SSA, family and friends

[sutpen]

I don’t know where to put this thread, and I don’t quite know if this the right spot. But I am converting to the church. I’m currently in RCIA, and I love the Catholic Church. I love and support all of her teachings because I believe that the teachings are from God. I also suffer with Same Sex Attraction. I’m familiar with Courage, and I have no issue with the Church’s teaching, but my family and friends aren’t exactly on the same page.

For about 10 years I embraced my homosexuality, and my family was very accepting and I made friends and I lived my life. Then about 3 years ago I realized what I had known for a long time, and that is that my life was empty. Anyway, the readers digest version is that I moved out of the country and away from family and friends. And God stepped in and called me to the Church.

Okay well now I’m back in the States, and I’m attending mass–and loving it–and I’m in RCIA–and it’s okay–but my main thing is that I haven’t really been in touch with my friends. They know I’m converting to Catholicism and I haven’t heard from most of them, but I haven’t been forthcoming either. I don’t know how much contact I should have with them. I’ve been thinking just sending out a general email that explains all of my beliefs, but for all my friends most of them are gay or gay friendly…anyway I don’t know what I should do, or how I should handle this situation.

 

[revert_jen]

Welcome to the Church!

I’m afraid I don’t know what you should do about your old friends. My thought is that you may know deep down which friends were “friends no matter what” and which friends were only friends as long as you were culturally similar. Maybe not, though, because sometimes people surprise us. Anyway, if you send out a general e-mail, you may want to make sure that it is as non-confrontational as possible. Just something along the lines of what you said here, “…I love the Catholic Church. I love and support all of her teachings because I believe that the teachings are from God.” Then maybe (if it is true) something like, “I would be happy to continue being friends with anyone who can accept me as I am now without trying to change me,” or something… that sounds a little pompous, maybe you can come up with something better.

I would advise against getting into a multi-sided debate on the issue this early in your journey. So if you send out a group e-mail, I would put the addresses in as BCC to prevent a reply-all-free-for-all.

Anyway, I really just wanted to reply to say that I will pray for you to find the best thing to do, whatever God knows it to be.

God bless!

–Jen

 

[sheilathebard]

I tend to dislike group emails, because everyone does need to hear things in kind of a different way. Perhaps a very short mass email saying, “I’m Catholic now, I no longer live the gay lifestyle, but I hope you will still consider me a friend,” and the longer explanations in individual letters.

By the way, congratulations on finding the Church!

 

[BrokenFortress]

I don’t really have any advice, but just wanted to welcome you to the Church!

 

[Gertabelle]

Welcome Home, Sutpen! :extrahappy:

I was “born and bred” Catholic, but that didn’t stop me from leaving the Church for about 14 years and living out my own SSA. Through God’s grace, and my ticking biological clock, I also saw that my life was empty. Reader’s Digest version: I returned to the Church, and after some twenty years of dealing with SSA, I now have absolutely no attraction of that sort left at all. Wish I could bottle that and share with others who are still struggling, but it really was a twenty year journey (and most of it really awful).

I also had moved away for about three years from all my friends. When I returned to the Church and returned to my old stomping ground, I “came out” about my conversion (“reversion”) to my former friends slowly, but only as I had contact with them. For the most part, I have had very little contact with my old friends because I haven’t sought them out. In the meantime, I have built and sustained some wonderful friends in my parish. I joined the choir (as the accompanist) and got involved in several parish activities that helped establish more relationships and support me in my walk with Christ.

A few old friends have returned, and there was, in fact, some discomfort on their part with my conversion. But being good liberals, they had to accept my new life direction or prove themselves total hypocrites And in the end, a couple old friendships remain. The others receive my prayers constantly, but that’s it. I’m glad of it, actually, as I have no desire to return to that world of liberal beliefs and practices. My prayers are all I have to offer, unless Our Lord chooses to send me back there for His purposes.

I am TOTALLY praying for you – daily, sometimes even moment-to-moment – as someone who’s been there and understands.

God bless you, dear one!

Gertie

 

[sutpen]

Thanks everyone for your advice and prayers. I’ve been thinking about this a lot recently because I feel myself being drawn closer and closer to the Church. I feel very cautious about engaging to deeply with my former life. I loved my friends at the time, and I still do, but I know the life that they are leading and what being their friend entails–namely a tolerance to recreational drug use and a general bleak outlook of life that encourages objectifying men and women to their sexual worth.

I’m generalizing because not all of my old friends fall into that category, but most of them are hyper-liberal. I think what I’ll do is just send out a general email, explaining my conversion, but not really engaging in any real debate…or not meaning to, but we shall see where God leads me.

Thank you all for your prayers