One of the best-kept Adventist secrets is the identity of a group of laypersons, pastors, teachers, editors, and administrators known as the Kinship Advisory, which meets every November with officers of Seventh-day Adventist Kinship International, Inc. Formed in 1976 and usually known simply as "Kinship" or "SDA Kinship," the organization endeavors to minister to the spiritual and emotional, and social needs of gay and lesbian Adventists and their families.

While Kinship endeavors to maintain positive relationships with the General Conference and other Adventist organizational entities, the good will is not always reciprocated. A dozen years ago the General Conference failed in a lawsuit to prevent the use of the words "Seventh-day Adventist" in the organization's formal identification. The general Adventist ambivalence toward homosexual persons has resulted in a perceived need for strict confidentiality. Members of the advisory group are unknown by individual names even to the Kinship board of directors, even though the group provides input regarding Kinship's current activities and future directions.

Prominent among this year's considerations was the idea of an invitational conference on homosexuality, tentatively scheduled for the spring of 2005 and expected to result in the publication of a series of papers in book form. The conference and book might include autobiographical accounts of gay and lesbian Adventists, as well as discussions of homosexuality from the perspectives of the natural and social sciences, Biblical interpretation, Christian and Adventist history, theology, ethics, law, and pastoral practice. Funding for this project could come from foundation grants and from donations by interested individuals.

Other educational initiatives included the preparation of a videotape, now in development, of interviews with parents of gay and lesbian Adventists, and a task force to develop a program of in-service education for pastors. Also discussed was the need to provide information and resources to assist teachers in Adventist elementary and secondary schools, colleges, and universities in responding to the needs of gay and lesbian students.

Earlier in the day-long meeting the participants listened to a devotional reflection on speaking truth to the church in love, prayed together about individual and collective concerns, reported on their individual activities related to gay and lesbian issues, and listened to the first-person story of a former pastor in Latin America whose ministry to a large congregation was terminated when his sexual orientation was reported to his employing organization, and who is now employed part time by a congregation in the United States. Of the four Kinship leaders who met with the advisory group, three were also former pastors.