With the recent anti-LGBT law in Mississippi and the spate of other new laws around the country designed to “protect” the religious community from the scourge of homosexuality, I decided to talk this week to someone who knows a little more about religion than I do. The Rev. Fritz Fowler is the pastor of University Lutheran Church. He earned his master of divinity from Gettysburg Seminary in 2014 and also holds a bachelor’s in pastoral ministry from Kingswood University in Canada.
PGN: So what the hell is wrong with religion?
FF: [Laughs] OK, I, like any other LGBT person, am frightened and concerned, if not alarmed and totally taken aback, by some of the recent events. LGBT people are not just losing their rights, we’re regressing. As LGBTQ people, we have to come together and say that we will not stand for, nor will we support, government officials who continue and strive to deny our own citizens equal rights and full citizenship in the country we live in.
PGN: It seems to me that religion is a scapegoat because at heart these people aren’t very religious at all. It’s just the weapon of choice.
FF: Yeah, I think some of the worst tragedies throughout history have been done in the name of organized religion. I think when you boil it down, people have insecurities and fears and they mask them over in the name of Christianity or other organized religions. I feel that my calling as a pastor and as a community leader is that we are charged to stand up for those who are oppressed or marginalized. I believe that in scripture and as a Lutheran pastor and a Christian, that the witness of the Bible has a preferential treatment for them and that God is always on the side of those without power. We should stand up for those who are told that they’re not welcome in the church because of their sexual orientation or gender expressions or skin color or what country they come from or how much money they have — not just locally but nationally and internationally, as members of the human race. What’s happening now scares me, especially some of the presidential candidates who are quick to spew hatred and sew the seeds of fear.
PGN: And many of them, like Ted Cruz, are doing it in the name of religion.
FF: And for that, I apologize on behalf of Christianity. I apologize to anyone who has heard messages from their churches or faiths that they’re worthless or loved any less because of how God made them.
PGN: [Laughs] OK, I’ll lighten up on you now. So how did you first feel the calling?
FF: I always wanted to be a pastor. When I was in elementary school and they said, “Draw a picture of what you want to be when you grow up,” I drew myself as a pastor behind a pulpit. I grew up as part of a more conservative Lutheran church and I was told at a young age that I wasn’t welcome and could never be a pastor. I was shocked and hurt for a really long time and then I was introduced into the Evangelical Lutheran Church, or the ELCA. They were a gay-affirming church and in 2009 they voted to allow clergy in same-sex relationships to become pastors with the same full rights and entitlements that heterosexuals had in the church. And so I became a pastor.
PGN: Interesting. I hear the word “evangelical” and I tend to recoil. It always sounds like the extremist wing.
FF: I understand. The original meaning of evangelical is “good news,” but you’re entirely right that in modern vernacular when people hear the word, they automatically think of fundamentalism and gay bashing, Ted Cruz and the Westboro Baptist family protests. But in my church, we interpret it as carrying the good news of the gospel.
PGN: Where are you from?
FF: I was born in a little town called Blossvale, near Syracuse in New York. Then I went to Kingswood University in Canada, about two hours north of Maine.
PGN: So Syracuse wasn’t cold enough for you?
FF: Apparently not! I received a bachelor of liberal arts with a pastoral ministry major and took a bunch of classes in church planting.
PGN: Planting?
FF: Starting new churches. After college I earned my master of divinity from Gettysburg Seminary and I was called to serve as the pastor at University Lutheran in February of 2015. I’m the Lutheran campus pastor for the University of Pennsylvania, Drexel and Temple. I get to spend time with students, providing pastoral care, spiritual development and faith formation.
PGN: What are the biggest concerns right now for the kids?
FF: Students want to be known. If they just want faith or religion, they can download sermons or TED Talks, they can read books or go to church online, but they want to be known and heard. They’re looking for community, people who accept them and understand them just the way they are. They want to find their identity, to be able to question the faith they grew up with and ask tough theological questions: things they’ve never been able to investigate about themselves or the world until they got to college. They want more than just frat parties on Friday night. They’re really thoughtful and caring individuals. I see them after church in fellowship, praying for each other and loving and checking on each other during the week. It’s wonderful.
PGN: When did you figure out your sexuality?
FF: I came out in a few different stages. I played soccer in high school and college and was a big outdoorsman. I’m an Eagle Scout with the Boy Scouts of America and the first person I came out to was one of my peers at Boy Scout camp, who was on staff with me one summer. In high school, I came out to a select group of friends. I didn’t realize it until a few years later, but I would have been expelled from Kingswood if the school found out that I was gay. Off campus, I found a great group of LGBT people to meet with. They were from all walks of life, which really paved the way for me as a person of faith and a gay person. I learned that whenever we close the circle of who’s welcome, the Holy Spirit, Jesus, opens that circle. We see that again and again in scripture. Lastly, I told my parents before I started seminary. I told my dad as we were driving home from a restaurant. I was so nervous and so fidgety that he finally asked if I was OK. I said, “No Dad, I’m gay.” He pulled the car over, put his arm around me and said, “I love you. You’re my son and I don’t care.” Just hearing those words set me free. Those words were so powerful. That was a pivotal point in my life where the relationship with my dad changed. My mom was a little more hesitant at first. Growing up as a Southern Baptist, she had very stereotypical images of what it meant to be gay. We had lots of conversations and walked through it together. It took about a year-and-a-half before she was really OK and open with it. On one of her last visits, I took her to Woody’s on a Friday night; it was her first time in a gay bar. It was fun to have her in the community to learn that gay people are just like straight people: We go to bars and dance and have a good time.
