Viewing life through a picture frame

During the last Courage meeting, the priest laid down a picture frame on the table. He explained that the picture frame represented a box. The table represented the world. The box that he started talking about was the box many of us get caught up in. It’s the box that we start to identify ourselves by just one thing. Because this group focuses on being gay and Catholic, he spoke about how gay people sometimes end up trapped in this box, only identifying themselves as being gay. Maybe this person labels themselves as a gay painter, a gay business owner or a gay singer. Everything they do revolves around being gay. I have meet people like this and I’m sure you have as well.

Now I know this can be related to other things people relate too, rather it be the color of one’s skin, the country they are from, alcohol, drugs, or many other things. It’s getting caught up on one thing and not being able to see all the other things out there.

I’m not saying one shouldn’t identify with this characteristic. But when one only focuses on this one area of their lives, it can be a problem. It’s important to keep one eyes open to the world and to experience the entire world, not just a small box.

I once received an email from a kind gentleman and he told me that if he could take a pill to change the fact that he is attracted to guys, he would. I have been there before and responded with the following message:

I did have a really hard time coming to terms that I was gay. I too at one point in time wish there was a way to change it, if there was a pill or something I could do to change it, I would. Now I am just happy with being me. This is what I learned about this situation. For me, I looked at other gay guys and thought I wasn’t like them. I’m not a big fan of bars, but most of the gay people I came in contact with seem to be bar flies. I enjoy sports, but most of the gay guys I meet didn’t know the difference between football and basketball. I don’t like drama, but it seemed most of the gay guys I meet live for it. I looked at all these gay guys and thought to myself that I was nothing like them and really didn’t want to be. But as I have gotten older and finally accepted myself for who I am, I have found out others gay guys that are into sports, that don’t like drama and not all gay guys like to hang out at bars. Part of my problem was what I associated with being gay. What I saw was not the whole picture, I didn’t have to be like the gay guys I had meet. Don’t get me wrong, the gay guys I’m talking about were nice guys, it was just that we didn’t share many similar interested.

I also think another issue for me was that the guys I meet seemed to make being gay a big part of their lives. I personally don’t think it has to be. For me, it’s just 1 part of me. Another part is I am left handed. I have blue eyes. I have brown hair. These are all just parts of who I am. I didn’t chose to be a blue eye, brown hair, left handed gay man. It’s just who God made me. Now if I really wanted too, I could get contacts to hide the true color of my eyes. I could color my hair. I could even learn to write with my right hand. Some people even say I could change my sexual preference. My point is I am the way God made me, and being gay is just 1 part of who I am as a person. It doesn’t have to be the main part of who I am as it seems so many people have made it to be. I would whether have others know me for being kind, caring, helpful then for being gay. So for me, I focus on those things and if others find out about my sexuality, then it fine, but I don’t want my sexuality to define who I am.

I know it may sound a little weird based on what the domain name I blog at. I picked that domain name for the keywords and the fact that I wanted others to know that one can live their life being both gay and Catholic. One of my hopes with this site was that it would help others know that there is at least 1 other person out that accepts that he is gay and that he is still part of the Catholic Church.

One other thing that the priest pointed out that I thought was very interesting was he said he believes that there have been many gay saints. He pointed out the reason we don’t know they were gay is because that wasn’t the focus of their lives. They were focused on doing good and doing God’s work. When I am gone and if people remember me, I would rather have them remember me for the good I have done than for being gay, left handed, brown haired, white or any other characteristic one can place on me.