You know, I've been to a few weddings in my life, not really believing the people saying "I do" should. They did anyway.
Should I live so long as to find a man I want to marry and the sentiment is mutual (and I suppose that's the tricky part, eh?), I'm perfectly fine if some people don't approve. Wouldn't it be nice for those who disapprove (for whatever reason) to have a ceremony at which to officially disapprove?
Or something like that.
Sort of short on thoughts tonight. And long on other things to accomplish before I lay my head down. Perhaps I'll be pithier tomorrow . . .
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
In Memoriam
Yesterday, our "gathering hymn" was "Lift High the Cross." Ever since the summer of 1983, I've had a particular image with that hymn. I'm in Bozeman, MT, with some few hundred other Lutheran college students for a Lutheran Student Movement National Assembly. It's a closing worship, and we've had a great week, and many of us are on that sort of spiritual high you can get at retreats or other intensive, focused religious gatherings. I have an image of this one student, from Texas Lutheran College (now University) carrying the processional cross.
He was not a close friend. He was a senior (maybe he'd just graduated, I'm not sure) and I'd just completed my first year in college. I went to Southwest Texas State University (now simply Texas State University) so I only knew him because he'd picked up a few SWT Lutherans on the way to a regional retreat that previous spring.
By that time, he knew he was going to seminary, probably was on a pre-sem track at TLC, although I don't know that. He was clearly pastor material. He had a natural leadership style that drew people to him, he clearly cared about people, and had a sense of humor that made him likeable. He was not showy about any of that, but a nice, quiet Lutheran boy.
Years later, I reconnected with him, if only superficially. By this time, he was a pastor in Louisiana and I was working in Austin, TX, at Augsburg Fortress, back when AF had a regional distribution point there. I went to Synod Assemblied for AF, setting up the assembly bookstore and such. We chatted some there. He talked a bit about his parish, how much he loved it, how well they treated him. No details except for that mutual love between a pastor and his congregation. When I teased him about staying in a first call for so long, he cited this love as the reason why he's never looked for a second call.
Then one day at lunch (I lived half a block from work at the time), I called my mother and after we'd talked about whatever it was I called her for, she said, "Didn't you talk about a _________." I said, yeah, he's now a pastor in Louisiana. He had some familial connection to someone in my hometown and there was a notice in the weekly paper that he had died. It was a bit shocking to say the least.
I don't remember how I found out he had died of AIDS related causes. I do know that I called around to other LSM friends, people who knew him better than I did, and it turned out everyone was as shocked as I was. He'd told no one that he was HIV+. Through the years, I kept running into people who knew him and slowly I pieced together the story that he'd known his HIV status for some time, but that he had promised himself that he wouldn't tell anyone until he had worked up the nerve to tell his mother.
This was before the current therapies that make HIV more manageable. This was back when a HIV+ diagnosis was a ticking timebomb and anything could be the last illness. He finally got up the nerve to tell his mother he was HIV+ when he was suddenly hospitalized with something. (I don't remember what---I want to say it was some stomach or intestinal infection that went ballistic in no time.) He died shortly thereafter, within weeks as I recall. It was especially fast, given how so many people with AIDS had extended, lingering deaths at the time.
This was my first personal AIDS related death. There was much that no one knew about his circumstances. He had, in fact, had a blood transfusion at some point and he was, in fact, gay and had a secret partner in the town where he pastored. Trying to figure out where he picked up the virus, however, is more about our desire to place blame somewhere than it is about the final outcome, which is that this pastor was dead, no one had known he was sick, and he left behind someone who was treated as "only a friend."
Understand, this was back when I was still not gay-positive. This was even before I'd gone to seminary, and I've already confessed that I wrote a papter in seminary about why GLBT folk shouldn't be allowed to serve in the ministry. Even feeling as I did about that, I still understood that there was someone who was more like a family member who could not sit on the family pew at the funeral. He was invisible to everyone except for maybe one or two people, and he was, reportedly, bitter toward the church about this.
What did I feel? I can't really remember, not exactly. I was sad for his death. I felt that he was very likely a very good pastor. And I probably felt he shouldn't have had a boyfriend and if he got the virus through sexual behavior, he shouldn't have been having that sexual behavior. All that feels very cold to me now, very judgmental and lacking in compassion, but I at the time I'm sure I felt plenty compassionate. I felt badly for the partner, who felt abandoned, invisible, unable to express his grief as a widower, but at the same time, I probably felt something like, "well, but he shouldn't have put himself in that position anyway, he shouldn't have been a pastor's boyfriend."
Even now, I don't use his name (although I'm sure there are people who could read this and know who I'm talking about) because I'm not sure if his mother ever knew about his partner. I don't know if his mother ever knew that he was gay. You'd think by now, she'd find out. But, you know, he would be approaching 50 at this point, and who even knows if his mother is still alive? All I'm saying is I don't want someone to be googling him and find my blog and have that as the source for "outing" him.
That's not the most important thing right now.
He remains on my mind today because we sand "Lift High the Cross" yesterday and on Friday we had a Lutherans Concerned meeting that is organizing to see to it that there are no more secret partners left behind (although I imagine there are some secret heterosexual partners left behind here and there, too---secret lovers are not the exclusive domain of homosexuals). He remains on my mind because his presence in my mind spans my pre-coming out days, my days of actively stating he shouldn't have been a pastor despite his many gifts for it, and my current days of being something akin to an activist (although I think activists are much more active than I am and I shouldn't use the term for my feeble efforts to the cause). He becomes a symbol of a personal journey and a symbol of how things used to be and a symbol of why things must change.
But before I make him only a symbol, I have to remember he was a man who picked up some Lutheran students for a weekend retreat one spring, who went on to seminary, and became a beloved pastor. He was a person with all the strength and frailty of any human being.
And he remains on my mind tonight because we sang "Lift High the Cross" yesterday.
He was not a close friend. He was a senior (maybe he'd just graduated, I'm not sure) and I'd just completed my first year in college. I went to Southwest Texas State University (now simply Texas State University) so I only knew him because he'd picked up a few SWT Lutherans on the way to a regional retreat that previous spring.
By that time, he knew he was going to seminary, probably was on a pre-sem track at TLC, although I don't know that. He was clearly pastor material. He had a natural leadership style that drew people to him, he clearly cared about people, and had a sense of humor that made him likeable. He was not showy about any of that, but a nice, quiet Lutheran boy.
Years later, I reconnected with him, if only superficially. By this time, he was a pastor in Louisiana and I was working in Austin, TX, at Augsburg Fortress, back when AF had a regional distribution point there. I went to Synod Assemblied for AF, setting up the assembly bookstore and such. We chatted some there. He talked a bit about his parish, how much he loved it, how well they treated him. No details except for that mutual love between a pastor and his congregation. When I teased him about staying in a first call for so long, he cited this love as the reason why he's never looked for a second call.
Then one day at lunch (I lived half a block from work at the time), I called my mother and after we'd talked about whatever it was I called her for, she said, "Didn't you talk about a _________." I said, yeah, he's now a pastor in Louisiana. He had some familial connection to someone in my hometown and there was a notice in the weekly paper that he had died. It was a bit shocking to say the least.
I don't remember how I found out he had died of AIDS related causes. I do know that I called around to other LSM friends, people who knew him better than I did, and it turned out everyone was as shocked as I was. He'd told no one that he was HIV+. Through the years, I kept running into people who knew him and slowly I pieced together the story that he'd known his HIV status for some time, but that he had promised himself that he wouldn't tell anyone until he had worked up the nerve to tell his mother.
This was before the current therapies that make HIV more manageable. This was back when a HIV+ diagnosis was a ticking timebomb and anything could be the last illness. He finally got up the nerve to tell his mother he was HIV+ when he was suddenly hospitalized with something. (I don't remember what---I want to say it was some stomach or intestinal infection that went ballistic in no time.) He died shortly thereafter, within weeks as I recall. It was especially fast, given how so many people with AIDS had extended, lingering deaths at the time.
This was my first personal AIDS related death. There was much that no one knew about his circumstances. He had, in fact, had a blood transfusion at some point and he was, in fact, gay and had a secret partner in the town where he pastored. Trying to figure out where he picked up the virus, however, is more about our desire to place blame somewhere than it is about the final outcome, which is that this pastor was dead, no one had known he was sick, and he left behind someone who was treated as "only a friend."
Understand, this was back when I was still not gay-positive. This was even before I'd gone to seminary, and I've already confessed that I wrote a papter in seminary about why GLBT folk shouldn't be allowed to serve in the ministry. Even feeling as I did about that, I still understood that there was someone who was more like a family member who could not sit on the family pew at the funeral. He was invisible to everyone except for maybe one or two people, and he was, reportedly, bitter toward the church about this.
What did I feel? I can't really remember, not exactly. I was sad for his death. I felt that he was very likely a very good pastor. And I probably felt he shouldn't have had a boyfriend and if he got the virus through sexual behavior, he shouldn't have been having that sexual behavior. All that feels very cold to me now, very judgmental and lacking in compassion, but I at the time I'm sure I felt plenty compassionate. I felt badly for the partner, who felt abandoned, invisible, unable to express his grief as a widower, but at the same time, I probably felt something like, "well, but he shouldn't have put himself in that position anyway, he shouldn't have been a pastor's boyfriend."
Even now, I don't use his name (although I'm sure there are people who could read this and know who I'm talking about) because I'm not sure if his mother ever knew about his partner. I don't know if his mother ever knew that he was gay. You'd think by now, she'd find out. But, you know, he would be approaching 50 at this point, and who even knows if his mother is still alive? All I'm saying is I don't want someone to be googling him and find my blog and have that as the source for "outing" him.
That's not the most important thing right now.
He remains on my mind today because we sand "Lift High the Cross" yesterday and on Friday we had a Lutherans Concerned meeting that is organizing to see to it that there are no more secret partners left behind (although I imagine there are some secret heterosexual partners left behind here and there, too---secret lovers are not the exclusive domain of homosexuals). He remains on my mind because his presence in my mind spans my pre-coming out days, my days of actively stating he shouldn't have been a pastor despite his many gifts for it, and my current days of being something akin to an activist (although I think activists are much more active than I am and I shouldn't use the term for my feeble efforts to the cause). He becomes a symbol of a personal journey and a symbol of how things used to be and a symbol of why things must change.
But before I make him only a symbol, I have to remember he was a man who picked up some Lutheran students for a weekend retreat one spring, who went on to seminary, and became a beloved pastor. He was a person with all the strength and frailty of any human being.
And he remains on my mind tonight because we sang "Lift High the Cross" yesterday.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Stories Beget Stories
I've been thinking all day about the random snippets of stories that arose in the LC meeting last night. I've been thinking about how impossible it is to convey the story in the same way that we experience it, how we each live a different story and even when two are present at the same event, two stories often emerge in the recounting of the event.
I can't plug in a flash drive and download my experience into your experience. However many ways we're alike, that will always make us all "other." Language, culture, genetics . . . these might bind some of us, but push far enough, and you're going to find someone not "me" in the other person's skin.
I keep searching for ways to tell my coming out story so that it makes sense for those who are not gay. I can understand that. Try as I might, I don't quite understand what it means to be heterosexual. The problem in not fully understanding comes when we use that lack of understanding to prohibit one another just because we lack that understanding.
I think I mentioned the friend who took me seriously when I asked him when he first realized he was straight. Of course, he didn't have the same experience of "coming out" as straight as GLBT folk have, but as I talked about how, post-coming out, I could look back and make more sense of different events in my life, that triggered something for him. Of course he wouldn't have said "oh, I realized I was straight when . . . " but he did say, "you know, I think I must have been straight as a preschooler, too, because I remember thinking this one girl was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen and I couldn't stop looking at her."
I am so thankful for his taking my life and my story seriously enough to think about his own. How does someone know if one is gay or straight? Maybe we don't know how we know, but once we are able to name it, several things in life begins to line up and make sense. We begin so see patterns in our life that has to do with our attractions, which goes beyond body and sexual organs. I have great rapport with women, generally, I'm attracted to their company. In the same way, straight men are attracted to other men in the sense they often seek out spaces without women---sports bar, poker games, hunting trips. These attractions aren't sexual, but neither are they complementary. Straight men and women often speak of feeling like the opposite sex completes them, even as they also desire interaction with their own sex.
Gay men speak of seeking that sort of completeness with another man. Lesbians speak of finding a connection beyond physical with another woman. It doesn't "make sense" in the same way that you can say a man and a woman being completed by each other "makes sense." But if the world made sense, there wouldn't be a duckbill platypus, either.
Another way to describe what happens. I presume (and have observed) that there is am attraction between men and women that is just something that happens, isn't planned, isn't thought out. In the vast majority of cases, this is not acted upon in any physical way, it just is, and it may not even be acknowledged most of the time. At some point, this attraction can cross a line into lust or even obsession, but for the most part, it's just attraction.
So often, homosexual desire is dismissed with "that's not love, that's lust." Well, in some cases it may be lust, but for the most part, it's just attraction. In the course of a day, I'll see any number of men I find attractive, but I don't lust after them, I don't become obsessed with them, I certainly don't have sex with them. More often than not, it's a passing thought, "oh, he's handsome." I don't ever have that sort of passing thought about women, although I assume (and have observed) that straight men do. It's just attraction. It's how were wired. It's only as interesting or disturbing as you want to make it.
I've long since drifted into rambling, so I'll give it up for tonight. I guess what I'm saying is that "understanding" may be overrated and looking for similarities is useful only to a point. We share many things, but ultimately we're all different. I believe this is part of God's plan, maybe in part so that we can better relate to God, who is Really Different from us. And I guess I'm trying to say that while we're hardwired for attraction, our attractions are different. (Gentlemen prefer blondes---except for the ones who prefer brunettes. Or balding.) It seems really far fetched to say that attraction is neutral or even a gift from God, except when we don't understand the attraction or don't have the same attraction.
