To Just Feel Normal Sun, 4th August, 2013
I had a wonderful pair of conversations with two young women who are a loving and committed couple who recently began attending Unitarian-Universalist services. While they now live in one beautiful relationship, they have two very different stories. First I spoke with April, who shared with me her incredible transition that began for her in a fundamentalist Christian faith community. She was engaged to a young man whose family was deeply committed to Biblical Christianity. Although she knew that she was a lesbian, she saw no other option than to do what was expected of her.
Her true sexual identity came out in the heat of an argument with her fiancé, and after her revelation, there was nothing but pain and rejection. Her would-be mother-in-law actually suggested that April was demon-possessed. Her youth pastor refused to let her see the kids that she used to work with each Sunday. This woman discovered that her religious community had no capacity to welcome her for who she really was, and she was cut off from the fellowship of the people she had loved and worshipped with.
When she discovered the UU faith community, along with her partner, Kayla, April was astonished to see us doing loud-and-proud things like marching in the Pride parade. “If you’re going to be welcoming,” she said, “it’s important to be as loud as possible.”
April’s partner Kayla has a totally different religious background. With a family headed by her mother, who was a bisexual activist for gay rights, Kayla’s family of origin, not surprisingly, found little comfort in the Catholic faith. Thanks to a supportive mother who understood issues of sexual and gender identity, Kayla was confident in her identity as a lesbian at an early age. The lack of religion in her life, in contrast to her partner’s experience, actually drew her to explore organized religion. She learned that Unitarian-Universalists were accepting of the LGBTQ community and diverse religious beliefs, and so she convinced her partner to try us out. She’s glad that we’re not silent about LGBT issues, because silence feels like disapproval. “When you interact,” she says, “you’re sharing a part of yourself. You want a response to that.”
When asked what her advice would be for how a lesbian couple like hers would like be treated when visiting for the first time, her answer was simple. They want to be acknowledged just like any other couple. And she feels we are doing a good job at that. Her feeling upon visiting here was that she just felt normal.
I continue to hope for, and work for, the day when respect for love, in all its beautiful forms, becomes the norm in our society.
I had a wonderful pair of conversations with two young women who are a loving and committed couple who recently began attending Unitarian-Universalist services. While they now live in one beautiful relationship, they have two very different stories. First I spoke with April, who shared with me her incredible transition that began for her in a fundamentalist Christian faith community. She was engaged to a young man whose family was deeply committed to Biblical Christianity. Although she knew that she was a lesbian, she saw no other option than to do what was expected of her.
Her true sexual identity came out in the heat of an argument with her fiancé, and after her revelation, there was nothing but pain and rejection. Her would-be mother-in-law actually suggested that April was demon-possessed. Her youth pastor refused to let her see the kids that she used to work with each Sunday. This woman discovered that her religious community had no capacity to welcome her for who she really was, and she was cut off from the fellowship of the people she had loved and worshipped with.
When she discovered the UU faith community, along with her partner, Kayla, April was astonished to see us doing loud-and-proud things like marching in the Pride parade. “If you’re going to be welcoming,” she said, “it’s important to be as loud as possible.”
April’s partner Kayla has a totally different religious background. With a family headed by her mother, who was a bisexual activist for gay rights, Kayla’s family of origin, not surprisingly, found little comfort in the Catholic faith. Thanks to a supportive mother who understood issues of sexual and gender identity, Kayla was confident in her identity as a lesbian at an early age. The lack of religion in her life, in contrast to her partner’s experience, actually drew her to explore organized religion. She learned that Unitarian-Universalists were accepting of the LGBTQ community and diverse religious beliefs, and so she convinced her partner to try us out. She’s glad that we’re not silent about LGBT issues, because silence feels like disapproval. “When you interact,” she says, “you’re sharing a part of yourself. You want a response to that.”
When asked what her advice would be for how a lesbian couple like hers would like be treated when visiting for the first time, her answer was simple. They want to be acknowledged just like any other couple. And she feels we are doing a good job at that. Her feeling upon visiting here was that she just felt normal.
I continue to hope for, and work for, the day when respect for love, in all its beautiful forms, becomes the norm in our society.
