Those Who Serve

Bishop John made his solemn vows on August 1, 1992, and was ordained to the priesthood on September 16, 1995.

Bishop John served in Texas as a pastor, Moderator of the Curia, and as Chancellor for the Diocese of El Paso. In 2010, he was elected Vicar Provincial of the Province of Our Lady of Consolation and became Pastor and Rector of the Basilica and National Shrine of Our Lady of Consolation in Carey, OH.

On March 12, 2015, Pope Francis named him the third Bishop of Lexington. He was ordained as the third Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Lexington on May 5, 2015.

Melinda Moore is a Licensed Psychologist and Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Eastern Kentucky University.

She holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from The Catholic University of America, where she trained in the Collaborative Assessment and Management of Suicidality (CAMS) and conducted research on CAMS. She regularly trains clinicians in CAMS, as well as advocates on behalf of suicide prevention in her role as chair of the Kentucky Suicide Prevention Group, Inc., a statewide suicide prevention nonprofit.

She has conducted military suicide bereavement research at the University of Kentucky and suicide treatment research at the Robley Rex Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Louisville. Her interest in Posttraumatic Growth emerged from her own experience with suicide and the changes that experience created within her allowing for her current career path and personal interests and relationships.

Jan lives in Cold Spring, KY, with her husband, Joe. They have been married for 50 years and have three grown children and 7 grandchildren.

Jan attended Catholic schools through high school and has advanced degrees in Elementary Education and Music. She was a member of the faculty of St. Joseph School and directed the children’s choir for 30 years. She retired in 2016. She became involved in the LGBTQ+ ministry almost immediately after her youngest daughter came out to her at the age of 30 in 2012.

Christine Zuba lives in Blackwood, New Jersey, near Philadelphia.  She received her BS in Electrical Engineering from Penn State University, and an MBA from Rutgers University.  Christine is employed as a television and radio broadcast equipment sales manager to both regional and national networks. Christine is a member of the Society of Broadcast Engineers (SBE) and the Association of Federal Communications Consulting Engineers (AFCCE).

A lifelong Catholic born and raised in northeastern Pennsylvania, Christine has lived in southern New Jersey for over 30 years.   Christine has two grown children, a daughter and son.. 

Christine has been a longtime parishioner of Saints Peter and Paul Church in Turnersville.  As a Transgender Catholic she serves as a facilitator of her parish LGBTQ ministry, Together in Prayer.  Christine is also a Eucharistic Minister, and a member of the hospitality committee.  Christine also participates in other ministries such as Out Catholics of Philadelphia, One In the Spirit (Marlton, NJ), and in the NJ-PA Consortium of Welcoming Parishes, a group of similar ministries across New Jersey and Pennsylvania. 

Andy Buechel-Rieger holds a PhD in Theological Studies from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He has also attended the Universities of Dayton and Notre Dame. He is currently Assistant Professor of Religious Studies in the Liberal Arts department of Mount St. Joseph University in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Fortunate Families Education Ministry Mission Statement

The Fortunate Families Education Ministry serves Catholic LGBTQ+ persons, their parents, families, teachers, and friends who are seeking a better understanding of issues related to the intersection of religious faith with sexuality and gender and/or to become a better ally for the LGBTQ+ people in their lives. We do this through:

• - Listening attentively to understand questions and concerns, acknowledging and respecting differences and lived experience
• - Sharing our stories
• - Guiding seekers to credible sources of information from the biological, medical and psycho-social sciences
• - Lifting up the voices of those within the Catholic Church who are working to build bridges with the LGBTQ+ community
• - Collaborating with the other Fortunate Families Ministries

Jason Steidl Jack is a gay Catholic theologian and Assistant Teaching Professor of Religious Studies at St. Joseph's University in New York. He is an active member of Out @ St. Paul, the LGBTQ ministry of St. Paul the Apostle Church in Manhattan, and is a leader in LGBTQ Catholic advocacy. In January 2023, Paulist Press published his first book, LGBTQ Catholic Ministry: Past and Present.  Jason resides in Brooklyn with his husband, Damian.

Br. Christian Matson is a diocesan hermit of the Catholic Diocese of Lexington.

He holds a PhD in Theology, Imagination, and the Arts from the University of St Andrews, an MA in Theology from Oxford University, and a BFA in Drama and Psychology from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. He works in new play development as a producer, playwright, actor, and dramaturg through his production company Earendel Theatricals.

After medically transitioning to male almost 20 years ago, he has privately consulted for multiple healthcare and educational institutions on best practices to support transgender community members, especially in religious contexts. He has also served as founding executive director of the Catholic Artist Connection, guest speaker on performance ethics at Juilliard, and Vice-President of the Oxford C.S. Lewis Society.

Jan lives in Cold Spring, KY, with her husband, Joe. They have been married for 50 years and have three grown children and 7 grandchildren.

Jan attended Catholic schools through high school and has advanced degrees in Elementary Education and Music. She was a member of the faculty of St. Joseph School and directed the children’s choir for 30 years. She retired in 2016. She became involved in the LGBTQ+ ministry almost immediately after her youngest daughter came out to her at the age of 30 in 2012.

Fortunate Families Transgender Ministry Mission Statement

The Transgender Ministry of Fortunate Families affirms, accompanies, and supports transgender and non-binary persons of all ages by facilitating respectful conversation between parents, families, pastors, religious and Church leadership.

