When people enter the doors of the Community United Church of Christ and look for the lead pastor, Rev. Leah Robberts-Mosser may not be the person they picture in their heads.

Robberts-Mosser is six feet tall in boots, wears rings and bracelets, has tattoos on her arms and is an avid fan of One Direction, specifically Louis Tomlinson. 

Since Robberts-Mosser moved to Champaign in 2009, she has served the CUCC — an LGBTQ+ open congregation — for around 14 years. 

Before moving here, Robberts-Mosser grew up in Jasper, Indiana, and was raised in a Protestant family who attended a United Church of Christ there. 

During Robberts-Mosser’s freshman year of college, she saw firsthand how religion convinced people in the LGBTQ+ community that they were not accepted through her cousin’s experience.

On Christmas day, her then 13-year-old cousin took her outside into the snow and told her, “I’m gay.”

“When my cousin came out to me, he was so afraid that God was going to hate him because he was gay,” Robberts-Mosser said.

Robberts-Mosser had seen her cousin go to church his whole life and was surprised he had to question whether or not God would accept him because of his sexuality.

Ever since Robberts-Mosser’s cousin came out to her, she felt she needed to be a different kind of Christian — an ally to the LGBTQ+ community.

“Too many people have been taught that for them to have a same-sex attraction is something that God hates,” Robberts-Mosser said. “Too many people have been taught that, and they develop higher rates of suicidality and addiction and long-term illness.”

Once Robberts-Mosser attended Hanover College in 1994 and took theology classes, she embraced her call to ministry. She received her Master of Divinity degree from Chicago Theological Seminary in 2004.

At CUCC, Robberts-Mosser has made it a point to continue the church’s legacy of being inclusive to LGBTQ+ individuals and combat homophobia.

“As a Christian pastor, I feel like I have a moral and ethical and professional responsibility to flip that script because the people who say that homosexuality is a sin are loud, and they are well funded,” Robberts-Mosser said. “And until my dying breath, I will do whatever I can to flip that script.”

Robberts-Mosser has been trying to flip that script through her biblical self-defense workshops, where she discusses how scripture has attacked the LGBTQ+ community and how it can be affirming to their identities. She calls verses used against LGBTQ+ individuals “clobber passages.”

She has also spoken to congregants from the CUCC who have experienced religious trauma. In the past, many have been welcomed to a church with open arms, only to be shunned for identifying with the LGBTQ+ community.

“(Religious trauma) always goes back to previous situations where they thought they could trust that they were fully accepted and loved for who they were, only to find out that the pastor and the church deacons were like, ‘We love you, but you can’t be gay,’ and it’s an absolute mind f–k for people,” Robberts-Mosser said.

When Robberts-Mosser encounters congregants who have experienced rejection from a former church because of their identity, she reminds them that God accepts them for who they are.

Not only has Robberts-Mosser fostered a safe space for LGBTQ+ individuals at CUCC but she also helps with outreach programs to aid the homeless and people with food insecurity.

Nathan Alexander, LGBTQ+ homeless workgroup chair and founder at Continuum of Service Providers to the Homeless, has worked with Robberts-Mosser for about seven years.

Due to Alexander’s distrust of religious institutions, he was skeptical of Robberts-Mosser’s intentions at first due to how churches can be disingenuous with their acceptance of LGBTQ+ people.

“My initial reaction was probably a little skeptical because it was, ‘Okay, you’re talking the talk, but do you walk the walk?’” Alexander said.

It wasn’t until he saw how Robberts-Mosser continuously lent her support to the community and discussed the feasibility of their projects in detail that he began to trust Robberts-Mosser.

“When we talked about logistics in starting to do programs, she was showing up for the community, and seeing that repetitive showing up meant a lot at first,” Alexander said. 

When providing quality resources to people in need, Robberts-Mosser believes in the golden rule — “Do unto others as you would have done yourself.”

“I just think we have to treat people with dignity and respect, and we have to elevate the way we help people,” Robberts-Mosser said. “Don’t build buildings you wouldn’t want to live in. Don’t serve people food you don’t want to eat. Don’t give people clothes you don’t want to wear. That kind of attention to detail really matters to people.”

In 2018, Alexander, Robberts-Mosser and other religious leaders started a project called the Homeless Youth Care Kit and distributed about 30 backpacks to Unit Four, District 116 and the Regional Planning Commission. Each backpack had socks, underwear, toiletries, snacks, a heated blanket, a sleeping bag and other materials.

For the past seven years, CUCC has housed Jubilee Cafe, where a free meal is served every Monday from 5-6:30 p.m. The cafe serves students and community members who experience food insecurity in Champaign.

Alexander explained that Robberts-Mosser intentionally makes guests at Jubilee Cafe feel welcomed and supported by providing resources and aid.

“There’s definitely times where she and I have collaborated on trying to find resources for people or get them integrated into other services that might be more wrapped around connecting people from Jubilee Cafe to like RPC or other organizations within the CSPH,” Alexander said. 

Mara Smith, Church Life board worship chair at CUCC, said that many pastors rarely share their personal interests, and their stories are kept behind closed doors. However, Robberts-Mosser defies the traditional image of a pastor by being herself, according to Smith.

“She’s just a normal person, like the fact that she curses and that she talks about (Louis Tomlinson) in One Direction — (she’s just) fun to be around,” Smith said. 

Although Robberts-Mosser fulfills her role as a lead pastor, Smith said Robberts-Mosser does not portray herself as above anyone else despite her position.

“She does not pretend that she is higher or better than she is, and she does not put out that mask of wanting to be the example for people,” Smith said. “She is the people. She is just as normal as every other person in that congregation, and she does not hide that because we don’t need an example to follow. We are already children of God.”

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