Nearly 80% of Americans identify as Christian, but among LGBT people, Christianity is often denounced as homophobic, creating an uncomfortable situation in which gay Christians feel ostracized from both their churches and the LGBT community.

Although the religious right's position on homosexuality has been widely publicized for years through the vocal protests of groups like Focus on the Family, gay Christians have been largely silenced, forced to struggle with their religious and sexual identities in isolation.

But recently a number of documentaries have been released that explore the difficulties facing gay Christians, including the lively Camp Out about a gay Christian youth camp, and the thought-provoking God and Gays, which approaches the subject from more of an activist standpoint. Both documentaries recently screened at Frameline.

Produced and directed by Kirk Marcolina and Larry Grimaldi, who previously worked together on Bravo's Boy Meets Boy, Camp Out chronicles the experiences of 10 gay teenagers as they attend the first overnight Bible camp for LGBT teens in Minnesota . This week-long camp is operated by the Naming Project, a Minnesota-based organization for gay Christian youth; this August marks the camp's third anniversary [for more information go to thenamingproject.org].

Among the 10 campers are 17-year-old Scancy, a Goth girl who identifies as bisexual and is not entirely certain whether she still identifies as Christian; 16-year-old Christine, a boisterous Elvis fan and lesbian; 15-year-old Tim, an emotional, recovering drug addict; and 18-year-old Thomas, a devout Christian who aims to become a pastor. The documentary follows them from their homes to Bay Lake Camp, where they connect with each other and their religion in often surprising and, yes, heartwarming ways.

One of the most amusing segments of the documentary occurs early on when the camp leaders, including Pastor Jay Wiesner (who was ordained by his congregation despite objections from the Evangelical Lutheran Church), decide to have all the kids sleep together in the sanctuary rather than splitting up the boys and the girls. The kids grumble to each other about the unfairness of the situation in a way that reminds us right away that they are teenagers first and foremost, with all their attached hormonal imbalances.

Indeed, Camp Out is most effective when it allows the teens to speak for themselves--which it does by allowing them to film video diaries on their own. These diaries reveal the campers' yearnings for community and spirituality, their desire for connection with one another, and their struggles to reconcile their Christianity with their gay identities. Rather than addressing, verse by verse, the passages in the Bible that may or may not denounce homosexuality, Camp Out shows through these teens that Christianity is a valid religious practice for many LGBT people.

God and Gays, directed by Luane Beck and produced by her partner Kim Clark, takes a much more direct approach to addressing the issues faced by gay Christians. Subtitled “Bridging the Gap,” God and Gays includes interviews with several gay Christians, including Rev. Dr. Mel White, who used to ghostwrite books for evangelical Christians such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertston. White went on to co-found SoulForce, an organization that works to free LGBT people from religious and political oppression.

God and Gays also features Rev. Deborah L. Johnson, founder of Inner Light Ministries; Mary Lou Wallner of TEACH Ministry (To Educate About the Consequences of Homophobia), whose daughter committed suicide because she could not reconcile homosexuality with Christianity; and Darlene Bogle, former director of the Exodus Ministry, famously known to help gays become “ex-gays.” Bogle explains that although at one point she felt that she successfully left homosexuality behind, in reality she had closed off a major part of herself, becoming numb to her feelings.

Although God and Gays is mostly structured like a typical documentary, with a series of talking-head interviews interspersed with footage from a SoulForce demonstration in Colorado, director Beck and producer Clark are part of the documentary in front of the lens as well as behind the scenes. In several transitional scenes, the couple is shown walking along a beach, holding hands, and discussing how Christianity has impacted their own personal lives, as well as how making this documentary affected them. This serves to situate the documentary as an overtly personal project.

It's clear that Clark and Beck do want to bridge the gap between God and LGBT people, and this documentary will likely be a welcome source of support for many gays who struggle with being Christian.

The debate on whether the Bible condemns homosexuality is addressed in God and Gays by several pastors, who speak about specific Bible verses and whether or not they can be interpreted as condemning same-sex love. It seems that the answer is more of a question than an answer: that the Bible may condemn homosexuality, but it also condemns a host of other behaviors that we accept as normal today, including allowing menstruating women to remain within the community as opposed to ostracizing them to the wilderness during their period.

This may provide some comfort to gay Christians, but may not address something that non-Christian gays want to hear about: Why do some gays feel called to be Christian, a religion that seems to condemn them so harshly?

Both Camp Out and God and Gays bring the gay Christian out of the closet, showing that gays can in fact be Christian and Christians can in fact be gay--something that not only the religious right denies, but many LGBT people deny as well. For gay Christians, both these documentaries are likely to be a source of comfort, as they reinforce the idea that it is in, in fact, OK to be Christian and gay. For non-Christian LGBT people, both films stimulate conversation about religious issues and the gay community, and even more importantly, demonstrate that not all Christians are homophobic.

For more information go to Frameline.org