Tag: Christian

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Letting Love Win (Pride Month Edition)

Content warnings: Homophobia, transphobia, suicide

As readers can probably guess by the content I have on my blog, I am LGBTQ+-affirming and do the best I can to be an ally for the LGBTQ+ community. When I say that I am affirming, it means that I believe that LGBTQ+ identity is valid, that a consensual same-sex relationship is not wrong, and that a change in gender identity can be in the best interests of someone’s mental health (to name a few key items).

However, it was not always that way. In fact, for a long time, it was the opposite—I was highly rejecting of anyone who identified themselves as being in the LGBTQ+ community. Given how divided many opinions still are on LGBTQ+ issues, and given the lessons that I think can be drawn from my story, I am opening up on here (after lots of encouragement from friends) about my journey from rejecting to affirming of LGBTQ+ individuals.

As many people know, I am a Christian. More specifically, I am a Catholic Christian. Growing up, two of the things I heard over and over again were that homosexual actions are a sin and that changing your body from the way it was created is also sinful. I never heard a single Christian say otherwise until I started to know fellow Christians who, like me, were affirming of people with LGBTQ+ identity—something that only happened in the last few years. I wasn’t taught about things like same-sex marriage and changing one’s gender identity as anything other than as a sin.

Given that fact, when I did talk about LGBTQ+ issues in high school and for some of college, what I said reflected what I had heard. For example, just as the things I was taught were against same-sex marriage, I gave a speech in front of a class at a summer camp that was also against same-sex marriage. The homophobia of that speech is one of the biggest regrets of my life, and I sincerely hope that speech didn’t emotionally harm anyone who listened.

So, what changed with me? Actually, a number of personal events and happenings listed here (not in chronological order), as well as some personal events and happenings not listed here, helped change the way I thought about LGBTQ+ issues:

  1. On multiple occasions, I felt a call from God to reach out to someone who just so happens to identify as LGBTQ+ with encouragement, support, and love. That call from God[1] was on multiple occasions quite possibly the difference between life and death for the person I reached out to. Yes, I’m saying that there are people who might not be alive today if I remained homophobic and transphobic.
  2. Speaking of people who are not alive today, I learned a few months ago about a blogger I followed who died by suicide, and apparently one of the contributing factors in them[2] deciding to take their life was how others treated them for identifying as transgender. This reinforced to me (as if I needed any further reinforcement) the fact that the way we treat LGBTQ+ people can literally be the difference between life and death.
  3. Even when love and support was not the difference between life and death, that posture of love and support still made a major difference. For example, my friend Joe,[3] who I first got to know because of a mentor-mentee program that my college’s chapter of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship had with a chapter of InterVarsity that was trying to form on another nearby campus, had struggled with the fact that he’s gay. However, he came out to me, and since then, I can tell that his coming out to me helped him love himself for who he is.
  4. Speaking of Joe, it has also helped to get to know friends (including Joe) who identify as LGBTQ+. Getting to know LGBTQ+ people changed my perspective in so many ways, ranging from my exposure to the harm caused by homophobia and transphobia, to my exposure to various LGBTQ+ terms I had not known of before (something that Joe, to his credit, worked with me on…a lot).

I used terms such as love and support throughout these four events and happenings. Therefore, one may be tempted to ask: “Brendan, why then are you affirming instead of loving but not affirming?”

While the personal events I mentioned above were certainly helpful in forming my current attitudes, learning various facts about LGBTQ+ topics and mental health also helped solidify my mindset. For example, I learned that gender-affirming procedures significantly improve mental health outcomes for people who identify as transgender.[4] I also learned that being in a legally-recognized same-sex relationship, and particularly a marriage, appears to have positive mental health outcomes for those couples.[5] Given my experience with having LGBTQ+ friends on the brink of suicide, as well as my awareness of the statistics when it comes to LGBTQ+ people and suicide,[6] I am all for anything that can decrease the chances of suicide.[7]

This is my story on how I became affirming, but why should my story matter? For a while, I wasn’t sure why (or if) my story would matter, and I certainly didn’t want to drown out the voices of people who tell their stories of being LGBTQ+; these were two major reasons why it took this long for me to share. However, I think that there is value in this story for people struggling with LGBTQ+ theology, and for people who are LGBTQ+ and struggling to find people who they can talk with. I also think that the extent to which homophobia and transphobia harms people is a “blind injustice.” Most of all, I think there is value in showing how much of an impact we can have when we let love win.

