Kevin Calegari
EXAMINER STAFF REPORT
Published 04:00 a.m., Tuesday, February 14, 1995
Kevin Calegari, an activist in the Roman Catholic gay and progressive movement, died of AIDS-related causes Sunday at his home. He was 36.
Mr. Calegari, a native San Franciscan, [his mother's maiden name was Semenza], spent many years working for just treatment of gays and lesbians in the Catholic Church and the recognition of their contributions to the church. He made contacts with other progressive organizations in the religious community and fought to include gays and lesbians in their efforts.
Mr. Calegari was president of Dignity / USA, the 4,000-member organization of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Catholics, from 1991 to 1992. During that time, he brought attention to the Catholic Church's policies against laws protecting gay rights. In one incident, he mailed a Holy Office instruction to fight such laws, along with a copy of the New Testament, to the Vatican in an envelope marked, "Return to Sender."
As co-chairman of the local chapter of Dignity, Mr. Calegari was an expert at drawing media attention to the cause of gay and lesbian Catholics. When Dignity / San Francisco was evicted from St. Boniface Church in 1988, he marched with members to St. Mary's Cathedral in a walking religious service and placed a wreath with a pink triangle on the door opening to the piazza in front.
He was a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather-Levi community.
Mr. Calegari had been accepted to the doctoral program at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley through the Jesuit School of Theology. His master's thesis focused on the role of Dignity within the larger movement to reform the Catholic Church and its identity as a self-governed religious community.
He is survived by his partner of 11 years, Tom Kaun; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care giver; his parents, George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Ave., San Francisco. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that contributions be made to Dignity / USA.
________________________________________
Kevin Calegari
Published 04:00 a.m., Thursday, February 16, 1995
A memorial service will be held February 25 for Kevin Calegari, an advocate of gay rights in the Roman Catholic Church.
Mr. Calegari, a San Francisco native and past president of Dignity/USA, died Sunday of an AIDS- related illness. He was 36.
Throughout the 1980s, Mr. Calegari was a leading voice in the campaign to challenge the Vatican's condemnation of gay sex as "disordered" and an "intrinsic moral evil."
As the local leader of Dignity, an organization of gay and lesbian Catholics, Mr. Calegari clashed with San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn, who in 1988 banned Dignity from holding its weekly Mass at St. Boniface Church in the Tenderloin.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Calegari was elected national president of Dignity. He continued the gay rights campaign in that role as an outspoken advocate during visits to the Vatican, to Washington for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops meetings, and to Denver last year to raise the gay rights banner during Pope John Paul II's appearance at World Youth Day.
Closer to home, Mr. Calegari sought to find a way for homosexuals -- including many facing death in the AIDS epidemic -- to retain a connection to the Roman Catholic Church. After years of condemnation over their sexuality, he said in a 1988 Chronicle interview, many had given up on organized religion.
"Churches have not offered spiritual nourishment to gays and lesbians," he said. "The overwhelming message is still one of condemnation -- not acceptance. Gays are looking elsewhere for spiritual nourishment."
Mr. Calegari, a Stanford University graduate who worked as a professional fund-raiser for the University of San Francisco and other organizations, was also a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather/Levi's community.
Mr. Calegari is survived by Tom Kaun, his partner of 11 years; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care-giver; his parents George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan Harrington of Sonoma.
His family suggests that contributions be made to Dignity/USA.
The February 25 memorial service is planned for 2 p.m. at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, where Dignity now holds its San Francisco services.
________________________________________
San Francisco Journal; Suffering In Dignity And Exile
By JANE GROSS, Special to the New York Times Published: December 20, 1988
In the middle of the priest's homily on Sunday night, applause rang out at St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church, a rare defiant sound in an incense-scented space usually reserved for hushed worship.
The applause came midway through the last service to be held on church property by members of Dignity, a group of gay Catholics that has been evicted by bishops throughout the country in the last two years.
''We gather to send our greetings and a clear message to Rome,'' said the Rev. Robert Arpin, who has declared publicly that he is homosexual and has AIDS. ''Like us or not, we are your sons and your daughters. We are your priests and your nuns. We are your faithful ones. We are your church.''
