• International Day Against Homophobia

    Today is the International Day Against Homophobia.

    I’m not going to say much about it except to point towards a youtube video – one of the most articulate speeches of recent years about the topic.

    It is an unlikely person speaking in an unlikely location – a drag queen called Panti Bliss speaking at the end of of a production in the Abbey Theatre in Ireland.

    Lots of people will have seen it. If you haven’t, take a look.

    The next time you hear a straight church leader speaking about how it is not actually homophobic to take actions which work to the detriment of gay and lesbian people remember this speech. And ask who is best placed to decide what is homophobic and what isn’t.

3 responses to “Thurible Spotting”

  1.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Thurible Spotting
    Just a small correction – Big Aggie came from Glasgow's Catholic Apostolic Church, not Edinburgh.  But who has the Edinburgh o­ne?

  2.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Thurible Spotting
    Thanks for the correction Ruth – I have no idea who has the Edinburgh o­ne. Wouldn't it be wonderful to get them all together for a service? Is the Glasgow CA church building still extant? I don't even know where it was.
    There is a rather odd offshoot of the CA Church called the New Apostolic Church which exists in Scotland in Dunfermline, but they do not seem to have taken o­n the powerful aesthetic of the Catholic Apostolic church. It is wonderful that the two thuribles from Glasgow and Dundee are different – no mass production in those days.

  3.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Re: Thurible Spotting
    The Catholic Apostolic Church in Glasgow was in McAslan St in Townhead. The building was apparently designed by AWN Pugin but was demolished in 1970. There’s a photograph of the interior in The City that Disappeared by Frank Worsdall

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