Her Way: Young Women Remake the Sexual Revolution

When I told my parents I was gay, … they were concerned for me for …
the problems that I was going to have with society. And I told them, I
said, “I'm not going to have a problem with society. It's society who has
the problem.”

—Allison, University of Miami student on MTV's
“Sex in the '90s” documentary

I slept with a woman once and I thought, “Am I gay? Am I straight?”
Then I realized I'm just slutty!Where's my parade?

—comedian Margaret Cho, from her 1999 one-woman show,
“I'm the One I Want”

It is Sunday morning in the Bible Belt. Like other churches in Dallas, the Cathedral of Hope is filled to capacity. Few spaces are left in its vast mall-like parking lot, and inside the cavernous sanctuary, there is standing room only. Upon entering, a visitor notices some subtle differences between this church and the others. The stained-glass front, in addition to a picture of a dove of peace and an Easter lily, includes intertwined pairs of the circular symbols for both women and men. Those lining up to accept communion stand either alone or in same-sex couples. Beneath a towering white cross on the back wall and in front of rows of pillars spelling out the word HOPE is a pink triangular marble altar in the shape of a well-known symbol of homosexuality. The minister, dressed in long white robes, calls out: “When the brokenness of the world threatens to break you, remember when He calls.… Once again we come here to receive from you, as you have given to us in the past …that we may go from your table as courageous people.”

Like other churches, the Cathedral of Hope contains many symbols. But

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