How to tell parents that my brother is gay

[Irishmom2]

Do we take them out to dinner, after they come back from church? If you were them, would you like all your kids their or would that make you feel like we’re ganging up on you? Or just not tell them at all and they can get the message when they’re holding hands? In the end we know it’ll be hard for them and we want to mitigate that as much as possible.

Any of these scenarios are ambushing them. Your brother needs to tell your parents. Alone, just him and your parents. No cheerleading sisters.

You are so concerned about your brother and his friend and your sister all having Thanksgiving together and no concern for your parents because they do not share your acceptance. You keep saying you respect your parents, but I just don’t see it.

 

[BioNerd]

I think you should show more respect and love for your parents. Those two people are the people that gave birth to you and raised you, you should show more concern over the fact that you may not see them at Thanksgiving. We have a homosexual in my family but, out of respect for our beliefs, he doesn’t demand that we support his homosexual lifestyle and he doesn’t bring his boyfriends over to parties. Your brother should do the same.

Ok now that’s just ridiculous. If my parents didn’t like my boyfriend (now fiancé) I wouldn’t “just not bring him around” to make them feel comfortable. Especially if we live on our own, are independent etc. We love and adore our parents, even with their Catholic mentality. But we’re not going to put our lives at a halt just because they don’t agree with our choices. Since when is that demanding support? They are more than welcome because our doors are wide open to them.

 

[EasterJoy]

Thank you! And we’re perfectly fine with them disagreeing! We’ll still love them and continue to be a part of their lives if they’ll let us. We’re just looking for advice on when and how to tell them. Do we take them out to dinner, after they come back from church? If you were them, would you like all your kids their or would that make you feel like we’re ganging up on you? Or just not tell them at all and they can get the message when they’re holding hands? In the end we know it’ll be hard for them and we want to mitigate that as much as possible.

The chances are that they know or at least suspect and choose not to ask about what they have not been told. Their possible reasons for doing that are varied and range from denial to a desire to give their children the courtesy of treating them like adults by not butting in where they aren’t wanted, but those reasons are their business, too.

Really: Let your brother tell them himself when he chooses to tell them. If he chooses not to tell them and your parents choose not to inquire about his behavior with the man he is living with, then let it be, too. That is respecting both your brothers’ choice not to tell them and your parents’ choice not to ask.

So what are you going to do if your parents get upset with you? You say, “Mom, this was between you and Mike. It isn’t my business to decide what he tells you and when. If one of us is dying of cancer, that’s maybe a little different, but if you have some health problem you don’t want to tell us about or if you don’t want to tell us your bank balance or what you or Dad tell Father when you go to confession, that is your business. If you had asked me, I’d have had to tell you to ask him. That’s all any of us want, right, is to be able to handle our own relationships in our own time?”

This is a good precedent to set, by the way. You are going to have your own private matters as you go through life, after all, things that you are going to want to tell others, even your family, when the time is right for you. You are going to want to ask for information directly from the person in question and only when you are ready to hear it. Give that courtesy to others in your family, in spite of your anxiety that some may impose some emotional penalty if you give the others their right to give out their own information in their own time. The alternatives are not better, trust us on that.

 

[MaryT777]

Well I know I didn’t come for this type of lecture… We respect our parents. No we honestly don’t “give a hoot” about Catholicism. We left that part of our lives when we left home. We would LOVE to have our parents with us at Thanksgiving but if they choose not to come because they don’t want to see my brothers relationship, that’s their consequence. We’re not going to kick two people out to make two more feel comfortable. Why would we stop our lives for their beliefs? But we’re here (bro’s receiving all these funny comments as we speak) because we love our parents and want to make this as gentle to them as possible.

You forgot to answer the question as to why you are here at Catholic Answers, which will be mostly a Catholic perspective? If you want only a non Catholic perspective there is a non Catholic Religious Forum. Might want to give it a try.

