Dignity Boston

Address: Inside St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church

Years Active: 1972–Present

Tradition: Catholic

Dignity Boston (also stylized as “Dignity/Boston”) was founded in 1972 as a welcoming community for LGBTQ+ Catholics, as a part of the national, California-headquartered organization DignityUSA. From its beginnings in a Randolph, Massachusetts gay bar (the “Randolph Country Club”), the group served as a community for LGBTQ+ persons who felt isolated from official Catholic Church policies, positions, and practice. (Indeed, according to an online document from February 2018 in which community members recounted the history of Dignity Boston, it is mentioned that the group’s founding document states that the group would not be “limited to gay and lesbian people.”) While Dignity Boston has, at times throughout its history, felt tension among its various constituencies regarding the kind of relationship the group should have with the Catholic Church, the community has nonetheless consistently fought against LGBTQ+ discrimination and served as a springboard for various activist initiatives. Dignity Boston has run a host of fundraisers and advocacy efforts for people living with AIDS, and particularly in the context of the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandals, its liturgy and worship was a source of welcome for many feeling disillusioned with Catholic institutions. Beyond these efforts, Dignity Boston’s website lists the numerous ways they have helped better the lives of, and worked to include, LGBTQ+ Catholics, such as co-running the Friday Night Supper Program with the Arlington Street Church, and advocating for transgender rights “from a Catholic social justice perspective.” (The above online document recounting Dignity Boston’s history notes: “About a decade ago, the community felt a turning point as more openly transgender people joined.”)

For a much more detailed history of Dignity Boston, please consult the linked document below.

Outside their services, in addition to hosting an “AIDS Ride Cycle Team,” the “Cardinal Sins,” the community also hosts on its website “Dignity Boston Responds,” which consists of Dignity Boston’s engagements with local current events—for example, opposing a Worcester bishop’s call for a local Catholic school to “no longer identify itself as a Catholic school because it flies the Black Lives Matter and Rainbow flags.”

[Note: since this description was written in June 2024, several of the links to Dignity Boston's website have now become broken, leading to error pages. We will soon be going back through and fixing this, looping in Dignity Boston to figure out where we can find the documents to which these links once directed.]

Sources and Further Information:

https://dignityboston.org/

https://www.dignityusa.org/sites/default/files/jubilee/part1/Dignity%20Boston.pdf (A more detailed and in-depth history of Dignity Boston)

Relevant Pages:

Arlington Street Church

St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church