Catholic and Gay

[Debora123]

I stumbled upon this blog and thought it was beautiful!

I have heard a lot about how mean the Church is, and how bigoted, because she opposes gay marriage. How badly she misunderstands gay people, and how hostile she is towards us. My gut reaction to such things is: Are you freaking kidding me? Are we even talking about the same church?

When I go to Confession, I sometimes mention the fact that I’m gay, to give the priest some context. (And to spare him some confusion: Did you say ‘locker room’? What were you doing in the women’s…oh.) I’ve always gotten one of two responses: either compassion, encouragement, and admiration, because the celibate life is difficult and profoundly counter-cultural; or nothing at all, not even a ripple, as if I had confessed eating too much on Thanksgiving.

Of the two responses, my ego prefers the first — who doesn’t like thinking of themselves as some kind of hero? — but the second might make more sense. Being gay doesn’t mean I’m special or extraordinary. It just means that my life is not always easy. (Surprise!) And as my friend J. said when I told him recently about my homosexuality, “I guess if it wasn’t that, it would have been something else.” Meaning that nobody lives without a burden of one kind or another. As Rabbi Abraham Heschel said: “The man who has not suffered, what can he possibly know, anyway?”

Where are all these bigoted Catholics I keep hearing about? When I told my family a year ago, not one of them responded with anything but love and understanding. Nobody acted like I had a disease. Nobody started treating me differently or looking at me funny. The same is true of every one of the Catholic friends that I’ve told. They love me for who I am.

Actually, the only time I get shock or disgust or disbelief, the only time I’ve noticed people treating me differently after I tell them, is when I tell someone who supports the gay lifestyle. Celibacy?? You must be some kind of freak.

Hooray for tolerance of different viewpoints. I’m grateful to gay activists for some things — making people people more aware of the prevalence of homosexuality, making homophobia less socially acceptable — but they also make it more difficult for me to be understood, to be accepted for who I am and what I believe. If I want open-mindedness, acceptance, and understanding, I look to Catholics.

Is it hard to be gay and Catholic? Yes, because like everybody, I sometimes want things that are not good for me. The Church doesn’t let me have those things, not because she’s mean, but because she’s a good mother. If my son or daughter wanted to eat sand I’d tell them: that’s not what eating is for; it won’t nourish you; it will hurt you. Maybe my daughter has some kind of condition that makes her like sand better than food, but I still wouldn’t let her eat it. Actually, if she was young or stubborn enough, I might not be able to reason with her — I might just have to make a rule against eating sand. Even if she thought I was mean.

So the Church doesn’t oppose gay marriage because it’s wrong; she opposes it because it’s impossible, just as impossible as living on sand. The Church believes, and I believe, in a universe that means something, and in a God who made the universe — made men and women, designed sex and marriage from the ground up. In that universe, gay marriage doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t fit with the rest of the picture, and we’re not about to throw out the rest of the picture.

If you don’t believe in these things, if you believe that men and women and sex and marriage are pretty much whatever we say they are, then okay: we don’t have much left to talk about. That’s not the world I live in.

So, yes, it’s hard to be gay and Catholic — it’s hard to be anything and Catholic — because I don’t always get to do what I want. Show me a religion where you always get to do what you want and I’ll show you a pretty shabby, lazy religion. Something not worth living or dying for, or even getting up in the morning for. That might be the kind of world John Lennon wanted, but John Lennon was kind of an idiot.

Would I trade in my Catholicism for a worldview where I get to marry a man? Would I trade in the Eucharist and the Mass and the rest of it? Being a Catholic means believing in a God who literally waits in the chapel for me, hoping I’ll stop by just for ten minutes so he can pour out love and healing on my heart. Which is worth more — all this, or getting to have sex with who I want? I wish everybody, straight or gay, had as beautiful a life as I have.

I know this isn’t a satisfactory answer. I don’t think any words could be. I try to make my life a satisfactory answer, to this question and to others: What are people for? What is love, and what does it look like? How do we get past our own selfishness so we can love God and our neighbors and ourselves?

