“I Can’t Believe You Said That!”

I'm not sure how this meme strikes you, but it makes me deeply uncomfortable in that sense of "Oh no, you've been reading my diary. Who told you?" I first stumbled across it while scrolling through Facebook. Frankly, it should be illegal to casually post memes about my emotional experience.

In my experience, this is one of the chief tensions of being a sexual minority in the church… we want to be heard, but chances are, we are tired of explaining ourselves. We want to be understood, but we struggle to be honest when we are afraid of judgment. We want to be loved as we are… but that feels unlikely, so we'll just present as someone else and be loved that way. When our lives aren't the norm or "default setting," honest living seems to require endless explanations, questions, and confusion.

I don't know about you… but I get tired. I get tired of the weird, sometimes invasive questions. I get tired of finding words that make sense to me and maybe will make sense to the person I'm talking to. I get tired of not being believed when I somehow manage to find those words and be perfectly clear.

Conversations about sexuality can be tricky, even with people I trust. I've had more than one "casual" conversation that became heated, defensive, hurtful, and tiring. Sure, there are times I've kept my cool under some unkind words (see the title of this post), but there are also times I just shut down or lose my cool from a well-intentioned question. Many times this is a response to real harm we've experienced - from the shame and condemnation where we should have been given grace and love. Other times, though, it's just the weariness of "translation exhaustion." Dr. Twyla Baker first used the term to describe the experience of indigenous communities but made the point that it applies to other minority groups as well. 

To put it in our context, translation exhaustion is the long-term weariness of constantly explaining ourselves, our beliefs, and our difficult experiences - often to people who don't share those experiences (or, at times, to the people who caused the hardship). It can be a slow burn, and it explains why sometimes we respond with such tension at what our heterosexual friends consider a simple question - because it may be a question I've been asked over and over or that I have only been asked by those who've harmed me.

Still, we want to be known, understood, and experience connection- which requires some hard conversations. So how do we ever talk to people about our experiences? How do we answer the hard questions, engage the "coffee invites," and let our heterosexual loved ones grow with us?

I don't pretend to do this perfectly, but I've walked a lot of life with some dear straight friends, and there are some things I've learned along the way.

1: Root In Your Dignity

Ever since my Revoice talk in 2020, I've been known to say the words "insist on your dignity" whenever someone asks about building rich relationships. Unfortunately, that's what it often takes - an insistence because this world is not set up with our dignity as the default. However, for the sake of this conversation, I'm going to borrow the phrase "root in your dignity" from a dear friend, as I think it sets a more compassionate tone for good conversations.

Too often, LGBTQ+ people have bought love by sacrificing dignity. Sometimes this takes the ugliest shape of agreeing to be abused, verbally or otherwise, but more often, it looks like what I call "absorbing all the discomfort of the room." We make ourselves, our needs, and our experience small - impossible to notice, even - so that others will make room for us. This works in the short term but ultimately leaves us insecure and exhausted. We're scared to ask for anything, afraid to give an honest answer. We find ourselves resentful because it's been ages since we drew a boundary. The more religious we are, the more we excuse this as holy, pious, or humble. In reality, our Christ called us to "love our neighbor as ourselves" (Mark 12:31, NIV), a posture that assumes enough self-love to give honest love to those around us. 

Fostering understanding with our loved ones requires a posture of dignity. We "root in" our own dignity, making it the foundation of the conversation and the relationship. In doing this, we invite our community to know us as we are, as we experience the world - not as we bend ourselves to make them more comfortable.

This might take different forms at different moments. It means that I don't answer personal questions from those I don't have a personal relationship with - instead, I might honestly say, "No, sorry, I don't know you well enough to talk about that." I might answer questions from a close friend or family member, but be honest when the phrasing was unkind or uncomfortable - "Hey, I'm happy to talk about that, but the way you said that felt off. Could you explain what you meant?" Honestly, one of the main advantages of this is that when I feel respected, I can be far more open. When I feel vulnerable, I have to close myself off. Sincere connection requires dignity.

