We dig and we dig and we dig

It has only just begun, and I know that I will look back on where I am now and say "oh, if only I knew what I was in for," and I am glad right now that I do not. I feel displaced and unwelcome, frustrated and unheard. I feel that my family has already begun a path to "fix" me and have not yet let me in on their thoughts, nor have they asked questions.

Today I took my collection of homosexual books out of my closet (ironically) and put them on my shelf. They are no longer something to hide. The five books that I own on this topic are nothing to be ashamed of, nothing embarrassing, but instead, markers of what I have quietly been desperate to know and hear from people that I was too afraid to talk to.

The 5 books that I am now proud to showcase:

"The Church and the Homosexual" by John J. McNeill

"Taking a Chance on God" by John J. McNeill

"Out of the Past, Gay and Lesbian History from 1869 to Present" by Neil Miller

"Boys like us, Gay Writers tell their coming out stories" 

One Teacher in 10, LGBT Teachers share their experiences" 

I hid these books behind less interesting and controversial books in hopes that nobody would see them, much like I used to hide my cigarettes behind my book "How to Stay a Christian in College." But now, even in the midst of it all, I am happy to quietly put them on my bookshelf next to everything else that I am comfortable showcasing. 

While looking through these books again, I found a preface by John J.McNeill in his book "The Church and the Homosexual" that I remember connecting with so intensely during a time of great fear and hiding. It was about a year ago and I had received this book in the mail, afraid that it would not be hidden or properly packaged so that the place I was living would figure out what I had ordered. I opened the book and tried to take in all of it at once, wanting every bit at the same time. Here is what I found in the preface:

"At this point, the ignorance and distortion of homosexuality, the use of 'stereotypes and falsehoods' in an official Vatican document, leads us who are gay Catholics to issue the Vatican a serious warning. Your ignorance can no longer be excused as inculpable; it has become of necessity a deliberate and malicious ignorance. In the name of all Catholic gays and gays and lesbians everywhere, I cry out 'Enough!' Enough of your distortion of the Scripture that make homosexuals the scapegoats of every disaster! Jesus himself in Luke 10:10 recognized the sin of Sodom as inhospitality to the stranger, yet you support the interpretation of that sin as homosexual activity. Through the centuries you have supported sodomy laws that have sent thousands of gays to their deaths. You continue to claim that a loving homosexual act is condemned in Scripture, when competent scholars are nearly unanimous in admitting that nowhere in Scripture is there a clear condemnation of sexual acts between two gay men or lesbians who love each other.

"Enough! Enough of your effort to reduce all homosexual acts to expressions of lust, and of your refusal to see them as expressions of deep, genuine human love! Enough of your effort to lead young gays to internalize self-hatred with the result that they are able to relate to God only as a God of fear and hate, and lose all hope in a God of love! Enough of your recent efforts to foster hatred and discrimination against us in the human community! Enough of an ignorance for which there is no excuse. Enough of driving us from the home of our mother, the Church, and denying us the fullness of human life and sexual love. Enough of fostering discrimination against us, even violence and gay-bashing. We cried out to you for bread, you gave us a scorpion instead!"

-John J. McNeill-