How to Leave the Gay Life Behind

[Magdalena59]

With respect, I think saying such things as “pray the gay away” can be unintentionally demoralizing for someone who is experiencing same sex attraction.

Of course, all things are possible with God. And it is certainly possible that God would grant someone complete freedom from their inclinations and from any temptations towards sexual impurity. But I don’t think that’s the way it works for most.

By way of example, a lot of men struggle with pornography. I have heard stories from some guys who experienced a profound conversion whereby God took away that addiction literally in an instant. But then there are a lot of guys for whom it is a longer struggle.

If we set the expectation that all someone has to do is pray about it and it will all go away, then we risk alienating them once they try it and it doesn’t work out that way for them. The Cross is part of our lot in life. Sometimes we have to struggle under its weight. It is better for us to put the emphasis on the fact that Jesus always is there to help us carry our cross rather than set the expectation that Jesus will remove that cross if we pray hard enough.

I understand what you are saying and in no way did I mean that God would instantly, though it could and has happened, free someone of same sex attractions or any other burden we are facing. My answer was in reference to the poster who said the only thing they could do is to live in celibacy because if you are truly gay those are your only two choices. Being gay or being celibate. My understanding of his post was praying wouldn’t or couldn’t help and there is no way to be free of being gay, which is not true because I know of those that have prayed, asked God’s guidance and he has freed them. Some in a short period of time. Others over years. The same thing with pornography. God doesn’t always heal us instantly but he does guide us closer to him and to a place where we can find grace and healing. If we ask for his help and Mary’s intercession, he will guide us to places and people where we can find help and healing.

There are many stories out there today of those who have found help and healing and are free of homosexuality and it is sad but too many people are belittling them, laughing at them and telling them they have not been freed of homosexuality and that they are living a lie. These people today are the ones who are being bullied.

 

[Magdalena59]

Sodomy is a sexual impurity. Same-sex attraction is not. Was Augustine sexually impure, in his later years, if he was tempted by some explicit dream of non-procreative sex?

I totally agree. Same sex attraction is not the sin. It is acting on those attractions that can be sin. It is what we do with those attractions or feelings. If Augustine just had a temptation or something came to him in a dream is different than having a thought or dream and acting on it.

I also want to say my comment was not meant to be judgmental because I am in no place to judge. I am a prodigal also. My purpose was to let others know the power of prayer and the love if God.

 

[Joe_5859]

I understand what you are saying and in no way did I mean that God would instantly, though it could and has happened, free someone of same sex attractions or any other burden we are facing. My answer was in reference to the poster who said the only thing they could do is to live in celibacy because if you are truly gay those are your only two choices. Being gay or being celibate. My understanding of his post was praying wouldn’t or couldn’t help and there is no way to be free of being gay, which is not true because I know of those that have prayed, asked God’s guidance and he has freed them. Some in a short period of time. Others over years. The same thing with pornography. God doesn’t always heal us instantly but he does guide us closer to him and to a place where we can find grace and healing. If we ask for his help and Mary’s intercession, he will guide us to places and people where we can find help and healing.

There are many stories out there today of those who have found help and healing and are free of homosexuality and it is sad but too many people are belittling them, laughing at them and telling them they have not been freed of homosexuality and that they are living a lie. These people today are the ones who are being bullied.

Ah, thanks. I understand what you are getting at now.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

I totally agree. Same sex attraction is not the sin. It is acting on those attractions that can be sin. It is what we do with those attractions or feelings. If Augustine just had a temptation or something came to him in a dream is different than having a thought or dream and acting on it.

I also want to say my comment was not meant to be judgmental because I am in no place to judge. I am a prodigal also. My purpose was to let others know the power of prayer and the love if God.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

A fair point. I operate with a sense of bias due to being male and my own experience…

Amongst some of the younger I have befriended, the sexual aspects of themselves they see as being liberating are actually things that do violence to their relationships to others. For example, I befriended a guy shortly after coming out who has attempted and still does attempt to get me into a sexual situation with him. He does this with all of his gay friends and, because sex usually happenes, he doesn’t have any purely nonsexual relationships with other men beyond the one with me. I worry about that impulse in him, but he has accepted this aspect of himself as part of who he is along with his orientation and has recoiled at the idea of getting help for it. Perhaps this is less common than it seems in my area, however.

