Categories: sexuality
Date: 17 March 2010 06:23:54
This morning, too early for any comments giving advice on how I might change this, I go down to Sheffield to talk to a group of LGBT peeps about Christianity and sexuality. From my experiences of sitting in these talks they tend to be filled with Christians from various sides of the debate and include a few people who are scared and confused seeking to reconcile their faith and their sexual orientation. I have never given a talk like this before, this one only happened because somebody shouted "can anybody help?" on a discussion site I belong to and I realised yes I could help, even if the thought of doing this scares me somewhat. Ihave agreed with the people organising I am going to use a couple of You Tube clips if the technology is available, share my story / thoughts and then engage in a q&a session. I am going to post the talk in here and then the clips. The aim of this is threefold: 1) to help and encourage anybody reading who is struggling, 2) to promote understanding by those who I respect hold different views and 3) to enable people to pray for me in an educated way today as I give the talk. As I am getting no money for this and am no academic on this subject, (and so it's not about to be published anywhere), I feel quite safe putting it up here, (minus the introduction which this paragraph has replaced) in the hope God might use it to help somebody, as I say. It does mean this is a very long post, so feel free to leave now or skip to the You Tube clips I want to go with this which I am posting at the end, rather than the beginning. I posted a resources list to go with the talk a couple of days ago which can be found here.
I have spent almost two decades wrestling with the relationship between my faith and sexuality. To give some background I married at the age of 19, when I was vaguely aware of my sexual orientation but was pushing it out of my mind. I was a “good evangelical Christian” and believed my only choices for life were heterosexual marriage or singleness. Looking back I can clearly say I got married too young, for moral but wrong reasons. It is not surprising then, after a few years, my husband went off with somebody else. For various reasons, including a growing awareness of my sexual orientation, whilst this was not ideal from a Christian point of view, it was the right thing for our relationship to end. In my mid-twenties, as a divorced single mum, I discovered that trying to live out a life based on legalism didn’t mean a happy ending.
As I say, even when I was married I realised that I was actually far more attracted to women than men, sexually. However, it was academic as I was married and my life choices and understanding of faith at that point meant that I could only think of expressing my sexuality within a heterosexual context, with my husband. In retrospect whilst on one level this was the right thing it caused a great deal of pain in the relationship which, if I had acknowledged who I was prior to marriage, could have been avoided. On a personal level it led to me pressing the self-destruct button labelled self-harm and eating disorder. These are destructive patterns of behaviour, God through his grace with the help of medical professionals has given me the strength to overcome.
After my marriage split up I spent a few years continuing to try and deny my sexual orientation to myself aswell as hide it from others. Even after I started to come out to myself, something which Gene Robinson said at Greenbelt this year, is the hardest part of the whole process for a long time I felt I had to be single and that I had to keep clear of doing anything within church which might be problematic because I was gay, even though I was single. This meant I kept to chairs and washing up because these were “safe” activities, aswell as things I actually do enjoy doing. Occasionally people would push me out of this zone, and make suggestions that my gifts might not just be for these things, but I would always want to laugh/scream at them didn’t they get it.
My position at this time would be described by Gay Christian Network and others as side B. This means I recognised my sexual orientation at the time as being somewhere between lesbian and bisexual, (I prefer the term non-hetero), but felt as a bible believing Christian I had to be celibate. To ensure I remained celibate I felt that I had to remain single. I was therefore in the position of feeling no call to singleness but feeling that my understanding of my faith together with who I am demanded it. In my early 30’s the feeling that, with a good innings, I could half a century of singleness ahead of me was not always easy to come to terms with.
One day my minister made some comment relating to one of the periodic news stories about the divisive debates within the Church of England. He said that gay people in relationships were sinning and anybody in this position should talk to him. However, if anybody was just struggling with same sex attraction they should just go home and give it to God in prayer as he would deal with it. Well, as I was in the second category I went home and prayed that God would make me straight. Not the first time I’d prayed it, but that day I prayed it with an increased intensity believing God would suddenly change my feelings and I really might become straight if I prayed hard enough.
I did have an incredible experience of God that evening, which was in many ways to change my life. However, he didn’t make me straight. What I got was an intense feeling of being hugged by God and being told by him that he loved me as I was. He told me I was who he made me to be and my sexuality was a gift from him.
This experience gave me hope and release on one level and enabled me to begin to deepen my relationship with God but it also meant an increasingly difficult relationship with church became almost impossible. Afterall, I knew what was meant to have happened, according to church teaching, when I prayed was for God to “heal” me of my sinful thoughts, but what had actually happened was he had affirmed me as somebody made in his image, whom he had created as I was and whom he loved as I was.
It meant I began a time of exploration and trying to work out how I could be gay and ok with God aswell as how I could maintain integrity within the church. My starting point was going back to scripture and starting to listen to alternative interpretations. Amongst those I found useful were James Alison, who gave an interesting talk at Greenbelt a few years ago and George Hopper who talked about his changed understandings of the passages. More recently I have also found the work of Adrian Thatcher useful. What I learnt from these theorists and theologians was that the passages so often quoted are interpreted by many to be referring to oppressive and abusive sexual acts. There is no equivalent to be found to our modern understanding of committed gay relationships to be found within these passages. I also benefitted greatly, although I ended up disagreeing with their side B position in the end, from reading the work of Stanley Grenz and Tony Campolo and thinking through the arguments from various angles.
