IN MEMORIAM

 

Frei Ġwann Xerri O.P.

1947-2021

B'sobgħa kbira nħabbru l-mewt ta' Fra Ġwann Xerri, missjunarju Malti fil-Brażil, li kien ħabib kbir ta' Drachma u ko-fundatur ta' Drachma Parents Group. 

Huwa kien jaf lil Drachma Parents Group titwieled, u kellu sehem qawwi ħafna fiha.  Kien dejjem jiggwidana bil-kliem tiegħu, jagħmlina kuraġġ u jgħinna nimxu l-quddiem b'ħafna mħabba u sinċerita'.  

Nsellmulu minn hawn.  J'Alla l-Mulej jilqgħu fi ħdanu u jagħtih il-glorja tal-ġenna.

Strieħ fis-sliem għażiż Fra Joao.  

With great sorrow, we announce the passing away of Fra Ġwann Xerri, a Maltese missionary in Brazil, who was a very close friend of Drachma  and co-founder of Drachma Parents Group.

He was one of the founding members of Drachma Parents Group and played a very important role. He guided us with his very wise words, with his insights, encouraging us forth in the path of love.

We remember him with love. May the Lord God grant him eternal peace.

Rest in peace, dearest Fra Joao. 

My beautiful son and I

The Times of Malta

Louisa Grech 

https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/my-beautiful-son-and-i-louisa-grech.827866

I have a son. He is not the only son I have but this son is gay. I love all my sons, they are beautiful persons, each having unique qualities, each one a treasure.

But, today, I would like to specifically share my experience about this particular son.

This son of mine, of ours, was born to us around midnight, one day in November, some 30 years back.

He was a boy like any other, playing and fighting with his siblings, interested in some things and not in others and doing well at school in spite of the many challenges we were facing as a family raising his younger brother with a disability.

He had, unfortunately, also witnessed the tragic accident that resulted in the loss of his baby sister while he was still of a tender age himself.

Considering all the challenges we had been facing, I could see that, as he was growing up, he was exhibiting certain beautiful characteristics and values that I was very proud of.

He was a loving and caring individual, always asking how one was feeling, making sure they were comfortable or getting them the things they needed to make them feel welcomed.

People and family loved being around him because he made everyone feel special and he always had time to listen to them.

He had an artistic streak in him too and wished to have an opportunity to perform. We took him to lessons and rehearsals regularly. We went to watch his performances and were enthusiastic about his achievements.

He always strived to do his best. He continued his studies and graduated. And, then, he decided to move abroad.

I knew that, one day, this would happen as he always had this wanderlust to travel, to see new places, to explore other civilisations.

However, there was another reason he needed to move out. He felt suffocated, unable to express himself honestly, to be who he is, to live what he is.

Since his secondary school days, there were moments when I could see that he was different. I began to understand, but not truly accept, that he might be gay.

I did not want it to be true, not because of who he is but of the suffering he would encounter because of who he is. It pained me that he would be judged, he would be sidelined, he would be rejected and insulted and hated.

I was pained because I loved him so much and I did not want to see him suffer.

When the truth was finally out, I hugged him and kissed him and told him I loved him with all my heart, my soul, my being.

How could it be otherwise? He was a part of me. I gave him life. I was there for him when he was a baby, a toddler, a child, a teen, an adult. And I will continue to love him all the days of my life and beyond. How can it be otherwise? He is my child, my son!

My wish for my children has always been one – to see them happy. Happy in their life, happy in their work, happy in their relationships. We were so pleased when we learnt that he had met a partner.

This partner became his soulmate and, last year, they tied the knot. It was a magical experience, an experience of love, of commitment to one another, a promise to share their life journey and be there for one another.

And all the people there – their families, their friends – they too were surrounding them with their love and support. What a beautiful experience!

God was awesomely present throughout this journey and will continue to be with us all throughout the rest of our lives!

I would like to thank Drachma Parents, who also supported us on this journey, who gave us a safe space to talk and open up our hearts, to feel that we are not alone in this journey and that, when our story is shared, we feel comforted and strengthened to move on and be champions for our children.

Louisa Grech is coordinator of Drachma Parents, a group of Catholic parents of LGBTQI+ persons, offering support and a safe space. To contact the group, e-mail drachmaparents@gmail.com or call 9945 4581.

EUROPEAN FORUM OF LESBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL AND TRANSGENDER CHRISTIAN GROUPS PUBLISHES A BOOK ON LGBT CATHOLICS AND THEIR STORIES

The stories of the LGBT Catholics in this book will make a difference in your life” assures Sister Jeannine Gramick in her prologue. Here you will find 34 personal stories divided into the six themes of: Family - Is Catholicism home? - A religious life? - A long journey - Significant events - Working for understanding and acceptance. 

The lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and non-gender-binary authors are aged from their 20s to their 80s and come from all walks of life in 13 European countries: Albania, Belgium, Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Italy, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Russia, and Spain. 

These stories are for reading silently and for reading out loud, by all people - whether religious or not, whether LGBT or not. The authors share their stories of being LGBT and Catholic to help increase awareness, understanding and acceptance of LGBT Catholics and to ease the journeys of those still working on how to live out being both LGBT and Catholic.

