Here’s an article on celibate gay Christians.
Rarely, outside of my work with GCN, do I hear anyone talk about what we call “Side B” celibate gay Christians—those who are attracted to the same sex but believe it would be wrong for them to act on those desires.
Today, Yahoo has an article up on that very subject.
It’s short, but I think it fairly represents the struggles such individuals endure, caught between the “Side A” gay world (embracing gay relationships) and the so-called “ex-gay” world.
Are you an aspiring author? Are you interested in the publishing world? Or are you just looking for something to read this summer?
If any of these are true of you, you won’t want to miss my podcast this week, as I interview Wendy Grisham, head of progressive Christian publisher Jericho Books.
This week, we discuss:
- Wendy’s advice for aspiring authors about how to get a publisher’s attention (and how not to);
- My confession about why I feel intimidated by people who say they love to read;
- Suggestions for moving, funny, and insightful books to add to your summer reading list;
- And more!
Give it a listen with the links above, or subscribe/download on the GCN Radio homepage.
I’m working on a series.
Hey, you guys, I had an idea for a blog post series, and you can help me.
I’ve decided to write a series of posts to address some of the most common questions I get asked by straight Christians about being gay and Christian.
You know, questions like:
- “Isn’t calling yourself a gay Christian like calling yourself an adulterous Christian?”
- “Why do you have gay pride parades? We don’t have straight pride parades.”
- “Shouldn’t your identity be only in Christ, and not in your sexuality?”
I bet many of you can think of more questions you’ve either heard from others or wondered about yourself. Suggest your favorites in the comments below (or use Tumblr’s built-in response feature) and I’ll add my favorites to the list.
My goal is to answer each question in a separate post and link them all from a single place to make the answers easy to find.
What common questions do YOU think I should answer?
Why I’m glad I lost my innocence.
I just saw The Great Gatsby this week. And—what do you know!—I rather enjoyed it.
As a kid, I had to read the novel in English class, and I hated it. I think this is for at least 3 reasons:
1. It had an ugly cover. (Yes, I know it’s considered a work of art. I thought it was ugly and creepy.)
2. Every book is worse when you’re forced to speed-read it in between mountains of homework and then be tested on it. Tests make even Dr. Seuss stressful. Heck, I’d probably even hate my own book if I had to be tested on it.
3. I, um, might have skimmed some parts. Or not actually finished it.
There’s another reason. As a kid, I was horrified by stories about people doing bad things, and Gatsby is full of them: cheating on spouses, lying, covering up crimes, and way too much partying. When I read stories like this, I couldn’t get past my disgust at people’s sin to dig deep enough for any serious analysis.
But then I grew up. And today, I can appreciate stories like this for what they are—tragic, sometimes frustrating, other times illuminating portraits of human beings in all our complexity.
In real life, people make bad decisions. They lie. They cheat. They sin. They are human. And the stories I preferred as a child, where the “good guys” always make the right decisions and evil is something out there somewhere instead of in us, just don’t reflect reality.
Yes, as I’ve grown, there’s been a sense of innocence lost. I’ve realized that the people I always looked up to aren’t perfect. My family’s not perfect. I’m not perfect.
I mean, it’s not that I ever thought I was literally perfect. But as a kid, the knowledge of my own sinfulness seemed more like something I knew in theory, as a matter of theology, but not something I frequently experienced. I knew I’d sinned, but my sins were (it seemed) of the small variety—failing to do a homework assignment and not wanting to tell my parents, for instance. In theory, I knew we were all sinners, all equally fallen, but I still had secret lines I’d draw between the small sins I’d committed (and had asked forgiveness for) and the big sins only other people committed.
Because, see, I was a good Christian. I was better than them.
My biggest sin, undoubtedly, was pride—quite possibly the biggest sin there is, theologically speaking, but one that doesn’t seem so bad. Pride is a sin good Christians can commit and still think of themselves as good Christians. But there were certain lines I’d never cross, certain sins I’d never commit. Because if you crossed those lines, you might be forgiven, but you’d never be like me or the “good Christians” I looked up to.
Well, I’m 35. And I’ve crossed at least three of the major lines I said I’d never cross. (No, I’m not going to tell you which ones.) I’m more fully aware today than ever that I am a sinful person. Forgiven, but sinful. But forgiven.
I’ve lost my innocence—not just about myself, but about how the world works. I know now that the people I always looked up to aren’t as perfect as I’d imagined, that even good people can make really bad decisions.
