Coming out of the Closet ... Spiritually
September 18, 2011
In celebration of one year at UUFWS, 54 weeks to be precise, I stand before you to come out of the closet: That is, I’m here to share something of my spiritual beliefs, for that is the closet in which I stand.
Let me clearly state that I reject all oppression, negativity, and suffering done in the name of any religion, but that I believe in God. I believe in reincarnation. I believe in love: overwhelming, all-powerful love. I experience that here, among you. Thank you. God, She is my copilot, but more than that She is my SOURCE of energy, thought, of knowing, of loving, of being. Let me be quick to add that my God generally lacks the human qualities many religions place on Him, like the human characteristics we endow upon our beloved pets. What an insult to the SOURCE OF ALL to assume it possesses any human characteristic. To me, this shows just how very finite our own human thinking can be.
It wasn’t always this way for me. Like many of you, I was traumatized by various oppressive, narrow-minded religions. My soul (before I knew I had one) was saved by the Nazarenes, Southern Baptists, and finally Jehovah’s Witnesses who met in our family home, countless times. When I joined the choir at the Episcopal church because I liked the fancy two-piece choir robes (and to be honest I had a crush on my Episcopalian, bass-singing best friend, Eric Knapp), the Baptist minister ran to my parents to tell them I was going to burn in hell. Hmmm ... now here I am at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship.
I became an atheist at about 16 years of age and declared with certainty that God was simply anesthesia for the masses. My first job was in a hospital at that time, and so that particular phrase got the point across rather quickly and sent all of my holy, God-fearing coworkers scrambling into heartfelt prayers for Jesus to save me. That was fun to see: a 16-year-old boy making the adults VERY nervous. Of note, my atheist period coincided with being thrown out of my parents’ home, forced to eat from dumpsters, all because I was homosexual. Both my parents and God had abandoned me.
Today, at the age of 54, I’ve put all that trauma behind me. Not very easily, I might add. We can talk about that over coffee. Today, I want to be a part of a greater, kinder, loving community, not restricted to being just gay, or just atheist, or neopagan, or Gnostic. That’s my real label. If you must give me a label, it is Gnostic — not agnostic, but Gnostic. I know that I have found within me a miniscule speck of stardust, of God ... it’s much less work if I just call it God.
God feeds my emotional, not intellectual, brain, and I need both fed. Using the G-word, as we like to call it around here, gives me common language with a far wider community, a more expansive reach. Yet it does not compromise my UU values. That common language, a simple three-letter word, is invaluable in my own small efforts to attain the highest good for the greatest number. I want to live in a world where no one is left behind, even those who have oppressed us. I believe we must find both the good and the God in each other to ensure the survival of our species.
I close with an open invitation to coffee and these words just recently fallen into my hand: May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of my heart, and the work of my hands, honor the Light within you. May the Light within me honor the Light within you.
