Film Explores Toll Of Battle Between Gays, Christian Conservatives

The film takes a different approach to the gays-in-the-church debate. It focuses on devout Christians who learn their child is gay and how that affected their belief that same-sex relationships are prohibited by Scripture.

"I made this movie for the movable middle in America," Karslake said, before a private screening Monday at New York's Marble Collegiate Church, where inspirational pastor Norman Vincent Peale preached for decades. Karslake, who is gay and a mainline Protestant, believes that "sincere, honorable, compassionate people" have been misled about how they should read the Bible.

The documentary features many pro-gay veterans of the theological debates.

Among them is the Rev. Mel White, the former ghost writer for the Rev. Jerry Falwell and founder of the gay and lesbian advocacy group Soulforce. So is Jimmy Creech, the former United Methodist pastor who lost his clergy credentials in the late 1990s for conducting same-sex union ceremonies. South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Rev. Peter Gomes, the prominent preacher and Harvard Divinity School professor, also make a case for acceptance.