That's all. For tonight.
I can't plug in a flash drive and download my experience into your experience. However many ways we're alike, that will always make us all "other." Language, culture, genetics . . . these might bind some of us, but push far enough, and you're going to find someone not "me" in the other person's skin.
I keep searching for ways to tell my coming out story so that it makes sense for those who are not gay. I can understand that. Try as I might, I don't quite understand what it means to be heterosexual. The problem in not fully understanding comes when we use that lack of understanding to prohibit one another just because we lack that understanding.
I think I mentioned the friend who took me seriously when I asked him when he first realized he was straight. Of course, he didn't have the same experience of "coming out" as straight as GLBT folk have, but as I talked about how, post-coming out, I could look back and make more sense of different events in my life, that triggered something for him. Of course he wouldn't have said "oh, I realized I was straight when . . . " but he did say, "you know, I think I must have been straight as a preschooler, too, because I remember thinking this one girl was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen and I couldn't stop looking at her."
I am so thankful for his taking my life and my story seriously enough to think about his own. How does someone know if one is gay or straight? Maybe we don't know how we know, but once we are able to name it, several things in life begins to line up and make sense. We begin so see patterns in our life that has to do with our attractions, which goes beyond body and sexual organs. I have great rapport with women, generally, I'm attracted to their company. In the same way, straight men are attracted to other men in the sense they often seek out spaces without women---sports bar, poker games, hunting trips. These attractions aren't sexual, but neither are they complementary. Straight men and women often speak of feeling like the opposite sex completes them, even as they also desire interaction with their own sex.
Gay men speak of seeking that sort of completeness with another man. Lesbians speak of finding a connection beyond physical with another woman. It doesn't "make sense" in the same way that you can say a man and a woman being completed by each other "makes sense." But if the world made sense, there wouldn't be a duckbill platypus, either.
Another way to describe what happens. I presume (and have observed) that there is am attraction between men and women that is just something that happens, isn't planned, isn't thought out. In the vast majority of cases, this is not acted upon in any physical way, it just is, and it may not even be acknowledged most of the time. At some point, this attraction can cross a line into lust or even obsession, but for the most part, it's just attraction.
So often, homosexual desire is dismissed with "that's not love, that's lust." Well, in some cases it may be lust, but for the most part, it's just attraction. In the course of a day, I'll see any number of men I find attractive, but I don't lust after them, I don't become obsessed with them, I certainly don't have sex with them. More often than not, it's a passing thought, "oh, he's handsome." I don't ever have that sort of passing thought about women, although I assume (and have observed) that straight men do. It's just attraction. It's how were wired. It's only as interesting or disturbing as you want to make it.
I've long since drifted into rambling, so I'll give it up for tonight. I guess what I'm saying is that "understanding" may be overrated and looking for similarities is useful only to a point. We share many things, but ultimately we're all different. I believe this is part of God's plan, maybe in part so that we can better relate to God, who is Really Different from us. And I guess I'm trying to say that while we're hardwired for attraction, our attractions are different. (Gentlemen prefer blondes---except for the ones who prefer brunettes. Or balding.) It seems really far fetched to say that attraction is neutral or even a gift from God, except when we don't understand the attraction or don't have the same attraction.
That's all. For tonight.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Lutherans Concnerned
Went to a Lutherans Concerned meeting tonight. Locally, the organization has been fairly non-functional, but we're trying to rally the support for the upcoming season of synod assemblies and, eventually, churchwide assembly. Mostly, it looks like a lot of work for the next few months.
But the gathering of people was very much encouraging. Some specific tasks were outlined and people were stepping up to take them on.
Most heartening was to hear stories. Some were, of course, very sad. The story of the teenager who blew his brains out because he was homosexual, went to the church for counsel and was rejected. The ending to this story was that a pastor was turned to being more open because he realized that he did not want to be part of a church that drove kids to suicide. Another story was of a woman who felt rejected by the church and was on the verge of suicide until she saw a Reconciling Lutheran congregation run an ad on cable tv. She claims to this day that this church saved her life. There were happier stories, of how a gay or lesbian pastor influenced someone's life, or how a gay member had a positive impact on a congregation. These were stories told just in passing---we weren't about the business of telling stories tonight, but they just happen spontaneously. It appears to me that there is so much already happening in the church with GLBT folk in the middle of it, positive things, life-saving things---It appears to me that God is already moving. The church needs to catch up to God.
If you're Lutheran or in any way closely affiliated with Lutherans, one way you can help the effort is to go to the Lutherans Concerned page and click on the Reconciling Lutherans link. This is a page where you can make a public statement of welcome to GLBT, even if your congregation is not Reconciling. That's a national effort and we need names from all 50 states. Spread the word as you see fit.
(And for those who don't support the effort---I'm sure you can find the other side's efforts easily enough. I say get involved and follow your conscience. I'm sure that whatever happens this summer won't be the last of the conversation. I do hope our---note first person plural---conscience is guided by some real study and prayer and the church will catch up with God sooner than later. )
I'm mostly bouyed by the number of heterosexual folk at the meeting tonight. I am thankful, so very thankful for them. As I said before, it'd difficult to be your own advocate, but it's easier to feel energized when you feel the support of advocates.
Work to be done. Work to be done. So much work God has already done.
But the gathering of people was very much encouraging. Some specific tasks were outlined and people were stepping up to take them on.
Most heartening was to hear stories. Some were, of course, very sad. The story of the teenager who blew his brains out because he was homosexual, went to the church for counsel and was rejected. The ending to this story was that a pastor was turned to being more open because he realized that he did not want to be part of a church that drove kids to suicide. Another story was of a woman who felt rejected by the church and was on the verge of suicide until she saw a Reconciling Lutheran congregation run an ad on cable tv. She claims to this day that this church saved her life. There were happier stories, of how a gay or lesbian pastor influenced someone's life, or how a gay member had a positive impact on a congregation. These were stories told just in passing---we weren't about the business of telling stories tonight, but they just happen spontaneously. It appears to me that there is so much already happening in the church with GLBT folk in the middle of it, positive things, life-saving things---It appears to me that God is already moving. The church needs to catch up to God.
If you're Lutheran or in any way closely affiliated with Lutherans, one way you can help the effort is to go to the Lutherans Concerned page and click on the Reconciling Lutherans link. This is a page where you can make a public statement of welcome to GLBT, even if your congregation is not Reconciling. That's a national effort and we need names from all 50 states. Spread the word as you see fit.
(And for those who don't support the effort---I'm sure you can find the other side's efforts easily enough. I say get involved and follow your conscience. I'm sure that whatever happens this summer won't be the last of the conversation. I do hope our---note first person plural---conscience is guided by some real study and prayer and the church will catch up with God sooner than later. )
I'm mostly bouyed by the number of heterosexual folk at the meeting tonight. I am thankful, so very thankful for them. As I said before, it'd difficult to be your own advocate, but it's easier to feel energized when you feel the support of advocates.
Work to be done. Work to be done. So much work God has already done.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Lacking
I find myself completely lacking for words today (or tonight). I just got the latest issue of the Lutheran out of the mailbox after work tonight and read the one-page story on the proposal that will go to the Churchwide Assembly this summer, and it's not moving me. Does a post stating I have nothing to post about count for keeping the lenten discipline?
Here. Here's what I'll post. I've said earlier that spending this blogging time everyday takes me to some darker places that I like to think I've left behind. Reading the Lutheran article, especially that the committee constructing the document couldn't come to any kind of consensus, and that the tentative document that they gave us basically says, "well, if we're going to do this, this is the first step, but we're not sure we should take it" . . . along with my ongoing lack of understanding of how we can spend so much time on so few verses that barely address our current understanding of sexuality while glossing over text after text about wealth . . . along with hearing the story from my co-worker the other day (see previous post) . . . I feel a bit numb.
It's nights like this that I wonder why I bother with the church at all. Mind you, I tried leaving the church. Sort of. For a few weeks here and there. I joke that my baptism seems to have taken an especially tight hold upon me that I keep getting called back to the church. Or else I enjoy being the center of negative attention. I'm at peace with God. You'd think that would be enough. But it's God who is doing the calling, nudging me back to church when I've tried to leave. God wants me in the church, as near as I can tell, but it feels too often like all I am to the church is a problem. That's more melodramatic than I like to be, but I'll let it stand.
I'm tired, and this is too much typing for having nothing to say. Nothing new, anyway. Maybe tomorrow will be more substantive.
Here. Here's what I'll post. I've said earlier that spending this blogging time everyday takes me to some darker places that I like to think I've left behind. Reading the Lutheran article, especially that the committee constructing the document couldn't come to any kind of consensus, and that the tentative document that they gave us basically says, "well, if we're going to do this, this is the first step, but we're not sure we should take it" . . . along with my ongoing lack of understanding of how we can spend so much time on so few verses that barely address our current understanding of sexuality while glossing over text after text about wealth . . . along with hearing the story from my co-worker the other day (see previous post) . . . I feel a bit numb.
It's nights like this that I wonder why I bother with the church at all. Mind you, I tried leaving the church. Sort of. For a few weeks here and there. I joke that my baptism seems to have taken an especially tight hold upon me that I keep getting called back to the church. Or else I enjoy being the center of negative attention. I'm at peace with God. You'd think that would be enough. But it's God who is doing the calling, nudging me back to church when I've tried to leave. God wants me in the church, as near as I can tell, but it feels too often like all I am to the church is a problem. That's more melodramatic than I like to be, but I'll let it stand.
I'm tired, and this is too much typing for having nothing to say. Nothing new, anyway. Maybe tomorrow will be more substantive.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Anger Management
I've had a bit of an angry week and I've been trying not to post while in that state. I had a pretty good day today, so I think it's safe to post without getting vitriolic (which, I'm told is not as vitriolic as some people's vitriol, but I don't like it all the same).
My church is doing a version of the Book of Faith initiative, which (for the non-ELCAers) is a national push to get everyone reading and studying the Bible. There isn't a national program per se, and each congregation is free to work out how they're going to do it (if they do it) and at my church, we have a retired engineer who along with a committee, has set up a daily reading schedule for us, with very short readings so as to not be overwhelming. It's not like those "read the Bible in one year" programs, where if your miss a day, you have enormous reading to do to catch up again. This is manageable, even if you have to catch up a couple of days at once. Then we have several different groups meeting throughout the week that members can attend to discuss what they're reading. We're about halfway through Luke right now.
The readings this week include the "lilies of the field" section, among other teachings on money and "security." I found myself getting worked up over how easily we read these sections and say, "well, Jesus didn't mean this literally," or "that's just impractical, you have to plan for your retirement" or other such comments.
And it seems just very unbalanced that we are able to do this with quite a few teachings from the Bible, most of them having to do with money or the poor, and yet we hold inviolable the handful of verses that refer to homosexuality, even if none of them address a committed, faithful relationship much less a scientific understanding of sexuality. We can make excuses for storing up goods, and even for other things like really strong teachings about divorce, but we can't quite bring ourselves (speaking for the whole institutional church) to make excuses for a sexual attraction that occurs naturally, has nothing to do with choice, and could be lived according to all the other rules of the Bible. This makes me angry.
Then yesterday, I heard a coworker, a young woman, a lesbian, talk about how she grew up in a church, and is feeling like God is calling her back to church, but she keeps hearing the condemnations of the church. She told the story without anger or bitterness, but a matter-of-factness that was even more heartbreaking than if she'd been fuming mad. Every church appears to her as if she'll be condemned if she enters the door. Or if she enters the door, she has to keep a big part of herself "private" or, rather, secret. It wasn't a situation where a long conversation was possible and the company wasn't really conducive to a serious conversation. So I wrote down my church's website and gave it to her, told her where we were located, and said to give us a try sometime. And maybe I'll follow up with her in the coming days.
But her story is just so common and so . . . well, heartbreaking is the best word I have for it. She feels like she's done nothing wrong, that she can't help but be attracted to women, but she still feels condemned by the church. And how much does my voice weigh against the weight of all the voices she's heard from the churches she's known? I don't know, but I told her how I'd been there and found some level of peace, if not with the church, then with God, and services are at 8 and 11 every Sunday morning. Come as you are.
My church is doing a version of the Book of Faith initiative, which (for the non-ELCAers) is a national push to get everyone reading and studying the Bible. There isn't a national program per se, and each congregation is free to work out how they're going to do it (if they do it) and at my church, we have a retired engineer who along with a committee, has set up a daily reading schedule for us, with very short readings so as to not be overwhelming. It's not like those "read the Bible in one year" programs, where if your miss a day, you have enormous reading to do to catch up again. This is manageable, even if you have to catch up a couple of days at once. Then we have several different groups meeting throughout the week that members can attend to discuss what they're reading. We're about halfway through Luke right now.
The readings this week include the "lilies of the field" section, among other teachings on money and "security." I found myself getting worked up over how easily we read these sections and say, "well, Jesus didn't mean this literally," or "that's just impractical, you have to plan for your retirement" or other such comments.
And it seems just very unbalanced that we are able to do this with quite a few teachings from the Bible, most of them having to do with money or the poor, and yet we hold inviolable the handful of verses that refer to homosexuality, even if none of them address a committed, faithful relationship much less a scientific understanding of sexuality. We can make excuses for storing up goods, and even for other things like really strong teachings about divorce, but we can't quite bring ourselves (speaking for the whole institutional church) to make excuses for a sexual attraction that occurs naturally, has nothing to do with choice, and could be lived according to all the other rules of the Bible. This makes me angry.
