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"You can't be a Lesbian and be a Christian!" These words kept me away
from the throne of God for 22 years.
I was raised a Catholic as a child, but it never meant very much to me.
I saw it
as an archaic list of rules and rituals. I had a conversion experience in my
senior year of high school while watching a Billy Graham crusade on
television. I was elated at the experience and started attending a large,
independent, non-denominational church that worshipped in the style of the
Assembly of God denomination. The senior pastor was a former Assembly of God
preacher. He had broken away from the denomination to form his own
independent church. Following their traditions I accepted water and Spiritual
baptism and participated in their emotional style of services. The
emotionalism was such that you thought you could feel the presence and power
of God. The theology was fundamentalism.
Being a music education major in
college, I quickly became part of their music staff. I was the instrumental
music instructor in their independent church school and the director of a 150
voice children,s choir as well as a smaller jr. high age choir. I worked
closely with both the minister of music and the director of Christian
education. I was asked to coordinate, produce, direct and sometimes write
children's musicals for presentation to the congregation. I was paid a small
stipend for the private instruction, the rest was "my ministry". At this
time along with my college classes I was also taking classes at the church
run school of theology (the energy of youth!). I was a regular poster child
for Fundamentalism! I was so busy between all of these activities that I was
unaware of my sexuality. I had dated boys occasionally but never had a date
that was worth repeating. I really didn't given it much thought or attention.
Right after I had written and produced a large children's Christmas
musical, (that was scheduled to be shown on local network TV), I was called
into the minister of music's office and asked the fatal question - was I a
lesbian? I didn't know what a lesbian was, so I asked him to define it. He
very embarrassingly stumbled over a definition, to which I said no - since I
hadn't self-identified yet. He informed me that someone, he didn't want to
say who, had accused me of making a pass at her. I knew immediately who it
was because there was only one person in my life at that time who was
insecure enough in her own identity to make that kind of allegation. It was
the senior pastor's niece. I had been asked to drive her home from two
different church events and accompany her to a church social event by the
senior pastor, who said that his niece needed a positive role model in her
life. We were about the same age, but she was greatly conflicted about who
she was and where God fit into her life, especially since she had a
fundamentalist preacher for an uncle and an atheist father who had financed
his brother's church. My thanks for doing this favor was for her to falsely
tell everyone that I had tried to seduce her.
Due to the inflammatory nature
of the accusation, the pastor chose to believe her even though he knew her to
be an unreliable source. I was fired. I protested. I was told to leave
quickly and quietly or a phone call would be made to my school district
telling them of the details of the accusation, where I was now a first year
teacher. Other church members came to my defense, including a married singing
duo who had been stars on the rock n roll scene before meeting Christ. They
too were told to be quiet and accept it, or they could be replaced. Within
two months the director of Christian education and the singing duo were also fired
for supporting me, along with an associate minister who supported them. The
paranoia was so strong that it was easy to throw people away.
I prudently
left and my school job was unaffected. I was however devastated. I couldn't
understand how the God that I loved and had served for 6 years could allow
this to happen. I headed straight to the local gay community center which I
found in the phone book. If I'd already been punished for being gay, I
wanted to know what it was all about. The gay community was a big comfort
and I found that I did indeed have an attraction to women. Later on I
realized that God was giving me a big boost to find out who I was before I
made any mistakes and ended up in a heterosexual marriage. But it took years
to reach that realization. In the meantime I felt like I had lost God. I
call this period my spiritual Wilderness. I wandered around for 22 years feeling lost
and believing that you couldn't be lesbian and Christian. I longed for the
relationship that I had had with God before, but that now seemed impossible.
I had been betrayed, slandered and abused by Christianity and there was a big
part of me that was very angry. I kept running into MCC (Metropolitan
Community Church) ministers in our community. I became briefly involved with
ministries with a couple of them. But deep down I was still too hurt and
angry, and I couldn't allow myself to trust ministers or believe their
message. It wasn't until years later that I found an MCC minister that used
the same Assembly of God style of worship. God was finally able to speak to
me and reach me once again. I felt like I had come home. God met me and the relationship began
again, fresh. I became the organist for the local MCC for 2 years and then
moved on to the United Church of Christ (UCC), a mainstream denomination that
is extremely gay supportive as well as supportive of issues of justice and
inequality in other social areas.
We as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Christians have been lied
to. Specifically we've been lied to by our brothers and sisters in Christ who
are Fundamentalist Christians. Their definition of God is too small to
include us. We who have come through this process, this trial
by fire, must
share with our disenfranchised brothers and sisters, that they too can know
God. The great lie, deprives our community of it's birthright - the right of
all human beings to know their creator. Thank God that we have
denominations like MCC and magazines like Whosoever that are willing to be a
part of our community; to meet us at the point of our pain and betrayal. They
meet us in our bars and in our community centers to tell us that we've been
lied to. While it is a single purpose ministry - only to the gay community,
it is a badly needed ministry. Healing and forgiveness must take place. It's
hard to forgive when you've been hurt so much, but it is necessary.
When I
could finally forgive the church that had betrayed me, I found that it was
gone. The congregation had divided and the building was sold to a large
amusement park. It was literally gone! It was with mixed feelings the day
that I saw the minister of music who had asked me if I was a lesbian, walk
into MCC with his new gay lover. He declined to come over to the organ and
say hello. It was also with mixed feelings that I found out that the senior
pastor's daughter had come out as a lesbian. God doesn't allow hatred in
God's name. But it takes time and forgiveness to see the changes. Thank God
for mainstream denominations like UCC that are a shining beacon on general
Protestantism to expose their bigotry and bias all in the name of God's love.
Through all of this pain and betrayal, I've grown.
I can see things now that I could never have realized before. God's truth
will necessitate growth. If we don't grow, we die. God meets everyone where
they are and in the style and language that they know. It is wrong for us to
say that there is only one way that we can know God. God is bigger than
that. The way that I met God is one way, but you may meet God through a
different tradition and a different style of worship. God who created the
entire universe in all it's diversity, can not be defined by one definition,
literally taken from a mistranslated version of the Bible! Therein lies the
fallacy of Fundamentalism. We, as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered
Christians are not really a paradox - only a part of God's bigger picture.
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Sacred Stories : A Celebration of the Power of Story to Transform and Heal Charles Simpkinson (Editor), Anne Simpkinson (Editor)
Richard T. Rossiter
Other Articles by L. Louise:
Is Fundamentalism Right for the Gay Christian?
Also In This Issue:
Mama Was Right: A Journey Home
The Battle Between GLBT and the Church
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