That is appalling.

Agreed. Additionally, it also establishes an unhealthy relationship to God where prayer and intercessions are seen as a means to an end. I have been in a hospice and know how many children die in such places. It is self centered to demand that God take away your own troubles while expecting those less fortunate to carry the full weight of their own crosses. Even if I was convinced it was a sin I would still be against demanding such petty, selfish contrivance while other more deserving suffer.

Praying for something doesn’t mean you wish for others to suffer more.

The whole point of the Sexual (without love) Revolution was to separate marital love and commitment from the sex act. It took 40 years of the media pushing this and self-described Hippies and anarchists living in our neighborhoods spreading the “gospel” of this sex with anyone anywhere lifestyle. The goal was to destroy the family and replace it with sex like relieving yourself in the restroom. Love? Commitment? Relationships? Messy, inconvenient and a waste of time. Just have lots of sex and go on to the next.

This constant, decade after decade, very gradual increase in portraying, in the media, immoral sexual activity as fun, good and “Hey. What’s the big deal?” means a lot of people who were looking for real friendship, real trust and a compatible marriage partner made it more difficult as the decades passed. The other problem was the viciously anti-family, anti-men radical feminists who sowed their seeds of hatred of family life in the 1970s. Today, a legal fiction called gay marriage was created primarily by politicians and judges and that is the outcome of a vote taken by the American Psychiatric Association in 1973. Years of research and published articles were ignored due to pressure by radical gay activists and closeted gays in the APA. So what was a disorder the day before, became not a disorder after the vote.

We are called to chastity, Straight, LGBT or whatever. No sex without marriage. Period. And that includes porn. If one reads the gay press, the goal is not privacy. The goal is “accept my sexual activity.”

Peace,
Ed

It was shown that homosexuality per se was not a mental disorder and then it was removed from the DSM.

 

[Magdalena59]

Praying for something doesn’t mean you wish for others to suffer more. .

It was shown that homosexuality per se was not a mental disorder and then it was removed from the DSM.

The only reason it was removed from the DSM is because the homosexual community started to kick up a fuss and demanded it be removed. The APA did not want any controversy or bad reputation, so they removed it. No scientific or medical research, just voted on the subject and then removed it. All based on a vote.

My hope is today because it is such a big controversial subject that as more and more psychologists and medical scientists are looking into the causes and reasons maybe we can come to understand more the difficulties homosexual face and why and bring hope and healing.

 

[Prodigirl]

This trailer seems timid to me. It tiptoes around its topic, coyly referring to it but not having the courage to say what it is or what it means.

I have little patience for it. I’m getting old and I don’t have time to listen to people mincing.

To my mind, it’s weak marketing. There’s absolutely nothing to draw me in. Mercy, I hope the whole film isn’t like that. People who are looking to be authenticated, understood, accepted, would barely see themselves in the trailer. Did they mention “gay” or the entire spectrum of the gay community? I didn’t hear it. Why are they whitewashing? What are they afraid of?

 

[PutresOmega]

That is appalling.

Yes, but I don’t want to give too bad an impression of him. The aforementioned male is still a friend of mine and while he will get fed up and go away for months at a time, he eventually comes back to talk to me and has recently thanked me for being there for him. He decided to go back to school and focus on something besides sex and all that. Not a fix but I am glad that simply by not taking advantage of him he feels he can trust me. I think there is hope for him.

Praying for something doesn’t mean you wish for others to suffer more.

True, but praying for myself when I can be praying for others always makes me feel guilty. I think some only call on God when they want stuff. That can establish a very bad precedent. I would view it as a wife who only ever talks to her husband when she wants money from him to buy something. Maybe I am just not seeing it the right way.

It was shown that homosexuality per se was not a mental disorder and then it was removed from the DSM.

This is true. There are no negatives that are inherent to homosexuality and, as such, it fails as a classifiable condition. If it had been a gay cabal that had caused it to be removed from the DSM then it would have been re-added by now but no evidence exists that suggests that homosexuality has any inherent negative impacts on mental or physical health. Nothing with establishing causality, anyways.