Then yesterday, I heard a coworker, a young woman, a lesbian, talk about how she grew up in a church, and is feeling like God is calling her back to church, but she keeps hearing the condemnations of the church. She told the story without anger or bitterness, but a matter-of-factness that was even more heartbreaking than if she'd been fuming mad. Every church appears to her as if she'll be condemned if she enters the door. Or if she enters the door, she has to keep a big part of herself "private" or, rather, secret. It wasn't a situation where a long conversation was possible and the company wasn't really conducive to a serious conversation. So I wrote down my church's website and gave it to her, told her where we were located, and said to give us a try sometime. And maybe I'll follow up with her in the coming days.
But her story is just so common and so . . . well, heartbreaking is the best word I have for it. She feels like she's done nothing wrong, that she can't help but be attracted to women, but she still feels condemned by the church. And how much does my voice weigh against the weight of all the voices she's heard from the churches she's known? I don't know, but I told her how I'd been there and found some level of peace, if not with the church, then with God, and services are at 8 and 11 every Sunday morning. Come as you are.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Old Thoughts
Nothing new today, just a link to some old thoughts. I think they're still worth exploring, still a bit at the heart of what role GLBT Christians can play in the church and world today. I wrote this about 10 years ago, I guess.
Read it here.
Read it here.
Monday, March 23, 2009
A Lesson From Physics
The argument about light, among physicists (and any physicists will likely point out that this will be highly simplified), has long been whether light travels in particles or in waves. For the most part, it depends upon what you look for. If you're looking for evidence of particles, you'll find it. If you look for evidence of waves, you'll find it. And maybe, light even responds to what you're looking for.
I've often used this illustration with the performing arts. You can't control what the audience sees because you can't control what the audience is looking for. And sometimes, the audience does influence the performance, whether they're finding what they're looking for or not. (It works both ways with performance, of course. Sometimes the performers get the audience they're looking for.)
Similarly, I find it one of the great mysteries of my religious life that some people read the Bible and grow in judgment while others read the Bible and grow in grace.
I think I'll just leave it at that today.
I've often used this illustration with the performing arts. You can't control what the audience sees because you can't control what the audience is looking for. And sometimes, the audience does influence the performance, whether they're finding what they're looking for or not. (It works both ways with performance, of course. Sometimes the performers get the audience they're looking for.)
Similarly, I find it one of the great mysteries of my religious life that some people read the Bible and grow in judgment while others read the Bible and grow in grace.
I think I'll just leave it at that today.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
One More Go at This
The last couple of posts have felt scattered and not exactly to the point. Here's one more attempt, from an illustration a pastor used some time ago, in regard to GLBT folk and the church.
Being gay is a bit like being an Israelite slave in Egypt. The Israelites were told to make more bricks and faster, but without the materials to make them.
For gay folk in the church, it's like this: We're told we're promiscuous, that we don't form lasting relationships, that for these and other reasons, we are denied full access to leadership in the church. At the same time, the church gives us nothing to help us create lasting relationships, to help stabilize our lives. We are not given a rite to make public our relationships, we are not given the opportunity to ask the community to pray for our relationships and support them. We're told that if we're going to do these things, then don't mention it too often or in certain circles---which, again, leads to secrets and shame.
The crazy thing is that, like the Children of Israel who made bricks without straw, GLBT folk are also making lasting relationships and are finding ways to stabilize their lives so that they can have some measure of security that any other marriage has. We do this without the straw of rites or public support.
If the story continues as in the Bible, I believe that GLBT folk will also one day be free. Whether this means leaving Egypt (the church, or at least a specific denomination like the ELCA) or if it means finding some way to live peaceably with the former oppressors---this remains to be seen.
God is always doing a new thing. Not every retelling (or re-living) of a Bible story has to end the same way.
Being gay is a bit like being an Israelite slave in Egypt. The Israelites were told to make more bricks and faster, but without the materials to make them.
For gay folk in the church, it's like this: We're told we're promiscuous, that we don't form lasting relationships, that for these and other reasons, we are denied full access to leadership in the church. At the same time, the church gives us nothing to help us create lasting relationships, to help stabilize our lives. We are not given a rite to make public our relationships, we are not given the opportunity to ask the community to pray for our relationships and support them. We're told that if we're going to do these things, then don't mention it too often or in certain circles---which, again, leads to secrets and shame.
The crazy thing is that, like the Children of Israel who made bricks without straw, GLBT folk are also making lasting relationships and are finding ways to stabilize their lives so that they can have some measure of security that any other marriage has. We do this without the straw of rites or public support.
If the story continues as in the Bible, I believe that GLBT folk will also one day be free. Whether this means leaving Egypt (the church, or at least a specific denomination like the ELCA) or if it means finding some way to live peaceably with the former oppressors---this remains to be seen.
God is always doing a new thing. Not every retelling (or re-living) of a Bible story has to end the same way.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Attraction
This is a fairly non-religious post, but I don't think this gets discussed enough.
We're wired for attraction. This seems to be true for all of us, although I've heard of people who claim to feel no attraction for other people. I think I've maybe met an asexual person or two, but not entirely sure. I know I've met some repressed people (takes one to know one!), which is not exactly the same thing.
Anyway. So we're wired for attraction. Sexual attraction, yes, but emotional attraction, too. Personally, I don't like it. I sort of wish I was one of those asexual people, who just has friends and the feelings never get more complicated than that. I wish that sex was something that people just sort of decided to have when they were ready to procreate and I wish it didn't feel so good so that we want it even when we weren't ready to procreate.
But attraction seems to be about more than procreation. People who can't procreate, whether as a result of genetics, medical history, surgical history, or being attracted to the "wrong" gender, still experience attraction.
Shortly after I came to terms with my sexuality, I had a very distinct "aha!" moment. It happened as I was walking to the HEB (which is a Texas grocery story chain, for those reading outside of Texas), and suddenly a mystery that I'd pondered all my life became clear. I understood why there was a "battle of the sexes" and why it was such a difficult transaction when women started moving into the workplace and not only as secretaries and such. It was sexual attraction. All my life, I'd always thought, "what's the big deal, why can't men just get along with women, why all this friction between the sexes?" I'd grown up in the '70s of "women's lib" and all of it just made sense to me. It never seemed shocking to me that women would want to aspire to the same positions as men---and be compensated in the same way.
At the same time, all my life, I'd always gotten along better with women, had always had better relationships with women supervisors and bosses (with a couple of notable exceptions). Almost all my best friends in school were girls and while I definitely wanted to be the boyfriend of a particular girl in high school, I realized it was more out of a desire to be "normal" than out of, well, desire. Grant you, I still hadn't realized, consciously, that I really was watching boys more than girls, so the desire to be normal wasn't about consciously avoiding being gay (although I'd been called gay from junior high on---funny how the straight cowboys and jocks I went to school with knew who I was before I did!), but I just wanted a girlfriend and to date like you're supposed to in high school. I mean, I did learn something from years of reading Archie Comics!
But despite some clear opportunities, I never so much as kissed a girl in high school. I didn't want to. I just wanted a girlfriend. (Okay, here's the religious aspect of this: I assumed I was not kissing girls---or picturing them naked, or daydreaming about getting them naked or whatever it is that teenage boys supposedly do---because of my superior morality. I assumed the other boys were simply not exercising will power or proper prayer or whatever I imagined I was doing to not notice girls breasts.)
But there, on my walk to HEB, I suddenly understood what it was I felt around women that made it so easy for me to get along with them. No sexual tension! I was completely at ease with women because I wasn't interested in their breasts or much of anything else about their naked bodies. On the other hand, I had very few male friends because---guess what---I was experiencing sexual tension! I may not have been picturing them naked, but quite often, I was studying their faces in ways I didn't with women. And, okay, full disclosure, I realized after the fact that while I never tried to look down a girl's shirt, I was always curious about the presence and amount of chest hair on a man. There were reasons I loved The Six Million Dollar Man that went beyond the action/adventure that we boys discussed on the playground.
All of this was unconscious. Until I came out, that is. Now that I was finally acknowledging my attractions, I finally understood what the tension was between something like 90% of the men and women of the world. I also understood why there are "girls' nights out" and men's poker nights. Just as we're wired for attraction, we're also wired to be with people for whom we do not feel attraction.
I don't know if any of this is making sense or not. One thing about blogging is that it feels very off-the-cuff and I certainly couldn't blog everyday if I did a rough draft, edits, rewrites . . . so these entries are rather rough and maybe too stream of consciousness.
Here's my point: I'm not attracted to women. There are studies that show that this is even more than a visual thing. Studies show that straight women and gay men respond to men's sweat in similar ways. Likewise, lesbians and straight men respond to women's sweat in similar ways. I've always built strong emotional ties to women, but never have I been drawn to kiss them.
I'm drawn to kissing men.
It seems to be a part of who I am, something that I can look back on in my life and see places where I've always felt this way. An early memory: Watching some dance number on Lawrence Welk and being fascinated by the male dancers tight, black trousers. I just had no idea what that was about, but it was there as a preschooler. I once had a straight male friend who, after I told him that story, thought for moment and said, "I think I must have been heterosexual as a preschooler, too. I remember thinking one girl in particular was just fascinating to look at, even if I couldn't put my finger on why." (I've always felt blessed by that man---the first straight man I'd met to take seriously the question "when did you realize you were heterosexual?")
So if I (and most GLBT folk, I suspect) can look backward on their lives and find these points of attraction even before they knew what attraction was, before the hormonally crazed years of adolescence, doesn't that suggest that attraction is innate? And doesn't it suggest that you just can't "choose" to be otherwise?
We can choose to be sexually active or celibate. This is true, and honestly, I would that more people chose to be celibate, or at least monogamous. With the exception of some notable lapses in judgment or restraint, I do choose celibacy. (All bets are off as soon as Harrison Ford comes out of the closet, though.) I'd like the next man with whom I have sex to be the last man with whom I have sex---I also hope to have recurring sex with him for a very long time. This may or may not happen. I make no predictions for the future as the past has proven that life has some disappointing episodes.
What I and many other gay Christian GLBT folk are asking is this: If we didn't choose this state, why does the church give us only one choice: celibacy? I could probably have sex with a woman, just as most men could probably have sex with another man (as happens in prisons), but that doesn't mean I would suddenly be attracted to the woman, any more than prison rape suggests attraction between the men involved. The church asking a gay man to marry a woman is unfair to everyone because the woman is likely to feel unattractive---which she will be to the man---and the man will likely not give her the attention she should have in a marriage relationship. I mean, I know a marriage is hardly all about sex, but I think most people would say it's a part of it, and doesn't everyone want to feel desired by their mate? I just don't believe God, who wired us for attraction, would then command us to act counter to our attraction. (Not that, as they say, attraction requires action, but . . . I won't belabor the point.
Which I've probably already done.
Something I wrote above---about feeling morally superior to all those boys whe were trying to look down girl's blouses---reminds (as so often happens) of a saying from the Desert Mothers (in this case):
"The holy Syncletica said, 'I think that for those living in community obedience is a greater virtue than chastity, however perfect. Chastity carries within it the danger of pride, but obedience has within it the promis of humility.'"
I know what Amma Syncletica is talking about here. Boy was I proud of not being attracted to the girls!
Of course, that saying opens a can of worms about "obedience," doesn't it? Well, perhaps another time. I've typed in my rambly way enough for this entry . . .
We're wired for attraction. This seems to be true for all of us, although I've heard of people who claim to feel no attraction for other people. I think I've maybe met an asexual person or two, but not entirely sure. I know I've met some repressed people (takes one to know one!), which is not exactly the same thing.
Anyway. So we're wired for attraction. Sexual attraction, yes, but emotional attraction, too. Personally, I don't like it. I sort of wish I was one of those asexual people, who just has friends and the feelings never get more complicated than that. I wish that sex was something that people just sort of decided to have when they were ready to procreate and I wish it didn't feel so good so that we want it even when we weren't ready to procreate.
But attraction seems to be about more than procreation. People who can't procreate, whether as a result of genetics, medical history, surgical history, or being attracted to the "wrong" gender, still experience attraction.
Shortly after I came to terms with my sexuality, I had a very distinct "aha!" moment. It happened as I was walking to the HEB (which is a Texas grocery story chain, for those reading outside of Texas), and suddenly a mystery that I'd pondered all my life became clear. I understood why there was a "battle of the sexes" and why it was such a difficult transaction when women started moving into the workplace and not only as secretaries and such. It was sexual attraction. All my life, I'd always thought, "what's the big deal, why can't men just get along with women, why all this friction between the sexes?" I'd grown up in the '70s of "women's lib" and all of it just made sense to me. It never seemed shocking to me that women would want to aspire to the same positions as men---and be compensated in the same way.
At the same time, all my life, I'd always gotten along better with women, had always had better relationships with women supervisors and bosses (with a couple of notable exceptions). Almost all my best friends in school were girls and while I definitely wanted to be the boyfriend of a particular girl in high school, I realized it was more out of a desire to be "normal" than out of, well, desire. Grant you, I still hadn't realized, consciously, that I really was watching boys more than girls, so the desire to be normal wasn't about consciously avoiding being gay (although I'd been called gay from junior high on---funny how the straight cowboys and jocks I went to school with knew who I was before I did!), but I just wanted a girlfriend and to date like you're supposed to in high school. I mean, I did learn something from years of reading Archie Comics!
But despite some clear opportunities, I never so much as kissed a girl in high school. I didn't want to. I just wanted a girlfriend. (Okay, here's the religious aspect of this: I assumed I was not kissing girls---or picturing them naked, or daydreaming about getting them naked or whatever it is that teenage boys supposedly do---because of my superior morality. I assumed the other boys were simply not exercising will power or proper prayer or whatever I imagined I was doing to not notice girls breasts.)
