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What? Build the World’s largest Gay and Lesbian Church in Dallas, Texas?

That’s Right, Mr. Johnson.
By Kimberly Goad |

THE INVITATION DIDN’T SAY, “BRING YOUR checkbook.” Not outright, anyway. Rick Brettell asked the dozen or so “important tastemakers of Dallas” to a seated dinner sponsored by the Dallas Architecture Forum. It would be an intimate gathering. And Philip Johnson (yes, that Philip Johnson) would be there to talk about his latest project.

The guest list was A-plus: Pai Patterson and Al Casey. Linda and Stanley Marcus. Lupe Murchison. Mary McDermott Cook. Ann and Gabriel Barbier-Mueller. The setting-Howard Rachofsky’s Richard Meier-designed home-was, too.

What became clear only after everyone arrived that night in January 1998 was that there would be more to the evening than architecture-talk and elbow-rubbing with an erudite architect. Philip Johnson’s latest project-The Cathedra! of Hope-was in trouble. Groundbreaking had been pushed back arid the project was destined to stall indefinitely unless the Dallas branch of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, which commissioned the design in 1995, came up with the remaining 14 of the estimated $20 million needed to build it.

Which explains why then-91-year-old Philip Johnson, still fragile from open-heart surgery many thought he couldn’t survive, traveled to Dallas that January night. The architect rarely engages himself in the sticky wicket of fundraising; if he does it for one client, he’d have to for the next (and the next). But his latest design is different: What even Johnson is calling his final masterpiece will house the largest gay and lesbian congregation in the world. Here, in Dallas. Over on Cedar Springs. Behind Ruth’s Chris Steak House.

Guests circling the architectural model- on display in Rachofsky’s upstairs living room-traded glances: Did Johnson really say the largest? In Dallas?

Since 1987, the year Michael Piazza-an ambitious and charismatic then-33-year-old ex-Methodist minister-took over the put-pit of Dallas’ Metropolitan Community Church, membership has exploded. The congregation that had been meeting every Sunday in a building on Maple Avenue (painted an unfortunate shade of pink) had tripled by the time it moved into its Cedar Springs sanctuary in late 1992. They were barely settled into the $3.5 million space when it became painfully apparent that they had (already) outgrown it. Rather than renovate to accommodate their growing needs, Piazza began thinking bigger. He started talking about building a “psychological cathedral for gays and lesbians around the world.” A nondescript sanctuary couldn’t capture worldwide attention. He needed architecture. He needed important. He contacted Philip Johnson.

Now, four years later, the congregation is looking for a way to pay for its Johnson-designed Cathedral of Hope.

With Dallas’ gay community virtually tapped out, MCC-which has pledged $6.3 million-is turning to straight Dallas for the bulk of the balance.

The $14 million question is this: Will a fundamentalist church-loving city contribute to a sanctuary housing the largest gay and lesbian congregation in the world?

What about a sanctuary designed by a celebrity architect who conceived Crystal Cathedral, AT&T Corporate Headquarters, the Seagram Building, and MoMA Sculpture Gardens, not to mention Dallas’ Crescent Court, ThanksGiving Square, and JFK Memorial?

Conventional wisdom suggested Dallas would happily embrace a celebrity architect, but would sooner pray to Mecca three times a day than ante up money to build a church of a denomination-not-their-own (especially that denomination-not-their-own). The only hope for The Cathedral of Hope: talk up the architecture part; play down the gay and lesbian part.

“When you’re asking for big gifts it takes a while unless you have well-established relationships,” says Brettell, who knows all about big gifts and well-established relationships from his years as director of the Dallas Museum of Art (from 1988 to 1992). “MCC doesn’t have a well-established relationship with the major givers.”

“You don’t go to a wealthy person and say, ’We have a multimillion-dollar project. Would you like to give?’” adds Doug Lawson, the fundraiser hired to navigate the capital campaign. “It takes time. We’re talking to people who have never been to the church and aren’t even aware that the project is underway.” Before the Rachofsky party, Lawson advised Brettell and the senior staff at MCC against doing what’s known in philanthropic circles as “The Ask.” Not that night. Not yet.

