Yesterday saw the launch of “Living Out“. It’s a wonderful website full of stories of Christians who seek to live godly lives while being honest about their experience of same-sex attraction.
I’ve written previously about men like Vaughan and Sam who have been courageous enough to stand up and speak about this subject, despite the criticism they often get. They and many others have got together to provide this amazing resource.
And, of course, I’m grateful to God for his work in the life of the clone.
In God’s providence,ย Living Outย has arrived at just the right time as the Church of England and the wider Anglican community begin to digest the disaster that is the Pilling Report.
I watched Peter’s video before seeing this post and I was like, “hey, this guy has David’s voice, what’s going on?”. It all makes sense now.
I can understand what this site is attempting to do ‘Living Out’ as opposed to ‘Coming Out’ but I feel very apprehensive that the site is promoting a view that it is okay for evangelical men in the conservative camp to not deal with their psychological issues, but say something like ‘just because we are in a fallen world’, we are ‘just’ like this and our ‘identity is in Christ’ so we shouldn’t have to deal with these deep emotional issues. It sounds like the single evangelical heterosexual female who is unable to marry due to there being no available men, and cannot help being heterosexual because God created them to be so, is the ‘last man standing’ in our culture. We definitely are following our culture.
Red, thanks for commenting. What do you mean by “promoting a view that it is okay for evangelical men in the conservative camp to not deal with their psychological issues”? What “psychological issues” do you think they’re not dealing with?
Epigenetics (twin studies) shows that there is no proof of genetic reason for same-sex attraction. Epigenetics has been around for decades but only now being highlighted. There are various underlying issues with same-sex attraction in the western context- factors that range from personality differences to identity development as pre-teens (that is, it is the factors are wide and complex, but profiling can reveal patterns so as to identify factors). My comment ‘psychological issues’ is really in reference to such men not being able to ’emotionally bond’ with a woman. It isn’t about attraction per se, it is about ’emotional bonding’. The lack of ability or want to ’emotionally bond’ doesn’t happen in a vacuum. This is the serious issue. Emotionally bonding has nothing to do with not being able to have sex with a women, or being attracted to a woman. It goes deep into the psyche and needs to be faced not brushed over. Although I know this site wants to help people and be a voice an avenue against the ‘liberal voice’ in the Anglican church, do believe it falls into promoting a view that it is okay for evangelical leaders to not deal with their issues as long as they say they are celibate- God demands more from leaders than this- and that scares me for the future of evangelicalism. Our identity is in Christ, but God wants all of us, but we shouldn’t use it as an excuse. I have met a couple of these men and some of them will preach, but have treated some of my female friends badly as they do not know how to emotionally engage with a woman even in simple terms. To me that’s a huge issue. Anyway thanks for giving me a voice on your site.
hi Red. I’m afraid I’m not in agreement that “it falls into promoting a view that it is okay for evangelical leaders to not deal with their issues as long as they say they are celibate”.
The videos are full of people testifying to far more engagement than that.
However, if you feel that they have treated an individual badly then I would suggest you approach them personally to seek some resolution to the matter.