Today, I can watch a film like Gatsby and instead of seeing bad people, I see just people—people driven by human emotions and desires, making bad decisions as we all do and reaping the consequences of their choices. I realize that this is the world we live in, and that the people who make such bad choices are essentially just like me. We’re emotional, broken, messy human beings with messy lives in a messy world. The evil isn’t out there, some wicked queen or fire-breathing dragon; it’s in us. It comes from us. All of us. ALL of us.
And in some small way, I mourn my loss of innocence, but in a bigger way, I’m glad for it. It makes the world more complicated, but it gives me empathy for other people when they do bad things.
I can see them as human beings, and love them even though I see all of their sin.
Which, I think, is how God sees us all.
It’s here! It’s here!
You guys have been asking me forever when there would be an audio version of TORN. Wait no longer! You can get it right now! Right this moment!
With a click of the mouse, you can hear me personally read my story to you while you work, drive, clean, or work out. Cool, right?
Get it here: Audible, Amazon, iTunes
By the way, I’m going to see if I can get them to choose a better audio sample, because right now, the sample is largely me quoting another book, which isn’t a good example of my book at all. If you read my blog, though, you know how I write. :)
Also, iTunes might have made one tiny mistake in their listing:
Oh, iTunes.
This week on the GCN Radio podcast, I strike up a fake feud with Mark Sandlin, pastor and co-founder of The Christian Left, over his beating me in a satirical competition. We also discuss why some Christians are so reluctant to call themselves “Christians.”
Oh, and we laugh a lot. (And yes, I promise this podcast is safe for people on all sides of the political aisle.) Play it above or download from our GCN Radio page.
If Christians have a bad reputation, maybe it’s because we need more empathy.
Last week, CNN.com ran an article asking if Christians are a “hated minority.” In the piece, some evangelical Christians suggest that they are being demonized for expressing their religious view that homosexuality is a sin, and that this is proof that Christian views are no longer tolerated in American society.
I had several initial responses to this:
- Those individuals don’t speak for all Christians.
- As I’ve said before on this blog, “homosexuality” is not a thing.
- This is a hot topic, so of course people will express their disagreement with you, whoever you are. No one on either side gets a free pass to avoid criticism.
- The issue isn’t just those individuals’ moral opposition to gay sex/marriage. A lot of it has to do with their language and attitude.
I decided to write an op-ed on this last point, explaining that the reason Christians have a bad reputation in today’s society has a lot to do with the perception that we lack empathy.
Well, today CNN published my letter on their website. Of course, they had to edit it a bit for their space (which, as an author, always feels a bit like having one’s child cut up and stitched back together), but they were very generous about letting me review the edits, and I think it still conveys my meaning.
Here’s how it starts:
In high school, I was a Christian know-it-all.
My nickname was “God boy,” and I was known for preaching at my friends about social issues of the day. I dismissed their objections—and accusations of homophobia—as intolerance for my faith.
“I’m just telling you what God’s Word says,” I’d argue.
Years later I realized my mistake. What my peers most objected to wasn’t my beliefs; it was my condescending attitude. I debated and preached when I should have listened. I thought that stating my position loudly and unyieldingly was a sign of strength. In the process, I alienated my friends.
I’m still an evangelical Christian, but one thing is now crystal clear to me. American evangelicals’ bad reputation isn’t just because of what we believe. It’s mostly because of how we behave.
You can read the rest on the CNN Belief Blog.
On Friday, my friend Matt and I sat down to discuss the week’s news about pro basketball player Jason Collins’s decision to come out as gay—and the conversations that have resulted.
Is it a problem for gay players to be in the locker room? Matt and I discuss this and other questions—and the fact that I know nothing at all about sports—on this week’s podcast! Click the link and give it a listen, or download it from the Gay Christian Network’s GCN Radio page.
Q:I have no comments but a question. If it is not about sex, then why have the gay pride parades across the nation that promote sexual acts. The way people dress in the parades flaunts sexual acts, shows nudity etc. Why must they be outlandish in the dress and behavior? Just saying. If they want to promote family values then they should present themselves as such.
Anonymous
Thanks for the question!
I have two things to say about this. First, I agree with you; when people at Gay Pride parades or other events behave in lewd or hypersexual ways, it sends the wrong message. I don’t like it, I don’t like the message it sends, and I wouldn’t do it.
But it’s important to recognize that when you turn on the news and see a guy in a thong simulating sex acts in a pride parade, he’s not representing the entire gay community. In fact, he’s in the minority. I know lots of gay people, and as far as I’m aware, I don’t know anyone who has ever danced in a thong in a Pride parade.
