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‘Saved and gay’ comes to Cheshire Bridge Road
Gay-friendly church second group to launch billboards

By DYANA BAGBY
Jun. 10, 2005

Gay Rev. Randy Layton-Morgan and his Charismatic Pentecostal church on Virginia Avenue are no longer preaching to the choir. Instead, the church is taking its religious message to Atlanta’s gay red light district.

On June 2, New Covenant Church of Atlanta reached out with a billboard along Cheshire Bridge Road near Faulkner Road among the tangle of adult entertainment signs along the four-lane thoroughfare.

“ Cheshire Bridge Road seems to be a place where our community needs reaching,” said Layton-Morgan, a founder of the church.

The billboard’s simple design — black with a white outline of the city’s skyline and a bright pink structure topped with a cross, along with the address of a Web site, savedandgay.com — contrasts with the surrounding neon signs and billboards promoting adult entertainment that, Layton-Morgan said, feeds a negative lifestyle for gay people.

“There are lots of clubs, adult stores [on Cheshire Bridge Road] — and people need hope,” he said. “This seemed an ideal place to spread a message of hope.”

Layton-Morgan started New Covenant five years ago and now has about 100 members. Additional churches are planned in Macon and Greenville, S.C., he added.

Dubbed as “gay fundamentalists” by some, New Covenant is a Charismatic Pentecostal church that uses fundamental language such as “saved” and “born again,” but is not a fundamental church in the current cultural meaning of the word, Layton-Morgan said.

“We are a predominantly gay church … and all of our leadership is gay,” he said. “But a lot of gay-affirming churches don’t speak the language of fundamentalism like we do. People [at Pride] have thought we were straight. But we’re exuberant in our worship, more clapping of hands and celebratory than a formal session.”

The church’s advertising on the Viacom-owned billboard, which cost $9,000 to rent, is scheduled to remain for two months to coincide with the Atlanta Pride festival and New Covenant’s fifth anniversary, Layton-Morgan said. The church is raising funds for a second billboard, he said.

Rev. Paul Graetz, senior pastor at First Metropolitan Community Church of Atlanta, said the billboard is an effective way for a gay-affirming Christian church to share its welcoming message.

“Because so much out there tells us there is no place for us to have a spiritual journey,” Graetz said. “We want to celebrate who we are because we have so much to give back.”

Kara Speltz, co-chairperson of the Catholic Team of Soulforce, a national gay interfaith organization, agreed it is great news to hear of a Christian church touting its message of inclusiveness through outdoor advertising.

But she admitted the phrase “saved and gay” troubles her.

“The word ‘saved’ suggests some are and some aren’t — and I believe we all are,” Speltz said. “But it is exciting to hear about this billboard because it will challenge the really fundamentals who think people can’t be that [saved and gay] way.”

New Covenant’s billboard campaign comes as Georgia Equality, the statewide gay rights group, finalizes plans to rent 11 billboards in July and September to be placed in strategic locations outside I-285 — as well as one in Midtown — as part of its “We Are Your Neighbors” campaign.

The 11 billboards located outside I-285 target areas with a large concentration of registered voters 35 and older who earn $40,000 or less annually and identify as belonging to a church. That demographic was found to be opposed to homosexuality, said Chuck Bowen, the group’s executive director.

The campaign is budgeted to cost approximately $125,000. The ads feature images of professionals, including a firefighter that says, “I protect you.” About two weeks after the billboards are installed, the phrase, “And I’m gay” will be uncovered, Bowen said. The ethnically diverse campaign also includes ads with a teacher, a student and a doctor.

Layton-Morgan said the billboards from New Covenant and Georgia Equality should bring heightened awareness to the word “gay.”

“By seeing the billboard, they can go to the Web and be in touch with people like them — that’s the most important thing about the billboard,” he said. “We are willing to put ourselves out there to share the Gospel.”

Ryan Lee contributed to this report.