I know. When pigs fly. But imagine just for the next four paragraphs that bacon has wings.
It’s five years in the future and the issue of homosexuality has been settled once and for all. Clergy, theologians and scholars from every denomination and faith tradition have come together agreeing without exception that there exists no biblical prohibition against homosexuality, but that in God’s creation there is a diversity within human sexuality. In response to their conclusions, they call all faith communities worldwide to a season of repentance and to begin the reconciliation process with their GLBTQ brothers and sisters. Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and James Dobson hold a joint news conference that opens with the words “We were wrong,” and a televised live feed from the Vatican shows a contrite and tearful Pope nodding in affirmation.
Change happens quickly. There are no longer any GLBTQ denominational organizations or congregations proclaiming themselves to be gay-affirming because all denominations and every church is now fully welcoming to the lives, ministries, and relationships of GLBTQ people. Focus on the Family has finally begun to focus their ministry and resources on equipping and supporting all families. Pastors that had been publicly removed from their positions because of their sexuality return to the pulpit. Families once torn apart by the conflict over erroneous religious teaching and sexual orientation are restored in forgiveness and grace. The church begins as never before in history to live out the kingdom of God on earth where all people are fully loved, received, and cared for as God’s own beloved.
As other sectors of life and society witness the transformation unfolding among people of faith, policies and attitudes around the world change. Legal marriage and adoption are opened to same-sex couples. Gays wishing to serve in the military do so, responding to the Armed Forces new slogan, “Ask or tell, it’s no big deal.” GLBTQ people are represented positively in movies, print, and on TV. It’s finally revealed in a delightful one-hour special on the Disney Channel that Goofy and Pluto have been together for years and are the chosen godparents to Donald’s nephews Hewy, Dewy, and Lewy. National Coming Out Day is officially discontinued because all the closets have long since been emptied.
Your mom calls. “When is my favorite daughter and daughter-in-law coming over for a visit? We haven’t seen you two since your wedding day and we’d like to have a little get-together with our church friends and neighbors so they can meet the happy new couple! Oh, and your uncle Bob and his partner will be making their yummy guacamole!”
Imagine that was all true and that it all happened tomorrow. You stumble out of bed and drink your morning coffee in a brand new world where gay, straight, bisexual, and transgendered are all held as equal. Nice to think about huh? But here’s what I wonder. I wonder if that, all of that, would be enough to settle the question for you once and for all? Could you then stop doubting that God loves you as you are? Could you let go of that nagging question that makes you ask of God or yourself, “Am I okay? Is this alright? Am I wrong? What if I’m wrong?”
You know what? I don’t think so for the same reasons I sometimes question my own worth or why I’m truly surprised sometimes to look in the mirror and not see the 325 pound version of me as I wrote about yesterday. As a heavy child, a big teenager, and a morbidly obese adult in this world I took a lot of messages into my mind that didn’t automatically fall away with the lost weight. The name calling, the attempts and the failures at weight loss, the guilt and shame of people looking at me and believing they were judging me based on my body. Some of you might totally relate to the weight experience and for others it might be something completely different but for all of us, to one extent or another we deal regularly or rarely with the old messages that play in our minds and our hearts around our sexuality.
Up to the day we realized we were gay most of us heard little but negative messages around homosexuality from our families and in our churches. There was no question the Bible explicitly condemned homosexuality and for some of us, the church taught homosexuality was more than a sin but among the worst of all sins. We’ve heard our share of gay jokes and under-the-breath comments like “Look at that guy over there. What a fairy.” or “Geeze, is that a man or a woman?! What a queer!” The media is littered daily with stories on banning gays from the military, protecting the institution of marriage (and civilization as we know it) from homosexuals, or of another hate crime against a queer or transgendered youth. On TV Christian organizations raise millions by instilling fear in their Christian viewers with false stereotypes of gays and the threat of our non-existent gay agenda. All those messages have found their way, and continue to find their way into us, so that even if everything in the world changed tomorrow, all that clutter would still be there. That’s why it’s in our hearts and minds that the real change needs to come, to learn to separate the sound of old messages from the voice of God and to renew our minds so that the old messages are replaced with new ones that bring assurance instead of doubt.