In the gaudy baroque church that has been Dignity's San Francisco home for four years, some 300 worshipers leaned forward in the carved pews, clapping appreciatively. In the front row, a man hoisted a placard that read ''God Is Gay.'' From a dark corner of the church, a transvestite in mantilla and miniskirt shouted falsetto approval. From the rear came a lone voice, in the cadences of gospel music, crooning ''Amen.''
Father Arpin conducted only half the service, then shed his vestments, flung them over a chair and walked tearfully away from the altar. Afterward he said he would abide by last month's order from Archbishop John R. Quinn of the Archdiocese of San Francisco forbidding local priests to celebrate Masses for the gay organization.
By design of the Dignity liturgical committee. last night's service was not a Mass. ''We wanted to create a service of our own,'' said Kevin Calegari, a member of the committee, ''a liturgy of journey and exodus to ritualize the experience we're having as gay and lesbian Catholics being forced out of the church, yet holding to a faith we feel so strongly about. The Archbishop has said we are not allowed to have a priest, and for one night we are going to experience that deprivation.''
After the scriptural readings, Father Arpin's homily and his somber exit, the worshipers streamed from the church, bearing candles cupped against the wind. Singing hymns and Christmas carols, they marched one mile uphill to St. Mary's Cathedral, the headquarters for the three-county Archdiocese, which serves 360,000 Catholics.
_________________________________________
Kevin J. Calegari Leadership Award
KEVIN CALEGARI was President of DignityUSA from 1991 to 1993. He was a tireless and passionate leader who brought new levels of visibility to our movement. In the best-known incident from his presidency, Kevin symbolized Dignity’s rejection of the Vatican’s 1992 Letter “Some Considerations Concerning the Response to Legislative Proposals on the Non-discrimination of Homosexual Persons” — in which bishops were instructed to oppose all legislation supportive of equal rights for lesbians and gay men — by writing REJECTED across the front of the document and nailing it to the door of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome. Kevin died of AIDS in 1994.
To honor his memory, and to recognize extraordinary leadership within Dignity as a movement, the Board of Directors of DignityUSA established this award. It is presented biennially to an individual who has demonstrated the same kind of passionate commitment Kevin gave to us.
_________________________________________
First Annual Kevin Calegari Lecture
To commemorate the 25th anniversary of Kevin Calegari's death, Dignity San Francisco will hold an annual lecture in his name on LGBTQ practical spirituality, broadly defined. The first speaker will be Deacon Brian Bromberger, who knew Kevin and has access to all his available papers. His lecture will focus on outlining Kevin's LGBTQ spirituality based on his life experiences and his writings.
The lecture will take place at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94122, on Saturday February 29, 2020 at 6:00 PM followed by an hors d'ouevres reception. There is no cost to attend.
Kevin Calegari (1958-1995) was co-chair of the San Francisco Dignity chapter as well as President of Dignity National from 1991 to 1993. He was a visionary leader of the LGBTQ Catholic movement.
EXAMINER STAFF REPORT
Published 04:00 a.m., Tuesday, February 14, 1995
Kevin Calegari, an activist in the Roman Catholic gay and progressive movement, died of AIDS-related causes Sunday at his home. He was 36.
Mr. Calegari, a native San Franciscan, [his mother's maiden name was Semenza], spent many years working for just treatment of gays and lesbians in the Catholic Church and the recognition of their contributions to the church. He made contacts with other progressive organizations in the religious community and fought to include gays and lesbians in their efforts.
Mr. Calegari was president of Dignity / USA, the 4,000-member organization of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Catholics, from 1991 to 1992. During that time, he brought attention to the Catholic Church's policies against laws protecting gay rights. In one incident, he mailed a Holy Office instruction to fight such laws, along with a copy of the New Testament, to the Vatican in an envelope marked, "Return to Sender."
As co-chairman of the local chapter of Dignity, Mr. Calegari was an expert at drawing media attention to the cause of gay and lesbian Catholics. When Dignity / San Francisco was evicted from St. Boniface Church in 1988, he marched with members to St. Mary's Cathedral in a walking religious service and placed a wreath with a pink triangle on the door opening to the piazza in front.
