Praying the gay away?

       

Sometimes even in the midst of a crowd we can seem all alone. In today's passage from Mark there are huge crowds, people seem to be swarming and running towards Jesus and his disciples. And then there is that son, the young man apparently ill from birth. I am sure  he is not cognizant of any crowds, he must feel terribly alone in the midst of the throngs.  Nothing has helped him, not even the efforts of the disciples.

        I am reminded  of people of faith who swear by prayer alone. I recall my own efforts at addressing my growing angst over the thoughts I might be gay. For quite some time I had been having these 'thoughts' that I was being told were the devil trying to make me act in errant ways. The devil certainly did not want me to devote my life to God, THAT is what these thoughts were. Or so I was told. Pray some more they said. To me it was more like doubling down on my ignorance. I was in fact ordained and then the problems really began.

        I had an array of my own 'disciples', fellow seminarians, who seem to each have there own idea of how to help me, none really having a full grasp of what I was dealing with. Unlike the no nothings that think you can simply pray the gay away, here is the real solution.

Yes, pray is in the mix. The best way to describe this is to keep the conversation going with the Creator who only has your best interests at heart and wants you to be the whole and beautiful being you were created to be. That 'conversation' is called prayer.

       On the more practical side there is therapy and learning all you can about your 'affliction'. Consult experts, see the specialist, talk to friends, advisers and professionals. That is faith in action.  Then you come to know, wait a minute, there are gay people in the bible?  ( John 4:46-53; 1 Samuel 18 ) Is the "disciple whom Jesus loved" also a reference to a homosexual relationship? Then you come to see the extent of homosexual relationship in nature and that God actually created the world this way. Therapy helps you realize that being gay is not a sin. Being gay is a part of who you are. Being gay does not mean rampant sex and promiscuity any more than it does if you say you are straight. The rub there though is that the straight lifestyle is the one more associated with promiscuity, one night stands and mindless sexual encounters. It is adultery that made it onto the top ten list of sins in the Ten commandments.

      Then, through prayer and therapy and opening your eyes and heart and mind to God's love you see that I'd rather take a lifetime being gay than any day being straight. It is who I am and who God created me to be. Prayer? You bet. Therapy and seeing that there really is no problem at all? The best. I want to be the best "gay" I can be in glory to God. 

         

Mark 9:14-29

 When they came to the disciples, they saw a great crowd around them, and some scribes arguing with them. When the whole crowd saw him, they were immediately overcome with awe, and they ran forward to greet him. He asked them, ‘What are you arguing about with them?’ Someone from the crowd answered him, ‘Teacher, I brought you my son; he has a spirit that makes him unable to speak; and whenever it seizes him, it dashes him down; and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid; and I asked your disciples to cast it out, but they could not do so.’ He answered them, ‘You faithless generation, how much longer must I be among you? How much longer must I put up with you? Bring him to me.’And they brought the boy to him. When the spirit saw him, immediately it threw the boy into convulsions, and he fell on the ground and rolled about, foaming at the mouth. Jesus asked the father, ‘How long has this been happening to him?’ And he said, ‘From childhood. It has often cast him into the fire and into the water, to destroy him; but if you are able to do anything, have pity on us and help us.’ Jesus said to him, ‘If you are able!—All things can be done for the one who believes.’ Immediately the father of the child cried out, ‘I believe; help my unbelief!’ When Jesus saw that a crowd came running together, he rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, ‘You spirit that keep this boy from speaking and hearing, I command you, come out of him, and never enter him again!’ After crying out and convulsing him terribly, it came out, and the boy was like a corpse, so that most of them said, ‘He is dead.’ But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he was able to stand. When he had entered the house, his disciples asked him privately, ‘Why could we not cast it out?’ He said to them, ‘This kind can come out only through prayer.’