PGN: [Laughs] You didn’t ease her in by having dinner at Knock first?
FF: Ha. I figured it was like taking off a Band-Aid: Let’s just do it! She danced and had a good time and when we left she said, “This was really helpful to see.”
PGN: So being a Lutheran is apparently fairly relaxed. You don’t hear about too many priests hanging out in the clubs.
FF: So, one of my core values is that I’m not just the pastor of a church, I’m the pastor of a community. I really believe that we have an obligation, a calling, to more than just the people who show up on Sundays. I’ll often wear my collar out. I’m proud to be a pastor and to share that and it’s not uncommon for people who may be questioning their sexuality or their faith to come up and ask questions. It’s one of the gifts that I can bring. On campus and off. It hasn’t always gone over well with people in the LGBT community, especially those who grew up where it wasn’t safe to be gay. One time when I was in D.C., I walked into a coffee shop wearing my collar and a man immediately started screaming at me, “It’s you homophobes in the church that are responsible for so many LGBT people being gay-bashed. Why do you hate us? You’re the reason so many people have such a bad view of religion.” He was obviously someone in pain who’d been hurt by the church and told that he wasn’t loved or valued. He was carrying so much baggage. He was inches from my face, spitting on me in his anger as he yelled. When he finished, the whole coffee shop had come to a standstill. I calmly said to him, “I would love to talk to you about you. Can I ask my boyfriend to join the conversation?” It defused things pretty quickly and we were able to talk about the ton of churches that are welcoming and affirming of LGBT people.
PGN: How do you deal with homophobia within the church? The “Leviticus said …” crowd …
FF: I had one person who clearly was not happy with a gay pastor and I confronted him about it, asked him why he had such negative views about LGBT people. He’d been reading and interpreting scripture literally. Leviticus states that man should not sleep with man, etc., but Leviticus has 613 laws, such as not cutting your hair or getting divorced. How can you choose to follow just the ones you think are important? The overarching command in scripture is to tell us about God’s loving message for us found in Jesus Christ to love each other as we have been loved. Biblically speaking, there is no understanding of homosexuality as we understand it today. Two people together consensually in a loving, all-encompassing way. When Paul talks about it, he’s referring to the time when there were massive sexual orgies where people were used and degraded, not two men, two women or individuals in a life-giving, faithful, loving relationship. Patrick Chang has a good book about queer theology called “Radical Love” that breaks it down.
PGN: Let’s hear more about your family.
FF: OK, my mom and dad have been married for 28 years. I have a sister two years younger than me. I am a twin but my twin brother, Thomas, died when he was 7 months old. My dad is a superintendent in a furniture factory and my mom cares for senior citizens.
PGN: The way you reference your twin sounds like something that still resonates with you, even though you were so young at the time.
FF: Correct. I don’t have any conscious memory of him but I always knew that I had a twin. My parents showed me baby pictures and told me stories about him and us in the hospital and back at home. They told me, “This is a part of who you are and it shaped part of our family, so you need to know about it.” They were open and allowed me to ask questions.
PGN: What was the most difficult question you asked?
FF: Did God kill Thomas because he didn’t love him? And my father answered, “No, Thomas is with God.”
PGN: What’s a favorite memory with your sister?
FF: Every summer since the time I was in diapers, we’d go camping up in the Thousand Islands. It was amazing. I loved being in the outdoors and fishing with my dad. I love the city and urban life but I still hike and camp as much as possible. My wedding is going to be outdoors because nature is where I feel most connected to God and the universe.
PGN: Other hobbies?
FF: I play on the kickball league with Stonewall Sports. I’m an avid cyclist and I love riding around and seeing all the different types of architecture, all the different neighborhoods and people that make up Philadelphia. At the Starbucks, they write “Rev.” on my cup and I love that because, to me, it means I’m living out the core value of really being a pastor everywhere for everyone. So much of ministry is just talking to people to check in and see how they’re doing. And marrying people. I love doing that and hearing the beautiful words of grace and affirmation.
PGN: What’s your go-to karaoke song?
FF: Oh, you don’t want to hear me sing. [My fiancé] Trevor is in the Gay Men’s Chorus, but that’s not one of my gifts.
PGN: What were your favorite TV shows as a kid?
FF: My favorite cartoon as a kid was “Doug” on Nickelodeon. My first time at summer camp, the lifeguard had to jump in and save me. After that I was drawn to “ER” and “Baywatch.” I was curious about how they saved people.
PGN: It wasn’t for the Speedos?
FF: [Laughs] Didn’t hurt! But I’d felt so helpless that I learned to swim and became a lifeguard, and I’ve been one for 10 years now.
PGN: Ever been skinny-dipping?
FF: Oh, boy! OK, I want to be authentic. [Laughs] Yes, I have, but you can only print it if you include the sentence: “It was before I became a pastor and before I went to seminary school.”
PGN: I promise! Tell me about your partner?
FF: I am engaged to a wonderful man named Trevor. He’s an attorney and we’ve been together for four-and-a-half years. Getting married in October. We met in D.C. when I was working as a lifeguard.
PGN: How did you meet?
FF: We met on OK Cupid. We spoke on the phone several times and had our first date on Aug. 2. We met at a pizza joint and ordered dessert first, which was my little test to see how flexible he was. We’ve been together ever since.
PGN: Sounds like a match made in heaven!
FF: Amen!
For more information on University Lutheran Church, visit www.uniluphila.org.
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