He was a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather-Levi community.
Mr. Calegari had been accepted to the doctoral program at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley through the Jesuit School of Theology. His master's thesis focused on the role of Dignity within the larger movement to reform the Catholic Church and its identity as a self-governed religious community.
He is survived by his partner of 11 years, Tom Kaun; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care giver; his parents, George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Ave., San Francisco. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that contributions be made to Dignity / USA.
________________________________________
Kevin Calegari
Published 04:00 a.m., Thursday, February 16, 1995
A memorial service will be held February 25 for Kevin Calegari, an advocate of gay rights in the Roman Catholic Church.
Mr. Calegari, a San Francisco native and past president of Dignity/USA, died Sunday of an AIDS- related illness. He was 36.
Throughout the 1980s, Mr. Calegari was a leading voice in the campaign to challenge the Vatican's condemnation of gay sex as "disordered" and an "intrinsic moral evil."
As the local leader of Dignity, an organization of gay and lesbian Catholics, Mr. Calegari clashed with San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn, who in 1988 banned Dignity from holding its weekly Mass at St. Boniface Church in the Tenderloin.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Calegari was elected national president of Dignity. He continued the gay rights campaign in that role as an outspoken advocate during visits to the Vatican, to Washington for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops meetings, and to Denver last year to raise the gay rights banner during Pope John Paul II's appearance at World Youth Day.
Closer to home, Mr. Calegari sought to find a way for homosexuals -- including many facing death in the AIDS epidemic -- to retain a connection to the Roman Catholic Church. After years of condemnation over their sexuality, he said in a 1988 Chronicle interview, many had given up on organized religion.
"Churches have not offered spiritual nourishment to gays and lesbians," he said. "The overwhelming message is still one of condemnation -- not acceptance. Gays are looking elsewhere for spiritual nourishment."
Mr. Calegari, a Stanford University graduate who worked as a professional fund-raiser for the University of San Francisco and other organizations, was also a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather/Levi's community.
Mr. Calegari is survived by Tom Kaun, his partner of 11 years; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care-giver; his parents George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan Harrington of Sonoma.
His family suggests that contributions be made to Dignity/USA.
The February 25 memorial service is planned for 2 p.m. at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, where Dignity now holds its San Francisco services.
________________________________________
San Francisco Journal; Suffering In Dignity And Exile
By JANE GROSS, Special to the New York Times Published: December 20, 1988
In the middle of the priest's homily on Sunday night, applause rang out at St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church, a rare defiant sound in an incense-scented space usually reserved for hushed worship.
The applause came midway through the last service to be held on church property by members of Dignity, a group of gay Catholics that has been evicted by bishops throughout the country in the last two years.
''We gather to send our greetings and a clear message to Rome,'' said the Rev. Robert Arpin, who has declared publicly that he is homosexual and has AIDS. ''Like us or not, we are your sons and your daughters. We are your priests and your nuns. We are your faithful ones. We are your church.''
In the gaudy baroque church that has been Dignity's San Francisco home for four years, some 300 worshipers leaned forward in the carved pews, clapping appreciatively. In the front row, a man hoisted a placard that read ''God Is Gay.'' From a dark corner of the church, a transvestite in mantilla and miniskirt shouted falsetto approval. From the rear came a lone voice, in the cadences of gospel music, crooning ''Amen.''
Father Arpin conducted only half the service, then shed his vestments, flung them over a chair and walked tearfully away from the altar. Afterward he said he would abide by last month's order from Archbishop John R. Quinn of the Archdiocese of San Francisco forbidding local priests to celebrate Masses for the gay organization.
By design of the Dignity liturgical committee. last night's service was not a Mass. ''We wanted to create a service of our own,'' said Kevin Calegari, a member of the committee, ''a liturgy of journey and exodus to ritualize the experience we're having as gay and lesbian Catholics being forced out of the church, yet holding to a faith we feel so strongly about. The Archbishop has said we are not allowed to have a priest, and for one night we are going to experience that deprivation.''
