Troy Deroy Perry Jr (born July 27, 1940) is an American cleric and the founder of the Metropolitan Community Church, with a ministry with the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities, in Los Angeles on October 6, 1968.
Early life
Troy Perry is the eldest of five brothers born to "the biggest bootleggers in Northern Florida", Troy Perry and Edith Allen Perry. As early as he can remember, Perry felt called to preach, labeling himself as a "religious fanatic". He was influenced by his aunts, who held street services in his hometown and who hosted Perry giving sermons from their home. Perry's father died fleeing the police when his son was eleven years old. After his mother remarried and moved the family to Daytona Beach, Perry was abused by his stepfather and ran away from home, not returning until after she divorced him.
Perry dropped out of high school, and became a licensed Baptist preacher by the age of 15 years. After Perry expressed his attraction towards males, his pastor suggested he marry a woman to resolve these feelings. He married this preacher's daughter, Pearl Pinion, in 1959, later remembering, "I was always interested in pastor's daughters because I thought they would make good preacher's wives. I didn't love her when I married her, but I did love her after our first year." They had two sons and relocated to Illinois where Perry attended Midwest Bible College and Moody Bible Institute where he studied for two years. Perry was the preacher at a small Church of God and sometimes had sexual relationships with other men but considered it youthful exploration. When he was 19 years old, church administrators told him one of the men had told them what they had done and he was forced to leave the church. They moved to Southern California, where he pastored a Pentecostal Church of God of Prophecy. After Perry's wife found his copy of The Homosexual in America, their marriage dissolved. They divorced after five years of marriage. Perry was directed to pray about being led astray by his homosexual feelings and later was told by his bishop to renounce himself in the pulpit and resign. Perry worked in a Sears department store and was drafted for the army in 1965, during which time he served two years in Germany.
Founding the Metropolitan Community Church
In 1968, after a suicide attempt, and witnessing a close friend being arrested at The Patch Bar, Perry felt called to return to his faith and to offer a place for gay people to worship God. Perry put an advertisement in The Advocate announcing a worship service designed for gays in Los Angeles. Twelve people turned up on October 6, 1968, for the first service, and "Nine were my friends who came to console me and to laugh, and three came as a result of the ad." After six weeks of services in his living room, the congregation shifted to a women's club, an auditorium, a church, and finally a theater. In 1971, their own building was dedicated with over a thousand members in attendance.
Several MCC buildings have been targeted for arson, including the original Church in Los Angeles. Perry's theology has been described as conservative, but social action was a high priority from the beginning of the establishment of the denomination. Perry performed what Time Magazine described as the first public same-sex unions in the United States as early as 1968 and ordained women as pastors as early as 1972.
Smithsonian Institution archives
A collection of items from Perry and the Metropolitan Community Churches is held by the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History. It was presented to the Smithsonian on the 51st anniversary of the founding of the church. It consists of personal items used by Perry in the founding of the Metropolitan Community Churches, historical Items from members and friends concerning Metropolitan Community Churches as well as Items that detail the work of the church and Perry in their struggle for equal and civil rights.