Short intro: Rev.
Franklyn Schaefer has been an ordained minister in the United
Methodist Church, serving in the United States for more than 20
years.
Even though Pastor Frank has
three gay children, he never considered himself an activist until
his Church denomination put him on trial for presiding over the
marriage of his son Tim to another man in 2013.
The Church jury gave him an
ultimatum: either recant and promise to never perform another gay
marriage or be sacked (or "defrocked").
Pastor Frank's decision was to
stand with his children and the LGBTQ+ community, reject the offer
and condemn the homophobic stance of the Church.
He was subsequently stripped
of his credentials and lost his local church (which he had served
for 11 years), though he was later reinstated following a long
judical appeals process.
As his story was highly
publicized, he became a national speaker and human rights activist
defending equal rights (including religious rights) for the LGBTQ +
community.
Pastor Frank's story is told
in the 2015 documentary "An Act of Love." He also published a book
entitled "Defrocked - How A Father's Act of Love Shook the United
Methodist Church."
New Beginnings in a new country
I'm
Frank Schaefer a German-American
who came to the US in pursuit of a theological
education. So, in 1990, my wife Brigitte packed as many things as
the airline allowed, took our three children Tim, Debbie, and
Kevin, and flew to the country that was to become our new home. It
was one of the most courageous things I have ever done. It was scary
and exciting at the same time. After some initial problems with my
student visa were cleared, I got underway at Valley Forge University and five
years later I graduated with a Master of Divinity degree from Princeton
Theological Seminary. In the meantime, I had joined the United
Methodist church where I pursued ordination. While I worked as a
student pastor at the U.M. Church in Morrisville, PA, our son Jordan Pascal was
born. We will never forget the love and support our parish poured
out over us during that joyful yet financially difficult time.
Avon, Pennsylvania
I was ordained an elder in
1998 while pastoring my first solo church, Avon Zion of Iona,
PA. To say that the Avon Zion Church was struggling would be an
understatement. In my first three months, not enough money came in
for my paycheck, which worked out fine because at that point we
didn't have our green card, so I was actually not allowed to work for pay at
that time anyway. We were able to turn the tide with the remnant of
this dying parish. We went from about 50 in regular attendance
to 150 within two years. A big part of the credit goes to the
congregation who went out of their way to rescue their church. They
had faced the real prospect of seeing their church doors closed and
became most welcoming toward new visitors as a result. Of course, my
family and I had to do our part. My wife and older children were all
deeply involved, Brigitte worked as a church secretary, Sunday
School teacher and lay counselor. My son Tim played the drums in the
worship band and sang in the choir. I tried to reach out with a
creative approach to ministry using music, media and humor. I
preached from a boat one
Sunday, constructed a huge whale out of pool-noodles and blankets in
the sanctuary, and I even did
stand-up comedy in the community, once on a
local TV show,
all in
order to rebuild my congregation. My family and I are just blessed to have been a part of
such an amazing turnaround story that was captured in this Lebanon
Daily News article.
Desperate Preachers everywhere
It was during our life at Avon
Zion, that I also started the Desperate Preacher's Site which began
as a blog, then a discussion forum on Lectionary passages and
eventually developed into a full-blown resource site for pastors and
Christian educators (Wikipedia
article). At it's height (in 2002), DPS had a subscriber base of
close to 2,000 desperate preachers. DPS resources are offered free
of charge at the present time (since the Covid-19 pandemic) and will
likely stay this way in the future (DesperatePreacher.com).
Hershey Med Center / Penn
State
After five years at my first solo church ministry in
Avon Zion, I decided to continue my education. I entered into a
program that combined four units of Clinical Pastoral Education with
an internship for Chaplaincy at the Hershey Medical Center (the
program was through Penn State U). I was grateful to have had
this educational opportunity. My online ministry was at it's peak at
that time, so I didn't have to take up any student loans. The
education was an eye-opener in many respects. I learned pastoral
counseling techniques, but I also learned a lot about myself.
Zion UMC of Iona,
Pennsylvania
After graduating from the CPE program, I was
appointed to my second church ministry in Lebanon PA, the Iona UMC.
We had a rough start there, since even before I started, it had already become known that my son Tim was gay and that
presented a challenge to a few people. Perhaps
the sarcastic video Pastor's Busy Day in the Office
I shot reflects the many frustrations I experienced at Iona.
Apparently, I had to let off steam with this production.
While I was able to do
my ministry somewhat successfully (we grew to a point where we
needed to start a second service), I had also been in a constant
tug-of-war with some pretty conservative and influential church leaders and long-standing
members. All this came to a head when I tried to dismiss one of the
most disruptive of these leaders--the choir director. Shortly after
she reluctantly agreed to "retire" from her duties as choir director, she
brought charges against me to my bishop, the most significant one
being that I presided over the wedding of my son Tim to another man.
Since this was deemed to be against church polity and theology at the
time, the Eastern Penn conference of the United Methodist Church had
apparently no choice but to put me on trial. In my book Defrocked
I go into some of the dirty details of this story. In the end, my
11-year ministry at Iona came to an abrupt end when the United
Methodist Church took my credentials.
