Ed. note: Today, we present the third and final portion of Justin VanLeeuwen’s tale of growing up gay as a Christian fundamentalist at Bob Jones University.
Justin VanLeeuwen
I wish I could remember more precisely the details of my gradual acceptance of myself. But just as merely recognizing my orientation was a process, so was embracing it. Those two events of my sophomore year, while not catalysts, do mark a watershed in the gradual erosion of my internalized homophobia. From my senior year of high school I had struggled on in pursuit of holy heterosexuality, at first hesitantly optimistic, then grimly determined. At the same time I began to revisit my belief in Christianity.
I would like to make it painfully clear that while the only barrier between me and full acceptance of myself as a gay man was Christian fundamentalism and its accompanying social mores, my orientation was not the only complaint I had against Christianity. While the two issues were conflated for me by the fundamentalist society in which I lived, I ultimately resolved them separately on their own terms. Since this is not a forum on Christianity, I will not delve into all the details of my decision on this point. Suffice it to say that as I struggled with the question of its truth or untruth, I found I could not believe it honestly. Put a different way, I found that I simply do not have a religious impulse in me. I could not claim Christianity for myself. It had been attached to me at birth, and I had accepted its presence because it was all I had ever known, but unlike my orientation, it was not part of the core of my being. I returned it without refund. I could do nothing else.
Once free to look at my orientation without a lens of preconceived immorality, I realized I could find nothing wrong with it. What could possibly be wrong with people loving each other and conferring mutual respect? Assuming we were disembodied spirits, how could that kind of a connection somehow turn evil just by placing those spirits in certain bodies? How could morality change based only on a defined condition? I concluded that the only way to condemn my orientation would be through an unreasoned, unexplained dogma, a postulate held to be self-evidently true, and something so flimsy I could not regard it with any intellectual respect.
All my life I had been fed guilt. I thought the only way to get rid of it was through a self-perpetuating, neurotic process of repentance and forgiveness that would provide a small emotional high, a calm in the midst of the storm of otherwise unrelenting spiritual trauma. Now I know that, though I as a human being have numerous flaws, my sexual orientation is not one of them, and no one’s condemnation can shake my confidence in that reality. The endless cycle of imposed psychological self-abuse has ended.
For the first time in my life, I am truly at peace.
The last two years of college were an exercise in endurance. The requisite hypocrisy continued to strain my sensibilities, but the university’s take-no-hostages approach left me with no alternative. As graduation neared, the excitement of freedom, of honesty, of authenticity grew explosively.
Shortly after graduation I came out to my family (again), which was easily the most bizarre experience of my life. I remember reaching a point emotionally where tears and laughter combined in a single, visceral language of strain and confusion. How else could I respond to their questions of whether I would contract AIDS or kill myself or my mom’s request that I tell no one until she had died (and many gay men and women have heard far worse from their families)? To my parents, these were not possibilities but inevitabilities. For so long they had heard the same lies I had. They had been told tacitly that having a gay child was one of the catastrophes of parenting most to be dreaded. The script for their response to my announcement had all but been written for them. I do not say this to wholly acquit them of blame. As much as I want to, I cannot do that. I was deeply hurt. And people need to know that the homophobia they perpetuate thrusts loving parent and child relationships suddenly and chaotically into a crucible of pain where each becomes unrecognizable to the other and in which some relationships do not survive. But I do want to humanize them because fundamentalism left them utterly unprepared to deal with the reality of a gay son; I am fortunate because I love them and because, though they disagree with what they would call my choices, my parents still love me.
When I sat down in a coffee shop across the table from a guy on my very first date, I was in heaven. For the first time in my life I was expressing my genuine interest in someone who was also genuinely interested in me, and I could see my way to a reality that I had only thought possible in dreams. For so long I had heard that homosexuals were miserable and depressed–the evidence was clear in our inflated suicide rates. Silly me to think that LGBT youths might be driven to depression and suicide by the dehumanizing hate that confronts them every day in the form of their preachers, friends, and family. I had heard stories of gay men who, having “lived the depraved gay lifestyle,” wanted nothing more than to be free of their bondage. I feared that this would be my fate. I was actually terrified that, though attracted to men, I would not be able to tolerate intimacy with one. This concept never even enters the mind of a heterosexual male in regard to women, not because his attractions are more natural, but because society never tells him his very nature is prohibited. I was not so fortunate as my heterosexual peers to grow up in a society where I was greeted with that basic human dignity. But once allowed to test with experience these warnings and threats, I found them to be nothing but lies. I am more whole now than I ever was when denying myself.
Today I can boldly affirm that I am a gay man. I don’t necessarily go around with my own G sewn brazenly onto my shirt, but I no longer have to bury it with anguish in the deepest parts of my being. Instead I give out my card when appropriate, and I do so with confident and mayhap defiant pride. I am now free to live an authentic life.
You have to go the way your blood beats. If you don’t live the only life you have, you won’t live some other life, you won’t live any life at all.
