marriage equality

I fail to understand why Christians simultaneously decry the "ills" of the gay community yet oppose any state recognition of same-sex relationships. Most criticism of the "gay lifestyle" consists of finding the most outrageous statistics possible and inferring such action onto the whole gay community.

Example: Gay people have 400k% as much sex (almost all of it unprotected) as straight people. They all have AIDS, use drugs, and engage in rampant BDSM sexual practices. HEAD FOR THE HILLS! Hide your kids, hide your wife, hide your husband, cause they're rapin' everybody out there.

When really, this example comes from a survey where the surveyors went to Badlands (gay club) in San Francisco, and asked only young males aged 18-24 about their sexual practices. There are any number of problems with this:

• The poor lesbians are entirely left out
• The older (or younger) gay men are entirely left out
• If you're not into clubbing, you're left out
• Self-reporting is problematic; many gay men like to brag about their sexual prowess
• If you don't live in San Francisco, where many gays go to seek refuge from their conservative upbringings and consequently may be somewhat wilder, you're left out

If marriage is such a great institution, why not allow or even encourage it in a community that lacks any institutions that assist with stabilizing relationships. It seems intuitively true that gay relationships are typically more fluid and less-long lasting -- though I'd be open to evidence to the contrary. But when you can check out of a long-term relationship without the hassle and social stigma of divorce, why would we expect any different? What sort of end status do gay couples have to aspire to?

If marriage is so great, then it seems like all the more reason to make it equally available to same-sex couples. And because of its great benefit, the constitutional argument for equality is even stronger.

love is not against the law

Perhaps I should spend today, Valentine's Day, focusing somewhat less on romantic love and boys and more on a nobler and less sexual form of love: love of neighbor.

Consider this famous passage on love, in the broad context of loving our neighbors as ourselves (and remembering Jesus' answer when asked who exactly our neighbors are):

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. - 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

What does it mean to believe and hope all things for our neighbors? Our poor neighbors? Our neighbors in Iran? The neighbors who are our enemies? How do I love my neighbors who make the assumption that I'm functionally not a Christian because I gave up fighting my gayness? How can I challenge conservative evangelicals to love their gay neighbors better?

I suppose when the Bible fails to be specific enough the Holy Spirit must step in and provide guidance.

LGBT Morality

The stereotype of the LGBT community is that it is sexually permissive -- anything goes. And, like most stereotypes, there's a serious grain of truth there. I know a number of folks who have had and/or are having a lot of sex. Sex is quite casual for them, and a number of my gay friends say it is "worse" here in San Francisco than in other cities. People let loose more here than elsewhere.

And, while I haven't exactly been an angel, that lifestyle is not what I want. I was discussing this with a counselor yesterday (yes, I got over my mistrust of mental health professionals) what I really want in life. And it's not to have obscene amounts of sex with as many guys as I can convince to sleep with me. What I really want -- and what I believe most people really want -- is to express myself physically with someone with whom I have a deep emotional connection and with whom I share some sort of commitment. And while that's not an exact statement of Biblical sexual morality, it seems like that's the great point of Biblical sexual morality (also, children, arguably).

The problem is that there's a huge dearth of scholarship and theological reflection on LGBT sexuality. It seems like there are two positions -- gay sex is wrong, wrong, wrong, WRONG. That's the sum total of theology there. The other position is that gay sex is OK with God. The only inference I can draw from that position is that as much as you want is also OK with God, or perhaps some sort of "do no harm" premise which seems implicit in Christianity generally. But both positions are unsatisfying. Someone needs to think about gay people and sex and figure out how/when sex is OK, in the absence of the institution of marriage. A "committed relationship?" What does that look like? When you're dating seriously? When you've done some sort of marriage equivalent? Or is it really whenever so long as you're not using the other person? Or is the only limitation not hooking up?

I'll have to think about this more.

hating the darkness

"Come, Lord, and tarry not;

Bring the long looked-for day;

O, why these years of waiting here,

These ages of decay?

Come, for love waxes cold,

Its steps are faint and slow;

Faith now is lost in unbelief,

Hope's lamp burns dim and low.

O, come and make all things new!

Come and make all things new!

Build up this ruined earth,

Come and make all things new."

- Horatius Bonar, adapted.

If there's a fundamental witness from Christianity, it's this: things aren't like they are supposed to be.

Brokenness shouldn't exist. Divorce shouldn't exist. Parents shouldn't abandon their children. Loved ones shouldn't die. Car crashes shouldn't end young lives. Cities shouldn't decay. Streets shouldn't be unsafe. Cancer shouldn't exist. Hurting people won't commit suicide. Tsunamis shouldn't devastate. Good lives shouldn't be shortened, and long lives shouldn't be filled with pain.

The truly radical claim of Christianity isn't that things aren't like they are supposed to be. Humans know that, in an a priori fashion. The human heart cries out that things are as they ought not be, and longs for those things that seem incorruptible.

Instead, the radical claim of Christianity is that things will, one day, be made right. As C.S. Lewis writes in the Chronicles of Narnia, after Aslan had died and come back:

"But what does it all mean?" asked Susan when they were somewhat calmer.

"It means," said Aslan, "that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know. Her knowledge goes only back to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and the darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward."

Because of what God did in Jesus, a decaying and ruined world is being renewed as death begins to work backward. New life will spring up in unexpected places, and will gradually overtake the darkness in the world. This is indeed a crazy claim. Why is it so crazy?

The claim is hard to believe because we don't see it in our lives. People die. Cancer grows in the bodies of infants. Society and the church tell teenagers that being gay is the worst outcome in life, so they desperately fight to cover it up and change themselves. Some kill themselves out of their desperation not to be gay and experience the sure and swift rejection of their friends, families, and churches. What does it all mean?

1) It does indeed take a leap of faith to believe this truth. But this is the core of Christianity even at its most abstracted level, and the Holy Spirit testifies to it strongly in my own heart. I'm not trying to convince the proverbial "you" out there in blog-land to believe it, but I can't not believe it. A nihilistic existence where I just try to "get mine" would be far easier. And that's perhaps the path that most take, I don't know. But I cannot accept that, and it seems like all of creation itself is groaning out to be renewed.

2) It's appropriate to hate the darkness in the world now. To weep and gnash our teeth at the pain in the world. To be angry when pain fills our lives, whether self-inflicted or inflicted by others. I have issues with God for my own gayness, I have issues with society/the church for telling me that this is the worst problem to have, and I have issues with myself for responding by trying to force myself to be straight and involving another person in my struggle without her knowledge or consent. I hate all of it, and know that all of it isn't as it should be.

3) The Gospel calls us to work for renewal, to "be the change" we believe the world needs. Christians work for cancer to be cured, to prevent suicide, to renew broken neighborhoods and cities, to seek freedom and justice for the oppressed -- to fight against the darkness wherever they find it. How the world is being renewed is awfully undefined in the Bible -- so I just assume it's up to me.

How do I fit in? What are my particular strengths? What is my calling? TBD.

don't stop believing

Faith. How do I still hang onto it?

Well, I suppose it's a mixture of things.

Most importantly, it's this background belief (that I rarely even question) that God is up to something I don't understand... at all. But if the history of redemption is God creating a world prone to a fall from perfection, letting it fall into sin and disrepair (analogous/related to the concept of entropy), rescuing it through the life and death of Jesus, and then letting the church simmer for 2000+ years kinda/sorta bringing God's Kingdom into the world little by little (but screwing up a ton) then... I don't understand that either. In sum, if I were God I would have done it all a bit differently. But I'm not a deity, and I can't not believe, so I just keep hanging on.

Second, I make myself do Christian things. I make myself talk to God, I make myself conform to some sort of Christianity morality, I make myself go to church and sing the songs that I may or may not actually believe on any given day. There's a saying: "If you drag the body long enough, the heart and mind will eventually follow." So I keep being a Christian, thinking eventually I'll believe it.

Third, I do believe it, sometimes. Every now and again, albeit rarely, the Holy Spirit captivates my heart in the way only He can. And He's done it before, so I know how it feels. And those moments reduce me to tears, because I know that, for all my lack of belief and indescribable pain and anger at God and everyone else, He hasn't given up on me. In the middle of my gayness and the sinfulness that invades all of our lives, God hasn't given up on me. And I can't get over the idea that God still knows the plans He has for me, and those plans are for my welfare and aren't evil, and include a future and hope. That doesn't change just because I'm gay.

Does that give me a lot of specifics for the day? No. But it helps me to hang on. Being a Christian in the gay world isn't much easier than being gay in the church. But I've always lived my life in that tension between two different worlds, and now is no different.

what i believe (today, anyway)

I had to write a statement of faith for the church I've been attending. It was nice to get to hear other folks' statements, and it was a good exercise to write my own. Even if, per usual, mine was way long in comparison. But it sums up where I'm at right now, though parts of it might not even apply later on today -- my heart swings that wildly. Belief. Who knew it would be so hard?

---

I believe in God the Father,

a perfect parent, without any of the shortcomings of my earthly father and mother.

God is sovereign, yet unsearchable, acting or not acting in surprising ways;

some that I like and understand, some that I dislike and fail to understand.

I believe in a God who is neither safe nor predictable, yet is always good.

I believe that we, of our free choice, have disregarded God’s will and have fallen into sin.

The symptoms of our fallen condition are apparent everywhere:

In ourselves, in our internal struggles over right and wrong,

and in the fact that we far too often choose bad over good;

In our relationships, where we constantly are pulled toward selfish action,

and are consistently choosing to magnify ourselves to the detriment of others;

And in our communities, where we fail to care for those persons Jesus prioritized,

and are always looking for an “other” to exclude and be better than.

I believe in a God that was not content to let us stray away,

but sacrificed his own child for the sake of humankind

(a pain that, for any parent, is worse than one’s own death).

In the death of Jesus, the pattern of sin in the world was dealt a fatal blow.

Death itself was turned upside down, and began to work backwards,

allowing new life to spring up in the most unexpected places.

I believe in a God that never lets us go, no matter how hard we try to run,

Sending the Holy Spirit into the world to continue the work of reconciliation,

Comforting us when sin -- personal, relational, communal -- brings us pain

As well as when God fails to act to fix the broken things in our lives.

I believe the Holy Spirit is present in baptism and the Eucharist

in inexplicable yet powerful ways,

guiding and directing us even when we feel like we’re anchorless.

I believe in a God that does not fit into my boxes or categories,

Liberal in his love and mercy,

Arms wide-stretched to the poor and marginalized.

Yet God rufuses to coddle us, pushing us toward growth and change,

Calling us to be the hands and feet of the Kingdom of God,

Which, two steps forward and one and a half steps back,

God is surely bringing into the world. Even if it doesn’t seem like it.

I believe in God’s Church,

the universal community of believers at all time and in all places,

Headed by Christ, led by the Holy Spirit

Yet constantly screwing up, placing periods where God has placed commas,

Excluding certain races, genders, and sexual orientations where God has refused to do so.

Yet I still believe that the church is God’s chosen instrument

to bring God’s own Kingdom into the world,

Mirroring the brokenness of humanity,

Providing essential community,

And serving as a rather odd witness to the God that created the Church the way that He did.

I believe that God will one day,

In God’s own time,

Through a manner of God’s own choosing,

Probably in the way we all least expect,

Fix all that is broken in the world,

Right all wrongs,

Repair all wrecked relationships,

And will consummate God’s Kingdom in the new heavens and the new earth.

Lord Jesus, come and make it so.

Amen.

going mental

To some extent, mental "health" care got me into this mess. I'm not sure how this would have shaken out, but I do know that the pseudo-psychology of folks like Exodus International exacerbated this problem in my life. Their books, their preaching, their counseling, all encouraged me to hold on to the lie that I can be straight. To the clear detriment of my own mental health.

So when it comes to coming out of this mess with some semblance of health and wholeness, I'm more than skeptical about opening up to another person who may have an agenda and perspective that is not in line with my own. My psychiatrist is one matter: her care is primarily clinical/medical, focusing on levels of medication that even out the peaks and valleys. Let me tell you, psychiatric medication is a beautiful thing (despite some side effects).

But counseling... that's a whole 'nother beast. How do I open up to someone? I feel like I bottled up the gay-ness for so long, not telling anyone. Then I finally tell folks, and it becomes a battle to fight and a thing to change. I know a mainstream psychologist or counselor wouldn't do that, but there's a lingering mistrust of folks who get into the hard and dark places of the heart and have a lot of power to do what they will with that knowledge. I'm torn between obviously needing counseling, but being fearful of it at the same time.