But there, on my walk to HEB, I suddenly understood what it was I felt around women that made it so easy for me to get along with them. No sexual tension! I was completely at ease with women because I wasn't interested in their breasts or much of anything else about their naked bodies. On the other hand, I had very few male friends because---guess what---I was experiencing sexual tension! I may not have been picturing them naked, but quite often, I was studying their faces in ways I didn't with women. And, okay, full disclosure, I realized after the fact that while I never tried to look down a girl's shirt, I was always curious about the presence and amount of chest hair on a man. There were reasons I loved The Six Million Dollar Man that went beyond the action/adventure that we boys discussed on the playground.
All of this was unconscious. Until I came out, that is. Now that I was finally acknowledging my attractions, I finally understood what the tension was between something like 90% of the men and women of the world. I also understood why there are "girls' nights out" and men's poker nights. Just as we're wired for attraction, we're also wired to be with people for whom we do not feel attraction.
I don't know if any of this is making sense or not. One thing about blogging is that it feels very off-the-cuff and I certainly couldn't blog everyday if I did a rough draft, edits, rewrites . . . so these entries are rather rough and maybe too stream of consciousness.
Here's my point: I'm not attracted to women. There are studies that show that this is even more than a visual thing. Studies show that straight women and gay men respond to men's sweat in similar ways. Likewise, lesbians and straight men respond to women's sweat in similar ways. I've always built strong emotional ties to women, but never have I been drawn to kiss them.
I'm drawn to kissing men.
It seems to be a part of who I am, something that I can look back on in my life and see places where I've always felt this way. An early memory: Watching some dance number on Lawrence Welk and being fascinated by the male dancers tight, black trousers. I just had no idea what that was about, but it was there as a preschooler. I once had a straight male friend who, after I told him that story, thought for moment and said, "I think I must have been heterosexual as a preschooler, too. I remember thinking one girl in particular was just fascinating to look at, even if I couldn't put my finger on why." (I've always felt blessed by that man---the first straight man I'd met to take seriously the question "when did you realize you were heterosexual?")
So if I (and most GLBT folk, I suspect) can look backward on their lives and find these points of attraction even before they knew what attraction was, before the hormonally crazed years of adolescence, doesn't that suggest that attraction is innate? And doesn't it suggest that you just can't "choose" to be otherwise?
We can choose to be sexually active or celibate. This is true, and honestly, I would that more people chose to be celibate, or at least monogamous. With the exception of some notable lapses in judgment or restraint, I do choose celibacy. (All bets are off as soon as Harrison Ford comes out of the closet, though.) I'd like the next man with whom I have sex to be the last man with whom I have sex---I also hope to have recurring sex with him for a very long time. This may or may not happen. I make no predictions for the future as the past has proven that life has some disappointing episodes.
What I and many other gay Christian GLBT folk are asking is this: If we didn't choose this state, why does the church give us only one choice: celibacy? I could probably have sex with a woman, just as most men could probably have sex with another man (as happens in prisons), but that doesn't mean I would suddenly be attracted to the woman, any more than prison rape suggests attraction between the men involved. The church asking a gay man to marry a woman is unfair to everyone because the woman is likely to feel unattractive---which she will be to the man---and the man will likely not give her the attention she should have in a marriage relationship. I mean, I know a marriage is hardly all about sex, but I think most people would say it's a part of it, and doesn't everyone want to feel desired by their mate? I just don't believe God, who wired us for attraction, would then command us to act counter to our attraction. (Not that, as they say, attraction requires action, but . . . I won't belabor the point.
Which I've probably already done.
Something I wrote above---about feeling morally superior to all those boys whe were trying to look down girl's blouses---reminds (as so often happens) of a saying from the Desert Mothers (in this case):
"The holy Syncletica said, 'I think that for those living in community obedience is a greater virtue than chastity, however perfect. Chastity carries within it the danger of pride, but obedience has within it the promis of humility.'"
I know what Amma Syncletica is talking about here. Boy was I proud of not being attracted to the girls!
Of course, that saying opens a can of worms about "obedience," doesn't it? Well, perhaps another time. I've typed in my rambly way enough for this entry . . .
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Rumors and Stereotypes
(Caveat: Candace, if I'm confusing you with someone else, let me know!)
I remember Candace Chellew-Hodge telling a story once about someone (I think a family member) stating their opposition to GLBT folk with a litany of awful things GLBT did. I think Candace's friend/relative had heard these things on a talk radio program. Things like promiscuity, recruitment of children, drug use, alcoholism, and who knows what all.
Candace replied something to the effect, "Why are you believing what they say on the radio over the life you see me lead?" Or something to that effect.
I thought it was an excellent comeback.
I mean, despite ample evidence, no one believes that all straight people hang out at sports bars, are constantly on the look-out for their next hook-up, practice serial monogamy, are involved in domestic violence, and procreate more by chance than design. It's ludicrous to see it in print, isn't it?
GLBT folk get these sorts of generalizations all the time. And while I've known some church-going queers who were also regulars at the bars, the same is true of a bunch of church-going straight folk. I mean, does everyone really believe that the straight, single male is at the bar merely to drink a couple of beers? Well, maybe, but it's just as likely he's there to meet someone to take home.
But no one seems to be talking about that. I mean, the document that outlines the celibacy requirement for ELCA rostered professionals (briefly known as Visions and Expectations for the non-Lutherans out there) states that single straight pastors are to be celibate until marriage. And while that may happen sometimes, I know of plenty of situations that this was not true. In other words, no one is taking a survey and asking around to find out if the straight, single pastors are virgins or if they're remaining chaste with their betrothed before the wedding night.
So, it seems that there are many places where double standards are applied here.
And so much of the discussion seems to be about what "they say" GLBT folk do. Well, okay, let's have that discussion, if it's pertinent to someone's ability to serve as pastor---but you can bet I'll start asking the straight clergy about their sexual history.
Is that harsh? I don't mean it to be, but honestly, Visions and Expectations is one of the most tread upon documents (at least as far as sexual conduct goes) and everyone looks the other way except when it's a pastor who is attracted to someone of her/his own sex.
So, can we put aside all the things "they say" about GLBT folk---and maybe even about straight single men (especially)---and get to know one another? Maybe we'll discover that we're all fragile, broken people living under grace and not up to anyone's vision or expecation.
I remember Candace Chellew-Hodge telling a story once about someone (I think a family member) stating their opposition to GLBT folk with a litany of awful things GLBT did. I think Candace's friend/relative had heard these things on a talk radio program. Things like promiscuity, recruitment of children, drug use, alcoholism, and who knows what all.
Candace replied something to the effect, "Why are you believing what they say on the radio over the life you see me lead?" Or something to that effect.
I thought it was an excellent comeback.
I mean, despite ample evidence, no one believes that all straight people hang out at sports bars, are constantly on the look-out for their next hook-up, practice serial monogamy, are involved in domestic violence, and procreate more by chance than design. It's ludicrous to see it in print, isn't it?
GLBT folk get these sorts of generalizations all the time. And while I've known some church-going queers who were also regulars at the bars, the same is true of a bunch of church-going straight folk. I mean, does everyone really believe that the straight, single male is at the bar merely to drink a couple of beers? Well, maybe, but it's just as likely he's there to meet someone to take home.
But no one seems to be talking about that. I mean, the document that outlines the celibacy requirement for ELCA rostered professionals (briefly known as Visions and Expectations for the non-Lutherans out there) states that single straight pastors are to be celibate until marriage. And while that may happen sometimes, I know of plenty of situations that this was not true. In other words, no one is taking a survey and asking around to find out if the straight, single pastors are virgins or if they're remaining chaste with their betrothed before the wedding night.
So, it seems that there are many places where double standards are applied here.
And so much of the discussion seems to be about what "they say" GLBT folk do. Well, okay, let's have that discussion, if it's pertinent to someone's ability to serve as pastor---but you can bet I'll start asking the straight clergy about their sexual history.
Is that harsh? I don't mean it to be, but honestly, Visions and Expectations is one of the most tread upon documents (at least as far as sexual conduct goes) and everyone looks the other way except when it's a pastor who is attracted to someone of her/his own sex.
So, can we put aside all the things "they say" about GLBT folk---and maybe even about straight single men (especially)---and get to know one another? Maybe we'll discover that we're all fragile, broken people living under grace and not up to anyone's vision or expecation.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Compromise
I'm using the title word in the worst and best possible ways. I'll leave it up to you to decide how bad or how good it is.
It seems to me that there are many evils in the world, like war, that we tolerate and sometimes even get behind. We "support the war effort" and "support the troops." On one level, we know war is a terrible, horrific thing but we send young men and women into it out of some sense of patriotism or because it is the lesser of two evils or it's expedient.
There are teachings in the Bible that are just nearly impossible to follow. Love your enemies. Give to whoever begs from you. Sell all you have, give the proceeds to the poor, and follow Jesus. Yet we own stuff---from TVs, stereos, libraries of books and CDs and DVDs to cars, boats, houses. Our churches are sometimes among the richest properties in a neighborhood, with some having physical plants that rival small colleges. We make excuses for these possessions---my treasure isn't really bound up in these things, need a place to live, so I may as well take advantage of tax breaks home ownership brings (I can give more to the church that way!), we have to meet somewhere for worship and so it may as well evoke some grandeur of heaven. Let's just not discuss who our enemies are and how we might "love" them.
I've discussed throughout this blog that I feel that barring GLBT folk from church leadership inhibits evangelism, creates undue stress to GLBT folk who are called to church leadership, and sends a message to GLBT folk (especially our youth) that "you're not good enough, you're broken and unworthy, you're God's mistake."
Even if you're uncomfortable with the idea of having a GLBT pastor, can you maybe add it to the list of things that you accept in the world? Say something like, "well, I'd rather all pastors were heterosexual, but since they're not, let's just make it all above board and support them in their relationships. It's better than making them keep secrets, and maybe it'll makes us look better in the media."
I don't know. Something like that.
I can't tell you how uncomfortable it makes me to compare being gay to war. But out of all the things that we just go "well, what are ya gonna do?" it feels really disingenuous to draw the line at issues of sexuality. I mean, I really wish the ELCA could make a social statement that denounces war and join in with the Quakers and Mennonites as a "peace church." On that issue, I really am a Quaker (and, full disclosure, if I could find a "peace church" that was sacramental, I probably would already be there, but for me the emphasis on baptism and eucharist are big things that keep me in the ELCA) and it irks me that we aren't more proactive in preaching peace. I'm fairly certain that it's demonstrable that wars do a great deal more damage to families, communities, EVERYTHING, than a couple of women who live together in legal, spiritual, and physical covenant.
So if I can remain a part of the ELCA and accept that there are pro-military members, can the people who don't want GLBT pastors remain in the ELCA even if there were?
It seems to me that there are many evils in the world, like war, that we tolerate and sometimes even get behind. We "support the war effort" and "support the troops." On one level, we know war is a terrible, horrific thing but we send young men and women into it out of some sense of patriotism or because it is the lesser of two evils or it's expedient.
There are teachings in the Bible that are just nearly impossible to follow. Love your enemies. Give to whoever begs from you. Sell all you have, give the proceeds to the poor, and follow Jesus. Yet we own stuff---from TVs, stereos, libraries of books and CDs and DVDs to cars, boats, houses. Our churches are sometimes among the richest properties in a neighborhood, with some having physical plants that rival small colleges. We make excuses for these possessions---my treasure isn't really bound up in these things, need a place to live, so I may as well take advantage of tax breaks home ownership brings (I can give more to the church that way!), we have to meet somewhere for worship and so it may as well evoke some grandeur of heaven. Let's just not discuss who our enemies are and how we might "love" them.
I've discussed throughout this blog that I feel that barring GLBT folk from church leadership inhibits evangelism, creates undue stress to GLBT folk who are called to church leadership, and sends a message to GLBT folk (especially our youth) that "you're not good enough, you're broken and unworthy, you're God's mistake."
Even if you're uncomfortable with the idea of having a GLBT pastor, can you maybe add it to the list of things that you accept in the world? Say something like, "well, I'd rather all pastors were heterosexual, but since they're not, let's just make it all above board and support them in their relationships. It's better than making them keep secrets, and maybe it'll makes us look better in the media."
I don't know. Something like that.
I can't tell you how uncomfortable it makes me to compare being gay to war. But out of all the things that we just go "well, what are ya gonna do?" it feels really disingenuous to draw the line at issues of sexuality. I mean, I really wish the ELCA could make a social statement that denounces war and join in with the Quakers and Mennonites as a "peace church." On that issue, I really am a Quaker (and, full disclosure, if I could find a "peace church" that was sacramental, I probably would already be there, but for me the emphasis on baptism and eucharist are big things that keep me in the ELCA) and it irks me that we aren't more proactive in preaching peace. I'm fairly certain that it's demonstrable that wars do a great deal more damage to families, communities, EVERYTHING, than a couple of women who live together in legal, spiritual, and physical covenant.
So if I can remain a part of the ELCA and accept that there are pro-military members, can the people who don't want GLBT pastors remain in the ELCA even if there were?
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Advocate
I've always said I find it very hard to be my own advocate. I've always found writing, speaking or otherwise drawing attention to myself and the injustices I feel as a gay man to be very difficult. In part, I have a keen understanding that my level of persecution is minute compared to so many persecutions in the world. It's really hyperbolic to call anything I've experience "persecution," especially when placed next to the various genocidal campaigns practiced in just the last decade or so. In that light, it's really ludicrous to call any experience in my life "persecution."
But I will stick with "injustice." I think there are many ways that I've been taught that I'm intrinsically bad (disordered, mentally ill, whatever euphemism you might prefer) that has unjustly hindered my life in many ways, from career choices to things more subtle that are harder to discuss.
