I’m glad you got it all out of your system, because I am not going to have you accuse me of the complete opposite of what I believe and practice.

Lines like we want to “destroy” you are obviously talking to someone other than me, so you can find them.

Every single thing you’ve written here I could say in reverse about your view of me. But since I’m sure that’s blatantly inaccurate, I won’t do so.

Some things are more important than rhetoric.

Thanks

MSpencer

And, as others have pointed out, and I think validly since the original thread was about what gay people hear – and not just from the posters here – is that some of what I am reacting to isn’t directly what is expressed here, but what I have experienced from others, many of whom express the same views as those here.

And posters here are equally expressing things about gay people that haven’t come from what we have posted.

For me the biggest frustration is that most Christians refuse to acknowledge that we actually exist. Michael, while you do it less than many, you do it too. Just as a left-handed person is not simply a right-handed person who makes the choice to use his left hand, and could simply choose otherwise, being gay is not being a heterosexual person who is tempted towards or chooses to have sex with someone of the same gender. It isn’t even solely about the isolated fact that our sexual, emotional, and psychological attractions are same-gender oriented, although that is far more accurate.

Just as a left handed person not only happens to have the basic reality that they have a primary orientation towards using their left hand, their reality is also irreconcilably wrapped up in having that be true in a world where just about everyone else takes for granted the exact opposite. It isn’t just using the left hand, but also doing so in a world designed for and by right-handed people.

What we hear from evangelicals is that we are not, and never will be welcome among you. Of course, we can go back into the closet and back to lying to everyone about the central relationships in our lives.

But be very clear what we hear, even when you all start saying that we should pray to be healed of the “temptation.” You are asking us to agree that what we experience as a huge and central part of the way we interact with others, how we see the world, who and how we love, and our experience of our place in the world is wrong and must be changed. That who we actually are has to be destroyed, and that, like the women in the Stepford Wives, be replaced by someone who isn’t us, and whose experience we wouldn’t recognize.

We are welcome among you to the exact degree to which we are willing and able to be someone else Gay people are welcome, as long as they aren’t gay.

There are many atheists in the world who are convinced that there is no such thing as God, and that any experience someone has of the Divine is simply delusion, that prayer is an act in complete violation of reason, and that spiritual or religious growth is a sham.

If (when, no doubt), you are in conversation with them, how willing are you to grant them their premises, and when you do, what are you left with to explain “your side” with anything resembling truth or integrity. Yet that is what most of our conversations with Christians turn into. In order to have any conversation at all, we are asked to deny many of our own fundamental realities.

I’m sure that’s what others are saying when they say they’re not being heard. The underlying basis of the conversation starts from a falsehood, and we are asked, either directly or by omission, to continue that falsehood.

Rick, your post is very long and complicated. What is it particularly that you would like me to ‘get’?

Addressing the points in your post as I understood them (and if I’ve misunderstood any, then feel free to correct my understanding):

1) I agree with you that the there is a large gulf and the journey only begun. I ‘get’ that. I did not mean to say that I thought we were all going to solve the issue here. I’m not sure that this is actually a solvable issue. That’s why I think we have to listen rather than try to solve. I will try to do better at listening.

2) I hear that you have tried to imagine feeling invalidated. Thank you.

3) I believe that I do accept ‘your viewpoint’ as yours. I understand that there is a desire to be biblically faithful. I don’t actually think I’m even trying to change your opinion.

4) I’ll admit that the hanging point for me is your last point. I do understand the difference between ‘objectively thinking something is a sin’ and ‘thinking less of an individual’. But – correct me if I’m wrong – the evangelical position does always seek to separate or ring-fence gay people in some way. Heterosexual sinners admit their sin; gay sinners in monogamous relationships do not admit their sin. Therefore the latter group must be ring-fenced (e.g. variously denied membership, lay office or ordination)

I’m not gay, so I can’t say ‘what gay people hear’. But that was the original question. What *I* hear as a ‘gay supporter’ *is* a ‘thinking less’. And that will always be the hang-up on my side of the fence: no matter how lovingly it’s couched, it will always sound like a ‘thinking less’. Even as I appreciate the lengths that some individuals to sympathise.

Have I ‘heard’ any of the points you wanted to make? I was trying to, but I’m not sure what was especially important for me to hear.

1. Teach children? No.
2. Denomination decide.
3. Marcus Borg? Never.

It’s been a good discussion although the definition of a “perfect” discussion is when everyone ends with my view.