* Drachma is a member of the European  Forum

SIBT FAMILJA: L-OMOSESSWALITA’ RIGAL TA’ ALLA

Niftakar l-ewwel darba li mort għall-laqgħa. Kont ġà ltqajt mal-koordinatur tal-Grupp u kien spjegali kif taħdem id-dinamika ta’ Drachma. Kont iltqajt miegħu wara li d-direttur spiritwali tiegħi kien issuġġerieli biex nissieħeb magħhom. Għax, għandkom tkunu tafu li jien għandi problema ... kif naqbad ngħid ... jien gay.

Għamilt snin twal naħbiha u nipprova nagħmel tabirruħi li jien straight. Kont nibża’ minn ilsien in-nies. Wara kollox kelli xogħol rispettabli u ma ridtx li n- nies jaħsbu li jien kont xi kriminal jew agħar xi pedofilu! Imma forsi l-ikbar biża’ tiegħi kienet li nitlef ruħi. Jien lil Alla nħobbu, u nixtieq ngħix b’mod normali, imma kif nista’ nagħmel hekk, jekk dak li nħoss hu ħażin? Min jaf kemm il-darba staqsejtu lil Mulej, imma għaliex, għaliex għamiltni gay? Għaliex tajtni dan il-kastig? Għaliex tajtni din is-saħta??? Kont wasalt f’punt li emmint dik id-diċerija dwarna l-gays li ma tistax tkun gay u nisrani, minkejja li jien qatt ma għixt ħażin.

Imtaqqal kif kont b’dawn il-mistoqsijiet li l-ħin kollu kienu jberrnu f’moħħi, kont mort minn qassis għall-ieħor. Kien hemm minnhom li fehemni. Kien hemm oħrajn li kliemhom minn fuq l-ambone ferini. Sakemm sibt lil dan il-qassis ta’ veru, li kien hu stess li qalli: ħabib, għaliex ma tmurx għand Drachma? Dawk nies bħalek huma, u bħalek qegħdin jippruvaw iħollu din l-għoqda tal-omosesswalità! 

B’tama kbira biex forsi nsib xaqq ta’ dawl f’ħajti, ċempilt in-numru li sibt miktub fuq il-websajt tal-grupp: drachmalgbt.blogspot.com. Il-leħen li weġibni kien ġentili, kien kalm, vuċi li tassigurak. U malajr ftehemt biex niltaqa’ miegħu u qsamt miegħu il-ħafna biżgħat, tamiet, dubji u xewqat li kont ili nostor f’qalbi. Ma sibtx għajnejn iebsa lesti biex jikkundannaw. Ma sibtx bniedem jferfer subgħajh lejja biex iċanfarni. Imma sibt min jismagħni u lest li jakkumpanjani. Stedinni għalhekk għal-laqgħa tal-Grupp.

Niftakar dik l-ewwel laqgħa u niftakar l-iktar il-biża’ li kelli. Issa jekk xi ħadd jarani barra fit-triq? U jekk jindunaw? U jekk jarawni li kont magħhom? 

U dħalt għal dik l-ewwel laqgħa u minn hemm ma ħaristx lura. 

Bdejt vjaġġ biex niskopri iktar lili nniffsi, u biex nifhem iktar xi jrid Alla minni. Immaġinajtni bħad-dixxipli ta’ Emmaws huma u sejrin lura d-dar mifxulin fuq il-mewt ta’ Ġesù, u l-Mulej ġie u qagħad magħhom u spjegalhom bil-paċenzja kollha. Jien ukoll kont bdejt interraq f’din it-triq, u ftit stajt nifhem. Jien ukoll kont mifxul u jien ukoll ma kontx nista’ nifhem għala ħajti kienet kif kienet. U fi Drachma sibt persuni jisimgħuni, u jterrqu l-istess triq miegħi, bis-sabar kollu. Alla jaf kemm sigħat għamilt mal-membri tal-grupp, nibbumbardjahom b’mistqosijiet, u huma bil-paċenzja kollha, jisimgħuni u jgħinuni. Fuq kollox sibt spjazju sigur fejn kont naf li mhux sa nsib persuni li jippruvaw jabbużaw mill-fiduċja tiegħi jew jippruvaw ikissruni. Ħaġa li baqgħet timpressjonani kienet is-sens ta’ libertà ġenwina li ħassejt fi ħdan Drachma. Iva, ħassejtni liberu li nfittex, nesplora u nifhem iktar mingħajr biża’ ta’ kundanni jew ta’ xi ħadd li joqgħod jittikkja biex jara kemm mil-listi tad-dommi ma kontx naqbel magħhom. Għalhekk waħdi, mingħajr ebda pressjoni, aċċettajt li l-omosesswalità kienet tassew rigal li Alla tani. Irrealiżżajt kemm kienet tixbah lil dak it-talent li l-qaddej ingħata mingħand Sidu imma li hu pprefera jaħbih flok ma jiżviluppah. Jien hekk kont għamilt b’dan id-don u ara issa, meta skoprejtu mill-ġdid, fhimt kemm stajt inkun bniedem aħjar għalija nniffsi u għall-oħrajn. Il-coming out tiegħi, għad li ma kienx faċli, kien ħafna inqas diffiċli. Imma fuq kollox, fi Drachma kont sibt familja. Illum ma niddejjaqx nistqarr li jien gay u nisrani, għax nemmen li l-Mulej iħobbni u jridli l-ġid mhux minkejja li jiena gay, imma proprju għax jien gay!  

