HIS ESSAY Was written at the request of a straight friend of mine (for his own use). But I thought it would make a good topic for a post as well….

My purpose: to sketch some ideas about pastoral care of LGTBQ folks in Orthodoxy.

My experience as a gay man in the Orthodox Church is of two different camps: First I was a member of a parish with the policy of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. I think many members of the congregation were same-sex attracted. All of the ones I spoke with reported being open to the option of a relationship in the future although everyone had stopped “playing” in the way that has become normal even among straight people. There were gay couples in this parish too: visible and present. If one had any doubts about who was a couple, Theophany house blessings would have cleared it up. But no one ever really talked about the couples, as such. On the other hand, if one *did* bring it up, one got the official teachings of the Church and one was encouraged to move in that direction. As I was when I asked.

My own “talking points” at conversion included the assumption that if the Church was right in some places then she was right in others as well: I had to allow that she might be right about sex, and so I needed figure out a way to live in a chaste, celibate way for the rest of my life. My first priest – whom I have no doubt loved me and prayed for me until he fell asleep in the Lord – he suggested I get married to a woman. He said that I’d at least have someone there for me. I couldn’t understand this idea which seems to be to inflict oneself on a woman in order to pass. Part of me wants to imagine it was because he was from Russia, and a little backward? If so, it was the only way: because he was quite attuned to things otherwise.

On the other hand, my second parish was not a “don’t ask” sort of place. The priest was very involved in everyone’s life and, quite clearly, would not have a sexually-active gay person present himself at the chalice. Confession often involved ways to avoid masturbation and the inevitable fall. I felt that Father wanted to keep an eye on me. He often dispatched me to “figure out” if other people in the parish were gay.

None of these marked a very healthy way of living. The first because it involved a sort of semi-closeted denial. The second because it involved abuse, really. And the first – where the congregation pretends the gay folks are not there and the gay folks pretend they are not there as well – it’s really quite damaging. Even if chaste, we need to bring our *entire lives* into the Eucharistic liturgy. We need to be forgiven some parts, strengthened in other parts, yes; but *all* of our lives need to be transformed by the epiclesis. What we do not bring or present on the altar can not be part of the sacrifice.

I am wrestling with this question: is there a difference for the pastor between the lesbian who has chosen to lead a celibate life and the monogamous couple that has been together for 15 years? Should the celibate person be treated with any more or less pastoral respect than the person who appears to be sexually active? Is there a way to *know* what people do in their bedroom? (Being honest here: at my advance stage of Middle Age, I’ve begun calling myself a cuddle-sexual.) On the other hand, when I was trying to be celibate, my mind was filled with tortured sexual thoughts about just about all the men in my social world – that I would confess and struggle with again and again. It’s hard to be a gay man who finds bearded men attractive – and to be Orthodox.

But the struggles of a person who is celibate are radically different from the struggles of one who is not. The attempt to suppress or sublimate all sexual urges requires a *LOT* of help. Help is not the same thing as silence. One time I posted a picture of an old friend and I on my blog and my priest became very agitated, said that teenagers read my blog and I shouldn’t have such pictures anyway. He said that when a man becomes a priest or a monk, he’s not allowed to discuss his past life and I should follow the same path. I shredded three years of journals before I realised the untruth of this advice.

The person who is struggling to live their sexuality in a different way (off instead of on) needs to be open and honest about the struggle, needs to be able to celebrate what was good and joyful about their past even as they repent of what convicts them about it.

When I was trying to be celibate, that’s when I met my partner, Brodie. And since I wasn’t sleeping around, making pick ups in bars, etc, my friendship with Brodie was never clouded by the “psychic ripples” of other sexual encounters. After 5+ years of celibacy, I began to see, clearly, where my past life was broken and where my own sins (not the sins of being in the gay community but my own, personal sins) were the cause of my pain. My struggle was to *work* on those areas, those personal sins and try to overcome them. Like any other sinner, I’m prone to fall, and I must get back up again.

There are two issues that still seem to me of primary importance: the first is the command to “love one another as I have loved you” and the second is to not cause “the weaker brethren to stumble”. “Weaker” is always in the second person: I am never the weaker brother – only you are. In this light I think there are a couple of steps toward ministering to persons who identify as same-sex attracted within an Orthodox context.

Love one another… the gay man or lesbian, the trans-gendered person in our midst is just a pedestrian sinner. Much of the cultural right and left is currently taken up with what seems to be the only remaining sin in the world. And Gays are worse than murders and satanists, at least in this light. There is evidence of this online – but it’s out there, mostly among recent converts to the faith, and usually (but certainly not always) from those conservatives in really liberal denominations.

It was easy to try and pin the blame on being gay: I got published in “Touchstone” magazine because I was willing to pin all the blame on just “being” gay. You know: gay pride parades and orgies and such. I blamed all them for leading me to sin. That played right into the hands of the warriors on the cultural right. Strangely enough, when I suddenly realised my sins were *my* fault, they no longer wanted to publish me. A gay man, depicted as a HUGE sinner, they could handle. But shown as an average one, with ego and lust and pride issues – this was more than they could accept.

Even taking the few scriptural references as read, a same-sex couple has just average sinners in it: lies, greed, ego. Pastoral care of the gay couple, or the gay single – celibate or not – must start with the realisation that these are normal people, normal sinners, and normal, everyday, seekers of salvation in God’s grace. Start there: I doubt you’ll go very wrong at all.

Making the weaker brothers stumble. This goes two ways – yes, I can imagine a few Yayas or Babushki who would be horrified to learn what that nice young woman was “really” like. And that could harm them and harm their faith journey. Look at my “native” ECUSA to see what I mean. When left and right both walk away from each other, who should take the blame if not both? But what if left and right were made to talk to each other, to sit together to pray for each other? To be honest not about “politics” and “civil rights” but rather each about his or her struggle, his or her own sins.

I think my friend imagined this might be for priests. But I am more than certain that a priest, in this area, is there only as a facilitator of the conversation – it is one from which all of us need to learn and grow. The pastoral care of persons who are same-sex attracted must be conducted by the entire community (as must all pastoral issues).

I would love for a service modelled on Forgiveness Vespers to be celebrated this way: invite a local gay group to your congregation. Make it clear this will be a dialogue and difficult for all!!! Maybe invite the local Dignity chapter (RC) or Integrity (ECUSA). Axios, the Orthodox conterpart to these groups is officialy no more – but it’s still out there. Or maybe there is a gay youth group in the area. Also invite one of the groups like Courage (RC) that tries to help gay men and lesbians live according to the church’s teachings without seeking for a “cure”. (I wish there was such an Orthodox group!) And have your congregation share their own stories – of fear, of concern for children, or of realising that a member of the family was gay, etc. And when you have all heard each others stories – really listened, wept, prayed for each other – then do the mutual prostrations that require mutual forgiveness.

That’s the way forward. To do that love together, to do that forgiveness together. Not to beat each other up, but to know that, ultimately, if God has his way, we’ll have to live with each other through eternity and, maybe, we should practice now. We have to start the conversation.