You are more than welcomce on this site and I enjoy the posts from non Catholic posters but you are not seeking a “Catholic answer.”

Mary.

Mary.

 

[EasterJoy]

You forgot to ask the question as to why you are here at Catholic Answers, which will be mostly a Catholic perspective? If you want only a non Catholic perspective there is a non Catholic Religious Forum.

Mary.

I think the OP wanted to know how their very Catholic parents would see this question. This Family Forum is a logical place to ask.

They might see it in any number of ways, but staying out of the family dynamic whereby we try to fix a relationship between two other family members when neither party has asked us to be a mediator is a good policy. Even being a mediator when we have been asked to do it is rushing in where angels fear to tread, but it is an even worse idea when no one asked for our “help.”

By the way, OP, your parents’ pastor is not a bad person to talk to about this. It sounds as if he probably knows them well, and both you and your parents will be able to trust him to be discrete. He can give you feedback, and if you ask him to say nothing to your parents, be assured that he will not. Priests know how to keep a confidence. If you need to talk to someone “with skin on,” I’d suggest you try him.

 

[KildareBrigid]

Thank you! And we’re perfectly fine with them disagreeing! We’ll still love them and continue to be a part of their lives if they’ll let us. We’re just looking for advice on when and how to tell them. Do we take them out to dinner, after they come back from church? If you were them, would you like all your kids their or would that make you feel like we’re ganging up on you? Or just not tell them at all and they can get the message when they’re holding hands? In the end we know it’ll be hard for them and we want to mitigate that as much as possible.

Honestly, if your brother wants to tell them, it probably won’t matter how he does it (as long as it is respectful). They are going to feel the way they feel no matter if you tell them tomorrow or in October.

 

[MaryT777]

Honestly, if your brother wants to tell them, it probably won’t matter how he does it (as long as it is respectful). They are going to feel the way they feel no matter if you tell them tomorrow or in October.

Exactly. We have given Catholic answers and the OP wants to help his brother which is a good intention. Unfortunately, we cannot read the minds of the parents.

Mary.

 

[Lea101]

Any of these scenarios are ambushing them. Your brother needs to tell your parents. Alone, just him and your parents. No cheerleading sisters.

You are so concerned about your brother and his friend and your sister all having Thanksgiving together and no concern for your parents because they do not share your acceptance. You keep saying you respect your parents, but I just don’t see it.

Genuine question. Why would the parents need concern? It’s the brother that is gay, it’s the brother that might be shunned/attacked, not the parents. It’s the brother that will be affected the most, the parents don’t need more or equal concern IMO

 

[jmcrae]

Thank you for your advice! As a side note, I’m a girl, we’re fraternal twins. We do think that he should tell them in advance so they can have time to “grieve” if needed. They have all our support, but what else can we do? We will understand if they decide not to go, that absolutely have that right and we won’t be upset but I’m sorry, we will not go sit with them alone at their house when it’s their choice to isolate themselves from a family event because my brother will have his partner there. My sister is ok with it as well, we might even go the day after to spend time with them. Also, I don’t see how anyone is drawing a line…my brother got a boyfriend. We’re open to them and if they choose not to go then…

Who’s excluding who, here? It seems as thought you’ve already decided that that’s how they’re going to react, without even giving them a chance.

They love your brother even more than you do - they’ve changed his diapers, and stayed up with him all night when he was sick - every single time he was sick. So don’t just assume they’re going to reject him. They probably already know he’s gay, at some level. They probably noticed in kindergarten that he was the only boy in his group who wasn’t teasing the little girls, and it probably didn’t escape their notice that he wasn’t looking at girlie pictures when he was twelve. Perhaps they thought he was “mature” for his age, or naturally saintly, but at some level they knew he wasn’t quite normal.

Also, you need to realize that there is absolutely no difference between accepting your brother’s homosexual lifestyle even though you don’t share in it, and accepting your parents’ Catholic lifestyle even though you don’t share in it, other than that the one is “à la mode” these days, and the other isn’t.

