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Episcopal ministry opens doors for LGBTQ students, grad workers

By Ethan Sandweiss

Posted December 16, 2022

A pride flag draped next to a religious icon in Canterbury House. The tall chair to the right of the window is reserved for the bishop's visits. (Clayton Baumgarth / WFIU-WTIU)

Reverend Ed Bird said students often mistake his church for the campus LGBTQ center.

He’s the priest at Canterbury House, an Episcopal ministry on Seventh Street across from IU’s campus.

The yellow brick building is draped in pride flags and houses the Graduate Workers Coalition’s impromptu headquarters.

Rev. Ed Bird spent nearly 20 years in Chicago as a vicar and social worker before coming to Bloomington. (Clayton Baumgarth / WFIU-WTIU)

Students usually refer to Bird as “Rev Ed.” He was a non-practicing Episcopalian until his early 20s, when his struggles with depression brought him to faith and social justice. Bird remembers the moment he discovered his calling.

“Thirty years ago, I was working in a French Hungarian bistro in Memphis, and I ladled some gravy onto a plate. And this feeling of emptiness washed over me,” he recalled. “Immediately, a sentence came into my head that I almost heard literally: ‘you're supposed to be helping people.’”

Bird started his career as a psychiatric social worker in Memphis and soon moved to Chicago, serving the homeless community. He said that for him, faith and service come hand in hand.

“St. Francis himself said, ‘Preach the gospel at all times, occasionally use words.’ And so we like for our open mindedness, and our open arms, and our open door to kind of reflect our primary value of hospitality,” Bird said.

Canterbury House as seen from Seventh St. (Clayton Baumgarth, WFIU-WTIU)

Since he arrived in Bloomington, Bird has worked to apply the same principles of tolerance and duty in a completely different environment.

Many Christian organizations put on an inclusive face but stop short of restorative justice, Bird said. He wants to address the church’s complicated legacy to make Canterbury house a more inclusive place.

“I’m willing to bet that 95 percent of the harm caused to people who identify as queer or LGBTQIA comes from the church,” Bird said. The Episcopal Church ordains openly gay and female ministers, but its progressive shift has caused several splinters within Anglicanism as a whole.

Pro-union signs left over from the picket line last spring wait in the ministry's basement, or "undercroft" in Episcopal terminology. (Clayton Baumgarth, WFIU-WTIU)

Aside from worshippers, Canterbury House is often filled with PhD students belonging to the union. When the Graduate Workers Coalition was looking for a place to operate in the spring, Bird made his ministry available.

“They had contacted Trinity Church to see if they could use space there. They said, that sounds like something you might call Canterbury about.”

The union still operates out of Canterbury House, hosting study sessions and sharing the top floor with Bird’s office.

“It’s wonderful to walk in and have the place full of students,” Bird said.