I've been doing some mindfulness exercises and reflecting on my experience with religion as an LGBTQIA+ person. This is in no way an attack on people of faith, as I have as many, if not more, fond memories as I do negative ones. While I disagree with aspects of the religion, most Catholics I know are wonderful, loving and accepting individuals. That being said, this is some contemplation and reflection of my own struggles. TRIGGER WARNING: this talks briefly about abuse and heavy religious themes. This took me about 5 hours to write and edit, so I hope it stays up.
While growing up, we were not a particularly religious family, Christmas and Easter were big deals at my house, and they were the rare happy memories that weren't traumatic. The secular and Christian aspects of the holidays blended without distinction. My mother sent me to a Catholic school that I assumed meant we were Catholic, but I now know that the area we lived in was rough in the '80s and private school was the best chance I had to get a good education for my mother. However, I would go on to be confirmed into the church in my early adult life when it was revealed to me that I was not Catholic on the dotted line, as it were. It was a way for me to justify my childhood. But I am getting ahead of myself. Having learning difficulties made it hard for me to take in a lot of what I was taught in school. And yet, the religious aspects; the rituals, stories, symbolism, iconography, pageantry of it all was engaging. It was really the only time in my early years at school where I felt that I understood what was going on.
Eventually, because of an accident at work that landed my mother on a pension, we moved to another town, and I was sent to a Public school. I felt alienated from the other students as I held onto my Catholic identity, which was not really what the kids at this Public school cared about. Because I struggled through school, I had to repeat a grade, which also felt humiliating. I started to get teased for being the held back kid and being more interested in what was perceived as "girl stuff" in the first few years at school, which would turn into "gay stuff" in the later years of primary and onto high school. I wasn't smart, but at Sunday school, I knew all the answers. The adults were more than willing to entertain my inquisitive mind, asking about bible verses they were not evening using in Sunday school, asking questions about the different textures and colours of the robes the priest and altar boys and choir wore, and what kind of wood the crosses were made out of. I'd also ask silly questions like what Jesus would say about something I had heard from a news article or do they think he'd like Madonna or Prince.
I wasn't aware of the abuse going on and, in hindsight, am surprised I never experienced it, as other people with my particular proclivities have told me they were specifically targeted. Based on my own experience, it was the outside world that was abusive, manipulating, predatory; it was family and so-called friends and strangers who were dangerous and took advantage of me and abused me. I had a close friend who molested me. I was 7, but I now know people had already been questioning my sexuality, and the parents of the person who abused me accused me of seducing their son; I was 7. My family had a running bet on whether I would grow up gay or a pedophile; again, I was 7. The church was my escape from all of that.
By the time I reached my rebellious teens, I had begun to develop a complex built on the Catholic concepts of Momento Mori (which vaguely translates to remember you must die) and Mortification of the flesh (a glorified way of saying self-harm). I started to obsess on Old Testament wrathful god, and the book of revelation, and the Stations of the Cross. Also, Marilyn Manson, the goth subculture and Satanism started to pique my interest, as I could explore my doubts and inflated melodramatic teen against while still essentially remaining in the Catholic paradigm. I was also spending a lot of time with counsellors, youth workers and psychiatrists and being put on medications. All sorts of terms like BPD, SZD, OCD, ASD, and PTSD were being suggested. But I would eventually come back to the church in my mid 20's, and I somehow managed to balance my faith, sexuality, and failing mental health.
I am not going to say that being Catholic was necessarily horrible for me. The official church position is that Catholics are meant to love LGBTQIA+ people, despite their "sexual perversion". In my inner circle of the church and youth group community, they all accepted me for who I was and certainly not the case for many people. I even met and fell in love with my first boyfriend, who went to church with me. However, it all came to fruition when I went on pilgrimage to have mass with the Pope during WYD '08. Being a devout Catholic, this was something I took seriously. I had discussions and debates with priests, prayer groups and the laity. I took confession and went to mass. I spoke to people all over the world.
But one day during the pilgrimage, I split from my church group to see The Dark Knight at the cinemas. I felt conflicted, and my emotions were all over the place, and I felt lost and thought seeing a movie would be a nice break. Maybe the fact that the late Heath Ledger had previously starred in a movie about a gay man struggling with his sexuality subconsciously drew me to choose to watch that particular movie, or maybe it was the fact that ever since being a kid and watching the campy 60's Batman TV show reruns I was a big fan of the caped crusader, either way; the movie was great, but I was very distracted by my inner conflict. One particular scene stood out to me. When Batman is interrogating the Joker: He says, "Don't talk like you're one of them! You're not, even if you'd like to be. To them, you're just a freak, like me. They need you right now, but when they don't, they'll cast you out—like a leper. See, their morals, their "code"…it's a bad joke, dropped at the first sign of trouble. They're only as good as the world allows them to be. I'll show you, when the chips are down, these—ah—"civilised people"? They'll eat each other."
Bear in mind I was on antipsychotics at the time, but I felt like I had been spoken to by a spiritual force. Now I felt I needed to resolve the question of my sexuality and my faith.
When everyone from around the world collectively walked through the streets of Sydney to the place we would all have mass with the Pope, my mind and heart was heavy in prayer and contemplation. My church group took a break from walking on a hill, when suddenly the police gathered us to move, as a group of protesters carrying LBTQIA+ pride flags came towards us. An officer said to me, we will move you guys away from them, and my response as they came into contact with them was, "it's OK, I believe in their democratic right to express their opinion." As my church group moved on, I just dropped to the ground and started to ball my eyes out. And a protester with a pride flag wrapped around them reached down and hugged me tightly.
When we were all sprawled out in the horse racing field the night before Mass with the Pope, I went and had confession with what turned out to be a Franciscan monk. It ended up being about an hour-long deep discussion about my sexuality. The Monk took the position that what I was searching for was 'a brotherly connection and intimacy that, because of social mores, was being expressed physically, where if I had my spiritual needs fulfilled, I would be satisfied without resorting to sexual perversion.' I would end up having what is referred to in Catholicism as a dark night of the soul. And when everyone stood up when mass started with the Pope, I stayed seated on the group weeping silently to myself, feeling like I had wasted my life.
The long road trip home after it, as all said and done, was very solemn for me; I would end up never going to church with my old youth group, my whole social connection with my friends and godparents disintegrated, and by the end of that year, I had a complete mental breakdown.
I would eventually be officially diagnosed with SZD and OCD, and social anxiety. I would end up on a pension and have been only now 2021 finally starting to get back on my feet.
I'm facing my fears, doing ACT, starting to take care of my body. I am 37. I identify as bi/pansexual. I still have some religious hang-ups and have an ersatz relationship with my former boyfriend, who is on the spectrum and has OCD. He repressed his identity, which is why we broke up. If I can't be with him intimately, I can at least be his brother in Christ. As messed up as it is, I love him so much. I don't push the topic because I know how long and hard it was for me to accept myself.
That all being said, If I meet another person and we connect, I am not going to prevent myself from having a fulfilling relationship because of my religious hang-ups. If there really is an all-loving, benevolent God(s), then He, She or They, would have to love all the colours of the rainbow as it were. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe it does. IDK...but to paraphrase the late Bill Hicks, It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors and close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one.
Brothers, sisters and non-binary siblings, that's where I think I will leave it. Have a day!