What I’d like to do over the next few entries is look at alternate ways of understanding ourselves and our sexuality that goes against the voices that occasionally chatter in our heads, and that we begin by putting aside any messages that suggest our sexuality is sin or happenstance and that we receive it instead as a holy and unique calling of God; allowing ourselves to believe that being gay isn’t simply okay with God but that it’s by God’s design and for God’s purpose we’re GLBTQ people.
And yes, I promise. I’ll make every effort in the world to be more brief in my writing. I realize I’m breaking all the rules around good blogging with these ridiculously long posts so I’ll work on shorter ones. You’re being so patient with me!
I remember seeing the words “morbidly obese” on my medical chart for the first time when I was in the sixth grade. Though I didn’t fully understand what the words meant I pieced together it wasn’t good. No one had ever called me “obese” before, but as the biggest girl in all my elementary school classes I was familiar with “Fatso”, “Lard Butt”, and “Fatty Fatty Two By Four” and I felt reasonably sure “morbidly obese” was somehow connected. I was the slowest in gym class and the last to be chosen for any team sports. Except dodge ball. I was a demon in dodge ball. I went home in tears from Campfire Girls one afternoon because the safety pin that held my Campfire Girl skirt together had popped open and I was so embarrassed someone might see the gap at the top of my skirt I left the jabbing pin in my waist until after the meeting.
High school wasn’t any better, only now the kids who teased me were bigger and meaner and by my teens I’d outgrown youth sizes and had to resort to buying clothes at maternity stores. I don’t know about your high school but cotton jumpers decorated with little ducks were never in fashion at mine. As an adult my weight continued to climb which made me feel increasingly bad about myself, which sent me to the food to feel better or feel nothing at all, which caused me to gain more weight and so the cycle continued until at the age of 43 when I found myself on the upside of 325 pounds.
No matter how many wonderful things were going on in my life or the number of remarkable people who surrounded me, I was conscious of my size every minute of the day. Children would point at the fat lady. Adult strangers would scowl at me in disgust. Clothing continued to be impossible to find and climbing a single flight of stairs left me sweaty and painfully gasping for air. I had heart pain and high blood pressure. I had the added humiliation of not fitting through store turnstiles, of requiring an extension belt on airplanes, and being reminded every time I turned on the TV or opened a magazine or simply went out into the world and mixed with the general population that I wasn’t like everyone else. I know there are large-sized men and rubenesque women with a healthy self-esteem and body image. I wish I could have been one of them but I wasn’t. Instead I was miserable and not at all fond of myself.
At the age of 43 I joined a support group, worked a spiritual program, ate healthy and moderately one day at a time, and lost 140 pounds by the grace of God and a break between meals. For the past eight years I’ve had no problem buying clothes. I no longer worry about whether I’ll fit behind a restaurant booth or in an airplane seat or through a turnstile. At the first of the year my doctor reported that after looking over all the test results from my physical exam I was in remarkable health. Children no longer point and shout “Mommy! Look at that big lady!” and when I’m out in the world strangers return my smile with one of their own. I work out at the gym, I ride my bike, and I walk for miles at a time and feel great. The self-loathing is gone. I’m grateful for my life and my health and most days when I look in the mirror I feel really comfortable with who I’m seeing looking back at me.
But not all the time. There are still those times, rare though they might be, when I go into a new setting and wonder if people there are thinking about how big I am. I obsess that the clerk at the clothing store thinks I don’t belong in her store even though the clothes I’m carrying to the dressing room are the same size as the clothes in my closet at home that happen to fit me with ease. There are still those times when I feel fat. Why?
