January 2013
Can a gay person be religious?
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In my opinion this is more a question of geography rather than ideology. In the UK, there are numerous groups from all religions that welcome gay people and several, including christianity, where same sex marriage is wholeheartedly supported. However, we must never forget how incredibly lucky we are to live in our tolerant, open society. Such a rarefied atmosphere is far from the norm internationally and although attitudes are changing, there's still an arduous and probably never ending journey to endure.
"A person is understanding and accepting. People are scared, panicky and judgemental.
A pack mentality can quickly overcome civilised sensibilities so leaders and governments
have a duty to set an example and develop opinions."
Recent statements by the US president and UN about gay equality are encouraging but will still have to percolate through centuries' old traditions of religious intransigence.
Imagine a young man in Pakistan. He knows he's gay, as must be about 10% of the population around him. He's been taught from an early age that such thoughts are wicked, disgusting and will only lead to hell for him and shame for his family. What can he possibly be expected to do? Be forced into a miserable dishonest marriage, run away and possibly be at risk from revenge or so called honour attacks or, as is too often the tragic case, commit suicide?
Some people may call me an atheist and yes, I do not believe in any god. Actually it goes further than that - I know no god exists. I don't ask anyone to accept my knowledge although I'm confused when believers insist they know a god exists but dispute the possibility of my contrary view. However, I prefer to describe myself as a humanist. I lead a good life and try to help wherever I can. I accept other people for who they are, as long as they're decent and loving. Colour, creed, sex, age, sexuality or anything else simply isn't important to me. It may be simplistic but I just say live and let live. I have no problem whatsoever with faith - if someone wants to believe something, that's fine. I'll never agree with it but will always defend the right for such a belief to be held. As long as it doesn't involve hurt of any kind, I don't care. It's not my life so I'll keep my nose out.
"It does seem unfortunately though that many religions do not share this standpoint. Here I very much delineate between faith and religion. The former is a personal choice that can surely only be arrived at through personal investigation. The latter is a multifarious system of control."
Humans are inherently incapable of accepting responsibility for their own actions and desperately seek anyone or anything else to blame. Why on earth else would horoscopes be even remotely popular? Human nature is to compete and oppress. Using self described divine teachings (every single one of which was written by a mere man) to justify awful acts of violence is a way of blinkering against the horrors that are being perpetrated.
Most religious organisations have excessive amounts of money (just take a trip around the vatican if you want to see the gold plated evidence for yourself) based on the blackmail of following the church for a better afterlife. Yes, blackmail. How else do you define the tenet 'do what we say or you'll suffer eternal damnation'? More human suffering and death has been inflicted throughout history in the name of religion that anything else. Slightly differing interpretations of insignificant passages in the bible for example have resulted in hundreds of years of hatred.
"A simple fact to describe the utter ridiculousness -
every religion agrees with atheism when it comes to describing any other religion."
Is it any surprise that gay people are generally scared of, if not actively persecuted by, such systems? Stereotypical claims of universal love and acceptance are easily exploded by such, again man made, passages in many religious tomes that demonise same sex relationships. I am amused and saddened that some choose to use this as the exclusive message of these books though. A man recently in the US had a large tattoo on his back quoting leviticus 18.22 which condemns homosexuality. Tragically ironic as leviticus 19.28 condemns the adornment of tattoos and there is no relative scale of sin. What I do in bed doesn't affect anybody else so what's the problem? A man or woman goes devoutly to church, helps in the community and is a caring person. Should he or she be shunned or worse simply for being gay? A lot of people would categorically say yes. The mystery of why so many gay people are conflicted about their inherent sexuality and their desire to follow their faith deepens.
Faith is an individual conclusion based on introspection and thought. Religion is a control freak designed by man to tell you what to do and take your money. I can't say be gay if you want to because that's no more of a choice than your eye colour. I can say if you want to follow a structured belief system, then please do so. If you find one you're happy with and are able to work within being yourself, I'm delighted for you. However, as I suspect is the case in the overwhelming number of cases, even here in the west, that you have to hide aspects of your true personality to conform, I question why you think your religion has the right to tell you who you are. Indeed, why is it even your religion?
I know several people who are devout christians, muslims and jews. They all know I'm gay and are perfectly comfortable with it. I've only ever known 3 gay people who were deeply religious. One wouldn't even come to a production of godspell I was in as he feared he would be insulted by it. The second became HIV+ and was disowned by his family for getting exactly what his lifestyle deserved - he's been struggling to decide if they were right ever since. The last was so conflicted by his orientation and what everyone was telling him at church that he simply killed himself. His name was Paul, he was 19 and lived in Manchester. That just shouldn't be allowed to happen. Do what you want with your own life but please don't tell others, even if you think you have some moral authority from a book written a few hundred years ago by very definitely non divine intervention, how to live theirs.
You may have noticed throughout this article, I've refrained from capitalising certain words. This is completely deliberate as I believe in equality for everyone and even the small act of changing the appearance of a word may serve to give it an importance or superiority it doesn't, in my eyes, deserve.
"Each to his own. If you want to follow a religion do so but I emphasise, if you want to."
Being yourself in the world can be difficult enough and although I'm fortunate to live in a reasonably enlightened country, I hope I wouldn't be afraid to stand up for who I was, wherever I happened to be.
Be yourself as everyone else is taken. I love you and I hope you will love yourself.
Follow CJ on Twitter - @CJdemooi
Check out CJ's Blog - www.cjdemooi.tumblr.com and website www.demooi.co.uk
Check out CJ's Blog - www.cjdemooi.tumblr.com and website www.demooi.co.uk
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