Guests were greeted at the door and then promptly escorted to Rachofsky\s second-floor living room to view the architectural model. Afterward, they made their way back downstairs to the dining room.

Brettell spoke on the importance of the Johnson design to Dallas; then Johnson stood up and told of how he initially turned down Piazza when the senior pastor approached him in 1995, but eventually reconsidered after Piazza explained that The Cathedral of Hope was more than just another big Dallas church.

Brettell, everyone knew; Johnson, everyone wanted to know; Piazza (“that nice preacher,” as one guest, forgetting his name, referred to him), no one knew.

He had only recently begun traveling in Johnson’s circles and wasn’t entirely comfortable chatting up the well-to-do in the name of The Cathedral of Hope. A politically savvy man, Piazza attended the Rachofsky dinner without Bill Eure, his companion of 19 years. (Ironically, Eure, considered “the preacher’s wife” at MCC, is far more comfortable in these kinds of social settings.) That night, Piazza was presented not as the gay leader of the largest gay and lesbian congregation in the world, but simply as a Dallas pastor who was passionate about finding a way to accommodate his growing flock.

As Piazza stood to address the group- Johnson sat on one side and Stanley Marcus, on the other-Brettell, seated at the head of the table, was ’’frankly a little nervous,” He had never heard Piazza speak before and wanted him to talk not about the mission of the church, but about the importance of the architecture. “To raise this to an urban level, you have to talk about the architecture.” Brettell believes. “Michael’s talk ended up being about the building, a terrific and moving talk that had nothing to do with the church itself.”

Nothing, indeed. If only Piazza could’ve passed the plate that night.

Nor did they



OF ANYONE HAS A WAY OF MAKING A believer believe, it’s Piazza. When he returned to Dallas after persuading Johnson to design his church, he delivered the news to his board of directors using his best Sunday-morning cadence. No one asked how the church would pay for the $20 million design. Half the board didn’t even know who Philip Johnson was. Those familiar with the architect and his work didn’t realize that he, too, is gay. Nor did they realize he is an avowed agnostic.

A year later, the architectural model for the new design was unveiled and. within weeks, fundraising commenced during the Sunday service tagged “Miracle Sunday.” “What we decide to do with Jesus in ourheart today will determine who this church becomes and what this church leaves as a legacy,” Piazza said from behind the altar.

At the end of the morning’s sermon, the plate wasn’t passed. Instead, members lined up to make their offering at the front of the sanctuary where a red wheelbarrow sat parked in front of the altar. Between mailed-in contributions and donations from the congregation. MCC collected $150,000 that Sunday-not exactly a miracle.

Indeed, even on “Miracle Sunday” (here were church members who questioned whether plans for the new design reflected Piazza’s ambitions for the church or Piazza’s ambitions for himself. In a congregation that lad lost 1,300 to AIDS, why weren’t they spending the $20 million on outreach and other church programs? Moreover, if MCC realize Johnson is an avowed agnostic.couldn’t find a church capital company willing to work with them to build their current sanctuary-which wasn’t even paid for yet-how were they going to pay for the Philip Johnson design?



THE EXPRESSION ON MICHAEL PIAZZA’S face says “Buyer’s Remorse.”

It is February 1996. Inside the church conference room at MCC, Piazza and the rest of The Cathedral of Hope building committee crowd around a long table. At the head of the table, Philip Johnson, dressed in his Sunday best, stands beside a black wastepaper basket that has been emptied and placed upside down on top of the table. Sitting atop the makeshift stand is the architectural model of Johnson’s vision for The Cathedral of Hope.

The room stares in stunned silence. Is it just Piazza, or is this design-Johnson’s second try-uglier than the first? Piazza flew to New York to see that one, a “short and squatty” model everyone, even Johnson himself, now refers to as “the frog.”

Johnson is so confident of No. 2 that he’s flown to Dallas to make the presentation himself. He speaks in the hoarse, barely audible whisper that has become his everyday speaking voice. The expression on his face indicates he is clearly pleased with No. 2, a design dominated by columns that hang from the ceiling. Each of them, Johnson explains, will be constructed of brass to reflect the light; the effect will be an explosion of color.

