"Pastor: If my children were gay, I'd ..."

Pastor: If my children were gay, I'd ...
http://us.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/vi...or-blog-post-gay-children.wral.html?hpt=hp_c3

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This is an excellent video presented by CNN that shows a pastor's reaction to the question of what he would do or how he would react if he found out that his children were Gay.

 

My parents came to the same conclusion after many years of soul searching. I come from a very fundamentalist family, was raised around "good people" all my life. But I am gay. That was no more my choice than was the fact that I have green eyes. My family finally understood that after several years.

The damage to our relationship took a toll. I have not been able to trust my parents for anything. In my head, I know that they are fine with me now. But my heart still won't let me trust them. They abandoned me when I needed them most. I don't know if that breach of trust can ever be healed. This pastor is doing the right thing, good for him. I wish my parents had been able to do the same.

 

I am truly sorry for what happened to you, Lee. I often think, along with many others, how can parents do that to their children, their own flesh and blood?

The traumatic effect of the incident can certainly carry on for years to come and the hurt will almost always still be there because it happened with one or the two main people who brought you into the world. It has to hurt, most unfortunately, but some parents appear to be immune or unresponsive to the feelings of their Gay children and that has to be a very sad and hard thing to have to encounter. Yes, the pastor in this case, knowing Scripture well, has said that he would embrace his children if they were Gay and we have to wholeheartedly Congratulate him for his stance on this. That will inevitably bring great relief to his children should they turn out being Gay just knowing that they have a loving dad who will still care for them and love them unconditionally and without prejudice.

I hope you can speak with others who have gone through what you are going through. It helps many times just to talk about it with people who will understand. But know that you are not alone. You must be strong to face each new day with the knowledge that you have done nothing wrong and that you were born just as you are and deserve full respect for the fine person you continue to be.

 

Thanks. I still will never understand how a parent could do what mine and many others have done. I realize that religion runs deep, but when it comes down to your own kids, I don't get it. Like I said, we have reconciled and my parents now are very for same sex marriage. But I still do not understand why that would ever happen in the first place.

My aunt tried to tell me that it was all about tradition, etc. But what tradition makes you abandon your own child?

I feel like I can never trust them ever again.

 

Lee, I understand completely how you feel. You are hurt because of the hurt brought upon you. You are right in asking what tradition would make a parent abandon their own child. And imho the answer is only a foolish, prejudiced, and discriminatory tradition fraught with ill-will towards the people whom God created.

However, you say your parents have changed their position on the matter. I know it still hurts but that pain must ameliorate because blood runs thicker than water. It may be hard to overcome that hurt but somehow you must learn to get past that as to hold rancor against your parents will not bring you the peace of mind that you are entitled to having. It can only breed more discord each time you think about the incident and that is not what you need to continue thinking about now. Forgiveness is key in this situation and it should come from both sides. If you have not yet had a good heart-to-heart talk with your parents about this, then you might want to consider doing so in order to get past this matter and so that they can be afforded the opportunity to know that it is still very real to you and fresh in your mind and that you need to hear words of love from them for what happened in the past. Without conversation they may never know and you will only continue to harbor the ill feelings that are not seeds that can sprout forth a new blossom of healing.

In whatever personal decision you make concerning this, I wish you only the best and hope that both you and your parents can come together very soon on this and release the past to the past and look forward to a new understanding with words of forgiveness and new hearts filled with light and love instead of the darkness of the past.

 

Something you have to understand is that parents want to see their children get married and have children of their own, and continue the family line.

A same sex marriage and an adopted kid is pretty huge let down for them.

 

Your parents were probably just products of their upbringing and to a degree, brainwashed by dogma. Seems that they have grown and if you are as honest with them as possible about your residual fellings, maybe you can reconcile and finally let it go.

 

And while that may be so in many cases, parents also need to understand the pain that their insistence on their children to have children and be married is having on them as that is not something that is more than likely going to happen with a Gay or Lesbian child. They must be aware of that and not be insensitive to the matter. Because when they are and when they try to change a person into something they want them to be rather than accept them for who they are then even greater problems arise that are much larger than the situation at hand.

And while parents may mean well, they also have to love their children and in the end realize that their sexual orientation is not something they can just turn on or off at will like a water fountain any more than one can change their skin color because it is an inherent part of who they are and how they were born. That is something that some parents refuse to accept, and consequently that is what has caused many Gay and Lesbian children, most unfortunately, to feel that their only recourse is to commit suicide in extreme cases or take to the streets desperately seeking a friend or friends who can understand them and not chastise and belittle them for who they are. But the problem there is that once on the streets life becomes even more difficult for the child and things often end up with worse consequences than if the family just got together and had a good heart-to-heart talk about the matter and work towards a better understanding of what their child or children are going through because it is not only about the parents, it is also very much about their children and they need to know and realize that as well.

 

Very touching. If only he were the majority.

 

I can't help but think that if this guy were a religious leader when the opposite position were popular, would he preach the opposite. So many religions teach what people want to hear, and that's it. Maybe I'm too cynical, but right or wrong, preachers who reach for the popular opinions at exactly the popular time strike me as more opportunistic than inspired.

