A lesson · LGBTQIA+ Youth and Spiritual Learning
TeenLGBTQIA+ Youth and Spiritual Learning
Is there anyone in the world who shouldn’t have access to Truth? A lesson on belonging that works whether you’re figuring out your own identity or a friend’s.
Assumptions & Caveats
Before you begin
What you should know
A Christian Science Sunday School teacher spent years running a class openly welcoming to LGBTQIA+ youth and their peers. When her small congregation closed, she went looking for a new home for the class, and heard “not a right fit” more than once before a larger church finally opened its doors. What she found, once the class was actually running, surprised her: they didn’t talk about sexuality or gender much more than any group of teenagers does. What mattered was one question she kept coming back to: is there anyone in the world who shouldn’t have access to Truth? This lesson borrows that question, and that’s all the background it takes to lead.
What we're assuming
- Almost everyone in this room fits one of two situations, and some fit both: someone who is LGBTQIA+ or questioning, or someone who has a friend, sibling, or peer who is. We’re not assuming which, and nobody has to say. This lesson is built to be useful either way — sometimes both at once, in the same person.
Learning goals
What they walk away with
- Knowing that being LGBTQIA+ was never a barrier to their spiritual identity or worth — that was never actually in question.
- One concrete way to show up for a friend or peer who is LGBTQIA+, even without having every answer worked out themselves.
- Understanding that their own convictions and their care for someone they know don’t have to cancel each other out — those are two separate things, not one.
- Knowing that whichever one of these describes them today — figuring out their own identity, or figuring out how to support someone else’s — they fully belong in this room.
How to hold the room
Before you start talking
Before you start talking: - This isn’t about arguing anyone into a position, including your own. You don’t need your own theology fully settled to lead this well — your job is making sure every young person here leaves knowing they’re not alone and not excluded. - Some young people here may be LGBTQIA+, questioning, or have someone close to them who is — and may not be out, or ready to be. Nothing here should ever require anyone to disclose their own identity or someone else’s. - If a young person seems to be speaking on behalf of a friend, don’t press for more detail than they’ve offered. Keep it about how they can show up well, not about extracting more of the friend’s story. - Shaming a young person for where they currently are, in either direction, works against everything this lesson is trying to do.
The lesson flow
Step by step
Each beat alternates a little input, a little doing, and a little reflecting. Skip, slow down, or stretch any of these to fit your group.
A message you got somewhere
Privately, on paper: think of one message you’ve received — from family, church, friends, social media, anywhere — either about your own identity, or about people who are LGBTQIA+. Did it make room for you or them, or shrink the room? You don’t have to share which message, or where it came from. Just notice it landed somewhere.
Seeing past the label
Share this, in your own words: Christian Science teaches that everyone’s real identity is spiritual — a reflection of divine Love, not defined by material labels. Mary Baker Eddy wrote about “looking long enough” to see past gender and human categories entirely, to something she called “the intelligent compound idea… showing forth the infinite divine Principle, Love, called God.” That’s not this site’s invention — it’s well over a century old.
Source: Mary Baker Eddy, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, pp. 268–269. In the public domain in the US.
Reflect or discuss: If you knew for certain this was true — that everyone is fundamentally a reflection of Love, no exceptions — what would that change about how you see yourself, or a friend?
What this looks like for you
Two quiet prompts. Do whichever fits — you’re allowed to do both.
If this is about you: One truth about who I am, spiritually, that doesn’t depend on anyone else’s opinion: ___
If this is about someone you know: One way I could show up for them that doesn’t require me to have all the answers: ___
If your own beliefs and your care for that person ever feel like they’re pulling against each other: those are two separate dials, not one. You don’t have to turn your convictions down to turn your curiosity and care up.
You were never excluded
Whether you came into this room still figuring out who you are, or figuring out how to be there for someone who is, close with this, unqualified: “Love is impartial and universal in its adaptation and bestowals. It is the open fount which cries, ‘Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters.’” Everyone thirsts. Everyone’s invited to the water. That was never in question.
Source: Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 13 — itself quoting Isaiah 55:1 (King James Version). In the public domain in the US.
What you'll need
The materials
- Paper and pens — or a shared doc / whiteboard if you’re meeting virtually
- Optional: the “A Message You Got Somewhere” reflection card for beat 1, and the “What This Looks Like for You” dual-track card for beat 3
If it's not going well
When this one gets heavy
Read this before you lead it, not during it: LGBTQIA+ youth face meaningfully higher rates of family rejection and self-harm than their peers — that’s not a side note, it’s the room you’re actually holding. If someone discloses family rejection, rejection from a faith community, or anything sounding like hopelessness or self-harm, stop being a “lesson leader” and be a caring adult instead. Keep The Trevor Project (a crisis line built specifically for LGBTQ+ youth) alongside your general safety resources for this one. If a young person is speaking on a friend’s behalf, remember that friend’s story isn’t theirs to press for — help the young person in front of you get their friend connected to real support rather than trying to solve it through them. And if disagreement ever turns into mockery, targeting, or pressure on someone to declare who they are, that’s not “differing views” anymore — redirect immediately, same as any other unsafe moment.
For the fuller tiered guidance — including what to do if someone discloses something serious — see For Mentors.
Help this get better
Teaching this to a group we haven't planned for?
Tell us — this only gets better with your eyes on it. We read every one of these.