I had nearly 43 years of being conditioned to relate to the world and to myself as a “morbidly obese” person and that doesn’t change overnight. For 43 years children pointed and people starred. For 43 years I stood out in a crowd for no other reason than because of my weight and that made me feel different. I was identified in the world as a fat person and if that were just a neutral observation then that would be one thing but in our culture fat comes burdened down with an arsenal of groundless value judgments, and those damaging messages driven into anyone over a lifetime are bound to occasionally and randomly rewind and play again. When that happens, there’s a choice as to how to respond; listen to the old messages and let them determine how I see myself or when the old messages start up stop and remind myself that’s what they are, old messages that aren’t any more true of me today than they were when I walked in the world as a 325 pound woman. Just because I feel a certain way doesn’t mean those feelings reflect what’s actually true and so it’s important I find ways to come back to the center of what is true when the minions in my head start kicking up the dust.
So this is a little story from my life but I share it with you for a very different reason other than just spilling my personal beans. It’s kind of a quirky little way of leading into a bigger conversation on the old messages that keep bubbling up to the surface for some of us as we walk the Christian journey as GLBTQ people. I know the correlation probably seems beyond obscure at the moment which was confirmed for me by the puzzled “Huh?” look D had when she read it but come back tomorrow and give me another chance. I promise to not be so vague or metaphor-ish.
I’ve only entered two other races in my short “athletic” career. I completed a half-marathon a couple summers ago which turned out to be a miserable experience due to ridiculously hot weather that slowed me to a pace considered competitive only among potato bugs. By the time I crossed the finish line there were four cheering spectators remaining consisting of D and three friends while the majority of the other competitors and hoards of former spectators were already stationed in an air-conditioned restaurant somewhere chugging down glasses of ice water and munching on chips and salsa.
Several months later I entered a full-marathon in Portland, Oregon, but due to an ankle injury which I’d like to report was from a failed parachute landing rather than an unsuccessful curb step up, I was forced to drop out at mile 12. The pain was making me whimper like a little puppy, the sight and sound of which was depressing the spectators and putting a royal damper on the whole affair.
That’s my long and checkered athletic racing career which led up to Sunday’s 9 miler at Big Sur, and I’m happy to report that not only did I finish the race 238th in a pack of 500 (so what if I had to trip a few to pass them), I had a great time every mile of the way. The weather was amazing and with the course running along the shore of the Pacific Ocean the scenery was eye-popping stunning.
The day’s events included not only the 26.2 mile marathon open to individuals and relay teams and the 9-mile walk/run, but there was also a 5K run and a 10.6 walk/run. The races all had different starting lines; the full marathon and 10.6 mile walk/run were point to point races, meaning they started 26.2 and 10.6 miles out from where the finish line was located; while the 5K and the 9-miler were loop races so that the starting lines ending up morphing into the finishing lines. While all the races had staggered start times, at some point in the morning we were all out on our respective courses at the same time which is quite an amazing feeling to know you’re out on the same road at the same time with the gazelles.
I hadn’t thought all this through before the race since I was just focused on my little part, and in the minutes prior to the race my entire thinking capacity revolved exclusively around calculating when would be the last possible second I could squeeze in one final trip to the porta-potty, gadging whether my shoe laces were too loose or too tight, and scanning the other participants to see if there was anyone who looked like they might possibly be slower than me. It wasn’t until I was less than a half mile from the finish line that what was about to happen dawned on me.
Even before I could see the finish line with its huge inflated vinyl finisher’s arch, I could hear the music and crowds of people cheering just over the rise of the approaching hill and with every step closer more spectators began to gather, waving and applauding and shouting “Good job! You look great! Keep going, you’re almost there!” As we neared the finish line people were standing three rows deep on either side, held back by bright blue waist-high crowd control barriers, and the collective noise of the crowds, a band playing live music, and the announcer on the public sound system was overwhelming and thrilling at the same time. And that’s when I got it. Everyone out on the course that day had run different distances and started at different times but we were all going to be crossing the same finish line…together.
