Local
New web site targets closeted Catholic priests
A gay activist has launched a web site to collect information about closeted gay Catholic priests assigned to the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., with the aim of “persuading” them to disclose their sexual orientation and speak out against the church’s opposition to same-sex marriage.
Phil Attey, an Internet consultant who coordinated local gay volunteers for the 2008 Obama campaign, said he hopes to identify such a large number of gay priests that a “critical mass” will be reached and church leaders won’t be able to oust them.
“The goal of this campaign is not to hurt any of these Catholic priests,” Attey said. “The goal of this campaign is to create an environment where priests will be able to come out safely to their parishes.”
Attey told D.C. Agenda that his web site could disclose the identity of priests he confirms are gay if they decline to identify themselves.
“We’re hoping it doesn’t come to that,” he said.
“One of the reasons we’re asking for such detailed information is that the more details we have, the more appealing it is for the priest to come out on his own so that all he has to say is that he’s gay rather than have all of the lurid details we may have on them or not have on them come out.”
According to Attey, the response to the web site, www.churchouting.org, has been “overwhelming,” with D.C.-area gay Catholics submitting information about closeted priests about whom they have first-hand information.
He said the information received would be carefully vetted and a priest’s sexual orientation would not be disclosed unless it is verified by two or more people with reliable information.
“Once a story is verified, we will be contacting the priests involved to help them make the right choices,” a message on the web site says.
A spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Washington could not be immediately reached for comment.
Bill Donahue, president of the conservative Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, called Attey’s web site a form of “religious cleansing” and a “witch hunt,” according to Christian News Service.
“Are they going to start harassing, intimidating, stalking priests?” CNS quoted Donahue as saying. “This is simply beyond the pale.”
Attey said he expects conservative, anti-gay groups such as Donahue’s organization to level that type of accusation against churchouting.org.
“None of that is true, and people will come to see that as we move forward,” he said.
The site includes a drop-down menu showing the entire roster of 314 priests assigned to parishes throughout the D.C. metropolitan area under the auspices of the Archdiocese of Washington. It also includes directions prompting readers to submit their name and e-mail address along with a narrative identifying a closeted gay priest and a description of how they know the priest is gay.
Attey said recent statements by Archbishop Donald Wuerl, who heads the Archdiocese of Washington, opposing the same-sex marriage bill pending before the D.C. City Council played a role in his decision to launch the web site late last month. He said Wuerl’s decision to sign a document prepared jointly with fundamentalist Christian groups known as the Manhattan Declaration, which calls for using civil disobedience to oppose certain laws that conflict with religious beliefs, including same-sex marriage laws, also prompted him to act at this time.
However, Attey said he had been planning the site for several years, largely as a concerned gay Catholic interested in challenging the church hierarchy’s anti-gay positions and the large number of closeted gay priests who, according to Attey, lend their support to the anti-gay policies by remaining silent.
“This is a site dedicated to every Catholic family who has lost a loved one to suicide or disassociation, needlessly caused by the spiritual pain inflicted by the church hierarchy’s relentless attacks on LGBT people,” Attey wrote on the site.
Gay activists have had mixed views on the use of outing as a means of advancing LGBT rights. D.C. gay activist Michael Rogers, editor of the gay blogs PageOneQ and BlogActive, has received national attention for his stories outing closeted anti-gay politicians. Rogers said he would have no objections to Attey’s outing of priests who actively campaign against gay rights. But he said he was less certain about outing priests who remain silent or who quietly support the LGBT community but don’t take a public stand.
“I don’t know where to draw the line on religious outing,” he said.
Mitch Wood, president of the Gay & Lesbian Activists Alliance, said an outing campaign against the Catholic Church should be directed at “higher up decision-makers, not rank-and-file clergy.”
GLAA Vice President Rick Rosendall cautioned that indiscriminate outings of priests could backfire and hurt the LGBT rights movement.
“If you had an ordinary priest who was not brave or bold enough to throw his pastoral career into a tailspin by confronting the hierarchy publicly, targeting him would likely turn the main focus back on those doing the outing, and show them to be cruel and fanatical,” Rosendall said.
“Our opponents on the radical religious right already portray themselves as victims,” he said. “We should take care to avoid playing into their hands.”
