Controversial New Book Tackles Black-Church Homophobia

CLEVELAND - Attempting to break "hundreds of years of silence," a new, controversial book argues that pervasive homophobia in the historically black church has reached "crisis" proportion. "The black church's teaching that homosexuality is immoral has created a crisis for lesbian and gay Christians in black churches," the Rev. Horace L. Griffin, an Episcopal priest, writes in the preface of his new book, "Their Own Receive Them Not: African American Lesbian and Gays in Black Churches." The book is being officially released on October 15, 2006 by Cleveland- based The Pilgrim Press.