The conference at Central Reformed Church, 10 College Ave. NE, starts Thursday, Oct. 24, and includes a 7 p.m. worship service open to the public. A 7 p.m. Friday concert and keynote speech by Justin Lee, The Gay Christian Network founder and author of “Torn: Rescuing the Gospel from the Gays vs. Christians Debate,” also is open to the public. Lee also spoke this week at Calvin College.

The founder of The Gay Christian Network is among the scheduled speakers at a conference on gays in church.Making Room for All 2013specifically focuses on including lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people in the Reformed Church in America, which has a strong presence in West Michigan with about 50,000 members in Kent and Ottawa counties.

The conference at Central Reformed Church, 10 College Ave. NE, starts Thursday, Oct. 24, and includes a 7 p.m. worship service open to the public. A 7 p.m. Friday concert and keynote speech by Justin Lee, The Gay Christian Network founder and author of “Torn: Rescuing the Gospel from the Gays vs. Christians Debate,” also is open to the public. Lee also spoke this week at Calvin College.

The rest of the Room for All conference, including a Friday morning session at which the past two general secretaries of the RCA will talk about the church’s position on gays, is open by registration at the door. Here’s a schedule of events that runs through Saturday morning.

Registered participants include Jeff Chu, an RCA church elder in New York who has written a book on being gay and Christian, and Minnesota state Sen. Scott Dibble, who pushed for marriage equality in that state.

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