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If you vigorously disagree with me

If you vigorously disagree with anything written in my blogs, do not be surprised .  Each of us is naturally rooted in our own history of experiences with LGBTQ believer.  Take comfort that there are millions of others who are locked into a “total war against the homosexual minority” [302,000 Google hits].  But a sustained war can be debilitating, and there is a sane wisdom in the admonition of Jesus to “love your enemies.”  So, while you are thinking of the kind of refutation that you’d like to prepare, give a thought also to the kinds of experiences that you might want to gain for yourself by visiting a support group and finding out first-hand what gays and lesbians really think about themselves and what kind of support they need.

Pope Francis wrote in Evangelii Gaudium: “Whenever we encounter another person in love, we learn something new about God” (§272). The pope further reminds us that “A Church which goes forth is a Church whose doors are open. Going out to others in order to reach the fringes of humanity does not mean rushing out aimlessly into the world. Often it is better simply to slow down, to put aside our eagerness in order to see and listen to others.” (§46).  This is ideally the best attitude to bring to a support group that you are visiting.

Preparing yourself for visiting a support group

Consider doing an online search using the search phrases “lesbian support group” or “gay support group” or “teen support group.”  Pick out a “group” that fits into your comfort zone.

When I did my online search using Google, I adding the word “*Cincinnati” so as to insure that my initial hits were local.  I received 728 hits for lesbian groups and 6200 hits for gay support groups in Cincinnati.

I chose to introduce myself as “a straight interested in better understanding the lives of gays and lesbians.”  You might want to do something like this for yourself so as to avoid setting up false pretenses.

After your second meeting, I invite you to write a reflection on your experience and send it to me at Milavec@Jesus4Lesbians.com with the words “second encounter” in the subject line.  I will be glad to hear from you, to learn from your experiences, and to give you a reply.  Alternately,  I invite anyone who visits a support group to post below their experiences.

Bring a friend to the first meeting, if the thought of being the sole interloper makes you uneasy.  My hunch is that you will be amazed.  I myself received a warm welcome, and I didn’t have to pretend that I had any homosexual leanings to earn that welcome.

If you want to find someone who lives close to you to join up with you and go to a support group, type your first name, age, sex, and zip code [e.g., Aaron 80 m 45211] as the header to your post.  In the body of the post, briefly describe what support group you’d like to visit, where it is located, and why this particular group seems most appealing to you.

For parents and guardians

If you are a parent and are very much troubled by the experience of Gloria and Tony that I narrated earlier, then you most definitely will want to find yourself a “Parent Support Group” such as the one advertised above.

For those parents and guardians who are in conflict with a youth who has what you identify as a “dangerous” or “immoral” life style, please know that God wants to return you and your beloved child to a place of peace and love.

Remember that priests and pastors are sometimes very poorly equipped to be of help in this matter.  I myself have spent 25 years training future priests, and I  know firsthand that some seminaries are very ill-at-ease when discussing homosexuality.  Confide in your priest or pastor if you must, but don’t make the mistake of implementing any of the advice you receive before having tested it out within your Parent Support Group first.  Your child is too precious to risk doing unintentional harm to him/her by making repeated mistakes.  In the end, you will find little consolation in the fact that the pope is infallible if you get trapped into being excessively rigid or excessively lax when it comes time for loving your child with the same unconditional love that you have received from your heavenly Father.  God is love, and God loves your child no matter what sexual orientation they have received from their Father in Heaven.

Fraternally,
Aaron

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When spiritual forces suffocate our children

Matthew Vines identifies a hidden menace that exists within communities that preach “submission to God” as the necessary condition for the salvation of lesbians. For myself, it was in reading Hillary McFarland’s book, Quivering Daughters (2010), that I realized just exactly what this menace is. McFarland summarizes her thesis in just a few lines:

For many wives and daughters, the Christian home [and the Christian church] is not always a safe place. And through spiritual and emotional abuse, women who [subordinate themselves to their husbands in all things and] become “the least of these” . . . experience deep wounds that only God can heal. But if living “God’s way” caused this pain [for women], why should they trust Him [Her] to heal it?

These words could apply just as well to the “anti-gay gospel” preached within the church in which Matthew Vines was raised. If he had submitted meekly to this “gospel,” then his resistance would have been broken, and he would have completely submitted (“Not my will, but thine be done.”). And while this “anti-gay gospel” promises him eternal life in the world to come, his whole existence in this world would be menaced by the incessant fear of God and the reoccurring realization that being gay condemns him to a life devoid of an intimate partner who holds him when he is afraid, who heals him when he is wounded, and who goes with him wherever God might lead.

This is why the personal spiritual journey of Matthew Vines is of critical importance. After his father approved of his six-page summation of his biblical research, Vines took his discoveries and presented them to the elders in the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in his home town. He met privately with many of the church members as well. And here is what he discovered:

Despite my best efforts and the support of my family and some of our friends, our broader church community proved unreceptive to my message. Months of grueling, emotionally draining conversations with church leaders and members produced next to nothing in terms of progress. So eventually I left, dejected and depressed, but also determined to make change. Several months later, I found a church in town that was brave enough to offer me a public platform to speak about the issue. . . .

Notice here that Vines didn’t think that he should stay in the hope of slowly wearing down their resistance. Nor was he tempted to just give in, to acknowledge the superior insights accumulated in his church tradition, and to get on with the task of trying to make peace with the realization that sexual intimacy would never have any sanctioned place in his life.

Matthew Vines’ entire family deciding to leave their church as well. They didn’t do this in anger or in frustration. They did it because they wanted to express, first and foremost, their solidarity with their son or with their brother. They also did this, I would conjecture, because they were increasingly suspicious, thanks to the insights of their son, that there might be something drastically mistaken in the traditional Bible interpretations and that the “anti-gay gospel” was indeed destructive The psychological and spiritual harm that falls upon children.

