I am a teacher at a christian school in rural NSW, and I teach a subject called Communty and Family Studies to senior students. They have to complete an IRP (Independent Research project) on a topic of interest, and one of my students Jon has decided to research the topic “The effect that the church has had on the GLBT community and the individual’s wellbeing”. I told him that I post on this forum, and he wondered if you would answer some questions for him. If you want to send the answers to him directly, please send to [email protected], or else just post here and I will pass them on to him. He is in Year 12 and trying his best to get a handle on this. thanks so much,

Jenny

Here are his questions:

1) Do you go to church? Why?

If no please skip questions 2 – 4

2) Do you feel accepted at your church?

3) Did you feel that you had to do anything to achieve that acceptance? Please explain.

4) What are some of the effects the church has had on your wellbeing? (pos and neg)

5) Do you have a relationship with Jesus?

6) Do you feel that you had a choice in being whom you are?

7) What is your attitude to parts of the bible such as Leviticus 18: 22 and Romans 1: 26-27.

8) How important are the statements made by the 100Revs and Desmond Tutu (Supporting the GLBT Community) to you?

1) Do you go to church? Why?

I go to church for a few reasons. Primarily because it keeps my faith strong, being around a group of beleivers in prayer and worship. Church is supposed to be uplifting. I also go because I was raised in church and its something I have always done every Sunday. Attending church has been engrained in my life from a young age. When I stopped going to church for a year after I came out of the closet, I missed it terribly.

2) Do you feel accepted at your church?

The church that I go to now is a gay affirming church, so yes I do. If I were to still attend the church denomination I grew up in I would definitely NOT feel accepted.

3) Did you feel that you had to do anything to achieve that acceptance? Please explain.

Not in the church I am currently attending. The Assemblies of God church I was attending before would have been a different story. For me, acceptance from other people in my congregation would not have been an issue because I would have dared not come out as a gay man in that church. I knew exactly where that church stood on homosexuality. I didnt even bother trying to come out as a gay man and still try to attend church there. I would have been immediately alienated. Sadly, my presumptions were validated, when I came out after leaving the chruch I was attending, I never heard from some of my closest friends there again.

4) What are some of the effects the church has had on your wellbeing? (pos and neg)

Unfortunatly, mostly negative. I lived for many years in personal anguish, trying to supress my sexuality and conform who I really was inside to the beliefs and view points of the church. I lived a lie for many years, and even entered into a marraige hopping I would be “cured”. All of this because I truly beleived I was damned to hell for being a homosexual. This caused a lot of guilt, a lot of pain, and much inner turmoil. Even though I dont attend the church I was raised in, I am still affected by it. My parents have not changed their views, and side strongly with the church. This of course has put a terrible strain on the relationship I have with my own parents whom I love more than anything. The churches views and oppinons have helped shape the society in which we live today. My own well being, how I am treated, my own personal relationships with loved ones, have all been effected immensely because of the churches stance on homosexuality.

5) Do you have a relationship with Jesus?

Yes I do! Very much so.

6) Do you feel that you had a choice in being whom you are?

If you would have asked me while I was still in the closet attending the church I grew up in, yes. At this point in time in my life, my answer is a HUGE RESOUNDING NO!!!!! I didnt choose one morning to wake up and destroy my marraige, or put a terrible strain on my relationship with my family. This is who I have always been. I have always wanted to be with the same sex, its my environment that shaped me otherwise.

7) What is your attitude to parts of the bible such as Leviticus 18: 22 and Romans 1: 26-27.

I think these verses are interpreted to fit the agenda of the conservative church today. I think its hypocritical for the church to take these two verses at face value, yet “interpret” other verses that go against their own beliefs and views differently. There are just to many unanswered questions on the “true” interpretation of these verses for me to not live my life as a gay man. For me, these so called “clobber” verses dont hold much value. You can make the bible agree with any belief you have personaly if you take the scriptures out of context. Here is my question to anyone who uses the bible to condem homosexuality. Why did Jesus never once mention homosexuality in the Bible?

How important are the statements made by the 100Revs and Desmond Tutu (Supporting the GLBT Community) to you?

I think its very empowering and encouraging for the entire community. It shows progress in moving forward. There are many wounds that need healing. I think this was just one of the first steps in that healing process.

is there an edit button for you in the top right hand corner or only appears for moderators.

thanks for the extra explanation.

deadlines deadlines deadlines

Hey Jenaz……i wondered what your students was for this project.

Hi guys, I hope this helps too. 😀

1) Do you go to church? Why?

Yes. I love the annointing, worshipping and the teaching/preaching, I also love being with other Christians who love the Lord and love soaking in his presence also the times when I pray for others and have a word for them that hits the spot, now thats priceless. I also love being prayed for and receiving a word of encouragement.

