One of the gifts that I did not mention in my Christmas post was the gift of Netflix. I was most happy with this gift, not only for legal access to animes and my so-called "nerd shows," but to a number of other movies, especially documentaries. I love documentaries and all they embody, going out and talking to people and investing time in creating a beautiful or bizarre, but always eye-opening thing drawing from the real world. I just finished marathoning through two documentaries, drinking in about four hours of talk on a subject that I feel can't be discussed in my house--homosexuality.
Allow me to describe by situation. I have always grown up firmly planted in the Church of Christ. Though I haven't always been the preacher's daughter, I have always been a minister's daughter and raised by devout parents and grandparents, who raised my aunts and uncles the same way, who raised my cousins the same way. Granted, there are a lot of us, and not everybody stuck to the "straight and narrow," as it were, but every family member most immediate to me in my life has been on that path. We are a very happy, well-mannered bunch. I would never question the amount of love or understanding in my family on either side. But some things just aren't good to talk about. So we don't.
But now, I am reaching the pivotal point in my childhood where things begin to shift. My environment is different at school; my peers feel differently about some things than their parents do. We are becoming people, and it's exciting and terrifying and infinitely vital. And we are faced with burning questions about opinions, just as all people are. We must be decided about everything; there is no lukewarm among the young just as there is no lukewarm on the Day of Judgement. And one of the most sensitive topics among teenagers today as well as in my family unit is homosexuality. On the other hand, people love to talk about it in school and such. The problem is they don't always know what they're saying. You've got the talkers who fancy themselves Defenders of Social Justice and of Freedom Among People, the ones who will spew every breed of nasty about every gay human to walk the earth, the ones who lamely echo whatever it is their parents/friends/teachers/role models have said, and then you have me. The one who keeps quiet when she can. The one who says, "I don't know how I feel about this yet." The lukewarm.
When did being undecided become a sin worse than the debatable sin which we are so divided on?
Maybe part of my silence is my fear. A few of my friends and the people that I enjoy talking to harbor a bitter grudge towards the church and the people attending. And when they describe the biggest proponents of Christianity in their homes, I don't blame them. The fervor I hear from their testimonies is more fueled by hate than love. But I also don't want to become one of them. I don't want to be responsible for the actions and verbal venom of the bigoted. And it's paranoid to think that way, but heck, I'm fourteen. I'm paranoid by nature, and I may never outgrow it, though I certainly hope to.
But part of my silence is also lack of knowledge. I'm being pelted with a lot of messages without any factual anchors, and still others with factual anchors that are flipped for two differing theories. I've got my friend over here who doesn't even eat at Chik-Fil-A anymore because of that whole mess this past summer, and my friend over there who gets immensely uncomfortable at the very word 'gay.' Division among my family isn't so obvious. Like I said, we just don't talk about it. But I'd assume that my father certainly doesn't approve, displayed by his grumbling and turning the station when the topic arises. My sister doesn't approve, given her desperate efforts to change the subject when I do try to talk about it with my mom, who I think would explain it to me in a less biased way. And I wouldn't even attempt such discussions with my extended family. So I must extract my information from documentaries.
The two that I watched, One Nation Under God and For the Bible Tells Me So, did a good job of showing all sides of this argument, the extremists and the ones caught between. The religious men and women, the ones with degrees in Bible and psychology, talked a lot about reading with the historical context in mind and knowing that there was no Greek, Latin, or Arabic word for homosexual. It wasn't thought of.
The translation that we know as 'abomination' was a way of saying unconventional, according to them. They also explained the demand for guests at the door in Sodom and Gomorrah as inhospitable conduct, not homosexual conduct. God had much more to destroy the city for than just the residents with different sexual behaviors. And one interesting point they brought up in both movies was the possible motivation to fear gay men was the fear that men have of being "lowered." Being called girly is equated to weakness and inability. And this insult still works! Even women throw it around! But news flash. There is no "girl" role in these relationships. Neither member wears the pants. And because the lack of roles blows our traditional minds, fear is planted. But it is a far braver thing to love.
