On Learning and Choosing to Love…Oh! And Happy Pride!
Summer, 2001:
"I had sex with my boyfriend," she confessed to me, offloading the burden of the secret that I had sensed her carrying for weeks. She burst into tears as we were sitting in her car that was parked in the church parking lot where our dad was a pastor of an evangelical, Christian church.
My older sister, the person I looked up to most in the world at that time, my best friend, my confidant, my hero, had made what I saw, at the time, the biggest of mistakes.
Immediately, the fire of self-righteous anger rose from my gut to my mouth, and the words I spewed out were anything but gracious, kind, or loving. That I know for sure. And although I have no memory of the actual words that I spoke, I can feel even now the intensity of the emotions that I felt in that moment.
Anger, judgment, disappointment…hurt. My world reeling. How could she do this? How could she do this to me? To our family? To God?
I'd never even been on a date, I can tell you now that I couldn't possibly understand what she was feeling or what she was going through.
And all I could meet her with were harsh words and judgements that I had been shown were the proper responses to these things.
But just as suddenly as those harsh words spewed out of me, something else began to happen inside of me.
Fast forward nearly 20 years to May 2020:
I knew they were troubled, their anxiety at an all-time high. They were usually the one lightening the mood or easing the tension in our family home with their off-handed and well-timed comments and jokes.
I could sense their distress, we all could, but none of us knew the cause or the extent. I had made the drive down the mountain to be there for my family during this tumultuous, strange week of their lives where the youngest sibling, who never caused any problems, had become a source of contention.
We busied ourselves by trying to do the dishes. Something so simple and menial, seemed in deep contrast to the heaviness of that day. Everyone walked out of the room, and we caught a small moment to talk, just the two of us.
"Catie, what is it? What is going on? You can tell me. Anything."
There was barely a pause before they blurted it out. It was almost as if they had been holding it back for so long they couldn't take it for one more second, like some hidden volcano with pressure building and building over time, everyone else blissfully unaware of the potential pyroclastic event.
"Your sister is still gay," they blurted, anger and shame spewing out like lava, now it was my youngest sister bursting into tears with their own confession.
They said "still gay" because they had been down this road before. In a secret mental battle with what they'd been taught about that word, about "those people."
But they thought they had found a way around it.
And yet, here they were. Finding themselves on the same path yet again…not able to choose despite being told it was their choice.
And I was brought back to that moment as a teenager when my older sister had spilled her own confessions out to me all those years ago.
In the time it took Catie to say those 5 words, I had already made all the connections in my mind about what this could mean for them, myself, and our family…but especially for them.
And although I could only understand in part because I've never walked that road myself, I was determined to walk with them on theirs, choosing love.
I had spent 20+ years un-learning and re-learning how to love people. I had been on a journey since the summer of 2001 that had shown me that the way I was taught to love wasn't love at all.
And I knew that I couldn't make the same mistake twice. I could not and would not again choose dogma over a real-life human being.
So I took a breath, and simply said, "I love you." It was all I really knew to do.
And in that moment, it felt exactly right.
It's been two years, and I'm still learning what loving and accepting others means in practice, but here are a few things I've learned so far.
People don't need harsh words and judgment. People need love. People need a safe space.
They need a space to be fully themselves without fear of judgment, without having to worry that they'll be abandoned or hurt, without feeling like they have to change who they are in order to be accepted.
Everyday, people are being hurt and abused, forced to live a shell of a life because they have to hide parts of who they are. There are people contemplating suicide because they are terrified of what it will mean for them to "come out."
For many, it means loss of family and friends. Loss of home. Loss of safety. And even loss of life, literally or figuratively.
These losses are all too real for those who are part of the LGBTQIA+ community.
I don't typically take a very strong stance on anything. It's my nature to leave a little room for the possibility that I might be wrong or could be persuaded, but this…This is a hill I'm willing to die on:
All humans deserve safety, honor, and love simply for being human. This is something I will always stand for.
And because of this, the lessons I've learned over the past 20 years, and so much more that I can't possibly share in one blog post, I am making a choice.
I have sat silent for way too long because of the fear of what it would mean for me and my family, for my reputation as a "good Christian," for my relationships, for the approval I try way too hard to earn and keep, and for the peace that I tend to want to protect above all else.
And peace is important. But you know what's more important? Love.
Without love, we have nothing.
And for me to show love, I have to do what everything in me is calling me to do. And in this moment, that is to make this choice and with it, this declaration:
I am a safe space.
With that, I want to leave you with an open letter to the LGBTQIA+ community.
And if you want to be a safe space or want to learn to be, I invite you to take this small step with me to start being one. Let people know that you are a safe space. Tell them, and then let's take the next step to show them.
Dear Beautifully and Wonderfully-Made Human,
First of all, I want you to know that you are seen and you are loved. Whoever you are.
That seems like a good place to start.
Second, I want you to know that I am a safe space.
I haven't always been, and I'm sorry for that.
I've been part of systems and held strongly to beliefs that marginalized and abused you, and I made judgements about you and the people you love based on things that I could never fully understand.
And I thought I was being love by making those harsh judgements, only really accepting you if you were willing to change.
But now, I can see more clearly, that wasn't love.
I am truly sorry for the part that I have played in your pain.
I've been learning and growing (and I still am), and what I am learning is that love means embracing someone without the goal of trying to change them.
Love means accepting someone, along with all the pieces, broken or whole, that make up the fabric of who they are. (And by the way, beautiful human, YOU ARE NOT BROKEN.)
Love means really and truly listening with open ears, open mind, and open heart ready and willing to learn because the wisest person knows they really know nothing.
Love means being love.
And being love means choosing to be a safe space for people to be fully themselves, being somewhere they don't have to hide. It means choosing to walk with them even if it means their fate becomes your own.
That is love. And that is always the best place to start.
We can't always make a choice. You probably know that better than anyone.
But this is a choice that I can make.
And so, I am choosing love. I am choosing to stand with you, to walk with you.
I am choosing to be a safe space.
If you're scared, if you feel like you have to hide yourself from everyone, if you feel like you have to shrink yourself or water yourself down in order to be accepted, please know that you don't have to hide yourself from me.
You belong here. I’m proud of you, and I'm so happy that you are here.
Happy Pride Month.
Signed,
Your LGBTQIA+ Ally
P.S. I'm still learning to be this safe space and a true ally. I'm here. I'm listening, and I'm ready to learn.
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