As others have pointed out, it’s your brother’s job to “come out” to his parents, or to anyone else who might need “coming out” to, and it’s not your job to babysit him while he does so.

There is no easy way to do it, and probably the best way would be to simply tell his parents that he has something to tell them that he fears they might find disappointing, in a private place, with just the three of them together, in a quiet uninterrupted corner, with open-ended time to talk things through. No matter how disappointed they are, they aren’t actually going to kill him - and if they yell at him, he’s old enough to stand quietly still until they get done yelling, and then speak to them calmly.

 

[jmcrae]

Genuine question. Why would the parents need concern? It’s the brother that is gay, it’s the brother that might be shunned/attacked, not the parents. It’s the brother that will be affected the most, the parents don’t need more or equal concern IMO

It seems as if the parents are already being shunned by the whole family, because of how they might react.

 

[Trident_H]

Well I know I didn’t come for this type of lecture… We respect our parents. No we honestly don’t “give a hoot” about Catholicism. We left that part of our lives when we left home. We would LOVE to have our parents with us at Thanksgiving but if they choose not to come because they don’t want to see my brothers relationship, that’s their consequence. We’re not going to kick two people out to make two more feel comfortable. Why would we stop our lives for their beliefs? But we’re here (bro’s receiving all these funny comments as we speak) because we love our parents and want to make this as gentle to them as possible.

So let me get this straight (no pun intended). You’re willing to maybe exclude 2 other people (your parents) to make 2 different people feel comfortable instead?

So basically you’re saying what your parents would do is wrong. But when you guys do it it’s ok?

Glad you guys are having so much fun with the comments though. I mean nothing quite like asking for honest advice and then laughing at the answers. Troll much in these parts?

 

[MaryT777]

So let me get this straight (no pun intended). You’re willing to maybe exclude 2 other people (your parents) to make 2 different people feel comfortable instead?

So basically you’re saying what your parents would do is wrong. But when you guys do it it’s ok?

Glad you guys are having so much fun with the comments though. I mean nothing quite like asking for honest advice and then laughing at the answers. Troll much in these parts?

Yep, I was thinking the same thing about who trolls around in these parts…

As the OP noted in one of the above posts.

“No we honestly don’t “give a hoot” about Catholicism. We left that part of our lives when we left home”
OP above.

I respect the beliefs of my mother although she left Catholicism years ago because last I read in the Bible one of the commandments is to “Honor thy Father and Mother.”

Mary.

 

[Trident_H]

Any of these scenarios are ambushing them. Your brother needs to tell your parents. Alone, just him and your parents. No cheerleading sisters.

You are so concerned about your brother and his friend and your sister all having Thanksgiving together and no concern for your parents because they do not share your acceptance. You keep saying you respect your parents, but I just don’t see it.

Yep. Basically this.

 

[KEP1983]

Why would we stop our lives for their beliefs?

To put it bluntly: because your parents beliefs are more true and your secular humanist beliefs are false.

I have yet to meet a single lapsed Catholic who actually researched and understood their faith before leaving it. That’s actually good, since you may be in a state of invincible ignorance-- that is, not culpable for your lack of understanding and rejection of truth.

I could give tons of info/evidence, but I’ll just choose one random one I recently came across. The images in the video show the original photographs and newspaper article published by the secular atheist journalists who witnessed the event.

youtube.com/watch?v=v3rGCNocB2I

If you can’t explain all of the evidence away-- not just pieces, but all of it-- then your secular beliefs are false and your parents beliefs are true, regardless of how you, your parents, or your brother** emotionally** feel.

But we’re here (bro’s receiving all these funny comments as we speak) because we love our parents and want to make this as gentle to them as possible.

That’s good to hear. Your brother should tell them himself, ahead of time, so they can make a decision. Just springing it upon them at a family holiday is just asking for trouble… and I assume you’re not looking for trouble?

