Dignity Conference Witnesses to the Possibility of a Truly Welcoming Catholic Church
The vision of LGBTQ+ Catholics fully participating and serving the Church was front and center at the recent DignityUSA conference, writes transgender man and lifelong Catholic Maxwell Kuzma in a column for The National Catholic Reporter
In July, DignityUSA, a national organization of Catholic LGBTQIA+ people and allies hosted their biennial conference with the theme”We Are God’s People: Here, Now, Always.” Gathered together in that space, Kuzma writes, “LGBTQ+ Catholics don’t have to wait for permission to be ourselves or to serve; we claim our place boldly, bringing our full selves — gifts, struggles and all — into the life of the church.”
Maxwell Kuzma participates in the Eucharistic liturgy at the 2025 Dignity USA conference.
The event was as vibrant as it was diverse, reflecting the richness of the LGBTQ+ community. Kuzma remarked:
“This event was colorful. There were vibrant banners with tassels, liturgical dancers and rainbow stoles. It wasn’t just young people like myself, despite what conservative pundits want you to believe. Attendees included LGBTQ+ adults: married lesbians and gay men who have families, kids, jobs, mortgages and 401(k)s. Ordinary people. Ordinary Catholics. Joining together to celebrate Catholic spirituality and LGBTQ+ community: here, now, always.”
The conference served as a space for attendees to both celebrate and affirm the experiences and gifts of LGBTQ+ Catholics as well as to reflect upon the ongoing challenges the community faces. Panels and group conversations centered the experience of LGBTQ+ Catholics “in their own words, from their own perspectives, without the need to translate for a heteronormative culture,”
Attendees gathered in song, liturgy, and contemplative silence. Conversation explored what justice and inclusion look like for queer Catholics who are facing increased hostility and violence. Throughout the conference, the vision of full participation and inclusion of LGBTQ+ Catholics was both hoped for and realized.
For Kuzma, the conference provided an opportunity to reflect on his own journey as a transgender Catholic, coming from growing up in a “fundamentalist bubble” and now working as a proud advocate for LGBTQ+ Catholics. This shift had a significant impact on not only his sense of faith but his personal prayer life as well, and a period of contemplative silence during the keynote address of the conference made that clear. He explains::
“For years, [contemplative prayer] had been anathema for me. I had not been able to sit quietly within myself, because my self was deeply uncomfortable all the time. Back then, I was attempting to suppress my queer identity — and it wasn’t working…But not this time.This time, I was able to close my eyes and sit in the presence of God without shame, without guilt, without anxiety. I know who I am now, and I’m not running away from that truth.”
When LGBTQ+ Catholics are given the space and permission to freely and fully be themselves,they are able to place themselves before God with nothing holding them back. DignityUSA’s work, Kuzma remarks, helps to provide that space:
“Something profoundly meaningful happens within a community where you are fully loved, welcomed and accepted: your relationship with God, and with the church itself, is transformed. Such a community nurtures the courage to embrace your identity as part of God’s creation. It offers not only solace but also a call to action, rooted in the church’s social teachings and the lived experience of justice and love.
“DignityUSA is a living witness to the possibility of a church that truly includes all people. As the LGBTQ+ community continues to face new challenges, holding fast to the assurance of our own inner authority in relationship with the divine is a powerful act of resistance and hope. This is the banner we fly: a banner of peace, courage and unwavering faith in the God who loves us as we are.”
—Phoebe Carstens, New Ways Ministry, August 7, 2025
Yes, Dignity does make a difference in the ‘feeling’ of acceptance by the Catholic Church but don’t be mistaken the Church despite coming a distance over the past 55 years I have been fighting and advocating for ‘equality’ and the reduction of the underlying “shame’ that the Church despite its appearance of full inclusion still to be maintains the basis of inequality and discrimination. Until we are accepted as equals and ‘very good’ made in the image of our God and Creator, which does mean as Kittridge Cherry MCC retired minister, author and human rights advocate has worked all her life for and is in the process of writing another book this one about the basic tenet;”if God has made us in His own image, than it must reason that one aspect of God is that he has a “Queer” side included within Himself” And until the Church sees the LBGTQ+ community truly in the image of God, Queer side included and all we will never be fully accepted by the Catholic Church which causes itself to suffer and be limited in the message Christ brings to the world. Don’t be fooled by the beauty and gift John McNeil gave to the world, the Church and us by his development of Dignity when I was first getting into the movement actively in the beginning of the 1970’s. We and our love which maybe God made us to teach the Church truly what love is, without conditional rules and fully free and hospitable. The Church still is not fully hospitable and unconditional it still is like a private club mainly for males and binary people only. Dignity is a gift to us for healing but don’t let the beauty of feeling accepted there fool you is believing the Church is that way. We work towards that but too often certain doors remain closed to us filled with conditions if you truly want to feel like you belong. Women need to feel equals which includes ordination. LBGTQ+ need to know not just feel they belong like the binary do, without we being the ones that have to validate, explain, and tell why we are the way we are? Why not have the binary explain, validate and tell why they are the way they are, maybe if the church would really treat equally sexually would be given equal not one sided explaining and validation to do or be forgiven for being created as we are, the way God intended why does the Church make God less than the creator of the very good existence of us. I no longer accept ‘scraps from table’ and refuse to patronize and continue to support the underlying oppression and hate from the conditions placed on us by the Church.