U x’inhi allura Drachma?

Drachma hija għaqda ta’ persuni LGBTI, u anke nies oħrajn li jiltaqgħu sabiex jgħinu lil xulxin fl-integrazzjoni tas-sesswalità u l-ispiritwalità. Twaqqfet fl-2004 minn grupp ta’ żgħażagħ li bdew din il-mixja flimkien fost diversi diffikultajiet u sfidi. Kien hemm bla dubju dawk li għalihom l-omosesswalità u r-reliġjon kienu jidhru inkompatibli. Oħrajn li forsi ħasbu li Drachma hija xi dating agency għall-persuni gay, jew sempliċiment xi social club. Għad li norganiżżaw laqgħat soċjali bejnietna, l-iskop ewlieni tal-grupp jibqa’ li nakkumpanjaw lil xulxin fil-mixja tal-ħajja, fuq livell spiritwali u soċjali wkoll. Matul is-snin ġibna f’Malta numru ta’ teologi u kelliema ta’ fama internazzjonali, inklużi t-teoloġi rinomati James Alison, Margaret Farley u Jeanine Grammick, kif ukoll l-attur u drammaturgu Amerikan Peterson Toscano li ppreżenta x-xogħlijiet tiegħu f’Malta. Kienet proprju wara t-taħdita ta’ Grammick, li grupp ta’ ġenituri waqqfu l-grupp ta’ Drachma Parents Support Group. Illum bejn iż-żewġ gruppi hemm madwar 130 persuna li huma involuti fil-Kommunità ta’ Drachma. 

Drachma LGBTI hija l-fergħa tal-persuni LGBTI u jiltaqgħu numru ta’ drabi matul ix-xahar, filwaqt li l-ġenituri jiltaqgħu kull tielet Ħamis tax-xahar, fis-7.30pm fid-Dar Mount St Joseph. Għal aktar informazzjoni żur is-sit drachmalgbt.blogspot.com jew ċempel 79253875.

Chris Vella 

Drachma LGBTI  

GAY, CHRISTIAN & DOING FINE

GET TO KNOW DRACHMA

DRACHMA LGBT ACTIVITY ON THURSDAY 19TH SEPTEMBER 2013

On Thursday, 19th September Drachma LGBT organised a celebration at the University Chaplaincy, which was well attended by members and the public. Members of Drachma shared experiences and reflections on their LGBTI experience and their struggle and continual process of integration of their faith and sexuality.

This meeting also brought together the various sections within the Drachma family: Drachma LGBT, Drachma women, Drachma TS, and Drachma Parents that organised this celebration to kick-start the year of events Drachma intends to organise for its 10th anniversary in 2014. 

Below, you can read two of the reflections that were shared by these members:

Opening Reflection

Becoming more of You – becoming relational!

Today, we shall be speaking about ‘Relationship’, which is a core Christian theme and a core LGBTI issue. I want to share with you four points, taken from the Genesis, which I think are crucial for this theme:

1.      He created them as Man and Woman

Looking at it from one angle, we as LGBTI people might feel left out of this male-female binary, especially if it were only to imply heterosexual people. Today, I believe, that, at least 10% of the population is gay; that would mean at least 40,000 people in Malta.

In addition, if the male-female binary is taken as a rigid form of category, then it would leave out many people who do not feel themselves to be completely male or completely female. I used to think that transgender people and intersexed people (people that have both sexes) were few (so they were just an exception); yet only a couple of days ago I discovered that one in every 2000 people is intersexed! Before I used to think that we were a very rare species, that we were so few that we were practically irrelevant.

A third element here is that many people out there might believe that being LGBTI is an option, meaning that people choose to be their gender and choose their sexual orientation. You can ask yourselves, as I do myself: have I chosen my sexual orientation? Have you chosen yours?

So, whenever I read the Genesis and reflect on it in those three narrow senses that restrict humanity to heterosexuals, to the rigid male-female binary, and to the issue of choice, it leaves many people out from God’s creation, which I know is not the case. Yet, if in reality we are so many and we are so different, how come, the Bible and society at large still consider the Male-female and the heterosexual norm as ‘normal’ and ‘natural’? So what are we? Freaks?

And God created Humanity as Man and Woman

If I were to re-read this same text and place it in its wider context and wider biblical meaning, the focus on ‘male and female he created them’ is an emphasis on relationship. God is Himself ‘relational’. God is Trinity, three divine persons in communion, different and complimentary. And the emphasis the biblical author wanted to make is that Man is also created relational and must forge beautiful complementary relationships in a beautiful world made out of difference. The biblical text there may only refer to Man and Woman and might seem to exclude other differentness. Yet, reading the Bible more intently and profoundly, we would discover a lot of differentness, which we normally tend to ignore or put aside. Yet, the Lord is here and He blesses this differentness!