Despite this being the case, however, has not made me one to "stick up for myself" or defend myself in the way that many activists do. When I've tried to be an advocate for anyone, it's generally for poor or hungry people. The charities to which I donate most often tend to be charities that work for the poor and hungry of the world (one of my favorite being the Lutheran World Relief, and not just because it's Lutheran---they have a remarkably high ratings when it comes to how far they take a dollar to the people they serve). In fact, I tend to find being an advocate for the poor and hungry to be much more important than being an advocate for myself. I'm hardly wealthy, but I've gone hungry without choosing to.
So this blog, as we approach the midpoint of lent, is becoming harder because I really find this difficult to do. I may have said it in this blog (I know I've said it somewhere), but I'll repeat it. The reason I'm doing this blog now---as well as trying to do some other more activist sorts of things in preparation for the ELCA Churchwide Assembly in August---is because it suddenly occurred to me that if the measures before the assembly fail, it could mean another generation will grow up in a church that gave the same contradictory messages I received growing up. GLBT ordination and same-sex weddings are almost beside the point. GLBT kids growing up in the next 20 years really shouldn't have to feel like they're second class Christians in this church. It isn't that they'll all want to be ordained or even get married---it's about being told that if you felt called to that life, it was available to you because you're acceptable to God and acceptable to the church. Finding that acceptance is key to the next generation of GLBT youth growing up with fewer terrors of losing their faith or family or life for something they didn't choose.
So, the reason I'm doing this blog is less about me and my sexuality, it's about the kids who are being born right now who will grow up to be GLB or T.
And for that reason, consider this blog entry a plea to any straight people reading. This is about the children you'll be/are creating (seeing as how I'm not going to procreate). This is about kids who need more than very special episodes of sitcoms or even whole TV series starring gay characters. They need a spiritual home that the larger culture can't give them. They need a place to meet potential mates and a community that will support their relationships---just like the straight kids get---so they don't turn to communities that offer little spirituality and promote serial relationships, if not outright disregard for relationships.
So the plea is---becomes advocates for GLBT people. As we approach the Churchwide Assembly, find out who the representatives are from your synod and write to them polite, reasoned letters, asking them to be advocates, too. Before that, do the same with your individual synod assemblies.
This affects me less and less as I get older. This matters very much to the kids who don't even know it matters to them yet.
But I will stick with "injustice." I think there are many ways that I've been taught that I'm intrinsically bad (disordered, mentally ill, whatever euphemism you might prefer) that has unjustly hindered my life in many ways, from career choices to things more subtle that are harder to discuss.
Despite this being the case, however, has not made me one to "stick up for myself" or defend myself in the way that many activists do. When I've tried to be an advocate for anyone, it's generally for poor or hungry people. The charities to which I donate most often tend to be charities that work for the poor and hungry of the world (one of my favorite being the Lutheran World Relief, and not just because it's Lutheran---they have a remarkably high ratings when it comes to how far they take a dollar to the people they serve). In fact, I tend to find being an advocate for the poor and hungry to be much more important than being an advocate for myself. I'm hardly wealthy, but I've gone hungry without choosing to.
So this blog, as we approach the midpoint of lent, is becoming harder because I really find this difficult to do. I may have said it in this blog (I know I've said it somewhere), but I'll repeat it. The reason I'm doing this blog now---as well as trying to do some other more activist sorts of things in preparation for the ELCA Churchwide Assembly in August---is because it suddenly occurred to me that if the measures before the assembly fail, it could mean another generation will grow up in a church that gave the same contradictory messages I received growing up. GLBT ordination and same-sex weddings are almost beside the point. GLBT kids growing up in the next 20 years really shouldn't have to feel like they're second class Christians in this church. It isn't that they'll all want to be ordained or even get married---it's about being told that if you felt called to that life, it was available to you because you're acceptable to God and acceptable to the church. Finding that acceptance is key to the next generation of GLBT youth growing up with fewer terrors of losing their faith or family or life for something they didn't choose.
So, the reason I'm doing this blog is less about me and my sexuality, it's about the kids who are being born right now who will grow up to be GLB or T.
And for that reason, consider this blog entry a plea to any straight people reading. This is about the children you'll be/are creating (seeing as how I'm not going to procreate). This is about kids who need more than very special episodes of sitcoms or even whole TV series starring gay characters. They need a spiritual home that the larger culture can't give them. They need a place to meet potential mates and a community that will support their relationships---just like the straight kids get---so they don't turn to communities that offer little spirituality and promote serial relationships, if not outright disregard for relationships.
So the plea is---becomes advocates for GLBT people. As we approach the Churchwide Assembly, find out who the representatives are from your synod and write to them polite, reasoned letters, asking them to be advocates, too. Before that, do the same with your individual synod assemblies.
This affects me less and less as I get older. This matters very much to the kids who don't even know it matters to them yet.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Community
"Abba Antony said, 'Our life and our death are with our neighbor. If we gain our brother, we have gained our God; but if we scandalize our brother, we have sinned against Christ.'" (Daily Readings with the Desert Fathers, edited by Benedicta Ward, p. 36)
If you do a web search on my name and "Desert Fathers," there's probably a few hits. Maybe not a lot, but few. I say this so that it is less surprising that I'm currently using the above book as devotional reader.
The quote reminded me of something Dietrich Bonhoeffer said in Life Together (and if I could find my copy, I'd quote it exactly but tonight my paraphrase will have to do). In effect, he said Christian community is a reality and a gift and it exists whether or not we are with other Christians. It is a reality and a gift even when we don't feel very loving to the community we have. The communion of saints simply is.
These things come to mind as I've been thinking more and more about how this struggle we're in is about community, who is in, who is not, who has full privileges, who is relegated to crumbs from the table.
I had a conversation with someone recently (and I won't identify him because I love him and he's not here to give his full side unless he's following this blog and wishes to comment) who said he wished I saw the church less institutionally and more as the one, holy, catholic church, what he said they used to call the "invisible church." In come circles, we might speak of "the mystical body of Christ."
It is a good reminder. It is a good reminder and still it is the institution that is denying full access to GLBT people, just as it once denied women full access (and still does in some institutions bearing the name of Christ). It is good to think of the church as transcending the institutions that build walls around altars, even as we see through the walls to what some of us can't approach.
What does it mean to have our life and death belong to our neighbor? What does it mean to belong to the mystical body of Christ, whether we feel a part of it or not? What does it mean to trust our baptism into Christ as being all there is to belong to the church when some powerful voices tell some of us that we can't belong fully?
I don't have answers. Not tonight. I'm merely thinking "out loud" and exposing where some of this blogging has led me in time when I'm not at the keyboard.
I see the church as the mystical body of Christ I believe to belong to my neighbor and my neighbor to me transcends any institution's decrees. I believe I belong to the body Christ even when I've tried to leave the church, even when I sit angry and hurt by an institution that says it represents that body.
But what happens when my presence, my existence in this body scandalizes my neighbor? Can I ask my neighbor to not be scandalized? Do people who wish to keep the status quo of the current policies agonize over scandalizing me, their neighbor? And how can we stop that? How can we belong to one another when we disagree about something that is at the core of a minority's identity? Bonhoeffer would say it happens whether we feel it or not.
I'm beginning to think we're all about to simply lose our neighbor and sin against Christ.
Who is my neighbor? How can I bind up the wounds of the homophobe when I seem to be the one causing the wounds? How can the homophobe bind up my wounds, wounds caused by homophobes? (By the way, I dislike the word homophobe---is there another one to use? The "anti-gay"?)
Who is my neighbor? Can people on each side of this divide promise to be the other side's hated, but good, Samaritan?
If you do a web search on my name and "Desert Fathers," there's probably a few hits. Maybe not a lot, but few. I say this so that it is less surprising that I'm currently using the above book as devotional reader.
The quote reminded me of something Dietrich Bonhoeffer said in Life Together (and if I could find my copy, I'd quote it exactly but tonight my paraphrase will have to do). In effect, he said Christian community is a reality and a gift and it exists whether or not we are with other Christians. It is a reality and a gift even when we don't feel very loving to the community we have. The communion of saints simply is.
These things come to mind as I've been thinking more and more about how this struggle we're in is about community, who is in, who is not, who has full privileges, who is relegated to crumbs from the table.
I had a conversation with someone recently (and I won't identify him because I love him and he's not here to give his full side unless he's following this blog and wishes to comment) who said he wished I saw the church less institutionally and more as the one, holy, catholic church, what he said they used to call the "invisible church." In come circles, we might speak of "the mystical body of Christ."
It is a good reminder. It is a good reminder and still it is the institution that is denying full access to GLBT people, just as it once denied women full access (and still does in some institutions bearing the name of Christ). It is good to think of the church as transcending the institutions that build walls around altars, even as we see through the walls to what some of us can't approach.
What does it mean to have our life and death belong to our neighbor? What does it mean to belong to the mystical body of Christ, whether we feel a part of it or not? What does it mean to trust our baptism into Christ as being all there is to belong to the church when some powerful voices tell some of us that we can't belong fully?
I don't have answers. Not tonight. I'm merely thinking "out loud" and exposing where some of this blogging has led me in time when I'm not at the keyboard.
I see the church as the mystical body of Christ I believe to belong to my neighbor and my neighbor to me transcends any institution's decrees. I believe I belong to the body Christ even when I've tried to leave the church, even when I sit angry and hurt by an institution that says it represents that body.
But what happens when my presence, my existence in this body scandalizes my neighbor? Can I ask my neighbor to not be scandalized? Do people who wish to keep the status quo of the current policies agonize over scandalizing me, their neighbor? And how can we stop that? How can we belong to one another when we disagree about something that is at the core of a minority's identity? Bonhoeffer would say it happens whether we feel it or not.
I'm beginning to think we're all about to simply lose our neighbor and sin against Christ.
Who is my neighbor? How can I bind up the wounds of the homophobe when I seem to be the one causing the wounds? How can the homophobe bind up my wounds, wounds caused by homophobes? (By the way, I dislike the word homophobe---is there another one to use? The "anti-gay"?)
Who is my neighbor? Can people on each side of this divide promise to be the other side's hated, but good, Samaritan?
Sunday, March 15, 2009
A Non-Post Post (Housekeeping)
Just a gentle reminder that if you're going to post a response to this blog, please be sure you use your full name. I really am not approving posts---even supportive ones!---that are not using real names. This may have been a poor decision on my part, and may act to silence people who would otherwise join the conversation, but I've seen too many conversations on this topic descend quickly into ugliness when participants can hide behind perceived anonymity.
So if you've tried to post a response to this blog and you have not seen the response appear, email me at neilellisorts (at) yahoo (dot) com to identify yourself and I'll approve the post. So far, all the responses have been friendly, but I'm going to be a bit legalistic on this point. I hope everyone understands.
Having said all that, responses are heartily encouraged. It's a lenten monolog without responses!
So if you've tried to post a response to this blog and you have not seen the response appear, email me at neilellisorts (at) yahoo (dot) com to identify yourself and I'll approve the post. So far, all the responses have been friendly, but I'm going to be a bit legalistic on this point. I hope everyone understands.
Having said all that, responses are heartily encouraged. It's a lenten monolog without responses!
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Civil Rights
I'm just going to write about this tonight because I'm not sure I can sort it out any other way. And because I'm still sorting it out, I hope I will write carefully.
GLBT activists talk about civil rights all the time. Some miles have been covered. I believe police antagonism at a gay bar is much more difficult now than it was at the Stonewall Inn before 1969. I believe it is much harder for the judicial system to dismiss violence against GLBT folk because they were just a bunch of queers. It is much harder for TV personalities to make accusatory, inflammataory, or just plain desultory blanket statements about GLBT folk just on the basis of them being GLB or T. This sort of forward movement in GLBT civil rights is the result of many activists who targeted these inequties, brought them to light, and convinced more an more people that GLBT people should not be treated so inequally on the basis of their sexuality or sexual identity.
In many ways (and here's where I must tread carefully because this is so controversial), this forward movement is much like the the Civil Rights movement of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks. They---and obviously not only they---stood up to injustices, called them unjust, and said the justice system must do something about them. Police harrassment, indifferent court systems, and derogatory stereotypes are much harder to perpetrate---not impossible, but much harder---than they were half a century ago.
In this way, our movements have been very similar, and I know that many of the African American community don't like to see similarities, but I think these are fairly plain to see. I will agree with some in the African American community that there are enormous differences between the two movements, most of them having to do with the very nature of our identities. I'm fairly certain that there are many situations where I "pass" for straight, and so appear merely as a white male, and I do believe that I benefit from the slippery spectre of white privilege. On the other hand there are not many African American people who can pass for white, although there is a history of light skinned people working very hard to do just that. Just in that way, in the way that we are able to be identified when we walk into a retailer, the differences between the struggles of the GLBT and the African American communities is very different. I think it is very misleading and very condescending to make statements like "Gay is the New Black" (as I believe at least on GLBT magazine did on its cover).
But here is another way in which the two civil rights movements are very different. The black community in the 1950s and 1960s had a religious community where their leaders organized and made it a religious issue as much as a civil rights issue. The GLBT is not so strong in that area, in part because so many GLBT folk have experienced the opposite--they have been tossed out of their religious communities, by and large, and even when they formed new religious communities like the Metropolitan Community Churches, those communities were too busy bandaging the wounds of their membership to organize for civil movements. That's not to say that they've done nothing in that arena, and there is Soulforce, which tries to model itself after the work of MLK and Gandhi. So far, their efforts have failed to catch the media attention that the black churches were able to get in the middle fo teh 20th Century.
