He left before they had a chance to ask him to.
He was a same-sex-loving man, he told his congregation, and he was resigning his post as their pastor.
Seven years later, Benjamin Reynolds sat in a Starbucks at Dearborn and Harrison in Chicago. He's at his usual table, the high round one in the front corner.
This has been his "office" since July when he signed on as the faith director for Illinois Unites for Marriage, the coalition trying to pass an equal marriage bill in Illinois. He takes his meetings here, working to build support among faith communities and African Americans.
Lately, he has wondered what would have happened if he stayed on as the pastor at Emmanuel Missionary Baptist Church, the Colorado Springs church his parents helped charter. The congregation might have embraced him. Nearly everyone else—from his family to his religious mentors—affirmed him when he came out. But he needed to chart his own course, and he wanted to give his church permission to stay theirs.
There was no missed opportunity in leaving.
"I that think life is a series of calls," Reynolds said. "We're not called to just do one thing. We're called to many things over the course of our lives."
Reynolds' sexual orientation had always been an issue. As a child, he struggled to conform to male gender roles, much to the chagrin of his father.
"It was the things that I enjoyed—playing with dolls, whether it was my sister's Barbie dolls or my G.I. Joe," Reynolds recalled. "It was my mother's high heels. It was wearing my brother's choir robe, watching my mother cook and participating with that."
But Reynolds couldn't be gay, he told himself. His religious upbringing didn't allow it. He had always been in the church, and he had a gift for ministering, giving his first sermon at age 14.
He built a traditional life for himself.
He attended the University of Denver, and took a job as a court reporter in Dallas, Texas. He continued ministering on the side.
In 1991, the pastor at Emmanuel Missionary Baptist died, and the church sought out Reynolds to replace him. He returned home to Colorado Springs for the job. He married a woman and adopted her daughter.
In 1999, he began seminary at the Iliff School of Theology.
"I think that's where things began to bubble up in me," he recalled.
Seminary was about deconstruction, a journey towards being more open. The more Reynolds opened himself up, the more he came to terms with being gay.
For the first time, he accepted himself. He and his wife separated.
"But I still had this congregation who did not know, or I didn't think they knew," Reynolds said.
In 2000, Reynolds began weekly discussions in his church about Black sexuality, holding talks about sexual health, HIV/AIDS and LGBT issues. In the eighth week, they started talking about homosexuality. The responses were not positive, Reynolds remembered.
"So the work was to help us see it differently, and I think we did," he said. "We had wonderful discussions, had wonderful opportunities for guest speaks to talk to the congregation, and I thought we were there."
In 2006, Colorado voters found themselves facing a referendum to offer domestic partner benefits to same-sex couples.
"I'm hearing reports about this, and I'm like, 'This is the face of God,'" said Reynolds. "'If we cannot as a society give people who love each other that right, we have no idea who God is.' I got so convicted by that, I became so passionate about it that I agreed to be one of the clergy who would speak out on it."
Reynolds voiced support for the referendum at a press conference. The next day, his face was on the cover of The Denver Post.
He returned home to a congregation full of questions. Was Emmanuel becoming a gay church? What direction was the church going?
During that time, Reynolds had come out to a few colleagues, including Vincent Harding, his college mentor.
"I think the message was very clear to me from him that one has to take their own story and tell it," Reynolds said. "You cannot wait for someone else to tell your story, or you cannot allow someone else to tell your story. That meant I needed to be able to say who I was before these pressures of speaking out publicly as a minister then becomes a standard."
On Sept. 29, 2006, a 45-year-old Reynolds stood up in front of his congregation, came out and resigned. It was a solemn night, he recalls. There were a lot of tears.
Reynolds took a year off and then moved to Chicago in 2008. He started a Ph.D. program at Chicago Theological Seminary, where he eventually became the director of the LGBTQ Religious Studies Center.
He and his partner, Bruce, met in 2011.
A couple months ago, a friend told him over dinner that the Holy Spirit spoke to him about Reynolds applying for a job. Reynolds did not take it seriously until the Human Rights Campaign called him from Washington D.C. shortly after.
Reynolds accepted the offer as faith director for the Illinois Unites for Marriage, the coalition pushing for the passage of same-sex marriage in Illinois. He now primarily works with African Americans of faith, seeking out support for marriage equality among those who have yet to be vocal on the issue.
The media, said Reynolds, has largely painted Black faith communities as a monolithic mass, staunchly against equal marriage due to religious conviction.
"I respect those that may have their opinions about it, but there are other voices," said Reynolds. "This is the truth that I know from my work and from my experience. I think the media has captured just a few voices."
But so far, Reynolds says, he has yet to have a conversation with anyone who is against the bill. And he has been thinking back to his own experiences coming out in the church.
Before he came out publicly, nearly everyone close to him embraced him, from his family to his colleagues in the church. But Reynolds left before his own congregation could weigh-in.
"In recent days, I have been prone to think about, 'what if I did not resign?'" Reynolds said. "What if they had said, 'Pastor, we want you to stay?' Because they could have said that, but I really didn't keep a window open for that to happen."