And sure enough, the timing was such that at the very moment I ran under the finisher’s gate, the first few elite marathon runners were crossing over it too. The crowds were cheering like crazy for these incredible athletes who’d just finished running 26.2 in nearly the same time it had taken me to hobble through 9 miles, and because I knew it was for them and not for me I instinctively put my head down and began to shuffle off to the side. The weird thing, no, the amazing thing, was even though the color of my runner’s bib designated me as a competitor in the 9-mile event, when I looked up at the crowds, there were strangers looking right at me, smiling and cheering and saying “Good for you, congratulations!” and the volunteers in their neon green teeshirts at the finisher’s line patted me on the back as they cheered and pointed me toward the row of young people who were there to slip the finisher’s medals around our necks. It didn’t matter what race we’d run or whether we came in first or last; everyone who had entered a race and finished was cheered across the finish line, everyone was greeted with the same enthusiasm by the teams of volunteers, and everyone had a medal slipped around their neck, no medal larger or grander than the other.
On the course that day were a thousand stories. There were athletes who train all their lives for these events and who set personal bests nearly every time their feet strike the asphalt. For some people this marathon was nothing more than an event to keep them loose and ready for the next major marathon they’re planning to run. For others this was their first time to ever enter a race in their lives and they cared more about just crossing the finishing line than how long it would take them to get there. Hansi, a 65 year old woman I’ve known for the past several years completed the full marathon in 3:52 minutes, taking first place in her age division; an achievement she repeats over and over again at the various marathons she participates in around the world every year. Brandon, my 33 year old best male friend in this or any other universe, walked the 9-miler with me despite two blown out knees and chronic pain. There was a man walking with his arm secured in a sling following a recent rotator cuff operation. There was a blind person, a severely overweight woman, a 92 year old man. Everyone that came to the race that day had a different story and a different reason for being there, but we all did our best and were all rewarded when our race was done.
The metaphor here is a no-brainer. Obvious but all the same brought to life for me as I walked the course on Sunday on a brilliantly gorgeous coastal day. The race isn’t the same for everyone. God calls each of us to a plan and a course designed just for our life. You might curve to the right, while I loop around to the left. You might run miles more than I will ever walk, but in the end we’ll find ourselves crossing the same finish line to receive an equal reward from a God who is waiting to welcome us all with the very same joy, pride, and boundless delight.
Yes, I believe that. I gave up the notion of a God of retribution and reward a long time ago for a God who responds not to human merit, sacrifice or works, but acts out of divine mercy and grace originating within and flowing out of the very being of God. Since the same thing awaits us all at the finish line does that mean all reason to do our best is gone? Not at all. On Sunday I did my best despite knowing others would run circles around me and that I’d cross a finish line and get a medal and a finisher’s shirt too. Those had already been promised to me. Just as life everlasting has already been promised through the gift of God given through Christ. No, on Sunday I gave it my best because it was too wonderful of a day to not have done so, to have not honored the race by giving it all I had to give it that day.
I want to walk with Christ each day committed to doing my very best in every moment and of giving my all, not driven to secure a greater reward but compelled by the gratitude of knowing that what awaits is freely given because so great is God’s love, so marvelous is Christ’s gift. It’s grace that makes me want to do my best. To know that whatever my best, your best, in today is enough and is all that God would ever ask of us. A part of the race is behind us.There’s nothing that can be done to change it and so we do what Paul suggests in Philippians 3. We look forward, keeping our eyes focused on what lies ahead. All we have is the next foot fall, the next step on the course that leads to someplace and to something more than we could ever imagine or dream. Today is the day. The race is before us, and I’m honored to be sharing the journey with you!