2: Forgive Often, Forgive Deeply

I recently celebrated 10 years of friendship with my best friend. Celebration is a value in our house, so we made a whole thing of it - we rented a convertible and drove it into the California desert for a few days in the sun. During this trip, a friend we saw asked, "What would someone have to do to make their friendship last 10 years?" Immediately, I said, "Be ready to forgive over and over again."

There's a sort of Facebook motivational poster mentality that focuses a lot on cutting off "toxic" people, and I've really struggled with this mentality. While I might agree with this in some cases (read: abuse), it's rarely the best default. To be honest, we can all be a little toxic sometimes. It's part of the human condition. I have some deep, meaningful relationships in my life - and all of them have been hurtful at one point or another. Some of the people in my life who most offer me support, connection, and safety have been the people I've had the hardest, most disappointing conversations with. Forgiving them has enabled longevity in those relationships and empowered healing.

To be absolutely clear, we're not talking about abusive relationships or folks who refuse to grow, learn, or offer us dignity. We're talking about friends and family that are in the process of learning how to dignify us well (often because they have experienced indignity themselves). If I had not been willing to forgive my best buddy when he asked a clearly homophobic question 4 years ago, we wouldn't be celebrating 10 years of friendship. Hard conversations will have their conflicts, and, unfortunately, the need for forgiveness is a guaranteed price of intimacy.

I find that it helps to remember that I have had to dismantle the homophobia inside my own heart. I have been uncomfortable with and unloving many parts of my heart and story. I have had to unlearn the ways in which I was used to the indignity of LGBTQ+ people. It makes sense that my heterosexual loved ones will also have to. (An aside here - forgiving deeply and often applies to yourself, too.)

I know there's a sort of terrible forgiveness mentality that implies that forgiveness is erasing the wrongdoing or "pretending it never happened," and I disagree. To forgive means an offense has been committed - if not, there would be no need to forgive! It is profoundly dignifying to myself to name wrongdoing against me - and it is deeply dignifying of myself and my loved one to forgive that wrongdoing. In forgiveness, we dream, "What if this wrongdoing doesn't define you or me?"

To forgive an unkind question might mean taking "I can't believe you just said that" and turning it into "What could our relationship look like if we could have better conversations?"

It's important to note that forgiveness doesn't just impact our relationship with the offender. Jesus said that "the mouth speaks what the heart is full of" Luke 6:45 (NIV). In seasons of my life where I struggle to forgive one person, my heart quickly grows bitter, angry, and resentful towards others. When I am still living with the impact of one hurt, other relationships become defined by that. This isn't to shame those who struggle with forgiveness (myself included, truth be told) but to name the cost of that struggle.

It makes sense to me that so many high-church traditions include confession and pardon in their liturgy… surely we need constant forgiveness of ourselves and others. We need to forgive often and deeply.

3: Understand Your Limits

I don't know what it is about our community, but many of us feel pressured to fix everything around us. Call it Velvet Rage-ish perfection drive, but I have found myself in so many conversations I should have rejected or ended. I tend to do great under pressure and collapse after, so I can't even tell you how many conversations I've had, sometimes for hours, where the other person experienced me as calm, cool, and kind… and I went home and cried on my couch.

Many of us have experienced real trauma, sometimes deeply tied to our faith. We might have various triggers; if nothing else, that translation exhaustion is a natural and authentic factor. We must find the energy for the conversations and connections that matter… but understand our limits. You might limit how much you talk about something or choose when to have the conversation so that you can have emotional resources.

Maybe some topics just hurt you more than others. That's ok - feel free to avoid them! I was recently being interviewed for a podcast and found myself getting more emotional than I expected about some religious trauma we were discussing. I paused and said, "Please, let's not include this; let's change topics." I felt embarrassed, weak, and silly - but I was then able to have a much better conversation because we pivoted the interview to areas within my capacity.