 

[Rau]

The only reason it was removed from the DSM is because the homosexual community started to kick up a fuss and demanded it be removed. The APA did not want any controversy or bad reputation, so they removed it. No scientific or medical research, just voted on the subject and then removed it. All based on a vote.

My hope is today because it is such a big controversial subject that as more and more psychologists and medical scientists are looking into the causes and reasons maybe we can come to understand more the difficulties homosexual face and why and bring hope and healing.

I hope there is work into understanding a cause. But to deem it a mental illness and by inference, in need of treatment, absent any idea of how it arises and how it ought to be treated, does not seem sound.

 

[djames99]

Easy. Devotion to the Blessed Virgin.

Many will fall away because they are accustomed to getting things in their own time frames.

 

[Tigg]

I thought this film was honest and quite frankly the responses (and even more telling, the lack of responses) to it are much as I suspected. I have often wondered if the myriad of threads on this subject, many of them closed or deleted, were initiated, not so much for honest dialogue or information, but only to advocate for that which Catholics cannot support and to de-senitize Christians to the whole issue as if the more it is spoken about, the more it will be accepted as normal. I remember the author of one thread who basically accused Christians of hatred and said she needed to leave the thread for her mental health when posters began to speak of redemption through God’s love and reiterate the words of the Church. In general, I have found that no encouragement toward the good seems to be wanted or accepted. Even posters who have bravely shared their own stories of leaving the gay life have mainly been ignored except to tell them they are the exception, even though God says, “My grace is sufficient for you.”

As to the words of bishops and the Church, here is a post that says it all.

My personal experience and reality disagrees with the quotes above . If your side wants to correct our “erroneous thinking” then present us with the truth and not all of these hastily cobbled falsehoods, lazy apologetic, and appeals to authority. Until then I will continue correcting the error in the Church whenever and wherever I can to anyone who will listen or read what I say in the hopes that when this foundation of sand finally does cause the superstructure of their power to collapse, that it doesn’t drag what is actually true and good into oblivion with it.

Frightening to me that man can so readily place himself above God and reject the very thing that can enable salvation and healing! How discouraging his words must be to those who sincerely want to grab hold of the life line.

The video covered the temptations, intimate thoughts and feelings that gays encounter. I hope many watched it even if they chose not to comment. Our life’s mission - the working out of our salvation (with fear and trembling) is a journey all must undertake. Trials and suffering for our brief period on earth is an essential part of the walk, which is not to say we do not also hold peace and joy in our hearts when we are right with God. All of us need to understand ourselves and how certain inclinations leave us vulnerable to sin.

In the film was heard:

“We all have a deep need for love.”				
		“I needed to be wanted.”

“I was overwhelmed with grace.”
“Only God could have brought me back.”
“When I saw the cross of the pope, it took my libido away.”

And the Mother Angelica quote, so simple yet so profound, “God created you and I to be happy. No one else can do this for you.”

I attended World Youth Day in ’93. It was almost time for the consecration and as we knelt on the ground, two lesbians, holding hands and dressed very scantily, walked in front of us and blocked our view. My initial reaction was shock to see this at a papal Mass! Then immediately I began to praise God that He had given them the grace to be in that place, at the time - they who so much needed to be before the Real Presence of Christ. And I symbolically placed them both in the chalice as it was elevated.

“Dan” said at one point he was seething with anger when he looked at a church. He wanted God dead. I see much rebellion and anger about this topic directed against the Church on these threads. May the oceans of grace given to Dan in the film penetrate those who feel as he once did.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

I thought this film was honest and quite frankly the responses (and even more telling, the lack of responses) to it are much as I suspected.

I’m struck by the lack of responses too – particularly the lack of responses from straight folks. I would have expected a film like this to send shock waves through Catholic culture. But sadly, people with SSA aren’t likely to share something like this on Facebook, and many people without SSA just seem to avoid the topic. It’s quite sad.

The sin of rebellion you’re talking about is not simply a sin on the part of the rebel, Tigg. It’s a sin on the part of Church members, if these Church members don’t show an interest in the lived experience of gay people. I don’t agree with everything you say, but I’m glad that you actually show an interest.

Most straight Catholics want to avoid this issue like the plague. We’ve seen what comes of such avoidance in the priest scandals, but we still aren’t changing our ways.

