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Within a week, the Washington Times printed two separate op-ed pieces on how sexual behavior, specifically gay and lesbian sexual behavior, is controllable and how it should be and is morally necessary and responsible to completely squelch. Here, as in previous pieces published in the super, super conservative newspaper, the Washington Times compares homosexuality to infidelity and pedophilia.

While both articles upset me terribly (I happen to believe being gay is completely separate and different from being someone who could cheat on a spouse or sexually abuse anyone) I do agree that sexual acts are definitely things from which we can abstain. 

What I don't agree with is that sexual behavior is the only thing (or even a big thing) about being gay. I think there is so much, much more to being gay than being sexual.

The kind of mentality expressed below and the kind of mentality expressed in the constant homophobia I see expressed in ultra-conservative viewpoints can be devastating and it is often based on hate, fear, complete misunderstanding and even outright lies.

And yet I cannot help but find myself still (even after more than twenty five years of being unable to deny who I am) wanting to "not be gay." I started reading the book pictured ^above^ (whose innocent, promising little cover really just hides the fact it's a somewhat less harsh take on 'ex-gay therapy') and felt more sad than ever. The writer (whom I have no doubt is very sincere in the unintentionally hurtful statements he makes) basically says that giving in to who you are is "self-indulgent."

Maybe so, maybe it is, but I also know (from deep, painful experience and with all my heart) that denying who you really are, fighting that every single day of your life...well, that can also make you think and feel very, very dark thoughts, to the point that you want oblivion, that you no longer want to live.

I honestly do not know what to think and I struggle with this daily, even now in our supposedly more enlightened 2018. Do I believe and try to follow what people like the writers above believe or do I dare hope to believe that writers like this one may, instead, be right?:



In this book is a beautiful passage that goes like this:

...Their gender and sexual orientation is not something controllable or chosen. It cannot be “fixed” through conversion therapy or stern biblical admonitions. It simply is. These people should not be confined to closets as this woman with the issue of blood had been. It was not her strict adherence to the rites and rituals of religion which made her whole. It was her faith. And that faith allowed her to go in peace.

If you identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, or any other designation; welcome. If you love someone who identifies as one of those designations; welcome. In this space you are safe. In this space you are recognized as a particular expression of the image and likeness of God. In this space you can experience wholeness as a follower of Christ.

In many of these stories, the protagonist dies. Some are murdered by people who consider them subhuman or evil. Others commit suicide, overcome by the ugliness they face, and unable to stand a future of more. Meanwhile, Jesus weeps.

I want to hope that maybe this could be true, but so many, many people (both strangers I meet in books and people I know in real life) tell me otherwise.