Matthew Vines identifies a hidden menace that exists within communities that preach “submission to God” as the necessary condition for the salvation of lesbians. For myself, it was in reading Hillary McFarland’s book, Quivering Daughters (2010), that I realized just exactly what this menace is. McFarland summarizes her thesis in just a few lines:

For many wives and daughters, the Christian home [and the Christian church] is not always a safe place. And through spiritual and emotional abuse, women who [subordinate themselves to their husbands in all things and] become “the least of these” . . . experience deep wounds that only God can heal. But if living “God’s way” caused this pain [for women], why should they trust Him to heal it?

Matthew Vines at risk of a spiritual death

These words could apply just as well to the “anti-gay gospel” preached within the church in which Matthew Vines was raised. If he had submitted meekly to this “gospel,” then his resistance would have been broken, and he would have completely submitted (“Not my will, but thine be done.”).  And while this “anti-gay gospel” promises him eternal life in the world to come, his whole existence in this world would be menaced by the incessant fear of God and the reoccurring realization that being gay condemns him to a life devoid of an intimate partner who holds him when he is afraid, who heals him when he is wounded, and who goes with him wherever God might lead .

This is why the personal spiritual journey of Matthew Vines is of critical importance. After his father approved of his six-page summation of his biblical research, Vines took his discoveries and presented them to the elders in the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in his home town. He met privately with many of the church members as well. And here is what he discovered:

Despite my best efforts and the support of my family and some of our friends, our broader church community proved unreceptive to my message. Months of grueling, emotionally draining conversations with church leaders and members produced next to nothing in terms of progress. So eventually I left, dejected and depressed, but also determined to make change. Several months later, I found a church in town that was brave enough to offer me a public platform to speak about the issue. . . .

Notice here that Vines didn’t think that he should stay in the hope of slowly wearing down their resistance. Nor was he tempted to just give in, to acknowledge the superior insights accumulated in his church tradition, and to get on with the task of trying to make peace with the realization that sexual intimacy would never have any sanctioned place in his life.

Matthew Vines’ entire family deciding to leave their church as well. They didn’t do this in anger or in frustration. They did it because they wanted to express, first and foremost, their solidarity with their son or with their brother. They also did this, I would conjecture, because they were increasingly suspicious, thanks to the insights of their son, that there might be something drastically mistaken in the traditional Bible interpretations and that the “anti-gay gospel” was indeed destructive to the spiritual and psychological well-being of Matthew. By extension, they might have conjectured that if the “anti-gay gospel” is poisonous to their son, it would follow, as the night follows the day, that this “gospel” would be toxic to other youths wrestling with their sexual orientation as well. Here is how Vines masterfully expresses this in his own words:

Could it be true? Could it really be that this holiest of books, which contains some of the most beautiful writings and inspiring stories known to mankind, along with the unparalleled teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, also happens to require the emotional and spiritual destruction of sexual minorities? For any of us who learned to love the Jesus who called the little children to him, whose highest law was that of love, and who was a fierce defender of the downtrodden and the outcast, this simply did not seem possible.
Thus, the suspicion was that the teachings of Jesus invalidate the “anti-gay gospel” and that, in the case of homosexuality, false teaching has distorted the biblical texts such that “Scripture is used to manipulate. God is used as a weapon.”

Personal story of a straight-A Catholic college student

One late night at the end of her sophomore year of college, Jackie sat in her parked car and made a phone call that would forever change the course of her life. An attractive sorority girl with almond eyes and delicate dimples, she was the product of a charmed Boise, Idaho, upbringing: a father who worked in finance, a private­ school education, a pool in the backyard, all the advantages that an upper-middle-class suburban childhood can provide – along with all the expectations attendant to that privilege.

“There was a standard to meet,” Jackie says. “And I had met that standard my whole life. I was a straight-A student, the president of every club, I was in every sport. I remember my first day of college, my parents came with me to register for classes, and they sat down with my adviser and said, ‘So, what’s the best way to get her into law school?’”

Jackie just followed her parents’ lead understanding implicitly that discipline and structure went hand in hand with her family’s devout Catholic beliefs. She attended Mass three times a week, volunteered as an altar server and was the fourth generation of her family to attend her Catholic school; her grandfather had helped tile the cathedral.

“My junior year of high school, my parents thought it was weird that I’d never had a boyfriend,” she says, “so I knew I was supposed to get one. And I did. It was all just a rational thought process. None of it was emotionally involved.”

After graduating, Jackie attended nearby University of Idaho, where she rushed a sorority at her parents’ prompting. She chose a triple major of which they approved. “I remember walking out of the sorority house to go to Walmart or something, and I stopped at the door and thought to myself, ‘Should I tell someone I’m leaving?’” she says. “It was the first time in my life where I could just go somewhere and be my own person.”

In fact, it took the freedom of college for Jackie to even realize who her “own person” was. “Growing up, I knew that I felt different, but when you grow up Catholic, you don’t really know gay is an option,” she says. “I grew up in a household that said ‘fag’ a lot. We called people ‘fags,’ or things were ‘faggy.’” Her only sex-ed class was taught by a priest, and all she remembers him saying is, “‘Don’t masturbate and don’t be gay.’ I didn’t know what those words meant, so I just hoped to God that I wasn’t doing either of them.”

When Jackie got to college, the “typical gay sorority encounters” she found herself having didn’t seem to qualify as anything more than youthful exploration; she thought all girls drunkenly made out with their best friends. By her sophomore year, she was dating a fraternity brother but was also increasingly turned on by a friend she worked with at the campus women’s center. “I was just playing it off as ‘So maybe I’m just gay for you – I mean, I don’t have to tell my boyfriend’ this kind of thing,” she says. “I knew what I wanted, but it was never something I ever envisioned that I could have on a public level.” And yet, as her friendship with this woman turned physical and their relationship grew more serious, Jackie saw her future shrinking before her: a heterosexual marriage, children, church and the knowledge that all of it was based on a lie.

“I honestly thought my whole life I was just going to be an undercover gay,” she says, shaking her head in disbelief.

For better or worse, that plan was never to be. Toward the end of her sophomore year, Jackie got a text message from one of her sorority sisters who said she’d been seen kissing another girl, after which certain sisters started making it clear that they were not comfortable around Jackie. (“You’re living in the same house together,” she says, “and, of course, to close-minded people, if somebody’s gay, that means you’re automatically interested in all 80 of them.”) Eventually, she went before her chapter’s executive board and became the first sorority girl at her college to ever come out, at which point she realized that if she didn’t tell her parents, someone else would. “I was convinced somebody was going to blast it on Facebook.”