And part of that is the result of not having a traditionally gay church in the same way there were traditionally black churches. Part of that is because being GLBT is being from every layer of society. We are not from one traditional anything. We rise out of all traditions. This is our strength and it is our weakness. It is our strength because this means that no subculture can say "we have no gay people here" (despite efforts to say just that). It is our weakness because when we try to organize, we come from so many different organizational traditions that we have a hard time organizing.
So before this new civil rights movement can get a religious community to make it a religious issue as well as a civil issue, we need a large religious body with a uniform tradition of organization to say with one voice, "denying GLBT folk full access to any part of our civil and religious lives is wrong."
Being a member of the ELCA, I of course hope we might be among the first national religious church bodies to say just that. We won't be the first, but if we start taking steps, we will be the largest. And in this instance, numbers matter, since we seem to be at a place where we're still taking popular votes on who can fully participate in the freedoms and responsibilities of this nation.
That's what I'm hoping for, anyway. If the Presbyterians get there first, that would be great. The UCC is there, but they're too small (although they are doing remarkable things in trying to be heard and I honor that). The Episcopalians are still too divided on the issue, and really, they're not a huge religious body, either, just often more influential. Of course, if the ELCA passes the measures this summer, there will still be divisions---this is still a journey and the destination is still across Jordan---as is the the African American civil rights movement despite there now being a black man in the White House.
But it would be an enormous step forward. This is what I'm praying for.
(Brief civil rights history lesson: While it's certainly no secret, it's also not well known, but an important advisor and confidant of MLK was Bayard Rustin---a gay Quaker who brought to MLK nonviolent options of opposing injustice. It is generally acknowledged that had Rustin be straight, he would be honored alongside MLK, but since he was openly gay, his contribution to the civil rights movment is often ignored.)
GLBT activists talk about civil rights all the time. Some miles have been covered. I believe police antagonism at a gay bar is much more difficult now than it was at the Stonewall Inn before 1969. I believe it is much harder for the judicial system to dismiss violence against GLBT folk because they were just a bunch of queers. It is much harder for TV personalities to make accusatory, inflammataory, or just plain desultory blanket statements about GLBT folk just on the basis of them being GLB or T. This sort of forward movement in GLBT civil rights is the result of many activists who targeted these inequties, brought them to light, and convinced more an more people that GLBT people should not be treated so inequally on the basis of their sexuality or sexual identity.
In many ways (and here's where I must tread carefully because this is so controversial), this forward movement is much like the the Civil Rights movement of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks. They---and obviously not only they---stood up to injustices, called them unjust, and said the justice system must do something about them. Police harrassment, indifferent court systems, and derogatory stereotypes are much harder to perpetrate---not impossible, but much harder---than they were half a century ago.
In this way, our movements have been very similar, and I know that many of the African American community don't like to see similarities, but I think these are fairly plain to see. I will agree with some in the African American community that there are enormous differences between the two movements, most of them having to do with the very nature of our identities. I'm fairly certain that there are many situations where I "pass" for straight, and so appear merely as a white male, and I do believe that I benefit from the slippery spectre of white privilege. On the other hand there are not many African American people who can pass for white, although there is a history of light skinned people working very hard to do just that. Just in that way, in the way that we are able to be identified when we walk into a retailer, the differences between the struggles of the GLBT and the African American communities is very different. I think it is very misleading and very condescending to make statements like "Gay is the New Black" (as I believe at least on GLBT magazine did on its cover).
But here is another way in which the two civil rights movements are very different. The black community in the 1950s and 1960s had a religious community where their leaders organized and made it a religious issue as much as a civil rights issue. The GLBT is not so strong in that area, in part because so many GLBT folk have experienced the opposite--they have been tossed out of their religious communities, by and large, and even when they formed new religious communities like the Metropolitan Community Churches, those communities were too busy bandaging the wounds of their membership to organize for civil movements. That's not to say that they've done nothing in that arena, and there is Soulforce, which tries to model itself after the work of MLK and Gandhi. So far, their efforts have failed to catch the media attention that the black churches were able to get in the middle fo teh 20th Century.
And part of that is the result of not having a traditionally gay church in the same way there were traditionally black churches. Part of that is because being GLBT is being from every layer of society. We are not from one traditional anything. We rise out of all traditions. This is our strength and it is our weakness. It is our strength because this means that no subculture can say "we have no gay people here" (despite efforts to say just that). It is our weakness because when we try to organize, we come from so many different organizational traditions that we have a hard time organizing.
So before this new civil rights movement can get a religious community to make it a religious issue as well as a civil issue, we need a large religious body with a uniform tradition of organization to say with one voice, "denying GLBT folk full access to any part of our civil and religious lives is wrong."
Being a member of the ELCA, I of course hope we might be among the first national religious church bodies to say just that. We won't be the first, but if we start taking steps, we will be the largest. And in this instance, numbers matter, since we seem to be at a place where we're still taking popular votes on who can fully participate in the freedoms and responsibilities of this nation.
That's what I'm hoping for, anyway. If the Presbyterians get there first, that would be great. The UCC is there, but they're too small (although they are doing remarkable things in trying to be heard and I honor that). The Episcopalians are still too divided on the issue, and really, they're not a huge religious body, either, just often more influential. Of course, if the ELCA passes the measures this summer, there will still be divisions---this is still a journey and the destination is still across Jordan---as is the the African American civil rights movement despite there now being a black man in the White House.
But it would be an enormous step forward. This is what I'm praying for.
(Brief civil rights history lesson: While it's certainly no secret, it's also not well known, but an important advisor and confidant of MLK was Bayard Rustin---a gay Quaker who brought to MLK nonviolent options of opposing injustice. It is generally acknowledged that had Rustin be straight, he would be honored alongside MLK, but since he was openly gay, his contribution to the civil rights movment is often ignored.)
Friday, March 13, 2009
Not So Seriously, Folks
Okay, in order to get a blog posted before midnight (in order to keep my self-imposed rule about posting everyday in lent---sorry to make you suffer my self-imposed rule), I'm just going to be silly for a moment. (During lent? I know . . . )
So, given that the real issue with the ban on gay and lesbian clergy is on the expression of their same-sex attraction (because, technically, you can be an out gay man or lesbian and still get ordained so long as you promise not to have sex, ever), I want to just ask some questions.
How far does this go?
I think it's a given that any genital activity is forbidden. I think that's clear.
But how about holding hands? Could two men hold hands? How about those handshakes where the clasping lasts a little too long?
Or say two women rent a movie and watch it together at one's house. Can they sit on the love seat together? Can they sit closely, leaning on each other? Would putting an arm around a shoulder while watching a romantic comedy be enough to get one removed from the ELCA roster?
Can a man gently caress another man's cheek?
Can a woman nuzzle another woman's neck during a hug?
Does one have to shut down emotionally around people of their own sex and never look lovingly at them? Does a clergy person have to report a crush?
Because, frankly, all of the above is expressing my sexuality and none of it has to involve nudity, much less genitalia.
If I found a man who would sleep in another room, never let me see or touch him (and vice versa) while he was nude, but might touch my cheek tenderly now and then . . . could I have that and be on the ELCA roster?
Just asking.
(and the little clock in the corner of my computer screen tells me it's 12:03. Rats. Didn't make it, even by being less serious.)
So, given that the real issue with the ban on gay and lesbian clergy is on the expression of their same-sex attraction (because, technically, you can be an out gay man or lesbian and still get ordained so long as you promise not to have sex, ever), I want to just ask some questions.
How far does this go?
I think it's a given that any genital activity is forbidden. I think that's clear.
But how about holding hands? Could two men hold hands? How about those handshakes where the clasping lasts a little too long?
Or say two women rent a movie and watch it together at one's house. Can they sit on the love seat together? Can they sit closely, leaning on each other? Would putting an arm around a shoulder while watching a romantic comedy be enough to get one removed from the ELCA roster?
Can a man gently caress another man's cheek?
Can a woman nuzzle another woman's neck during a hug?
Does one have to shut down emotionally around people of their own sex and never look lovingly at them? Does a clergy person have to report a crush?
Because, frankly, all of the above is expressing my sexuality and none of it has to involve nudity, much less genitalia.
If I found a man who would sleep in another room, never let me see or touch him (and vice versa) while he was nude, but might touch my cheek tenderly now and then . . . could I have that and be on the ELCA roster?
Just asking.
(and the little clock in the corner of my computer screen tells me it's 12:03. Rats. Didn't make it, even by being less serious.)
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Shame
Years ago, when I was first coming out, a friend was doing her own work of dealing with some childhood sexual abuse. As I was telling her some of my story, she responded with a spontaneous, "That's like being abused!"
She then started to apologize, saying she shouldn't equate abuse with sexual orientation, but I understood what her response. We talked some more and came to realize that we were both given situations over which we were powerless to do anything about (forced sex, minority sexual attraction), that we were both coming to terms with our powerlessness over those situations, even coming to terms with our own individual "okay-ness" despite these circumstances, and, perhaps most importantly, we were both learning how to talk about them despite a lot of feedback, verbal and nonverbal, that a lot of people just didn't want to hear to about it.
"Well, okay, so that's how it is for you, but can you just not talk about it? It makes us uncomfortable."
Shame is such a subtle, complex thing. Dorothee Soelle said she believed Germany needed to hold onto it's national shame over the Holocaust, as she felt it was a logical response to that event and it would hold off the national pride that led to it. Having felt shame over something I have no control, I might argue with her, that generations that were not alive for the Holocaust maybe ought not to be held responsible for it, or at least should not be made to feel shame as if they were present at the event. (Although, as I type that, I wonder if this isn't a big part of traditional lenten spirituality---accepting responsibility for the crucifixion of Jesus because of our sins. Hmmm . . . .)
All I know is that I have felt the shame that comes from being told I shouldn't feel the attractions I feel, even when I spent a good many years trying very hard not to feel them. I know my friend felt the shame of being taken advantage of by a powerful member of her family. We both know the shame of finding out that even well-meaning, otherwise supportive friends telling us we shouldn't talk about it so much. "It's not anyone's business," we're told.
Except those type of comments are ultimately not supportive. They say, "If someone uses that information against you, it's your fault for putting it out there." I know, as I was coming out and making my first public statements of who I was at about the same time Matthew Shepard was murdered, I heard "If someone beats you up, it's because you wouldn't remain silent."
Keeping secrets is a very stressful, shame-creating thing. We all keep them, some of them are indeed keep for good reason and I know I have kept them for the sake of other people. (A saying from the Desert Fathers teaches that when we hide the sin of a brother or sister, God also covers our sins, but when we expose another's sin, so will God reveal our sins.) There have been careers and families that I have protected by keeping secrets.
But in my case and in the case of my friend, the secrets we keep are not the result of our sin, even though we are often made to feel it is so. It took me until my 30s to understand that what I felt was really no different from what many men felt---I just felt it toward a different gender. It took my friend until her 40s to understand that having her virginity stolen from her didn't make her a dirty, damaged girl.
I bring this up because I've been a little surprised by how some of these feelings are resurfacing as I'm actively thinking about being gay and Christian, more actively writing about it than I have in years. I'm finding keeping this lenten blog is taking me back to some rather dark times of my life, times I'd rather leave behind, I'd rather not talk about, I'd rather keep secret and hidden. They make me uncomfortable.
Internalized homophobia is alive and well and playing in my head.
I bring this up despite an internal urge to keep silent about it (ah Neil, your life has been so much easier than most, stop yer whining!) because I'm finding this blog is costing me something more than the time to write it everyday (save Sundays). I'm finding that digging around in some of my history and my feelings about being a member of the ELCA are becoming something of a weight on these forty days.
And this reinforces why I need to do it. What better time to do it than lent?
It certainly increases a desire for resurrection.
She then started to apologize, saying she shouldn't equate abuse with sexual orientation, but I understood what her response. We talked some more and came to realize that we were both given situations over which we were powerless to do anything about (forced sex, minority sexual attraction), that we were both coming to terms with our powerlessness over those situations, even coming to terms with our own individual "okay-ness" despite these circumstances, and, perhaps most importantly, we were both learning how to talk about them despite a lot of feedback, verbal and nonverbal, that a lot of people just didn't want to hear to about it.
"Well, okay, so that's how it is for you, but can you just not talk about it? It makes us uncomfortable."
Shame is such a subtle, complex thing. Dorothee Soelle said she believed Germany needed to hold onto it's national shame over the Holocaust, as she felt it was a logical response to that event and it would hold off the national pride that led to it. Having felt shame over something I have no control, I might argue with her, that generations that were not alive for the Holocaust maybe ought not to be held responsible for it, or at least should not be made to feel shame as if they were present at the event. (Although, as I type that, I wonder if this isn't a big part of traditional lenten spirituality---accepting responsibility for the crucifixion of Jesus because of our sins. Hmmm . . . .)
All I know is that I have felt the shame that comes from being told I shouldn't feel the attractions I feel, even when I spent a good many years trying very hard not to feel them. I know my friend felt the shame of being taken advantage of by a powerful member of her family. We both know the shame of finding out that even well-meaning, otherwise supportive friends telling us we shouldn't talk about it so much. "It's not anyone's business," we're told.
Except those type of comments are ultimately not supportive. They say, "If someone uses that information against you, it's your fault for putting it out there." I know, as I was coming out and making my first public statements of who I was at about the same time Matthew Shepard was murdered, I heard "If someone beats you up, it's because you wouldn't remain silent."
Keeping secrets is a very stressful, shame-creating thing. We all keep them, some of them are indeed keep for good reason and I know I have kept them for the sake of other people. (A saying from the Desert Fathers teaches that when we hide the sin of a brother or sister, God also covers our sins, but when we expose another's sin, so will God reveal our sins.) There have been careers and families that I have protected by keeping secrets.
