A Straight Christian Man and LGBTQ Equality
By: James Finn
Tags: Christianity, Religion, Equality, LGBTQ, Social Justice

An evangelical Christian and his gay friend

My former business partner Tim is a lovely man, devoted father to two small children, a faithful husband, and kind to a fault. He’s also a very conservative Christian. Despite that, he’s a loyal, accepting friend to me, a gay man. I’ve worked six-day weeks with him, 12 hours a day. I’ve hunted and fished with him and his family, spent weekends at his home.

I’ve even had my boyfriend over for barbeque and beers. (Don’t tell his pastor about the beer!)

I’ve never gone to church with Tim. I know what they preach there. What his church has to say about gay men like me is nothing good.

Friends aren’t always allies

As much as I love and respect Tim, I probably wouldn’t go so far as to call him an LGBTQ ally. He’s close! He’s taught his kids to respect lesbian and gay people, to see same-sex couples as ordinary and expected.

Through long, quiet talks with me and another LGBT friend, he’s come around from toxic views of transgender people to supporting people using public restrooms that match their gender identity.

I hesitate to call Tim an ally because he’s not all in. His kids still soak up toxic messages at church, and Tim still supports an institution that actively works against LGBTQ equality.

Systemic and institutional homophobia

Systemic homophobia, sometimes called cultural homophobia, is endemic in the United States. By systemic, I mean homophobia baked into our culture — the kind that leaks out around the seams whether we notice it or not.

(Throughout this article, I use homophobia as an umbrella term to refer to prejudice against and opposition toward all LGBTQ people. I include transphobia and biphobia in the definition to avoid multiple awkward sentences.)

When Tim’s kids go to school and hear their friends saying, “That’s so gay,” to refer to things they think are uncool, they’re experiencing systemic homophobia. When they go to Sunday School and learn that only opposite-sex couples should marry, that’s also systemic, but it’s approaching institutional.

Institutional homophobia is organized opposition to LGBTQ equality. The usual sorts of institutional homophobia in the US are religious, state-sponsored, and corporate, with the latter being fairly rare. Essentially, institutional homophobia refers to the exercise of collective power to prevent LGBTQ equality.

When Tim goes to his large evangelical church and drops money in the collection plate, he’s funding efforts to pass laws to keep LGBTQ people from enjoying civil equality.

* Sometimes sociologists refer to the combination of personal, interpersonal, systemic, and institutional homophobia as heterosexism.

Ally or not, Tim is part of our solution

All of us trans, bisexual, lesbian, gay, and queer people know what it feels like to be on the wrong end of other-ing. Many of us grew up perpetual outsiders, learning either to keep our identities deep secrets, or to keep our distance from “normal” people. So, friends like Tim are important.

When Tim taught his kids that “guys can have boyfriends too,” he made me feel warmly welcome in his home, but he did more than that. He chipped away at systemic homophobia by modeling respect and tolerance in his own family.

Yes, I wish he’d go further than that. I wish he’d take a stronger stance and choose a church that doesn’t fight against LGBTQ equality, but I can’t force decisions on him.

Tim doesn’t play the “No True Christian” game

I’ve been frank with Tim about my feelings, and he’s been frank right back with me. “Look,” he says. “My whole family goes to that church. Grampa joined 60 years ago. You and me both know my little twenty bucks in the plate twice a month isn’t paying for any lobbyists.”

He has a point, one I don’t like, but that I tacitly accept because he’s my friend. I also know he’s “walking the walk” for a lot of people. Tim’s a popular guy. When church people see him hanging out with LGBTQ folks, he’s modeling loving behavior and making a difference. So, more power to him.

What Tim doesn’t do is pretend that Christians with homophobic attitudes aren’t Christians. You’ll never hear him say things like, “People who don’t like gay folks aren’t true Christians.” He’s never answered my rants about how so many Christians are bigots with, “Not all Christians.”

Tim faces up to the problem and worries about it

Tim and I have spent so many long hours working and playing together that I can’t even remember all our long talks. Besides chewing the fat about how we’d make the world a better place if we could be voted in as global dictators for life, we’ve talked and talked about LGBTQ issues.

Tim worries about his kids. What if one of them is gay or trans? How could he live with people bullying or mistreating them? Why is his church so intent on branding people like me as immoral for reasons that don’t make objective sense? What can he do as a dad, business owner, and community leader to make the world a little kinder?

Most people learn their intolerant views in church

He recognizes that religion is a critical part of the problem. I needed the Pew Research Center to show me that homophobic people almost always learn their intolerant views in church. Tim laughed when he saw me include that data in an article. “Scientists had to study that?” he asked me. “Isn’t it obvious?”

Tim agrees with me that Christianity in the US doesn’t reflect homophobic bigotry, it causes it. I don’t mean to say that Christianity must cause homophobia, only that it often does, and only by facing up to the reality can we start to do something about it.

Denial is exhausting and counterproductive

Maybe one reason Tim and I get along is that he doesn’t try to sweep dirt under the carpet. He doesn’t exhaust me by running around in rhetorical circles.

Sometimes Christians who are LGBTQ allies exhaust me. “Not all Christians,” they’ll say when I write about LGBTQ kids getting abused in Christian schools. When a big denomination fights to exclude LGBTQ people from adoption, LGBTQ Christian allies are quick to say “Oh, well they aren’t TRUE Christians.”

As if that helps. As if it makes any difference at all.

We get it already

We LGBTQ folks already KNOW not all Christians are homophobic bigots. Hell, we love lots of Christians. We don’t need you to remind us, we need you to help us figure out what to do about all the Christians trying to hurt us.

Denying Christian status doesn’t help us

We also don’t need you to tell us who’s a Christian in your book and who isn’t. I understand you may be trying to separate yourself from groups of people you (rightfully) consider to be toxic. You don’t want to be classified with them, so you define them as something other than Christian.

But Christians fighting against LGBTQ equality don’t care if you think they’re true Christians. Neither do I. Because it doesn’t matter. They’re going to perpetuate systemic homophobia and exercise the power of institutional homophobia regardless of what you as an LGBTQ ally think about their status as Christians.

We need you to work for solutions, not play definition games

We need you to be like Tim. Even if he’s not a full ally, he’s a breath of fresh, honest air.

“Yes,” Tim agrees. “Most of the Christians in my denomination don’t understand gay and trans people. They’re afraid of things they don’t understand. We need to change that and do better. I’m going to do my best to help. Grab me another Bud Light out of the fridge?”

So, even though Tim has terrible taste in beer (he is SO straight), he’s got a good head on his shoulders and a good heart, filled with kindness and acceptance.

His challenge, and all of ours, is to work on getting other conservative Christians to understand what he understands.

Facing up to the challenge matters. Denying it will only frustrate and exhaust us.