LAS VEGAS, NEVADA - JULY 20: Kim Burrell attends the 39th Annual Stellar Awards at Mardi Gras Ballroom in The Orleans Hotel & Casino on July 20, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Gabe Ginsberg/Getty Images)
Kim Burrell is backtracking on previous harsh comments about people who identify with the LGBTQ+ community. The singer shared an apology while speaking at the 39th Stellar Gospel Music Awards on July 20.
This marks the second in eight years that Burell has apologized for her now-infamous sermon. She first apologized in 2016 after videos of her comments went viral.
At the Stellar Gospel Music Awards, Burrell shared that she now understands the “reach and impact of [her] voice beyond gospel music.” However, she says that understanding came with “time and much soul-searching.”
Additionally, Kim Burrell suggested preachers must exercise caution when preaching beyond their parishioners and to others who want to be in it but are too scared to feel misunderstood.
“[I] understand that some of my past words, comments, preaching have been received by the LGBTQ+ community as negative and hurtful. There’s nothing more hurtful than to think — to imagine — that you’ve said something in the name of God, and it hurt somebody,” Kim said on stage.
She explained that her “church jargon” was “sometimes” needed “for the people in the back.” However, she proceeded to apologize for her choice to use the homophobic lingo.
“And for that, I want to apologize to the LGBTQ community. Let’s give them a great big round of applause,” Burrell told the audience. “We want them to have strength and to sincerely know that we must all do the work to embrace all of God’s people. Tonight, I hope this award and this moment can be the beginning of bridge-building and listening to each other as we follow peace with all men and develop the character of God, which requires seeing God.”
In the past sermon, Kim alleged that queer folks have a “perverted homosexual spirit” and a “spirit of delusion and confusion.” Additionally, Kim Burrell said identifying within the LGBTQ+ community is a “sin.”
“…[the spirit] has deceived many men and women… You as a man, you open your mouth and take a man’s penis in your face, you are perverted. You are a woman and will shake your face in another woman’s breast, you are perverted,” Kim Burrell previously said.
Kim Burrell first took back her words while speaking on Facebook Live in December 2016. At the time, she said: “We are not in a war against flesh and blood. I came on because I care about God’s creation and every person from the LBGT and anything else, any other kind of thing that is supporting gay…I never said LGBT last night,” she said. “I said SIN and whatever falls in the sin was preached.”
Despite her apology, Kim Burell lost an opportunity to appear on ‘The Ellen DeGeneres Show’ and her talk show on Texas Southern University’s radio station in early 2017.
This past January, the singer and preacher went viral for silencing a woman who interrupted her solo performance during a church service. Kim Burrell later addressed while she came at the churchgoer the way she did!