I knew this understanding of scripture has put me at odds with some of my friends, and various people I have worshipped with. That is why in my previous church, before moving to Durham I resigned my church membership but remained an active part of the church. This was not an easy decision, but it was the one I felt I had to engage in and I benefitted greatly from having a loving pastor who did not agree with me on the issue, but who did realise the painful issues involved and my desire for integrity.
As time has gone on and I have found myself mixing with LGB Christians more regularly both locally and in wider contexts through GCN and other groups aswell as reading more contributions to the debate on sexuality. I have become aware of how the expression of sexuality is in many ways like alcohol.
Alcohol and the expression of sexuality are not bad, but they do need to be used in a responsible way or else they can be very harmful. For some this means that they decide to be tea total, whilst for others the decision is to drink in moderation. For sexual activity this means some choose to be celibate. Others choose to engage in relationships that are within a monogomous, loving, non-oppressive, enhancing context where both partners are equal, even if they bring different things to that relationship. Within this context Christians who share each others faith learn to grow closer by sharing every aspect of their lives including spirituality.
The relationship I have been in for the last six months has been positive for me in a huge range of ways. Being able to give and recieve love in a range of ways has enhanced my life and seen me grow.
As I have said one area I have had to work through is what being in a relationship means about my faith and how it is expressed. I have come to realise that it is important and biblically to be living a life of integrity and following biblical principles of commitment, faithfulness and love.
Through moving out of a position of fear to one where I stop saying “no” to various involvement in the church I believe I am “called” to, (like local preaching), has enabled me to grow spirituality. I have come to peace being in a position of being me, with integrity; gay and Christian. I respect others with differing views and so appreciate the need to be discreet on occassion, but not deny who I am if I am asked, etc. At the end of the day if somebody with appropriate authority turns round and says, “sorry, you can’t do/ need to stop doing x,y or z because of your sexuality” there will be a sense of sadness, but I will take it that at this time that is not the right place for me to be. I will still have other opportunities to serve in other ways. Taking this attitude is what enables me to live and serve with integrity and removes the “fear” element.
I know I have reached a particular position, and that the story I have shared points to same sex relationships, within the parameters mentioned earlier of faithfulness and love now being acceptable in my view. Yet, I also continue to respect those who hold the opposing view and believe that the only option for those who are gay or lesbian is celibacy and for those who are bisexual a heterosexual marriage. I know from personal experience how isolating it can be to take this position and the reasons why the interpretation of scripture some choose to take leads to this conclusion.
I honestly believe that whilst those who use this interpretation of scripture to try and oppress others and to stop others being all God has intended them to be should be challenged, that those who after careful consideration take this position should be supported and engaged with with respect. As someone once said, the only thing harder than being gay in the church is being Christian in the gay scene. Being side B and seeking to be honest about ones own sexual orientation whilst maintain a position of celibacy can be even more isolating.
I want to finish by examining a quote from the Evangelical Alliance and their 1998 report, Faith, Hope and Homosexuality. The report says, “In all aspects of the Christian life, and not least in relation to homosexuality, it is essential to balance biblical sexual morality with biblical grace in our response to every individual. Truth on its own can often be cold, condemning and occupied more with the letter than the spirit of the law. The heart of the Gospel is that truth finds its fulfilment in God’s grace, offering the chance of repentance, forgiveness and new life. Such truth is not compromised when compassion and respect are shown to an individual; nor are such responses a seal of approval on wrong behaviour. They are, rather a sign of God’s love."
This quote is something I think people need to hold onto, even though I know I have a different understanding of what biblical sexual morality is on this issue than the EA. What often seems like a polarised debate is actually more complex and many people I know are of the view, “honestly, I don’t know what to think about the correct interpretation of the scriptural passages involved”. Whatever interpretation of scripture we take if we allow ourselves to take extreme positions which vilifies the other we are falling into sin, based more on trying to prove we are right, than love for our brothers and sisters.
Grace is more important than legalism. That doesn’t mean anything goes but it does mean in looking at debates on sexual ethics we need to recognise the imago dei within all, not just those who happen to agree with us.
Finally it is the gospel which matters. That is the sharing of the good news of Jesus Christ. We all have the task of engaging in mission, showing God offers grace and second and third chances aswell as repentance and forgiveness. Our lives need to show we have received this love and repentance and grace. I believe rigid legalism leads to people repressing who they have been created to be and holds people in fear. What the world needs to see is the power which is expressed through us allowing God to forgive us and love us, leading us into the freedom which grace gives. This is not a freedom to do whatever we like, but it is a freedom for us to live the life he has created us to live. For some of us that means a life in committed, faithful, monogamous, loving same sex relationships reflecting the sexual orientation God has created us with. For others it means living out a life of singleness God has called them to. Only if we learn to live in this way, with integrity, will we be able to share our faith, with sensitivity, with the LGBT community, showing them the love God has for them and learning from them how God has been working in their lives and community.
The GCN You Tube clips I am hoping to show at the beginning are these:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBMbNSyqwkA&feature=related[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUmxDbSXvPU&feature=PlayList&p=DA1EBE6901CF9CE4&index=0[/youtube]