My brother in law is also gay, his boyfriend is an Ivy League Professor. We have experience with this sort of situation. My brother-in-law tries to please everyone, while his boyfriend is a militant homosexual activist who tries to force everyone to accept his beliefs and lifestyle.

 

[Beryllos]

The chances are that they know or at least suspect and choose not to ask about what they have not been told. Their possible reasons for doing that are varied and range from denial to a desire to give their children the courtesy of treating them like adults by not butting in where they aren’t wanted, but those reasons are their business, too.

They love your brother even more than you do - they’ve changed his diapers, and stayed up with him all night when he was sick - every single time he was sick. So don’t just assume they’re going to reject him. They probably already know he’s gay, at some level. They probably noticed in kindergarten that he was the only boy in his group who wasn’t teasing the little girls, and it probably didn’t escape their notice that he wasn’t looking at girlie pictures when he was twelve. Perhaps they thought he was “mature” for his age, or naturally saintly, but at some level they knew he wasn’t quite normal.

Yeah. They know more about him than you imagine. Of course they couldn’t know all the latest details, but they know him. Parents observe quite a lot as they bring up children through childhood, teen years, and young adulthood.

You are focusing on the relatively straightforward challenge of your brother revealing his secret, but the greater challenge for your whole family may be to strengthen relationships which have been strained by years of secrecy.

Best of luck, and may God bless your family!

 

[BioNerd]

So let me get this straight (no pun intended). You’re willing to maybe exclude 2 other people (your parents) to make 2 different people feel comfortable instead?

So basically you’re saying what your parents would do is wrong. But when you guys do it it’s ok?

Glad you guys are having so much fun with the comments though. I mean nothing quite like asking for honest advice and then laughing at the answers. Troll much in these parts?

What a coincidence because we were thinking the same at first! “Your parents beliefs are true and your humanistic secular ones are false” “He doesn’t bring his boyfriend along to respect our religious beliefs” This is the first time I’ve ever heard people talk like this (minus my parents). I feel like I was just sent back to 1950! But no, I’m not seeing your point of view. We invite everyone to the party. Two people object to going based on religious beliefs. Congratulations, there are no obligations to attend and no hard feelings from anyone at the party. Yet somehow we’re excluding them because they are the ones refusing to attend… But thank you anyways because maybe this is how my parents might see it and it’s good to know they might have this point of view so we can know the kindest and gentlest way to respond to them.

To everyone else that’s actually given genuine advice, thank you. Especially EasterJoy. Ideally we hope our parents will react calmly and no we’re not asking them to treat my brothers boyfriend like their new son in law, he just wants them to know before rather than having to “surprise” them. If they decide to attend and just treat my brother and his partner like normal human beings, we’ll jump for joy. And if not, they’re still our parents whom we’ll always love and will always be welcomed into our homes.

 

[BioNerd]

Yeah. They know more about him than you imagine. Of course they couldn’t know all the latest details, but they know him. Parents observe quite a lot as they bring up children through childhood, teen years, and young adulthood.

You are focusing on the relatively straightforward challenge of your brother revealing his secret, but the greater challenge for your whole family may be to strengthen relationships which have been strained by years of secrecy.

Best of luck, and may God bless your family!

Thank you so much! We really hope so!

 

[Don_Ruggero]

Thank you! And we’re perfectly fine with them disagreeing! We’ll still love them and continue to be a part of their lives if they’ll let us. We’re just looking for advice on when and how to tell them. Do we take them out to dinner, after they come back from church? If you were them, would you like all your kids their or would that make you feel like we’re ganging up on you? Or just not tell them at all and they can get the message when they’re holding hands? In the end we know it’ll be hard for them and we want to mitigate that as much as possible.

As a priest, I would have a few suggestions for you, BioNerd.

Over the course of my years, I have worked with families through issues that were painful…on both sides of the equation.

