Notables – Queer Silicon Valley

Josh Selo

October 23, 2024 by queer silicon valley team

Sometimes, by luck or hard work, it happens that the right person comes along at the right time for the right job. That’s what happened when the longtime Chief Executive Officer of the Bill Wilson Center was retiring in 2023 after a remarkable 40-year career.

Josh Selo, who had been CEO of West Valley Community Services based in Cupertino, California, was interested in the job, and excited about the prospect of working at one of the largest and most respected nonprofits serving homeless and foster teenagers and youths, particularly those who were LGBTQ+, in Santa Clara County.

For Selo, it was more than just a career shift. Having experienced housing insecurity as a child and enduring merciless bullying in junior and high school, Selo started his career working with youth, young adults, and families. The job seemed to bring together so many parts of his life and experience, including the more than 26 years he has worked for community-based nonprofits, a reflection of his desire to be of service to others.

Fast forward to May 2024 and the evening of Bill Wilson Center’s annual dinner. Held at the Santa Clara Convention Center in one of the cavernous ballrooms, the event was sold out with more than 315 people in attendance. Selo was the MC, informing the audience of Bill Wilson Center’s work in the community, paying tribute to former employee and community leader Janet Childs, and presenting stories of how Bill Wilson Center helped two homeless youths overcome their challenges so they could reach their goals.

Then it was time to fundraise. Standing at the mic, the 6’2”, 48-year-old blended his career experience with his background studying theater in college into true showmanship. Before you knew it, Selo was successfully inviting people to raise their dinner programs to contribute various amounts of money to support the work of Bill Wilson Center, starting with $10,000, then $5,000, then $2,500, etc., all the way down to $100. The room was full of energy, with just about everyone in the convention hall raising their hands in support. All in all, the event raised more than $277,106, making it BWC’s most successful event ever.

Clearly, Selo was right where he belonged.

Early life

Born on Valentine’s Day in 1976, Selo was raised in Los Angeles. His father was a small business owner, and his mother a homemaker. His parents separated when he was 10.

“That period was hard because we were now a single-income family,” he said, adding his mother returned to work as a secretary. “If not for my grandmother, we would not have been able to remain housed. We were always on the edge of remaining housed for much of my childhood. We lived in constant fear of not being able to pay the bills from month to month.”

Selo’s middle and senior years in school were tough. “If you didn’t present as the status quo, you were picked on quite a bit,” he said. “I was bullied for how I walked, talked, for who I was or who I was perceived to be. I was called terrible names. It has left a permanent mark that I have carried all my life. I knew that I was different, but I didn’t know what it was.”

Everything changed when Selo attended college. Inspired by a high school teacher, he enrolled as an English major at the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1993. Shortly into his freshman year, he also began to explore his sexual identity.

“I started to understand what it meant to be gay,” he said. “I finally admitted to myself that’s what I was.”

Dating men was challenging and intimidating. Having a close group of friends and changing his major from English to Theater helped.

At the same time, he said, Will and Grace became a hit on television, helping to normalize what it meant to be gay. He decided to embrace who he was and put it out there.

“I’m very much a fighter. I’m a bit scrappy, and very competitive” he said, “So, I was not a person who was going to hide it. I wore the rainbow rings. I got my ear pierced. I felt like my days of hiding were over.”

Selo feels lucky to have a supportive family, which made his coming out process much easier. “I know from hearing from friends, even from my own husband, that it can be pretty awful when your parents approach you from a place of hate, which can impact you for a really long time.”

Selo told his sister first, as she had always had his back. His mother, who had suspected he was gay, expressed concern about his safety. He delayed coming out to his father, afraid that he wouldn’t be able to accept him as a gay man.

“My dad used to use all these words, tell these jokes. I knew how he felt about gay people. And then when I was 13, he sat me down with a stack of Playboy magazines and told me to check them out. I literally looked at the top one for a minute and walked out of the room. I didn’t know what he was expecting me to do,” said Selo. “That’s why I was nervous about telling him, but he was fine. I really met no resistance from my family.”

Selo had been involved in the Jewish community all his childhood, so when he graduated in 1997, he decided to pursue a master’s in Jewish education. At the time his brother was living in New York and studying to be a rabbi, so he set he packed his bags and headed east. Perhaps not surprisingly, Selo was the only out gay person attending his school. At that time, the conservative wing of the Jewish religious movement didn’t knowingly ordain gay people as rabbis.

After three years and graduating with his degree, Selo took a job at the Jewish Community Center in Manhattan, overseeing programs for teens. JCCs, as they are often referred to, are general recreational, social, and fraternal organizations serving the Jewish community in cities across the country, including Palo Alto, Los Gatos, and San Jose.

This was the first step on a career path that introduced him to the nonprofit world. One of the most memorable projects he led was Operation Chicken Soup. Each month, Selo would bring together high school students from the Upper West Side to make chicken soup from scratch and deliver bowls to low-income and recently unhoused people living in SROs on the Upper West Side.

“We’d chat with the residents and hang out. It was a pretty incredible experience,” he said, adding that while the soup was cooking, he’d talk with kids about homelessness, housing insecurity, and other social challenges.

During his 10 years at the JCC, Selo worked with children, youth, and families, overseeing summer camps, a young family program, and a program for families with children with special needs.

Selo lived in New York from 1997 to 2013. He dated intermittently, which led to his meeting his future husband Philippe Selo online 20 years ago. Their first date was at Jamba Juice at Columbus Circle.

“I knew right away that this was a different kind of person,” Selo said. “He texted me five minutes after the date was over, and told me that it was really nice meeting me. Here is a human who wanted to express that he had a good time and felt like he didn’t need to pretend to be cool, which I really appreciated. I had no idea that now, almost 20 years later, we would still be together. It was an interesting time to be young and gay in New York.”