After the scriptural readings, Father Arpin's homily and his somber exit, the worshipers streamed from the church, bearing candles cupped against the wind. Singing hymns and Christmas carols, they marched one mile uphill to St. Mary's Cathedral, the headquarters for the three-county Archdiocese, which serves 360,000 Catholics.
_________________________________________
Kevin J. Calegari Leadership Award
KEVIN CALEGARI was President of DignityUSA from 1991 to 1993. He was a tireless and passionate leader who brought new levels of visibility to our movement. In the best-known incident from his presidency, Kevin symbolized Dignity’s rejection of the Vatican’s 1992 Letter “Some Considerations Concerning the Response to Legislative Proposals on the Non-discrimination of Homosexual Persons” — in which bishops were instructed to oppose all legislation supportive of equal rights for lesbians and gay men — by writing REJECTED across the front of the document and nailing it to the door of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome. Kevin died of AIDS in 1994.
To honor his memory, and to recognize extraordinary leadership within Dignity as a movement, the Board of Directors of DignityUSA established this award. It is presented biennially to an individual who has demonstrated the same kind of passionate commitment Kevin gave to us.
_________________________________________
First Annual Kevin Calegari Lecture
To commemorate the 25th anniversary of Kevin Calegari's death, Dignity San Francisco will hold an annual lecture in his name on LGBTQ practical spirituality, broadly defined. The first speaker will be Deacon Brian Bromberger, who knew Kevin and has access to all his available papers. His lecture will focus on outlining Kevin's LGBTQ spirituality based on his life experiences and his writings.
The lecture will take place at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94122, on Saturday February 29, 2020 at 6:00 PM followed by an hors d'ouevres reception. There is no cost to attend.
Kevin Calegari (1958-1995) was co-chair of the San Francisco Dignity chapter as well as President of Dignity National from 1991 to 1993. He was a visionary leader of the LGBTQ Catholic movement.
Kevin Calegari
EXAMINER STAFF REPORT
Published 04:00 a.m., Tuesday, February 14, 1995
Kevin Calegari, an activist in the Roman Catholic gay and progressive movement, died of AIDS-related causes Sunday at his home. He was 36.
Mr. Calegari, a native San Franciscan, [his mother's maiden name was Semenza], spent many years working for just treatment of gays and lesbians in the Catholic Church and the recognition of their contributions to the church. He made contacts with other progressive organizations in the religious community and fought to include gays and lesbians in their efforts.
Mr. Calegari was president of Dignity / USA, the 4,000-member organization of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Catholics, from 1991 to 1992. During that time, he brought attention to the Catholic Church's policies against laws protecting gay rights. In one incident, he mailed a Holy Office instruction to fight such laws, along with a copy of the New Testament, to the Vatican in an envelope marked, "Return to Sender."
As co-chairman of the local chapter of Dignity, Mr. Calegari was an expert at drawing media attention to the cause of gay and lesbian Catholics. When Dignity / San Francisco was evicted from St. Boniface Church in 1988, he marched with members to St. Mary's Cathedral in a walking religious service and placed a wreath with a pink triangle on the door opening to the piazza in front.
He was a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather-Levi community.
Mr. Calegari had been accepted to the doctoral program at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley through the Jesuit School of Theology. His master's thesis focused on the role of Dignity within the larger movement to reform the Catholic Church and its identity as a self-governed religious community.
He is survived by his partner of 11 years, Tom Kaun; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care giver; his parents, George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Ave., San Francisco. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that contributions be made to Dignity / USA.
________________________________________
Kevin Calegari
Published 04:00 a.m., Thursday, February 16, 1995
A memorial service will be held February 25 for Kevin Calegari, an advocate of gay rights in the Roman Catholic Church.
Mr. Calegari, a San Francisco native and past president of Dignity/USA, died Sunday of an AIDS- related illness. He was 36.
Throughout the 1980s, Mr. Calegari was a leading voice in the campaign to challenge the Vatican's condemnation of gay sex as "disordered" and an "intrinsic moral evil."
