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This Sunday morning I broke the rules of proper decadence and arose well before noon to attend the Sunday service at St. Bartholomew’s Church (Episcopal, New York) in order hear the orchestral and choir presentation of Elegy to Matthew –in memory of Matthew Shepard who was a young gay man hatefully murdered in 1998.

I will briefly review the history of the Matthew Shepard story for those outside the US who might be unfamiliar with it. It is a horrible story of hate. Matt Shepard was born in Wyoming but had most of his education in Europe. He was intelligent, cultured, multi-lingual, proudly and openly gay, and his academic achievements made it possible for him to choose amongst the best universities to continue his studies. But, perhaps for some romantic ideal, he chose to go home to the Wild West to go to college. Most important of course, he was simply a human being. On a chill evening in 1998, when Matthew was 20 years old, standing a mere 5 feet 4 inches (160 cm), blond hair flopping over his forehead, he was in a saloon in Laramie, near where he lived. It was a mixed locale of gay and straight clientele of the sort one might find near any college campus. There he met two rough men in their early twenties, uneducated, loutish drifters. They pretended to be gay and, perhaps out of some innocent boyish fantasy of cowboy love, Matt went with them. It may be that they resented him for his intelligence and education as much as they hated him for being gay. They drove to an isolated place, out on the lonely beautiful prairie; as the sun set, they beat him and pistol whipped him and hung and bound him on a roadside fence, and left him there to die. Eighteen hours later, someone drove past this remote place and found him in a coma from his wounds and nearly frozen to death. He was covered in his own blood except where his final tears had run. He died four days later. His murderers are serving the rest of their lives in prison.

People, more kind-hearted than I, like to point out that THREE young lives have been wasted. Yet, I find it painfully difficult to equate the lives of the murderers with Matt’s stolen life. But, that was precisely the point of presenting the choral elegy to Matthew as a part of a church service. The Elegy was first commissioned and sung in Carnegie Hall by the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus in 1999. The original composer of the work, David Conte, also created the orchestration and mixed choir version for this morning performance. In a sermon preceding the Elegy, the Rector, William McD. Tully, recounted the words that Matthew Shepard’s father spoke during the pre-sentencing part of the trial of the murderers. In the State of Wyoming those affected by a murder are permitted to speak their opinion and feelings about what should happen to the killers. Although Matt’s father was, in fact, in favor of the death penalty and unable to forgive his son’s murderers, he granted the killers ‘life’ in order to allow healing to begin. In keeping with the teachings of his faith, The Reverend Mr. Tully, of course, spoke of G-D’s love and forgiveness of all people regardless of the sins they have or have not committed. His implied challenge was deeply troubling because it provoked those present to imagine forgiving Matt’s murderers even as they did not forgive him for living. And that thought brought out, to my astonishment, my outraged anger and hate –my own unwillingness to forgive what they had done, although I had just been told that Matt’s own father had, at least, forgiven them for living. And then, immediately, the beautiful sweet song of the Elegy to Matthew began.

Following the service, there was a reception for the composer, David Conte, and the choral lyric’s poet, John Stirling Walker. William Trafka, Organist and Director of Music at the church introduced them. The small reception room was packed with ‘men in tweeds,’ New York Gay intelligentsia who, despite the ravings of the immediately preceding Saturday night, had come this morning to hear healing art. There was a great deal of technical talk about the creation of the music and words. During a question and answer period, a woman asked the composers if they did not think that the work was perhaps too sweet sounding considering the monstrous tragedy it memorialized. I then dared to suggest that the dark tragedy spoke for itself, that the music which followed was the light, that is the enlightenment, and therefore was rightfully sweet.

Going to an event such as this, one expects to be moved. The anger over such a hate-filled killing followed by a beautiful musical memorial created by clever brilliant people cannot do otherwise than bring forth deep thoughts and feelings. I had not, however, anticipated the profound sense of being and reminder of faith that the proceedings elicited. Setting foot inside a church is indeed dangerous to the comfort of entrenched cynicism.