When they were together for about five years, they started talking about having children and decided to formalize their partnership by getting married. At that time, many states didn’t allow gay couples to wed, so they went to Massachusetts to marry.

“My mom didn’t speak to me for about a month because we eloped,” Selo said. “She really wanted to be at the wedding.”

Their first child, Madeleine, was adopted shortly thereafter, followed by Lexie almost two years later. The family relocated to California in 2013, and Selo found work at the YMCA Silicon Valley and settled down to get to know the Bay Area as a new resident.

Still yearning for a more meaningful career, he returned to school and earned a master’s in business with a focus on finance. He found work as Executive Director for West Valley Community Services. As part of the Emergency Assistance Network, the nonprofit helps people facing food and housing insecurity. During his seven years there, the organization created its first mobile food pantry, and led a $2.5 million capital campaign to serve the expanding need in the region for supportive services.

Bill Wilson Center

Bill Wilson Center was founded in 1973 as a counseling center for runaway and homeless youth. Focusing on housing, education, counseling, and advocacy, it now provides services to more than 5,000 children, youth, young adults, and families in Santa Clara County annually. Its street outreach and crisis line programs reach an additional 100,000 clients, and its behavioral health department provides individual and family counseling.

Working at Bill Wilson Center to provide housing and behavioral health for those in need was right up Selo’s alley. Selo said the nonprofit offers everything from shelter to permanent supportive housing. It provides supportive services, system navigation, education support, workforce development, and job coaching.

“We run the county’s only shelter for minors between the ages of 12 and 17,” he said, adding it also offers housing programs for families and individuals up to age 30.

Bill Wilson Center operates a call center, which works to match people experiencing homelessness with a shelter bed. It also offers to transport them to the shelter along with their pets and belongings. It partners with Santa Clara County to provide programs for current and former foster youth, from a safe space to hang out and participate in social activities to a place to take a shower, wash clothes, eat, and meet with a social worker. It also offers youth with clothing, counselors, coaches, and support.

Selo says Bill Wilson Center gives him the opportunity to do more to serve his community. “There’s a lot more work we have to do,” he said. “I personally am deeply committed to staying in that space for the long haul.

One of the highlights of his first year at BWC was re-launching a housing program for unhoused LGBTQIA young adults that had been funded by the federal government but no longer received federal support. “We were able to put together a pretty robust funding structure, able to support not just 12 months of operations, but 18 months because people felt that this was important.”

“That’s the kind of work that I want to do now. It resonates with me. If I can be the person connecting all of these different parties to make this happen for our young people, that’s what I want to do. It’s how I can make sure that my life has meaning and that the world is even a tiny bit better than it was.”

Selo now has some extra dollars to help make that happen.

For more information about the Bill Wilson Center, go to BillWilsonCenter.org.

Angelica Cortez

October 30, 2024October 23, 2024 by queer silicon valley team

Dr. Angelica Cortez, community activist, social entrepreneur, and founder and executive director of LEAD Filipino, brings almost two decades of experience in public policy, advocacy, and community development work to the nonprofit. The organization is dedicated to grassroots leadership, culturally responsive education, health equity, and civic literacy in the FilAm community. LEAD stands for Leadership, Education, Activism and Dialogue.

While working with the California Immigrant Policy Center and State Assemblymember Rich Gordon, Cortez focused on health and human services issues statewide. She fought for state legislation on corporate board diversity while serving as vice president of Racial Justice and Equity for the Silicon Valley Leadership Group. Cortez is the first senior vice president of Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion for Pacific Clinics, a mental and behavioral health service provider. She also advocates for LGBTQ+ leadership, health equity, social justice, and Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) political engagement.

“I’m a product of my people and will spend my days working toward community advancement,” she said.

Cortez grew up in an immigrant, working class community in Pittsburg, an East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. Her father spent his early years in the Philippines and immigrated to San Francisco with his family to the United States. Her mother came from a blended family of Guamanian, Japanese, Filipino, Dutch, and Irish heritage. Cortez was raised with rich Filipino and Guamanian customs and traditions emblematic of her culture, including strong family values around service, unity, and collective stewardship.

“I’m very driven by my cultural heritage, my identity, social groups, and causes but also the intersections of being a member of the LGBTQ+ community,” she said, adding in second grade she had a crush on a girl. “I had this attraction but didn’t really understand what it meant.”

Cortez kept her feelings to herself, as they were at odds with her religious Catholic upbringing. Her family attended church on Sundays, where Cortez sang in the choir and read the mass to the congregation. She and her sisters also helped their mother, a Eucharistic minister, bring communion to the sick and homebound.

Although her sisters teased her for being the family’s golden child, lacking gay role models, Cortez felt confused and alone.

“I knew it wasn’t right in the eyes of a devout Catholic family,” she said. “I hid who I was for a long time. I didn’t come out until I was 25.”

In college, Cortez realized she had overcompensated during high school. She was a high achiever academically and athletically and involved with extracurricular activities.

Joining in student activism and a Filipino American student organization Akbayan, at San Jose State University brought her a sense of connection and cultural pride. But through the years, she faced stereotyping.

“I have a million stories of people making lazy assumptions about my sexuality and my husband and my kids at home,” she said. “When they look at me, they see an Asian woman. Because of that, folks would ask me if my favorite Disney princess was Mulan? I’d say that’s a different Asian. I’m Filipina.”

People would also ask if she was into Hello Kitty. “I didn’t mean any disrespect to Hello Kitty,” Cortez laughed, “but just because I’m Asian doesn’t mean I have an affinity for Hello Kitty.”