This does not represent me as a gay man:
Just like this does not represent me as a Christian:
In both cases, the most visible and outrageous people get the spotlight, and they get way more than their fair share of the TV coverage.
And in both cases, if you’re in the group, you know that these people don’t represent you, but if you’re outside of the group, it can be easy to assume that everyone else in the group is like the most visible images (even if they’re better about keeping it quiet).
I suspect you may have some follow-up questions, so I’ll go ahead and ask them for you.
Okay, so maybe you and your friends wouldn’t dress up like that, but clearly some people do. Why do they do it?
I don’t want to speak for someone else, but I can guess. Here are a few reasons I can think of:
- Some gay people treat Gay Pride Day kind of like Mardi Gras or Halloween. In New Orleans on Mardi Gras, for instance, lots of straight people dress outrageously, get drunk, and behave lewdly in the streets. And while some Halloween costumes are scary, a large percentage of adult women’s Halloween costumes are skimpy and sexual. But a straight woman flashing her boobs on Mardi Gras or dressed as a “sexy nurse” on Halloween might not act that way at all the rest of the year, and she certainly doesn’t represent all straight women.
- There are some gay people who live their lives around sex, just like there are straight people who live their lives around sex. (Research suggests that gay people aren’t any more or less promiscuous than straight people.) For gays whose lives do revolve around sex, being surrounded by gay people can be an excuse to show off their bodies and “let it all hang out,” so to speak.
- Some gay people use intentionally shocking images as a form of protest. For instance, some people feel like, “If I’m going to be judged for my sexuality regardless of what I do, I’ll give these judgmental people something to be upset about!” I don’t think that’s effective, but then, I’m not the one doing it.
- We don’t all have the same beliefs about what is appropriate/offensive/shocking/etc. Not all straight people have the same beliefs or values, right? Same thing with gay people. Just because I find something to be inappropriate or offensive doesn’t mean everyone who has the same orientation as me will also find it inappropriate or offensive.
I’m sure there are many other reasons as well, but you get the idea. And regardless, most gay people at Pride events dress and behave just like anyone else you’d see on any other day of the year. You only notice the outrageous ones, because they’re outrageous.
So perhaps you’re thinking:
Okay, but if the hypersexed images don’t represent all gay people, why don’t any gay people speak out against them?
Sometimes they do. Back in the mid-90s, for example, gay author Bruce Bawer wrote a book called A Place at the Table all about how images like that hurt the gay community and represent only a minority of people. I have plenty of gay friends who refuse to even go to Pride events because they find them offensive.
But, to be honest, I think many gay folks are tired of other people preaching at them and so they don’t want to preach at others. A lot of gay people think about Pride events sort of like a lot of straight people think about Mardi Gras or Halloween—if you don’t like it, you don’t go, and if you do go but you don’t like some people’s behavior, you just ignore it.
We’re all different, and no one person can represent an entire group.
Follow up: The day after posting this, I went to a local LGBT festival to take pictures and see how much sexual imagery I actually encountered. Here’s what I found.
Four ways Christians are getting the gay debate wrong.
Yesterday, basketball center Jason Collins became the first professional American athlete to come out as gay while still active in a team sport.
As soon as the news broke, the religious debates started. Christians expressed their disapproval; Christians came to his defense; people accused one another of being bigots or sinners. It happens every time, and as a Christian, I find it incredibly frustrating.
Shortly after the news broke, for instance, ESPN anchor Chris Broussard came under fire for the following comments:
BROUSSARD: Personally, I don’t believe that you can live an openly homosexual lifestyle or an openly—like premarital sex between heterosexuals. If you’re openly living that type of lifestyle, then the Bible says you know them by their fruits. It says that, you know, that’s a sin. And if you’re openly living in unrepentant sin, whatever it may be, not just homosexuality—adultery, fornication, premarital sex between heterosexuals, whatever it may be—I believe that’s walking in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ. So I would not characterize that person as a Christian because I don’t think the Bible would characterize them as a Christian.
As I’ve been following the debate over the last 24 hours, I’ve been struck by how often I see Christians make the same mistakes over and over.
Here are four ways many American Christians are getting this whole thing wrong.
1. Equating “being gay” with “having sex.” If an unmarried person tells you they’re “straight,” would you assume that they’re having sex? Probably not. Most straight adults are having sex, but not all of them are. The same is true for gay adults. In his coming out article, Jason doesn’t say anything about his sexual beliefs or practices; he says only that he’s single. Why, then, does this suddenly become a debate about the morality of gay sex, with comparisons to sexual behaviors like “fornication” and “adultery”?
