As a queer person, I'm still not sure I'm OK, by Dodie*

I’m still not sure, as a queer person, that I’m OK, by Dodie*

I wish I knew how to say that I’m still not sure, as a queer person, that I’m OK. The most vocally Christian people are also the most vocally against us. I’m afraid to look gay around Christians, and I’m afraid to look Christian in public, for fear that people will assume that I’m a bigot.

I was raised to believe that we can’t make an image of God for ourselves. How can we know what He thinks?

I was diagnosed a few years ago with OCD, but, contrary to popular opinion, we don’t all wash our hands constantly, or arrange objects in order. Some of us become obsessed with the fear of being bad people, and I’m one of that group. I hear mostly disapproval, or reluctant, consciously generous forgiveness, from sources that identify themselves as Christian. And, although I love my wife, I’m afraid to show physical affection for her because I can’t shake off the image of arriving at the gates of heaven and discovering that I’ve been following all the wrong rules.

Someone at the Iridesce workshop I’m currently attending quietly objected to the idea that we are right or acceptable, and she left early during the break. Every time that sort of thing happens, I spend the rest of the day, and sometimes half the night, wondering: we’re a pokey little church that can’t sing. Most of us are old. We can’t afford to heat the whole building. Is God really with us?

~ Dodie*

(*Not their real name. Shared with permission of Dodie.*)