Piazza says nothing, although he is thinking to himself: “Ninety percent of the world sees buildings from the outside-not from the inside-and this looks like a college library.” The church, to be built beneath Love Field’s flight pattern, can’t exceed 70 feet. Which explains why No. 2 looks as flat as No. I, “the frog.”

Johnson discusses every aspect of the design, even plans for the ancillary parts- the hallways, the bookstore, office space, storage, even parking-until finally there is nothing left to explain. “If we like the approach,” the architect says, “then I can start to work on it-which I can’t wait to do-in detail.”

“Mmm hmmm,” Piazza says distractedly, his eyes fixed on the square rendering balanced atop the upside-down trash can. Conscious of the fact that one of the building committee members is videotaping the morning’s unveiling (this was, after all, supposed to be a moment for the church archives), Piazza waits until the camera is off and Johnson is gone to express his sentiments. To his relief, the rest of the committee agrees with him.

The following week. Piazza summons the courage to call Johnson. “I’m not sure this accomplishes our goal,” he tells him.

This time, Johnson is the one responding with stunned silence.

Piazza tries another tack: ’Tin not sure this is going to capture the imagination of America.”



No. 3 was worse. “The ugliest of them all.” Piazza says, referring to Johnson’s hourglass-shaped third aNttempt. “It died an instant death.”

Johnson promptly went to work on No. 4. but only after Piazza got permission from the Federal Aviation Administration to exceed the 70-foot limit. Now, Johnson was free to design up to 120 feet high,

Still, Piazza was growing anxious. Johnson’s health wasn’t good. Seven months had passed since the pastor had announced plans for the design at a special 25th anniversary service held at the Meyerson Symphony Center to accommodate the 2,300 in attendance. Momentum was dying. Without telling anyone, Piazza wrote a letter to I.M, Pei.

If anyone is as closely linked to Dallas architecture as Philip Johnson, it’s I.M. Pei, the architect behind the Meyerson and Dallas City Hall. If Johnson couldn’t come up with an appropriate design (or if his health kept him from completing the project), Pei would be an ideal substitute. In the letter. Piazza didn’t mention the fact that the congregation was already working with Johnson; he simply explained what MCC was and what he was hoping to accomplish with the new design.

Piazza never heard back from Pei; as it turns out. he didn’t need to. The FAA’s lift on height restrictions freed Johnson; No. 4-inspired by a design called “A Berlin Fantasy,” originally done for the Lauder family of New York-would be The Cathedral of Hope.

The week after Johnson unveiled the model at a July ’96 press conference in New York (timed to coincide with the architect’s 90th birthday), he checked into the hospital for open-heart surgery. Weeks of post-op convalescence turned into months; by January 1997, Piazza was told the architect wouldn’t live out the month.

He and Doug Lawson paid the ailing Johnson a visit ai his home in New Canaan, Conn. Piazza was making a pastoral call. Lawson, who had steered the fundraising effort for Johnson’s Crystal Cathedral 20 years before, wanted to see his old friend one last time. They also had a couple of unresolved issues to discuss, not the least of which was Johnson’s list of potential patrons. Piazza had sold the less enthusiastic members of his congregation on the new cathedral by pointing out that a celebrity architect comes with built-in patronage.

When he and Lawson pulled up to Johnson’s Glass House in New Canaan, the architect was sitting by the window in a wheelchair, semi-lucid, his hair badly in need of a cut. Not long into the visit, Piazza became convinced that Johnson “wasn’t in pain; he was just out of it.”

“I’ve been with too many dying people,” Piazza says. “This man was not dying. What he needed was some stimulation. He’d been too isolated.”