 

change is hard for the church, Mosques, ect... they are set in their ways, bravo for this guy being strong enough to do what is right and just

 

Actually, he IS in the majority on same-sex marriage in this country!

New poll shows solid majority of Americans support same-sex marriage
http://randyreport.blogspot.com/2014/08/new-poll-shows-solid-majority-of.html

 

Oh please, what about the traumatic effect to the parents?

This is the problem with homosexuals and their sympathizers, they believe only the gays have feelings and are affected by this issue.

>>>MOD EDIT Flamebait Removed<<<

 

It is indeed unfortunate that some parents cannot accept their Gay and Lesbian children. Yet the fact remains that those Straight, Heterosexual parents made their children and their kids have their flesh and blood. Therefore, while some parents have different expectations for their children we do not live in a world where the parent's wishes are always supposed to come true. We have to face reality. And the reality of the situation is that parents have to realize that some of their children may be born homosexual while others may not. That is a fact of life that happens even in the Animal Kingdom (which, incidentally, we are also members of.)

For those parents who continue to have a hard time with their Gay and Lesbian children, they should consider discussing their problem with a very fine national organization called PFLAG.

http://community.pflag.org/getsupport

 

There is really no language to express quite how little of a toss I give about bigoted parents thinking it stinks that their child is gay.

They need to suck it up, drop the bigotry and act like proper parents rather than like fanatical cultists wanting to burn away whatever features they don't like.

I'm sure they can feel that the situation is traumatic for them. The fault lies entirely with them, however, and I have no more sympathy for their supposed 'plight' than I have for members of the KKK thinking it's awful that black people are allowed to live in the US.

 

When I was in my 20's (in the 70's) I worked with a gay that came out to his parents when he was 18. They disowned him and it took it's toll on him. Personally I could not divorce myself from my kids as long as they were honest and ethical. Morality is subjective and reliant on social mores but there are so many people that don't fit conventional mores that you either believe in blood bonds or succumb to social pressure. I am not one that ever took social mores too seriously.

 

Thank you for proving my point.

Homosexuals and their sympathizers idea of inclusion only goes one way. That feeling is never reciprocated.

As for the parents, well when your child is born abnormal it is a logical feeling to not want to accept it but to fix it. Homosexuals would have been better off going with the argument that it is a choice, at least it would be harder to blame them. But since it has been proven with genealogy that there is indeed a "gay gene", which is abnormal meaning its variance is outside of the norm of 95% of the population, we can conclude that relatively soon in the future a set of parents will be able to test for this gene prior to birth and correct it or abort it if they do not want to deal with it thereby removing those homosexual tendencies from the child or destroying it.

Homosexuality is not normal, nature does not create species that do not procreate. If it were normal we would be seeing a lot more than 4% of the people who lean this way. It is definitely an error in genetic coding.

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/gay-gene-discovery-suggests-sexual-orientation-not-choice-1436389

 

I won't make any excuses for my lack of tolerance and respect for bigots. Being opposed to bigotry is a good thing, and I don't care about the feelings of bigots when they complain that their bigotry isn't tolerated.

This is no different than the issue of race. Homophobes are no less of a blight on civilization than racists.

No, it is not logical. In fact, it is the exact opposite.

Even if we do assume that homosexuality is somehow a flaw in a human being, which it absolutely is not in any way whatsoever, the impulse to try and fix that which cannot be altered is completely and utterly illogical, it is entirely an emotional response and completely lacking a rational foundation.

This isn't an argument, it's fact. I don't care about pointless buzz phrases.

There's another thing of which I don't care one bit; your views on what is "normal" or "natural". Those opinions are irrelevant.

Nature doesn't have an opinion of good or bad, nature just is.

 

Yeah. I meant the majority of religious folks.

 

yeah, some worry if the parent hurt his hand when he beats the child.... and some worry about the pain of the child

no one thinks of the parents pain... give me a break....

.

 

It's really quite simple... what would you do if your child began engaging in behavior that you considered to be abhorrent?

Let me be clear... I am not comparing homosexuality to these behaviors... however you don't consider homosexuality to be abhorrent and as much as you or anybody else may disagree with them... many people do.

So what if your child was engaging in a behavior that YOU felt was abhorrent? What would you do? Let's say your child engaged in bestiality or sex with children. Would you continue to give them a place to live if they continued their behavior? Would you continue to support them financially? Would you continue to allow them to come to family functions and treat them just like you did before you found out they were engaging in that behavior? Whatever behavior that may be....

 

I understand and respect where your coming from on this, but it's important to remember it's not what the parents want; rather since it's the life of their child, it should be what the child wants when it comes to that and nothing more.

 

Why do you people always have to bring up bestiality and pedoohilia when talking about homosexuality. Don't you understand how weak and invalid it makes your argument?

 

Why do homosexuals always bring up heterosexuality as justification for their actions?

Regardless, you're COMPLETELY (as usual) missing the point. He claims not to understand how his parents could (I assume) disown him. I told him, the reason is because they considered his behavior to be abhorrent.

So I simply suggested that he think of a behavior that he considers to be abhorrent and then tell me how he would deal with that behavior in his own child.

 

And by bringing up bestiality and pedoohilia you invalidated your argument.

You have a terrible habit of using red herrings.