While at SJSU, having studied political science, grassroots movements, power building, and civil rights strategies, Cortez became aware of social injustice and the importance of public service and representation. As Community and Political Affairs Chair of a Filipino American organization, she helped bring over 200 Eastside Union High School District students to SJSU to attend workshops on college applications and financial aid.

“For a lot of these kids, they were the first in their family to go to college,” she said. “Being able to make a small imprint in their trajectory filled my heart. A lot of them went on to pursue their own journeys in advocacy, activism, civil rights work, running campaigns, working as legislative staffers, and working in the public sector. It’s gratifying to know that I had a piece in that.”

About 16 years later, Cortez was among many community leaders to help launch Delano Manongs Park in East San Jose, the first park in San Jose and among one of the few in the country named in honor of the Manongs, the Filipino American labor leaders that fought for farmworker rights and protections throughout the 1960s.

Although she was initially slow to reveal to friends that she was queer, starting a romantic relationship emboldened her. Being young and in love with a woman at college helped her live her truth, she said, and find the courage to fully come out to herself.

“For me, it was standing in the mirror and saying to myself, ‘You love women. You are lesbian.’ And being okay with that and smiling back at myself,” she said, “and walking with my head held high.”

She was determined to live fully and openly, sharing who she was, regardless of the consequences.

“If my people rock with me and love me, then they’ll walk toward me,” she told herself. “And those that don’t will walk away.”

Today, when working with young students, she urges them to come out to themselves first. Through LEAD Filipino, she partners with other queer organizers to create emotionally and psychologically safe spaces. They provide culturally responsive programs that share stories and celebrate queerness in FilAm and AAPI communities.

Cortez said she was privileged to have her family’s love and support when she came out and appreciates being able to be her true self. She and a close cousin both came out to each other’s surprise and delight.

Cortez was motivated to create LEAD Filipino around issues impacting the Filipino American community, such as system gaps, economic hardship, food insecurity, cultural education, housing, and social justice.

Her career took off after finishing an internship at City Hall and joining the Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits, where CEO Patricia Gardner became her mentor as well as a second mom.

Through participating in the Filipino Memorial Project from 2008 to 2012, she learned lessons in advocacy, fundraising and building neighborhood buy-in while working to have a mural commissioned at the Milpitas Library depicting the Delano Manongs. The project included outreach to student organizations, letter writing, and testifying at city commission meetings.

Cortez also worked as a legislative staffer with state Assembly member Rich Gordon, who was openly gay and chair of the LGBTQ caucus. She helped staff his portfolio on Health and Human Services and oversaw the internship program in the district office. A bill to include LGBTQ+ history in school books was passed but not yet implemented, she said.

These early professional experiences would influence her decision to one day start her own community organization.

Not seeing a FilAm voice among lobbyists advocating for policy and civic issues, along with attending the Asian Pacific American Leadership Institute APALI), crystallized her desire for coalition building.

Cortez wanted to start an organization to increase FilAm civic literacy and civic representation. In 2015, the organization offered a workshop with the Filipino Youth Coalition in East San Jose. In 2016, LEAD Filipino took off, receiving its first grant to motivate Filipinos in Santa Clara County to vote. The first campaign was called Iboto Pilipino (Vote Filipino).

Leading by example and through open discussion, LEAD Filipino’s leaders help youth come out to their families while providing resources and support. The organization partners with service providers like Santa Clara County’s Q Corner, providing services and education on how to have constructive conversations safely, such as bringing a family member along and talking in a place of comfort.

LEAD Filipino plans to acquire a community center where youth, student, and senior organizations can lead Filipino civic programs, arts, and cultural groups and serve the broader community.

In addition to its transformational programming, Cortez would like to see the organization work toward social justice and the defense of LGBTQ+ communities. She’d like LEAD Filipino to dedicate its resources and advocate for the creation of an LGBTQ+ California policy commission focused on social safety nets that is being spearheaded by South Bay/Silicon Valley Assembly member Alex Lee.

Cortez has dedicated her life around justice, equity, and systems that don’t just reflect FilAm values and experiences, but strengthens how FilAm, AAPI, immigrant, and LGBTQ+ communities interact with systems of power to create the change they want to see. Her contributions are visible across civics and organizing, social impact, and health equity.

“The answer is not to shrink away and think someone else will do it,” she said, “because you’re the person we need to do it. We need to hear what you have to say. We need that diversity of perspective, opinion and experiences. This is the time to lead in your own way, to stick to your convictions and know that you’re not ever alone in this.”

Arturo Magaña

December 7, 2024October 23, 2024 by queer silicon valley team

For Arturo Magaña, folclórico dance is an expression of their Mexican and LGBTQ+ cultures.

Magaña has a deep understanding of who they are and what matters to them, including being their authentic self; a gift they received at an early age from their mother.

“This is who I am. I need to represent myself,” they declared to Susan Cashion, co-founder of the Los Lupenos Dance Company, asserting their right to dance with men and perform wearing a skirt.

Today, Ensamble Folclórico Colibri, which Magaña directs and co-founded, strives to brings a sense of acceptance to LGBTQ+ people.

“I’ve seen the faces of young people and their parents when we are performing,” they said. “They see themselves and they see the representation and the pride of our heritage as queer men, or as a lesbian or as a nonbinary person

Colibri includes members both in and outside the LGBTQ+ community. The dance company accepts straight members to show solidarity with its allies. But not everyone is a supporter.

In 2018, the organization experienced pushback by a Folclorico group in Mexico which threatened to request the Mexican government stop them from performing. But Magaña would not be cowed.

“We put our foot down and we said, ‘we’re not going anywhere. You can do whatever you want. We have a freedom of expression,’” they said.

As a result, within a month, Colibri’s likes on Facebook rose from less than a thousand to about 9,000. Unfortunately, the group still faces some backlash from those who feel it goes against tradition.