As the local leader of Dignity, an organization of gay and lesbian Catholics, Mr. Calegari clashed with San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn, who in 1988 banned Dignity from holding its weekly Mass at St. Boniface Church in the Tenderloin.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Calegari was elected national president of Dignity. He continued the gay rights campaign in that role as an outspoken advocate during visits to the Vatican, to Washington for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops meetings, and to Denver last year to raise the gay rights banner during Pope John Paul II's appearance at World Youth Day.
Closer to home, Mr. Calegari sought to find a way for homosexuals -- including many facing death in the AIDS epidemic -- to retain a connection to the Roman Catholic Church. After years of condemnation over their sexuality, he said in a 1988 Chronicle interview, many had given up on organized religion.
"Churches have not offered spiritual nourishment to gays and lesbians," he said. "The overwhelming message is still one of condemnation -- not acceptance. Gays are looking elsewhere for spiritual nourishment."
Mr. Calegari, a Stanford University graduate who worked as a professional fund-raiser for the University of San Francisco and other organizations, was also a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather/Levi's community.
Mr. Calegari is survived by Tom Kaun, his partner of 11 years; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care-giver; his parents George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan Harrington of Sonoma.
His family suggests that contributions be made to Dignity/USA.
The February 25 memorial service is planned for 2 p.m. at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, where Dignity now holds its San Francisco services.
________________________________________
San Francisco Journal; Suffering In Dignity And Exile
By JANE GROSS, Special to the New York Times Published: December 20, 1988
In the middle of the priest's homily on Sunday night, applause rang out at St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church, a rare defiant sound in an incense-scented space usually reserved for hushed worship.
The applause came midway through the last service to be held on church property by members of Dignity, a group of gay Catholics that has been evicted by bishops throughout the country in the last two years.
''We gather to send our greetings and a clear message to Rome,'' said the Rev. Robert Arpin, who has declared publicly that he is homosexual and has AIDS. ''Like us or not, we are your sons and your daughters. We are your priests and your nuns. We are your faithful ones. We are your church.''
In the gaudy baroque church that has been Dignity's San Francisco home for four years, some 300 worshipers leaned forward in the carved pews, clapping appreciatively. In the front row, a man hoisted a placard that read ''God Is Gay.'' From a dark corner of the church, a transvestite in mantilla and miniskirt shouted falsetto approval. From the rear came a lone voice, in the cadences of gospel music, crooning ''Amen.''
Father Arpin conducted only half the service, then shed his vestments, flung them over a chair and walked tearfully away from the altar. Afterward he said he would abide by last month's order from Archbishop John R. Quinn of the Archdiocese of San Francisco forbidding local priests to celebrate Masses for the gay organization.
By design of the Dignity liturgical committee. last night's service was not a Mass. ''We wanted to create a service of our own,'' said Kevin Calegari, a member of the committee, ''a liturgy of journey and exodus to ritualize the experience we're having as gay and lesbian Catholics being forced out of the church, yet holding to a faith we feel so strongly about. The Archbishop has said we are not allowed to have a priest, and for one night we are going to experience that deprivation.''
After the scriptural readings, Father Arpin's homily and his somber exit, the worshipers streamed from the church, bearing candles cupped against the wind. Singing hymns and Christmas carols, they marched one mile uphill to St. Mary's Cathedral, the headquarters for the three-county Archdiocese, which serves 360,000 Catholics.
_________________________________________
Kevin J. Calegari Leadership Award
KEVIN CALEGARI was President of DignityUSA from 1991 to 1993. He was a tireless and passionate leader who brought new levels of visibility to our movement. In the best-known incident from his presidency, Kevin symbolized Dignity’s rejection of the Vatican’s 1992 Letter “Some Considerations Concerning the Response to Legislative Proposals on the Non-discrimination of Homosexual Persons” — in which bishops were instructed to oppose all legislation supportive of equal rights for lesbians and gay men — by writing REJECTED across the front of the document and nailing it to the door of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome. Kevin died of AIDS in 1994.
