Today’s post is a bit different from my usual posts, but its a story that I really want to share. This week the United Methodist Church held a General Conference trying to reach a decision on an increasing divide within the Church between those advocating for more progressive and inclusive Church policies for LGBT members, and those advocating for a traditional heterosexual interpretation of marriage.
I am neither Methodist, or part of any institutional religion. I am also not part of the LGBT community. But I watched some of the General Assembly as some, seemingly lovely, Church leaders struggle with why their interpretation of homosexuality is interpreted as hate, when they do indeed love their Gay brothers and sisters… they just do not agree with them.
Their words gave me deja vu, as I remember articulating similar words early in my college career. Though my views on both God, Sexuality and Religion have changed drastically- there was a time I was quite religiously involved and conservative in my interpretations on such matters. It was not because I had specifically researched the concept, but rather I believed the authorities in my life when they said that heterosexuality expressed in covenantal marriage is a biblical truth, and in all honesty I was afraid what would happen to me if “strayed” from these truths. I was genuinely scared about accepting a different interpretation, as I feared loosing a tradition I thought was meaningful.
That being said, I was openly disturbed by the exclusion of LGBT people on my Christian-College Campus. I could not accept their social isolation as love, and I could not deny that they were indeed treated as outsiders. I then began to try being a “nice-conservative.” Somebody who held conservative beliefs, and yet loved my brothers and sisters who disagreed with me. I had LGBT friends and actively engaged in myself in conversation with them in hopes to make them feel welcome.
…and that is when the transformation happened. Like I said, I can’t say my conservative view point was well researched or thought out, but as I slowly became friends with these campus “outsiders” I began to see the world, at least in part, through their eyes. I noticed how people talked about them as if they were not there, or asked questions about them as if they were not more than their sexual identities. I watched the existential angst grow in my friends as they were rejected by family members and churches for their orientation and I tried to comfort them as the acceptance of their sexual identity became a confusing and dark road. I thought these things meant I loved them, and I certainly tried, but I knew it was not enough…
… I knew this because I recognized that though I was comforting my friends, I held back as I engaged with them, and I simultaneously hoped they would do the same. I didn’t want to hear about their potential partners, or engagements or marriages, because I did not want to admit that this news did not make me happy. I did not want to tell them about how I really felt about issues, because I did not want to create tension among us. But, though I was uncomfortable I did not think anything of it, at least not in a sense which would change my opinion or my behavior. Indeed, no one can love “everything” about a person. We all disagree in different topics, and this was just another one, and the best way forward was to let our disagreements be, and move on.
It was only until I had a taste of my own medicine that I realized how wrong I was, indeed some topics of disagreement matter more than others. In my sophomore year I began a relationship with an American that lasted close to three years. Though a Canadian and American heterosexual relationship may not sound taboo, it certainly was in my Indian-Canadian community. I remember how awkward it was when I told others about my relationship. The knowledge that I was dating a white-boy put me at odds with others in the community. I remember how hurtful it was when people shared their disapproval or shock, without even getting to know my partner. And I remember how lonely all of this made me, as the disagreement was not over something arbitrary, but over a relationship that was deeply meaningful to me at the time. And that was painful…
…And yet, nothing was more painful then the experience of interacting with the “nice-Indian.” The Indian who did not agree with my decision, but “loved” me anyways. The Indian who invited me to every social event, but did not really care to hear about my relationship, as they disagreed with it. And slowly I began to crumble as I smiled at a table, where people told me they loved me, and cared for me (which I do believe they did in emotion), while simultaneously knowing that this love stood on a string. Because when I would need them, truly in ways we need our communities, they could not be there for me. They could not celebrate relational milestones, they could not grieve if the relationship was lost. They could not give me blessings for a bright future, and they could not even affirm that I had a good man… because they didn’t agree with it. And slowly, slowly I began to feel the pain of being surrounded in a group of people who tell you they love you, but don’t really want to hear who you are once you leave the pre-determined boundaries of the relationship. And that pain, the loneliness in a group of people, hit me to my core.
And thus, I remember one day having lunch with a gay friend of mine, barely listening to what she was saying, only to interrupt her and say that I was sorry. That I knew now, that really me saying that I loved her, while rejecting such an intimate part of her life, was really an act of delusion on my part. It was playing nice, to ignore the fact that my opinion marginalized her and instead of accepting this consequence, I was compensating for it… only to hurt her further. Only to give her the promise of friendship, without the commitment of true open and deep conversation. The promise of relationship, without listening. And as I awkwardly expressed my apology, and revelation, I could not help but be annoyed at myself. As my revelation did not come from humility learned through years of friendship with her, but was inspired only from my own feelings of marginalization. And despite that, she smiled, forgave me, and we continued eating in a new found peace.
We as people are so disconnected from how our ideas affect those who do not share them, and we lack ability to naturally empathize with those who have a different lived reality than us. My relationship with my LGBT friends helped me challenge the views I had grown up with, by judging them based on how they affected other people. The gave me new eyes to see and ears to hear… and all in all they made me a better person, and more importantly a better friend.
I really can understand why someone in the General Assembly would be confused as to why their Biblical interpretation is determined as hateful, when their actions are not openly hostile. But I just found that until you can delight in the things that bring your friends life, and grieve in the things that bring your friends grief, you can never truly love them. And such things are truly not decided by race, gender or creed, but tested through lived experience, relationship, laughter and tears. And we simply have to be brave enough to walk those paths of life together, while letting go of dogmatic hindrances that hide our way to one another.