“It’s more of this fear and repression,” Magaña said. “When we put on our show, I added a tagline that said, ‘We’re not here to change tradition. We’re here to add our stories because they matter.’”

Sharing its community stories through dance is everything to Magaña, and sometimes has the power to change perspective. In 2018, Colibri performed a traditional piece called Quadro with the addition of a lesbian wedding and a dance portraying two men falling in love.

“People saw us in a different light,” Magaña said. “It wasn’t just about dancing men to men or women to women. It was for us to convey our day-to-day story because that’s what folclórico does.”

While performing in an event with the California School for the Deaf, a seven-year-old trans dancer who was so moved, she started crying and hugging them and asked to wear one of their skirts. Her mother said it was life changing for her daughter and made her feel seen.

“That to me, was probably the best acknowledgement that we have received,” Magaña said.

Looking back

In 1992, at age 18, Magaña witnessed men dancing together for the first time during a ProLatino folclórico performance. Intrigued, they joined the dance troupe, which was invited to Washington, D.C. to dance for the Peace March, in addition to performing during San Jose Pride and San Francisco Pride festivals.

After ProLatino dissolved around 1995, Magaña joined the elite dance company Los Lupenos de San Jose as a lead dancer. They stayed with them for about 15 years, performing in ethnic dance festivals and touring with renown artists such as Linda Ronstadt and Lila Downs.

To bring folclórico to the LGBTQ community, they joined Colectivo ALA, Colibri, which eventually became its own entity. The troupe marched in the San Francisco Pride Parade I 2016, receiving an award for the most vibrant and colorful group and honorable mention from the city and county of San Francisco. It annually participates in Silicon Valley Pride. Colibri also headlined Latino Pride in Seattle. They were honored to be invited by Somos Seattle, a queer organization focused on representation of the Latino community.

Colibri was adopted by the School of Arts and Culture at Mexican Heritage Plaza in 2017 as a cultural partner. In 2018, it performed a stage production boasting 40 dancers, including performers from Mexico’s Grupo Folclórico Teocalli. Colibri is also cultural partners with Mosaic America and was featured in 2024 at the World Arts West Festival.

Getting personal

Magaña, a native of Juarez, Mexico was born in 1974. They immigrated to the U.S. in 1988 with their family. Not knowing English and feeling alienated, they experienced culture shock. At school, they were taught all their lessons in an ESL classroom with other people Spanish speakers.

But they felt blessed their mother accepted them as they were and gave them the freedom to pursue their passions.

“I always knew who I was as a queer person,” Magaña said. “I didn’t really have the name, of being queer or gay but I knew I was different.”

Magaña started dance at ten years old at the Casa de Cultura in Mexico. Seeing Folklorico ProLatino in connected them to Mexico, introduced the possibility of two men dancing together and helped define who Magaña was.

To be their authentic self and have self-express as a queer artist, Magaña parted ways with Los Lupenos in 2015.

“There was an opportunity where we got invited to dance and dance men to men,” they said. “I asked permission… and I was denied. I was pouring all my heart and soul into dance, and to represent Los Lupenos and my culture and I was being poured into a cage.”

At the School of Arts and Culture, performing in 2015 with the male co-director was a personal turning point.

“We got on stage… holding hands and holding partners, and we didn’t even want to touch ourselves because we were in front of an audience,” Magaña said. “We didn’t know how they were going to react, so we were very timid. Through the middle of the song, we heard the kids start clapping and cheering. At that moment, something sparked. We were afraid of our own identity, how we were going to be received by other people. But other people are enamored with what we’re doing. It was the right time for Colibri to be part of the community.”

Magaña found strength in RuPaul’s advice.

“I learned you don’t have to pay attention to anyone. You do something that you love because you love it,” they said. “And if other people cannot accept it, (it) is their fear, not the fact that you’re doing something wrong.”

They enjoy performing with Colibri in festivals.

“When people see us dance, they appreciate the color, they appreciate the dance. They appreciate the beauty of the art and it’s beautiful,” Magaña said, adding the troupe performed with the San Francisco Symphony and San Francisco Opera and was featured on the mainstage at the San Francisco Pride celebration.

LGBTQ+ folklorico groups in Mexico emulating Colibri’s mission feels like a seal of approval to Magaña that what Colibri is doing and has done is the right thing.

“It’s representing ourselves as who we are, doing a cultural art, performing a cultural piece as we are,” they said, adding their piece include activism. “We have beautiful pieces that depict a gay wedding, lesbian wedding. We have a beautiful piece from Michoacan that actually depicts the violence that is perpetrated on our trans community. Not all of our stories are happy stories. The main character does not survive. But it’s the reality of what happens to our community. Colibri being a social justice group… and we represent our community… it’s important for us to represent every aspect of our community.”

As Program Manager for Avenida’s Rainbow Collective, which provides services and enrichment for the LGBTQ+ older community, Magaña feels he in the right place at the right time.

“The fact that they are celebrating the community, that they’re doing research to improve the health of our community, is important to me,” Magaña said. “Now that I’m about to be 50… I think that I was placed in this position to also look at myself and look at the services that I need as an aging queer artist. Sadly, our elder community goes back into a closet because of the generation that they grew up in. So having the ability to offer this type of service is very important.”

Magaña said they want to be able to lend a hand, advocate for somebody, provide support and represent their community.

“I think that one of the biggest compliments I have received when I perform,” Magaña said, “is from an audience member that says,’ I see myself in you. You are representing myself and my culture.’”

