Enlightening The Eyes of my Gay Heart

Growing up, I often tell young LGBTQ folks now, I didn’t know I was “gay.” The reason I say that is because we didn’t have that in those days. Or rather, I thought gay was what the yuletide was what with decked halls and all that. I didn’t know I could be a man who loved a man for life (or even for awhile). All I saw in the world was or appeared to be heterosexual. So I didn’t know there were any options.

Then again, I knew very well to whom I was attracted emotionally and sexually. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do about that so mostly I did nothing. I have now dim memories of times that I came across LGBTQ people and only much later (usually decades later) realized that was what that had been.

Like so many things in life, as I grew into adulthood and went out into the world I began to see things that were new and different for me, and very quickly I began to catch on that there was a whole big chunk of reality I knew nothing about and hadn’t really let myself encounter. So a first step for me was just letting my eyes see things in a different way.

My seeking came from an inner yearning and eventually I began to get past just observing and head for real learning. Somehow or other I came across a news stand someplace (probably in a book store, remember book stores? We used to have stores full of books of all kinds …. And often a huge magazine rack and lots of newspapers too.) and there one day was a newspaper called The Advocate. And boy did I devour every word of that once I got it home.

Now my eyes were really open and I began to see love all around me, especially of the LGBTQ variety. I wanted in and while I worked on that I opened my heart as well as my eyes. And then let’s just say one day I was delivered by an angel and never looked back.

But then a whole new world opened up for me. I remember very nervously being escorted to my first ever gay bar by a group of my new friends. It was equal parts terrifying and exciting. But it also was incredibly liberating. And I kept thinking “you mean this was here all along and I didn’t know about it?” It was both like being shifted into a new dimension, which it was, and like being delivered from exile, which it also was.

And, to cut to the chase, I met my husband and he dragged me to church. And boy was that ever a revelation. There in that bastion of holiness, surrounded by beauty and glory and joy and salvation, there were integrated people of all sexualities, of all races, of all genders, of all ages, of all social stations. I could go on and on. Again I thought “you mean this was here all along?” And, of course, it was. And it is.

Because Christ is king. Christ is king of the dimension of love, where there are no divisions, where revelation is yours if only you will open your eyes, where learning to walk in love is the surest path to eternal citizenship.

The prophet Ezekiel [34:11-16, 20-24] gives the word of God concerning God’s lost sheep, who God promises to rescue, to gather, to feed … to “make them lie down” in rest and relief. And a shepherd will be set over them. And I think of Christ, my king, who brought me back from exile and into a new dimension of being one with God’s creation of me and with and through whom I have been able to live a long life of love.

Like the Psalmist [Psalm 100] I learned to dance and sing and rejoice, not just at church but at that gay bar too. I learned to be joyful with all my heart, to give thanks and to be present with song.

Like Paul writing to the Ephesians [1:15-23] I learned the meaning of having “the eyes of [my] heart enlightened” to know the hope to which I had been called.

And then I understood [Matthew 25:31-46] that the Son of Man has come in glory and his angels are all around us and we have been gathered into the dimension of his love because we have learned to walk in the love given to us in creation by God in whose image we all are created.

And Christ is our LGBTQ king.

Amen.

Last Sunday after Pentecost, Christ the King, Proper 29 Year A RCL (Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24; Psalm 100 Jubilate Deo; Ephesians 1:15-23; Matthew 25:31-46)

©2023 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

Trans Glory

Often I wonder how it is we will know when we have entered the dimension of love, when we have gained God’s kingdom. How will we know we have arrived in a dimension of justice and righteousness governed by the love that powers all of creation?

Jesus famously and often reminded his listeners that although they were good at deciphering the signs of the changing seasons through reading fig trees or stars or winds and so forth, they were no good at all at looking for the signs of righteousness and justice that point to the pathway into the dimension of love.

This week I think I saw a sign, a beautiful sign, a surprising sign. My husband and I are addicted to Jeopardy. Like many people, we watch it partially out of habit and partially out of curiosity. But like many people of our generation we also use it as a tool to check daily our sharpness. I often also learn trivia watching—like the time I learned that “vulpine” means “relating to foxes” and then I understood how a colleague had chosen the name for her new firm. But this week was different.

This week a high-rolling winning champion was unseated by a surprisingly fierce demur woman. Amy Schneider is her name and it turns out she is a trans woman. As we arrived at the weekend she had won three championships with a brilliant mind and a dazzling smile. That smile, by the way, is our sign, that Amy is showing us the pathway into the dimension of love where justice reigns and all of God’s created children, including especially we who are LGBTQ are thriving. God’s love does, indeed, restore all things.