We are specifically called to do it, love. Not just out spouses, our families, our communities. We need to love the enemies we've created for ourselves, and we need to love the ones we've never known or met yet. I can't tell you what God has to say about this. I can't go out and organize some sort of demonstration of the lukewarm, a public outcry that we honestly don't know what to think about this mess. But I can swear to you that no matter who you are or what you have done, your Creator loves you as a son or daughter. And I will try to give you the respect and admiration that you deserve for being loved.
Allow me to describe by situation. I have always grown up firmly planted in the Church of Christ. Though I haven't always been the preacher's daughter, I have always been a minister's daughter and raised by devout parents and grandparents, who raised my aunts and uncles the same way, who raised my cousins the same way. Granted, there are a lot of us, and not everybody stuck to the "straight and narrow," as it were, but every family member most immediate to me in my life has been on that path. We are a very happy, well-mannered bunch. I would never question the amount of love or understanding in my family on either side. But some things just aren't good to talk about. So we don't.
But now, I am reaching the pivotal point in my childhood where things begin to shift. My environment is different at school; my peers feel differently about some things than their parents do. We are becoming people, and it's exciting and terrifying and infinitely vital. And we are faced with burning questions about opinions, just as all people are. We must be decided about everything; there is no lukewarm among the young just as there is no lukewarm on the Day of Judgement. And one of the most sensitive topics among teenagers today as well as in my family unit is homosexuality. On the other hand, people love to talk about it in school and such. The problem is they don't always know what they're saying. You've got the talkers who fancy themselves Defenders of Social Justice and of Freedom Among People, the ones who will spew every breed of nasty about every gay human to walk the earth, the ones who lamely echo whatever it is their parents/friends/teachers/role models have said, and then you have me. The one who keeps quiet when she can. The one who says, "I don't know how I feel about this yet." The lukewarm.
When did being undecided become a sin worse than the debatable sin which we are so divided on?
Maybe part of my silence is my fear. A few of my friends and the people that I enjoy talking to harbor a bitter grudge towards the church and the people attending. And when they describe the biggest proponents of Christianity in their homes, I don't blame them. The fervor I hear from their testimonies is more fueled by hate than love. But I also don't want to become one of them. I don't want to be responsible for the actions and verbal venom of the bigoted. And it's paranoid to think that way, but heck, I'm fourteen. I'm paranoid by nature, and I may never outgrow it, though I certainly hope to.
But part of my silence is also lack of knowledge. I'm being pelted with a lot of messages without any factual anchors, and still others with factual anchors that are flipped for two differing theories. I've got my friend over here who doesn't even eat at Chik-Fil-A anymore because of that whole mess this past summer, and my friend over there who gets immensely uncomfortable at the very word 'gay.' Division among my family isn't so obvious. Like I said, we just don't talk about it. But I'd assume that my father certainly doesn't approve, displayed by his grumbling and turning the station when the topic arises. My sister doesn't approve, given her desperate efforts to change the subject when I do try to talk about it with my mom, who I think would explain it to me in a less biased way. And I wouldn't even attempt such discussions with my extended family. So I must extract my information from documentaries.
The two that I watched, One Nation Under God and For the Bible Tells Me So, did a good job of showing all sides of this argument, the extremists and the ones caught between. The religious men and women, the ones with degrees in Bible and psychology, talked a lot about reading with the historical context in mind and knowing that there was no Greek, Latin, or Arabic word for homosexual. It wasn't thought of.
The translation that we know as 'abomination' was a way of saying unconventional, according to them. They also explained the demand for guests at the door in Sodom and Gomorrah as inhospitable conduct, not homosexual conduct. God had much more to destroy the city for than just the residents with different sexual behaviors. And one interesting point they brought up in both movies was the possible motivation to fear gay men was the fear that men have of being "lowered." Being called girly is equated to weakness and inability. And this insult still works! Even women throw it around! But news flash. There is no "girl" role in these relationships. Neither member wears the pants. And because the lack of roles blows our traditional minds, fear is planted. But it is a far braver thing to love.
We are specifically called to do it, love. Not just out spouses, our families, our communities. We need to love the enemies we've created for ourselves, and we need to love the ones we've never known or met yet. I can't tell you what God has to say about this. I can't go out and organize some sort of demonstration of the lukewarm, a public outcry that we honestly don't know what to think about this mess. But I can swear to you that no matter who you are or what you have done, your Creator loves you as a son or daughter. And I will try to give you the respect and admiration that you deserve for being loved.
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