LEAD Filipino

October 23, 2024July 21, 2024 by queer silicon valley team

LEAD Filipino works to increase representation of FilAms in political, cultural and educational programming and fights for the community’s civil rights, social justice and economic empowerment. Issues such as culturally responsive education, community health, grassroots leadership and community action are at its core. Its name says it all, as LEAD stands for Leadership, Education, Activism and Dialogue.

angelica lead — Dr. Angelica “Gel” Cortez (pictured)

Dr. Angelica “Gel” Cortez, founder and executive director of LEAD Filipino, is a leading voice in the Filipina/x/o American power building movement and has initiated multiple statewide and national civic campaigns. Cortez brings almost a decade of experience with local government and advocacy work to LEAD Filipino and is the first Senior Vice President of Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion for Pacific Clinics.

Partnering with the Filipinx Igniting Engagement for Reimagining Collective Empowerment (FIERCE) Coalition, LEAD Filipino curates conversations around ethnic studies, housing, mental health and public safety. The organizations advocate together in Sacramento for legislation affecting its communities.

LEAD Filipino also hosts two annual summits: Queer Lakbay Summit and the Fly Pinays Leadership Summit. It also hosts an educational civic engagement program, Awareness in Action.

Queer Lakbay Summit

Now in its fourth year, the Queer Lakbay Summit takes place from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. on Saturday, June 22, at Evergreen Valley College in San Jose. The theme for this year’s summit is shared responsibility and collective action.

The program will include speakers, workshops, and panel discussions that will spotlight education, health equity, law, government, and the arts. It will also include a “fireside chat” focused on careers and professionalism.

The summit’s name–CAMP LAKBAY: Tayo Na, Bes–comes from Lakbay being the Tagalog word for Journey and Bakla being the Filipino word for gay. Queermittee Director Paula Mirando said the idea of the summit’s theme is to gather around a campfire to share stories of queer ancestors and pave the way for the future. A Queermittee is a volunteer team who helps plan the annual Queer Lakbay Summit.

lead filipino group — Attendees of Camp Lakbay (photo credits to E Aaclan)

camp lakbay 2 — Attendees of Camp Lakbay (photo credits to E Aaclan)

“In this American culture, there’s an emphasis on independence, but in Filipino culture, there is an importance of interdependence,” she said, “It’s the idea of shared responsibility in taking collective action to make sure we all have what we need. What’s important about these different summits is we’re prioritizing talking to each other, and hopefully respectfully understand each other’s perspectives and then take action.”

The summit promotes awareness of community resources, such as Filipino Advocates for Justice and Q Corner. The workshops provide a safe space to discuss difficult topics like faith and queerness and balancing independence with a sense of indebtedness to parents.

“I hope attendees take away a sense of community,” Mirando said. “Everyone I’ve met through the summit has felt so grateful to be able to meet people with these shared identities. It’s nice to have a day where we can be together and be ourselves. I feel equipped with knowledge I now can apply to my life, whether that’s setting boundaries or having a hard conversation with family. I feel activated to do more for my community.”

This year will include a “fireside chat” focused on being a queer Filipinx pursuing a career.

Other LEAD Filipino Activities

The Fly Pinays Leadership Summit, held in March during Women’s History Month, engages Filipina women and girls in sisterhood, mentorship, and leadership. Since 2017, it has drawn nearly 200 women, girls, professionals, educators, creatives, and scholars together to reflect on values related to Fil Am identity, culture, sisterhood and mentorship.

Awareness in Action is a 10-week summer Filipino American Studies and civic engagement course. In the summer of 2024, it will offer virtual classes as well as field trips. Through workshops, community tours, guest speakers and group projects, Awareness in Action aims to impart Filipina/x/o leaders with an understanding of the importance of coalition building, community solidarity, political participation and civic engagement. It strives to develop students’ social identities while educating them about public issues, helping them to grow into the next generation of leaders.

LEAD Filipino has three teams focused on education, health equity, and civic engagement. The latter works on a Get Out the Filipino Vote program.

“We want our voices to be heard, especially as a community that has historically been kept out,” Mirando said. “Our data has not been counted or disaggregated from the rest of the populations. How do specifically Filipino Americans vote versus the larger Asian American population? Why are we voting the way we vote? Getting that information, we can better organize for our collective futures.”

Mirando said the mental health of LGBTQ+ youth is at stake in the coming election.

“We’re seeing how all these different onerous policies have an impact on youth,” she said. “When more restrictive policies get passed, it creates this internal sense of hopelessness or not belonging and internalizes homophobia. As time goes on, we see these increasingly restrictive policies.”

Mirando said some states don’t allow queer children to access gender-affirming care or out queer students to their parents.

“Even in California schools, with these policies coming up, it’s important to stay active and not just be complacent,” she said. “We have a shared responsibility to each other… to speak up, especially for those of us in our community who don’t necessarily have the ability to vote.”

Mirando said queer Filipinos need to tell their own stories and make their voices heard. She said others hearing those voices and stories is powerful validation.

“We definitely want to broaden our reach,” she said. “We want people to know we’re here and to build connections with other organizations so we can uplift each other.”

LEAD Filipino is located at 38 S. 2nd St., San Jose. For more information, please call (408) 614-8734 or see: https://leadfilipino.org/core-areas.

Bryan Franzen

September 2, 2023August 13, 2023 by queer silicon valley team

The Reverend Dr. Bryan Franzen has been the senior pastor of San Jose’s Westminster Presbyterian Church since January 1, 2012. He is one of the few openly LGBTQ+ head ministers in San Jose and is well known for his community and political involvement.

Born in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1974, he was the third of three boys to a father who was in middle management for Sears Roebuck & Co. and was also a reserve officer in the US Army. His mother, a teacher, was a stay-at-home mom during most of his upbringing, but was very active in philanthropic work, often bringing him along.