To honor his memory, and to recognize extraordinary leadership within Dignity as a movement, the Board of Directors of DignityUSA established this award. It is presented biennially to an individual who has demonstrated the same kind of passionate commitment Kevin gave to us.
_________________________________________
First Annual Kevin Calegari Lecture
To commemorate the 25th anniversary of Kevin Calegari's death, Dignity San Francisco will hold an annual lecture in his name on LGBTQ practical spirituality, broadly defined. The first speaker will be Deacon Brian Bromberger, who knew Kevin and has access to all his available papers. His lecture will focus on outlining Kevin's LGBTQ spirituality based on his life experiences and his writings.
The lecture will take place at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94122, on Saturday February 29, 2020 at 6:00 PM followed by an hors d'ouevres reception. There is no cost to attend.
Kevin Calegari (1958-1995) was co-chair of the San Francisco Dignity chapter as well as President of Dignity National from 1991 to 1993. He was a visionary leader of the LGBTQ Catholic movement.
EXAMINER STAFF REPORT
Published 04:00 a.m., Tuesday, February 14, 1995
Kevin Calegari, an activist in the Roman Catholic gay and progressive movement, died of AIDS-related causes Sunday at his home. He was 36.
Mr. Calegari, a native San Franciscan, [his mother's maiden name was Semenza], spent many years working for just treatment of gays and lesbians in the Catholic Church and the recognition of their contributions to the church. He made contacts with other progressive organizations in the religious community and fought to include gays and lesbians in their efforts.
Mr. Calegari was president of Dignity / USA, the 4,000-member organization of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Catholics, from 1991 to 1992. During that time, he brought attention to the Catholic Church's policies against laws protecting gay rights. In one incident, he mailed a Holy Office instruction to fight such laws, along with a copy of the New Testament, to the Vatican in an envelope marked, "Return to Sender."
As co-chairman of the local chapter of Dignity, Mr. Calegari was an expert at drawing media attention to the cause of gay and lesbian Catholics. When Dignity / San Francisco was evicted from St. Boniface Church in 1988, he marched with members to St. Mary's Cathedral in a walking religious service and placed a wreath with a pink triangle on the door opening to the piazza in front.
He was a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather-Levi community.
Mr. Calegari had been accepted to the doctoral program at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley through the Jesuit School of Theology. His master's thesis focused on the role of Dignity within the larger movement to reform the Catholic Church and its identity as a self-governed religious community.
He is survived by his partner of 11 years, Tom Kaun; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care giver; his parents, George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Ave., San Francisco. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that contributions be made to Dignity / USA.
________________________________________
Kevin Calegari
Published 04:00 a.m., Thursday, February 16, 1995
A memorial service will be held February 25 for Kevin Calegari, an advocate of gay rights in the Roman Catholic Church.
Mr. Calegari, a San Francisco native and past president of Dignity/USA, died Sunday of an AIDS- related illness. He was 36.
Throughout the 1980s, Mr. Calegari was a leading voice in the campaign to challenge the Vatican's condemnation of gay sex as "disordered" and an "intrinsic moral evil."
As the local leader of Dignity, an organization of gay and lesbian Catholics, Mr. Calegari clashed with San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn, who in 1988 banned Dignity from holding its weekly Mass at St. Boniface Church in the Tenderloin.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Calegari was elected national president of Dignity. He continued the gay rights campaign in that role as an outspoken advocate during visits to the Vatican, to Washington for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops meetings, and to Denver last year to raise the gay rights banner during Pope John Paul II's appearance at World Youth Day.
Closer to home, Mr. Calegari sought to find a way for homosexuals -- including many facing death in the AIDS epidemic -- to retain a connection to the Roman Catholic Church. After years of condemnation over their sexuality, he said in a 1988 Chronicle interview, many had given up on organized religion.
"Churches have not offered spiritual nourishment to gays and lesbians," he said. "The overwhelming message is still one of condemnation -- not acceptance. Gays are looking elsewhere for spiritual nourishment."
Mr. Calegari, a Stanford University graduate who worked as a professional fund-raiser for the University of San Francisco and other organizations, was also a founding member of the Defenders, Dignity's outreach to the leather/Levi's community.
