CHAPTER 1
BECOMING A BETTERTRAIL GUIDE
PICTURE IN YOUR MIND TEENAGERS HIKING OR CLIMBINGin a really difficult-to-navigate area. There are no obvious trailmarkers for them to spot. They are having a difficult time gettingsure footing. They need help. That's where you come in. Yourrole is critical as a trail guide, and there are several things I wantto bring to your attention to help you become a better guide fortoday's youth.
Teenagers who experience same-sex attraction or who aresorting out sexual-identity questions are navigating difficult terrain.You will be a better trail guide when you understand whatthey are dealing with and better grasp the unique developmentalissues they are facing. You will bring more to your ministrywhen you learn how to establish an atmosphere of grace. Youwill be more effective when you learn to listen empathically.
The place to begin is with compassion.
Several years ago my wife and I attended a meet-and-greetluncheon for adoptive parents in one of the suburbs of Chicago.While I was parking the car, my wife went in to find us a spot atone of the tables. She sat down with a group of women and didn'tgive that fact much thought. When I joined her and the otherguests, we realized that I was the only guy at the table. Thenit dawned on us that the women at our table were all same-sexcouples, and we were the only heterosexual couple at the table. Itwas a little awkward at first; we felt we had crashed the party, or atleast I had. However, as prospective adoptive parents, we sat withthe women at our table and the many other couples in the roomwho shared a similar interest in learning more about the process.
After the luncheon was over, we went out to our car onlyto find that it wouldn't start. The engine wouldn't turn over. Ibegan to suspect it was the car battery, so after assessing both thesituation and reflecting on my overall competence with automotiverepair, I proceeded to give the universal sign for "help" byleaving the hood of the car up.
The next several minutes were interesting. I looked under thehood occasionally—just because it was something I could do toretain the impression that I knew something about cars. I movedsome things around. A steady stream of luncheon attendeeswalked by on their way to their cars. For several minutes nobodystopped. Then a guy walked by with his wife, and I asked himfor a hand giving the battery a jump. He glanced away from meand mumbled, "Oh, sorry, I have to get to a meeting at church."Great—now what?
Then, unexpectedly, one of the lesbian couples from ourtable walked up to us. One of the women offered to take a lookat the car. She quickly confirmed that the problem was the battery."I agree; I think you just need a jump," she said. "Let me getour car; we'll pull up right here and take care of it."
I couldn't help but think of the story Jesus told of the GoodSamaritan. It is recorded in Luke 10:25-37 (The Message):
25 Just then a religion scholar stood up with a question to testJesus. "Teacher, what do I need to do to get eternal life?"
26 He answered, "What's written in God's Law? How do youinterpret it?"
27 He said, "That you love the Lord your God with all yourpassion and prayer and muscle and intelligence—and that youlove your neighbor as well as you do yourself."
28 "Good answer!" said Jesus. "Do it and you'll live."
29 Looking for a loophole, he asked, "And just how would youdefine `neighbor'?"
30-32 Jesus answered by telling a story. "There was once aman traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. On the way he wasattacked by robbers. They took his clothes, beat him up, andwent off leaving him half-dead. Luckily, a priest was on hisway down the same road, but when he saw him he angledacross to the other side. Then a Levite religious man showedup; he also avoided the injured man.
33-35 "A Samaritan traveling the road came on him. When hesaw the man's condition, his heart went out to him. He gavehim first aid, disinfecting and bandaging his wounds. Then helifted him onto his donkey, led him to an inn, and made himcomfortable. In the morning he took out two silver coins andgave them to the innkeeper, saying, 'Take good care of him. If itcosts any more, put it on my bill—I'll pay you on my way back.'
36 "What do you think? Which of the three became a neighborto the man attacked by robbers?"
37 "The one who treated him kindly," the religion scholarresponded.
Jesus said, "Go and do the same."
Jesus knew the heart of the religious scholar. This was a guywho was trying to justify himself. Jesus pushed him in an areathat would be really difficult for an observant Jew of that day. Hemade the neighbor in the story a Samaritan. It is important tounderstand that observant Jews did not associate with Samaritans.Indeed, the Samaritans were considered unclean. Who was hisneighbor? Who showed compassion? The Samaritan.
We all have people in our lives like the Samaritan was to thereligious scholar. My pastor recently put it this way: God putsin our lives people each of us has a hard time picturing God loving.We have a hard time seeing them in all of their complexitybecause of positions the church holds. For many in the churchtoday, gay, lesbian, and bisexual people are the "other"—thosewho are difficult to see with compassion.