A complementarity and respect that extends to all creation

Reading the Genesis text again and again, one also notices that this ‘relational’ aspect also extends to Humanity’s relationship with the rest of the creation and especially the animals, that God created as ‘companions’ to Adam. It is true that the Genesis says that Man was to ‘master’ the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven, the cattle and every creature that crawls on earth. However, the verb ‘master’ in the Biblical language and God-logic as a whole has never been ‘lording’ over as dictators or exploiters and power mongers. It is not intended for man to master the world to fulfil his or her egotistic needs. Rather, Jesus gives a very different meaning: Jesus is Our Lord, but He does not lord over us, as if he were our owner. He is Lord by serving. Look at John 13 (12-15), when Jesus washed the feet of his apostles. To his apostles and to Peter in particular he said: ‘Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me Master and Lord, and rightly; so I am. If I, the, the Lord and Master, have washed your feet, so you too must wash each other’s feet. I have given you an example so that you may copy what I have done to you’. So the relational element also comes into this, because our relationship with others and with creation should be one of complementarity, respect as well as service that extends to all creation.

2.      And God saw that everything was good, very good

If indeed, all of creation is very good and so marked with differentness, then no one can be said to be a misfit or a freak. Looking at the whole of creation, I realise that nature is so abundant, complex, beautiful, multi-layered, multi-layered and what appears to me as an exception, is not really an exception but a reality in its own right. Diversity is all around us. Why should we kill it off and present a boring monochrome norm? Look at us here people, is there anyone of us who is identical to someone else? We are all different. God does not create clones. Indeed, the best ‘picture’ of God’s creation is the image of a mosaic: every single piece of the mosaic is different and yet, together they make such an awesome picture! Yet, society prefers to put people in categories, to expect everyone to be like everyone else. As if we were clones! We are NOT clones! We are NOT robots! We are, each one of us, unique individuals, to the point that God himself exclaims through the Prophet Isaiah: Your name is engraved on the palm of my hand! Above all, we are good! Very good! How lovely to be Your creation, Lord! How privileged! With St George Preca, I must say with great emotion: I am the work of Your hand! How blessed!

3.      

Created in His Image

Man is created in God’s image.  But what kind of image? Does God have a face? Is it one face? Does He have a beard? No not that kind of image! So how are we His image? Is it because we think? Is it because we are creative? And that makes so proud! We are so intelligent! Look at us. God created the world in millions of years and we are destroying it in less than 200! Quite a record!

Yet, I believe, this is not the proper meaning of being created in God’s image. Who is God? The answer is given to us, very beautifully, by John, in his first Letter, when he gives the most concise but most perfect definition of God: God is love. That is all. No need to go beyond. In other words, when God created Man in his image, he created in Him the capacity to love God and others. Listen to John’s advice in the same letter (Chapter 4), which still makes sense to us Christians today:

7 Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God, and he who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 He who does not love does not know God; for God is love. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  12 No man has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and he who fears is not perfected in love. 19 We love, because he first loved us. 20 If any one says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. 21 And this commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should love his brother also. (1 John (RSV) 4)

Taken from this perspective, being in His Image means that I have the capacity to love. I am called to love and love is freeing; love is joyful; love is beautiful. And love is really for all.

4.      ‘This is why man leaves his father and mother to be joined with his wife and together they become a single body’

This opens up the last point. How am I to love? Whom can I love? To whom can I give my intimacy? And to what extent? If I were to take this biblical text from a very narrow view, it would seem that the Biblical writer wanted to reduce things to merely man and wife, a limited binary that leaves out the entire LGBTI population. The issue of love is here simply reduced to the issue of the right or wrong and the normality of sexual acts. Put differently, the concept of loved is basically boxed in a very narrow moral framework that considers homosexuality as intrinsically and objectively disordered.

With such a definition, our love is written off immediately as out of place, bad, disordered and maybe evil. But, the problem with all this, is simple: we are putting more emphasis on sex than on the actual people who are having sex. As one intersexed person once commented: ‘People have genitals but genitals are not everything. People are not genitals!’  

To be fair, the Bible does present us in its entirety and beautiful completeness various and diverse intimate relationships and these were rich, diverse and profound beautiful ones. Look at the beautiful intimate relationship between David and Jonathan, or between Ruth and Naomi, or between Jesus and John the Evangelist. Intimacy and love has so many levels, which we tend to forget. There is such a richness in this intimacy that goes well beyond the usual moral and doctrinal over-emphasis on genital activity.

