LGBTQ+ Community Embraces Rerelease of Avalon’s ‘Testify to Love’ From Founding Member Who Says He Was Ousted for Being Gay

Michael Passons: ‘Real Love Is Free of Judgment’

To celebrate the rerelease of “Testify to Love,” former Avalon member Michael Passons posted a “love letter” to fans. “Today a decades-long silence ends,” he said, recounting how “for a long time I shut music out.”

Calling “Testify to Love” a “long-lost friend,” Passons shared that he’s “reclaiming my voice, not just for me but for anyone who’s ever been told they’re not loved or not worthy of love.” To the song’s longtime fans, he said, “I hope you feel something new when you hear me singing now.”

The singer added, “To those who can’t listen anymore, maybe because [the song] reminds you of a time you believed in love, before life or people made it complicated, this is especially for you. Because I still believe love, real love, is free of judgment, bias, or prejudice.”

Comments to that post include warm wishes from fellow CCM artists. “Wiping tears over here,” wrote Nichole Nordeman. “I love this new version and I am fully celebrating the end of your silence. We need you. Standing on my tiptoes with joy and pride for you, … Go go go!!”

CCM group Point of Grace, which toured with Avalon, wrote to Passons, “We sure do love you and cherish the years of deep friendship that traveling together brought us. Your voice is one of a kind – and that other guy singing with you is pretty good too!”

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On social media, fans are sharing their stories with Passons. “I listened to [‘Testify to Love’] as a closeted kid and it means so much to see yall today living joyfully,” one wrote. “Thank you so much for sharing this song the way it’s meant to be!”

Another person, “an openly queer pastor,” wrote, “Now, I look back at my younger self singing ‘Testify to Love’ and know it was his anthem of his own queerness that was deeply confusing and disrupting to his being.” The pastor ended with the lyrics, “I’ll be a witness in the silences when words are not enough.”

Not everyone approved of the rerelease. “Beautiful song that gives me great memories but I’m now so sad you have made this an anthem for the LGBTQ community,” someone wrote to Passons. In reply, another person emphasized that both the song and Jesus are “FOR EVERYBODY!!!”

On her May 18 podcast, conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey lamented that the song had gone “woke.”