This post is dedicated to the memory of the aforementioned blogger who took their life. In their second-to-last tweet on Twitter, one of the things they asked for after they were gone was for people to love everyone, regardless of gender or sexual orientation.

If you are an LGBTQ+ individual in immediate crisis (regardless of whether you are a runaway, are contemplating suicide, or are finding yourself in some other difficult situation), I encourage you to consult this list of hotlines compiled by PFLAG: https://pflag.org/hotlines

[1] I believe that it was a call from God for me to do what I did. That being said, I understand that there are skeptics and nonbelievers who might be reading this. If you are among the skeptics or nonbelievers, the purpose of the usage of God here is not to convert you to my faith, but to show you how my faith played a major role in my story.

[2] I followed this blogger for a relatively short period of time, so I don’t know what the blogger’s preferred pronouns were. Therefore, I’m going with gender-neutral they/them pronouns here.

[3] I got Joe’s stamp of approval to share all that I share about him here.

[4] Quite a bit of research has been done on this, notably by the Yale School of Public Health. You can read the findings from the Yale study here: https://medicine.yale.edu/news-article/21447/

[5] Research has been done on this as well, including from the American Journal of Public Health. If you are interested in reading the full piece, you can do so here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3558785/

[6] I wrote about these statistics in a previous blog post: https://blindinjusticeblog.com/2019/07/05/on-the-acceptance-of-lgbtq-people-in-families/

[7] One of the most well-known aspects of Catholic theology is the commitment to all human life, from conception to natural death. This refrain is usually used for abortion, but this refrain is relevant to me for LGBTQ+ issues as well, since I realize that our treatment of LGBTQ+ individuals can make the difference between life and death.

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Opposition to the Americans with Disabilities Act within American Christianity: A Wrong that Must End

People who read the title of this post may be led to think that I am anti-church, anti-Christianity. And I get that. It’s a title that may come across as directly attacking Christianity.

To the contrary, however, I believe that sometimes the best love is to offer honest, constructive criticism, especially when it comes to matters of justice.[1] In the case of ableism within American Christianity, I offer some constructive criticism: opposition to implementation of the Americans with Disabilities Act from many in the American Church is wrong, and that opposition must end.

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law twenty-nine years ago as of this Friday. It was arguably the most sweeping civil rights legislation since various African American civil rights legislation passed in the 1960s.

And yet, a key institution, a key group was excluded from the ADA: religious institutions.

Religious institutions as a whole are exempt from the ADA, but I should note that it seemed to be Christians who really took the lead in advocating against the inclusion of religious institutions in the legislation (hence, my focus on Christians in this post). The arguments from the (predominantly Christian) opponents at the time involved the money argument (that it would cost too much) and the “problem” involved with government “intruding” on religious institutions.[2]

Money is an understandable concern, as it costs money to make any building ADA-accessible. However, using money as an excuse to not support the ADA at all (and de facto to exclude a whole group of people from churches), as opposed to coming to an agreement that would implement the ADA at churches and other religious institutions in a way that makes the churches accessible without bankrupting the congregations, does give credence to Timothy’s argument that the love of money is the root of all evil (1 Timothy 6:10)—in this case, the evil being the exclusion of people from church spaces and the desire to hold on to money rather than spend it in order to make worship and fellowship spaces accessible to all being at the root of this evil.

I find it difficult to rationalize the “intrusion” argument—the argument that government forcing churches to comply with ADA would be too intrusive. It is wrongful that church institutions have in this case been more concerned about “intrusion” than the fact that the lack of it has literally kept people of various disabilities from going to church, and in many cases keeping people of various disabilities from becoming or staying Christian. I know people who have found themselves spiritually homeless, if not abandoning their faith, because we as a Church have often worried more about intrusion than about the fact that inaccessible churches keep people away from church.

Controversial as it may be for me to say this, religious institutions should not be exempt from the Americans with Disabilities Act. Additionally, regardless of what the law is, individual church congregations should try to use the money and resources they do have to make their churches more accessible to people with a variety of disabilities. It is the right thing to do.