Here maybe Richard Woods book Another Kind of love comes handy:

‘Real sin and guilt must be discerned in terms of the fundamental attitude of the individual person toward other persons, toward himself or herself and toward God - the totality of life's values and meanings. The "essence" of sin in the personal sphere is the elevation of myself to an all-important status, so that everyone, or, more accurately, someone is reduced to the status of an object for my desire or use without regard to his or her dignity, needs, desires, or well-being. Sin is not just selfishness, but also "otherlessness". Ultimately, it is the failure to love, whether by refusal or by violation' (p. 127)

What Woods is trying to say is that love is about loving persons in their entirety, not reducing them to objects of lust or abuse, even if mutual, but to serve, to be sensitive to that person, to be one with the other, not just sexually but in all senses. To become a companion to my loved one, not just a partner as if we were doing some business deal, or a lover just as if sex were the only important part in life. The love of my life must be my companion, someone to love tenderly and to walk with humbly. Just as the Lord himself does with us.

Conclusion

I conclude by quoting a beautiful psalm, Psalm 139 that shows how the Lord loves and knows us completely:

1O LORD, thou hast searched me and known me!

2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You know my thoughts from afar.

3 You search out my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways.

4 Even before a word is on my tongue, lo, O LORD, You know it altogether.

14 Wonderful are thy works! You know me right well;

15 my frame was not hidden from thee, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.

16 Thy eyes beheld my unformed substance; in thy book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

Let us love the way God loves! Let us look at the person as a whole being. Let us respect and give ourselves entirely to the ones we live. Let us be Agape!

Chris

Concluding Reflection

Waking up every morning and expecting things to get better, felt many times like a big mistake of helplessness and futility.  For most of my life, I considered that not having a special someone in it, my better half, was my personal failure. 

A wise man once said:

It is clear that I must find my other half,

but is it a he, or a she?

What does this person look like?

Identical to me?

Or somehow complementary?

Does my other half have what I don't?

Did he get the looks?

The luck?

The love?

Were we really separated forcibly,

or did he just run off with the good stuff?

Or did l?

Will this person embarrass me?

Can two people... actually become one...again?

I set targets and age limits.  I said to myself that if I didn't find someone by 23, then I’m doomed.  Damned forever to be alone with twelve cats in a smelly flat till I die!  Three years passed by with no proper success.  So after some gruesome negotiations and the fear, now, of cats, I gave myself another 2 years and soon moved it again by 5 to when I’d be 30. Was I destined to live a life spent wondering from one quick fix to the other?  From one vice to another?  Of one-night stands?  Am I to live a life of self?  Of consuming?  Of self-gratitude?  Of just pleasure?  Is this my life?  Isn't there more to life than this?  I examined myself and blamed my loneliness on the lack of money, on my weird sense of humour or maybe I was too fat or perhaps I wasn't charming enough or amply witty.  Is it worthy to live a life like this? 

The world around fooled me to believe that a girl would magically fall, slowly from the sky amongst angels singing, amidst the sound of harps playing and birds chirping.  She’d be my soul-mate and we’d have 2.3 kids and live happily ever after.  But what happened?  Where did I take the wrong turn?  Should I have done something in particular but didn't?  Am I lost? Being gay, it felt that God’s representatives on Earth didn't accept me, so how could He even love me?  I didn't think I could expect or even deserved God’s love.  I felt shunned so I thought I got absolved, that I did not need to live a life bound by values and principles; that I somehow didn't need to adhere to being a good person.  I was a minority, so the rest of the world could go and get stuffed!  I figured that if God is not accepting me for who I am then I do not need to accept Him and His rules.  That will show Him!  I surrendered to the fact that being gay, I was destined to hell, so why bother with all the hassle of religion and correctness and love.  I often even joked about it.

I compared myself to my fellow friends and peers from University and asked why I wasn't lumbering a pushchair and a milk-bottle in a shopping plaza on a Saturday afternoon, already, like everybody else.  Society seemed to have forgotten to plan for me.  I felt like the remainder; the anomaly; left uncatered for!

What I didn't realise was that if I couldn't find happiness and completeness within, on my own, then no one and nothing could. 

If God didn't plan a family and children for me, he surely had something else prepared.  He surely must have recognised that creating a unique human from scratch would take around 9 months and lots of care and effort.  And besides that, a human is annoying and noisy and dirty for the first 15 years!  At least! He surely had a purpose for me after all that hard work?  You wouldn't even raise a finger to buy a toaster if you had no use for it!

Quickly approaching the end of my sanity and desperation, I needed to find some respite and a sense of community, so through the marvels and wizardry of the internet, I stumbled upon Drachma.  To be honest, I wasn't immediately quite sure if this was going to do the trick.  I wasn't going to start attending purċissjonijiet , saying the rosary or beating on my chest for all of humanities sins anytime soon! However, as they say the proof of the pudding is in the eating.  So I wasn't going anywhere before I had a good taste!

Pretty soon Drachma made me realise that I am not alone after all.  It made me realise that other people like myself, want more from life, apart from the obvious.  We’re definitely not the norm, but pretty much normal.  As normal as left-handed and green-eyed people … who play the banjo on summer evenings.  Surely they too are not the norm, especially here in Malta, but certainly normal.  God never gives us a load heavier than what we can put up with.  So it’s obvious that we are highly thought of, up there, to give us the load we carry so fabulously!

