Cultural Engagement and Bridge Building

Before I transfer to Madison, I was a devoted student activist in Taipei, Taiwan and I worked on various issues that i sincerely believe my effort made the world a better place.

In recent weeks, three events took place that made me felt an urge to reconcile the Christian part and the Activist part in me. First, two months ago I attended UW Law School’s Workshop in the role of court and same sex marriage. Second, last month Presbyterian Church ordained their first openly gay minister here in Madison, that drew controversy and also the protest of the notorious homophobic Westboro Baptist Church. Third, Taipei just held one of the largest Pride parade in Asia this past weekend, and I was one of the campus organizer and co-sponsored a legislation in student council that support gay rights two years ago for the parade.

These events made me think hard on the constant tension between the gay community and christian community in our society. I believe issue like same-sex marriage will be a relevant and dominating social issues for these couple of years. I also believe that dialogues and more understandings can shed light to the situation.

So my project design is to look into more resources, both scholarly and non-scholarly, then try to provide a new scope of confronting this issue that can create productive outcomes, thus benefit our society as a whole.

I will look into opportunities that can advance lgbtq rights in wisconsin politically and legally, and try to see what I can do. I will look into progressive theology, gender and sexuality and faith in a modern context.

On the more academical part, I am thinking about applying what I learned in political science and international relations, such as conflict resolution and reconciliation to this situation and see if we can use the concept.

I will also interview an organization in Chicago called The Marin Foundation, which is the first organization established to build a bridge between the christian community and the gay community.

Their work was getting noticed and was featured in Guardian and BBC last month, I was deeply inspired. I will think of ways that I can participate in this courageous effort to bring together two communities that are long divided by mistrust and misunderstandings.