But in my case and in the case of my friend, the secrets we keep are not the result of our sin, even though we are often made to feel it is so. It took me until my 30s to understand that what I felt was really no different from what many men felt---I just felt it toward a different gender. It took my friend until her 40s to understand that having her virginity stolen from her didn't make her a dirty, damaged girl.
I bring this up because I've been a little surprised by how some of these feelings are resurfacing as I'm actively thinking about being gay and Christian, more actively writing about it than I have in years. I'm finding keeping this lenten blog is taking me back to some rather dark times of my life, times I'd rather leave behind, I'd rather not talk about, I'd rather keep secret and hidden. They make me uncomfortable.
Internalized homophobia is alive and well and playing in my head.
I bring this up despite an internal urge to keep silent about it (ah Neil, your life has been so much easier than most, stop yer whining!) because I'm finding this blog is costing me something more than the time to write it everyday (save Sundays). I'm finding that digging around in some of my history and my feelings about being a member of the ELCA are becoming something of a weight on these forty days.
And this reinforces why I need to do it. What better time to do it than lent?
It certainly increases a desire for resurrection.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Picking and Choosing Verses
Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." Mark 10:21
Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Luke 6:30
Where is the moral outrage (not to mention thousands of dollars and hours spent agonizing) over the non-literal observation of verses like the above?
(An easy target, I know, but all I have time for today. And still pertinent to the discussion, I say.)
Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Luke 6:30
Where is the moral outrage (not to mention thousands of dollars and hours spent agonizing) over the non-literal observation of verses like the above?
(An easy target, I know, but all I have time for today. And still pertinent to the discussion, I say.)
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Not My Words Today
Back when I was in seminary, I remember one day when Dr. Floyd explained some things about biblical prophecy that cleared up some things for me and made a whole lot more sense than the Hal Lindsey school of prophecy that I'd previously bought into. (Yes, I was a teenage fan of The Late Great Planet Earth---so many shameful things in my past.) I raised my hand, feeling the world changing even as I did so. I said to Dr. Floyd, "I've been an active member of the church from the time I could walk. Sunday school, confirmation, Luther League, Lutheran Campus Ministry, continuous church attendance. Why is this the first time I'm hearing this?" I was a bit indignant and Dr. Floyd admitted he didn't know why this information didn't make it to the pews, but it had been taught for a very long time.
Yesterday, my friend Candace Chellew-Hodge wrote a piece for Religion Dispatches that addresses this similar phenomenon. So today, I offer a link to her words. I think they are pertinent to what I'm trying to get at throughout lent.
http://www.religiondispatches.org/blog/religionandtheology/1203/clergy_cowardice/
(Candace is the author of Bulletproof Faith, which I referenced a few days ago, and also the editor/founder of Whosoever, an online webzine for GLBT Christians.)
Yesterday, my friend Candace Chellew-Hodge wrote a piece for Religion Dispatches that addresses this similar phenomenon. So today, I offer a link to her words. I think they are pertinent to what I'm trying to get at throughout lent.
http://www.religiondispatches.org/blog/religionandtheology/1203/clergy_cowardice/
(Candace is the author of Bulletproof Faith, which I referenced a few days ago, and also the editor/founder of Whosoever, an online webzine for GLBT Christians.)
Monday, March 9, 2009
Run for the Hills
I'm on a listserv of GLBT Christians (well, maybe more than one), and one day someone posted this bit of verbal self-defense. I don't remember now if it was original with the poster or if it was something she had seen elsewhere.
But it went something like this: Someone starts railing about how GLBT folk are going to bring down fire from heaven, that God was going to send wrath and destruction upon whatever community the railer was defending from the evils of GLBT presence. So the GLBT person replies, "Then why aren't you running for the hills?" Sort of stops the railing short, but to follow up, we might ask, "If you've received a word from the Lord that wrath and fire are about to rain down upon us, why aren't you packing up like Lot and his family and getting the hell out of Sodom? Could it be that you don't believe your own threats?"
I think it's a pretty clever response.
And it brings up the question: What's the worst that can happen? What are we really afraid of, as a corporate body, that will happen if we start ordaining GLBT folk who are in committed same-sex relationships? What's the fear of holding marriage ceremonies in our worship spaces? What do we think will happen?
I don't say that opponents to this idea are expecting fire raining down from heaven. I suspect the fear is something much more subtle, and may simply be a fear of something unusual. I don't think anyone really believes that people will start demanding legal marriage status with their poodles (although people do make provisions for their pets in wills---something that gets contested in same-sex relationships, so maybe we already recognize a closer bond between people and their pets than we do between same-sex couples? I'm being---a little---facetious).
I've heard people ask, "what do we tell the children?" I say, "what do you tell children when a man and a woman get married?" I mean, the smallest kids get marriage without knowing the mechanics of it all, from legal responsibilities to bedroom activities. I think kids can understand, "most men marry women and most women marry men, but sometimes a man marries a man and sometimes a woman marries a woman." That's all the explanation that needs to be made, it seems to me. I certainly don't hope adults are explaining male-female marriage with descriptions of the honeymoon! Or even by outlining the legal ramifications of the marriage contract.
But back to the point of this post: What is really the fear? Angering God? Well, okay, I suppose if your God is an angry, punishing God, I can see that, but, you know, we seem to be less concerned about angering God when we trade in a perfectly good car for the latest model simply because we can afford the latest model---while hungry people live in the community. So why do we believe God is angrier about a woman marrying a woman than about hungry neighbors?
Why aren't we all running for the hills?
But it went something like this: Someone starts railing about how GLBT folk are going to bring down fire from heaven, that God was going to send wrath and destruction upon whatever community the railer was defending from the evils of GLBT presence. So the GLBT person replies, "Then why aren't you running for the hills?" Sort of stops the railing short, but to follow up, we might ask, "If you've received a word from the Lord that wrath and fire are about to rain down upon us, why aren't you packing up like Lot and his family and getting the hell out of Sodom? Could it be that you don't believe your own threats?"
I think it's a pretty clever response.
And it brings up the question: What's the worst that can happen? What are we really afraid of, as a corporate body, that will happen if we start ordaining GLBT folk who are in committed same-sex relationships? What's the fear of holding marriage ceremonies in our worship spaces? What do we think will happen?
I don't say that opponents to this idea are expecting fire raining down from heaven. I suspect the fear is something much more subtle, and may simply be a fear of something unusual. I don't think anyone really believes that people will start demanding legal marriage status with their poodles (although people do make provisions for their pets in wills---something that gets contested in same-sex relationships, so maybe we already recognize a closer bond between people and their pets than we do between same-sex couples? I'm being---a little---facetious).
I've heard people ask, "what do we tell the children?" I say, "what do you tell children when a man and a woman get married?" I mean, the smallest kids get marriage without knowing the mechanics of it all, from legal responsibilities to bedroom activities. I think kids can understand, "most men marry women and most women marry men, but sometimes a man marries a man and sometimes a woman marries a woman." That's all the explanation that needs to be made, it seems to me. I certainly don't hope adults are explaining male-female marriage with descriptions of the honeymoon! Or even by outlining the legal ramifications of the marriage contract.
But back to the point of this post: What is really the fear? Angering God? Well, okay, I suppose if your God is an angry, punishing God, I can see that, but, you know, we seem to be less concerned about angering God when we trade in a perfectly good car for the latest model simply because we can afford the latest model---while hungry people live in the community. So why do we believe God is angrier about a woman marrying a woman than about hungry neighbors?
Why aren't we all running for the hills?
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Ecumenical Dialogs
One of the harder realities of the GLBT presence in the church---any church---is the line we seem to draw in the sand for so many people. Questions about GLBT full participation quickly creates a "for" and an "against" camp, with a small camp of undecided.
There has been some concern expressed about how full participation of GLBT folk in the ELCA will affect ecumenical dialogs. The ELCA has long been an active participant, often instigator of discussions with other church bodies. Here in the U.S.A., I'm not convinced that this is a huge concern. Most churches likely to engage in dialog with us are also struggling with the issue---call me optimistic, but we might be leaders for other such denominations. Two bodies with whom we are in full communion, the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church, are already ordaining openly GLBT folk. There is controversy there, to be sure, but it's already happening (in which case, we would be following their leadership). I have to express some real doubt that ordaining GLBT folk will have little effect on ecumenical dialogs with churches like Roman Catholic Church or the Orthodox Churches. Neither really fully recognizes anyone but their own kind and things like our ordination of women are already stumbling blocks between us. That we have any kind of friendly relationship with them is a grace, but I don't think there's much use in pretending that, short of our entire denomination turning to Rome or one of the Orthodox bishops, we're not likely to be in full communion with them anytime soon anyway. And as for other American Lutheran bodies, we might share a few social services in some parts of the country---and I that is significant cooperation---but we can't worship together, can't even share a prayer meeting together, and I don't believe that refraining from ordaining GLBT folk will improve those relationships anytime soon, either.
The place that is troubling for ecumenical relations in regard to GLBT folk is internationally. One of the most troubling things I read in Gene Robinson's book, In the Eye of the Storm, is that he was told (in what country, I don't recall just now) that Gene Robinson was equal to George W. Bush---arrogant Americans just doing whatever they pleased no matter what anyone else thought. In a discussion with my pastor, he pointed out that there would be strains on relationships with some Lutheran bodies in Africa and Asia, where Christianity often takes a hard line on many social topics.
These are more than just troubling to me. They grieve me. As I've said more than once, just in these blog entries, it doesn't make sense to me that I (and it's hard not to take it personally) am a divisive presence in the church.
At the same time, I don't know how to just simply say, okay, for the sake of unity, I'll be a second class participant in this church. Actually, I'm rather capable of doing that to myself---but I cannot say it for everyone, certainly not for the qualified candidates for ministry whose only detractor is that they're attracted to people of their own sex. I cannot say it for the next generation of GLBT Lutherans who will grow up in a church that doesn't regard them as worthy of full church participation. In fact, I have to say loudly, if with all the respect that I can muster, that for the sake of Asian and African GLBT youth, there needs to be a church somewhere in the world that models full acceptance.
Because there are GLBT youth in Africa and Asia, in the Lutheran churches in Africa and Asia, and if the ELCA's acceptance of GLBT folk into the ministry rosters damages relationships with those Lutheran churches, then at least there is a Lutheran witness for the youth (and maybe not so youthful) of those churches.
Because I'm sure most any gathering of GLBT folk will contain stories of teenage depression if not suicide attempts because they felt God did not love them, because they felt condemned by the church, because there were not voices in the world to say "you're okay, God loves you, God wants you." The ELCA might be very far from these churches in Asia and Africa and whatever other setbacks there might be in relationships with them, I'm optimistic enought to think we can be a light of hope to individuals in those churches until such a time that those churches might come around to full acceptance of GLBT folk.
Is this an arrogant American, doing what he wants, regardless of what anyone else thinks? I hope not. That's not my intention. (Hey, I was in Daley Square in Chicago the week before we invaded Iraq, saying with thousands of others that we don't want to be that sort of American!) But if God is calling us forward to full inclusion of GLBT folk in the life of the church, we have to move forward with humility and awareness that this will cause some trouble among church bodies---but do so with the hope and intention (and the work that has to go behind those hopes and intentions) that we are bringing Good News to the world.
There has been some concern expressed about how full participation of GLBT folk in the ELCA will affect ecumenical dialogs. The ELCA has long been an active participant, often instigator of discussions with other church bodies. Here in the U.S.A., I'm not convinced that this is a huge concern. Most churches likely to engage in dialog with us are also struggling with the issue---call me optimistic, but we might be leaders for other such denominations. Two bodies with whom we are in full communion, the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church, are already ordaining openly GLBT folk. There is controversy there, to be sure, but it's already happening (in which case, we would be following their leadership). I have to express some real doubt that ordaining GLBT folk will have little effect on ecumenical dialogs with churches like Roman Catholic Church or the Orthodox Churches. Neither really fully recognizes anyone but their own kind and things like our ordination of women are already stumbling blocks between us. That we have any kind of friendly relationship with them is a grace, but I don't think there's much use in pretending that, short of our entire denomination turning to Rome or one of the Orthodox bishops, we're not likely to be in full communion with them anytime soon anyway. And as for other American Lutheran bodies, we might share a few social services in some parts of the country---and I that is significant cooperation---but we can't worship together, can't even share a prayer meeting together, and I don't believe that refraining from ordaining GLBT folk will improve those relationships anytime soon, either.
The place that is troubling for ecumenical relations in regard to GLBT folk is internationally. One of the most troubling things I read in Gene Robinson's book, In the Eye of the Storm, is that he was told (in what country, I don't recall just now) that Gene Robinson was equal to George W. Bush---arrogant Americans just doing whatever they pleased no matter what anyone else thought. In a discussion with my pastor, he pointed out that there would be strains on relationships with some Lutheran bodies in Africa and Asia, where Christianity often takes a hard line on many social topics.
These are more than just troubling to me. They grieve me. As I've said more than once, just in these blog entries, it doesn't make sense to me that I (and it's hard not to take it personally) am a divisive presence in the church.
At the same time, I don't know how to just simply say, okay, for the sake of unity, I'll be a second class participant in this church. Actually, I'm rather capable of doing that to myself---but I cannot say it for everyone, certainly not for the qualified candidates for ministry whose only detractor is that they're attracted to people of their own sex. I cannot say it for the next generation of GLBT Lutherans who will grow up in a church that doesn't regard them as worthy of full church participation. In fact, I have to say loudly, if with all the respect that I can muster, that for the sake of Asian and African GLBT youth, there needs to be a church somewhere in the world that models full acceptance.
Because there are GLBT youth in Africa and Asia, in the Lutheran churches in Africa and Asia, and if the ELCA's acceptance of GLBT folk into the ministry rosters damages relationships with those Lutheran churches, then at least there is a Lutheran witness for the youth (and maybe not so youthful) of those churches.
