Joseph Kuilema figures that a place of privilege was a good place to fight for LGBTQ+ rights.
Kuilema lost his job teaching at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Mich., after he officiated a wedding for two women in 2021. Calvin is affiliated with the Christian Reformed Church, which opposes same-sex relationships. Kuilema says his treatment was unjust, and he’s taken the university to court.
As a straight cisgender white Christian man with a supportive partner, “I felt that I was in a position to fight back,” Kuilema tells The Advocate.
He conducted the wedding in October 2021 for a former student, Cole Sweda, and their fiancée, Annica Steen. Sweda is a transgender man, but in the legal documents for the marriage, both were listed as female. The authorities at Calvin also considered it a wedding for two women.
Kuilema, in addition to having taught at Calvin, is a member of the Christian Reformed faith, so he was well aware of the denomination’s stance on same-sex relationships and LGBTQ+ issues in general. But he was and is a supporter of LGBTQ+ equality, was part of an affirming congregation, and had often spoken out about his disagreements with the church. His job as an assistant professor in the social work and global studies programs did not entail teaching the church’s religious beliefs. Before officiating the wedding, he checked with his pastor, his church council, and his department chair and colleagues, and they unanimously agreed that he could conduct it, Kuilema says, and this is noted in his lawsuit as well. And he officiated the wedding as a private citizen, not in any official capacity as a university employee, he points out.
Keep up with the latest in LGBTQ+ news and politics. Sign up for The Advocate's email newsletter.
He was not a tenured professor, having been denied tenure in 2018 because of what the board of trustees called the “tone” of his LGBTQ+ advocacy, according to the lawsuit he's filed. The denial had come even though colleagues, deans, and committee members considering the matter had recommended tenure for him. He had gone through a series of temporary appointments, and in June 2021, he was told he again would not be considered for tenure but was reappointed for a two-year term, his suit notes.
But in December 2021, Calvin leaders became aware of the wedding and began an investigation. In the new year, the university’s Professional Status Committee informed him that his contract would be terminated as of August 2022. He appealed, but to no avail. He filed suit in Kent County Circuit Court in Michigan in April 2023, alleging discrimination in violation of Michigan law. He was terminated because of his association with people who are gay or transgender, or perceived to be, and that is illegal under the state’s Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act, his suit says.
From left: Cole Sweda and Annica SteenHannah Terwin
The Christian Reformed Church is conservative, based on the beliefs of John Calvin, the famously stern, influential 16th-century French theologian for whom the university is named. The university, known as Calvin College until 2020, is noted for its academic rigor, and it has many famous alumni, ranging from well-regarded filmmakers Paul Schrader and Patricia Rozema (she is a lesbian) to right-wing activists such as Betsy DeVos, who was secretary of education when Donald Trump was president.
But the school wasn’t always homophobic, at least in Kuilema’s experience. He attended Calvin from 2000 to 2004, and one of his dormitory mates was an out gay man who was largely accepted.
“The college I went to was willing to push back against the denomination,” Kuilema recalls.
He joined Calvin as a professor of social work in 2008, and during that time he often spoke of his differences with the Reformed Church’s position on LGBTQ+ issues, mostly without negative consequences until the past few years. The school took a rightward turn during the 2016 election cycle, he says. After that came the objections to his outspokenness, the denial of tenure, and his dismissal.
Several former Calvin students recall experiencing homophobia at the school and in the Christian Reformed Church, even before that rightward turn that Kuilema cites. Ricardo Tavárez, a friend of Kuilema’s, was a student at Calvin Theological Seminary, a sibling institution to the university, from 2011 to 2016, earning a master’s degree. He’s a gay man in a same-sex marriage, and, he says, he wasn’t accepted into the seminary’s doctoral program because of that — even though there’s no formal policy excluding people who are in same-sex relationships. A letter he received from the seminary said it had to “pause” his application while dealing with the issue.
Tavárez has had other differences with the church. Despite not being accepted into the doctoral program, he was still an ordained Christian Reformed minister. He started a congregation in Grand Rapids, and it was initially Christian Reformed. He came out to some people in the denomination, and it wasn’t well received, he says. So he left the Christian Reformed Church and took his congregation with him. It was nondenominational for a while, then joined the United Church of Christ, a very LGBTQ- friendly denomination. He’s in the process of changing his ordination to the UCC.
As to whether it’s worth fighting for change from within, he says, “There are some institutions that will come around — I do not believe that the CRC is one of them.”
“You can say that you are welcoming or that you want to hear other people’s opinions, but then they’ll turn around and do things like they did to Kuilema,” he says.
