A Letter for You, or, Happy October 11th

Dear friends and family,

This message has been a long time coming.

The truth is, I haven't been very honest with some of you. While I've tried to be more upfront about everything in recent months, there are still a lot of things that I've kinda kept hidden from many people. I suppose most people have some kind of skeleton in their closet; but it will stay there and haunt you until someone opens the door and turns on the light and shows it for what it really is. So, keeping that in mind, I think it's time I turned on the light for good.

The first time, I probably wasn't entirely honest. Let me re-introduce myself.

My name is Jacob Swanson. I'm a 24-year-old male, born, raised, and currently living in West Michigan, the oldest of four children of two pretty incredible parents. I love singing classical music and show tunes, backpacking in the woods, drinking good coffee, playing whatever instrument I can get my hands on, and reading really good literature. I have a degree in English and a teaching license. I have strange fascinations with old buildings, interesting phonology, record covers, and all things Scandinavian. Most importantly, I'm a Christian who, while always struggling to believe truly and live rightly, has learned to love and trust in Jesus.

I also happen to be attracted to men.

It's been like this for as long as I can remember. I never thought of girls as more than friends when I was very young, of course, and as puberty hit, I started to notice other guys instead of girls. I wrote it off as a phase at first, but as the years passed I realized that it wasn't going away. I was just as attracted to guys my senior year of high school as I was in eighth grade. Maybe more so. I had dated girls in high school, but I was never physically attracted to them, if I'm being honest.

It's certainly not something I chose. I grew up as a Christian—I still am one—in a conservative home and a conservative church where it was made clear that marriage is between one man and one woman and that sex is always and only to be enjoyed in marriage. I don't need to tell you how confused I was when I realized I was physically and emotionally attracted to guys. I didn't think it was possible, to be honest, and I tearfully prayed over and over again that God would somehow take it away and make it stop. It haunted me. How could a Christian be attracted to someone of the same gender? It didn't make sense to me, honestly, but there it was. I was a walking contradiction, afraid and ashamed. Did I do something wrong? Did my parents? How did this happen?

To be honest, I really don't know what caused it. My best guess is that it was something I was born with. I can't point to any of the “usual suspects” in popular evangelical thought—a distant father, an overbearing mother, abuse as a child—because none of them seem to fit. It seems like it's just a part of who I am. Nobody can seem to prove that it's inherent, but nobody can seem to prove anything else, either... but I guess that's a discussion for another time.

Whatever the reason, as I got older, I realized a few things were true. Physically and sexually, I was attracted exclusively to men. When I saw a couple on the street, my eye gravitated toward the guy, and I could always pick out a good-looking guy in a crowd before I even thought about a girl. I had girlfriends in the past, and I had been emotionally attracted to them, but as time went on even those attractions seemed to be replaced by those for guys. By the time I was in college, I rarely, if ever, had real crushes on girls, while I seemed to fall in love with a new guy every week. Silently, of course. I didn't tell a soul.

It turns out there's a word for that, when a guy is consistently attracted to other guys and not to girls, whether or not he does anything about it. The attraction is enough. That word is gay.

I am very many things. I am a Christian. I am a musician. I am a brother, an introvert, and a language nerd. I am gay.

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Now, I want to be as clear as possible. It's important, I've learned, to define the terms you use, and lots of arguments happen simply because people think they're talking about the same thing but aren't, really. When I say I'm gay, it simply means that I'm attracted, pretty much exclusively, to other guys. It means that attraction to women is minimal at best.

It does not mean that I've acted on that attraction. “Acknowledging my same-sex attraction, owning the fact that I'm gay,” says Wesley Hill, who writes about his experience in a book called Washed and Waiting, “leaves open the question of how I'm going to steward my sexuality.” Orientation is different from behavior, as I've learned since first grappling with this in high school. Just because I am attracted a certain way doesn't mean that I must act a certain way.

This was a distinction that took me a long time to understand. I finally started to get it after a year or two of college, but the word gay still frightened me. I felt that if I started using it I'd turn into some strange, effeminate, wildly promiscuous version of myself. (And right now, I have to apologize to everyone in the LGBTQ community for ever thinking this way. It's a testament to deeply-ingrained harmful stereotypes that I, being gay myself, would ever think this way.) I didn't understand the distinction between description and prescription. I didn't yet get that just because I fit some description—a man who is attracted to men—it didn't follow that I had to act a certain way.

And so, about six months ago, I slowly started to describe myself as gay.

The thing is, even though I've been compelled to come face to face with this fact about myself, I still hold to the things I always have. There's a lot of controversy around this subject right now, of course, but I'm still pretty convinced that the traditional view of sexual ethics is what scripture and tradition most clearly point to, and that excludes any kind of sexual intimacy outside the marriage of one man and one woman.

So, where does that leave me?

It seems that someone in my situation, who upholds the traditional interpretation of the Bible and yet finds oneself attracted to the same sex, has four options.

The first is to chuck the Bible and live as any normal, non-religious gay man would. This doesn't seem like an option for me at this point.

The second is to pursue some kind of therapeutic system aimed at erasing homosexual desires and replacing them with heterosexual ones. This doesn't seem plausible or really very desirable, though, as reparative therapy seems now to be regarded as ineffective at best and harmful at worst. Most people experience little change, if any. While I'm open to God changing my orientation, I'm not planning on actively pursuing it. I'm convinced that God calls us to holiness, not to heterosexuality.

The third option is to pursue marriage with a woman, my orientation notwithstanding. This is a possibility—but is it fair to the woman, and will marriage fulfill the role it's meant to if there isn't complete mutual desire? These are questions I'm still working through, and unless God makes it abundantly clear that this is his plan for me, I'm not going to assume it is.

In the meantime, the fourth option seems to be the best, and that is celibacy. Potentially life-long celibacy. And that's a bit daunting, I'm not going to lie. Doable, but scary.

But, celibate or not, the fact remains that I'm attracted to men.

I know some of you (assuming that anyone actually reads this) might not like the use of the word gay. It took me a long time myself; I never used it at all before this spring, but it seems like the most appropriate, accessible word at this point. Those in the LGBT community generally refer to someone as gay when that person experiences attraction primarily to the same gender. That seems true for me.

Gratefully, as I've walked this journey filled with tension these last 10 years, I've picked up some pretty marvelous companions and helpers. Many of them have been straight friends that have cried with me, laughed with me, picked me up when I had nothing left, and pointed me over and over again toward Christ. Some of them have been gay Christians themselves, often, but not always, committed to celibacy as well. Even if I am to be celibate for my entire life, I know that I can have real, deep relationships in the friends that God has put and will put in my life.

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I may tell more of my story soon. For now, suffice it to say that I realized my attractions in middle school, but it wasn't until late in high school that I told a soul, and it wasn't until after a year in college that I told hardly anybody else. At this point I've told many more people—immediate family, quite a few friends, most anyone that asks for my story.

So why come out like this in public? Why put this on the internet for all to see?

There are many reasons, not all of which I'll put out here right now. One simple reason is that I want to be honest. I don't want to hide behind walls of deception, and I don't see a need to. If I can safely be open about what I experience, I want to be. Meaningful, dynamic relationships are important to me, and the vulnerability that comes with this has the potential to be a great asset.

Another reason is that, having struggled silently for so many years, I know the shame and the fear that people experience, especially conservative Christians who struggle with same-sex attractions. If I can be a voice that offers support and understanding, I want to be. While gay Christian blogs, books, articles, and the like are starting to pop up, the conversation in many ways is still in its infancy, and all sorts can benefit from hearing a different perspective. Young gay Christians need to know that there are other paths out there and people who want to wrestle through it with them. Older straight Christians need to know that it's more complicated than perhaps they first thought.

But I think there's a bigger reason yet. I would never have chosen this path, but I have learned so much about myself, about God and about his gospel through this struggle to understand who I am, what I am prone to, and how to deal with it. Honestly, it's lead me to look at everything differently—and from that new perspective, I and other gay Christians have begun to see where things have started to go wrong for the Church. Don't get me wrong: I love the Church! But it's also true that we've gotten our priorities a little skewed.

Marriage, for one. When you tell someone that you're intending on being celibate, even though you'd have loved to have a family if things were different, you tend to get a lot of sympathy. “Oh, man, I can't even imagine having to go without,” or “Don't you feel you'll be missing out on life?” And honestly, sometimes I do—but I think that's symptomatic of an emphasis on marriage that never should have been there in the first place. Yes, marriage is wonderful and a gift for those that experience it, but it's not the best or most important part of being human. Paul was celibate. So was, uh, Jesus. I figure if Jesus didn't see marriage as completely necessary, that's probably a safe bet for me, too, even if I have a harder time doing it. The truth is, the Church doesn't do a great job of supporting singles; but that's another blog post, I suppose.

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I don't want to shove anything down anyone's throat. I won't be bringing up this post in every conversation simply to be a loud-mouthed advocate, though honestly, I think there's a place for loud-mouthed advocates. I just want to be open. I want to be honest. I want to let this conversation happen, not hold it back from fear or timidity.

I remember the first time I told someone. It was to one of my best friends in high school on the way back from a Christmas shopping trip. I knew I needed to tell someone and this friend seemed like a good candidate, so slowly, hesitatingly, I tried to push the words out of my mouth. “I... I think I... I'm... uh... attracted to guys,” I stammered. My friend didn't respond. 20 minutes home, and not a word. I was sure at that point that I would take this to my grave.

I've come a long way from there. In college I was confused when, after telling a friend and small group member, he simply said, “Oh. OK.” Since then, I've realized that that response is a whole lot more common than the first.

This doesn't need to be something that's cloaked in shame. I am sure now that I am in no way “less than” because of my attractions. It took me an awful long time to get there, though.

I wrote this primarily with the many conservative Christians I know and love in mind, but I hope it reaches further than that. First, though, to that crowd: please take what I say with as much understanding as you can muster. Roll it around in your mind for a while. Understand that this isn't an 'us vs. them' kind of issue, but that this affects people that are close to you. As one of you myself, I know that this is a hard issue. It's complicated. One of the hardest things for the LGBT community to take has been the way the Church has oversimplified and overgeneralized the issue—and the people that deal with it firsthand, who are so much more than just an issue. We've been waging a culture war without really understanding the terms. I hope you see the harm that can come from that, not just to our witness or even the pain that might be inflicted on the “other side,” but the pain and confusion and shame that has been inflicted on your Christian friends, neighbors, brothers, sisters, children. Please take a moment at least to acknowledge how complex and difficult and nuanced this all is.

To those non-Christians or gay-affirming Christians who furrow your brows and object to my conclusions: I know it's weird. I've had plenty of people tell me it doesn't make sense, and in some ways, you're right. But still, this is how I feel called, and I only stand or fall to my own Master. I don't think I'm somehow missing the most important part of life. God is my provider, and I am confident he will give me everything I need, and I really am sure that I'll be alright.

And, maybe most importantly, to those of you who are trying to figure out who you are, what the heck is going on with your sexuality and how you fit into all this, know you're not alone. Maybe you're just now asking these questions. Maybe you've been asking them for years and never voiced them. Maybe, like me, you've already found some kind of freedom or understanding about your sexuality and are seeking more answers. Whatever the case, God loves you as you are, and he is not waiting for you to be perfect to extend grace! He loves you madly, and there are many out here—myself included—that desire only to love you as he loves you. You need not be ashamed, and you need not be alone.

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Coming out is often seen as an end of struggle and secrecy, but I know that for me it is the beginning of a lot of confusion and tension and growth. My hope is that this will spark conversation. I pray that in this we will learn better how to love one another and how to be Christ to the world. I know it's not all going to be easy and comfortable now, but I'm OK with that. I think it will be worth it.