In addition, the trouble with the whole two irreconcilable paradigms approach is that it cuts immediately cuts off debate. I’ve also noticed that when people start talking in terms of two mutually exclusive positions, the wrong questions are often being asked. Perhaps we need to start thinking of other questions to ask from different perspectives. Maybe that will help break the logjam. Any suggestions?

First, I haven’t seen anyone say you can’t teach our children.

Second, the various discussions in various denominations are matters that denominations get to decide through their various processes. Right or wrong, the process has to be respected, otherwise what’s the point?

Third, I’d suggest you read Marcus Borg, the Heart of Christianity, and appreciate that the two paradigms competing in Christianity are too different to produce the same treatment of this issue. Ever. I’m sorry, but that won’t ever change unless someone abandons a fundamental belief, at which point I don’t see what they would continue as part of Christianity anyway.

peace

You might not be intending it, but the message that comes across very often is one of “You are full and equal members of the Church, but . . .” “You’re a sinner just like everyone else here, but we can’t let you have a leadership position or teach our children, etc.” “Yes, your orientation is toward someone of the same gender, but you can’t be in a committed sexual relationship because sex is only for marriage, and you can’t get married because gay sex is wrong.” Essentially, it seems to boil down to “You are full and equal members, but heterosexuals are more equal than you are.”

Oftentimes, those of us who are invited to tell what we hear and try to explain just that (in as many ways as we can think of) are met by the same arguments as before that seems not to even recognize what we just said. This isn’t about making you agree with us. This is about telling what our experiences are with the Church but then it seeming as if we hadn’t said a word.

Sometimes, I’ve found in dialogues that it helps to listen to what the other person says and then try to say back what we heard. Then the other person is able to respond, “Yes, that’s what I’m saying” or “No, you’ve misunderstood.” Of course, this goes both ways. However, I’ve seen plenty of examples of gays trying to get inside and understand the evangelical arguments but almost no examples of the reverse. Instead of telling what you heard us say, you simply repeat what you said before. If someone of us express exasperation, realize that we’ve been trying this for years and years, but the engagement only seems to go one way.

But I’m still listening.

OK, sorry. I got the impression I was being told ‘thanks for your opinion, now stop expressing it’.

I’m afraid I’m just running out of language to express myself. I try to meet evangelicals on their terms when I speak about this issue. I try not to repeatedly say ‘Your views are wrong’.

Story. I belong to a prayer group whose ground rules are that we go away and pray about a bible passage and then come back in two weeks and talk to the group about what has happened in our prayer. The other day, one of the members of the group said: ‘I realised that I didn’t believe in X and I really surprised myself. Then I told God that and got a sense that he could handle the fact that I don’t believe in X.’ A big part of me wanted to say ‘I know how to solve the dilemma about X! Here is The Right Answer ™.’ But the ground rules prohibit that; and I totally understand why they do. To me, that’s listening.

I think that’s all I have to say. Thanks for listening.

Then you have seriously underestimated the extent of the gulf which now presents itself and the length of the journey that seems to be in its embryonic stage.

“It appears rather disingenuous to say ‘I want to learn how to communicate better with you but I’m not comfortable with the idea of understanding where you’re coming from.’”

Pam, who doesn’t desire to understand where you are coming from? You seem to want us who’ve never walked in your shoes to take the final exam on the second day of the semester. Did you not read this in my previous comment:

“I cannot imagine what it feels like to have what is inherently real and active within me and what I feel defines me, to not only be invalidated but be the one area about which I am rejected. That my friend is a pain I have not endured.”

Do you think coming to even that understanding is easy for a fundamentalist like me? You underestimate the barriers we must forge as we do of you as well. If you can accept our theological point of view as ours, and if we can accept yours as yours, then we can discourse on a level of mutual respect that doesn’t always have to be communicated with our sexuality as the foundation.

I mean you have interests and opinions and perspectives and questions and an entire life that isn’t completly tethered to your sexuality, right. Do you like football? Do you like Chinese food? I mean let us drop some of the baggage and interact above the fray and with that we may feel enough confidence to delve into more serious aspects of our lives with somewhat less of a defense mechanism. You won’t feel that I see you as a “scalp” and I won’t feel like you’re trying to steal my faith.

And if you can never understand my non-personal opinion about sexual behavior without believing I think less of you then not only will that restrict our commitment to each other, you have completely missed the depth to which I assign (and MS) my own sins and shortcomings. And I in turn receive you completely with the knowledge that you do notconsider your lifestyle as sinful and/or a shortcoming.

OK, I get it. Do you get me?

But I’m still listening.