1: Setting The Table | When We All Get to Heaven

The Metropolitan Community Church (MCC) in San Francisco provided a critical spiritual and communal sanctuary for queer individuals during the height of the AIDS epidemic. Between 1987 and 2003, the congregation recorded over 1,200 cassette tapes of sermons, memorials, and music, preserving the voices of a community navigating profound loss and systemic indifference. These recordings reveal how members reinterpreted Christian theology to affirm queer identities, transforming traditional rituals like communion into acts of defiance and healing. By creating a space that recognized their suffering and celebrated their lives, the church offered a radical alternative to mainstream religious institutions that often condemned them. This archival project serves as a testament to the resilience of a community that refused to abandon its faith or its queerness while facing an existential medical and political crisis.