I just want to do my best in this life. Today I want to love and follow God with all that I am, giving Him my best
Whether others accomplish more (which begs the question who determines what accomplishments
This weekend I’m in Monterey Bay for the Big Sur International Marathon and no, I’m not putting 26.2 miles on these precious piddy-pats of mine, particularly since the route follows Hwy 101 along the coast between Big Sur and Carmel making for one ridiculously hilly course. Instead I’m going to be sashaying my sweet little self on the 9-miler walk/run which is more than enough for me, thank you very much. Even so, I still need to be at the starting line by 7:45 a.m. I was hoping for a start time of 10 or 11 but for some reason these wacked-out sporty-type people think being competitive means getting up before dawn and standing in the cold with a mess of other adrenalin-amped knuckleheads who are hopping up and down and draped in plastic garbage bags in a pathetic attempt to stave off frostbite. If it weren’t for the bright and shiny bling they hand out at the finish line and that I get to spend the race accompanied by my most awesome friend Brandon, I’d be waking up just in time to clear the hotel before check-out time.
But as it is, I’m here and admittedly having a most excellent time. The weather is California spring perfect; warm weather, cool breeze, blue skies. It was so beautimous this morning that I went out for a one mile wog (that’s what I do…kind of walk kind of jog kind of look like a clumsy oaf) followed by a 20 mile bike ride.
I didn’t rent the bike intending to ride 20 miles (my rear end was rather startled by the distance too) but the wonder of the day kept wooing me to just go a little further to see what was up around the next bend and so I did, bend after bend after bend and I was never disappointed. The colony of seals barking as they lazily rolled from blubbery side to blubbery side on the sun-warmed rock jetty, the bright fushia ground cover of lampranthus set against the background of the blue ocean, children wading in tide pools scooped out of the rock formations lining the shoreline, a working lighthouse, an old woman dressed in a soiled painter’s coat capturing the watery landscape with brushes of paint and a tightly stretched canvas, and people everywhere; kayaking along the shore, biking, walking, running, strolling, climbing on beach rocks, everyone just as wooed by the day as I had been. We were collectively enchanted by the visual beauty, won over by the sounds of squawking seagulls and barking seals, and smitten by the thick sweet smell of the budding ice plant mixed with the salty freshness of the ocean. It was all so spectacular that with every spin of the bike wheels I heard myself saying out loud because I simply couldn’t keep it in, “oh amazing look at that good job God oh my goodness I can’t believe how beautiful this is all too perfect I’ve never seen a blossom that red in my life oh wow oh wow oh my.” I was hungry. I was tired. I knew I should turn around before I went out too far and wore myself out before the big (or not so big) race, but I just couldn’t bare the thought that there might be something more just a little further down the road and so for a little more than two hours I wove from the dunes of Sand City into the tourist-filled Monterey Bay with Steinbeck’s Cannery Row and Fisherman’s Wharf, along the floral-lined coastal trail of Pacific Grove, rounding the bend at Lover’s Point before coasting into Asilomar. It was only when I realized I needed to get back to the hotel in time to meet Brandon and his sweet Rachel that I was able to turn the bike around for the return ride.
This is when I take the sublimely ordinary events of the morning and leap with abandon into a metaphor. A quirky little habit of mine.
Here’s the metaphor. The Christian journey as seen through this morning’s bike ride. I keep moving forward in my walk with God because I don’t want to risk the chance of missing out on the next surprise that’s bound to be waiting just around the approaching bend. How do I know there’s something up there? Because there always has been something around every bend I’ve ever gone around and I’ve never been disappointed by what I’ve found there. That’s not to say the road hasn’t been bumpy at times or the wind hasn’t blown against me or the glare hasn’t hampered my vision but never have I moved a little further along and wished I could go back to where I once was. I mean, it was great back there; there was plenty of God-graced wonder on the road behind me but that was for then and not for now. I remember the road behind and give thanks for it, but it’s always about keeping my eyes looking ahead toward the horizon. God’s up ahead. Waiting to dazzle me. Plotting and planning and making ready. “I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Always good. Always. People and circumstance might have other plans but God? Oh, those plans are a sure thing.
