Finding my faith again as an out queer

[rug]

"I understand why so many of my LGBT+ friends want nothing to do with religion—I spent more than a decade of my life living that, too. But these are not the only options; there are now a number of faiths in which LGBT+ people are not merely accepted, but affirmed."

12 JAN 2017 - 4:27PM
By Emily McAvan

When I was young, I believed in God. That belief, I was taught, was incompatible with being queer or transgender. For many of us, the stark either/or choice between accepting one’s gender/sexuality and faith is a deeply painful one, fraught with rejection from community and family.

My parents raised me in a fundamentalist Protestant sect that believed every word of the Bible was holy and correct, that one could easily find the truth from the text in the English translation (King James, of course), that God had literally created the world in seven days, and that there was no such thing as evolution. More than that, LGBT+ people were sinners, women had to wear modest attire including covering their heads, and they were most especially not allowed to preach. Every Sunday morning, we got up early and headed to church all day, where I was taught to hate myself for every sin - major and minor - that I had committed or even thought about committing.

Over the course of my teens, it became readily apparent that this religion was incoherent nonsense. My budding inner literary critic found numerous contradictions in the Biblical text, and the science I learnt at school made the creationist theology laughable at best. But more than anything, the misogyny and homophobia of the church was intolerable to me as a closeted teenager. Over and over, I had been told that LGBT+ people were sinners—an idea that made me feel sick to my very core as I began to realise that I myself was queer and trans. Not surprisingly, as soon as I could stop attending church, I did.

For many years afterwards, I was extremely happy about being an atheist. No longer did I have to worry about the burden of all that sin, nor worry about the absurdities of belief in a literalist faith. A life without God was a huge relief. On Sunday mornings I slept in. I came out, began taking hormones, and made a life for myself as an out queer trans woman. I had lovers, study and then work, and a lot of good books. I was relieved from the burden of hating myself for being queer and trans, and felt free to live loud and proud. But something was missing.

http://www.sbs.com.au/topics/sexuality/agenda/article/2017/01/12/finding-my-faith-again-out-queer

[msongs]

1. people who are content with themselves dont need outside superstitions to prop themselves up IMO nt

[rug]

2. You are either belittling her experience or you do not understand it.

Eventually, that curiosity led me to a synagogue, where the first person I met was a queer man. It felt like a sign. The rabbi was very welcoming, and we had many great chats about the place of LGBT+ people in the Jewish community. There was never any question of conflict between my gender and sexuality and my becoming Jewish. After a move, I found myself at a new synagogue, one with a female rabbi and annual services for Pride. Our rabbis preach loudly and frequently for the need for marriage equality, and take every opportunity to create an open, welcoming communal life. Instead of the rhetoric of LGBT+ sin, we are told that all Jews are btzelem Elohim, made in the image of God. There is a stark difference between this and the faith of my childhood.

[okasha]

3. Nailed it. It looks like both.

A person who is going through the realization that she is queer, let alone trans, is not likely to be content with much of anything and is looking for some way to reconcile her new self not just to society but to her own expectations. It's not on a level with dying your hair.

[AtheistCrusader]

4. Given the relative prevalence of 'faith' that would deny the OP's subject identity, belonging,

comfort, sanctuary, etc... one would think that people who have had to slog through such discrimination would be experts in the concept that religion really tells us nothing about the universe or our place in it.

She found a different strain of religion that is more welcoming. Ok. Maybe so. Does that even imply they offer truth about anything else? Is this a case of 'stopped clock twice a day', or actual validation of supernatural truth in the hands of a small number of humans?

[rug]

5. The post implied she was emotionally crippled, needing to grasp at superstition.

"people who are content with themselves dont need outside superstitions to prop themselves up"

An opinion as common here as it is incorrect.

Nor is her story about truth. It's about her experience reconciling her sexuality and humanity with her religious beliefs.

BTW, a person's faith is real and does not require scare quotes, any more than truth does.

[AtheistCrusader]

6. It wasn't meant as scare quotes in that instance.

I was trying to be clear I was being inclusive of all, rather than just the one she was wrangling with.

"It's about her experience reconciling her sexuality and humanity"

I identify better with humans for whom, that right there; is enough. I don't understand what religion really offers her, or you, or anyone else. People often list reasons, but 'why' seems as ephemeral as the concept of 'god' itself.

[rug]

7. Why is a pretty universal question among humans.

I have yet to see a dog ask it though.

[AtheistCrusader]

8. Resisting the urge to ask a recurisve 'why' question.

I suspect it has to do with most people being taught from the get-go, that there is a 'why' to ask about.

I ask 'why' questions as well, but they are more 'why does the universe exist', not 'why are we here', because one implies an assumed purpose, the other can be the result of mindless natural forces.

[rug]

9. I was told in grammar school that the former are "how" questions, the latter "why".

Hence, two different intellectual pursuits, science and theology/philosophy.

[AtheistCrusader]

10. Entirely true.

Which is funny, because in my line of work, we always tell customers "we don't do 'why' questions".

[hrmjustin]

11. For me I never had an issue reconciling my being gay and being a Christian.

[rug]

12. I hope that becomes the norm.