So while Jackie hoped for the best, she knew the call she was making had the potential to not end well. “You can’t hate me after I say this,” she pleaded when, alarmed to be receiving a call in the middle of the night, her mom picked up the phone.

“Oh, my God, you’re pregnant” was her mom’s first response, before running through a litany of parental fears. “Are you in jail? Did you get expelled? Are you in trouble? What happened? What did you do?” Suddenly her mom’s silence matched Jackie’s own. “Oh, my God,” she murmured in disbelief. “Are you gay?”

“Yeah,” Jackie forced herself to say.

After what felt like an eternity, her mom finally responded. “I don’t know what we could have done for God to have given us a fag as a child,” she said before hanging up.

As soon as the line went dead, Jackie began sobbing. Still, she convinced herself that her parents would come around and accept her, despite what they perceived to be her flaw. As planned, she drove to Canada to celebrate her birthday with friends. When her debit card didn’t work on the second day of the trip, she figured it was because she was in another country.

Once back in the States, however, she got a call from her older brother. “He said, ‘Mom and Dad don’t want to talk to you, but I’m supposed to tell you what’s going to happen,’” Jackie recalls. “And he’s like, ‘All your [credit] cards are going to be shut off, and Mom and Dad want you to take the car and drop it off at this specific location. Your phone’s going to last for this much longer. They don’t want you coming to the house, and you’re not to contact them. You’re not going to get any money from them. Nothing. And if you don’t return the car, they’re going to report it stolen.’ And I’m just bawling. I hung up on him because I couldn’t handle it.”

From that moment, Jackie knew that she was entirely on her own, that she had no home, no money and no family – and that this was the terrible price she’d pay for being a lesbian.[i]

A woefully tragic story that ends well

Woe to those Catholic households where, despite the best-laid plans for coordinated indoctrination, a child confesses having “homosexual inclinations.”  A mother known to me, let us call her Gloria, had a son of seventeen who confessed to such inclinations.  Upon hearing this, Gloria passed through many stages of grief.

First, angry denials: “No child of mine could possibly be gay!”  And threats: “Remember your teaching, son.  Sexual sins are always mortal.  Repent and confess them to a priest or, God forbid, you will go straight to hell.”

Second, there comes bargaining with God: “God, how could you have permitted this?  I have been a faithful believer and have supported your true Church all my life.  What must I do to get this unwanted sickness in my child’s life reversed?”

Thirdly, some months down the line after Gloria’s ceaseless prayers and novenas did not get the miracle she wanted, self-doubt emerges: “Where did I go wrong?  Or my husband?  Or his teachers?”

Then, her son leaves home and travels over a thousand miles away: “For the first time, I can breathe freely without my mother continually hounding me and prying into every aspect of my private life.”

With her son’s absence, Gloria becomes emotionally fragile.  She breaks down in tears multiple times every day and, invariably, whenever anyone asks about her son.  She seeks therapy.

Then she unexpectedly finds great solace in a support group of parents of homosexual children.  For the first time, she hears from parents who have arrived at the point where they accept the sexual orientation of their children.  She is horrified initially, but then she comes to realize that this acceptance enables parents to return to a supportive relationship with their children after a horrible period filled with harsh judgments and heart-breaking estrangement.

As a result of this realization, Gloria begins to avoid her parish priest entirely because she no longer wants to hear “any judgments he might have regarding the conduct of her son.”[i]  Gloria gradually stops going to her parish church entirely because she cannot tolerate the “self-righteous pity” expressed by certain “busy-bodies who are praying for Tony’s (not his real name) conversion and return to the Church.”

Tony writes a letter of a few pages each month.  At the end of three years, he writes a long letter describing how he met Joe, “a courageous and sensitive young man,” and how, over the course of time, they gradually became great friends.  Then Tony describes how they gradually became lovers and how they finally “pledged their undying love to each other.”  Then, for the first time in years, Tony acknowledges that he sorely misses his mother and, “if and only if she would agree to accept him as gay and to bless the love he has for Joe” then both of them would want to explore how they might visit for a few days right after Christmas.

Gloria is ecstatic!

At this point, Gloria tells me that she is ready to accept her son “just as God created him, no more and no less.”  This readiness came from her association with members of her parents support group.  As she became more and more at ease with their positive assessment of homosexuality, she at the same time became resentful of how the teachings of the Catholic Church had pitted her against her own son.

“Even before his leaving,” she said, “I should have been blessing him every day and assuring him that I will be there for him in whatever path God calls him—whether as a gay or as a straight.”  To this very day, she cannot understand how “bishops and priests teach us that loving our Creator and loving our neighbor are the heart of Jesus’ message and then, twisting this beautiful message, they go and teach my son that his deepest desires for intimacy are ‘disordered’ and that love-making between same-sex partners is always[ii] a mortal sin.”  In fact, she tells those who sympathetically hear her whole story that “those parents [in her support group] who seldom went to church taught me more about the depth of God’s love than all those Catholics who went to church every Sunday and firmly believed that Tony was destined for an eternity in hellfire.”

 

[i] At this point, Gloria completely distanced herself from the teaching of the Catholic Church regarding homosexuals.  In fact, she deeply resents the fact that her parish priest had set her against her son’s homosexuality and against any same-sex union that he might try to make for himself.

[ii] While some moral theologians sometimes say that sins against the sixth and ninth commandments deal with “serious matter” and, accordingly, infractions result in a mortal sin.  Even in classical moral theology, however, the conditions for committing a mortal sin always require, subjectively, that the person “recognizes the seriousness of the matter and then goes ahead and does it anyway.”  In the case of homosexual acts, however, even Cardinal Ratzinger acknowledges that those naturally inclined to such sex acts are less culpable than those heterosexuals who do the same thing while being emotionally repulsed by the act.

