Let My People in: A Lesbian Minister Tells of Her Struggles to Live Openly and Maintain Her Ministry

Raised in a Roman Catholic, blue-collar family in Rhode Island, Denman recounts in fulsome detail how, en route to becoming a Methodist minister, she decided against entering a convent, joined the Air Force, fell in love with a priest, then married an ex-monk to whom she bore a son before divorcing him. Studies in Protestant liberation theology and feminism led the author to affirm her latent lesbianism: she took a female lover and embarked on a fiery confrontation with the United Methodist Church, where her sexuality was unacceptable. Thanks to Denman's pursuit of the media, an ecclesiastical trial in which she lost her Methodist credentials received national coverage. Here, however, her near-total self-absorption erodes the reader's initial sympathy for her travail. Author tour. (Jan.)