LGBTQ Activism and Church
Restart
Even though I had three gay
children, I never considered myself an activist until my own Church
denomination put me on trial for presiding over the marriage of my
son Tim to another man almost 6 years prior to being charged.
After a highly publicized United Methodist Church trial (which
made national news), I was
stripped of my credentials and my local church ministry in December
of 2013. Immediately following the trial, I became a national
speaker, defending the cause for LGBTQ rights in progressive
churches, colleges, and seminaries. I was approached my many
national news TV programs and appeared on Good
Morning America, the View, Anderson Cooper, Tamara Hall, CNN New Day
and many others. I also fought the conviction,
and won with the help of my very able councils Bob Comb, William
Ewing, and Scott Campbell as well as my associate Clydette Overturf, to
all of whom I will always be grateful. I was reinstated on an appeal in June
2014, a ruling that was upheld by the Church's highest Court in
October 2014.
Anderson Cooper
360 interviews Rev. Frank Schaefer
Meanwhile I was approached by
Chalice Press to see if I was able and willing to write a book about my experience. With
the help of another author, they were able to publish
"Defrocked" within 4 month. It tells the
story of my trial and the aftermath. At about the same time,
Scott Sheppard,
a documentary film-maker with a Methodist background produced a film
that told our family's story along with others within the United
Methodist church. The film,
An Act of Love,
produced among others by
Pauley Perette
(NCIS), was released at Mill
Valley CA in 2015.
Upon reinstatement, I was told
that I was "un-appointable" in Pennsylvania. Fortunately,
a United Methodist Church leader with a heart for social justice, bishop Minerva
Carcaņo,
invited me to minister in California. I followed her invitation to
pioneer the
University United Methodist Church restart in Isla Vista, CA.
I have enjoyed the ministry experience at University UMC, especially
working with students and the LGBTQ community.
My wife Brigitte
My wife Brigitte should be on
the Vatican's list to sainthood, and not just because she's been
married to me for 4 decades. But perhaps they won't be able to make
room for two St. Brigittes. Truth is, she is a beautiful creature,
inside and out. She is generous, principled (without being
judgmental), and the most loyal person ever. She is a deep thinker,
she's spiritual more than religious and has a knack for fixing and
improving things by simple means--she calls them hacks. She
has more than supported me throughout my life; I could not have done
any of what I had to do without her. She has been an amazing
pastor's wife and church secretary, and an even more amazing mother
and home-maker. And she is a fiercer LGBTQ advocate than any. When
it comes to her children, she is like a lioness who defends her cubs
viciously with all her strength to her last drop of blood. Even to
this day, she is happiest when she touched base with all of her
children on any given day, supporting and encouraging them. Many of
our students at church have adopted her as their mother away from
home. Funny thing about Brigitte is that she loves thunderstorms and
heavy rain storms, and interestingly most of her birthdays have been
rainy days (until we came to southern California). Though she
worries about the future sometimes, when a crisis actually hits, she
turns into this resourceful, strong leader who knows exactly what to
do and is able to help everybody around her. I feel more in love
with Brigitte today than ever before. She is the best.
Click here for pictures and
some stories about us.
My Children
I love all of my children, and there isn't a thing I
would not do for them. I am proud of all of my children. None
of them know this better than my oldest, Tim, who came out to us in
his senor year of high school. My wife and I believe in
unconditional love, and so, of course we accepted and supported our
son (Listen to the story in my
Book Review video). And of course, I couldn't say "no" when he
asked me to preside of his wedding even though I knew it could get
me into trouble. Can you believe that Tim, despite the
ugliness of the trial, still became a pastor himself? It is a good
feeling if one of your children follows in your footsteps! It turned
out that three of our four children are gay and, of course, we
supported all of them as much as we could.
My daughter Debbie probably had the happiest
childhood of them all. She just didn't want to grow up. She was the
only one that stuck with my tennis lessons and so I became her coach
when she played number two on her high school tennis team. We also
played in mixed doubles events and actually won a couple of
tournaments together (the only trophies I didn't throw out). It was
amazing, she knew from little on that she wanted to become a teacher
and so she did become a special ed, math, and German teacher,
currently working at a high school in York.
My son Kevin has always been such a philosophical
thinker. The kinds of conversations I had with him at age six
totally astounded me. I predicted then that he would become a
professor one day. And wouldn't you know that he is the first person
in our families that is getting a PhD. He is studying linguistics
and is already teaching undergraduate courses at UCSB. So proud!!!
One of the things I love doing with Kevin is carrying on
conversations in German and, recently, also in Spanish.
Jordan Pascal is amazing in his own right. When he
was young he dismantled a lot of things out of curiosity, now he is
putting things together. He is finishing his studies in Computer
Sciences at UC Santa Cruz and has already helped our family so much
with our computer problems and such. He recently installed a complex
smart light system in our house and last year he was able to
retrieve the data of his aunt's fried thumb drive - she is a teacher
and had all of her students grades and work progress stored on it.
Can you imagine her relief?