It dawned on me that I needed was right in front of me.  I had a caring family, sincere and real friends.  And once you realise how truly blessed and how easily everything can be taken away, you cannot but start valuing everything. I realised I am starting to form part of a community that is weaving itself.  A community made out of the most special of fabrics.  That the secret to happiness was simply to love!  To empathise and connect with one another.  To make each other’s short time on this planet, somewhat better.  To love … with no scope or agenda. 

Thanks

Claude

To all men and women of good will, An open letter by a Catholic gay man

I am a devout Catholic man, in my mid-thirties, well respected by my peers in my place of work, in my town and in the social circles I interact with. I am also very involved pastorally with young people, in diaconia and in liturgy. I take my faith very seriously. I am also an academic currently doing doctoral research in my field of study. And I am also gay.

In our lovely island(s), our society has made great strides. Social progress, liberal ideas, openness and even, political correctness; these have become almost apparently the markers of a new more tolerant society. Both mainstream political parties seem to have accepted that society has changed, whether for better or for worse. Yet, beneath this superficial apparent sense of tolerance, there are still several layers of prejudice and misunderstanding fuelled by strongly-rooted cultural ‘fears’ and impressions based on collective stereotypes. This is typical of the stereotyped impressions of gay people.

About prejudices and grotesque images

For many people, gay people are intrinsically troubled people, with deep psychological disturbances. They must be callous people, always and only interested in sex. They do not know what faithfulness is all about, for they are lustful and only interested in unnatural forms of sex. And, I forgot to say, since they are so promiscuous, they must all be HIV positive. They also tend to be paedophiles. They are so militant and so fanatic. They want rights, rights and rights. They want to destroy marriage. They want to destroy the family. They feel they are better than normal people. They think they should be the norm but they are immoral and lack values. In short, they are what local people collectively call żibel. The most common but twisted image that ‘normal’ people have of gay people is that of naked lustful gays making an orgy, or kissing vulgarly in public (and in front of innocent children) and luridly making out in public during the infamous gay parades, we have all seen on television.

You might think I’m exaggerating and yet, I am not. I’ve heard all of these comments from the mouths of a good number of church-going Maltese Christians, who needless to say, did not realise that they were sharing such thoughts with one of the evil species itself! What these God-fearing people forget is that these grotesque images of gay people are hardly more than superficial and twisted images of the vast majority of gay people. We tend to forget that the ‘naked lustful guys’ and the ‘militant and fanatic’ gay people, or the transgender ‘queers’ are also human beings that have a soul, a heart, feelings and emotions. Each of them has a story and has had to face countless challenges and difficulties. We tend to forget that if some become militant or resentful, it is because society has thrown so much hatred and  umbrage that bitterness and living differently becomes a statement of fact, a mechanism of self-defence and an act of survival. For many heterosexuals, it is difficult to understand the extent of the trauma of discovering one’s own sexual difference in the context of an oppressive cultural mentality that labels us collectively as disrespectable people who cannot be trusted just because we happen to be gay. Despite the lip service of politicians and churchmen in favour of tolerance, the common mentality still looks disparagingly, as if it were a crime to be gay, of which the gay person is seen to be entirely culpable. The lack of tolerance and genuine respect and understanding has led many to become resentful, to become militant, to bunch up in a gay-ghetto mentality, even rejecting God, the Church and all of Christianity as it has not been kind to members of our species. My life itself has been a constant struggle, as I have battled with demons, within and without, that called me evil, sick, perverted and even incapable of sincere and genuine true love.

The very struggle for survival and for the acquisition of basic human rights have made gay people tough, and in the eyes of many ‘respectable’ people too militant and fundamentalist. I would like to remind those who call such people as ‘erbat iqtates li jagħmlu ħafna storbju żejjed’, that, it is thanks to these people that the silent majority of gays manage to get their voice heard and have managed to stop the narrow-minded majority from forgetting that these people too have their own dignity. While it is true that there are some gays who act promiscuously and irresponsibly, it might be very sobering to reflect that many ‘straight’ people also act in similar fashion and sometimes even worse. Yet, we do not judge the entire heterosexual stream as callous because a few act irresponsibly. Moreover, if we are true Christians, we would remember that even Jesus Christ recognised the beautiful person behind the apparent dirty façade of adulterous women and so many other street women. He too saw God’s child in each and every one of the people that were considered as ‘rubbish’ in Jesus’ society.  It is good to keep in mind all of this to keep things in the right perspective. Indeed, the vast majority of gays, the silent majority, are equally respectable people with whom you brush shoulders at school, at work, at the church, in the gym and playground, in the każin and not surprisingly one of them may well be your very best friend. Even the ones whose difference provoke discomfort in you, they too are also beautiful human persons with human dignity. If we do not believe this, then we should not call ourselves Christian.

Unfortunately, these were the mentalities that myself and many of my ‘species’ had to cope with in our teenage years as we discovered, much to our increasing frustration that we loved persons of our same gender. Throughout my life my greatest worry was and still is that as soon as I tell the world I am gay, my entire image of respectability would collapse. I am sure in fact, that I would not be allowed to work with young people, because of God knows what I might do. And if, I were to have a boyfriend, I would not probably be allowed to be active pastorally, because of the scandal that my presence at the heart of the Church would provoke. Indeed, most probably, my presence there would be interpreted not as a sign of richness but rather as a sign of corruption and rot!

