Alison Amyx

Alison Amyx, as Believe Out Loud's senior communications strategist, works diligently to foster healthy, authentic, and challenging conversations on justice for all LGBTQIA people.

Alison was raised Southern Baptist in northwest Georgia. She accepted Jesus into her heart at the age of seven. Over the course of her childhood, she developed deep doubts about whether she was worthy of God’s love. These doubts were strong enough to lead her toward every altar call in walking distance, and eventually, these doubts led to her second baptism at the age of seventeen. By college, these doubts grew as wide as the distance between the two images of God she was presented as a child—the angry, vengeful God who sent people to Hell, and the God of Love beyond understanding.

While pursuing an undergraduate degree in sociology at Mercer University, a historically Baptist school in Georgia, Alison took a required Christianity course that changed the way she read the Bible. She was hooked. By her senior year, she narrowed her focus on the sociology of religion, and her undergraduate studies culminated in project on the social factors that influence perceptions of an authoritarian God. This project, along with a growing interest in conflict transformation, led Alison to pursue a Master of Theological Studies at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. Though Alison embarked on religious study as purely an “academic pursuit,” the existential angst of her childhood persisted throughout seminary. After five years of studying many types of faith (and meeting many, many Methodists), Alison found herself leaning back into her roots—the Baptist tradition. During her last semester of seminary, she realized that she was, in fact, a person of faith, and her faith was rooted in a love beyond understanding. Just one week later, she realized she was gay.

Alison began her communications work in seminary—first at the Religion and Public Health Collaborative at Emory University, and then at Interfaith Power & Light, a national organization mobilizing a religious response to global warming. From the intersections of faith and doubt, to religion and environmental work, and faith and sexuality—Alison’s is called to work in spaces where gaps are bridged and conflicts are transformed.

In 2012, Alison joined the staff of Believe Out Loud as the senior editor, where she was tasked with creating and curating content for the largest online network of LGBT Christians and allies. In this position, she has curated extensive conversations about mental health, race, sexuality, and gender in the LGBTQIA community. In 2016, Alison created and launched Believe Out Loud’s Blogger Payment Program to ensure the individuals who write for Believe Out Loud receive compensation for their work. This program prioritizes individuals who write about identities and experiences that are underrepresented in the wider LGBTQIA movement.

From the individuals who write for Believe Out Loud, to the members of the Believe Out Loud who hold the community accountable, Alison has grown tremendously in relationship with a community of LGBTQIA believers—including the elders who bridge the gaps between generations in our movement.

Alison currently lives in New Jersey with her partner Reese Rathjen. In her spare time, she visits cats, sings in choirs, and serves on the board of BPFNA ~ Bautistas por la Paz, la red más grande de Bautistas por la paz en el mundo, the largest network of Baptist peacemakers in the world. Alison believes in evolving identities and currently holds the following labels close to heart: Southerner, person of faith, trans partner, Baptist, and queer femme.

(This biographical statement provided by Alison Amyx.)

Biography Date: August 2017

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