Homosexuality, As I See It

I write these blogs because I have a desire to express my own personal views about life its own self. I do not write to change anyone’s mind nor form an argument. This and some articles to follow are just reports on how I see things.

The way I view and relate to homosexuality is the result of some mind changing encounters that I want to share. That will make this the longest blog I have written and hopefully the longest I ever will write but the stories seem to be important.

 FIRST ENCOUNTER
There is no way to describe how little I knew about homosexuality when I became pastor of the first brick church in a college town in the 1950’s. I thought gay people (they weren’t called gay then, but I really hate the other words) were greasy little men who hung out in public bathrooms accosting young boys. Then I had a great shock.

A professor in the college, that was also a very close friend, told me she was a lesbian. I had no idea there was such a thing as a gay woman, nor did I know how to relate to the news she dared share. She only did so because she mistakenly believed I had already figured it out for myself.

The shock was made more intense by the fact that she was one of the finest and most dedicated Christians I had ever known. She gave her time and her life to working with a Campus Christian organization which I was active in while a student at the college. She received no pay for what she did. Matter of fact, she spent a great deal of her own money attending seminars and conferences often in other states to promote the work, and spent untold hours offering personal counseling to students.

I had no idea what I was supposed to do about this information. Should I expose her, ruin her career and create a scandal or simply realize what she had told me in confidence meant I was bound to tell no one. I am so grateful that I took the latter course. As long as she was alive, I told no one. But that and other like experiences left me wondering if I was too lenient and too soft on sin.

I was also left with theological questions. If being gay was a sin how did she become such a great Christian spirit? And even more mind boggling to a Baptist, why didn’t her conversion cure her? I had heard her story and believed then and now that if her conversion wasn’t real no one’s is.

I suddenly realized that most of the people Jesus met were considered to be sinners by the people of that day and yet He loved them. I would also be meeting and dealing with folks considered to be unsavory by the public and often by the members of churches I served. Discovering how to respond like He did would be one of the great challenges of my life.

 SECOND ENCOUNTER
In 1968 a couple who were very active in the church I pastored in Tulsa and close friends of mine told me a devastating story. He was a traveling sales representative who had gotten caught in a trap. The County Attorney in Oklahoma City was trying to become governor and was seeking public notice by rounding up all of the homosexuals and having them arrested. My friend was caught in that trap with ridiculous evidence and arrested for being gay. Part of the so-called evidence was a Playboy magazine in his brief case, something every gay man would carry?

Although the charges were ridiculous and my friend was certainly not guilty, his trial was coming up and they were desperate. If word got out that he was even accused, it would wreck his career and his life.

I drove to the city for the trial and have never seen weaker evidence nor a worse performance by my friend’s lawyer. The case went to the jury as the trial adjourned for the day and I drove home in blind fear. I knew he would be found guilty.

I called four of his close friends that night and ask them to meet in my office. I told them the story and asked them to go with me to hear the verdict the next day. Watching my friend’s face as he saw and was hugged by his friends the next morning is one of the most Christ-like scenes I have ever seen. He was found guilty, but his friends stood with him, helped him get a suspended sentence and wrote letters to his employers and customers telling the true story. In the end the damage was held to a minimum, but the experience shook me to my core.

People were actually arrested, tried and sent to prison because of their sexual preferences? Just being accused of being gay would ruin a life? I realized we had made homosexual people into the modern-day lepers who were outcast and called unclean. I realized that Jesus reached out to the outcast and loved them, so was I going to do the same or was I going to say, “Well yes Jesus loved them BUT…”

 THIRD ENCOUNTER
A young man booked me to speak at all of the junior colleges that surround Dallas, Texas. On the way back to the hotel after the first day he told me he was gay. I shocked him by saying I was very interested in understanding the gay culture and community. When he figured out I was serious he asked if I would like to go out with he and his partner that evening and I readily agreed to do so.

We ate in the restaurant where most of their friends usually gathered, made the rounds of a club or so and then went to their apartment where they talked until three in the morning telling me what it was like to be gay. They destroyed all of the stereotypes about gays I had ever heard. They told me about knowing they were different from a very early age but having no idea what that meant.

They told of trying to fake it among their peers while living in fear of being exposed, of the horror of having to come out to their parents, of the many times they contemplated taking their own lives, of the guilt and fear they found in their religious experiences and the rejection of gay people they saw among their church family.

They expressed anger at being accused of trying to convince others to be gay. One said, “I would give everything I have not to be gay, why would I wish that on anyone else?”

Through the night they shared intimate details that revealed thought patterns, reactions, and feelings that had to be inborn in their lives. These were not things that could just be decided or taught. To me they had to be born the way they were.

In addition to these encounters I have made friends with and loved many gay people. My wife and I helped a group start a gay church and attended worship there many times. All of these encounters have helped form some my conclusions about this vital subject.

First
I believe homosexuals are born to be homosexuals. There may be some degrees of gayness involved. Some folks might be sexually confused, and some might have another agenda that causes them to seek ways to be different, but I believe the truly gay person was created to be gay.

Second
As a rule these are some of the nicest and most creative people I know. They have much to offer our society and our culture and we suffer a great loss when we isolate and reject these humans. They are needed and add such wonderful diversity to our world.

 THEN CAME THE EPIPHANY
I led a breakout session for a conference on teen suicide. The speech I gave that morning dealt with the need for safe people and safe places where teens could be heard and understood. In the break out session I placed a bucket on a table and said the bucket represented the feelings, fears, doubts, and frustrations experienced by the average young person.

When I asked the group, what was most on the mind of young people at this age, most said sex. The hormones are raging and the whole world becomes new during this time of massive change in their lives. Sex thinking it is the one subject they find most mystifying. Then we faced the question of where are the safe people and the safe places where kids can go to talk honestly about what they feel and fear? The majority of the time they are left with just talking to their peers and getting a load of misinformation.

After we had talked the issue through, I then said, “Now suppose this young person is having different feelings. What if they are afraid they might be gay? What if they have never felt like they fit in and have always felt lonely and estranged? Where can they go to find safe people and safe places?

The audience sat in strained silence until almost on cue a person said, “I am a youth worker in a church. what if what that young person is doing is wrong? What do I do? “I was suddenly overwhelmed with not only my answer to that person but an epiphany that became an answer and a position for me. I said, “There are more than enough people around ready and willing to tell that young person he or she is wrong. I don’t have to worry about that. If I don’t do so I can rest assured somebody will. I guess if everyone was like me the world would go to Hell, but I have decided that I want to be a safe person to everyone possible. In the Old Testament there were cities of refuge where people could go even if they were guilty and find refuge. I want to spend the rest of my life being a place of refuge for those who have no place else to go.” At long last I had been set free.