Pastor featured at Seattle event takes leadership role at South Carolina church

Rev. Laura Bethany Buchleiter, a transgender lesbian pastor who spoke at an event in Seattle in 2019, has taken on a new congregational leadership role in South Carolina.

North Anderson Community Church Presbyterian, a congregation affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA), called Buchleiter to serve as its stated supply pastor, according to reporting by Qnotes Carolina. The church is described as a small congregation, with an average Sunday attendance of roughly 20 to 30 people.

Buchleiter’s connection to the broader LGBTQ-affirming Christian movement has included public speaking and ministry work. In 2021, she was ordained by University Baptist Church in Bloomington, Indiana. Baptist News Global reported that the congregation was affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, making Buchleiter the first transgender-identified person ordained by a CBF-affiliated church, according to the research available for this report.

Her ministry and public advocacy have also addressed the relationship between gender identity, faith and religious institutions. In a 2019 interview with Q Christian Fellowship, Buchleiter discussed her identity and spiritual journey. She has described her first name as connected to the laurel wreath, a traditional symbol of victory, and her middle name as a reference to Bethany in the New Testament.

Buchleiter has also spoken about being diagnosed with an intersex condition. In a 2021 interview, she argued that the existence of diverse bodies and gender experiences need not be understood as a rejection of Christian belief. Instead, she described that complexity as compatible with her understanding of divine creativity.

Earlier this year, Buchleiter discussed religious trauma on the “Gay With God” podcast. The Presbyterian Church (USA) also shared a video featuring her discussion of the subject, describing the process of self-understanding and faith as one that can include unexpected changes and difficult turns.

For Seattle readers, Buchleiter’s new position offers a local point of connection to a national and regional conversation about transgender people in Christian leadership. Her appearance in Seattle in 2019 placed her within the city’s network of LGBTQ-affirming faith discussions, while her new role illustrates how those debates continue to play out in congregations elsewhere in the country.

The Presbyterian Church (USA) has become more open to LGBTQ inclusion over recent decades, even as it has faced substantial membership and congregation losses. The denomination reported losing more than 26,000 members and 128 congregations in 2025, and its membership has declined from more than 2.5 million in 2000 to slightly above 1 million as of last year, according to figures cited in the research.

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