Church teaching continually develops in response to doctrinal developments, pastoral needs, and the encounter with new scientific and philosophical insights. Pope John Paul II's Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, acknowledges that, “profound understanding of man does not come from theology alone, without the contributions of many branches of knowledge to which theology itself refers”.  Pope Francis’ Fratelli Tutti, instructs us, “to be committed to living and teaching the value of respect for others, a love capable of welcoming differences, and the priority of the dignity of every human being”.

The Transgender Ministry encourages Church leadership and all people of God to listen to and to understand the personal stories of transgender and non-binary persons, educates and advocates for the health, safety, dignity, and spiritual well-being, for them and their families.

Shawn resides in Nicholasville, KY, and is a student at the University of Kentucky's College of Social Work. He is a member of the Catholic Diocese of Lexington LGBTQ Outreach Commission, the Honor Society of Phi Theta Kappa, The Society for Collegiate Leadership and Achievement, and is the student member of the Bluegrass Community and Technical College Human Services Advisory Board.

John graduated from Transylvania University.
Following graduation, John became a Certified Public Accountant and began conducting audits of local governments and non-profits. He is based in Berea, Kentucky.

Brad is a native of Athens, Texas and lives in Lexington, Kentucky. Brad earned his Bachelor of Business Administration from The University of Texas at Austin. He is the Finance Director at the Child Development Center of the Bluegrass located on the campus of the University of Kentucky.

Sr. Luisa Derouen is a Dominican Sister of Peace and has been ministering among transgender people and their families nationally for 22 years. She has a BA in Religious Studies from Loyola University in New Orleans, LA, and an MA in Liturgical Theology from the University of Notre Dame, IN.

She completed her internship in spiritual direction from the Ignatius Jesuit Center in Guelph, Ontario, Canada.

She has been a speaker and writer on transgender spiritual issues, as well as facilitating many transgender panels. It has been the greatest privilege of her life to know hundreds of transgender people and give witness to the sacredness of their lives.

She has gifted her legacy and ministry to Fortunate Families and our Transgender Ministry upon her retirement January 1, 2022.

Fr. Martin is an American Jesuit priest, writer, and editor-at-large of the Jesuit magazine America. In 2017, Pope Francis appointed Father Martin as a consultant to the Vatican's Secretariat for Communications. He is a New York Times Best Selling author and frequent commentator on the life and teachings of Jesus, and on Ignatian—inspired by the life and teachings of Saint Ignatius of Loyola—spirituality. Father Martin's outreach to the LGBT community has drawn a strong backlash from conservative Catholics. He is the author of Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community Can Enter into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity.

Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, a retired auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Detroit, died April 4, 2024. He was 94. He served as an adviser to the executive director of Fortunate Families from 2017 until 2022.

Bishop Gumbleton was born Jan. 26, 1930, and grew up in Epiphany Parish on Detroit’s west side. On June 2, 1956, he was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Detroit, and on March 8, 1968, Pope Paul VI appointed him the 10th auxiliary bishop of Detroit. He was consecrated on May 1, at that time the youngest bishop in the country.

A champion of social justice causes, Bishop Gumbleton was one of the most prominent Catholic leaders to speak out against the Vietnam War and became the founding president of Pax Christi USA, an American Catholic peace movement that calls for non-violence and the abolishment of nuclear weapons. He traveled the world, speaking out against wars and meeting victims of violence in Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Israel, Palestine, Colombia, Haiti and Peru. For his lifelong effort to promote peace and harmony, Bishop Gumbleton received the 2007 Detroit Spirit of Martin Luther King Jr. Award, in addition to several other honors from universities and nonprofits.
Inspired by the civil rights and anti-war movements of the 1960s and the 1971 encyclical Justice in the World, Bishop Gumbleton spent his life promoting peace, nonviolence, human rights, and equity. He traveled around the world to engage with and learn from people in impoverished and war-torn regions, and he was devoted to his neighbors and parishioners in Detroit. He was beloved for his gentleness and humility, and respected for his deep integrity and commitment.

“Bishop Gumbleton took the gospel to heart and lived it day in and day out. He preferred to speak the truth and to be on the side of the marginalized than to tow any party line and climb the ecclesiastical ladder. When it came to speaking the prophetic word he was unafraid and lived with the consequences. I pray for more shepherds like Tom Gumbleton who lived the spirituality of nonviolence in all contexts. It is kind of fitting that he shares the anniversary of death of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.” said Bishop John Stowe, OFM Conv.

Casey Lopata, with spouse Mary Ellen Lopata, was one of Fortunate Family’s co-founders. From 1992 until his death in 2021, he worked in ministry with gay and lesbian Catholics and their families. The Lopatas were founding members of the Catholic Gay and Lesbian Family Ministry (CGLFM) and the Catholic Association of Lesbian and Gay Ministries (CALGM) and charter members of the Catholic Parents Network.

In 2003, the book Fortunate Families, written by Mary Ellen Lopata with Casey Lopata, was published. The book shares the stories of, and offers guidance to, Catholic parents of gay and lesbian children, and outlines what these families want and need from their Church. The following year, they founded the organization Fortunate Families to focus on ministry with parents on a national level, retiring from the board in 2014 after guiding and growing the organization through its first decade. They continued to serve on the organization’s Advisory Council in the following years.

Casey had a master of divinity degree from St. Bernard’s Institute in Rochester, N.Y. His full obituary can be found at https://www.anthonychapels.com/obituaries/Casimer-Casey-Lopata?obId=20986594.