Matthew Shepard & a world where hate never wins

October is, as noted here previously, LGBTQ+ History Month --- and today, the 25th anniversary of Matthew Shepard's death.

Shepard is the 21-year-old University of Wyoming student who was beaten, tortured, tied to a fence and left to die outside Laramie overnight on Oct. 6-7, 1998, because he was gay. His clinical death occurred a few days later at a hospital in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Shepard's death was not an isolated incident in the long history of anti-gay extremism cultivated and enabled by the Christian church and manipulative politicians, merely the one that because of its outrageousness caught the attention of the nation --- and world --- at large.

That attention has allowed Matthew's death to become a teaching tool in the effort to defuse hatred and expose the sources of the irrational fears upon which it is based --- and the tactics of those who might turn those fears to their own advantage.

Five years ago, Shepard's ashes were interred in the crypt of The Washington National Cathedral, intended as a church for all people but also serving specifically the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, D.C.

According to a release from the Cathedral, "Today, we'll toll our funeral bell 25 times at noon ET to mourn Matthew's passing, but also to recommit ourselves to building the world that Matthew wanted to see: One where everyone is welcome, everyone is accepted, and where hate never wins.

 

"This Cathedral was honored, five years ago, to finally inter Matthew in the Cathedral crypt, where he is safe, and celebrated, and at rest with God. You're invited to visit Matthew's final resting place throughout the day today in the Chapel of St. Joseph of Arimathea. Light a candle, say a prayer, and let's make this a world Matthew would be proud of."

As events in Israel and Gaza remind us, having faced barbaric terrorist attacks and holding our collective breaths today on the brink of unknown retaliatory horrors, the goal of a world where hate never wins remains elusive.

Photos courtesy Washington National Cathedral.