Father Joseph Palacios, an openly gay Catholic priest who teaches at Georgetown University, said he was ambivalent about the outing web site.
“A gay priest leading a double life and working overtly or covertly against gay rights is working against his own self interests and that of the gay community that he participates in,” Palacios said. “This kind of hypocrisy should be brought to light – just as should be done to straight priests living double lives.”
He said a gay priest generally should be “personally encouraged to look at himself and make the decision to live the truth of his sexuality.”
Attey said he doesn’t expect his web site to disclose the names of gay priests in the immediate future.
“I’m not looking at this as a short-term project,” he said.
In an official statement released at the reveal event Capital Pride Alliance described its just announced 2026 Pride theme of “Exist, Resist, Have the Audacity” as a “bold declaration affirming the presence, resilience, and courage of LGBTQ+ people around the world.”
The statement adds, “Grounded in the undeniable truth that our existence is not up for debate, this year’s theme calls on the community to live loudly and proudly, stand firm against injustice and erasure, and embody the collective strength that has always defined the LGBTQ+ community.”
In a reference to the impact of the hostile political climate, the statement says, “In a time when LGBTQ+ rights and history continue to face challenges, especially in our Nation’s Capital, where policy and public discourse shape the future of our country, together, we must ensure that our voices are visible, heard, and unapologetically centered.”
The statement also quotes Capital Pride Alliance CEO and President Ryan Bos’s message at the Reveal event: “This year’s theme is both a declaration and a demand,” Bos said. “Exist, Resist, Have Audacity! reflects the resilience of our community and our responsibility to protect the progress we’ve made. As we look toward our nation’s 250th anniversary, we affirm that LGBTQ+ people have always been and always will be part of the United States’s history, and we will continue shaping its future with strength and resolve,” he concluded.
District of Columbia
Capital Pride board member resigns, alleges failure to address ‘sexual misconduct’
In startling letter, Taylor Chandler says board’s inaction protected ‘sexual predator’
Taylor Lianne Chandler, a member of the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors since 2019 who most recently served as the board’s secretary, submitted a letter of resignation on Feb. 24 that alleges the board has failed to address instances of “sexual misconduct” within the Capital Pride organization.
The Washington Blade received a copy of Chandler’s resignation letter one day after she submitted it from an anonymous source. Chandler, who identifies as transgender and intersex, said in an interview that she did not send the letter to the Blade, but she suspected someone associated with Capital Pride, which organizes D.C.’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, “wants it out in the open.”
“It is with a heavy heart, but with absolute clarity, that I submit my resignation from the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors effective immediately,” Chandler states in her letter. “I have devoted nearly ten years of my life to this organization,” she wrote, pointing to her initial involvement as a volunteer and later as a producer of events as chair of the organization’s Transgender, Gender Non-Conforming, and Intersex Committee.
“Capital Pride once meant something profound to me – a space of safety, visibility, and community for people who have often been denied all three,” her letter continues. “That is no longer the organization I am part of today.”
“I, along with other board members, brought forward credible concerns regarding sexual misconduct – a pattern of behavior spanning years – to the attention of this board,” Chandler states in the letter. “What followed was not accountability. What followed was retaliation. Rather than addressing the substance of what was reported, officers and fellow board members chose to chastise those of us who came forward.”
The letter adds, “This board has made its priorities clear through its actions: protecting a sexual predator matters more than protecting the people who had the courage to come forward. … I have been targeted, bullied, and made to feel like an outsider for doing what any person of integrity would do – telling the truth.”
In response to a request from the Blade for comment, Anna Jinkerson, who serves as chair of the Capital Pride board, sent the Blade a statement praising Taylor Chandler’s efforts as a Capital Pride volunteer and board member but did not specifically address the issue of alleged sexual misconduct.
“We’re also aware that her resignation letter has been shared with the media and has listed concerns,” Jinkerson said in her statement. “When concerns are brought to CPA, we act quickly and appropriately to address them,” she said.
“As we continue to grow our organization, we’re proactively strengthening the policies and procedures that shape our systems, our infrastructure, and the support we provide to our team and partners,” Jinkerson said in her statement. “We’re doing this because the community’s experience with CPA must always be safe, affirming, empowering, and inclusive,” she added.