[1] Note that I am a Christian, so it is important for me (and other Christians who care about this issue) to give constructive criticism.

[2] https://sojo.net/articles/resisting-ableism-american-church

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Addressing the Notion of “Praying Away” Mental Health Conditions

In many Christian circles, regardless of theology, there is the belief that you can often pray your troubles away. There is a belief that you can pray away financial troubles, family issues, physical illness, and yes, mental health issues as well.

While I am very supportive of praying for people who go through these different types of issues,[1] I think that it is extraordinarily important for me to use my past experiences with mental health issues to address the notion that it’s not always as simple as praying your mental health issues away, or that you are subject to condemnation if prayer doesn’t take away your mental health issues.[2]

You see, I was once one of those people who believed that if I prayed long enough and hard enough, any stress or anxiety I felt about my life would just go away. And honestly, in many of those cases, that was the case.

However, around the time of my grandpa’s death last fall, I discovered that suddenly, it wasn’t quite that easy. Far from it. To the contrary, no matter how much I prayed, I felt like I was sinking more deeply into an abyss of mental health issues. In response, I prayed all the harder, and yet I continued to struggle with unwelcome, unpleasant, and upsetting thoughts and ideas, best known as intrusive thoughts.

For a time, I suffered in silence—without a doubt the absolute worst thing I could’ve done at the time. I was worried about condemnation from others if I told anyone—condemnation for being a freak, for being weird, for the fact that I didn’t pray hard enough for all of this to go away, for the fact that I somehow didn’t rely on God enough. The last two of these fears, of course, relate to this notion that you can just “pray it away” and that there’s something wrong with you if you are not able to do that.

Thankfully, I was lucky to have a circle of loving family members and friends (most of whom are Christians, by the way; these people probably know who they are and these people mean the world to me) who didn’t condemn, who didn’t subscribe to the aforementioned beliefs about mental health and prayer. As a result, while my mental health is not always perfect (intrusive thoughts do make a comeback from time to time, seemingly around times of great change in my life), it has never reached quite the lows that it did around the time of my grandpa’s death.

If I want people to learn anything from my story, it would be that, regardless of whether you believe in the power of prayer (I certainly do!), sometimes mental health is more complicated than praying the sickness away, and we are being unjust to ourselves and others if we think it is always as simple as praying something away. Sometimes, it’s significantly more complicated than praying and requires support from family and friends, counseling, and/or therapy. And you know what? That’s okay.

So for anyone out there who is trying to pray the mental health condition away but you feel like you’re failing at it, as I was, just know that you’re not a freak, you’re not condemned, you’re not having issues with “failing to pray hard enough,” and you’re not alone.

[1] I’m a believer in Christ and proud of it. So yes, I am supportive of praying for people who are going through different varieties of struggles, because I pray for people going through different struggles all the time!

[2] If anyone is wondering what the “blind injustice” is, it’s that there’s a widespread belief that there is somehow something wrong with you if prayer does not cure you of your mental health issues.

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Men and Mental Health

As some of my readers know, I’ve had some experiences with intrusive thoughts, which is when one struggles with unwelcome, unpleasant, and upsetting thoughts and ideas. These experiences led me to write about mental health from a faith (Christian faith, more specifically) point-of-view a couple of months ago.

Writing about mental health from a faith perspective is important. However, given the sobering statistic that 77% of those who die by suicide in the United States are men, as well as the fact that we are in the midst of Mental Health Awareness Month, I think it’s important to have a discussion about men and mental health.

The thing about men, at least in the United States, is that we have expectations connected to our gender identity that make it problematic to be open about our mental health. We’re taught to be tough, strong, not show weakness, not be vulnerable, and confident, to name a few. Characteristics required of us in order to improve our mental health when we’re struggling mentally—vulnerability, weakness, seeking help—are not “manly.” Attempts to live up to those ideals of being a man can, if we’re not careful, keep men from opening up to their families, friends, counselors, and therapists (that is, if one gets to the point of getting counseling or seeking therapy—as getting counseling or therapy is seeking help, doing so may not be considered “manly”).

