‘Somebody is listening’: Raleigh pastor gets meeting with Biden to talk LGBTQ issues
Exactly six months after Rev. Vance Haywood, senior pastor of St. John’s Metropolitan Community Church in Raleigh, wrote a letter to newly elected President Joe Biden on Inauguration Day, he got an unexpected call from the White House.
“They called us on Monday (June 21) and said, ‘Hey, we’re here, we saw your letter, and we want you to come and meet the president,’” Haywood said in an interview. “It was kind of neat.”
In his letter, Haywood shared his experience working with the LGBTQ community in the Triangle, especially during former President Donald Trump’s administration.
“We don’t push politics, or push people or parties, but we do talk policy,” Haywood said. “(Biden’s win) was a breath of fresh air after the last four year for queer folks and for trans folks.”
Biden spoke at the Green Road Community Center, a mobile vaccination site in Northeast Raleigh on Thursday, June 24. There, the president kicked off a canvassing event to urge unvaccinated Americans to get their shots against COVID-19.
Most of the people in the building were community leaders like Haywood, volunteers and front-line workers from local nonprofits that have been helping administer vaccines in the Triangle.
After Biden spoke, Haywood was one of the people who got to meet with him briefly.
“The president knew about the issues we wrote about,” he said. “He talked about some of the things that he’s done to continue working for LGBTQIA+ people, both in politics — or in the government — and in the church.”
Haywood believes that gay rights are closely tied to the systemic racism that has become the topic of many conversations in the last year. He said through his work at St. John’s he sees the impact of policy that fails to protect people of color and members of the LGBTQIA+ community, an abbreviation that also includes intersex and asexual people.
“Everyday we see how bad policy, bad politics and centuries of abuse and oppression have impacted queer folks, but also queer folk of color and how disproportionately they are impacted,” he said.
Haywood, who is openly gay, became the fifth pastor of St. John’s MCC in February 2018. It is known for being an LGBTQ-affirming church.
He said his church is also “very diverse” and that, when tapped to lead his congregation, he wondered whether he was the right person to do so as a white man.
“I felt like we were not in a space where we needed another white person up there in the box making noise,” he said.
But Haywood also said that his identity plays an important role in the social justice work he does inside and outside his church, ensuring historically marginalized groups are represented in spaces where people who share his identity are in the majority.
“White people have to start talking about this because we’ve ignored it for too long,” he said. “We have to own our own racism.”
Contrary to custom, Haywood’s biography on the church’s website says he prefers not being called “reverend.” He isn’t opposed to it, he explained, but prefers being called by his first name.
“We get so caught up on titles and put people on pedestals for it and (titles) get in our way sometimes,” Haywood said. “I want folks to be comfortable and most of our folks at the church just call me Vance.”
This story was originally published July 2, 2021 at 8:00 AM.