Parents who were disappointed in choices that their children made, on the one hand – whether co-habiting outside of marriage, marrying outside of the Church, having children outside of marriage, choosing to go to a different Christian confession, leaving the Church and faith all together – or realisations about their sexual orientation, among many other life circumstances.

On the other hand, I have tried to help people, with varying degrees of success, in dealing with issues related to animosity against the Church because of their childhood or some other aspects of their lives or families where they were wounded or damaged or pained on account of the Church.

All that by way of saying that I am sympathetic to the scenario you are presenting, regarding both generations in this portrait. I expect finding a mutual path ahead for everyone concerned will be a challenge for your brother and his companion, for you and your sister, and the others who are part of your respective lives as well as for your parents.

Not knowing any of you personally, it is very difficult to try to give you concrete and practical counsel, since advice really rests on knowing the people involved and being able to estimate their reactions, at least to some degree.

In terms of what you specifically ask in this post…

It would seem to me preferable for the matter to come out into the open in a planned as opposed to an accidental way since accidents can happen in unfavourable moments and unfavourable circumstance just as a realisation by a slow dawning could be awkward in the extreme and even tortuous.

It would also seem to me the occasion of a low-key small family gathering (and apart from a holiday) that you or your sister hosted in one of your homes would be better than at a dinner at a restaurant. A group of five is already substantial in a setting such as a restaurant when it is a normal occasion.

Rather than making the matter front stage, it seems better for the topic to come about in a more casual manner and without some dramatic build up, lest they think you are going to announce one of you is terminally ill.

Being in a non-public venue would allow your parents to not feel that they are trapped in the midst of strangers, as one can feel when one confronts something of great import while on a pubic stage like being in the middle of a restaurant. If they need space and time to process what they are told – that is if the matter really is a surprise to them that is totally unforeseen – they can make an early evening of it, without causing the disturbance of walking out of a restaurant, and return to their home…and your siblings and you will be together in a familiar place.

The other advice I can offer – and presume to do so since you are no longer practicing the faith and it might not occur to you – is the possibility of you meeting with your parents’ priest or a priest to whom they are close. Especially if he has been in their lives long enough that he might remember all of you from your younger days or have a particular closeness to them.

After this many years, there are a number of children from my old parishes who, having grown up, have chosen other paths in life – they know, however, that my door is always open to them. Similarly, for their parents…my door is always open.

Depending upon the pastoral gifts that the priest possesses, he may be able to offer the concrete suggestions to you that you are seeking on the one hand and also be available to help your parents process these realities and companion them as they process it on the other – and even know of a good counselor he could suggest.

I always counsel, on both sides of these situations, that the familial bond should in all cases be preserved. There are cases, of course, where it is tragically not possible at all, notably in issues involving some form of terrible abuse. Issues such as are being discussed here are not of that nature, thankfully, and should not be thought of as such. A way ahead should be sought and found.

A wholesale rejection of family members is always a tragedy, whatever side of the argument they are upon.

I can well imagine that the presence of you and others is a tremendous source of support and encouragement for your brother and I can also well imagine that, when he talks about this with his parents, who are your parents, too, he would wish to do so in the context of the entire family. As the one purveying news, that is his prerogative, after all.

It is evident in what you post that the children feel more affirmed by your relationships with each other than you do by your respective relationships to your parents and that the relationships of each of you to them is already a strained one. I am sure they must perceive that reality as well – and will understand it even more with the conveying of this news, if both of your brother’s sisters are sitting beside him.

I assure you and your family…all of your family…of my prayers.

 

[BioNerd]

Thank you so much Father Ruggero! He will definitely consider talking to their parish priest first and getting advice from him on how to deal with talking to our parents. We don’t want them to feel like we’re against them, even though all of us have chosen paths they wouldn’t have wanted us in. What hurts us is that they feel like they failed us to some extent and they blame themselves. We really don’t want them to hurt, but we can’t pretend to be something we’re not. Thank you so much for your advice, it truly means a lot to our family.

 

[RPRPsych]

I don’t give a hoot about this thread.