In 1985, American televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker had a man called Steve Pieters on her show.
Pieters was undergoing chemotherapy at the time, so they were connected via satellite — but their connection felt palpable.
"I want to tell you, there's a lot of Christians here who love you and wouldn't be afraid to put their arm around you, and tell you that we love you and we care," Bakker told Pieters tearfully.
It was a ground-breaking moment, and one that is captured in the film The Eyes of Tammy Faye, which opened in Australian cinemas last week.
Steve Pieters, himself a Christian minister, has said this was the first time that a televangelist interviewed an HIV-positive gay man on air, and — more than that — showed acceptance and love.
It resonated. Pieters said for years afterwards, people would tell him that the interview had saved their life or helped them come out.
Faith riddled with fear
Two decades passed before Alex Pittaway saw that interview, but it has never left his mind.
Raised in a Pentecostal family, Alex was an active member of Hillsong during his childhood and teenage years. He attended camps and small group sessions, sung in choirs, and even volunteered with the church's television production unit.
But Alex knew there was a part of him that wasn't accepted by this religious community.
"When I heard the words come out of a preacher's mouth at Hillsong, that to be gay was not just a sin, but it was the worst type of sin … my heart just sank," he recalls.
"Because that was me they were talking about."
After finishing high school, Alex says he entered a psychologically dark place.
He remembers Hillsong teaching that the Second Coming of Jesus was imminent, and that if he wasn't a "good enough Christian", he wouldn't be saved.
"I would have hallucinations that the ground was shaking, which was a precursor to the Second Coming of Jesus … even just hearing a loud noise or something that sounded like a trumpet terrified me, because I'm like, 'Oh crap, is this it?'."
The night before his 19th birthday, Alex says he dreamt of a life that wasn't governed by fear. It was the catalyst he needed to seek help.
Alex saw a counsellor who connected him with a LGBTQ+ support group in Sydney.
As a "sheltered" teenager, he recalls walking into the meeting place — shared by the AIDS Council of New South Wales — and being shocked by the sex-positive posters.
"Then a weight lifted off my shoulders, and I knew I was in the right place. I knew that God accepted me no matter what."
Later, Alex joined the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC), an international LGBT-affirming Protestant Christian denomination.
"At first I thought, 'Wait a minute, this is too accepting, this is too loving. Where's the fire and brimstone?'" he recalls.
"It almost felt like an AA meeting, I was like, 'This isn't a real church'. But it grew on me because it gave me the freedom to come to God and build my faith from the ground up."
AIDS seen as 'God's punishment'
During this period, Alex came across the famous Tammy Faye Bakker interview with Steve Pieters who, aside from being an AIDS activist, was a pastor with MCC in the United States.
"I was like, 'This woman is incredible! She is interviewing an HIV-positive gay pastor and loving this person'," Alex recalls.
"This was back in the day when we knew so little about HIV, how people got it, how it was transmitted. There was so much ignorance in the world.
After that interview, Bakker — who died in 2007, at the age of 65 — began taking her children to services at MCC, and marching in Pride parades.
Steve Pieters has said she felt "a calling to minister to the LGBT community" after their interaction.
Alex sees Bakker as an antithesis to the religious leaders of his childhood.
"For me and for many people, she was like that parent who was there to offer hugs and acceptance on such a deep and profound level," he says.
"It was as if we got the pastor that we never had [growing up]."
Change in evangelical circles
Not long after seeing the Pieters interview, Alex had the chance to meet Tammy Faye's son, Jay Bakker, who is a pastor and co-founder of the inclusive Revolution Church.
"He came out to Australia for an MCC conference, and I got to spend a whole week with him," Alex recalls.
"I saw so much love and grace that Tammy Faye had imparted to Jay. He did great work in having a public platform and a voice to speak to the evangelical community and say, 'God loves everyone, God includes everyone'."
And in the years that followed, Alex took a similar path.
He studied to become a seminarian in the United States, and has since become a minister with MCC, and a Uniting Church member.
While Alex is grateful to be a leader in a church that affirms LGBTQ+ people, he knows that some Christian communities don't share the same values.
"I think we're seeing less out-and-out hostility towards the LGBTI community from [evangelical] circles, but there is still a long way to go," he says.
"Evangelical leaders — including televangelists — they're seeing their sons, their daughters, their relatives coming out, and that can't help but somewhat improve the tone of the conversation.
"But I think Tammy Faye played a big role in being the first female televangelist, and one of the first people in the evangelical world, to be fully embracing of more people."
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