Hummmm, I’m wondering if I type gay.

I agree with you Kirrus. Practicing Christianity, or not practicing it, is all a very personal decision. It was very clear to me when that church refused to even let us attend that it had missed the entire point of what Christ was teaching. Whether I decided to go to church or not, I knew that was not where I was at.

My only hope is that children raised with a strong church background can still, in this country at least, come away with a sense of love and compassion towards other people, or, if they will turn the messages they hear inward into a more exclusive and judgmental message. I fear that they will end up being very judgmental towards certain people. And that leads to nowhere.

I would love to make it to Wales someday. I’ve heard it is a very friendly place to visit. It has always been one of my hopeful destinations in the future.

I have had a gay christian friend in the past. Living in Wales, there are a lot of gay people here, plus I’d already guessed that you were gay

I need to be careful about what I say here, because, after all this is a public blog, but I’ll say this.. IMHO, the church in the western world has been moving away from Christ’s teachings for a while. If you can find one that will include you, great, stick with it. If you can’t, use the ‘net to find people who are like you, and study the bible on your own.

I’ll say no more here… if you want to talk more, contact me through my blog… http://kirrus.co.uk/contact-info

Yes, we believe salvation is black and white, that is one of our core values, but we’re not about to try to force our beliefs on you, nor chuck Bible verses in your face.

Love can turn into hate very easily. Just, please don’t assume that all those who believe in a religion will turn their love into hate towards you…”

Kirrus,

There is a reason that I believe what I believe. I am a gay man and I have a partner. We have been together since 1975. We have been through a lot in our lives; abandonment from our families, losing many friends to AIDS as the “Christians” sat on the sidelines saying that “we deserve AIDS”, “AIDS is a gift from God”, “Thank God for AIDS”, and my all time favorite, “Kill a fag for Christ”. And out of all of this, we have even been “gay bashed”, with one gay basher, just before putting a 4 inch gash in the top of my head with his boot stated, “this is for Jesus”.

Through all of that, we both remained Christians. I was raised Episcopalian. My partner was raised Presbyterian. We always believed that Jesus was about love and that He knew our hearts better than anyone. When we were in San Francisco, we were able to belong to a church who openly accepted “us” as a couple, in every sense of the word, except for “married”.

We moved to Coventry, Connecticut twelve years ago. I wanted to find a church that both of us felt we could belong too. Since my partner was raised Presbyterian, I approached the pastor of the local Presbyterian church, in an email. I found their website, and it looked like a place we could be comfortable. But, in the email, I was very clear that we were a gay couple. I did this not to put our sexuality in his face, but so he would know in order to avoid any misunderstandings. We don’t hide who we are as a couple. To do so would be a disservice to our relationship, and to us.

I received an email back from the pastor telling us that we were doomed to an eternity in Hell, and furthermore, that we most definitely would not be welcome at their church. He ended that with an all-caps sentence that read, “YOU ARE NOT WELCOME YOU AT OUR CHURCH. PLEASE DO NOT ATTEND.”

Well, I could hardly believe my eyes. I expected a response that he may want to meet us before we came to church there, but not something like that. My partner had, shall we say, less kind words for his email.

I honored his request to not set foot on their property, but I left him with one final message, “Would Jesus have turned us away?”

Because of this experience, my partner will not attend a church again. He won’t even step foot in one. He won’t say that he’s atheist, but he calls himself agnostic. But that was just the clincher for him. As for me, I tried to attend a congregational church in our area that was “open and affirming”, but my heart just was no longer in it.

Today, I go to no church. We are disillusioned with all of it. God lives in our hearts and our actions, and my actions that I do everyday for so many people that I never talk about, well, that is where God is. If there is a test to be made, I made it, and I pass it every day through my acts of kindness, compassion, and understanding.

The church failed that test.

Yes, we believe salvation is black and white, that is one of our core values, but we’re not about to try to force our beliefs on you, nor chuck Bible verses in your face.

Love can turn into hate very easily. Just, please don’t assume that all those who believe in a religion will turn their love into hate towards you…

If I ever start shouting biblical verses at anyone, or call anyone an abomination feel free to give me a good, hard slap till I stop / come around.

I think.. hate is so interchangeable with love because, although they are both opposites, they are also core emotions… each will touch a response deep inside. Hate infers wrath, wrath infers negative action whilst love infers peace, kindness, helpfulness, caring.

Which is the easier path to take towards something that you do not understand, something you can never understand?

I apologise for all those idiots who seem to think that someone being different *in __any__ way* from them, is an excuse to be nasty and rude.

Err… Hope thats ok! :S

Gabriella is a darling in front of the camera, she really enjoys having her picture taken!

You should be afraid. There is a lot at stake. It’s not any one issue that you mentioned. It is the concept of what love is. That very simply, innocent concept (and it really is simple and pure), has had so many perversions and conditions placed on it, that if you don’t honor or abide by one certain type of love, you are an abomination.

If you don’t practice religion, or if you have no faith, you can’t possibly believe in God. You are therefore an abomination.

If you love the wrong gender, you are an abomination.

If you believe that there is no right side to war and that this nation is not “under God”, you are an abomination.

If you are not willing to pray for the troops, you don’t support the troops.

What I’m trying to say is simply this; the love that Christians today are peddling comes with a hefty price tag. You either are willing to believe in that, or you will spend eternity in Hell. This is where the world is today. It really is black or white, right or wrong, salvation or damnation. And those of the religious persuasion are more and more unwilling as time goes on, to simply allow people to be who and what they truly are, without shouting biblical versus at those of us who are different.

Religion is simply becoming a device to inflict terror (yes, I mean that quite literally) on others — those of us who don’t belong. The world is getting more uncertain every day, and the fuel that keeps the fire of uncertainty burning is, RELIGION.

The flip side of the love Christians preach and believe in, is hate. And the distance between that love and hate is smaller than the eye of a needle.