Furthermore, when two women use sex to express and celebrate their mutual love, they frequently do not see this as sinful at all.  In fact, they often engage in sex because they judge what they are doing as “love-making” and experience their mutual sex as a “source of grace.”  Cardinal Ratzinger would intervene here saying that, due to the fact that the procreative aspect of sexuality is missing, there must always be a degree of moral guilt.  Such a judgment, however, would follow from Ratzinger’s essentialist thinking and his attempt to define a universal rule used to evaluate heterosexual acts.  Furthermore, even in the case of a venial sin, one must judge the action as a minor deviation from what God expects.  Something which is regarded as a “virtuous deed” cannot subjectively be “a sin” at all.  Here again Ratzinger’s disordered thoughts on homosexuality bring him to conclusions which conflict with classical moral theology.

Those who want to interact with this blog are invited to “Leave a Reply” below.  A solid way to begin doing this is to offer “readback lines.”  To do this, quickly glace back over the entire blog and pick out the one or two lines that have made a deep impression upon you.  Copy them [CTRL-C] and then paste them [CTRL-V] into an empty comment box below.  If you wish, signal the emotion that you feel when reading your readback lines.  The primary emotions are anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise.   No need to further explain yourself.  It is enough to identify the text important to you and to name the emotion(s) that it evokes.  All of this normally takes less than a few minutes.

I and others will “thank you” for your contribution.  If you are tempted to say more, I urge you to hold back.  Your sense of safety and the safety of others is best protected by not getting overly wordy in the beginning.  This will come after a few days or weeks.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Related Videos and Leave a Reply~~~~~~~~

Related Videos:

  • Mary McAleese, Irish Catholic Mother who Goes Up against the Church to protect her gay son, 24-minute video, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7laFwqGIvE
  • Stephen Fry, a British actor, who happens to be gay, offers this critique as part of the public debate in 2009 on the topic: Whether the Catholic Church is a force for good in the world,’ 20-minute video, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SJ6AV31MxA[ii]
  • What Would You Do?: Son comes out to Mormon family, 7-minute video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnY_V4X1C8M
  • Phil reacts to a father devastated when he found out that his son Zach wants to transition to biologically become a woman, 5-minute video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6AQ_85U7Q0

~~~~~~~~~Please remember, if you are an LGBT teen in need of help, the National Runaway Switchboard at 1-800-RUNAWAY can help you.

[i] The story continues at https://www.rollingstone.com/
culture/culture-news/the-forsaken-a-rising-number-of-homeless-gay-teens-are-being-cast-out-by-religious-families-46746/

[ii] Interested persons can find a shorter version and commentary here: http://www.thebodyissacred.org/body/obsession.asp

 

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The coming out experience

For lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender people, realizing their sexual orientation or gender identity and sharing that information with family and friends is often a gradual process that can unfold over a series of years. This section looks at the process of coming out—when and how it happens, how difficult it is, and what impact it has on relationships.

The vast majority of LGBT respondents (86%) say they have told one or more close friends about their sexual orientation or gender identity. And some 54% say all or most of the important people in their life know that they are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender.

There are large differences here across LGB groups. Lesbians and gay men are more likely than bisexuals to have told at least one close friend about their sexual orientation (96% of gay men and 94% of lesbians, compared with 79% of bisexuals). And they are much more likely to say that most of the people who are important to them know about this aspect of their life: 77% of gay men and 71% of lesbians say all or most people know, compared with 28% of bisexuals.

This section also explores the interactions LGBT adults have outside of their circles of family and close friends—in their communities and workplaces. Some seek out neighborhoods that are predominantly LGBT, but most do not. A majority of employed LGBT adults say their workplaces are accepting of people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Still, about half say only a few or none of their co-workers know about their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Ultimately, these journeys are personal and hard to quantify. Survey respondents were invited to elaborate on their experiences, and many of their stories are captured in an interactive feature on the Pew Research Center website.

Click here to view this important topic on the Pew Research Center site.

Those who want to interact with this blog are invited to “Leave a Reply” below.  A solid way to begin doing this is to offer “readback lines.”  To do this, quickly glace back over the entire blog and pick out the one or two lines that have made a deep impression upon you.  Copy them [CTRL-C] and then paste them [CTRL-V] into an empty comment box below.  If you wish, signal the emotion that you feel when reading your readback lines.  The primary emotions are anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise.   No need to further explain yourself.  It is enough to identify the text important to you and to name the emotion(s) that it evokes.  All of this normally takes less than a few minutes.

I and others will “thank you” for your contribution.  If you are tempted to say more, I urge you to hold back.  Your sense of safety and the safety of others is best protected by not getting overly wordy in the beginning.  This will come after a few days or weeks.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Leave a Reply~~~~~~~~

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No one can escape one’s experiential base

David was 7 years old and hoping to become a farmer like his dad.  Lisa was 12 and hoping to become a teacher like her mom.  A few years back, I was giving David and Lisa a tour of my garden.  Then, I lifted up a rock and, underneath, five pill bugs[i] came to life and began to flee.  I picked up one and placed it in the palm of my hand, and I showed them how the bug immediately curled up into a perfect little sphere.  “That’s why it’s called a pill bug.”

David came closer and attentively watched as the pill bug gradually felt safe enough to abandon its pill-shape [left side of pic] and to turn into a scaled bug crawling over my hand.  When this unexpected transformation took place, David was fascinated and came closer while Lisa backed away in fright.

I took the pill bug and placed it gently in David’s hand.  It immediately rolled itself into its pill-shaped defense.  Then David watched it attentively until it came out of hiding and began to crawl forward on his open hand.  He touched it briefly, and again the bug rolled itself into a “pill.”

I asked Lisa if she wanted to try this for herself.  “No way,” was her reply.  “I don’t want to be bitten by a nasty bug.”

Lessons learned from the pill bugs

I’m telling you this story to illustrate how, in the face of the pill bug, David and Lisa have massively different reactions.   Neither David nor Lisa had ever experienced pill bugs before.  David was attracted by the bugs and interested in their activity.  Lisa was repulsed by the bugs and drew back because she was afraid of being bitten.  She wanted to keep as far away from the bug as possible.  In her experience of bugs, they were almost always nasty and prone to bite her.  She wanted nothing to do with pill bugs.

For the purposes of our discussion here, let’s assume that the entire population can be divided into three subsets:

  1. DRs = those with David-like responses;
  2. LRs = those with Lisa-like responses;
  3. BiRs = those with a mixture of mild fascination and mild repulsion.

Imagine for a moment that you, the reader, have the opportunity to visit my garden in Cincinnati, Ohio, and that I, as part of your garden tour, would pick up a pill bug and set it in the palm of my hand. . . .  Just imagining this usually has the effect of letting you instinctively feel and know in advance whether you would be among the DRs who came forward to explore the pill bugs because they were experiencing a spontaneous fascination.  Likewise, my picture and story might be enough to persuade you that you were among the LRs who instinctively pulled back because they were experiencing an undeniable disgust.   Alternatively, perhaps you could say in advance that you would expect to find yourself among the small number of persons who are BiRs.

Now I want to invite you to do some speculation

Consider what it would take to convert a DR to a LR?  I imagine that this sort of conversion would be rare but not entirely impossible.  Once a positive attraction is rewarded and reinforced through repeated positive experiences, it is difficult to revert back to a frightened repulsion of pill bugs.  Only something very traumatic could wipe out the historical sequence of positive experiences.  I could imagine, for example, that a DR could read a medical report that proves that pill bugs are the carriers of a deadly disease.  Fear of contacting this disease would be sufficiently traumatic to cause a DR to pull back when spotting a pill bug.

Now, consider what it would take to convert a LR to a DR?  I imagine that this sort of conversion would be rare but moderately possible.  One would have to gain the trust of the LR and to gradually expose him/her to acknowledge some positive aspects of pill bugs.  Along the way, the LR would have to discover, vicariously, that the pill bug did not sting or bite.  Then, under the guidance of a trusted mentor, to cautiously come forward and to allow pill bugs to rest and foam on one’s hand.  Thus, with slow and gradual steps, the spontaneous negative repulsion could be gradually recognized for what it truly is, namely, as a fear and flight response based upon the irrational prejudice that the pill bug had a nasty bite.

I refer to the LR fear and flight response as based upon an irrational prejudice.  The pill bug does not, in fact, have a nasty bite.  Lisa’s repulsion was based upon her projection of a character trait that was never actually experienced.  Lisa’s fear of the unknown cannot compete with David’s delight in what is known.  David’s appreciation of pill bugs is not based upon an irrational projection.  It is based upon first-hand positive experiences.  In an open society where free and open judgments are arrived at freely, one could expect that the conversion rate to the DR position would, over a period of time, slowly overcome the conversion rate to the LR position.