What does this mean? In my work in this area for more than15 years, I have adopted as a professional brand the idea of "convictedcivility." This is a phrase that comes from Richard Mouwvia Martin Marty. The idea originally was this: We have toomany Christians out there who are strong on convictions butembarrass the name of Christ in how they relate to the worldaround them. At the same time, we have too many Christianswho are remarkably civil, but you would have no idea what convictionsthey hold. We need both convictions and civility.
I think about this when I hear the word compassion. It remindsme of the civility part of convicted civility. But compassion is morethan that. It refers to empathizing with the suffering of others.
Compassion is more than just being respectful with otherswith whom you disagree. But it's not any less than that.
Compassion is more than just refraining from saying, "That'sso gay!" and "Stop acting gay!" but it's not any less than that.
Compassion is more than not passing along the latest gayjoke, but it's not any less than that.
In The Way of the Heart, Henri Nouwen offers the followingreflection on compassion:
Let us not underestimate how hard it is to be compassionate.Compassion is hard because it requires the inner dispositionto go with others to the place where they are weak, vulnerable,lonely, and broken. But this is not our spontaneous responseto suffering. What we desire most is to do away with sufferingby fleeing from it or finding a quick cure for it. As busy,active, relevant ministers, we want to earn our bread by makinga real contribution. This means first and foremost doingsomething to show that our presence makes a difference. Andso we ignore our greatest gift, which is our ability to enter intosolidarity with those who suffer.
Practically speaking, compassion involves truly seeing and listeningto another person. It says, "Tell me more about what'shappening in your life ..." It involves trying to see her circumstancesthrough her eyes (empathy). Compassion seeks tounderstand. It unpacks a person's story and allows a person's backgroundand experiences to "thicken the plot" in that person's life.
Compassion also leads by example. It invites another to betransparent by being appropriately transparent first; in otherwords, it models transparency rather than demanding it fromanother and then being witness to that person's vulnerabilities.
Compassion is difficult for some people to muster, particularlyin this area. Why is that? There are a number of reasons,but one of the most obvious is the culture war. By this I meanthe ways in which people are reduced to political causes. If youstart with the assumption that everyone in the gay communityis an activist who wants to change the fundamental meaning ofmarriage, for example, then you are less likely to see the range ofexperiences among people who experience same-sex attraction,and your ministry will reflect that.
In the opening story of this chapter, I shared my experiencemeeting a lesbian couple who demonstrated compassion to mewhen our car would not start. Before anyone runs with the analogybetween ethnicity and sexual identity, I am not saying thatjust as Jews of that day thought of Samaritans, Christians todaythink of gay persons. However, we have a cultural context todayin which we have local communities of faith in which the climateis such that young people who are navigating this terraincannot find any compassion. In fact, we may inadvertently pushpeople toward the mainstream gay community precisely becausewe share the same tendency to reduce complexity to culture war.We appear to prefer politics to pastoral care.
KEY TERMS
Let's begin our journey into the world of sexual identity by clarifyingsome key terms. It's generally not all that helpful to refer to"the gay community" when you speak because there is actuallygreat diversity within the gay community. So in this book I tendto use the phrase "mainstream gay community" to indicate whatthe majority of the members of the gay community tend to prefer.This reminds us that there are those within the gay communitywho disagree with one another. Take the topic of gay marriage, forinstance. Not everyone in the gay community wants it, not everyonesupports it, but I would say that the mainstream gay communityis supportive of gay marriage. They support it, in largepart, because of what it symbolizes (equality, dignity). In any case,by saying the "mainstream gay community" I am reminded thatthere are those who are part of the gay community who disagreewith the mainstream of the gay community.
I frequently refer to "people who experience same-sex attractions,"but I find that the phrase "people who experience same-sexattractions" is a little wordy and is cumbersome when used frequently.So I need language that will fit in a carry-on. I don'tneed long phrases when everyone knows what is being said—thatneeds to be checked luggage. So I'll often use the phrase"sexual minorities" as shorthand. In doing this, I know thatthere are readers who will not be receptive to that phrase.
The main concern I hear from those who are concerned withthe phrase "sexual minority" is a fear that it plays into the politicalinterests of the gay community—a community that wants toadvance a particular vision of homosexuality as something akinto the civil rights movement. The rights debate has relevance tothe legal issues surrounding gay marriage and gay adoption. Iunderstand that referring to sexual minorities might carry someconnotation that I support these legal arguments, but I assureyou that my primary concern is clinical and pastoral. I am concernedwith helping the Christian community find better andmore helpful ways to respond to young people who are sortingout sexual-identity questions in light of their same-sex sexuality.When we depict the gay community solely in terms of specificpolitical agendas, we tend to overstate what is intended.
