Young, gay and thrown away

And while Lopez won't say how she feels about her son's sexual identity, Sam's stepfather explains to anyone who asks that if they were to "look into the scriptures," they would know that homosexuality is "completely wrong," and would understand why both he and his wife are "totally against homosexuals."

About his stepson, he will only say, "He knows the difference between right and wrong. And being homosexual--he knows that is completely wrong."

In Hope House's three-bedroom quarters, just 30 minutes away from his parents' home, Sam is laughing riotously.

He's perched his long, skinny frame in front of the living-room TV, and he's watching Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. He loves this movie. He's just reached his favorite part of the film, in which the three main characters, their bus vandalized with homophobic slurs, find a bucket of purple paint and transform their vehicle into a symbol of gay pride. For the rest of film, three gay men travel across the desert in a purple bus. Sam loves it.

In the comfort and safety of this new home, Sam says he can be who he is.
He believes there's hope for him; he's at Hope House.

The Reverend Paul Tucker's eyes light up with pride as he talks about the genesis of Hope House. It wasn't long ago that homeless gay teens would visit Tucker, who's a minister at the 1,500-member Cathedral of Hope church, and tell him their stories--like the 17-year-old boy who ended up in Parkland Memorial Hospital's psychiatric ward after a drug overdose. The boy's parents had kicked him out of the house at 14 after discovering he was gay.

"He started selling his body and drugs as a means of survival, but became hooked on cocaine and overdosed," Tucker says. "They were going to release him to an adult shelter, but he was scared to death. A young, effeminate gay man in an adult shelter would have been an ultra-violent situation.

"I've had so many young people come into my office and tell me about things from verbal abuse to being hit on to actually being raped in shelters. Most of them gladly choose the street rather than be in that situation, because at least they feel they have other options on the street."

Sometimes the youths stayed with Tucker for up to six months. But after giving shelter to his third youth, he began to realize that, because he is an openly gay man, people could misinterpret his acts of kindness. It was then that he came up with the idea for Hope House.

"I looked around and saw that no one else was doing this," he says. "They were scared to death of the gay issue and the youth issue. That lie that gay people can't be trusted around young people has kept our community immobilized for years."

Tucker knew that critics would see a program such as Hope House as a disguised attempt to "recruit" impressionable, unbalanced youths into the homosexual lifestyle at an age when they were still exploring and establishing a sexual identity for themselves. And since Tucker wanted to match the youths with gay and lesbian adult "mentors" to serve as role models, the recruitment issue would be unavoidable.

But Tucker decided to brave the criticism. He brought his idea for Hope House to Cathedral of Hope's advisory board, which decided to incorporate outreach for gay youths as part of the church's mission. The church agreed to pay for most of Hope House's basic operating costs. Several congregation members with experience in youth and shelter programs also pledged to help.

The church began training mentors for the program in April 1994. Meanwhile, Tucker was "talking up" the program in the gay community. "I figured there was nothing like this around, so people would really be excited, and by far, people were," he says. Doctors, dentists, and psychotherapists called the church to volunteer their services, and others donated furniture, clothing, and other items.

The next--and most crucial--step was to find a house. It took six months, but the Hope House team found a suitable vacant home on an Oak Cliff residential street.

"We wanted to just blend in and be a part of the neighborhood," Tucker says.
Funded primarily by the gay community, the fledgling program operates today on a budget of about $100,000. Hope House has also received small grants from businesses and organizations such as Marshall Field's and the Communities Foundation.

Tucker sees the program as an important step in removing homeless gay youths from the streets and providing specially tailored counseling for those with emotional or drug-abuse problems. Hope House plans to replicate itself in other cities. But its organizers admit that before any expansion plans can be carried out, the program must prove its effectiveness--and staying power--in Dallas.

And that still remains a challenge. In the course of reporting this story--which took about two months last summer--all three of Hope House's young adult residents left the program abruptly.

While Hope House has limited residential space, it also offers community outreach programs, including counseling for underage teens who are in the process of "coming out." These youths attend weekly support group meetings and are also matched with a gay mentor or couple as role models. Hope House's case manager contacts the youths every month, and they're offered psychological services to deal with issues of isolation and rejection.