Applying the pill bug experience with the homophobic experience

This is exactly what is happening in our society when it comes to responses to gays and lesbians.  At any given time, only a small portion (5 to 8 %) of men and women experience a same-sex attraction.  The majority of the population, meanwhile, is heterosexual and instinctively feels bewildered, perplexed, and repulsed by those who claim to have this attraction.  This homophobic reaction is an  instinctive response that operates very much like the LR.  As a result, LRs pull back in horror and are prone to amplify their fear and flight response.  When feeling attacked, LRs use their negative emotional energies to manufacture irrational projections.

Here is an example from a Christian website of how negative emotional energies are being creatively used to manufacture irrational projections.

As witnessed in the Bible in Genesis 19:1-11 [the story of why God decided to destroy Sodom], homosexuals are predatory, continually on the search for their next sexual experience. Homosexuals are characterized by morbid, unhealthy, sexual desire (which the Bible calls lasciviousness). Homosexuals are prone to multiple sex partners, because homosexuality is rooted in sex-addiction. I heard a homosexual say that “sex is sex, whether male or female.” May I say [in response], sex with the same sex is a horrible sin, and a form of mental illness[ii] caused by spiritual rebellion against God and His holy Word.

The author defines all homosexuals as “predatory,” as “characterized by morbid, unhealthy sexual desire,” and as “rooted in sex-addiction.”  These characteristics would better apply to pediphiliacs or nymphomaniacs.  The latter might indeed say, “sex is sex, whether male or female.” Only in the last line does the author touch on homosexuality as such and here is labeled as “a horrible sin” and a “mental illness”[ii] caused by “spiritual rebellion against God.”  So this brings up back to Gen 19:1-11 where the men in town (seemingly all homosexuals) rape the virgin daughters of Lot.  The author does not seem to notice that the crime here is that “gang rape” is being used to send the message to Lot that “visitors [angels actually] are not welcome here in Sodom.”  Gang violence has nothing to do with any of the two dozen homosexual lovers that I know personally.  This author clearly has had a different experience.  Of this, we learn nothing. The author alludes to Gen 19:1-11 but forgets to label homosexuals as “prone to gang violence.”

God inspired the prophet Ezekiel to say why He brought those cities to ruin. “Now this was the sin of … Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen” (Ezekiel 16:49–50, NIV).

Here is another example where work-place experiences are in the forefront:

The secular workplace is hell-on-earth for many Christians, because of constant harassment in a hostile work environment being around the wicked. God-fearing Christians and the unrepentant wicked don’t mix! Gays are disrespecting Christians every time that they wave their filthy lifestyle in our faces. There’s no way that sexually deviate, left-wing, liberal, homosexuals can co-exist with conservative, Bible-minded, Christians.[iii]

The author here fails to say precisely what is meant by waving “their filthy lifestyle in our faces.”  Does a female worker with a 5×7 pic of her female spouse and two daughters on her desk fit this definition?  Maybe so.  Think about it.  In a world of LRs, it would be downright insensitive and repulsive to have a framed pic of pill bugs on your desk.  Is this what the author means by “constant harassment in a hostile work environment being around the wicked.”  Clearly the business world is “uncomfortable” hearing about gay and lesbian marriages unless it is buffered by the smoldering hostility of “jokes.”

  • Nearly two-thirds (62%) of LGBT employees heard lesbian and gay jokes at work, while 43% heard bisexual jokes and 40% heard transgender jokes.26
  • Nearly three quarters (70%) of non-LGBT employees believe it is “unprofessional” to discuss sexual orientation or gender identity in the workplace.  [“Don’t ask; don’t tell?”] 27
  • LGBT people often cover or downplay aspects of their authentic selves (e.g., hiding personal relationships, changing the way they dress or speak) in order to avoid discrimination.28
  • When applying for jobs, LGBT people often conceal information about their sexual orientation or gender identity from their résumés in order to avoid bias or discrimination—especially people of color (12%), people with disabilities (15.5%), and young people between 18 and 24 years old (18.7%).29

Despite this persistence of old values, the Pew Research Report of 2013 indicates tremendous strides forward when it come to the social acceptance of LGBTQ persons.  Here is why this is so:

In the eyes of LGBT adults, greater social acceptance has come as a result of more Americans knowing someone who is lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender as well as the efforts of high-profile public figures. A large majority (70%) says individuals simply knowing someone who is LGBT has helped a lot in terms of making society as a whole more accepting. Similar-sized majorities say well-known public figures—both LGBT (67%) and non-LGBT (66%)—have helped change societal views.

In an open society where free and open judgments are arrived at through open discussion, one could expect that the conversion rate to the DR position would outmatch the conversion rate to the LR position.  This is exactly what has happened in the past fifty years.  As heterosexuals have personal contacts with gays and lesbians living among them as neighbors, as co-workers, and as dedicated Christians, they quickly realize that the fear and flight of their earlier years were based upon irrational projections.  As a result, based upon studies such as the Pew Research Center, all sectors of society are gradually gravitating toward becoming DRs because this position is based upon first-hand positive experiences that are not distorted by false projections and irrational fears.

Respondents were asked about the various factors that may have contributed to increased acceptance of people who are LGBT. Individual relationships and the role of well-known public figures are viewed as being the most helpful things in terms of fostering acceptance. Fully seven-in-ten LGBT adults say people knowing someone who is lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender helps a lot, and 24% say this helps a little.

 

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How do these conversions take place?  To understand them, one has to recognize that everyone undergoing a conversion has a personal story to tell.  With this in mind, I want to share a few of my own conversion stories and then to draw some general conclusions.

My conversion away from being a Jew-hater

My early religious training within Catholic schools and my early cultural training in an ethnic suburb of Cleveland at the outbreak of World War II made it quite natural for me to pity, to blame, and to despise Jews.[iv]  Had I been bombarded by Hitler’s speeches blaming and shaming Jews, I would undoubtedly have cheered him on.  The greater part of my family and neighbors would have done the same.  In point of fact, however, I never had contact with a single living Jew. But, then, in an unexpected moment, a real flesh and blood Jew, Mr. Martin, made his way into my life.

Mr. Martin agreed to employ me part‑time as a stock‑boy in his dry goods store on East 185th Street in Cleveland, Ohio.  I had just turned 16, and I desperately needed a larger income than my Cleveland Plain Dealer route had been able to afford me; hence, I felt lucky to have landed this new job.  On the other hand, I was anxious upon learning that Mr. Martin was “a Jew”. Would he exploit me?  Could he treat a Christian fairly?  Would he want me to work on Sundays[v] or on other religious holidays?

Over the months I was testing Mr. Martin and, unbeknownst to me, he was testing me as well.  One evening, after closing, I was sweeping the floors when I found a crumpled twenty-dollar bill under a counter.  My starting salary was fifty cents per hour, and twenty dollars represented a lot of money for a teenager in 1955.  Yet, without thinking twice, my Christian instincts took hold, and I turned the money over to Mr. Martin “lest someone come asking whether anyone has found it.”  It didn’t even enter my mind that the money might become mine if no one claimed it or that I might receive a reward if someone did.