Bryan remembers one of the most impactful groups his mother worked with was a church group that gave microloans to small businesses in a community that had roots in the Underground Railroad. Those neighborhoods and descendants still lived in poor conditions; many of the homes didn’t have indoor plumbing. This gave him his first introduction to helping people who are in need.

In addition, when his young mother’s best friend was restricted to a wheelchair due to spinal bifida, Franzen recalls he and his brothers using the wheelchair as a jungle gym of sorts, which she loved. Although his parents were fairly conservative, it was normal for him to be surrounded by people of different ethnicities and abilities.

Franzen remembers when he was about nine that he wasn’t attracted to girls like his brothers and friends were, but it would take a few more years for him to realize he was gay. He knew homosexuality wasn’t something supported by society, so he worked hard not to have mannerisms that were stereotypically gay. As was expected, he dated a girl in high school but was relieved early in the relationship when they agreed that “good Christians” did not have sex before marriage.

Franzen went to Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois, a private college that is affiliated with the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. (PCUSA). Both of his brothers had gone there, so his father was able to negotiate a reduction in tuition. “My dad gave me a choice. I could go to Millikin or Eastern Illinois University, which I really didn’t want to attend. I have some learning disabilities, so I worried that I may not get the extra help and services in a larger college,” Franzen said.

As a freshman, Franzen was put into a senior seminar on world religions, specifically Hinduism and Buddhism. “The class really challenged me and brought me out of my cocoon and everything that I had been growing up with. I just fell in love with studying religion and why people believe what they do.”

By the end of the class, Franzen knew that his trajectory was either ministry or being a college professor.

At the end of his first year of college, Franzen began volunteering at the local Presbyterian church in Decatur, Il. The associate pastor suggested he get a job at a church to gain experience. This led him to become the youth director at a Presbyterian church in Monticello, Illinois, working with Sid Hormel, who was the pastor at the time. “Sid got me excited about a future career in ministry and really helped me to develop my call.”

After graduating with a major in world religions, he applied to numerous seminaries. He was coming to the point of choosing one back east when he got a call from a recruiter from the San Francisco Theological Seminary. He flew out for the Inquirer’s Weekend the next day and fell in love with the campus and the program. He studied at the seminary from 1997 to 2000, where he had a great deal of exposure to non-Christian religions and cultures he’d never known before.

During seminary, Franzen did a pastor shadowing at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Marin City, the bicultural church author Anne Lamott attends, and interned at the Chinese Presbyterian Church in Oakland.

Throughout his bachelor’s and master’s programs, Franzen threw himself into academics to avoid thinking about his sexual identity. “I think a lot of gay folks in conservative areas and professions overcompensate in other ways not to have to deal with things.”

He was afraid of coming out because he’d heard stories of people who faced great difficulties, and at the time the PCUSA was still debating the ordination of LGBTQ+ individuals. Because he did not have a partner at the time, he didn’t see any reason to take on that fight. “I knew life would be easier if I were straight and because of that there were times that I didn’t want to be gay,” he admitted. “But, you know, it was never not part of who I understood myself to be.”

Franzen was ordained on July 15, 2001, and had his first call at the First Presbyterian Church in Council Bluffs, Iowa. The conservative congregation there had grown in its relationship with the LGBTQ+ community. An elder in the church had died from AIDS, and some in the leadership began to question their views. “They looked inward and asked themselves if we had been accepting of him, would he have been able to have healthier relationships? Would he have been able to be out? Would he have gotten more medical attention quicker?”

The average age of the members of the congregation was in their early eighties, so 27-year-old Franzen was leading a funeral practically every other week. Being surrounded by death took its toll, and soon he was reflecting on his own life and consequently, his sexuality.

He sought counsel at the Metropolitan Community Church in Omaha, which was just across the river from Council Bluffs. The pastor there gave him powerful advice and helped him find the counseling he needed. “At this point, I really needed to deal with my sexuality and have that life opened up to me so that I could be a healthier pastor.”

Although he never officially came out to his elderly congregation, Franzen found his place in the gay community in Omaha. “Omaha was a great place for me to come out. They had one of the better gay scenes of anywhere I’ve ever lived,” he said with a laugh.

From there, Franzen transferred to Hightstown, New Jersey, to lead another struggling congregation. While in New Jersey, he worked on the campaign to allow for civil unions and then gay marriage to the state. He stayed there for nearly eight years and was able to bring stability and growing programs to the congregation. But towards the end realized that it did not challenge him as it once had, so sought out a new congregation.

Even from across the country, he was drawn to Westminster in San Jose and its troubled past. The once very conservative congregation had a dozen splits since the mid-eighties. To make things even more difficult, the pastor before him had given a sermon that was anti-women and anti-gay before announcing his departure for another congregation in San Jose.

“With many of the conservative members gone and the congregation a shell of what it once was, many looked at the congregation and saw the problems. I saw a church in a thriving community with diverse neighbors and the Billy DeFrank Center close by, and

I thought this is a place where I can be out where I can really do some great things and connect the community with the church and the church with the community.”

While Franzen never sought out a “gay” congregation, he knew that the success of the congregation and its future was to be a place of welcome. “I wanted to go to a church that I considered to be the body of Christ, which was welcoming and inclusive of everybody.”

Since arriving in 2012, he has worked with the Billy DeFrank Center and other LGBTQ+ organizations in town as a representative from the church. Many community groups hold their meetings there. He is frequently invited to give the opening invocations at government meetings. In addition, he serves on the San Jose police chief’s LGBTQ+ community task force, he has been the chairperson for the Santa Clara County Human Rights Commission, a founding member of the Silicon Valley Faith Collaborative, a PACT Leader, and is currently collaborating with the Bill Wilson center on a new facility focused on families in need utilizing the old education building from Westminster.

