Gay religious people can be delusional

 

The story of Fatine Young, the Malaysian pre-op transgender who parted ways with her "husband", Ian Young, soon after she obtained the Visa to stay in Britain indefinitely, is not a suprise. Her part of the story is not fully known, but Ian has gone to the press claiming how he was duped and had spent more than 12,000 pounds to bring her home to Britain. He had also lost his job as a school janitor after being hounded by the school's parents because of their negative views of his relationship with Fatine.

Fatine had reverted that she had made "sacrifices" and had sacrificed "her life" because of Ian when the fact was that her previous life in Malaysia was not much to sacrifice for. She was desperate to get out of the country posting in online dating sites as a "female" and at a much younger age being interested in a very wide range of straight men from 20 to 60 years of age. She was in Malaysia where being a transexual is the subject of much religious condemnation, rejection, and persecution. Ian was her way out of the country whom she created a fairy tale delusion in her mind.

We all live in delusions, some more than others. We become self centered, use other people, and suck emotions and sympathy just to survive in this hostile world. We become extreme in character - manipulative, loud, agressive, unforgiving, gossipping and complaining about others to hide our broken selves. 

In Singapore, the stories of suicide attempts by gay Christians, in particular, those that had gone through programs such as Choices does not surprise me. Many are ardent in their Christian faith, yet chose to die as a result of these "anti-gay" therapies rather than choosing life. Few such stories are common amongsts my straight Christian friends. They did not have to deny their true inner self, bounded by one's sexual orientation. When we start to deny our sexual orientation, we begin to deny the rest of our humanity and character and creating a false delusion to cover this. 

The inner self - the wounded and hurting person deep within  can never be denied however many layers of outer delusion and make-up we put on. It will show in how we become emotional wet blankets seeking attention and love, and sucking the life out of our partners and controlling them. Some transgender and gay Christian friends of mine even tell me how they have in the past wanted to commit suicides as if to engender sympathy, but to me a symptom of hating oneself.

The severely wounded soul with several layers of delusion just to survive in this hostile world is a most sad state of affairs. They can lie and cheat to keep up this life until one ain't sure who we are talking to. Ex-Gay ministries have a hard time of succeeding because they are enforcing a lie and resulting the person being more deluded, digging a deeper hell hole. At best it is an outward conformity because of a theological construction. But inside are dead skeletons.

The layer of protection/delusion will also block God from coming in to minister to them, and only hides the deeply wounded and rejected inner self within. As a result, there is a tendency for suicide, because the real "me", the real person has long been sentenced to die in a lonely self created cell.  We are rejecting ourselves when we deny our sexuality, and suicidal tendencies is just a natural progression of our self rejection.  We loose our humanity, our right to exist as a person. That is why the Christian Right is so anxious to put gays in prisons, because they want to take away our humanity and many of us ain't too perturb because we too have learnt the bad habbits of rejecting ourselves.        

We often live in our delusion, desiring love and acceptance from our religious faith, and building up layers of delusion when we found none. We form a smooth outer shell like the pearl to cover the pain of rejection, yet loose ourselves, our authentic self. The deconstruction of our delusion starts when we are willing to stand up to our former slave masters. The more religious we are, the more serious about our Christian faith, the more baggage that we will have.

Gay Christian affirming churches can seldom grow. For example, the Metropolitan Community Church did not grow as a single mega church, but expanded to many other cities in the US because there just wasn't any ministry to the GLBT people there.

It is hard work alone just to exist. In a place with strong anti-gay Christian movement, it is hard work just to breakdown continuously the layers of self delusion amongst gay Christians. How many times must we say that God loves them, or that the Clobber verses do not apply to GLBT people, many pastors have lamented! We forget that the Christian Right is a thief that steals our soul and humanity at night, and whilst the thief is there, we better bash bash him up - even many times.

Many Gay Christians hold so tightly to the love of God as if it is an absolute irrespective of God's righteousness, morality, and judgement. We hold on to this delusion so tightly because deep within, we need God's continuous love and embrace. Hence, our own theological construction is built by how we desperately need God in our lives. In doing so, we missed many other dimensions of the ministry of Christ and the reality of His death and resurrection at the Cross for our sins. For many in their desperation to connect with the divine, any faith will do, forgetting that Jesus is the way, the life and the Truth.

We often neglect the Spiritual aspect of Christianity. Jesus said that He will not leave us as orphans but will send His Holy Spirit to be our friend and comforter. The Love of God by itself is only part of breaking down the delusion that we ourselves have created. We can free ourselves only when we have a continuous spiritual touch from the Holy Spirit of God when we enter into a place to allow the love and the Spirit of God to minister to us, once we truly love and accept ourselves. We learn to love ourselves, to accept of queerness when we walk and stand up for ourselves and the right of dignity and existence.

 At the end, we cannot really heal ourselves, nor live in the delusion that just because God is everywhere that healing and wholeness will come. It is the hard work to enter and dwell in the presence of God, in the presence of the Holy Spirit. When we behold His Glory, we loose ourselves, and gain a new self, a new life and connection with God.

Jesus came not to set us free from this world and all its pain and sufferings , He came to set us free from within. When Jesus resides in that deepest place of our soul and Spirit because we invite Him there and seek His face, surely the pain and suffering of this world no longer have a great hold unto our lives.

 

   

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