 

[lutheran_farmer]

Pray for them. It must be difficult to bear that cross. If someone comes to your parish and confides in you that they are fighting same sex attraction, support them and involve them in the parish. They need God’s strength and many prayers to help them live a chaste life, especially when society is celebrating the opposite.

I spoke with a distant relative recently who is deep in that lifestyle. I haven’t spoken to him in years. He said he was happy and we spoke about those people we both knew who had struggled with alcohol or drug abuse. I worry about him because he runs with a fast crowd where both suicide and drug abuse are common. He felt rejected that last time he attended a church (Lutheran) because the pastor railed against gays (I heard this from his mom). The only things I said to him were about God’s love and how He doesn’t make mistakes. He loves us as we are and everyone has their own cross to bear. That’s all I felt comfortable doing since it’s been so long since we last spoke. I’m certain he has heard from other family members that I converted to Catholicism, so I wanted him to hear about God’s love more than anything because of his last church experience. I hope perhaps in future conversations (in person vice over the phone) the subject of God might come up. I hope I did well enough for now. He has a good heart and deserves happiness. I only hope he can find his way back to God.

 

[djames99]

The Catholic Church is entering a new era of non political correctness. From now on Catholics are to tell it the way it is.

This habit is a plague of society. They infect the thoughts of young children and cause them to learn of other false lifestyles. They’re principles infect the Institution of Family, and the Sacramental element of it. They have persuaded weak spirited and sensitized Christians to accept laws to allow them to raise vulnerable children in a sinful environment.

“seething with anger, God dead” - Ahh yes, another tell tale giveaway to the victim which satan can’t hide. The love of God is so obvious.

One may complain about being afflicted with an illness until a cure is available. Refusal to avail himself for a cure brings on deaf ears by society and logically questions motives and intent. Many who have placed themselves in a regime for change, and with the protection of St. Michael and the Holy Mother, have gone on to raise healthy families and no longer have the slightest inclination to this behavior. This proves without a shadow of a doubt that God was right and it is not a permanent condition.

Their complaints about the negative responses by society goes with the territory, as what is being observed by them is the effects of the offense, social out casting being right and proper. Again, the love of God is so obvious. But in comparison, the old law was much more severe on these afflicted with stoning being the common sentence.

As a child rejects the bad tasting medicine, so do these who have habituated themselves
with the temporary delectable, and now find themselves needing spiritual rehab.

The charitable Christian hand is still extended as Christ instructed. It is either this, or a deadly spiral of compounding that will totally overtake the ability to reason and snuff out the last flame of an abused conscience. Still, all will be imputed to him.

The cure is out there, give up the needle that gives the ‘fix’ satan wants you to enjoy, and place your trust in the Holy Mother before it’s too late.

 

[PutresOmega]

Frightening to me that man can so readily place himself above God and reject the very thing that can enable salvation and healing! How discouraging his words must be to those who sincerely want to grab hold of the life line.

More frightening, the person who likens my disagreement with the false statements they make concerning transgender people to disagreement with God. This quote was my own, in response to another series of quotes from the OP that claimed that transgender people choose to disobey/rebel their natural gender. Having had transgender friends who desperately wish they were not who they were, I found this assertion not only in defiance of scientific evidence to the contrary but offensive and abrasive.

I fully support the bloggers at places like Spiritual Friendship and the many Catholic gay people who choose chastity because they know their inclinations are selfish, debased, and wrong. I have routinely defended people who choose this path, vehemently, to my non-theistic LGBT brethren who can be less than charitable towards those who choose this path.

Let me also say that I don’t hate Tigg or the the others here and elsewhere who suggest that we are dangerous in some way (like we poison kids by merit of our presence, spreading our “lifestyle” to them and using that to claim that our being social outcasts or beaten to death with rocks is proper for what we are, for random example). I merely hate the evil that had gripped their hearts. I believe that this living in opposition to people whose only real difference from you is that they are romantically attracted to people of the same gender has caused you to be swaddled in this fear and constant malice. I don’t think this is the way God wants you to live.

 

[Rau]

…
I believe that this living in opposition to people whose only real difference from you is that they are romantically attracted to people of the same gender has caused you to be swaddled in this fear and constant malice. I don’t think this is the way God wants you to live.

