Message from:
The Coalition for Safer Schools of NYS, PO Box 2345, Malta, NY 12020
Email to:SARATOGANY@aol.com
The Real or Perceived Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered Student Protection Project

HeadStrong:
Welcome to HeartStrong...the place for GLBT's from religious schools!
www.heartstrong.org
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Dubuque Telegraph Herald, May 18, 2001
P. O. Box 688, Dubuque, Ia., 52001
(Fax:319-588-5745 ) (EMAIL:thonline@wcinet.com )
( http://www.thonline.com )

Author: Internal Struggles Over Sexual Identity Are Intense

Mary Rae Bragg

These days, Marc Adams spends much of his time on the road with his partner, Todd Tuttle, riding to the rescue of young people driven to desperation by their sexual orientation.

And like the young people they once were, those they hope to help are students who face rejection and alienation in the religious-based schools they attend. Adams and Tuttle are co-founders of HeartStrong Inc., which they say is the only national organization devoted to supporting gay and lesbian persons who are or have attended religious educational institutions.

They were in Dubuque Thursday night speaking to a group of about 40 at St. Mark Community Center as guests of the Dubuque Area Chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.

In the midst of a three-week speaking tour of the Midwest, Adams said he has given about 700 speeches in the 3 1/2 years since they founded their group, putting more than 177,000 miles on their car. What keeps them going is the thought that every 5 minutes and 48 seconds, a teenager struggling with their sexual identity commits suicide.

"We believe our work is a rescue mission," Adams said.

Adams is author of "The Preacher's Son." His book is about growing up as the only son of a fundamentalist Baptist preacher in rural Pennsylvania who tried to "cure" himself of his homosexuality by attending evangelist Jerry Falwell's Liberty University.

Tuttle was also a student at Liberty when he met Adams, sharing with him a struggle to keep from acknowledging their homosexuality. Both men eventually came to accept their sexual orientation and 13 years ago became life mates.

Although Adams became successful in a Los Angeles advertising business, he and Tuttle continued to be concerned about those attending private schools that labeled gays and lesbians as abhorrent to God. It was a pressure that Adams said drove him to the brink of suicide while he was at Liberty.

Their ongoing concern led them to quit their jobs, use the money they had saved for a down payment on a house to found HeartStrong, and go on the road, ministering to troubled students in religious schools.

Because they are private schools, religious institutions are not required to abide by federal laws against name-calling and discrimination. Students at those schools can be subject to Gestapo-like tactics, Adams said, and expelled if they are so much as rumored to be gay.

Filled with self-hatred, many become causalities of a type of religious persecution, Adams said, and his group is the only one talking about it.

"We've been there ourselves," Adams said. "We can speak their language."

The purpose of their organization is not to change the schools, but to give support to the students struggling with their sexuality and keep them from killing themselves, Adams said.

http://www.heartstrong.org
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This message has been distributed as a free informational service for the expressed interest of non-profit research and educational purposes only.

"The Real or Perceived Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgendered Student Protection Project"
("Being safe at school should not be a radical concept".. Jamie Nabozny)

A project of:
Coalition for Safer Schools of New York State

John Myers
Director of Operations and Programs
PO Box 2345
Malta, NY 12020
(518) 587-0176
Email:saratogany@aol.com

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