The Advocacy Council for Human Rights

The newsletter incorrectly stated the date of the PFLAG meeting.  The correct meeting time is Thursday Jan 19 at 5:30.  The place will still be the Unitarian Unilateralist church on Emerson in the church library.  Hope to see lots of people there.  Sorry for the incorrect information first given.

The January edition of the Rainbow Connection is now available for reading online.

Hope everyone has a wonderful New Year!!

Amasong, Champaign Urbana’s Premier Lesbian/Feminist Chorus, would like to
invite you to our Winter Concert, Dec. 10 at 7:30 p.m. and Dec. 11 at 4:00
p.m., McKinley Presbyterian Church, 809 S. Fifth St., Champaign. Suggested
donation $15-$25, more if you can, less if you can’t! Read more »

The December edition of the Rainbow connection is now available for viewing.

The November edition of the Rainbow Connection is now available online:

The Capitol City Men’s Chorus has set its next concert for 4 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 20 at the Laurel United Methodist Church, 631 S. Grand Ave. W in Springfield. A $10 donation is the suggested ad- mission.
Established in 2005, the cho- rus membership is open to any male with a musical interest that is 18 years of age or older.
Past concerts have been based on love songs, Broadway showtunes, holiday music, and old
radio shows. The group has also performed in the capitol rotunda and at various fundraisers.
For more information contact the chorus at chorus@tccmc.org or visit the chorus web site at www.tccmc.org.

Equality Illinois and the Advo- cacy Council for Human Rights are sponsoring their second annual Interfaith Equality Round Table breakfast discussion at 9:30 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 17 in the Community Room at Bloomington Public Library, 205 E. Olive St.
The discussion will focus on the impact of state/federal legisla- tion on LGBT communities and implications for communities of faith and societal change; con- structive dialog concerning LGBT equality across faith traditions around issues we disagree on; and outreach to the LGBT community within and across faith traditions.
Clergy, lay leaders and central Illinois LGBT leaders are invited to attend the discussion. If you know of clergy, lay persons or community leaders who would be interested in partaking in the discussion, please share this information with them. A light breakfast will be served.
Please RSVP attendance plans to Caroline Staerk at cstaerk@eqil.org. Questions can also be directed to Caroline at 773-477-7173.

by Ryan Mishler

For one week this past July, I went to summer camp. Some may wonder why a 22-year-old college student would want to go to summer camp, but the camp I attended didn’t involve sing-alongs and s’mores. I went to Camp Pride, a summer leadership camp held at Vanderbilt University for LGBT and ally college students who want to make their campuses more welcoming for LGBT students, staff, and faculty. Read more »

October newsletter is now available: October Newsletter

Your Normal LGBT Film Festival has a new Website:

Your Normal LGBT Film Fest

Check it out for complete descriptions of all the films in the film festival.

The September edition of The Rainbow Connection – now in color! – is available on the Newsletter page.

Hello,

My name is Marcena Gabrielson. I’m an assistant professor of nursing at Illinois State University. A personal contact has provided assistance to me by kindly forwarding this email to you in the hopes that you will consider participating in this pilot study.

If you are a lesbian who is 55 or older, I am inviting you to participate in an anonymous pilot study aimed at establishing a reliable tool for measuring social support among older lesbians. This study will test the reliability of a modified version of a commonly used social support scale with an all lesbian sample. The modified version includes a category for identifying “family of choice”. I am a lesbian myself and therefore, am especially concerned about social support and promoting health among older lesbians. I want to assist health professionals to provide informed, respectful and high quality health care to older lesbians. Studying social support among older lesbians may lead to important information that providers need for promoting health among the lesbian population. This study will involve a completely anonymous online survey that will take approximately fifteen to thirty minutes of your time to complete.

The study website can be found here.

If you have questions about the study, you may call me at 309-438-2319 or e-mail me.

Thank you for assistance with this project.
Marcena L.

It’s hard to believe, but pride month is already over and July activities – including our annual “Family Reunion” Picnic – are right around the corner! (See flyer)

This year’s picnic will begin at noon on Sunday, July 24 at Underwood Park in Normal. Read more »