What You Should Know About Being Gay

People who do not understand the views of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people are not all bigots; and people who are fully affirming in their support of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender* people are not all heretics.  This conversation often is relegated to love and hate, right and wrong, but there is a wide expanse between the two sides.  And that middle group is, for the most part, silent.  You are the ones to whom I am offering these insights, from experience, knowledge, study, relationship and with a genuine interest in engaging the too often silent middle.

With Bible in hand and in spirit, an open mind and heart and a willingness to listen to people, I entered the conversation that often brings out the worst in people.  I hope to inspire you to move and to speak up with the Jesus-voice inside you. 1.  Being gay is not a choice.  In the world now people are almost evenly divided on the question of choice: “Are people born gay?” (42%) vs. “Do they choose to be gay?”(44%).  For the most part, how we answer this will dictate related views about inclusion in the church and civil rights for gay, lesbian and bisexual people. When individuals hold the “born gay” option as true, it is more probable that they are also supportive about extending equality to the gay, lesbian and bisexual people.
To the contrary, those who believe people “choose to be gay” most often see being gay as a “behaviour” and not an intrinsic part of a person’s being.  Behaviours, they reason, are controllable and changeable and therefore, they conclude, sexual attraction is controllable, if not changeable.  When sexual orientation is seen as a choice and a behaviour, people are less likely to extend civil rights and inclusion in the church for gay, lesbian and bisexual people.There is no gene yet discovered for human sexuality, whether that be heterosexual or homosexual.  Opinions formed in and out of relationships along with anecdotal evidence become the basis for each of our truths. Relationship.  I write and say that word a lot — it matters.
Being gay and sexual orientation are not as simple as “who you have sex with.”  Sexual orientation speaks of an emotional, relational and sexual fulfillment and comfort.  Gay people, just like heterosexual people, are attracted, at the core, to a gender at a young age.  All of this is innocent and has no sexual overtones.  As heterosexuals, when we recall a crush on a second grade teacher or the warm ease of being with a family friend, we never associate “sex” with it; yet we will often insert “sex” into the historical impressions of a gay person. Long before thoughts of sex enter a child’s brain, both heterosexual and homosexual children have a brain imprint of attraction.  There is no choice for “behaviour.”It is innate.