Because I'm sure most any gathering of GLBT folk will contain stories of teenage depression if not suicide attempts because they felt God did not love them, because they felt condemned by the church, because there were not voices in the world to say "you're okay, God loves you, God wants you." The ELCA might be very far from these churches in Asia and Africa and whatever other setbacks there might be in relationships with them, I'm optimistic enought to think we can be a light of hope to individuals in those churches until such a time that those churches might come around to full acceptance of GLBT folk.
Is this an arrogant American, doing what he wants, regardless of what anyone else thinks? I hope not. That's not my intention. (Hey, I was in Daley Square in Chicago the week before we invaded Iraq, saying with thousands of others that we don't want to be that sort of American!) But if God is calling us forward to full inclusion of GLBT folk in the life of the church, we have to move forward with humility and awareness that this will cause some trouble among church bodies---but do so with the hope and intention (and the work that has to go behind those hopes and intentions) that we are bringing Good News to the world.
Friday, March 6, 2009
Personally
I wasn't always a pro-GLBT Christian. Perhaps that's surprising, but it shouldn't be. Any number of GLBT Christians can tell stories of fighting our attractions, trying to "go straight" in an effort to be a better Christian. I remember arguing with my straight friends in seminary about what was wrong with being gay. I remember writing a paper in seminary that argued against full inclusion of "unrepentant homosexuals" in the life of the church.
The story of my coming to terms with this can be found in this essay I wrote about 12 years ago. http://whosoever.org/Issue7/morality.html
For this blog entry, suffice to say that I know something of the struggle to become pro-GLBT, even when the "G" lives within my skin. I try to be patient as I watch people struggle with the issue, especially when it isn't that personal for them. Still, I have to confess to impatience.
My impatience comes from watching other people's lives get sidelined and watching the church lose authority in a culture that is less concerned about these things. We only have one life, and there's only so long that some people can wait. A lot of people die waiting. A lot of people seek out community in bars and clubs because the church doesn't/won't offer a place of belonging.
There is chronos and there is kairos, and it seems there is neither for too many people. We wring hands over the this things, worried about who will leave and afraid of who might join.
A recent study by Tina Fetner, How the Religious Right Shaped Lesbian and Gay Activism, shows how the millions of dollars raised and spent by anti-gay propaganda has not stopped the growing sympathies for GLBT folk. In fact, her studies suggest that it is the anti-gay propaganda that has helped change some minds about GLBT folk---for the postitive. As a religious person, I can't help but see the hand of God in this. What they meant for evil, God used for good. (Or at least, it appears evil to me from my perspective.)
It's not that I don't believe minds can change, that they won't change. It's happening and at a rather fast pace as these things go. What I worry about is that it won't change fast enough, and we'll have another generation of GLBT kids growing up in a church that won't embrace them fully, won't honor their relationships, won't give them the means and support to create meaningful relationships, won't say anything more than "you're welcome here, but don't expect that means you have full access, full acceptance."
My mind was changed. It was a religious experience. I don't know how to help others have that experience. But I pray for it.
The story of my coming to terms with this can be found in this essay I wrote about 12 years ago. http://whosoever.org/Issue7/morality.html
For this blog entry, suffice to say that I know something of the struggle to become pro-GLBT, even when the "G" lives within my skin. I try to be patient as I watch people struggle with the issue, especially when it isn't that personal for them. Still, I have to confess to impatience.
My impatience comes from watching other people's lives get sidelined and watching the church lose authority in a culture that is less concerned about these things. We only have one life, and there's only so long that some people can wait. A lot of people die waiting. A lot of people seek out community in bars and clubs because the church doesn't/won't offer a place of belonging.
There is chronos and there is kairos, and it seems there is neither for too many people. We wring hands over the this things, worried about who will leave and afraid of who might join.
A recent study by Tina Fetner, How the Religious Right Shaped Lesbian and Gay Activism, shows how the millions of dollars raised and spent by anti-gay propaganda has not stopped the growing sympathies for GLBT folk. In fact, her studies suggest that it is the anti-gay propaganda that has helped change some minds about GLBT folk---for the postitive. As a religious person, I can't help but see the hand of God in this. What they meant for evil, God used for good. (Or at least, it appears evil to me from my perspective.)
It's not that I don't believe minds can change, that they won't change. It's happening and at a rather fast pace as these things go. What I worry about is that it won't change fast enough, and we'll have another generation of GLBT kids growing up in a church that won't embrace them fully, won't honor their relationships, won't give them the means and support to create meaningful relationships, won't say anything more than "you're welcome here, but don't expect that means you have full access, full acceptance."
My mind was changed. It was a religious experience. I don't know how to help others have that experience. But I pray for it.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Evangelism
How does a church say "all are welcome here" while saying "so long as you know your place"?
This is what GLBT people hear. You're welcome here, participate in Bible study, assist in worship, give your offerings, but don't think you're worthy of being a pastor. You may do so much and no more.
How do I invite people into this community? How do I tell them "come and see" when what I have to show them is that some are privileged, and some are barred to full participation.
Where is the Good News in that?
This is what GLBT people hear. You're welcome here, participate in Bible study, assist in worship, give your offerings, but don't think you're worthy of being a pastor. You may do so much and no more.
How do I invite people into this community? How do I tell them "come and see" when what I have to show them is that some are privileged, and some are barred to full participation.
Where is the Good News in that?
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Self-Sacrifice and Humility
It is not self-sacrifice is someone else is taking it away from you.
It is not humility if someone else is telling you your place.
Discuss.
It is not humility if someone else is telling you your place.
Discuss.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Choosing Your Scholarship
To follow up on yesterday's post . . .
Last year, Candace Chellew-Hodge published her book, Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians. In it, she recounts a story which ends up with her stating that the religious argument against GLBT folk is not the other side of the argument.
In other words, we can no longer make this argument a religious argument. It is not GLBT folk on one side, religious folk on the other.
So the question becomes reframed as: What scholarship are you going to accept, because the scholarship has been done. If there is a faithful, sane, responsible reading of the Bible that supports the condemnation of GLBT folk, so be it. But there is also a host of scholarship done by faithful, sane, responsbile people who do not believe the Bible condemns GLBT folk.
I suppose the question goes one step further, then. What scholarship are we going to accept, that most fully and tangibly proclaims the Gospel? What scholarship is most likely to bring in the Reign of God for the poor and oppressed?
Is it now an argument between people who chose scholarship that supports being exclusive, divisive and mean and people who chose scholarship that supports being inclusive, diverse, and open?
Other recommended reading: Thou Shalt Not Love: What Evangelicals Really Say to Gays by Patrick M Chapman. The title is misleading. It's really a compendium of cross-disciplinary studies on GLBT issues, from biblical studies to anthropology. Chapman is a PhD in Anthropology and he brings a wealth of scholarship to this one book.
Last year, Candace Chellew-Hodge published her book, Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians. In it, she recounts a story which ends up with her stating that the religious argument against GLBT folk is not the other side of the argument.
In other words, we can no longer make this argument a religious argument. It is not GLBT folk on one side, religious folk on the other.
So the question becomes reframed as: What scholarship are you going to accept, because the scholarship has been done. If there is a faithful, sane, responsible reading of the Bible that supports the condemnation of GLBT folk, so be it. But there is also a host of scholarship done by faithful, sane, responsbile people who do not believe the Bible condemns GLBT folk.
I suppose the question goes one step further, then. What scholarship are we going to accept, that most fully and tangibly proclaims the Gospel? What scholarship is most likely to bring in the Reign of God for the poor and oppressed?
Is it now an argument between people who chose scholarship that supports being exclusive, divisive and mean and people who chose scholarship that supports being inclusive, diverse, and open?
Other recommended reading: Thou Shalt Not Love: What Evangelicals Really Say to Gays by Patrick M Chapman. The title is misleading. It's really a compendium of cross-disciplinary studies on GLBT issues, from biblical studies to anthropology. Chapman is a PhD in Anthropology and he brings a wealth of scholarship to this one book.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Biblical Authority
This isn't a topic that I find terribly helpful, as we tend to get really polarized over it. Still, it's a bit central to the debate at hand, so I'll make my statement and move on.
Several years ago, an ordained friend told me about a Bible study she led. They were reading through some of the Old Testament stories, post-Egypt, where the Israelites are heading to the Promised Land and leaving something of a bloody trail behind them. They were wiping out tribes of peoples as they marched. Someone in the study group had not read those passages before and was disturbed that God had commanded the Israelites to destroy whole peoples. My friend answered, in our trained, historical-critical way, that history is written by the winners and where the winners can claim God's favor, all the better, but my friend didn't believe God told anyone to commit genocide.
Someone else in the study said, "But it says so right here in the Bible. God told them to do it!" It became apparent that the second student had less trouble with a genocidal god than with a scriopture open to discussion and interpretation.
Let's say that again. The second student was better able to worship a genocidal god than deal with a Bible that may not be 100% accurate.
At what point does the Bible then supplant God as the object of worship? At what point are we willing to do horrendous things, justify them by horrendous things in the Bible, and then walk away because "God said to"? Unfortunately, history is full of answers to these questions. In the end, I don't believe most cases have anything, really, to do with God, the Bible, or religion at all, but our own grabs for power or wealth. But I digress, if only a little.
What if, instead of approaching the Bible as some magical book with unwavering authority, we were to approach it as a set of books, written by our ancestors in faith, but open to conversation, open to, even, disagreement? What if we, in our modern times, claimed the authority of our own baptisms as equal to the baptisms of St. Paul or any of the New Testament writers? What if we really believed that the Holy Spirit was still active and still moving us today, still giving visions of how wide is God's grace and mercy, how many people truly are welcome into the Reign of God?
The Bible is a wonderful book. It's also a foreign book in every sense of the word. It was written in languages that no one speaks anymore. It was written in cultures that had vastly different ideas about medicine and technology and science. Yes, some of the knowledge remains accurate, but no one today believes that all the genetic material of new life is contained in a man's "seed" and that a woman is merely the "ground" in which he plants it---and that she is either fertile or barren soil. No one believes that there is a dome above us, holding back waters except when it rains. To get to any useful information from the Bible, we need to be aware of their lives, how they thought, how they experienced the world---much of it so differently than we experience.
The Bible is a wonderful book. It is to be approached with the reverence as afforded to our forebears. At the same time, our forebears are sometimes wrong. Or they had bad information on which to form their conclusions. We'll be wrong, later generations will see we had incomplete information on which we form our conclusions.
So I propose we set aside the Bible sometimes and practice some discernment from our relationshiops, from our own life in the Spirit, leaning not completely on what has gone before, but taking responsibility for our lives in our time and place.
In regard to GLBT folk, this, I honestly believe, means opening up the church to full inclusion and participation. In our time and place, it seems irresponsible to exclude them. It seems exclusion at this point is to deny the movement of the Spirit in GLBT lives.
It is to choose a genocidal god over the God who is always doing a new thing.
Several years ago, an ordained friend told me about a Bible study she led. They were reading through some of the Old Testament stories, post-Egypt, where the Israelites are heading to the Promised Land and leaving something of a bloody trail behind them. They were wiping out tribes of peoples as they marched. Someone in the study group had not read those passages before and was disturbed that God had commanded the Israelites to destroy whole peoples. My friend answered, in our trained, historical-critical way, that history is written by the winners and where the winners can claim God's favor, all the better, but my friend didn't believe God told anyone to commit genocide.
Someone else in the study said, "But it says so right here in the Bible. God told them to do it!" It became apparent that the second student had less trouble with a genocidal god than with a scriopture open to discussion and interpretation.
Let's say that again. The second student was better able to worship a genocidal god than deal with a Bible that may not be 100% accurate.
At what point does the Bible then supplant God as the object of worship? At what point are we willing to do horrendous things, justify them by horrendous things in the Bible, and then walk away because "God said to"? Unfortunately, history is full of answers to these questions. In the end, I don't believe most cases have anything, really, to do with God, the Bible, or religion at all, but our own grabs for power or wealth. But I digress, if only a little.
What if, instead of approaching the Bible as some magical book with unwavering authority, we were to approach it as a set of books, written by our ancestors in faith, but open to conversation, open to, even, disagreement? What if we, in our modern times, claimed the authority of our own baptisms as equal to the baptisms of St. Paul or any of the New Testament writers? What if we really believed that the Holy Spirit was still active and still moving us today, still giving visions of how wide is God's grace and mercy, how many people truly are welcome into the Reign of God?
The Bible is a wonderful book. It's also a foreign book in every sense of the word. It was written in languages that no one speaks anymore. It was written in cultures that had vastly different ideas about medicine and technology and science. Yes, some of the knowledge remains accurate, but no one today believes that all the genetic material of new life is contained in a man's "seed" and that a woman is merely the "ground" in which he plants it---and that she is either fertile or barren soil. No one believes that there is a dome above us, holding back waters except when it rains. To get to any useful information from the Bible, we need to be aware of their lives, how they thought, how they experienced the world---much of it so differently than we experience.
The Bible is a wonderful book. It is to be approached with the reverence as afforded to our forebears. At the same time, our forebears are sometimes wrong. Or they had bad information on which to form their conclusions. We'll be wrong, later generations will see we had incomplete information on which we form our conclusions.
So I propose we set aside the Bible sometimes and practice some discernment from our relationshiops, from our own life in the Spirit, leaning not completely on what has gone before, but taking responsibility for our lives in our time and place.
In regard to GLBT folk, this, I honestly believe, means opening up the church to full inclusion and participation. In our time and place, it seems irresponsible to exclude them. It seems exclusion at this point is to deny the movement of the Spirit in GLBT lives.
It is to choose a genocidal god over the God who is always doing a new thing.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