Franzen recognizes the abusive history and oppressive power of the church institution but finds the Presbyterian church to be a healthier environment where people aren’t fearful of their sexuality or forced into the closet. “We welcome the LGBTQ+ people as our brothers and sisters and non-binary friends because they are us and we are them, and we are all broken people together.”

Still, there is much work to be done. “We’ve got to get to a place where people are comfortable to be able to come out and experience the love that people have for them.”

Franzen recalls a time early on in his ministry when he recognized a member of his congregation at a gay bar. The young man had come into his office two weeks earlier for a counseling session about some problems with his family.

“I looked at him and said, ‘Now I understand what we were talking about.’ And he looked at me like I was crazy. I said, ‘You’re having a hard time coming out to your family, and you’re afraid they’re going to reject you if you tell them that you’re gay.’”

“And he looked at me and he had a little tear in his eye, and he said, ‘Yeah.’ I said, ‘I know your grandma. It’s okay to tell her because I came out to her myself. You know, there are people that will accept you because they love you for who you are.’”

Franzen understands that many LGBTQ+ people are struggling between their faith and sexuality. “Too often churches make you choose, but in my tradition, we don’t see LGBTQ+ people as sinful, wrong, or bad in any particular way because they are like everybody else. What really matters at the end of the day is that you’re able to connect with God and with the rest of the community. Reconciliation happens when people realize they don’t have to hold on to the expectations of others.”

It was not by happenstance that Franzen was drawn to the ministry. Having followed his mother around while very young and always seeming to be at church, the church had become a safe space for him. “Growing up, the one place where I could let my guard down, where I could be as flamboyant as I wanted to be, where I could just be relaxed, was at the church. It is my hope that I can help create that reality for others in my ministry.”

Rev. Lindi Ramsden

September 2, 2023August 13, 2023 by queer silicon valley team

The Reverend Lindi Ramsden, the former senior minister of the First Unitarian Church of San José, was raised in Orinda in the 1950s at a time when it was still considered “cow country” by her grandmother. There were acres of cow pastures to run around in, slopes of grass to slide down on cardboard sleds, and quiet streets to play catch or go skateboarding. She remembers it as a relaxed and outdoors-oriented childhood.

By the time she got to junior high, there was pressure to conform to more traditional feminine activities, which she admits she bought into that at the time. However, she was always “an outdoors kid and a tomboy at heart.”

She began her faith journey in the ninth grade at the Orinda Community Church (UCC). “I had a sense of wanting to be part of something that was larger than oneself, part of a community, part of a larger value system.”

Lindi remembers in high school, during the early 1970s, a controversy surrounding whether Bill Johnson, a young gay seminarian, could be ordained by the United Church of Christ. She recalls being supportive of him, even writing a paper for a high school social issues class. While not considering herself a lesbian at the time, she felt “it was crazy that the church wouldn’t just automatically include him.”

Lindi’s high school church experience led her to the religious studies program at Stanford in 1972. However, she soon realized her own beliefs and identity were out of alignment with the theology she was studying. She just didn’t view Jesus in the same way Protestantism asked her to. “I didn’t actually understand the role of Jesus as one of a divinity, as a Trinitarian. I didn’t understand his life as redemptive for sin. I understood him as a really profound teacher.” To add to her hesitation, she started to figure out she was a lesbian and didn’t think any ministry would accept her, so she switched her major to human biology.

It wasn’t until after graduating from college in 1976 that she started to meet Unitarian Universalists and realized, “Oh, there’s a theological space here for me that is a little bit wider.” With a renewed interest, she enrolled in the Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley in 1980, where it was “a very safe place to be an openly lesbian person.”

While openly lesbian ministers were not yet being called to serve in UU congregations, in 1983, she began a ministerial internship under the Reverend Rob Eller-Isaacs at the First Unitarian Church of Oakland. Shortly after completing her internship, Lindi and her partner at the time, were invited to adopt a baby boy. Though it was early on in their relationship, the two couldn’t pass up what felt like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The congregation in Oakland was supportive, even throwing them a baby shower.

After graduating from seminary in 1984, Lindi applied for several congregational ministry positions. “At that time, you would create a packet of written material as well as photos of yourself, your family, etc. However, as soon as the packets got exchanged the doors would close, and I wouldn’t be able to continue on in that ministerial search,” she said.

A year later, the Unitarian Universalist Association recommended her to serve as the Extension Minister (a temporary position) to grow the dwindling congregation at the First Unitarian Church of San José, which didn’t have enough money or members to call a full time minister through the regular ministerial search. At the time, the church had only 30 to 40 active members, none of whom were openly LGBTQ+.

At first, Lindi was anxious about moving to San José because of concern that the city would have a strong conservative bent. In addition, the San Jose Mercury News had recently outed a lesbian Girl Scout official, implying that lesbians were a danger to children. Thankfully, those fears dissolved soon after her arrival. After two years of solid growth, the church asked her to stay on to become their settled Senior Minister, which she was glad to accept.

In January 1989, as a result of the church winning a national UU award for congregational growth, the Mercury News published an article about the church and its lesbian minister. The community response was overwhelmingly positive. The Sunday after the article appeared a hundred new people showed up. Laughingly, they are known as “the people of the article.”

Between 1985 and 2003, the church grew to 320 adult members, 140 children, and another 150 “friends of the congregation,” and developed a small Spanish-speaking ministry, several of whose members were connected to the LGBTQ+ community.

Lindi estimates that at some point in time as much as 15-20% of the congregation were members of the LGBTQ+ community. “For the children growing up in this particular congregation, it was just normal for them to have a woman minister, to have a lesbian minister.”