It’s a work in progress.

youngandcatholic.net/2011/07/catholic-and-gay/

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

This has been posted at least twice before, where are people all stumbling upon it from?

 

[Debora123]

This has been posted at least twice before, where are people all stumbling upon it from?

Whoops, sorry. Didn’t realize others have already posted this.

I saw it on facebook.

 

[LaSainte]

Beautiful!

 

[Loboto-Me]

Doesn’t matter how many times someone posts this… who can tire of such a great message from someone who knows how it really feels to be obedient when it’s so hard to be?

Thanks for posting

 

[Philotheatoo]

Beautifully pointed out. My prayers are with you on your journey.

 

[Dee_S]

Doesn’t matter how many times someone posts this… who can tire of such a great message from someone who knows how it really feels to be obedient when it’s so hard to be?

Thanks for posting

Well said. Such admirable and humble devotion is itself a grace. And as we all know, God gives his grace gratuitously - at His own discretion…to whom and when He wants.

Surely, those who think they either ‘deserve’ or have ‘earned’ his graces, should question whether they are the Pharisee or the Publican?

 

[Jaypeeto4]

I think that this is a wonderful, touching, and inspiring article
by a very thoughtful, godfearing and courageous person.

The only thing I would question is the author’s calling himself (or herself?) “Gay.”
Not because he or she is acknowledging his or her attraction to the same sex,
but simply because, in the common use of the term,
people use the term “Gay” to describe a same-sex attracted person who
is actively pursuing the practicing sexual lifestyle, which this good author
is clearly NOT doing. God bless him or her for such faithful obedience to Christ.

I would also tend to question the use of the word “homophobia.”
It was a word that was made up by radicals to try and silence anybody who opposes
the militant and active homosexual lifestyle and political agenda.
The word is really inaccurate. Nobody is “afraid” of homosexuals, whether sexually active or celibate. But the sexually active militants use the term “homophobia” to try and silence people from reminding them that the SEXUALLY-ACTIVE lifestyle IS sinful.
Not the attraction/orientation, but the unlawful copulation and fellating.
So I do not use the term “homophobia.”
People who loathe persons with SSA are people who HATE, not FEAR, homosexuals.
For people who genuinely HATE persons with same-sex attraction,
I use the term BIGOT to describe them. Merciless, Self-Righteous Bigot, in fact.
God bless the author.
Love to all,
Jaypeeto4
+JMJ+
PRAY THE ROSARY DAILY

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

I stumbled upon this blog and thought it was beautiful!

youngandcatholic.net/2011/07/catholic-and-gay/

I find it hard to label someone “gay”.
It is like branding someone “the-guy-who-has-got-TB”

 

[Debora123]

I think that this is a wonderful, touching, and inspiring article
by a very thoughtful, godfearing and courageous person.

The only thing I would question is the author’s calling himself (or herself?) “Gay.”
Not because he or she is acknowledging his or her attraction to the same sex,
but simply because, in the common use of the term,
people use the term “Gay” to describe a same-sex attracted person who
is actively pursuing the practicing sexual lifestyle, which this good author
is clearly NOT doing. God bless him or her for such faithful obedience to Christ.

I would also tend to question the use of the word “homophobia.”
It was a word that was made up by radicals to try and silence anybody who opposes
the militant and active homosexual lifestyle and political agenda.
The word is really inaccurate. Nobody is “afraid” of homosexuals, whether sexually active or celibate. But the sexually active militants use the term “homophobia” to try and silence people from reminding them that the SEXUALLY-ACTIVE lifestyle IS sinful.
Not the attraction/orientation, but the unlawful copulation and fellating.
So I do not use the term “homophobia.”
People who loathe persons with SSA are people who HATE, not FEAR, homosexuals.
For people who genuinely HATE persons with same-sex attraction,
I use the term BIGOT to describe them. Merciless, Self-Righteous Bigot, in fact.
God bless the author.
Love to all,
Jaypeeto4
+JMJ+
PRAY THE ROSARY DAILY

Well “gay” tends to mean someone who is attracted to the opposite sex, and doesn’t particularly specify how much they act on it, or even whether they do at all. Would it really have been that different and that practical if instead of using the word “gay” every time, the author said “person with same sex attraction??” Either way, why does one word even matter? The message in this blog is the same, and it is one of courage and obedience. No need to get picky with petty definitions, IMHO.

