It always
upsets me whenever anyone gets in touch to say they are being bullied at school
or at work, hounded at home or in the street or whatever, wherever, because
certain people know or suspect they are gay. Being treated for prostate cancer,
it doesn’t do much for my self-confidence either when certain well-meaning
people suggest I should amend my take on religion ‘in case things don’t work
out.’ Even so, as regular readers may well be weary of hearing me say, I am
content to put my trust in nature.
There is
no excuse for homophobic behaviour unless it is sheer ignorance. So I am
posting today’s entry on both my general and gay-interest blogs in the hope
that the more vulnerable gay reader may take heart and the less enlightened
heterosexual (regardless of sex, colour, creed, age or position in society)
take note.
There are
many facets to identity of which sexual identity is but one. As I have often
said, it is the whole that counts.
Regardless
of social, religious, cultural or, yes, sexual identity, we should be judged,
(by those who set themselves up to judge) for our approach to life and people;
kindness, respect, a capacity for compassion and other forces for good should
not be undermined, as they often are, by our mistakes and failures. Most if not
all of us make mistakes. Most if not all of us fail at something sometimes.
Worse, we may fail other people, however unintentionally. We might think we
have failed ourselves, and that may be true although I suspect we are often too
hard on ourselves. Life is tough, and few of us survive emotionally and/or
psychologically and/or physically unscathed by all it throws at us from time to
time. Human nature is a complex organism; a living organism, not a machine.
The
natural world, too, is a complex organism and one to which we can all relate
and are related. So I have little time for people whose
socio-cultural-religious bigotry insists that Earth Mother (God by any other
name?) would condemn anyone for their sexuality alone. Certainly, none of the
Holy Books - including the Quran - imply this is the case. Oh, ‘devout’
Christians can quote Leviticus at us, but that is Old Testament and it is the
New Testament that counts if you are a follower of Christ. Besides, relatively
few Jewish people are homophobic and Judaism has its roots in the Old
Testament. [I will never understand why so many religious-minded people are
homophobic when the Holy Books they claim to revere are not.]
Whatever a person's religion, no one will ever convince me that any God worth believing in would see a person's sexuality as any kind of a barrier to His (or Her) loving them. Religions appear to agree that God is Love. Why then should any God create any world - human or natural - where the kind of discriminatory attitudes perpetuated by certain people are encouraged by the very societies in which they live? It makes no sense, which is precisely why I subscribe to no religion and choose instead to take the sense of spirituality that inspires me from nature, free as it is of dogma.
If nature does not have a problem with same sex relationships (there is evidence of this in the natural world) why should humankind?
GOOD
HEAVENS
Godly
people have asked me
why I
‘flaunt’ my sexuality;
I say,
flaunt it I never would,
but
(surely?) openness has to be
a force
for good
Godly
people have despised me
for
‘soiling’ my identity,
asking
why I feel no shame
for
staining my natural integrity
with a
‘dirty’ name
I tell
these godly people I’d rather
tell the
truth than be a liar
to please
to them and their kind,
suggest
they look within themselves
for other
axes to grind
Godly
people have maligned me
for
defending my sexuality,
as anyone
with integrity would
when
openly accused of resisting
a force
for good
Godly
people have pitied my soul,
for
placing it in such peril
by a
penchant for mortal sin
that
would see me burn in Hell,
disowned
by Heaven
I tell
these godly people, I’d rather
be left
to die on barbed wire
than toe
this Faith's line or that
although
I remain in the line of fire
for
refusing to submit
Such
godly people, they walk away,
despairing
of anyone gay,
unable to
accept the likes of me
are proud
to hear Earth Mother say,
‘Child of
mine, go free.'
Ah, but
even godliness can deceive
(some
wear it on their sleeve)
by denying
sex, colour, sexuality,
much of a
muchness rites of passage
defining
all humanity
However
and wherever the inner eye
sees God
(or not) who can deny
spirituality
but suffers, oh, so terribly
from
leadership skills resolved to rely
on prayer
and hypocrisy?
Faith
takes many shapes and forms,
transcending
everyday norms;
a key to
open up hearts and minds,
confident
in how it performs to
carry on
asking the
right questions
Could it
be their guarded hostility,
(the
godly people who tell me
I’m a
poor ‘sinner’ for being gay)
derives
from a repressed humanity
demanding
a right of way?
Besides,
no religion is fit for purpose
that
would deny gay people a voice
.
Copyright
R. N. Taber 2011
