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What if people accuse the film of being pro-gay?

Di Sabatino: That's okay. I'm pro-people. I'm not pro-gay. I went to those guys [White and Perry] out of the honesty of my heart. Who better to talk about being part of the evangelical community and being ostracized? I shared my convictions with them. But I like them, and they were honest.

Honestly, how many times a day do we look at something and say, "I don't agree with this?" Why can't we do that with a film? This does not glorify that lifestyle. Nor am I in a position to make some sort of theological statement about it. I make theological statements, but that's not one of them. I like Brian McLaren's statement in Time magazine when he was asked what his views were on homosexuality, and he said, "There's no way that I can answer that without offending somebody."

Lonnie is not the poster child for gay Christianity. That would be a horrific thing to do to his memory. Voltaire said history is playing a pack of dirty tricks on the dead—turning Lonnie into a "gay preacher" would be a horrible thing to do to him. But neither is he this kind of Damascus-Road, I-once-was-gay-and-turned-away-from-this-lifestyle guy. He struggled.

Frisbee (center) singing at a service

How difficult was it to get people to talk about him?

Di Sabatino: His friends would talk. The people who were there would talk. The institutional people were a little more difficult, the people who were involved in those circles. The Calvary Chapel people were a little more closed-lipped than the Vineyard people, but the Vineyard movement has become a lot more decentralized since John [Wimber] died. Getting Chuck Smith Jr. to speak was a kind of coup. He's just such an honest guy, and I wish I could run the whole interview.

Both the Calvary Chapel people and the Vineyard people have come back to me to point to books where Lonnie's been mentioned, but I'm careful to say in the movie that his influence has not been properly contextualized. I don't think putting his name in one of the lines in a book means anything. There was a concerted effort not totalk about Lonnie.

What was your motivation in telling this story?

Di Sabatino: When I was at Queen's [University] in grad school, I remember telling this story to people, and their mouths just dropped, and they said this was a great story—even people who didn't care about the evangelical world, who looked at it as a circus, just resonated with the story. And I remember Mark Noll coming to Queen's that year and talking about the fact that, up until that point, his best-selling book had sold about 700 copies, and I thought, "If he can sell only 700 books, then what am I going to do?" We have to learn how to tell stories in a different way, and get out beyond our comfortable circles, and that's really where this was born, and looking at people whohave done that. U2 have been able to go out into the marketplace and bring stories, bring artistic endeavours, to a different level, and not necessarily with an eye on the Christian community.

So you expect over 700 people to see this film?

Di Sabatino: They already have. And I'm expecting to show it to a heck of a lot more.

For more information on the film, go to the official website. The film is not yet available for purchase on video, but you can sign up at the website for updates via e-mail.

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