Where and how does one begin to write when still reeling from the pastoral guidance issued yesterday by the bishops. Having spent the whole night awake and swinging between sobbing and total cold rage, I would have thought I would have some publishable thoughts by now, but all I can offer now is a stream of consciousness.
My first point is the ironic timing of the release of this statement. No one could have missed the not so anonymous love letter from the bishops to their people was couriered by cupid itself and landed on Valentines day – wow really thanks you shouldn’t have – no really you shouldn’t have! Secondly on the day that this guidance was issued (thus effectively shutting the door on people’s vocations and I am quite sure for some of us, the door on the denomination of our upbringing) the press was running an article about how Vicars are needed to fill the many vacancies in the church (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/15/vicars-needed-church-england-fight?CMP=twt_fd ). Hmm, now I am not saying there is a full battalion of us gayers waiting in the ranks to fill the gaps, certainly at the minute we are far too busy making it rain in the south, but, I do have to wonder how many people discerning their call have this weekend realised that the church of England is not the place for them.
I’m not big into the gay thing, I don’t like having to mention it, I don’t like having to decide to out myself when I meet new people. I am very good at being gender neutral when I am with patients at work and they assume my wedding ring means there is a husband at home. My long suffering partner knows how uncomfortable I get being boxed and labelled as the gay ones and how I routinely discourage their (see done it again) touch in public. I have good reason to be a not-so-keen gay person. All it has ever seemed to bring is heartache and pain. My military career was cut short because of it, organised religion is not so keen on my sort either (I think maybe I’m not getting very good careers advice). When I left the military I came to the point when I believed that I was unlovable, unlovable and thus pointless. It wasn’t losing career, the friends, the lifestyle, that I could have dealt with. No, the tipping point came when I believed that I was not loved by God and could not be loved by God because I was and still am gay. I don’t bounce round the place flying rainbow flags here there and everywhere, because to be brutally honest it would be terrific to be straight, but I am not made like that. Because I’m not made like that I live with the tension of coming-out over and over again, with people hurling abuse at us in the street or writing on our car. I have managed the tension between being gay and serving a church that condemns who I am, until this weekend.
You see this weekend, the bishops, the people in the ivory tower who write their pastoral messages and the ugly spectre of discrimination arrived in my in-box. This latest message that has the audacity to begin with, “We write as fellow disciples of Jesus Christ who are called to love one another as Christ has loved us” and then promptly and with great precision dismantles people’s lives and love. In the midst of this dismantling I realised that the tension with which I have held my sexuality and my church has been torn apart. This letter closes the door on any hope for me as person of faith within organised religion. It closes the door on youngsters who are exploring their vocation and their sexuality. It drives love underground. It breeds fear and anxiety. It destroys people’s faith and belief in a God who loves them, just as they are. This letter opens the door to fundamentalists and conservatives to drive out the unclean in their midst and do you know what, when they have driven us, the gays away, they’ll move on to the next group that doesn’t fit their view of the scriptures. You, the divorcees, the single parents, those who don’t sit with the right political views, you’ll be next. This isn’t a matter of the gays getting vocal and restless again. This is a matter of justice. It is a matter of saying “not in my name, this was not done in my name, which I am pretty sure is what Christ is saying today.” These are my thoughts today, thoughts of a hurting, bleeding Christian from what feels like that place of abandonment that is the cross. Tomorrow or in the days to come, I hope the tears will clear enough to see beyond the pain to an empty cross and the hope that brings
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