Not only are Amy’s wins phenomenal all by themselves, but they lent a special meaning occurring as they did in Trans Awareness Week. If you haven’t seen Amy or her wonderful smile here are a couple of links:

(You will have to Google “Amy Schneider Jeopardy” look for first one from Uproxx “Transgender Woman Amy Schneider Becomes New ‘Jeopardy!’ Champion During Trans Awareness Week” and then “the second one” is from Newsweek “Transgender Woman Amy Schneider Becomes New ‘Jeopardy!’ Champ During Trans Awareness Week.” WordPress isn’t having any links today for some reason. I apologize.)

If you want to risk tears of joy have a look at the second link and scroll down to the smiles of the two men applauding her first win. If that isn’t a sign I don’t know what is. It is a beautiful example of the description (2 Samuel 23:4) of “ruling in the fear of God” as “like the light of morning, like the sun rising on a cloudless morning, gleaming from the rain on the grassy land.” Hallelujah! Rejoice and sing (Pslam 132:9).

Today in the church is the feast of Christ the King. It is  (according to the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Religion) “celebration of the all-embracing authority of Christ, which shall lead [humankind] to seek the ‘peace of Christ’ in the ‘Kingdom of Christ.’” It is a sign in many ways. It is a sign that Advent is coming, that time when we turn inward and seek to align ourselves with the manifestation of Emmanuel “God with us.” Christ the King is a sign that we must always remember to love, because it is in the love we build up that we find the paving stones of the path into the dimension of the authority of God’s love. It is, as the Revelation tells us (1:8) a sign to look always through our love to find grace and peace from the one who is “the Alpha and the Omega,” who is and was and is to come.

The reading from the passion in John’s Gospel (18:33-37) is the revelation of the blindness of many to the dimension of love, even when it stands in their midst. The signs are all around them and yet they cannot see. The truth is given to them and yet they cannot hear it. “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”

The signs are all around us, the truth is being told to us eternally. Can we listen, can we hear, can we find the path into the dimension of love? Can we learn that glory is to be found in the brilliant smiles of people all around us? Check out the manifestation of trans glory and follow Amy’s brilliant smile.

Christ the King Year B 2021 RCL (Proper 29): 2 Samuel 23:1-7; Psalm 132:1-13(14-19); Revelation 1:4b-8; John 18:33-37 ©2021 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

The Sweet Moments we Share

I experienced two formative community moments long ago, both involving a profound sense of belonging. The first was when I attended the consecration of The Right Reverend Barbara Harris in Boston in 1989. There was, of course, a packed convention center. I don’t think I had ever experienced so large a crowd of Christians before, let along so large a crowd of Episcopalians (Anglicans in the US). The electric moment was the recitation of the Nicene Creed. The whole auditorium full of people standing and reciting together “We believe in one God.” The power of the sense of unity in that opening statement was just the beginning. As we continued, no doubt most of us from memory and conviction, the power of community of belief brought together in this one sentient moment was overwhelming. Of course, the thousands of people present included many who had theological or political axes to grind with the forward-moving call of the Holy Spirit to the Episcopal Church at that moment. But the unity was unquestionable.

The other moment (and it is one of which I am so enamored that I know I’ve written about it here before) was in the closing ceremony of the 1998 Gay Games in Amsterdam. Again thousands were gathered in the Arena, including legions of athletes of course, but also many like me who had come to Amsterdam to participate in this great union of lgbt people over a two week period. And this was the apex, the final ceremony, the celebration of all of the love and sweat and accomplishment of the entire games. I don’t remember the specifics very well, only that at one point a musical group that looked like ABBA strolled onto the lawn in the center of the arena. (I was told at the time it was a group from the local Dutch theater where a review of ABBA songs was running that summer, but they sure looked like ABBA!) The opening chords of “Dancing Queen” began, and it was just like my consecration story, everyone stood at once, and of course, began sort of dancing in place, and with the first words the whole crowd began to sing in unison this amazing anthem of liberation. I remember the glorious smiles on the faces of the people all around me and I remember immediately realizing this was again an experience of memory and conviction—this time of the conviction of being liberated as lgbt people, at last—creating a powerful unity in a diverse community in one sentient moment. Again the unity was unquestionable.

God brings us together in the most fascinating of ways, from near and far, from where we have been scattered, from exile even, and with the immense power of love combining in the union of souls God creates kingdom for us in the sharing of loving memory and conviction and unity.