Now, in my case, I thankfully had men AND women in my life who helped me confront those stereotypes about men before I had my bouts of intrusive thoughts. However, I have known other men in my life who’ve struggled with those stereotypes and struggle with mental health at the same time, and I can say this—it’s not easy.

I don’t have all the answers to male suicide rates, but I do think that we need to start by making it okay for men to be vulnerable, and for men to seek help. I think that Olympic Swimmer Michael Phelps’ openness about his own past struggles is admirable and breaks many stigmas about men and mental health, but we need more Michael Phelpses in the world. We need to make it clear that it is okay for everyone, including me, to not always be okay. We need to make it clear that it’s okay for a man to struggle mentally and emotionally, and that it is okay to ask for help with our mental health.

National Suicide Hotline (United States): 1-800-273-8255

International suicide hotlines from the International Bipolar Foundation can be found here.

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Want to Keep Your Catholic (or Non-Catholic Christian) Faith and Have Been Abused by the Church? There Are Places You Can Turn to.

A couple of weeks ago, a grand jury report stated that over 300 Catholic priests in Pennsylvania sexually abused more than 1,000 children.

For me, this report was a punch to the gut emotionally. As a practicing Catholic who, for four years, had deep ties to one of the dioceses mentioned in the report (Diocese of Harrisburg, during my time at college), it would be an understatement if I said that the report was difficult to take.

Yet, in spite of the difficulty of even thinking about (let alone writing about) those in my own denomination perpetrating such horrible wrongdoings, I think that it is important to talk about this matter. Namely, it is important to dedicate my first “blindly just” post to organizations that are working in Catholic circles, or in non-Catholic Christian religious circles, to help victims of sexual abuse.

The purpose of this post is not to go into one of the “oh…look at the fact that not all Catholics/non-Catholic Christians are abusive” types of messages. No, the purpose of this post is to: a) attempt to be a resource for people who love their Catholic (or non-Catholic Christian) faith but have been hurt by sexual abuse within Catholic/non-Catholic Christian institutions and b) show to advocates on this issue, regardless of faith, some faith-based allies in the battle to confront sexual abuse in the Catholic Church (and other spaces) that many of us might want to consider working with.

Organizations doing this good work include, but are not limited, to:

  1. Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP)-SNAP was started in 1988 by Barbara Blaine, a victim of sex abuse by a priest. Since then, SNAP has worked to help survivors and those vulnerable to abuse, while at the same time advocating for various reforms to help curtail abuse in the Catholic Church and beyond. They have everything from their own hotline to support groups to advice on choosing a therapist. http://www.snapnetwork.org/
  2. Road to Recovery-Road to Recovery was founded in 2003 by Robert Hoatson. New Jerseyans may be most familiar with him as a candidate for governor last year, but he was actually once a priest who was suspended from performing priestly ministry because of his tireless advocacy for victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church (and is now no longer a priest). He and Monsignor Kenneth Lasch (who is still a priest, albeit a retired one) have an organization dedicated to, among other things, providing services to victims of abuse, offering referrals, advocating for victims of abuse, and providing direct and indirect services to victims of abuse. www.road-to-recovery.org
  3. Christian Counseling & Educational Foundation (CCEF)-They provide Christian counseling to people in need at three different locations across the United States. This is more on the counseling side of things than the advocacy side of things, but counseling is still an important resource in confronting sexual abuse. https://www.ccef.org/
  4. AdvocateWeb-From what I can tell, AdvocateWeb is, above all else, a site dedicated to providing a wide range of resources to victims of sexual abuse (and even some resources for family and friends of those who were abused). Think of AdvocateWeb as a database of resources for those who have been abused, instead of simply being a resource all by itself. Speaking of being a database of resources, they have a whole page dedicated to Christian organizations and groups dedicated to helping to address sexual abuse. So, if you’re not satisfied with any of the previous three resources I gave, maybe a referral from this fourth resource might help. Several clergy people (albeit I’m not sure of denomination) are on their Advisory Council. http://www.advocateweb.org/

These organizations, all of which have deep ties to Christian faith (and with the top two, more specifically Catholic Christianity), do not negate the damage that’s already been done by Catholic clergy. However, these organizations are hopefully of help and hope to advocates, as well as people who want to keep their faith but struggle because they were abused by someone within their own churches.