If you are the parent of an LGBT+ person then these words are for you

Text taken fromRelational Guide for Parents of Newly Out LGBTQ+ People(Guide for Christian parents with LGBTQ+ children who have just come out)* edited by BT Harmand, published by Q Christian Fellowship ** (United States), pp.5-6. Freely translated by the volunteers of the Gionata project.

If you are the parent of an LGBTQ+person, then this text is for you.

August 11, 2011 was the most difficult day of my life. And there is no other day that approaches him.

That day, I crossed several states in the car to get to my mother's house, near Louisville, in Kentucky (United States). She didn't expect my visit, so when she opened the door and saw me on the threshold, she was surprised.

I was there with a precise goal. Simple, but far from easy. For years, indeed decades, I had feared the moment when I should have said to my mother, a conservative Christian, something I never wanted to know: that I was gay.

That first conversation was difficult, but we did it. She assured me that she loved me and that her love would not change for me. Relief.

But the following years have been much more difficult than that first comparison. We discussed. We exchanged emails full of arguments. We made wrong assumptions on each other. We said things that we regretted.

In 2016, I published a blog and a podcast on my life experience in hiding as a gay Christian. I called it Blue Babies Pink. Tens of thousands of people have read or listened to my story. Hundreds of them personally wrote me via email or on Facebook. Many of these conversations were with Christian parents of LGBTQ+children.

And this was only the beginning.

Since then, I have spoken with parents in front of a coffee or during a dinner.

I kept meetings in churches and listened to small groups of mothers to tell the moment when their children made no coming out.

I spoke with fathers who told me phrases like: "Everything has changed and nothing has changed."That sentence was impressed on me.

In all these conversations, I noticed that parents often expressed the same concerns:

• "I seem to have to choose between my son and my faith."

• “I'm afraid for his future. I am afraid that his life will be very difficult. "

• "What will my friends think?"

• "I don't know how to tell her grandmother!"

• “My son doesn't even try to see things from my point of view. I need time to elaborate all this. "

• "I wish my daughter had told me before."

While trying a profound empathy for the path of each LGBTQ+person, I developed a great understanding for parents too. I know that, for many, this path is full of anxiety and fear.

• "I can't reconcile what the Bible says with my son's identity."

To respond to these difficulties, in 2017 I launched an online support program for Christian parents with LGBTQ+children.

Some of the parents participating in the online program are "affirmative", that is, they believe that God can also bless relationships between people of the same sex. (I myself believe in this.)

Others, however, are convinced that God can only bless the relationships between a man and a woman.

I love both these groups of parents. They are united by their firm decision to love, support and better understand their children every day.

The fact that you are here, reading these words, is already an important first step. This is just one of the many extraordinary resources you can find on the net. I encourage you to read and inform yourself as much as possible.

Therefore please for God to give you the necessary grace for this path and so that you can learn the wonderful dance of honoring him and loving your son, without condition.

* To read, the different parts translated by the volunteers of the Gionat project, of the "Relational Guide for Parents of Newly Out LGBTQ+ People" Guide (Guide for Christian parents with LGBTQ+ children who have just come out)click here

** Q Christian FellowshipIt is an ecumenical organization created to accompany LGBTQ+ people and their families on the path of faith, helping them to reconcile spirituality and identity. Activate since 2001, it mainly operates in the United States, but its reception and reconciliation message extends internationally. He brings together Christians of different denominations - evangelical, Catholics, Protestants and other traditions - creating spaces of dialogue and support.
Its goal is to build a more inclusive Christianity, in which LGBTQ+ people are not forced to choose between their faith and their identity, but can live both fullness. For infoQchristian.org

Original text:Relational Guide for Parents of Newly Out LGBTQ+ People: