a kingdom built of seeds

It wasn’t until I first began to grasp the full human experience of gay people (friends or otherwise) that my heart and mind began to change. It sounds trite (and I admit it now with some embarrassment), but an awareness dawned: they navigated the emotions of love and romance like anyone else, all the harder because they fell in love with the wrong person according to many in society, and much of the church.

Though she was in my social work course in college, we had never spoken. She stood up in front of the class for a personal presentation, visibly shaking with nerves. Through tears she began to tell us who she was—a lesbian—and shared about herself and her partner. Was this her first public “coming out”? Had she ever spoken about her sexual orientation to strangers? Whatever the case, it clearly required courage. Perhaps it was then that my awareness first began to shift, if ever so slightly. Somehow I had never seen it so clearly—her experience of being a lesbian and falling in love with a woman was, for her, as human and normal as any heterosexual. Whatever I then believed about the “right or wrong” of same sex relationships, it was a beautiful moment—her bravery, her honesty, her openness. How could God be against her, simply because of her sexual orientation? This college student’s vulnerability cracked a door for me. And it has not closed since.

I remember sitting down with a somewhat recently made friend at the time who had come out of the closet not long before. She came from a more conservative family and area. Over the period of a few months we consistently spent time together, usually going to see a movie and talking afterward. I remember tears coming to her eyes during some of our conversations as she verbally wrestled through her sexual orientation and its implications, while also struggling in a difficult and toxic relationship with another woman (her first). I tried never to preach. I listened, and spoke about God only when she welcomed it. Reading her responses, I believed that what she felt in my presence wasn’t judgment or fear, but love and belonging. What else would I show her, and what else would God? A young woman working through a monumental transition. Not religious, not a Christian, but someone whose experience was worthy of recognition and empathy. 

And then there was a friend I had made at church. She asked to volunteer with the high school youth group I was leading at the time. When we sat down to talk about it, with blunt honesty she informed me: “I’m a bisexual and am currently pursuing another woman.” Her love for and commitment to Jesus was evident. And she was a bisexual. This put me in quite a predicament. After speaking with the elder board, I had to say “no”. Whatever I believe now, I then believed it was the right choice, not because I took issue with her sexual orientation (really I didn’t), but because it was best for the church as a whole. Graciously, she understood. (Later, after some personal transition, she did end up becoming a volunteer youth leader.)

Fast forward. Eventually her involvement with the girl ended. We spoke at a coffee shop, and her story is a testament to the distance we must sometimes travel to discover what is best for ourselves. “I think I’m supposed to be with a man,” she said. I was a little taken aback. Through no outside intervention, without lectures and Bible thumping and truth shoving, in her own connection with God she knew what was best for her. Mind you, after dating a woman or two, after navigating her own journey. She had never lost God or her faith; clearly, God had never lost her. Had someone tried to play God in her life, had tried to convince her of the error of her ways, might this not have pushed her further away or in the opposite direction entirely? No matter where she landed in her personal process, all I had to give was love, empathy, and compassion, all I could offer was acceptance and belonging. I couldn’t and wouldn’t play God in her life. As it turns out, God did the best job of being God in her life.

Another good friend of mine is also a bisexual, currently engaged to a man. This beloved friend is loud and boisterous and fun and outgoing, and you always know when she’s in the room. She grew up in an ultra-conservative religious environment, one that didn’t allow women to be in leadership and taught that they belonged in the home, among many other signature restrictions of rigid fundamentalists. How hard must it have been to grow up in such a context and discover your sexual orientation is inherently “wrong” according to your tradition, contrary to everything you’ve been taught about right and wrong. Some time ago, when speaking about whether she could ever be in a long term relationship with a woman, she said, “I don’t know if I could be, because of my parents.” She feared she would be rejected, cast out, at worst excommunicated. This does not sound like the God I know.

And there is another friend from where I grew up, also raised in a very conservative Christian home. At one point of her life she was the Christian girl poster child, a talented singer who sang in countless worship sets. She went back and forth when she first owned up to her sexual orientation. When she received notes, letters, and messages attempting to show her the error of her ways when she came out for good, she left the church. (We spoke a few times throughout this process, long ago now. She is now engaged to a woman.) She experienced the perhaps well-intentioned but misguided overreach of those who tried to play God in her life, to speak the “truth” so that she would change and come back. We spoke about it over a drink many years ago. I could sense the hurt, the wounds inflicted after her courageous honesty. How can one be a part of the church after being told that who you are and who you love is inherently wrong? That you are on the outside simply because of a sexual orientation you can’t just change or turn off, and don’t want to? It might not be said outright, but what’s implied is this: “You do not belong because you are a homosexual.”

I have a gay uncle. He’s married to a man I’ve only interacted with a few times. Once, not too long ago, when they came to visit my parents’ home, something happened to my father. What happened to him was not so different from what happened to me in that college classroom—he began to see their humanity, apart from all the labels, stereotypes, and generalizations the church and society has perpetuated. He showed my uncle’s husband (who is a hoot, by the way) the property, the landscaping and turtle ponds. They had a conversation as two human beings on a level playing field. As old fashioned, socially conservative, and charismatic evangelical as my father is, I believe something shifted during and after this interaction. Some barrier was removed, or at least punctured. He saw my uncle and his husband in a new way. He had admittedly been a little resistant when they first arrived. But, as it turns out, he was backed into a corner. And this was all it took for him to see these fellow human beings—and family at that—with new eyes. While before he may have seen them through the eyes of an older, straight, more theologically conservative Christian man, that day he began to see them, I think, through the eyes of the God he so passionately follows. As my father shared this story with me, I was a little surprised and, more than anything, proud of him.

I think back to my gay friends (especially those from religious and/or conservative backgrounds). I want only to give them my love and say “I’m so sorry” for any hurt they’ve experienced from others who either don’t understand or don’t want to. I want to say “you belong” when others say they don’t. I want to tell them “I’m proud of you.” For my gay friends, I want only equity, justice, belonging, and love. 

I remember hearing a story from a pastor many years ago who did it right. He and his wife were on a cruise and befriended two men, a gay couple. They got along well and bonded quickly. Then the couple asked the pastor and his wife what they did for a living. As soon as the pastor said, “I’m a pastor,” a tangible wall went up; the two men shied away. But a short time after, something beautiful happened.

He takes both men in his arms for an embrace and, as he does, the two men begin to weep. I cannot remember if he told how he spoke or was silent. But the embrace itself, full of a love strong enough to breach the wall of whatever wounded history caused the two gay men to initially draw back, must have been as vast as God himself.