“I think he was just being a friend to that happy couple and trying to be supportive, and it just blew up in his face,” Tavárez adds.
Tavárez also had a confrontation with a denomination that holds similar beliefs, the Reformed Church in America (the Christian Reformed Church split from the Reformed Church in America in the 19th century). In 2019, he was hired as executive director of New City Neighbors, a nonprofit that runs an “urban farm” in Grand Rapids that provides experience for teens, supplies produce to food pantries and other clients, and runs a pop-up cafe. It was affiliated with an RCA congregation and leased space from the church. But because of objections to a gay executive director, the church told New City Neighbors in 2020 that the farm would have to find a new home — which, Tavárez is happy to report, it did. “We’ve come out on top,” he says.
D. Hollowell, who is agender and Black, attended what was then Calvin College in the 2013-2014 academic year after a gap year. They grew up in Grand Rapids in a family that attended a Baptist church; they weren’t familiar with the Christian Reformed faith but had a friend from that faith who was liberal and accepting of LGBTQ+ people. So they gave Calvin a try.
“I realized during orientation how far removed I was from any semblance of comfort and safety,” Hollowell recalls. There were very few Black or Latino students, also few LGBTQ+ ones — who weren’t encouraged to be out. There was a great emphasis on regular church attendance, “courtship,” avoiding the temptations of “carnal desires,” and getting into a heterosexual marriage. Bible study was required. People could be put on academic probation if suspected to be LGBTQ+ and possibly expelled, Hollowell says. One of their friends was stripped of the title of manager of one of the on-campus places of employment after coming out, Hollowell notes, and that was just “the tip of the iceberg.” Some administrators were held up as sources of support for LGBTQ+ students but were not really supportive, they say.
Kuilema, they say, was one of the few truly safe people. As he taught upper-level classes, Hollowell, as a freshman, didn’t have him as a teacher but got to know him and was impressed. “Joe and the other social work professors were such massive points of support,” Hollowell says.
There’s no question about Kuilema's commitment to his faith -- he was devoted to Calvin, and he was supporting marriage, Hollowell points out.
“He has been so much of a light-bearer for folks,” they say. What happened to him was “reprehensible,” Hollowell adds. “I wouldn’t wish that on anybody … such a brutal and underhanded attack.”
“Even if he didn’t put himself up as a martyr, [Calvin] made him an example,” Hollowell says.
Hollowell left Calvin after that one tumultuous year, transferring to another college. They had made friends among some queer and trans students of color, but most of them left too. “I really wanted it to work at Calvin … [but] I had no choice but to choose myself,” they say.
Black queer woman Danah Montgomery, a 2018 graduate of Calvin, did have Kuilema as a professor and calls his firing “a real loss for the institution.” She’s “disappointed but not surprised” at what happened to him, she says. Montgomery, who wasn’t out as a Calvin student, found her years at the school “a traumatic experience,” marked by a “love the sinner, hate the sin” philosophy that wasn’t really loving. The message was “you can’t be a ‘practicing homosexual,’” she says.
While she’s proud of her educational record and glad to have had certain professors, including Kuilema, she wouldn’t recommend Calvin, she says. She also doesn’t see it changing. “I don’t really believe in the power to change that from within anymore,” she notes.
Last July, the Kent County court denied Calvin’s motion to dismiss Kuilema’s suit. The university is now seeking permission to appeal that decision.
Asked for comment, university spokesman Matt Kucinski emailed this statement to The Advocate: “The Calvin University community has been well served throughout its 150-year history by having diverse viewpoints among its faculty. The university’s denomination, the Christian Reformed Church (CRC), has recognized and supported this diversity of viewpoints, endorsing the university’s approach to confessional commitment and academic freedom. While there is room for personal disagreement with CRC doctrine, the university has clear expectations for employees regarding teaching, scholarship, and personal conduct, and follows established processes to review alleged violations of those expectations and to determine appropriate responses. We are confident those processes were followed in this case and plan to defend this lawsuit in court. At this time, the university has no further comment on active litigation.”
Kuilema has landed on his feet. He is now an assistant professor, a tenure-track position, at Grand Valley State University, a public university in Allendale, Mich., just outside Grand Rapids. And he is as committed as ever to fighting for LGBTQ+ equality.
“The semester after I was terminated at Calvin, a trans student at Redeemer, a Canadian school affiliated with the same denomination, committed suicide,” he says. “That’s what’s at stake here. This is about people’s lives and about basic human rights. I’m more convinced than ever that we cannot allow schools like Calvin to take public money [in the form of student aid and other funds] and use it to discriminate against queer people and their allies. As a religious person, I am disgusted that they do so in the name of God.”