And here we are today, living in the middle of those plans. This is it. Look around. Look close, especially if the road seems bumpy or it feels like the wind is blowing against you or you’re getting worn and weary from the ride. Somewhere in the middle of all the craziness and mess God’s plans are unfolding before you. Plans for good. Plans intent on your future. Plans laced with hope. Keep on riding because there’s something else just around the next bend and you won’t want to miss it. Trust me on this. No. That’s not right. Trust God on this. Yeh, that’s much better.
You can’t predict how people will respond when you come out to them. People can surprise you with their responses either way, and either way you have no control over people’s feelings or reactions. Everyone wants to protect the people they love from being upset but as overworked as this might sound people have to be free to have their feelings, and you can be sure they’re going to have them, just like you did when you realized you were gay. You had a mess of emotions come up and so will they. At the same time, if they react by saying cruel things or yell at you, you aren’t required to stay and listen. You don’t deserve to be mistreated and we don’t do them any good in allowing them to say things to us in the heat of the moment they’ll most likely regret one day. They can call a friend or their pastor or talk to another family member but you don’t need to hear it. Keep in mind that because you were prepared and they weren’t and have been flooded with new information and the feelings that go with them, it puts you into a bit of a position to be the one to provide some direction on how things go, what’s allowed and what’s inappropriate, and when the time needs to move toward a conclusion. It’s not about being controlling but about taking responsibility for the situation to the extent you’re able.
Arrange to have a loving and affirming person in your life be available to meet with you as soon as you’ve come out to your significant relationship. It’s so important to be able to talk to someone as soon as it’s over so you can review how it went and they can offer you support and encouragement as needed. You really need to hear that what you’ve done is a courageous act and relating what happened to someone right away helps clear some of the noise in your own head and can help get you centered again. Whether in person, on the phone, in email to a friend or jumping onto the SisterFriends Community Forum, do what you can to connect with caring and understanding people as soon as possible. Don’t be alone with something so big.
It’s not your fault if in coming out your parents or significant loved ones are having a hard time. You aren’t the problem. Your sexual orientation isn’t the problem. All that you’ve done is be honest about your life and who you are. You’ve taken a step out of the closet to walk in wholeness. That’s a glorious thing that brings light in the world and witnesses to God’s working in your life. I’m going to say it one more time because it’s important, you aren’t the problem and you didn’t make the problem. The problem is the condemning, fear-based language regarding homosexuality that’s been propagated by conservative Christians in the public eye, the anti-gay soundbytes from denominations and conservative politicians, and the biased interpretations of Scripture that’s been hammered into people’s hearts and minds. When people react painfully to your coming out it’s hard to not take it personally, especially when they might say personal things, but to the extent you can, try to not take it personally.
How people first respond isn’t necessarily going to be their final response. You’ve gone through a process in reconciling your faith and sexuality. Your loved ones are now on their own journey to come to some kind of understanding for themselves. They might be angry, sad, frightened, and confused and that’s just on the first day. On Tuesday they might be angry that you ever told them because they’d rather not have known, and then on Wednesday they might be angry because they feel you deceived them by not telling them sooner. Emotions and reactions will flip-flop, but what remains rock-solid constant is God’s reaction to you which is nothing less than total acceptance and ridiculously extravagant love. Don’t you dare forget that!
Before I jump into some general thought around the whole wild and wacky coming out process, I want to be really clear that I’m not suggesting you come out . . .
If you live anywhere in the world where coming out would jeopardize your physical safety or freedom.
If you’re a queer youth or young adult and there’s any chance your parents would kick you out of the house or cut off all financial support for living and/or your education.
If you’re seeking custody of your children and there’s any chance based on the inclination of your local courts or your ex that you risk losing your children.
If you aren’t ready to come out for any reason.
Okay? Okay.
