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Author Stores arrays wide-ranging materials to offer attestation that persons of homosexual orientation should and can be accepted in the Church of Christ, Scientist. Same-gender sexuality has long been a conflicted concept within most religions. Stores presents accounts of the inner understandings and outer maltreatment of notable characters in that struggle.
For instance, in the 1960s, Troy D. Perry, Jr. realized his homosexuality while working as a Pentecostal preacher and later made a momentous decision to form a ministry for sexual minorities. This led to the creation of numerous small outgrowths, such as Pink Menno and Rainbow Baptists. Kay Lahusen worked for the Christian Science Monitor library in the late 1940s. Learning that her sexual orientation was considered a vice by that organization, she boldly challenged the church board and the American Library Association. These and other portraits establish Stores’ thesis that much has changed through these earlier courageous forays so that now the gay/lesbian cohort finds general and sometimes official acceptance.
Author Stores has created this lively saga to highlight the significant changes that have evolved regarding the status and treatment of gay and lesbian people within his Christian Science faith. Quotations by the founder of the Christian Science church, Mary Baker Eddy, offer further enlightenment, beginning with her clear statement, “I recommend that Scientists draw no lines whatever between one person and another….” Stores has gathered his well-constructed case study to draw deeper attention to the general regard for gay/lesbian persons. He avers that its purpose is not to teach his religion. Nonetheless, he has provided extensive material about Christian Science in lengthy appendices. Readers, both within or new to Store’s historical/philosophical treatise, will be educated by his firm, factual stance and may be inspired to seek further information based on the many areas of concentration presented here.