In God’s eyes

Today, I thank God because I see things very differently. I consider myself even fortunate and graced by God for creating me this way rather than in any another way. For, strangely enough I am starting to see my homosexuality as a gift from God; indeed a special grace He has given me in all His bountiful and mysterious love. It is true that God sometimes loves in mysterious ways and that His love is also accompanied by suffering and persecution. For me, in fact, this gift has been the source of countless suffering and up to very recently I could not see it as a gift but rather more as a horrible thorn stabbing through my heart. Yet, this very thought reminds me of Our Lady suffering for the death of Her Beloved Son, the Son of God. That very thought heartens me and gives me a lot of courage to move forward.

For a long time when listening intently to sermons by local preachers (and not all necessarily priests) I heard talk of man’s fallen nature, man succumbing to sin and from it, the direct or indirect deduction that homosexuality is sort of part of the result of man succumbing to evil. God ordained a natural order of things and sin distorted this natural plan and that is why such ‘objective disorders’ such as homosexuality exist. I’ve heard this kind of explanation a hundredfold times and I also believed it for a long time. Others have previously claimed that homosexuality is a reversible disease or a form of psychosis with gay sexual orientation only being something superficial. While I personally do not identify myself with all of the elements making up the ‘gay’ way of life and I have not adopted a gay ‘lifestyle’, I still feel that the gay element is an indelible and important part of my being. It is rooted in me. It is no disease and above all, there is nothing superficial in my homosexuality. It is also something beautiful from God, a gift that in the words of Mother Teresa can truly be something beautiful for God!

When I look at God’s creation, I am overwhelmed with awe at the complexity and variety and colour in his natural plan of things. In his wonderful complex prism, there are no such things as white or black but a whole spectrum of rich colours and wondrous beauty. With God there are no such things as exceptions or abnormalities. Everything is part of God’s logic. Everything makes perfect sense. We humans, with our limited intellect tend to put things into categories, into white and black, and normal and abnormal. But God’s folly is wiser than all our wisdom put together.

This reminds me of a comment by a dear and esteemed philosopher-friend of mine who once remarked on the fallacy of Rene Descartes’ statement cogito ergo sum, ‘I think therefore I am’. To my bewilderment, he told me quite simply that ‘we are’, not really because we think about ourselves. Our dignity is not rooted in the mental categories we invent about ourselves. Rather, our Being is rooted in our existence willed by God. Our being is not dependent on what we think about ourselves. Using this logic in the context of heterosexuality and homosexuality I conclude that indeed, straight or gay, we are still all of us sons and daughters of God, made differently with great variety, but really and truly, with no objective disorder in some instead of the others. In this context, I find it hard to believe that God just made heterosexuals and we homosexuals were simply a cheat, an exception or worse, an unfortunate side result of man’s fall from grace. How could I see God as immensely loving if He pre-ordained me to be defective or disordered and indeed a side-result of man’s collective fall? I find it hard to put these facts together, especially when I keep in mind that God is love. Moreover, we are not simply an exception. Although it is hard to come by with accurate statistics, it has always been safely calculated that 10-15% of the population is gay. Are we still simply an exception?

Catholic morality and homosexuality

Catholic morality and theology has been mostly written by heterosexuals or repressed homosexuals. Indeed, Catholic morality is fairer and kinder to heterosexuals than it is with homosexuals. While both heterosexuals and homosexuals are called to chastity, only the former are given the option of pursuing intimate and sexual relations with their partners in marriage in an acceptable and respectable God-ordained manner. Homosexuals are not given that option. Theirs is a forced celibacy. Either that or else eternal damnation. What an option! To couch it in more humane terms, we are encouraged to live chastity in a heroic manner, because we are told that the way we love is intrinsically un-natural and that by living chastity we can become great saints! We are reminded that every Christian has a cross to carry. Ours is a life condemned to chastity and to the prohibition of giving ourselves fully to the one we love so intensely, while our heterosexual counterparts are called to do so in a perfectly legal and sin-free sacrament of marriage. We are told that we do not have the right to do so for it is anthropologically and morally unacceptable and that it is intrinsically disordered. Yet, unfortunately, it all boils down to one thing… our love is considered illegitimate, unnatural and even sinful. It is equated with lustfulness and with unnatural love. We are told that heterosexual love is open to life; ours can never be life-giving.