For some reason, heterosexual folks sometimes feel like they can ask us almost anything. You'd be surprised by the questions I've been asked about my (nonexistent) sex life. At times, I've let myself be pressured into uncomfortable conversations. So I find it helpful to understand what I will and will not talk about when people ask me about my faith, sexuality, and life. People in my community get some information, friends get much more, and strangers get far less. It's not that I'm dishonest - I just know what I won't share with someone who won't carry it with me.

Maybe some topics are too sensitive or are in process to share in every conversation. That's ok. Maybe there are areas of your life that you can't help someone else with - that's alright! Heck, maybe you're reading this, and you don't want people to know you're LGBTQ+ or same-sex-attracted. You can prayerfully discern your limits. 

4: Use Helpful Resources

At some point, I stopped trying to explain everything to people and just told them to buy "Single, Gay, Christian" by Greg Coles. I'm not a paid sponsor or anything - I just read that book and said, "Oh, Greg said everything I'd want someone to understand." It's not a staple item when someone starts to ask me about my life - if they're willing to read a book, I suggest that one. I've probably given away 20 copies.

Like I said, we have to know our limits, and sometimes you just don't need to explain every little thing to somebody. I will forever love my friend Henry who, when asked too much about his life, will open up a pdf testimony on his phone and just hand it to the person. We want to be discerning here because shutting down conversation is not the goal, but you are not required to explain yourself over and over. I have found that a posture of explanation can quickly become a posture of self-defense, and self-defense makes it hard to let the love in.

It may be helpful to think of one or two articles or podcasts that represent you well and ask someone to engage those when the inevitable "Wait, you're a Christian but gay but not dating-gay but still very gay but still love Jesus b-" hits. It's often helpful to encourage parents or family members to talk to parents of other LGBTQ+ folks, so they can work through their anxieties in a way that does not expose and harm you.

I want to especially name this as a goal for our pastors - friends, our pastors are our shepherds, and we should encourage them to pursue the education and resources they need to shepherd us well. At this point, there are so many great organizations and individuals offering pastors support and resources.

5: Plan Restful Connection

Our life has to be more than tension, more than fighting. The love of God is real, and God wants rich, deep connection for us. We need lived reminders of this. Intentionally planning restful connections - with or without others - is deeply important. 

There are two main ways to do this: immediately following hard conversations or planning with the individual you've been talking to.

After starting at a new church, I knew I needed to have a conversation with the pastor to understand what he believes about sexuality and whether this church would be a good fit for me. I asked him out to lunch and planned to share about myself and ask him some questions about the church. I was fresh off of some church hurt, and honestly, the thought of lunch with this pastor filled me with anxiety - but getting back into a local church was important to me. Knowing this would be a heavy emotional toll, I let some friends know what I'd be doing and scheduled ice cream with a friend for after the conversation. I was able to be more vulnerable in the conversation because I had planned some restful, safe-feeling connection with someone I know who cares for me. I allowed my body, mind, and heart a break from the stress of explaining myself and letting myself "taste and see that the Lord is good" (Psalm 34:8, NIV).

This can also be really helpful inside the relational dynamic. If a friend and I have had a few hard conversations, I might invite them to do something and specifically ask that we not talk about anything serious. The break this provides us can remind us that we love - and like - each other in many ways and that the hard work of friendship we're doing is worth it. 

Want to get coffee?

It's become a joke in our community that if a pastor asks us to get coffee, we're expecting a talk about sexuality. I've had my share of "coffee" talks - over coffee, bagels, burgers, texts, phone calls, elders' meetings. I know it's tiresome, and we start to protect ourselves from exhaustion.

You're worth the connection, though. The life God is building for you is worth some hard conversations. The friends you're making are worth the weird questions and the explanations that are sometimes needed. It's worth it to be known. And while I personally won't ever show up to a coffee shop without asking ahead of time, "What are we talking about?" I hope to keep showing up to hard conversations, to keep offering dignity and grace and forgiveness, and sometimes endure exhausting explanations, to see what beautiful things God and I build together.