As for my tests, Mr. Martin passed with flying colors.  He was genuinely sensitive to my religious convictions and school obligations when it came to scheduling my work hours.  He treated me fairly, at times even generously, and this disarmed all my earlier reservations.  In fact, I gradually came to admire Mr. Martin, and this admiration presented me with a new problem–a theological problem.  I knew that God had slated all Jews for eternal damnation because of what they did to Jesus.  I also knew that Jews couldn’t go to confession to obtain pardon for such a grievous sin.  On the other hand, it seemed unfair, somehow, that God should hold Mr. Martin guilty for such a crime.  If Mr. Martin did not harm me, even in little ways, how could he have ever consented to handing an innocent man over to Roman torturers two thousand years ago?  Thus began my soul-searching journey to try and find a way to rescue just one Jew from the fires of hell.

 

 

What do you learn from my story?  You might want to stop reading here and write down a few of your thoughts before continuing.  When finished, click on this endnote to see what I wrote.[vi]

 

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[i] The pill bug is the only crustacean that can spend its entire life on land. Their shells look like armor and they are known for their ability to roll into a ball. Sometimes children call them rollie-pollies. Most pill bugs live for up to two years. They are most active at night.  They do not carry diseases or contaminate food.

[ii] Before 1973, homosexuality was considered as a “mental illness”, at least by the psychiatrists that authored edition 2 of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-II).  In edition 3, it was reclassified as normal

[iii] I leave it to my reader to discover the multiple layers of suspicion and misinformation that have been brought together in this example.  Source=http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/
Evils%20in%20America/Sodomy/how_to_respond.htm

[iv] Since I attended Catholic schools from kindergarden on up, religious training was very significant for me and for my parents as well.  From the Gospels, I learned that the Pharisees were Jews that stubbornly opposed Jesus and his teaching.  I pitied Jews because of this.  They had locked themselves within a false religion and would be judged by God on the Last Day for their bad judgment.  When bad things happened to Jews, therefore, it seemed to me that they were getting what they justly deserved.  No one ever told me that most contemporary Jews were not like the Pharisees and that Judaism had been changing for two thousand years after the death of Jesus.  As a result, when I heard the Gospel stories of how Jesus clashed with the Pharisees, I thought that I was discovering how living Jews were mindless hypocrites who opposed the moderation in Jesus’ message.  When I interacted with Jews, therefore, I was projecting upon them the mindset found in the Gospels.  As a result, I was highly critical of Judaism for a long time before I actually met my first Jew.

[v] In 1955, my family and I attended Holy Cross Catholic Church. I remember that the Sunday sermons often contained admonitions not to violate the 3rd Commandment by doing unnecessary work on the “Lord’s Day” (known as “the day of rest”).  Our sermons distinguished between necessary and unnecessary work.  Necessary work included mom’s preparing family meals and children washing the dishes.  Some dads had to work as firemen or policemen.  Unnecessary work consisted of activities like “mowing the lawn” or “painting the house” or “shopping for food”—things that could easily be taken care of on Saturdays.  At this point of time, most stores and shopping malls were closed on Sundays.   Happily Mr. Martin’s Dry Goods Store was among them.

I have not heard from the pulpit an admonition to refrain from unnecessary work on Sundays for the past forty years.  It reveals something about myself when I say that I kept this practice faithfully into the 1990s when members of my own family began to playfully chide me for maintaining a “rigorist mindset.”

[vi] Here is what I learn from my story:

  • While I was growing up as a good, practicing Catholic, I could not be relied upon to correctly understand Judaism and Jews because my pious upbringing was shot-through with misinformation and prejudices.
  • The conviction that I belonged to the “true religion” is not a protection against the “toxic errors” hidden within the fabric of my tradition.
  • When I encountered my first Jew, Mr. Martin, I doubted that he would be able to treat me and my religious obligations fairly.  Mr. Martin, on the other hand, was uncertain whether I could be trusted in money matters.
  • My spontaneous honesty when turning in the $20 without expecting a reward changed the way that Mr. Martin regarded me. Martin also passed my tests with flying colors.

Only when I began to admire Mr. Martin did I, for the first time, feel concerned about his financial and eternal welfare. The breakdown of my anti-Jewish prejudices came only because I had met one Jew that did not deserve eternal hellfire.

Those who want to interact with this blog are invited to “Leave a Reply” below.  A solid way to begin doing this is to offer “readback lines.”  To do this, quickly glace back over the entire blog and pick out the one or two lines that have made a deep impression upon you.  Copy them [CTRL-C] and then paste them [CTRL-V] into an empty comment box below.  If you wish, signal the emotion that you feel when reading your readback lines.  The primary emotions are anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise.   No need to further explain yourself.  It is enough to identify the text important to you and to name the emotion(s) that it evokes.  All of this normally takes less than a few minutes.

I and others will “thank you” for your contribution.  If you are tempted to say more, I urge you to hold back.  Your sense of safety and the safety of others is best protected by not getting overly wordy in the beginning.  This will come after a few days or weeks.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Leave a Reply~~~~~~~~

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Invitation to a lesbian vow ceremony

     I now jump forward to 1978.  Two women in my parish that were very well known to me (let me affectionately call them Martha and Mary) approached me and invited me to join with a dozen others at their home in order to witness their “vows of permanent friendship.”[i]  They asked me not to publicize this event since, for them, this was very private, “We don’t want to share our love with those in our faith community who might find this unsettling.”

My mind thought of a Jesus tradition

My mind thought of the Gospel story where Jesus was invited to heal the servant of a Roman officer in the occupying army.  Undoubtedly, Jesus did not agree with the brutality associated with Roman occupation; yet, since Jewish elders commended him saying, “He is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he built us our synagogue” (Luke 7:5), he went.  He went not to approve the Roman occupation but to respond to an authentic human need.  He may have received flack for it later; yet, Jesus was accustomed to disapproval and didn’t act to get the applause of others.

Another Jesus tradition came to mind

My mind also thought of the Gospel story where a menstruating woman came up behind Jesus and touched the tassels of his cloak.  According to the Jewish tradition, menstruation was no light matter.  Leviticus makes it clear that any woman in this condition has no business touching anyone or she would instantly make them “unclean.” As for men, any man deliberately having sexual relations with a menstruating woman was to be sentenced to death (Lev. 18:19; 20:18). Yet, Jesus appears to have regarded menstruation much differently.

Maybe his own parents, Mary and Joseph, already had a private opinion whereby they judged that the needs of others allowed them to override the rule of menstrual impurity.  Mary, for instance, may have visited a sick friend during her period “because she needed her” and was quite confident “that God would understand.”  In any case, Jesus does not upbraid the woman and use this occasion to enforce the importance of God’s commandments regarding menstrual impurity. The unexpected happens.  Instead of contaminating Jesus with her “impurity,” healing power flows from him to her.   He congratulates her saying, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace” (Luke 8:48 and par.).  Jesus names her as “Daughter of Israel” and applauds “her faith” that made her well.

This was not just an ordinary menstrual flow, to be sure.  She had been afflicted with an unregulated menses for the last twelve years.  In effect, she was a shut-in and unable to touch her husband or her children or her parents for that whole period.  When she spots Jesus, she can’t afford to speak or to be recognized by anyone who might know her.  She shouldn’t be out.  If discovered, she might be stoned.  Her journey out of her home is nothing short of an act of desperation.  She risks concealing herself in her garments, and she persuades herself that touching the fringes of his garment will go unnoticed.  This is “the faith” that impels her act of courage.

Martha and Mary exchange vows as permanent partners