Now, here are the four things I would have liked to have had someone tell me before I came out:
There’s no perfect way to come out. There’s not even a right way to come out. There’s just your way and you can’t be expected or expect it of yourself to do more than that. No one knows you like you do and no one better understands the history and all the little glitches and wonders that exist between you and your significant relationships. This is one of those times when all you can do is your best in the moment and then let that be enough.
Gather as much support as you can before coming out in your family or other significant relationships. Not only can they help you think through how you’re going to come out but they can be an encouragement and comfort during the time you’re coming out. Talk with a therapist. Arrange to meet with a local gay-affirming pastor. Look for a GLBTQ support group in your area or in another town. Call or email PFLAG and see if it would be possible to talk with one of their members who might be near your parents age or share their same religious beliefs. Ask if they could arrange for you to talk with a few GLBTQ people who’ve already experienced coming out to learn what was helpful to them. Join the SisterFriends Community Forum and let everyone there know you’re considering coming out and get their feedback, support, and prayers. All of this is to say, don’t do it alone. Before you break out of the closet to significant people in your life, slip out the small escape hatch and find a few safe people who can walk with you through this experience.
Choose the time and place to come out carefully. Avoid coming out at the holidays or on special occasions. Holidays and big family gatherings are traditionally stressful enough for most people and so emotions and the reactions they generate tend to flare a little too easy. Find a time when life is running as smoothly as it gets for you and your loved ones and then casually arrange to get together with them to talk. Avoid coming out in public places such as restaurants, instead choosing places that are familiar to you and those you’re coming out to such as their home. It’s much easier to bring things to a conclusion if you have the ability to leave rather than to get people to leave your home.
Less is more. Plan what you want to say and how you want to say it and avoid getting pulled into a long, drawn out debate or argument. The thing to try to keep in mind is that there’s every reason to believe most people we come out to hear nothing that follows the words “I’m a lesbian.” The rest of what’s said is a brain blur and can lead to more confusion than understanding and you’re not about to be to change anyone’s view on the Bible and Homosexuality while their ears are still ringing with “I’m a lesbian I’m a lesbian I’m a lesbian.” If they pressure you for more, offer the assurance that you take the biblical passages very seriously and at another time will be willing to talk more about the Scriptures but for now simply assure them of your continuing love for God and for them
I’ll be adding a few more thoughts on coming out but for now, I’d like to open the topic up to the collective wisdom of others of you. Let me also add that for the next couple days I won’t have much of a chance to read your comments as D and I have a long list of plans for the weekend, however I’ll be checking regularly to get them posted for everyone else.
My experience in coming out to my parents was best described by one of the participants interviewed in the documentary For the Bible Tells Me So. When she was asked how it was when she came out to her mother she paused and then with a thoughtful look and a smile responded, “It was remarkably unsuccessful.”
Remarkably unsuccessful. Bingo. Coming out to my parents was remarkably unsuccessful. After all, this was ground-breaking for all three of us and it’s safe to say we weren’t at our best. In the turmoil of the moment, unnecessary things were said on both sides and if given the option I’m sure my parents would have wanted a do over as much as I did but in the end, despite the mess of it all and the awkward strain to our relationship that fell over the proceeding months, we loved each other. Bottom line, our love was never in question. I was their daughter, they were my parents. And even now, years later, though our relationship has been restored by the passing of time and God’s grace (a remarkable combination), I still look back hoping that in those first painful days they held on to the certainty of my love for them as I held tightly onto the certain truth of their love for me, regardless of all our acting out and emotional collisions.
That coming out to my parents was remarkably unsuccessful wasn’t limited to their reactions or mine, but rather, it was remarkably unsuccessful because I wasn’t prepared to come out. I didn’t get to choose when I would come out to my folks because the time was chosen for me through a series of circumstances and so I never had the chance to get ready and think and pray things through. As a result, I talked too much and I understood too little. I desperately wanted a do over.