This is, of course, as true for our various unions of souls—I’m talking relationships here—as it is for crowds. Moments of union spring from simple acquaintance, discovered shared experience pursued over time deepens the sense of togetherness and unity as the love shared together grows and envelops us until we achieve that sweetness of experiencing God’s kingdom together between and among us.

I am powerfully in love just now with the love that God has brought into my life. I am daily unsettled by just how powerful love can be. I am filled with awe as I try to walk this path of love to which God has called me.

In the church today is the Feast of Christ the King. It is the final moment before the beginning of the new church year with the First Sunday of Advent, that sweet, sweet time of preparation for Christmas that begins next Sunday. According to theological tradition the Feast of Christ the King is the annual reminder that God has in Christ led all of humanity back from exile of self to the unity in God’s kingdom of love. The scripture rises along a trajectory beginning with Jeremiah’s prophecy (23: 3) that God “will gather the remnant of [God’s] flock … and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed.” The epistle to the Colossians (1: 12-14) reminds us that God has enabled us to share in the inheritance of the saints …that we are redeemed in the unity that comes from the end of sin. The crucifixion narrative from Luke’s Gospel (23: 43) concludes with Jesus, king even in this most excruciating human moment, bringing everyone with Him into Paradise. The kingdom of Christ is, indeed, the pinnacle of human experience, forged in the trials of life but crowned with glory in the moments of love that we share.

LGBT folks, like other oppressed communities, need to remember that it is in the sweet moments we share, whether sitting by the fireplace or rising in a chorus of “Dancing Queen” that we are brought from our exile into God’s kingdom of love.

“Christ the King” Proper 29 Year C (Jeremiah 23:1-6; Canticle 16 Song of Zechariah; Colossians 1:11-20; Luke 23:33-43)

©2019 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.

 

Alpha and Omega*

[John 18:37] “For this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”

[Revelation 1:8] So it is to be. Amen. “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is and was and who is to come, the Almighty.

[2 Samuel 23: 6-7] But the godless are all like thorns that are thrown away; for they cannot be picked up with the hand; to touch them one uses an iron bar or the shaft of a spear. And they are entirely consumed in fire on the spot.

 I hope you are feeling restored. We are. For all of our carrying on about turkeys and football and shopping, I have had an American moment this year. Thanksgiving has been a moment of pause and of the giving of thanks for the love I share and for his full recovery from the medical establishment’s foolhardiness. And we ate turkey, and watched movies (we’re gay – remember? – no football in our house!), and made turkey soup and had sandwiches, and tonight Mexican pizza—jack cheese and black beans and green chiles—for relief from the monotony of turkey dinner. “I like turkey dinner” Brad kept saying. I was grateful to hear it. And he ate the whole pumpkin pie leftover. I was thrilled. And for these small things I am thankful to God.

So it is time to turn to Advent, and to the darkness that gives us space for contemplation before the annual celebration of the birth of our savior. I am so grateful to my colleagues in seminary who introduced me to so many approaches to Advent. I have learned to savor the season, much as I savor the weekend after Thanksgiving as a time of quiet. Advent is about getting ready. Are you ready?

Are you ready to hear the truth? Jesus is the king of heaven who came into the world as a human so that everyone of us who could hear his voice could belong to God’s truth. Not just “would hear” but “could hear.” Are you one who can hear but refuses to listen? Advent is for you. Stop, sit very still, watch the gray clouds on the horizon, look at the sea all gray below the cloud cover, and listen, listen, listen, for what God is saying to you. Do not be like the thorns that are thrown away … instead, just listen.

And you will hear God saying “I am the Alpha and the Omega.” That means the beginning and the end, and that means, all things. That is God’s truth. Nothing else is God’s truth. You are gay and lesbian and bisexual and transgendered, and you are made in God’s own image. And you hear God’s truth, which is that God and no human is all things. God has made you to be one of the precious who hear God’s voice, who know God’s truth. The truth is this, that God loves you. And all God wants from you is that you should love God too. And the best way to do that is to love one another.

We celebrate this moment of pause – in the church it is the feast of Christ the King – because it is time to turn to Advent, to turn inward, to think carefully about how we listen to God and to the truth that Jesus came to give us.

Pray. Listen. Give thanks always. The Alpha is The Omega.

* Proper 29 Christ the King (2 Samuel 23:1-7; Psalm 132:1-13, (14-19); Revelation 1:4b-8; John 18:33-37)

©2012 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved