Flesh and Blood Truth

These two quotes have been rolling around in my head now for over a week:

The first from Lauro Aguirre: "Truth for the tyrants is the most terrible and cruel of all bindings, it is like and incandescent iron falling across their chests, and it is even more agonizing than hot iron for that only burns the flesh, while truth, burns it's way into the soul..." and from Robert Louis Stevenson: “Truth, even in literature, must be clothed with flesh and blood, or it cannot tell its whole story.” 

They tie into my last post and what Jendi Reiter wrote for us last May. One particular series of statements from her writing has continued to haunt my mind and grow in scope:   Some conservatives address the problem by redefining what homosexuality is. It's an immoral choice, it's a curable neurosis, it's a perversion. It has to be, because the text says so.

This is the rhetorical move that frightens me. "We know you better than you know yourself: your love is only lust, your identity is confusion, and if you can't change, it's because you're not trying hard enough." Basically, the conservative church is saying to GLBT people that they can't trust their own perceptions of reality, even concerning the contents of their own minds and the feelings in their bodies."....

 

....Other conservatives would acknowledge that same-sex orientation may be innate and unchangeable, but they argue that the Bible calls all people so afflicted to live celibately. This position at least avoids the necessity of spreading misinformation about GLBT sexuality, but it's still a variation of the same power grab discussed above.

She goes on to point out: All of us "Bloggers for Truth" have stories we can tell about our own partnerships or those of our parents, teachers, pastors and friends--all GLBT people whose lives have been touched by the Spirit. But we also have to make the Scriptural case that stories are truths, on a par with or superior to the truths of abstract reasoning, at least when it comes to practical ethics. Time and time again I hear anti-gay Christians argue that we are biased by our personal desires (either lust or pride) while they are merely following "what the Bible says". Their epistemology doesn't allow for scrutiny of the human element in interpretation, nor of their own emotional biases, because they need the Bible to remain magically exempt from the human condition of partiality and uncertainty.

Where has this been all leading? From now on the focus of this site will no longer be to expose the Anti-Gay's industry's lies and rhetoric, the pieces written here and elsewhere, as well as the findings of the most reputable medical and psychological organizations across the globe, are proof enough that they continue to use bad science, fear and outright lies to spread their vitriol.  We know they do.  We KNOW they do.  Enough of focusing on the negative. I am believing that as we move forward towards our rights, this can become a starting place, hopefully, of affirmation, encouragement and healing.  To share our truths with each other and even the world, and see how common our experiences are, to tell why you know you are who you are and how amazing it is to be just that. 

Once we have achieved the recognition of the rights that already belong to us as citizens, we will need to accept within ourselves that we do indeed deserve them.  Our greatest offense and defense against further oppression is breaking down any lingering doubts of what our hearts and minds already know, we are full citizens, who deserve full civil and human rights.

I would like to encourage any of you who wish to offer an article of your own flesh and blood truth, to email this blog at the contact link on the left. 

Your experience is the truth, it is your witness and it is our power.  From now on, all of us can come to accept that what we know is true, and no one will ever be able to take that away from us. 

“There are certain things that are fundamental to human fulfillment. The essence of these needs is captured in the phrase 'to live, to love, to learn, to leave a legacy'. The need to live is our physical need for such things as food, clothing, shelter, economical well-being, health. The need to love is our social need to relate to other people, to belong, to love and to be loved. The need to learn is our mental need to develop and to grow. And the need to leave a legacy is our spiritual need to have a sense of meaning, purpose, personal congruence, and contribution." -- Steven R. Covey