Being Gay and Celibate?

An interesting article. Thanks for posting the link, and also your take on it.

I'm a Catholic, not a Jew. I guess, however, that similar questions arise.

Firstly, I think people of a conservative religious position who urge celibacy as the only option very rarely understand quite what they are saying. If you are not in a situation, it is very hard to understand it. The tensions between religious belief and my own feelings, which form such a crucial part of my identity, have caused my huge anguish and pain. And endless trouble. And well meaning people who say things like 'we all have our cross to carry', or, in the old Catholic phrase 'offer it up', are, well, well meaning. They really are. But they just don't understand.

I have come to believe that, as the Rabbi says, living with integrity is what matters in the end. God cannot demand the impossible. Nor can it possibly make him happy to see us sad.

More than that is unclear to me.

 

I'm gay and celibate, but its not through choice......

 

Very interesting article, thank you for sharing. Definitely a worthy read for someone struggling with these issues. The world needs more people like this rabi. The only part that bothered me: If you cannot be celibate without doing yourself great harm, then it will be best for you to find a partner, join a shul and seek a way to make a family. Living a full and religiously alive life as a self-accepting gay person is better than your walking away from the community forever. Sounds a bit like ‘Oh well… If you must…’, which is still not the response I think you’d want to have if you are struggling with this. Not sure if I misinterpreted it.)

Like Camel, I was raised a catholic but at some point in my life I just completely stopped believing in God and remain an atheist to this day, buy I remember the days of guilt in my teenage years. I remember going to confession thinking I’d tell the priest everything and be forgiven, chickening out at the last minute and proceeding to plan how my afterlife in the burning hells would be…

My view on this is that if there were to be a God and a judgement day, I very much doubt anyone who has been a good, caring person, respectful of others will have much trouble getting into heaven. If you have a partner, be it a man or a woman and all you do is love him/her, then you can’t be doing anything wrong.

Religious institutions are, even if hypothetically decreed and started by a God, far too twisted by men’s thoughts and agendas to resemble anything like what God might have wanted them to be. We’ve become too good at it. We do it in every aspect of our lives, from religion to politics, from journalism to personal relationships. Take the quote that interests you, twist it around to suit your argument and ignore the rest of it. It saddens me that institutions that are supposed to about love, acceptance, togetherness can cause so much distress to very good people.

I mean no disrespect to any religious people in here. I echo what the rabi and two posters above said: living with integrity is the most important. Try to be a good person, find the love for whatever God you worship inside you, love him your way. If he is indeed all about love, he’ll love you the way you are.

 

Hi,

Why argue with God, the trouble is the guy standing between insisting on being the translator when none is needed.

---------- Post added 4th May 2015 at 05:05 PM ----------

True happiness is... to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca

 

Arguing with G-d can also be seen as debating issues with one's self. Looking at issues from multiple points of view based on different sources is a valuable exercise whether seen from a religious or secular point of view.

 

Kalopsia...

This is not about God in my opinion. You can shift it away from God and towards science and it becomes more obvious.

Einstein regreted his contribtions to science that opened the door to atomic bomb.

To me the answer is simple... From atoms, to love, to God humanity twists all things into weapons.

You cannot unscrambke the egg. You can refuse to eat it.

 

Hmm. Arguing with God, as you see it in the Hebrew scriptures (the Christian Old Testament) seems more like bargaining, or haggling, with God. If God endowed us with reason, he meant us to use that reason.

Catholic teaching is that an informed conscience is the ultimate guide to moral choices. But note that the conscience must be informed. 'It seems right to me' isn't really good enough. Again, you must use reason. And if you do, and a certain course of action seems right to you, then that course of action becomes not just ok, but necessary.

Kalopsia - I am sort of sorry if you have lost your faith completely. I understand, and think it tragic how many people are driven out of the Church by the attitude of other Catholics and often priests. But it is those people who drive others out of the Church who will be judged. I cling to my faith in God, a merciful, just and loving God, but I have little objective faith in the Church any more.