In our second year living in Santa Barbara, Debbie,
Jordan Pascal, and I made a fun little video, which shows the kind
of fun we are having as a family. It's a spoof of the country song:
"Buy Me A Boat"
(2016).
Life in and Away from our
German Family
I had a pretty happy childhood
growing up in Wuppertal, Germany with my parents, Horst and Christel
Schaefer, and my younger brother Uwe. Moving so far away has
certainly been hard in this respect, but the good news is that a.
social media and video chatting has made it easier to stay in touch
and b. we were fortunate to be able to fly back for visits on a
regular basis. At age 16 I made a video about our family, Home, Sweet
Home (shot with a Super 8mm film camera--haha). Before
retirement, my dad was an engineer, my mom a book-keeper. My
brother, like myself, became a pastor, artist (Uwe
X), author, and activist (esp. fighting human trafficking) as
well (he actually preceded me by a couple of years). As long as I've
known them, my parents were always very active in their faith. It
used to vex me to no end that we always had to be the last people at
church. My parents were also very supportive when my brother Uwe launched
a church in our hometown, the CGW which was to become one of the
largest congregations in the BDP (Bund Deutscher Pfingstgemeinden).
It's always fun when we visit and get together with now three
generations of the Schaefers as well as the Meyers - my wife's clan.
Of all the family videos I took, this one is my favorite:
Germany
(2009).
My family has always enjoyed
visits from family members and friends. My parents were able to
visit us frequently, my brother once, and of Brigitte's side of the
family, her parents, brother and sisters, as well as nieces and
nephews were able to visit. One of my favorite humorous videos I did
together with Mark, the husband of our niece Tina. The video is
entitled
Vater,
Vater (2007) and tells the story of two inept fathers who
nonetheless think they're very capable. This video landed me in a
bit trouble with my church board because in it I appear to drink
beer...which I did. Another fun video actually led to the
composition of the Easter Epic. Disclaimer: it's a pretty
goofy video
My Gothic Phase
Between 2011 and 2013, I got fascinated by the ancient Gothic tribes
in Europe, partially because part of my family is from the area
where they originated (the Gdansk area formerly East Prussia, now
Poland). I did a lot of research on their history and language,
wrote several articles and established a website,
GothicSage.com. I even composed a
song in the ancient Gothic language Atta Unsar
(2013) -- the words of the Lord's Prayer. For the
Atta Unsar video, I
let my hair grow a little to make it more authentic looking...and
yes, the Gothic people were apparently predominantly blond and
blue-eyed!
My Music and Multi-Media
Thang
Music has always been a big
part of my life and it came in handy for a variety of my pursuits in
life. It was my parents who got my brother and me started on the
creative musical path when they gave us a guitar at the age of 12.
My father, Horst, had learned to play the concert guitar in his
youth, and so he made sure we learned how to play the right way.
Later, I learned to play the piano as well as the
drums. These
musical skills always came in handy in my career; music is such a
powerful medium. I started a contemporary worship band in every
church I served, and was also able to enhance my online ministry (DPS)
for which I produced at least
12 successful video
presentations for churches, all of them featuring my own
original songs or sound track arrangements.
My creative musical pursuit
allowed me to publish three albums with original songs or public
domain songs with my own arrangements, Keep On
Smiling, (2008), Love Like
An Ocean (2011), and
Guitar Reflections:
Then & Now (2013). Since I self-published
my songs,
I had to create my own music company which I named: JavaCasa Music. I
chose to give myself an artist name; though I didn't get very
creative with that since I only added three
letters to my first name to make it: "Franklyn Schaefer." All
but one of my 33 published songs are originals (or original
arrangements of public domain tunes, such as my version of
GreensleevesandEin Ros
Entsprungen). The fact that my most successful song in terms
of digital sales and YouTube views is not an original, but the cover
of a hymn (Lord of the Dance)
has always vexed me a little. I found that it's hard to get an audience for original songs. I was more successful using my original music as sound
tracks for video presentations. Two of my compositions were very
successful in this respect,
Psalm 23
and the
Easter Epic.
Credit where Credit is Due
I will be forever grateful for
musicians that collaborated with me and enhanced my songs,
especially Amy Rose (featured in
Psalm 23 and Magnificat),
Clydette Overturf (I
Want to Thank You,
I Promise, and background vocals for
Keep on Smiling
and
Tell Me Now), Howard Lee (Love
Like an Ocean), and the kids (now all grown) from the Iona
Church who had a
major part in the song
Keep on Smiling (vocals and acting).
Speaking of which, I am also very grateful to all the wonderful
people who helped me film videos and those were willing to be actors
in my music videos. Special mention goes to my nephew Flo Meyer and
my friend Marty
Jenkins for their film contributions and acting in
Run Jimmy Run, a music video that aims to raise awareness
of homelessness. Marty played the part of the homeless person so
amazingly, and Flo played the part of a mean cop very convincingly! Special mention also goes to Le Tang, a JavaCasa
Music intern who single-handedly produced, filmed and edited
the cutest music video based on my song:
Tell Me Now.
