Ulises Perez

Ulises Perez was born in Caracas, Venezuela on June 19, 1966, to a Catholic family. In his youth he began attending a Pentacostal church and felt drawn to a life of religious service, helping people to find solace in God. He was an active missionary in Venezuelan cities, countryside towns, and the Indigenous communities in the Amazon.

His attraction to men was not a factor in his religious activities, although he heard a persistent message that homosexual behavior was condemned by God.

He joined the Venezualan Air Force in 1981 and served for more than ten years. In 1991, his life was threatened by severe kidney disease. He was unmarried, had no children and close to death he reflected on his life. Attending a Pentacostal church service, he experienced a moment of faith after which his kidney began healing. Equally unexpected, he received a scholarship to attend the private, evangelical, non-denominational theological center Tell My People. This non-profit school was established to train Spanish-speaking religious leaders; it drew students from around the world. At the time, Perez had no money, no visa, and no way to travel to the United States and only a vague sense of being called by God to the work of ministry. As money, a visa, and travel funds fell miraculously into place within months, by October 1991, he re-dedicated his life to ministry and moved to Harlingen, Texas, to begin biblical training.

Feeling called by God, he pursued religious education credentials for work in the United States. THis required beginning with an American GED (1998). Over the next years, he aligned himself with social norms, married and fathered a child, but experienced increasing dissonance between his Pentacostal position on homosexuality and his own truth. During the process of separation and divorce, he met his current husband in 2008.

Unable to reconcile his life as a homosexual with religion, he avoided all church attendance. When he and his husband were married in an MCC church, Ulises began moving back toward ministry. He enrolled in graduate work in religious studies that broadened his Pentacostal perspective and allowed him to reconcile homosexuality and biblical teachings. In 2017, he began an independent, Spanish-speaking religious service held in the MCC church open to everyone. The congregation includes families, straights and gays. He will complete his master’s degree in fall 2025 and be eligible for ordination in MCC. He remains close to friends in the local Pentacostal community by agreeing to not discuss differences about homosexuality.

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