So, prompted by these thoughts, I accepted the invitation of Martha and Mary.  When I arrived at their home, the couple greeted me warmly.  I enjoyed meeting others who were invited.  Most were already known to me.  Their ceremony was simple.  They emphasized that what they were promising to each other was not “marriage”[ii] but a “permanent partnership.”  They also mentioned that they were living in dangerous times wherein they could be easily punished for what they were now doing; yet, it seemed to them that, after twelve years, there should at least be a few whom they trusted who could witness “before God who they were and who they intended to be for each other.”  Accordingly, they joined hands and faced each other and promised an exclusive friendship and fidelity in sickness and in health for the rest of their lives.  They then exchanged rings as “a visible sign” of their permanent partnership.

During the rite, I imagined the fear and foreboding which Christians of the early centuries might have felt when they gathered together to witness marriages between free persons and slaves–a situation punishable by death according to Roman Law.  The early Christians felt that, within the community, the distinction between “Jew and Gentile, freeborn and slave” (Col. 3:11, Gal. 3:28) had been abolished by Christ.  Therefore, in their determination to serve God rather than men (Acts 3), they decided to witness and honor marriages of love which, in the eyes of Roman law, were acts of infamy.

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[i] They thought of themselves as exchanging “vows of permanent friendship” because, in this period, “marriage” was not yet seen as a possibility for same-sex couples.  These “vows” had no legal status.  If I were to speak for them, what they needed was a sense that, in an antagonistic society, at least a few people knew who they were and what their intentions were for each other.

[ii]The language of “marriage” was embraced because it would be advantageous to give same-sex unions an equal status before the law with heterosexual unions.  If this were not done, then every aspect of “same-sex unions” would have to be debated and voted on piece by piece—income tax law, visitation rights in hospitals, adoption rights, inheritance rights, etc.   This would have taken years.  To prevent this, all the rights of heterosexual couples had to be transferred whole and entire.

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An early encounter with a lesbian couple

An early encounter with a lesbian couple

     My second encounter took place in 1968 when I was doing graduate  studies in Berkeley, California, the hotbed of social experimentation.  In the context of a course, Human Sexuality, our professor invited a lesbian couple in their late 20s to share their stories.  Both women gave detailed accounts of growing up in middle-class families, of dating boys, and of discovering that they had little or no emotional interest in getting closer to boys.  What they did relish, however, was a series of crushes with girls.  As such, they gradually realized that they were “abnormal.” Then, they met each other on the Berkeley campus and secretly felt strongly attracted to each other.  With time, this hesitantly revealed the “abnormality” of their mutual attraction to each other.  This was a great relief and jubilation because they finally had found someone who validated their same-sex attraction.  The explosive sex that followed was a confirmation of what they had always dreamed of and never thought possible.  Even before they had a word to describe themselves, therefore, they had plunged into a committed union. I thank God that I had this very positive experience at a time when I was still only mildly hostile toward lesbians and gays. Here are some of the ways that I was touched by this encounter:

  1. The stories of these two women persuaded me that most or all lesbians are not scratching messages on bathroom walls nor answering ads for sexual encounters. Indeed, it illustrated for me how most lesbians are initially confused and afraid when they discover how “out of step”  they are with respect to the rest of their companions, whom they would describe as “normal” in so far as they embody the “norm” as far as sexual attraction is concerned.
  2. Prior to this encounter, I was under the impression that a “normal” person could spot a “queer” a mile away.  All one had to do was to notice the effeminate gestures in boys or the absence of femininity in girls.  With these two normally attractive women, there was nothing about the way they dressed, moved, or behaved that allowed me to even get a hint that they identified themselves as lesbians.  They had to tell me, or else I would never have known.  Hence, this encounter enabled me to challenge and to give up a stereotype that was dangerous and misleading.
  3. Thirdly, this experience opened up a whole new world that had been hitherto “closed to me.”  I was now talking and listening across the boundaries.  I was now hearing how these two women had moved from “trying desperately to fit in”[i] by imitating the coy and flirtatious mannerisms exhibited by their female friends.  Then, after years of frustration due to their inability to have a deep, emotional bond with a male, they slowly came to the frightening realization that they were “queer.” This destroyed any positive self-image that was left to them.  Now they hated who they were.  They cringed at the prospect of having to tell their closest friends or their parents that they were “lesbians.”
  4. Fourthly, there was the “ecstatic realization” that there were others out there like themselves who might welcome an intimate relationship with them.  After many trials and errors, they eventually recognized their “soul mate” for the first time.  This realization came so naturally and so spontaneously—without any effort.  They were overwhelmingly surprised that another human being could mutually feel what they feel and cherish them to the core of their being.  Mutual love blossomed and ushering in a self-acceptance and self-surrender that exceeded human understanding.  This is what “falling in love” is all about.
  5. Fifthly, I came to realize from their stories that, even given the healing power of love, this lesbian couple still had disagreements, they sometimes hurt each other, and they felt pangs of jealousy–the whole host of human emotions that heterosexual romances pass through.
  6. Sixthly, in the months following this encounter, I realized how tragically mistaken it was for the hierarchy of my Church to presume that they could accurately judge what was lawful before God and what were the appropriate life-style choices for lesbians.  Deeply listening to these two women made me feel humble and utterly unable to offer them any sound guidance whatsoever.  Anyone who listens deeply to their story knows first-hand how inappropriate and dangerous it would be to rush forward and propose “solutions” or “judgments” that originate in my male, heterosexual way of seeing things.
  7. Finally, after a few years, I realized that for me, as a heterosexual male, it was far easier to imagine lesbian sex than to imagine gay sex.  I remember the shock that I felt when, in my late-twenties, I first saw a handsome Black man walking in the park with his arm around a blond White girl.  My head told me that a man’s ability to love and to cherish someone is not determined by the color of his skin.  My gut, on the other hand, was churning and screaming out, “Something is very wrong here!”  I had to deliberately imagine myself as being that Black man and imagining for myself the pride and joy of having a companion like the girl I saw that day.  Gradually, over a period of months, I was able to quiet my gut feelings and to replace them with feelings of pride and joy.  I share this experience because it indicates the route whereby I was able to gradually diminish the “utter disgust” that male-to-male sex evoked in my gut.

Those who want to interact with this blog are invited to “Leave a Reply” below.  A solid way to begin doing this is to offer “readback lines.”  To do this, quickly glace back over the entire blog and pick out the one or two lines that have made a deep impression upon you.  Copy them [CTRL-C] and then paste them [CTRL-V] into an empty comment box below.  If you wish, signal the emotion that you feel when reading your readback lines.  The primary emotions are anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise.   No need to further explain yourself.  It is enough to identify the text important to you and to name the emotion(s) that it evokes.  All of this normally takes less than a few minutes.

I and others will “thank you” for your contribution.  If you are tempted to say more, I urge you to hold back.  Your sense of safety and the safety of others is best protected by not getting overly wordy in the beginning.  This will come after a few days or weeks.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Endnotes and Leave a Reply~~~~~~~~

[i] To appreciate the full scope of “fitting in” to the dominant heterosexual culture, consider reflecting on “30+ Examples of Heterosexual Privilege in the US” (http://itspronouncedmetrosexual.com/2012/01/29-examples-of-heterosexual-privilege/).