one of those bridges, June Norris, to help lead people toward standing up and working together against ignorance and social hate. I was there on several occasions along side June in those early Raleigh days as a community friend and continue to live in the Raleigh community that benefited from those early struggles of which June participated in or lead. Raleigh and the USA are still struggling with how to accept peoples difference, no matter their sexual orientation, but, if it had not been for the June Norris's of the World, these acceptance and understanding struggles would be much more divided. I send out a big thank you to June Norris from the entire population of Raleigh, North Carolina. Her retirement is much deserved and our lives here are rewarded from her time spent in our City of Oaks and lives. Willie ... Raleigh, North Carolina

Willie wrote on Jun 28, 2007 3:02 PM:It was great for me to come across the brief article about the Reverenced June Norris. I was searching for her through the internet to inform her of the death of another great pioneering individual from Raleigh who just died, when up popped this article. June Norris, while in Raleigh did help to open many eyes of the total Raleigh community to the need for all people to be accepted no matter their sexual orientation, gender, race or national origin. At a time when liberal Raleigh citizens, both homosexual and heterosexual were finally beginning to see one another clearly as beneficial citizens to the whole of society, there stood one of those bridges, June Norris, to help lead people toward standing up and working together against ignorance and social hate. I was there on several occasions along side June in those early Raleigh days as a community friend and continue to live in the Raleigh community that benefited from those early struggles of which June participated in or lead. Raleigh and the USA are still struggling with how to accept peoples difference, no matter their sexual orientation, but, if it had not been for the June Norris's of the World, these acceptance and understanding struggles would be much more divided. I send out a big thank you to June Norris from the entire population of Raleigh, North Carolina. Her retirement is much deserved and our lives here are rewarded from her time spent in our City of Oaks and lives. from Raleigh, North Carolina

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