– James Baldwin
14 comments
I just finished reading all three parts of your story, Justin. Bravo! It was beautifully written and thoroughly touching. If I’d known how many of us gays there were contemporaneously at the Academy, we could have caused quite the Fundamentalist scandal 🙂
“All my life I had been fed guilt. I thought the only way to get rid of it was through a self-perpetuating, neurotic process of repentance and forgiveness that would provide a small emotional high, a calm in the midst of the storm of otherwise unrelenting spiritual trauma.”
This is me. Was me. Is me. I recently found a journal that I kept from 2006-2009. I’ve been reading thorugh it, and noticing this hideous thread of shame and self-hatred. I confessed all of my sins in this journal, begging God to take away all of my sexual desire. Never happened. I felt so betrayed by Him and by myself. Women aren’t supposed to lust, aren’t supposed to be sexual beings, we’re just supposed to be passive about it all and it’s normal to not like it or want it, etc. Such lies. Such lies.Your bravery encourages me and inspires me.
Thank you, Justin, for a wonderfully written, heartfelt story. Your courage is amazing and your integrity is unquestioned. I work in churches and I’ve been around a little longer than you. I’ve never heard someone apologize for living an authentic life before they died.
This is me. Was me. Is me.
I recently found a journal that I kept from 2006-2009. I’ve been reading through it, and noticing this hideous thread of shame and self-hatred. I confessed all of my “sins” in this journal, begging God to take away all of my sexual desire. Never happened. I felt so betrayed by Him and by myself – women aren’t supposed to lust, aren’t supposed to be sexual beings, we’re just supposed to be passive about it all and it’s normal to not like it or want it, etc. Such lies. Such lies.
Your bravery encourages me and inspires me.
I’m a Christian and thanks to a discussion with a friend, am looking to try and understand what life is like for gays in a society that does not always accept gays. Since I have no gay friends – not that I didn’t want them but simply didn’t meet any – I have only the internet to look to.
Your reply is heart-breaking. It’s clear how deeply hurt you are. Whatever your or my or anyone else’s conclusion of homosexuality, God – the God of the Bible – loves you just as you are. That’s why He came to die for us, after all. And right or wrong, God will show you Himself – but we, as humans, are not to condemn. I say this with absolutely no understanding of being gay, or gay people, or the concept of homosexuality in general, so forgive my ignorance. But if you felt condemned, rejected, hated, it is not God but us corrupt and sinful human beings who have done that to you, who have spat on you and slapped you and kicked you with our words and thoughts and hearts just as we spat and slapped and kicked the King of Glory, Jesus Christ Himself. Don’t blame God for your pain – He is our healer – but I hope you can forgive those who have hurt you in your life. Sometimes we judge before we take the time to understand, and that is not right. For that, I am sorry.
Iris, thank you for your sincere efforts to understand.
I just saw this reply – thank you, Iris. Your sympathy and care mean a lot to me, and I’m sure to the others who have read your thoughtful and loving reply.
While I too am heterosexual, I am just now opening my eyes to the suffering of my LGTBQ siblings. And I find that in some ways, I can relate, because of the deep-seated shame I have always felt about my body and my sexuality (this shame, I think, is born mostly from wrong teaching about female sexuality and intensified by sexual assault and a lack of understanding about my own body and emotions). Mostly for now, I try to listen – and try to comment with sympathy and understanding when I can.
I think you’ve nailed it, though, about taking the time to understand. In the circles in which I grew up, it’s always, “God said it, I believe it, that settles it.” There’s no desire whatsoever to hear or see any other side, or to even consider that maybe God didn’t say that after all. It’s a lack of understanding, and worse – a lack of a desire to understand.
You rock. With you all the way.
Justin – I love your lifelong, determined pursuit for integrity, honesty, and authenticity in your life. What an inspiration to all of us. Thank you for your beautiful story.
Thank you for sharing your story Justin! All I can think of is Integrity with a capital “I”!!! Blessings to you for sharing this gift and have a great day! 🙂
Justin, you so carefully describe the challenge we have with our parents with respect and truth. You are so clear when you say that fundamentalist leaves parents unarmed to deal with a gay child. Very well articulated. But this is the best, and this quote needs to be a mantra for many:
“Now I know that, though I as a human being have numerous flaws, my sexual orientation is not one of them, and no one’s condemnation can shake my confidence in that reality. The endless cycle of imposed psychological self-abuse has ended.”
Every time sexual orientation gets lumped into a list of “sins,” we need to remember your wise words.
Fantastic job Justin!
I love you, and I always have. But today, after reading this, I love you for your courage and clarity, for your ability to tell your story without hate for the people and the system that stole so much of what it means to grow up from you.
I applaud your authenticity, your freedom and your peace.
Your sister,
Kelly
Kelly, your brother is remarkably honest and intelligent, I left BJU in l951 after two years. Sixty years later I still have nightmares about my time there. The place is about bibliolatry and the power trip of the Joneses. Stick with Justin. Your parents sound pretty doctrinally stuck, but they raised you and Justin. How wonderful is that?