Over the next couple entries I’m going to share a few of the things I wish someone had told me before I came out to my parents and I’m relying on those of you with your own coming out experience with parents and other significant relationships (young or adult children, ex-spouses, pastors) to add your reflections too and we’ll all be the wiser and blessed by what you’ve shared with us.
For several months I’ve been following a blog by John Shore called Suddenly Christian. John won me over to his blog with his incredibly quirky sense of humor but in short order it was his heart for God that had me jonesin’ for his newest entries.
Yesterday I was working away on an upcoming entry that follows up on the topic of coming out but when my RSS feed notified me there was a new entry posted to John’s site I closed up shop and headed over his way where I read “I’m Only Saying: If My Gay Loved Ones Go To Hell, I’m Going With Them.”
…If my gay friends, whom my life experience tells me can no sooner stop being gay than I can stop being straight, have to go to hell after they die, then I’m going with them. Too many gays and lesbians in my life have been too good to me in this life for me to leave them behind in the next. I won’t do it. That’s really all I was saying.
What I am not saying (and certainly haven’t said) is that the Bible is wrong, or should be changed, or that fundamentalist or “conservative” Christians are wrong or should change. I’m not even saying that it’s true that gays and lesbians are born homosexual in the same way I was born straight. Maybe I’m wrong about that. I don’t care. I leave those kinds of questions to the future, and to those in the present who, unlike me, find debates on insolvable matters engaging. (And you better believe I have no interest in alienating my fundamentalist and “conservative” Christian friends, for whom I have nothing but love and respect. I wish I had blood relatives who’d ever been as good to me as some of my conservative brothers and sisters in Christ have been.)
Again: I’m saying nothing more than this: If any of my dear gay friends get condemned to hell for no other reason than that they’re gay, then I will choose to go to hell with them. I am sure Christ will let me make that choice. I’m not sure of a lot of things, but I’m positive Christ understands sacrificing oneself for the love of others. (John Shore, Suddenly Christian)
If John, the married straight guy, were to sit down with Anita, the partnered gay girl, and we were to weave our way through the minutia of homosexuality and the Bible, we’d no doubt find places where our ideas diverged, yet the differences wouldn’t matter all that much because ultimately John and I would find ourselves talking less about the finer points of homosexuality that were at odds and more about matters of faith we share in common. We’d talk about Jesus, maybe kick around some thoughts on atonement or reconciliation or hey, how about this, the depth and breath and height of God’s love. Christians talking about the love of God. Imagine! The reason we’d be able to navigate beyond the hot topic and onto the essentials is that overarching our interaction would be a shared sense of respect for the other, recognition of the other’s faith in Christ, and appreciation for the person they were without judgment. I believe the same would be the case with Shush and Jon and Adam and Christian and others.
I’m rambling on about this for a couple reasons:
I was really moved by what he wrote and wanted to share it with you. If you appreciated his post I’d invite you to go leave a positive comment over at his site. I know that would mean something to him.
Many of us came from or are still walking in the evangelical Christian tradition where the rhetoric concerning homosexuality remains negative and oppositional, but there’s another voice raising up among evangelical Christianity. While their theological positions of homosexuality are perhaps varied from ours and from each other, they recognize GLBTQ Christians as equal relatives (not distant black-sheep cousins) in the family of God and they express a commitment for GLBTQ people to gain access to equal treatment under the law.
These are blogging communities where you can contribute your wisdom and insights as a Christian and they’ll be received with respect by the blogger and by the majority, though not all, of their readership. While I hope SisterFriends will be your home base, I encourage you to visit these other blogs and get involved, but not only in conversations involving homosexuality. When we’re on the journey to reconcile our faith and sexuality, our focus can understandably become somewhat myopic but it’s good to occasionally lay that all aside and get engaged in other faith questions you feel passionate about or are interested in. Please check out the BlogRoll on the right column for additional blogs and websites.
So that’s about all I wanted to say. Now…go click a link and feel the love!
May 3, 2008 
Posted in Christian Lesbian Identity 
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