What was supposed to be an hour-long visit turned into a three-hour stay as conversation turned toward the cathedral’s one unresolved design issue: Where would the bathrooms go? The architect wanted them in the basement. The pastor shuddered at the thought of some 2,000 people making their way downstairs between Sunday morning services. Arelatively spirited debate ensued, but when Lawson and Piazza left New Canaan that day, the bathrooms were still unresolved. “Within a week, Philip picked up the phone, called his office, and said, ’I’ve been thinking about the bathrooms’ and had this articulate conversation about it,” Piazza says, lapsing into his Sunday morning cadence, not inappropriate for the ending to a story he considers something of a miracle,

More importantly, he and Lawson returned to Dallas with the names and phone numbers of Johnson’s inner circle.



THE FORMULA SOUNDS DECEPTIVELY simple.”It takes as many calls on a donor as there are zeroes in the gift,” explains Doug Lawson. “If you push people too fast, you’ll lose it, It’s like dating: You don’t ask someone to marry you on the first date. On the first, second, and third visit, you’re just talking.”

Lawson-the nationally known fundrais-ing consultant behind Habitat for Humanity, Special Olympics, and the Smithsonian Institution, as well as The Crystal Cathedral-hadn’t even heard about The Cathedral of Hope when he was contacted in late 1996 to help spearhead the congregation’s fundraising campaign. Randy Sprabary, Cathedral of Hope’s director of development, had read Lawson’s book, Give to Live, and discovered that the author had worked with Robert Schuller. At that point, Johnson was recovering from heart surgery and the board didn’t know how to proceed with a national campaign.

Lawson mapped out a strategy to secure the important six- and seven-figure gifts the cathedral needs in order to finish the project by its latest target date (summer 2002). Key to his plan: Raise national awareness of the congregation through an infomercial (originally called “Holy Homosexuals,” but wisely changed to “A Cathedral of Hope: The Truth About Being Gay or Lesbian and Christian” by air-time); de-gay the congregation by forming alliances with mainstream Dallas churches and by denouncing the church’s affiliation with MCC; and, most importantly, once Johnson was on the mend, better utilize the celebrity architect.

Beginning with the dinner party at Howard Rachofsky’.s in January 1998, Johnson and Piazza were like traveling salesmen, crisscrossing the country to attend what they had dubbed “cathedral builder” parties. In New York, artist Edwina Sandys, Winston Churchill’s granddaughter, opened her downtown loft for a reception honoring her friend Philip Johnson (and his Dallas friends); in Washington, D.C., a well-connected (but closeted) patron opened his home on behalf of the cause.

“We try to be polite, gentle, loving, kind.” says Lawson, who attends the gatherings, as well, and is responsible for setting the agenda. “My recommendation is, always, at a big party, you tell people what’s going on, but you don’t do ’The Ask’ that night.”

The Ask: fundraiser-speak for the formal request for money. Not everyone associated with Cathedral of Hope is allowed to do The Ask. Piazza, for instance. He could pick up the phone and get $1,000, but Doug Lawson could do an actual Ask and secure $1 million (after the sixth visit, of course).

As for the architect, he is growing anxious. Piazza may be able to convince a congregation of believers that “God will provide,” but that doesn’t go very far toward reassuring a 93-year-old agnostic. Assuming the target date for completion isn’t pushed back-again-Johnson will be 96 by the time his final masterpiece is finished.

To restore momentum and to give the congregation the psychological boost it needs to believe the project isn’t fated to stall indefinitely, ground was broken last May for the bell-tower wall. And yet, as of September, construction had been delayed, pending the arrival of building permits.

Which means the target date for completion of the John Thomas Bell Wall, named for the late gay rights activist and Cathedral of Hope church member, has been pushed back from December 1 (World AIDS Day) to spring 2000. And that’s assuming there are no more delays.

“Philip doesn’t care about the bell wall,” says Piazza. “He’s anxious for construction on the actual cathedral to begin. But it all depends on fundraising. I thought the philanthropists who have funded major art projects in Dallas would be very reluctant to contribute to the largest gay and lesbian church. Dallas is a conservative city, and a lot of the folks who give generously are religiously conservative.

“Dallas is also very conscious of status and image, things like that,” Piazza adds. “I was afraid that might get in the way of people giving.” He pauses. “We haven’t proven that it won’t.”

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