I grew up in a Southern Baptist church with strict beliefs that people shouldn’t have sex outside of marriage. When I finally, tearfully admitted (after years of trying to avoid it) that I was attracted to guys instead of girls, I found myself on the receiving end of lecture after lecture about how being gay was a sin “just like adultery or premarital sex.” But I wasn’t having any kind of sex at all. Being gay isn’t like adultery or premarital sex, because being gay isn’t a sex act. Even if I never have sex, I’m still gay.
2. Using that (assumed) sex act to define us as people. It’s one thing to believe gay sex is sinful, but it’s quite another to define gay people and our lives by that one act. This is where that devious word “lifestyle” creeps in. (I’ve explained before on the blog why I hate that word.) Even if Jason Collins is having sex, that doesn’t mean he’s living a particular kind of “lifestyle.” Do all sexually active straight people live the same lifestyle? Was Billy Graham’s lifestyle the same as Howard Stern’s?
My friend Marty mentioned on my podcast this week that the words “gay lifestyle” are typically a euphemism for “having gay sex.” But by using the word “lifestyle,” you end up defining gay people’s lives entirely in terms of that sex. Notice how Broussard stumbles in that video clip when he tries to apply the same terminology to his other examples: “I don’t believe that you can live an openly homosexual lifestyle or an openly—like premarital sex between heterosexuals.” It’s as if he started to say “an openly ‘premarital sex’ lifestyle” and then realized that made no sense. Because if two straight people have sex before marriage, people might call that sinful, but no one would refer to that as their “premarital sex lifestyle.” We view it as one particular act, not a definition of the entirety of their lives.
(Also, just as a side note, I get Broussard’s point about the need for Christians to repent of sin, but considering that research says 80% of young unmarried Christians have had sex, I’d be a little reluctant to make blanket statements about who is or isn’t a Christian.)
3. Treating gay people as symbols of a culture war instead of as human beings. Jason Collins is a person. By his own admission, he’s been through a lot of struggles in figuring out who he is and whether to talk about it publicly. But it often feels that when someone like this comes out, many people on both sides view them as just a symbol for us to celebrate or bemoan, so that we all must rush to express approval or disapproval.
I wish, instead, that Christians’ first reaction to news like this were to want to understand, to ask questions like “Why would a Christian in a decidedly anti-gay field feel the need to identify himself as gay? What brought him to this point? What obstacles did he overcome? What has his experience been like?” These are the questions of a compassionate person, one who is willing to put the other person’s humanity first.
Maybe people don’t think of those questions as much when the person coming out is a celebrity. But when I came out to the people I knew personally, I had the same experience. People were quick to condemn me and only rarely took the time to ask me questions about why I felt the way I did or what had brought me to that point in my life. It’s as if, when you come out, you cease to be someone’s friend and become only a representation of an issue.
4. Assuming that being gay is a choice. Who you date, marry, or have sex with is a choice. Who you are attracted to isn’t. “Being gay” only refers to who I’m attracted to. It’s not something I chose, and it’s something many of us were, frankly, afraid of when we first realized it about ourselves.
But over and over, I see Christians talking about being gay as if it were something one could choose to be or not to be. In a Christian Post article this week, Jason Collins was described as “the first active athlete in professional sports to speak about his lifestyle choice” (emphasis mine). What “lifestyle choice” do they mean? On another website, a Christian commenter echoed many when he wrote that “I do not see how anyone can argue with what Broussard said: Living as an open homosexual is open rebellion to God.”
I hear these kind of statements every day. But think about it for a moment. If “living as an open homosexual” is rebellion against God, what choices do I have? I’m already gay; I can’t change that. I could choose to lie and not to be “open” about it, of course, but I don’t believe in dishonesty. Other than that, the only way I could avoid “living as an open homosexual” would be to stop “living.” I don’t have to tell you where that kind of thinking leads.
Is that what the commenter intended? Of course not. But that’s how the message comes across, day after day, to gay people across the country and around the world.
Let me be clear: I think everyone has a right to their moral views, even when they disagree with mine. We Americans can disagree on the morality of gay sex just as we can disagree on the morality of eating meat or drinking alcohol. We Christians have disagreed for centuries on theological questions from the makeup of the Scriptures to infant baptism to transubstantiation. But this isn’t just about a moral disagreement; it’s about how we treat one another and how we talk about one another. If we Christians can’t show more love and willingness to listen, it won’t change one person from gay to straight, but it will turn a lot of people against Christianity.
That’s why I wrote TORN. That’s why I write this blog. That’s why I do what I do. Hey church, are you listening?
