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Does being gay influence our spirituality?
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where did you find this?
Please provide some kind of reference. Thanks.
i posted it because i sensed some members here may benefit from listening to it
metta
From the bits I did watch, I couldn't even tell that he's talking about what sexuality has to do with spirituality. He talks a lot about how homosexuality affects social and therefore psychological factors, but not really anything about spirituality.
IMO, "spirituality" refers to the human experience of being connected to a universal truth that isn't necessarily a human construction. To me (as a hetero-normative male), I don't see how my sexual preference would affect this. I mean, I can see how some homosexuals may be turned off from a religion's stance on their sexuality, but that's a human thing, not the teachings at the core.
To use a Buddhist example, I don't see how being sexually attracted to people of the same sex/opposite sex/animals affects one's ability to meditate and act mindfully.
I don't intend to offend any LGBT members of this forum, so I apologize if I seem insensitive. But this is just my perception as a hetero-normative man.
'hetero-normative' make one think that anything outside 'hetero' isn't - 'normal'.
So when I first became interested in Buddhism, I was permanently tense around sanghas for signs that they were homophobic and about to throw me out on my ear. But that didn't happen, and although I have met homophobic Buddhists, I've realised that unlike most religions, Buddhism allows for much greater personal opinion on morality and judging other's morality is not considered the done thing.
So the only possible answer is a resounding yes, being gay influences your spirituality, because it influences how the world reacts and how you react to the world. Take your entire world and wrap it with a set of beliefs, assumptions, and practices that provide meaning, and you have your spirituality.
Now, exactly how does being gay influence our spirituality? I don't know. I've never lived in a world where the people around me think I'm less than human because of who I am. I imagine compassion and forgiveness for the bullys of the world would come a bit harder to me.
I don't have time to watch a video though. I wish the OP would post a summary of his point. I hope it's not that being gay has an adverse affect on spirituality, because if so, that's actually a result of societal issues thrust upon homosexuals... not the homosexuality itself. In parallel, I watched an interesting documentary on gender the other night that talked about how we think of gender roles/traits as nature, but they do change from society to society. But regardless of the differences, each society tends to think of them as 'natural' and 'normal' even though they are culture born.
I like when people say things like, "Who wants to be gay!? Look how hard it is! Look how much gay people suffer!" My response is, "Exactly! Who would want to be gay!? Look how messed up people like you make it for us!" hehe.
Oh, and I wanted to add that the way that being gay influenced my spirituality is that if I wasn't gay... I would probably have a higher probability of still being Christian. Maybe. It's hard to say, because I'm a pretty skeptical person in general, but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't the whole "you're an aberration/going to burn in hell for eternity" thing that really pushed me to look elsewhere.
So being spiritual means working with the mind; changing old negative behaviours and attitudes into new positive behaviours and attitudes.
And being 'gay' is not a definition of a multi faceted human being; and has as much to do with 'being spiritual' as anything else to do with what we crave and desire. Why do we pole vault over mouse turds sometimes?
It's hard to devote a life to a God, whose followers would gladly see you stoned to death...
Sorry, that's what I meant. How would being gay affect your Buddhist practice?
Gautama was reported to have said once (approximately): "Better your own truth, however weak, than the truth of another, however noble." If I read that right, it does not mean trying to be gooder-than-good; it just means being yourself and working from there.
That's good news. It means you can just sit as-is, maybe even sit as-is with other people? Sit a lot. Then come to the forum for fun, and sharing life stuff?
So in Western society, it is 'normative' (ie expected) that a person is heterosexual. This is very clear when you're gay, like me, and you mention having a partner and people immediately say "What does he do". Because people assume my partner must be male simply because I'm female.
Hetero-normativism is different to homophobia because the people who make these assumptions may not be prejudiced in any way. But the argument goes that nevertheless, it produces a subtle pressure on sexual minorities to not be themselves. Even if no one had ever explicitly told you "Being gay is wrong", the very fact that everyone assumes you are heterosexual may suggest to you that it is wrong.
Really what it's about is learning to be open-minded about other people's perspectives on life, and realising how even unconsciously, we could be oppressing another person. It doesn't really bother me that much that people assume if I have a partner, they'd be male, but it does slightly irritate me that it doesn't even occur to people that not all families are based on heterosexual relationships.
The question took him aback...
"nobody's ever asked me that, in that way before," he smiled, surprised. But he hadn't taken offence... his next comment was a bit sad....
"If I was gay, would you judge me?"
"On what grounds?" I replied, "no... why would I...?"
he never did tell me about his status - and it was none of my business anyway, but he was perceptibly more relaxed in my company after that....
It very much reminds me of the elderly neighbors here in Colorado Springs. I'm 62 and lived in the suburbs of D.C. for most of my adult life, and so in terms of talking to or about "Black" people, I would use terms such as "Black" or "African-American". Here my elderly neighbors (77-82) are still using terms such as "colored" or "Negroes", and they are doing so because they think that is showing respect.
It is amazing how fast the attitudes here in the US are changing toward gay people. Even 5 years ago I wouldn't have thought gay marriage would have been legalized at this point in time in so many states.
@Ada_B Well said!
@RichardH I watch a lot of documentaries on the lives of gays of the past and find this sort of topic very interesting... and sad. But mostly, it makes me feel so lucky to live in this time. Within my short life, I have seen the first woman come out nationally on a television program (Ellen Degeneres), the first completely gay show (Queer as Folk), the first completely lesbian show (The L Word)... and since then... we are everywhere in the media. It's amazing. I think I grew up right on the cusp of change so I was able to see things before, and now, I really do think we have come so far. Hillary Clinton's speech to the UN about protection for homosexuals as "human rights" made me cry.
But on the topic of old people, man, my grandma tries so hard. She is so great, but she's still confused and refuses to call my girlfriend anything but my "friend". But she still won't let her out of her house without a hug and that's what matters to me.