Mr. Calegari is survived by Tom Kaun, his partner of 11 years; Janet Cerni, his friend and primary care-giver; his parents George and Lorayne of San Anselmo; and his sister, Joan Harrington of Sonoma.
His family suggests that contributions be made to Dignity/USA.
The February 25 memorial service is planned for 2 p.m. at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, where Dignity now holds its San Francisco services.
________________________________________
San Francisco Journal; Suffering In Dignity And Exile
By JANE GROSS, Special to the New York Times Published: December 20, 1988
In the middle of the priest's homily on Sunday night, applause rang out at St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church, a rare defiant sound in an incense-scented space usually reserved for hushed worship.
The applause came midway through the last service to be held on church property by members of Dignity, a group of gay Catholics that has been evicted by bishops throughout the country in the last two years.
''We gather to send our greetings and a clear message to Rome,'' said the Rev. Robert Arpin, who has declared publicly that he is homosexual and has AIDS. ''Like us or not, we are your sons and your daughters. We are your priests and your nuns. We are your faithful ones. We are your church.''
In the gaudy baroque church that has been Dignity's San Francisco home for four years, some 300 worshipers leaned forward in the carved pews, clapping appreciatively. In the front row, a man hoisted a placard that read ''God Is Gay.'' From a dark corner of the church, a transvestite in mantilla and miniskirt shouted falsetto approval. From the rear came a lone voice, in the cadences of gospel music, crooning ''Amen.''
Father Arpin conducted only half the service, then shed his vestments, flung them over a chair and walked tearfully away from the altar. Afterward he said he would abide by last month's order from Archbishop John R. Quinn of the Archdiocese of San Francisco forbidding local priests to celebrate Masses for the gay organization.
By design of the Dignity liturgical committee. last night's service was not a Mass. ''We wanted to create a service of our own,'' said Kevin Calegari, a member of the committee, ''a liturgy of journey and exodus to ritualize the experience we're having as gay and lesbian Catholics being forced out of the church, yet holding to a faith we feel so strongly about. The Archbishop has said we are not allowed to have a priest, and for one night we are going to experience that deprivation.''
After the scriptural readings, Father Arpin's homily and his somber exit, the worshipers streamed from the church, bearing candles cupped against the wind. Singing hymns and Christmas carols, they marched one mile uphill to St. Mary's Cathedral, the headquarters for the three-county Archdiocese, which serves 360,000 Catholics.
_________________________________________
Kevin J. Calegari Leadership Award
KEVIN CALEGARI was President of DignityUSA from 1991 to 1993. He was a tireless and passionate leader who brought new levels of visibility to our movement. In the best-known incident from his presidency, Kevin symbolized Dignity’s rejection of the Vatican’s 1992 Letter “Some Considerations Concerning the Response to Legislative Proposals on the Non-discrimination of Homosexual Persons” — in which bishops were instructed to oppose all legislation supportive of equal rights for lesbians and gay men — by writing REJECTED across the front of the document and nailing it to the door of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome. Kevin died of AIDS in 1994.
To honor his memory, and to recognize extraordinary leadership within Dignity as a movement, the Board of Directors of DignityUSA established this award. It is presented biennially to an individual who has demonstrated the same kind of passionate commitment Kevin gave to us.
_________________________________________
First Annual Kevin Calegari Lecture
To commemorate the 25th anniversary of Kevin Calegari's death, Dignity San Francisco will hold an annual lecture in his name on LGBTQ practical spirituality, broadly defined. The first speaker will be Deacon Brian Bromberger, who knew Kevin and has access to all his available papers. His lecture will focus on outlining Kevin's LGBTQ spirituality based on his life experiences and his writings.
The lecture will take place at Seventh Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1329 Seventh Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94122, on Saturday February 29, 2020 at 6:00 PM followed by an hors d'ouevres reception. There is no cost to attend.
Kevin Calegari (1958-1995) was co-chair of the San Francisco Dignity chapter as well as President of Dignity National from 1991 to 1993. He was a visionary leader of the LGBTQ Catholic movement.
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