Interlude: Tired of Dying | When We All Get to Heaven

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4 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 16 November 2025

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Sunday after Magic Johnson announced his HIV-status, Jim Mitulski preached a sermon on being tired of people dying. We’re sharing it as an interlude, a pause, and an immersion into one moment in AIDS’ bleak midwinter. For images and links about this episode visit https://www.heavenpodcast.org/interlude. In the sermon Rev. Mitulski refers to ARC. That means AIDS-Related Complex, a diagnostic category meant to indicate an earlier stage of HIV infection than AIDS. It was common in the period to hear references to both AIDS and ARC. “Old Devil Time” is by Pete Seeger. The AIDS verses are by MCC San Francisco congregant Paul Francis. You can see Magic Johnson's press release, announcing his HIV status here. The biblical passage Rev. Mitulski is preaching on is John 11:1-44. Get more Outward with Slate Plus! Join for weekly bonus episodes of Outward and ad-free listening on all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe from the Outward show page on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or visit slate.com/outwardplus for access wherever you listen. When We All Get to Heaven is produced by Eureka Street Productions. It is co-created by Lynne Gerber, Siri Colom, and Ariana Nedelman. Our story editor is Sayre Quevedo. Our sound designer is David Herman. Our managing producer is Krissy Clark. Tim Dillinger is our consulting producer and Betsy Towner Levine is our fact-checker. We had additional story editing help from Sarah Ventre, Arwen Nicks, Allison Behringer, and Krissy Clark. For a complete list of credits, please visit https://www.heavenpodcast.org/credits. This project received generous support from individual donors, the Henry Luce Foundation (www.hluce.org), the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, and California Humanities, a non-profit partner of the National Endowment for the Humanities (www.CalHum.org). Eureka Street Productions has 501c3 status through our fiscal sponsor FJC: A Foundation of Philanthropic Funds. The music for this episode is from the Metropolitan Community Church of San Francisco’s archive. It was performed by MCC-SF’s musicians and members with Bob Crocker and Jack Hoggatt-St.John as music directors. Additional music is by Domestic BGM. Great thanks, as always, to the members and clergy of the Metropolitan Community Church of San Francisco who made this project possible. Some links to good groups: AIDS Healthcare Foundation – provides medical care and support for people living with HIV/AIDS and preventative care for people at risk for contracting it. The Magic Johnson Foundation – founded to address HIV/AIDS. Expanded to include education and community engagement. San Francisco AIDS Foundation – a place to seek information about HIV. POZ Magazine – a place to learn everything else about HIV (information included).Save AIDS Research – their recent, epic 24 hours to Save Research conference with all the latest HIV research is available on YouTube through this site. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm Christina Cauderucci, and this is Outward, Slate's show about queer life, culture, and
0:08.2	politics. We're back with a special interlude from when we all get to heaven, offering a moment to
0:14.0	step more fully into the world of MCC San Francisco. Today, we share a full sermon delivered in 1991 by Reverend Jim
0:22.5	Metulski on the Sunday after Magic Johnson announced his HIV status. You can listen
0:28.0	just as the congregation did and get a visceral sense of what it was like to be 10 years
0:33.2	into a devastating epidemic that some people were only beginning to understand.
0:38.4	Welcome to the sanctuary. Take a listen.
0:49.9	This is how Reverend Jim Matulsky prepares to preach a sermon.
0:54.5	Thank you.
0:55.9	So I look at, I read the room, I don't know how to do this, but I've always done this since childhood, even.
1:01.8	I can feel a room.
1:03.9	It's not infallible.
1:05.3	But I have my text, and I know I'm going to talk about that passage, and I have my notes that I've prepared for what I note all week long,
1:12.6	and then I feel it, and then I do it. I can't even tell you how. I don't know how I do it, but I do. The sermon is the part of the worship service that people sometimes dread.
1:34.4	The minister gets up in front of the congregation, Bible at the ready, and starts to talk.
1:40.4	And talks for a long time, sometimes a really long time.
1:45.5	The listener may be judged or shamed or confused or put to sleep,
1:51.2	but in the hands of a good preacher, it can be the most life-giving part.
1:57.4	Because a good sermon helps make sense of what's happening in the world
2:01.6	in relation to texts that are deemed sacred
2:04.8	and beliefs that are deemed holy.
2:08.2	Something especially important
	...

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