In an interview with the Blade, Chandler said she was not the target of the alleged sexual harassment.
She said a Capital Pride investigation identified one individual implicated in a “pattern” of sexual harassment related behavior over a period of time. But she said she was bound by a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) that applies to all board members and she cannot disclose the name of the person implicated in alleged sexual misconduct or those who came forward to complain about it.
“It was one individual, but there was a pattern and a history,” Chandler said, noting that was the extent of what she can disclose.
“And I’ll say this,” she added. “In my opinion, with gay culture sometimes the touchy feely-ness that goes on seems to be like just part of the culture, not necessarily the same as a sexual assault or whatever. But at the same time, if someone does not want those advances and they’re saying no and trying to push you away and trying to avoid you, then it makes it that way regardless of the culture.”
When asked about when the allegations of sexual harassment first surfaced, Chandler said, “In the past year is when the allegation came forward from one individual. But in the course of this all happening, other individuals came forward and talked about instances – several which showed a pattern.”
Chandler’s resignation comes about five months after Capital Pride Alliance announced in a statement released in October 2025 that its then board president, Ashley Smith, resigned from his position on Oct. 18 after Capital Pride became aware of a “claim” regarding Smith. The statement said the group retained an independent firm to investigate the matter, but it released no further details since that time. Smith has declined to comment on the matter.
When asked by the Blade if the Smith resignation could be linked in some way to allegations of sexual misconduct, Chandler said, “I can’t make a comment one way or the other on that.”
Chandler’s resignation and allegations come after Capital Pride Alliance has been credited with playing the lead role in organizing the World Pride celebration hosted by D.C. in which dozens of LGBTQ-related Pride events were held from May through June of 2025.
The letter of resignation also came just days before Capital Pride Alliance’s annual “Reveal” event scheduled for Feb. 26 at the Hamilton Hotel in which the theme for D.C.’s June 2026 LGBTQ Pride events was to be announced along with other Pride plans.
District of Columbia
Capital Stonewall Democrats elect new leaders
LGBTQ political group set to celebrate 50th anniversary
Longtime Democratic Party activists Stevie McCarty and Brad Howard won election last week as president and vice president for administration for the Capital Stonewall Democrats, D.C.’s largest local LGBTQ political organization.
In a Feb. 24 announcement, the group said McCarty and Howard, both of whom are elected DC Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners, ran in a special Capital Stonewall Democrats election to fill the two leadership positions that became vacant when the officers they replaced resigned.
Outgoing President Howard Garrett, who McCarty has replaced, told the Washington Blade he resigned after taking on a new position as chair of the city’s Ward 1 Democratic Committee. The Capital Stonewall Democrats announcement didn’t say who Howard replaced as vice president for administration.
The group’s website shows its other officers include Elizabeth Mitchell as Vice President for Legislative and Political Affairs, and Monica Nemeth as Treasurer. The officer position of secretary is vacant, the website shows.
“As we look toward 2026, the stakes for D.C. and for LGBTQ+ communities have never been clearer,” the group’s statement announcing McCarty and Howard’s election says. “Our 50th anniversary celebration on March 20 and the launch of our D.C. LGBTQ+ Voter’s Guide mark the beginning of a major year for endorsements, organizing, and coalition building,” the statement says.
McCarty said among the organization’s major endeavors will be holding virtual endorsement forums where candidates running for D.C. mayor and the Council will appear and seek the group’s endorsement.
Founded in 1976 as the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, the organization’s members voted in 2021 to change its name to Capital Stonewall Democrats. McCarty said the 50th anniversary celebration on March 20, in which D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and members of the D.C. Council are expected to attend, will be held at the PEPCO Gallery meeting center at 702 8th St., N.W.
ACLU sues Kansas over law invalidating trans residents’ IDs
After layoffs at Advocate, parent company acquires ‘Them’ from Conde Nast
Spring into sold
Plan your wedding the LGBTQ way
Calendar: February 27-March 5
New book profiles LGBTQ Ukrainians, documents war experiences
PHOTOS: Queen of Hearts
Two very different views of the State of the Union
Va. activists preparing campaign in support of repealing marriage amendment
