Giving Voice to LGBTQ
Older Adults One-Day Symposium
Saturday, April 14th
9 am – 4 pm
Remember CALLED TO BE? Many blessings came from that outreach event. Our faith values, once again, call us to do justice, this time in support of our GLTBQ senior brothers and sisters.
LGBTQ seniors are dying prematurely and alone because they are fearful of discrimination from professional caregivers who enter their homes or from bullying residents and staff in residential care centers. For those who do not have friends or family to help advocate on their behalf, these injustices happen daily affecting their body, mind and spirit.
Inspired by filmmaker, Stu Maddux’s, 2011 documentary, GEN SILENT, a group of church leaders, with the support of the Executive Director for the Ruth Frost Center for Abundant Aging, Co-Chair for TransOhio, Executive Consultant to Equality Ohio, a former staff member of Central Ohio Area Agency on Aging, and North Church members, formed a ministry to assist faith communities recognize the issues facing LGBTQ seniors and realize their resolutions.
GEN SILENT follows the lives of six LGBTQ seniors who put a face to the epidemic of our deeply flawed and antiquated healthcare system. Their frank discussion on engrained prejudices discloses that many former GLTBQ equal rights fighters are heading back into the closet. GEN SILENT depicts the disparity in the quality of professional caregivers including those now committed to making their LGBTQ clients safe and happy whether at home or in-care residences. We are offered new hope as each cross paths with impassioned people trying to change LGBTQ aging for the better.
It is our hope that this Symposium will empower LGBTQ older adults with information to build self-advocacy skills, find supportive resources, better equip their support team of family and friends, and introduce ecumenical church congregations to the difficulties facing its LGBTQ members.