 

Hi,

Whole point of social institutions is to create exclusivity and non complying outsiders. From golf clubs, to politics, to marriage and religion...

 

In the secular world, I chose celibacy for a very long time when married, but now I have chosen to live. I think I am still going to heaven!

 

Well ... religion shouldn't just be a social institution like a golf club. It is about human interaction with a transcendent reality which is God. If it functions like a golf club, something has gone badly wrong.

I understand many people don't believe in God. That's fine. I often tend to agnosticism myself. I am certainly not trying to make points or convert anyone. But religion should be, and at its best is, inclusive rather than exclusive.

 

second best copies and if one note is changed, by accident or design, or mis-interpertated it changes the whole piece. i believe this is where we are with the Christian Bible, changed text and mis-interpertations have muddied the Holy Waters. the most important message is to love. I saw it written that it would be better to be before Jesus on judgement day and be told you were wrong to include people like us than to be told that we were wrong to exclude a volunerable part of society.

 

I am a Catholic, so the community of believers - the Church - is more important to me than the Bible. I see the bible as an important record of that community, but my faith (such as it is) is not in the bible, it is in what it represents. That, I suppose, is the difference between a Catholic and Protestant view of things.

The Church is deeply flawed. It is composed of flawed men and women. And too often it is used for other purposes, to advance agendas, or for raw power. Even when that is not the case, and people in authority have good intentions, they are often rather limited men, often damaged themselves.

I try to be charitable. I have suffered and continue to suffer myself.

 

Yes.

This is sort of digression, I guess, but this is one passage discussing this that I like to keep in mind if I ever have to deal with one of those "The Bible is Flawless!!!!" fundamentalists:

"[...] But I say that whoever is angry with his brother is in danger..."

St. Matthew's account of this course of instruction reads, "Whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause." But Jesus could not have said "Without a cause" for in this very chapter He says again and again that one must forgive no matter what the cause. Was someone, copying the original manuscript, angry with his brother at the time?​

This came from Healing Light by Agnes Sanford. (1947). The flaw she points out may be a translation flaw--I think the passage is Matthew 5:22, and it appears that "without a cause" is in some translations, and not others. Interestingly, it is in the King James version, which I believe many "Bible is never wrong!" fundamentalists still embrace as the "true" Bible...

---------- Post added 5th May 2015 at 10:15 AM ----------

A lot depends on the particular Protestant view, I suppose. The conservative Christian groups generally seem to be the most rigid about the Bible.

Indeed, a retired Lutheran pastor commented recently that how the Bible is read varies group to group. Conservatives might see "law", while he would see "grace."

Then...I heard a quote several months ago. I have no idea where it came from; it was something that appeared in a video I watched. There was a reference to "last week", but the video from last week was no where to be found. But the quote was what God might say today to some groups. It was something like: "How dare you reduce me to between the covers of a book!"

 

I agree with you. I have a very cynical view of the world and not mixing my life with god becomes quite easy, since I just don't believe in it. However some people have a strong faith and they have to try to reconcile it with all aspects of their lives or they end up miserable. I was merely suggesting a way to do it (granted, the atheist is probably the least qualified to give religious advice, but hey...)

It's quite alright. The faith in the institution of church I lost in my late teens, when I slowly started observing those around me and releasing that it was more about politics and favouritism that 'the greater good'. My faith in god... well, I'm a man of science and all I've read, observed, listened to just leads me to believe he does not exist. I have the utmost respect for (good) religious people. As long as they don't try to convert me, I ain't trying to convert them to my 'religion'. Live and let live, as they say. Churches refusing to 'let live' is what gets on my wick...

 

Quebec, our lives have a lot of parallels in that I'm committed to my marriage also. We will celebrate our 37th anniversary this year. But I did open up to my wife about 3 years ago. I sometimes wonder if it was the right thing to do. But it has been beneficial to me in knowing that my wife now knows me thru and thru. It's brought about a tighter bond I think. But that doesn't mean it's been an easy ride for us. Do you think you might tell her some day?