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

Doesn’t matter how many times someone posts this… who can tire of such a great message from someone who knows how it really feels to be obedient when it’s so hard to be?

Thanks for posting

There are Catholics on here that start raging every time a gay Catholic calls them self gay because saying your gay makes everyone think that you are part of “the Community” and live “the Lifestyle” (AKA you very frequently shag and/or get shagged by men). What they don’t get is that most people don’t think that way…

 

[michelleds]

There are Catholics on here that start raging every time a gay Catholic calls them self gay …

That is an unfair and dishonest assessment of the current debate occuring in the thread same-sex romantic attraction sinful

 

[Equites_Christi]

The paragraph with the John Lennon comment gives me so much joy

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

That is an unfair and dishonest assessment of the current debate occuring in the thread same-sex romantic attraction sinful

I wasn’t aware that hyperbole is supposed to be taken seriously, last time I checked hyperbole is to create emphasis. The fact I used “raging” should have been a tip off. I apologize that I wasn’t clear enough that I was using hyperbole.

 

[Faith1960]

Whoops, sorry. Didn’t realize others have already posted this.

I saw it on facebook.

This is the first time I’d seen it. Thanks for sharing.

 

[John21652]

I wasn’t aware that hyperbole is supposed to be taken seriously, last time I checked hyperbole is to create emphasis. The fact I used “raging” should have been a tip off. I apologize that I wasn’t clear enough that I was using hyperbole.

hy·per·bo·le

[hahy-pur-buh-lee]
noun Rhetoric . 1. obvious and intentional exaggeration.

1. an extravagant statement or figure of speech not intended to be taken literally, as “to wait an eternity.”

The thing about hyperbole is that it splashes.

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

[NOPARSE]hy·per·bo·le

[hahy-pur-buh-lee]
noun Rhetoric . 1. obvious and intentional exaggeration.

1. an extravagant statement or figure of speech not intended to be taken literally, as “to wait an eternity.”

The thing about hyperbole is that it splashes.
[/NOPARSE]

I’d like to congratulate you on your extensive usage of the colour code.

people don’t rage on this forum, they get annoyed, they get flustered, perhaps they express anger, but they don’t rage; I don’t think I’ve ever seen a point where you are annoyed enough that I could legitimately use the term raging to describe you.

 

[John21652]

I’d like to congratulate you on your extensive usage of the colour code.

people don’t rage on this forum, they get annoyed, they get flustered, perhaps they express anger, but they don’t rage; I don’t think I’ve ever seen a point where you are annoyed enough that I could legitimately use the term raging to describe you.

What?
Where’d you get all those color tags?
All I see is text.
Ah, I get it now.You used the quote button then switched editor mode.
Sorry to dissapoint, but those color tags just came with the cut and paste.

And besides, I was pulling your leg!

 

[Debora123]

Sigh

Only on CAF would someone see something that courageous and loyal and instead start complaining and condemning it because the author used the word gay.

It made me proud of Catholics when I read that blog because it shows how kind and accepting and loving they’ve been to this individual (the author)… but then I come on here and all of a sudden I don’t feel as proud anymore…

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

What?
Where’d you get all those color tags?
All I see is text.
Ah, I get it now.You used the quote button then switched editor mode.
Sorry to dissapoint, but those color tags just came with the cut and paste.

And besides, I was pulling your leg!

I wrapped the inside of your post with a [NOPARSE] tag so everyone could see what I saw.

I’m sorry, I lost most of my ability to understand humor and sarcasm as I systematically repressed my emotions for many years. I thought was at fault and unclear so I decided to write substantially on how I meant it as a joke, I apologize for taking it seriously. Will you forgive me?