This post is part of my on-going story that I have been telling through this blog. If you are just coming here for the first time or if you need to catch up, you can catch the earlier parts of the story in Setting the Stage or Act One. See the navigation panel to the right labeled My Story. I hope that my sharing of my story is helpful, encouraging, informative, or at least entertaining for you. Please feel free to comment or contact me. Thanks!
While, I do wish that I could have learned what I needed to learn sooner and became comfortable with myself much faster, I apparently needed to take the time that I did in order to figure out who I was, and I am certainly thankful for that now as I do not still have those lingering questions about my identity in terms of being both gay and a person of faith. Honestly, those were good times. It wasn’t as though I spent the entire time being miserable and held captive against my will. Also, let’s remember that I entered my ex-gay period as an adult, of my own free will, and that they were merely assisting in what I had asked them to help me with. This is very different than situations in which children are forced into situations aimed at changing their sexual orientation or coercing transgender to deny their true gender identity.
While, I do wish that I could have learned what I needed to learn sooner and became comfortable with myself much faster, I apparently needed to take the time that I did in order to figure out who I was, and I am certainly thankful for that now as I do not still have those lingering questions about my identity in terms of being both gay and a person of faith. Honestly, those were good times. It wasn’t as though I spent the entire time being miserable and held captive against my will. Also, let’s remember that I entered my ex-gay period as an adult, of my own free will, and that they were merely assisting in what I had asked them to help me with. This is very different than situations in which children are forced into situations aimed at changing their sexual orientation or coercing transgender to deny their true gender identity.
I want to
share with you what is probably one of my fondest memories from my time at my
former church. In 2004, I believe, I
went on a mission trip. In churches like
the one that I went to, adult mission trips were less common. They were usually seen as a development tool
for young people, high school and college-age.
Well, since I didn’t begin attending church until I was 20, I kind of
missed out on that phase of life in the church and the experience of going on a
mission trip as a rite of passage. So,
when the opportunity came to go on a trip to Uganda as part of a group of
adults from my own church, I jumped at the opportunity.
The purpose
of the trip was not to teach people about Christianity or to win souls for
Jesus like many of the mission trips that young people from my church would
have gone on. This trip was, in terms of
the work done, more similar to the work that I see done by adult missionaries
now in my new context within the United Methodist Church. We went over to build a classroom that would
be used to educated children who had been orphaned through war, poverty, and
disease.
We spent a
total of two weeks in Uganda, mostly in the vicinity of the county’s capital,
Kampala. During the first week, we built
the classroom. The second week was
supposed to be more of a vacation.
During this time, we went on a safari.
On the day that we transitioned from the area where we had been working
on the classroom to going further out into the countryside for the safari
portion of our trip, we had been on the bus, more like a large passenger van,
for a very long time. When we finally
arrived at the safari resort area, it was evening, and the group was divided as
to whether or not we should go to the building where we would be staying or if
we should have the drive take us out into the surrounding area to see if we
could see any animals now. We had to
decide as a group because each choice required the driver to go in different
directions. Ultimately, the majority of
the group wanted to go see animals.
In the back
of the bus, and part of the minority, were my former pastor and I. We both just wanted to get to our rooms and
our beds. We were tired. We had been on a bus for hours, and, at that
point, we were getting more than a little slap happy. We did see some animals that night. Now, while others were only excited to see
more animals by each one that they saw, he and I were sitting in the back
thinking, if you’ve seen one giraffe, you’ve seen them all. So, we were just in the back, I think,
getting a little annoyed at first, and, then, we just started checking off
animals, giraffe, check; elephant, check; gazelle, check; zebra, check. Eventually, we got to the point that we were
laughing hysterically each time we could check an animal off, and, then we
would roll our eyes and laugh some more when people wanted to see more. It got bad enough that the guide up front
even had to tell us to be quiet which only made us laugh more. It probably isn’t that fun to read my
description of it, but I laughed so hard that night. I had many good times with my pastor and the
other members of that group and my church as a whole, but I don’t think I ever
laughed as hard as I did during that evening as we rode around in the back of
that bus and just laughed and giggled more insanely than any hyena we ever
would have encountered out on the grassy fields and plains of Africa.
I share this because I feel that so much of this blog focuses
on my inner turmoil surrounding my own acceptance of all aspects of who I am as
a person. I want you to know that it
wasn’t all conflict and turmoil. There
was genuine joy and fun as well.
On a much more serious note, what I did not realize at the time, by being a part of the actions of a conservative church in Ohio in support of the actions of the Kampala Pentecostal Church in Uganda, I played a role in introducing the conservative theologies in that country that have contributed to the horrible treatment of LGBTQ+ individuals in Uganda. As I mentioned above, our efforts in Uganda were aimed directly at supporting the education of children, but part of the education they received was a conservative understanding of the Bible and Christianity. In some small way I feel that I contributed to the mindsets and attitudes that plague the United Methodist Church now.
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