I think Kit is right, we need to be able to give all people a fair go. We tend to compare our ‘insides’ (our thoughts, feelings and decisions) to other peoples ‘outsides’ (their behaviour and sometimes the mask they show the world).

After the initial shock of my own fathers comming out after being married 27 years I was so angry, I still am actually. It was beyond me why someone would marry if they knew they were gay. That they could stand before God and devote themselves to a relationship and a person when they knew their heart wasn’t in it, as my father did apparently. My dad isn’t a Christian so he didn’t grasp the full significance of what he was doing but to treat a human being like a commodity to get you somewhere or fufill some selfish desire makes me see red.

I understand your plight Kit and I see how difficult it must have been for you, or see as much as someone on the outside possibly can into anothers suffering but I don’t agree with your decision. We all have choices. To promote marriage as something you ‘had’ to do is self decieving. You would have incurred great loss if you hadn’t gotten married, you would have been forced to give up your dream and your lifes work as a pastor, you would have been vicitmised and harrased as a gay man within your church, you may have ended up in the administrative job you mentioned and I do feel your pain. I have been harrased and vicitimised, ostracised within my own church (a group even got a pertition going to kick me out) all because I am gay.

You didn’t have to get married, you choose to marry to solve your problems, perhaps save your life and to continue your ministry. I’m not trying to get down on you for choosing that path eaither, I’m sure alot of people in your position would have done the same thing. All I’m saying is its healthy to reciognise that it was a choice on your part and to take responsibility for that decision. A marriage is supposed to be a reflection of Jesus’ relationship with the church.

The psychoanalysts are out in force. Raskdog disappoves of a late-coming-out grandfather and Sandy her own father. I assure you I am neither of these people and I have never asked for any medals.

The circumstances around coming out 30 years ago were very different to today as Anthony has said. I personally accept that my past was caught up in numerous scenarios (many that were personally distressing) and being gay was only one of them.

I forgive myself for not being able to face being gay when I was young. I forgive myself for marrying. I forgive myself for taking a long time to come out. I forgive myself for having to come out to my children. However I know that my children experienced their father’s devoted love through many years of divorce and personal trauma and I recognise that they love me in a way that humbles me today. (I have 2 children but I have also fathered 3 children who are not my own – one of which is now in heaven.)

I regret that many gay men and women are bereft of being parents. I accept that this is not my fault for having been a gay married parent. I hope that for the next generation of GLBTIQ people the option of parenting will be easily accessible. For the past few years I have been an activist seeking gay equality and I will continue to be.

Even so, I belong to a breed that is despised by some in the GLBTIQ community because I once married a woman. Nobody can change my history, not even me. I do not think I had it harder than guys who never married, but the fact that I married didn’t make my life easy. Anything but!

It’s also hard to imagine I’ve come out in a ‘more accepting world (that) is a result of years of tribulation by men who refused to conform to society.’ At least on this post it is far from accepting…

But hey… I forgive that too!

Kit

Respect for each other, sensitivity and especially apologies……are highly prized on the F2B forum.

thank you to those who help maitain a safe and welcoming space for us all to share.

Lol you have what we in polite company call ‘Charles Morrowism’ 😆 Does everybody remember him? First I irrationally blow my top because I hadn’t cooled off after reading his work to post properly and then he totally blows his top too, in the end it was a complete disaster.

We all say some things we really shouldn’t and tone doesn’t come across well on the net. The important bit is we learn from our mistakes, even if you have to make them fifty times before the lesson sinks in like me 🙄

Ahhhh…factionalism. Honestly, where would the world be without it?

[drifts off into a reverie][imagines people from all nations of the world standing on a sunny hilltop, holding hands and singing Amazing Grace]

[comes back to reality][shudders]

What an awful place! 😉

No, but seriously, I watched a program on conformity in my Psych class today. Scary stuff…really. It’s easy to see how people are ostracised and atrocities are committed when viewed from a psychological perspective. ❗

Not that I’m criticising, just making an observation.