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For her leadership in fighting for liberation for all, Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt, the first woman of color and first out bisexual President of the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA), will receive this year’s Faith Award at Creating Change, the annual conference of the National LGBTQ Task Force. The task force is dedicated to achieving freedom and justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer people, and their families through proactive, targeted, change-inducing initiatives.
“The National LGBTQ Task Force Faith Work for 2026 is presented to Rev. Dr. Sofía Bentacourt for her leadership and courage in communities of faith through a framework of love and liberation for all,” reads the citation. The Faith Award honors a faith leader whose work bridges spiritual values with the pursuit of justice, equality, and liberation for LGBTQ+ people, according to a task force statement.
Creating Change is the task force’s annual space for strategy, political education, base building, and leadership development. This year’s event, the thirty-eighth, will bring 2,000 attendees to Washington, D.C., January 21-25.
She has centered the narrative of authenticity and lived experience, which fortifies a theology that protects the sacred dignity of all people and works for their liberation in an unjust world.
“The Faith Award at Creating Change celebrates the faith-rooted leaders and the work they’ve done to build bridges and fight for liberation from within their traditions,” said Tahil Sharma, Faith Work director. “We’re recognizing Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt for her steadfast commitment as a faith leader, scholar, and community organizer through her leadership as the first woman of color and out bisexual president of the UUA. She has centered the narrative of authenticity and lived experience, which fortifies a theology that protects the sacred dignity of all people and works for their liberation in an unjust world.
“As an organization that recognizes the force of faith as a guide for mercy and a weapon for violence, her leadership and brilliance ratify our specific priorities around faith: ‘To create an equitable society for diverse LGBTQ people, we must continue to emphasize that people of faith are not our adversaries — and that equity and religious freedom are interconnected and mutually reinforcing,’” Sharma said.
In a recorded acceptance, Betancourt said, “Beloveds, more than anything else, I hope that in these days you know how very profoundly loved you are and that even with our complicated history, which I recognize and respect, that there is a whole range of religious traditions who have your back. To our transgender, intersex, and nonbinary loves, I hope you know that eleven heads of faith traditions not two months ago signed a public statement condemning the levels of violence attacking our communities in these days, affirming your wholeness, worthiness sacredness, and glory, an affirmation that should not be needed in these streets and yet is sadly still needed this day. We are here for you … May we all be strengthened for the task ahead, and I will continue to pray for your safety, your wholeness, your joy in these days.”
Betancourt was the lead author of an interfaith collective statement issued in November in support of trans, non-binary, and intersex people, affirming that they “deserve respect, love, and equal rights.” The statement comes at a time when trans, intersex, and nonbinary people face a worsening climate of hostility.
In July, Betancourt was elected as an Honorary Fellow by Harris Manchester College, one of the forty-three Oxford University colleges and a historical hub for Unitarian thought. The honorary fellowship is from a college deeply rooted in religious dissent and nonconformity and signifies renewed connection between the UUA in the United States, Harris Manchester College, a school with a rich Unitarian history, and Unitarians in the United Kingdom.
The general sessions of Creating Change will be available online at thetastkforce.org/creating-change/virtual/.