I agree. Of course, a proportion of those people respond to the attraction they experience in ways that are also not the way God intends them to live. Nevertheless, that are not deserving of malice.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

Chastity is absolutely possible for gay people, what is being contested is that they can all, or even most, become heterosexual; many of those people who “became heterosexual” later get caught having an affair with someone of the same sex.

djames99:

The Catholic Church is entering a new era of non political correctness. From now on Catholics are to tell it the way it is.

Usually when people say that what they manage to do in encounters with actual gay people is make it even harder to convert them.

This habit is a plague of society. They infect the thoughts of young children and cause them to learn of other false lifestyles. They’re principles infect the Institution of Family, and the Sacramental element of it. They have persuaded weak spirited and sensitized Christians to accept laws to allow them to raise vulnerable children in a sinful environment.

Charming rant, rather short on facts though.

“seething with anger, God dead” - Ahh yes, another tell tale giveaway to the victim which satan can’t hide. The love of God is so obvious.

When religious people frequently rant in the media about how gay people are going to Hell and treat gay people badly in day to day life it is far from obvious.

One may complain about being afflicted with an illness until a cure is available. Refusal to avail himself for a cure brings on deaf ears by society and logically questions motives and intent. Many who have placed themselves in a regime for change, and with the protection of St. Michael and the Holy Mother, have gone on to raise healthy families and no longer have the slightest inclination to this behavior. This proves without a shadow of a doubt that God was right and it is not a permanent condition.

Most haven’t gotten magically fixed after becoming devout Christians and many who do convince themselves they aren’t gay, but the truth is they still are (see the ex-ex-gay movement)

Their complaints about the negative responses by society goes with the territory, as what is being observed by them is the effects of the offense, social out casting being right and proper. Again, the love of God is so obvious. But in comparison, the old law was much more severe on these afflicted with stoning being the common sentence.

Clearly we should return to stoning fornicators and adulterers, that’ll help people understand that sex only belongs within holy matrimony.

As a child rejects the bad tasting medicine, so do these who have habituated themselves
with the temporary delectable, and now find themselves needing spiritual rehab.

It’s more like people trying to literally beat the devil out of epileptics.

The charitable Christian hand is still extended as Christ instructed. It is either this, or a deadly spiral of compounding that will totally overtake the ability to reason and snuff out the last flame of an abused conscience. Still, all will be imputed to him.

The hand might be open, but more frequently amongst devout Christians it is used to slap than to aid.

The cure is out there, give up the needle that gives the ‘fix’ satan wants you to enjoy, and place your trust in the Holy Mother before it’s too late.

That is profoundly insulting to all the LGBT people who are devout Catholics.

 

[LongingSoul]

Chastity is absolutely possible for gay people, what is being contested is that they can all, or even most, become heterosexual; many of those people who “became heterosexual” later get caught having an affair with someone of the same sex.

Illustrated by Rilenes situation… young people can be commonly preyed on and groomed by experienced homosexuals. It’s not publicised by the homosexual advocates, but you can ‘turn’ vulnerable people… even adults, to same gender sexual stuff. Just apply some seduction and consistent pressure to a young person and they can want more so to speak, and be sucked into the dark side.

Thank God the Catholic Church stands for the godly and the human way. They give vulnerable people a bar to reach for and escape this base stuff.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

Illustrated by Rilenes situation… young people can be commonly preyed on and groomed by experienced homosexuals. It’s not publicised by the homosexual advocates, but you can ‘turn’ vulnerable people… even adults, to same gender sexual stuff. Just apply some seduction and consistent pressure to a young person and they can want more so to speak, and be sucked into the dark side.

Thank God the Catholic Church stands for the godly and the human way. They give vulnerable people a bar to reach for and escape this base stuff.

Rilene was in a women’s bar of her own accord and she was not groomed. She was a victim of the fact that heterosexuals had so thoroughly associated love and sex that it felt natural for her to engage in sex because she felt she loved Margo. She was also a victim of the disappear of lay celibacy which again was caused by heterosexuals.

 

[CatholicSheila]

I’m not all that impressed by this.

What I get from Rilenes story is that if you “pretend” to be gay, then you can stop.

I don’t need to be told that. It is self-evident.

This really didn’t resonate with me in anyway.