2) Do you feel accepted at your church?

By those that know about me yes and there hasnt been a message preached at my church against homosexuality nor any prejudice against those who are. I am accepted as the person I am in the Lord coupled with my personality.

3) Did you feel that you had to do anything to achieve that acceptance? Please explain.

No. They knew me before I ever came out to them, my sexuality was irrelevant. Their was only one woman who felt odd with me but she had her own issues that she had confided to me about before she ever found out I was a lesbian.

4) What are some of the effects the church has had on your wellbeing? (pos and neg)

Positive: I became a better person and I got to know myself as a person, my life became more enriched and I found my calling in life. I got to know Jesus better and read my Bible and I now have someone bigger, Jesus, to turn to and be guided by, the Holy Spirit, when life takes its turns or throws a bad hand out and I look to God as my Father and the one I confide in about anything and everything and know he loves me and in time always brings about an answer or change for the better, usually what I needed, even if it tastes like broccoli sometimes 😆

Negative: I felt as though homosexuality was the worst of all sins and so I had something to feel ashamed and condemned about. I had to tell people my “sin” and so thus try and do whatever it took to change my ways and who I was attracted to and if I couldnt then I had failed or then this would be my cross to bare for the rest of my life, that I could never be with anyone in a faithful loving r’ship. That even if I did get married then when I couldnt be everything my husband wanted me to be or that every heterosexual woman naturally is, then thats a failing and a feeling I would have to live with for the rest of my life and the joy and happiness we are promised in God was not something meant for me.

5) Do you have a relationship with Jesus?

Yes very much so. Its the most natural thing in the world for me to talk to him through the day at any given time. He’s a surety to me as much as I know the sun will set and rise. 😀

6) Do you feel that you had a choice in being whom you are?

My orientation isnt one I just one day chose to become. It wasnt even born out of just curiosity of the same sex or from anything that has happened in my life. I could choose not to follow my orientation but it would still be there. Its not about sex, its a need to bond on a deeper level with someone of the same sex in a way a heterosexual woman yearns to bond with a man. I have had many close r’ships with women that was non-sexual so its not due to the fact that I dont have close female friends, I also have close male friends but I could never bond with them as a woman would in marriage.

7) What is your attitude to parts of the bible such as Leviticus 18: 22 and Romans 1: 26-27.

Leviticus 18:22 – This is part of the old covenant and isnt for us today anymore and besides it was for the priesthood hence the name leviticus “levi”, from what I can ascertain anyhow plus also this scripture in Heb 8:1-13 “1 Now this is the main point of the things we are saying: We have such a High Priest, who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, 2 a Minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord erected, and not man. 3 For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices. Therefore it is necessary that this One also have something to offer. 4 For if He were on earth, He would not be a priest, since there are priests who offer the gifts according to the law; 5 who serve the copy and shadow of the heavenly things, as Moses was divinely instructed when he was about to make the tabernacle. For He said, “See that you make all things according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.” F33

6 But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, inasmuch as He is also Mediator of a better covenant, which was established on better promises. 7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second. 8 Because finding fault with them, He says: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah– 9 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they did not continue in My covenant, and I disregarded them, says the Lord. 10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 11 None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. 12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.” 13 In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.”

There are other scriptures but it would be too long.

Romans 1:26-27 – Ok lets look at the preceding verses : 21 because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Professing to be wise, they became fools, 23 and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man–and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. 24 Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, 25 who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

therefor God gave them over to these passions etc…Now what Paul was faced with was people worshipping a god that needed such practices. They refused to worship the true God and so worshipped in a manner that was demeaning to both themselves and to God, having sex with each other to appease that god in full on orgies based on sex. It was not out of an act of partnered love they were having sex. These were people having sex in festivals and rituals making a public connection and worship with this particular god, mostly based on superstition.

I personally have never refused to have God in my thinking and as a Born Again Christian even more so God has always been my person of worship and yet I am still same sex oriented. I am not lust driven at all, I still follow the same standards set by God for any married couple or even single person (not perfectly since no one can possibly do that) but since the church wont allow me a legitimate marriage acceptable to itself, I have made a commitment before God myself, just as they did before marriage became what it is today. Meaning once upon a time, the consenting adult person you partnered with was the one you were with for life in every way.

How important are the statements made by the 100Revs and Desmond Tutu (Supporting the GLBT Community) to you?

Very very important. It has healed years of hurt and self condemnation and the feeling that I was a second class human being and less worthy than anybody on this planet. No one likes being hated or thought of as disgusting and not worthy of recognition, its not how Jesus taught us treat anyone. It was a brave stand and relief to see it happen and finally to be seen publically as acceptable as anybody else. The apology was needed even if I had forgiven already, it just reinforced that wound healed even more. It was closure to a degree.