Yet again, I beg to differ. With all the immense diversity in our lovely world, I find it difficult to understand how God arbitrarily decided to forget all of this variety and restrict ‘natural love’ to basically one form of love, that between a man and a woman, a male and a female. Why create so much variety to then exclude all varieties for the sake of only one form? The other contention is that love between two men or between two women is egoistic and closed to life. I ask again, for a love to be life-giving, does it need to procreate a new offspring? Is that the only form of life-giving that is acceptable? So what about a heterosexual couple that cannot have children? Cannot they still reach the fullness of love? Is their love lacking, simply because they failed to procreate? I believe that even two men or two women that love each other intensely and faithfully, can still procreate life, though not in a biological form. Their love is not necessarily more egoistic than that of a husband and wife. Their love can still be as faithful and as lasting. I know of several gay couples who have lived together for a long time and they have done so with remarkable fidelity. Isn’t this fidelity and love creating more love, open not just to each other but also beyond, in the community? If it is not so, is it a defect in their love or in the attitude of the wider community that has failed to appreciate the depth and intensity of this kind of love?

Compassion and Truth in love

It is true Catholic doctrine and morality distinguishes between the homosexual person and the homosexual act. It encourages people to show compassion to gay people. While compassion is a welcome thing, it is not really what I look for in the Church. Compassion is good but it is not enough. What I ask for, what I pray for is truth in love. But what does truth in love demand?

It demands, first and foremost a genuine and sincere re-reading of the Holy Scriptures and the traditional lore that the Bible condemns homosexual love as objectively disordered and damnable. Yet, the Bible says so many things that if taken explicitly today can be shocking and out of place. Who would today condone stoning an adulterous woman, or even condone an eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth? Yet, both are in the Bible and we know that even Jesus himself went beyond these rules and applied the universal law of love. Jesus does not say anything about gay love, although Paul does mention it in the Letter to the Romans when he condemns a whole list of vices including gluttony, adultery and homosexuality among others. Yet, have we really understood carefully what is being condemned by God? Homosexuality is mentioned in the Bible not in the sense of genuine and faithful love between two persons of the same sex, who in truth and in total sincerity are ready to love each other in the fullness of love – ready to give to each other agape love – total love and total self-giving. The Bible is not mentioning this type of gay love. Opponents and traditionalists would contend that the Bible does not mention that because gay people are intrinsically unable to give each other that kind of love. That is so untrue! The homosexuality that the Bible condemns is connected with references to incest (between a parent and a child), to pagan rituals in which sex between men was common and even considered as godly and to the trend in Greek classical culture where gay love was trendy and an entrenched way of life that reduced marital love to procreation and considered gay love as superior to marital (heterosexual) love.

Naturally, traditionalists and orthodox Catholics would emphasise that the Church’s magisterium has the responsibility of preserving the deposit of faith and indeed of ensuring that absolute truth is not hijacked by contemporary relativism. While I fully agree with the dangers of the dictatorship of relativism mentioned by Pope Benedict XVI, I am all too aware how sometimes absolute truth has been at times misinterpreted by the Church itself in its 2000 year old history. After all, did the Church not believe that the world is flat and at the centre of the universe, because it preferred to take the Bible literally? And didn’t the Church claim that anyone outside the Church was doomed to damnation? And yet on both these two accounts and on many others, the Church has realised that there is more than one way to look at things, while at the same time remaining ever faithful to the one true Absolute Truth. Indeed, I agree with the Church that there is one Absolute Truth and not a hundred small truths which one can adapt to serve his/her egotistic interests. At the same time, I consider that the truth can be seen from different angles, and whilst it remains the same truth, it can be interpreted or understood, or even perceived differently. Likewise, even the truth about homosexuality is not completely exhausted or to be found in an already final definite and infallible form in the Church’s current teachings. I believe that there are other angles that have not been yet explored. I believe and sincerely hope that the Church will someday soon realise and admit that she might not have always seen eye to eye with the Absolute Truth on this matter.

Conclusion

I conclude this rather long essay by inviting His Holiness Pope Francis and the local Church to open its arms to the many faithful Christians who also happen to be gay. We do not want just compassion. We want a genuine search for the truth, in genuine love. We want an opportunity for dialogue, for acceptance. We too are God’s children. We too are special people. We too have a vital role to play in the modern Church.

There are many of us, silent people in your ranks, who, like Jesus prefer to keep quiet and suffer the stressful condition of our being. There are others among us who are loud, resentful, critical and even militant who pointedly act differently because many in our society and in our beloved Church have chosen to look the other way, while we are persecuted and treated with disdain. While some of us may prefer to follow the example of Christ who carried his cross in silent dignity, others may feel that it is better to take up the proverbial sword and fight the injustices and persecution. It is not my place here to judge which path is the better one, though it is sobering to remember that Christ himself reacted defiantly to the High Priest’s servant who slapped Him in the face. Whatever the merit of our chosen pathways, I think it is time for the Church to look in our way and realise that we too are yearning to be part, although we cannot necessarily fit into her ‘heterosexual’ strait-jacket.

Like many other ‘straight’ people we yearn for something greater than ourselves. We do not want to destroy marriage. We do not want to destroy the family. We do not want to destroy the social fabric of society. We are also building blocks of this society and of this Church. Give us your hand. Listen to our calls. We are not against you. We are here in the core of this bubbling heart, and we want to be heard. We are not exceptions. We are also God’s loved ones. For my being gay has been His gift to myself, to my friends, to my family and indeed, to my Church. Ad maiorem Dei Gloria: For the greater glory of God!

Chris Vella