Lindi’s presence as an “out” minister helped create a culture of allyship and acceptance in the congregation. “The fact that the congregation was not an exclusively LGBTQ+ place also was important for LGBTQ+ families and their kids to feel like they were part of a larger community that valued them, that supported them, that cared about them,” she said. “There was a sense of camaraderie and acceptance in the congregation that was quite wonderful.”

During Rev. Ramsden’s tenure as Senior Minister, the First Unitarian Church of San José was heavily involved in social justice ministries. The congregation took part in providing sanctuary for refugees from Central America, participating in clergy fact-finding delegations in El Salvador and Honduras, and defeating the anti-immigrant Prop 187. Additionally, Rev. Ramsden and the congregation helped to organize a community coalition (CARES) which saved funding for 14 after-school program sites in the San Jose Unified School District. To further serve the local community, they formed the Third Street Community Center in the lower level of the church and partnered with City Year to provide after school support to immigrant children in the neighborhood.

Most personal to Lindi was the church’s help in the fight against the Knight Initiative, or Proposition 22, in 2000. If passed, it would amend the California family code to prohibit same-sex couples from being recognized as being married. When Lindi and her wife Mary Helen volunteered as the co-chairs of the local fundraising effort to defeat Proposition 22, members of the congregation stepped up too. They helped to educate their family and friends, made phone calls, and stood up for the LGBTQ+ people in the congregation. “I was so happy to see in San José how much the community rallied around us, both within the congregation and beyond.”

Lindi remembers asking Amy Dean of the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council if they could use their phone bank to call voters. Amy said yes, which Lindi considered a bold step. She believes that the South Bay Labor Council was the first labor organization to come out against the proposition. Unfortunately, Proposition 22 passed but won by smaller numbers in Santa Clara County than statewide.

Lindi and Mary Helen had first gotten married in a religious ceremony in 1992. “It was a strange experience as a clergyperson to be able to marry straight couples and sign marriage licenses but not be respected enough by the state to have a marriage license for my marriage,” she said, shaking her head.

Lindi and Mary Helen got married a second time when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom began allowing same-sex partners to marry—Valentine’s Day, 2004. ”We decided to go up to San Francisco and be part of what I affectionately call the most jovial and longest line for government services I have ever seen.”

Their marriage—along with all the others—was voided by the California Supreme Court in August. They were finally able to legally marry on June 17, 2008, the first day they could after the state Supreme Court struck down Proposition 22. Officiating was California Secretary of State Debra Bowen on the balcony of her office overlooking the state capitol. Joining them were their son Ben and Lindi’s mother.

After leaving her position at the First Unitarian Church in 2003, Rev. Ramsden served as Executive Director and Senior Minister of the UU Legislative Ministry of CA*, coordinating UU congregations’ statewide justice ministries across California. In addition to helping to pass historic human right to water legislation and health care reform, UULMCA and its Action Network educated and organized faith leaders and congregations to oppose Proposition 8 and secure marriage equality for same sex couples through the courts. In 2010, she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the Starr King School for the Ministry.

In 2013, Lindi left the UU Legislative Ministry to care for her mother and to finish a documentary on the human right to water. She was later asked to serve as the acting Dean of Students and Visiting Assistant Professor of Faith and Public Life at Starr King School for the Ministry, where she served until 2020.

Lindi, now retired, reflects on how she has seen the religious community progress. “There’s still work to be done to allow everyone to live their lives in dignity and with respect, to not be used as a political pawn,” she acknowledged. “The religious community has come a long way. But there are still parts that don’t accept LGBTQ+ folks. I hope over time that will change. In the meantime, it is the job of those of us who are fortunate enough to have found a home in a religious faith that is respectful and inclusive to cast a bigger web, to make a larger embrace so that everybody can live their full human selves and love whom they want to love.”

As to their son, Ben, he and is wife are blessed to be the parents of a wonderful daughter who is well loved by her doting grandmas.

*The UU Legislative Ministry, CA was later renamed the UU Justice Ministry of CA.

Queers of a Feather

July 27, 2023July 27, 2023 by queer silicon valley team

Are you an LGBTQ+ person who likes bird watching but normally does it close to home in an urban setting? Or maybe you are an LGBTQ+ person who goes hiking and exploring in beautiful open spaces and regional parks but has never been birding but wanted to?

Then there is a group for you: Queers of a Feather.

Whether you are experienced or completely new to birding, Queers of a Feather, or QoaF, will provide a fun opportunity to get out in nature, gain a bird’s eye view of species found locally, and find your flock.

QoaF is co-hosted by the Peninsula Open Space Trust, or POST, and the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society. Thanks to their knowledgeable facilitators, their events are the opposite of a wild goose chase. They’ll guide you on a leisurely stroll with many stops to get a gander at local birds. And if you get peckish along the way, never fear! They’ll provide snacks! (Please don’t feed the birds, though).

These will be LGBTQ-centered events led by LGBTQ-identifying facilitators with the purpose of creating a welcoming and inclusive space for queer community members to gather and develop a sense of belonging in the outdoors. While allies are welcome to attend, please be mindful that space is limited.

Scheduled outings usually run from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and are planned for Aug. 19, Nov. 18, and Feb 3. All will take place in the San Francisco Peninsula or in the South Bay. The August 19 birding is scheduled at the Windy Hill Open Space Preserve in Portola Valley. To learn more, visit the event page or subscribe to POST’s monthly newsletter via the form on their homepage.

About POST and Audubon Society:

POST protects and cares for open space, farms, and parkland on the Peninsula and in the South Bay for the benefit of all. POST has protected over 86,000 acres in San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Santa Cruz Counties.

The Audubon Society promotes the enjoyment, understanding, and protection of birds and other wildlife by engaging people of all ages in birding, education, and conservation. Visit scvas.org to learn more.