My use of the phrase "sexual minorities" is really aboutnumbers—the idea that it is not that common to experiencesame-sex attraction. To say it simply: There is a group of folkswho experience their sexual identity differently than those in themajority, those who identify as heterosexual. Those whose sexualidentity is same-sex are numerically in the minority, and so thephrase "sexual minority" can remind all of us of this fact.
Again, I realize that much of this language has been used toadvance particular political agendas. So you may have to do acognitive exercise occasionally to remind yourself that I am nottalking about that here. I am not equating sexual minorities withracial minorities, nor am I suggesting that this is a civil rightsconcern. That is a different subject entirely, one that I am notaddressing in this book. My concern here is with youth ministry:helping those who work with youth to be compassionate andspeak relevantly to young people of this generation.
If you are involved in youth ministry today you will likely facesimilar questions about the language you use. What words shouldyou use to talk about these issues? Should you reference homosexuality?Do you use the terms gay and lesbian? Do you talk about"sexual identity"? Or use the phrase "sexual minorities"?
I'll leave these questions for you to decide, but throughoutthis book I will try to define my terms so that the language I usehelps you think about the issue with greater insight and understanding.My hope is that your work on your own ministry willreflect the complexity inherent in this topic—so that you canbetter minister to all of your youth, including those who aresexual minorities.
Again, let me define what I am saying: Sexual minorities arethe students in your youth ministry who experience either theirsexual identity or their gender identity in ways that are differentthan those in the majority. Sexual identity refers to the act of"labeling" oneself based on one's sexual attractions or orientation.Common sexual-identity labels include gay, straight, lesbian,and bisexual. You may hear some kids refer to themselves asquestioning, curious, or queer. Still others prefer not to adopt anylabel whatsoever. The difference between attractions and orientationis just a difference in the strength of those attractions andhow persistent they are for a person. In other words, if a personhas strong attractions to the same sex, and if those attractionspersist and seem stable over time, they will likely think of themselvesas having an orientation toward the same sex.
Gender identity is something different than sexual identity.Gender identity refers to the act of identifying oneself as maleor female. People who experience their gender identity differentlythan the majority often report feeling distress or unease inresponse to their apparent gender as male or female. They mayfeel that they are really of the opposite sex, if not physically, thenat least emotionally and psychologically. They, too, are sexualminorities. They experience their gender identity in ways thatare different than those in the majority.
This book is primarily focused on sexual identity. So whenI reference sexual minorities in this context, I am referringprimarily to people who experience same-sex attraction. Theyare sorting out how to think about their sexual attractions andwhether to adopt an identity that labels their attractions. Forinstance, they may decide, based on their feelings or attractions,to say "I am Gay" as a designation.
This leads me to one final clarification. I will capitalize theterm "Gay" whenever I am referring to a sexual identity and morespecifically, the Gay-identity script. I use the term "Gay" as anumbrella term for gay, lesbian, and bisexual identities. This willguard against conflating the noun and the adjective. In otherwords, we need to distinguish between the noun (Gay) that refersto a sexual identity and the adjective (gay) that refers to an orientation.I have not made this distinction in my previous writing;however, there are benefits to acknowledging that in our culturetoday "gay" is used by nearly everyone (and certainly most of theyouth in your youth group) to refer to a homosexual orientation.To use it to refer to identity only will be confusing to them.
Another benefit to distinguishing between Gay as a sexualidentity and "gay" as a sexual orientation is that it avoids stigmatizingthe word "gay." Why does this matter? Because someChristians are finding it helpful to use gay as an adjective, as away of describing and naming their experiences. While I knowthis is controversial, it has been an important way for them toname their reality in a way that saying "I am same-sex attracted"simply does not accomplish.
Here is an illustration that may be helpful in understandingthe need for this distinction:
In the world of hearing loss, you have those who are Deaf andthose who are deaf. These two groups are well-distinguishedand identified. Anyone who uses capital "D" Deaf knows sheis referring to something more than small "d" deaf. Peoplewho are Deaf comprise a culture; they do not see themselvesas having a disability. Instead they see themselves as a peoplegroup with their own language and culture. On the other handthose who are deaf do not see their hearing loss as an identity;instead, they see it as a disability or medical condition. Thisgroup is more likely to be "oral." That is, they often undergointensive training to lip-read and use their voice to communicateinstead of using sign language. Some might also seeka cochlear implant. When they say "I am deaf" they are notsaying "I am Deaf." At times there is contention between thegroups because of a conflict in how each group understands itsexperience of hearing loss. For example those who are Deaf seecochlear implants as threatening and an extreme offense. Theydon't believe anything needs to be "fixed." They celebrate theiridentity as Deaf.
