Tag Archives: spirituality

The Bread of Fellowship at #GCNConf

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Practicing real hospitality in the midst of extreme differences can be hard. What does it mean to make another person feel truly welcome when their needs are seemingly at odds with yours? This question drives the ethos of the Gay Christian Network’s annual conference. How can we welcome all who want to be present, inviting each and every person to be challenged by God’s radical and unrelenting hospitality while simultaneously creating a safe space for all to feel loved and accepted? It is a high call. And as conference veterans, it’s a call we embrace as a part of our own call to hospitality.

One of the hardest places to practice real hospitality is the Communion table. Real hospitality requires that people consider the needs, desires, and convictions of others, taking special notice of irreconcilable matters of conscience. Various Christian traditions have developed diverse views of what happens during Communion, who can partake of Communion, and what Communion means. Moreover, each individual Christian is always encouraged to examine their conscience before taking Communion in order to decide how they want to respond when a particular opportunity to receive is available. There are so many reasons why a person would make a choice to abstain from receiving Communion. The choice to receive Communion can only be a free choice if the choice to abstain is also available.

Towards that end, the two of us have sought to create an option for GCN Conference attendees where people who come to the worship service that takes place during the closing session have the option to receive something other than blessed Eucharistic elements. This is the Bread of Fellowship. We started this tradition at GCN Conference 2013 in Phoenix, Arizona as a way to help conference attendees from closed-communion denominations, non-Christian attendees, and others who are not comfortable receiving Communion to feel more welcome. But this is not a tradition we made up on our own: we got the idea from the Eastern Christian practice of setting aside a basket of unconsecrated bread that can be shared by any or all in attendance at the liturgy. This unconsecrated bread is called antidoron. In Eastern Christian practice, the bread that is consecrated is cut from a larger loaf. The unconsecrated leftovers from this larger loaf become the antidoron, which is often linked to the Gospel stories where Christ feeds the multitude and the disciples fill baskets with what is remaining. We loved the idea of the Bread of Fellowship being something that could feed all, even when matters of conscience prevented people from receiving Communion.

At this year’s GCN Conference in Houston, the Bread of Fellowship was offered and blessed with the following prayer:

Living God, source of light,
hope of nations, friend of all,
builder of the city that is to come:
your love is made visible in Jesus Christ,
you bring home the lost, heal the broken,
and give dignity to the despised.
You gather us together, feeding and nourishing us.
In the face of Jesus Christ
we see your light shining out,
flooding lives with goodness and truth,
gathering into one a divided and broken humanity,
with people from every race and nation,
with the Church of all the ages.
Bless this bread, and unite us in fellowship.
Strengthen and preserve us in community with one another.
May all find welcome at this Table of Fellowship.

It is our prayer that God continues to bless everyone who has ever gathered at a Gay Christian Network and guides each and every person where they can hear the heartfelt words of, “You are welcome at this table of fellowship.”

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Gifts from Catholicism

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A reflection by Sarah

Earlier this week, Lindsey wrote a post titled “Gifts from Orthodoxy.” It covered a sampling of spiritual and theological treasures that Lindsey came to love while in the Orthodox Church, and so much of it resonated with me. Every item that Lindsey named is an aspect of my time in Orthodoxy that I will always treasure. As I have made my return to the Catholic Church, I’ve been thinking about all the gifts that Catholicism has given me over the years. In today’s post, I’d like to reflect on some of those in no particular order.

Throughout the past week, several readers have been asking me why I chose to return to the Catholic Church. The most common question has been, “Why would you return to a tradition that is unlikely to be more supportive of your calling to celibate partnership with Lindsey?” I don’t agree with the premise of that question, primarily because of what I would consider support for my calling. If there is anything I have learned from my years of experience interacting with other Catholics, it is that we share a common commitment to helping each other during difficult times. Our Church has an extensive social teaching that spans a variety of life-in-the-world issues. We care about whether people are able to meet their basic needs. Though we hold diverse opinions about the best way to resolve the problem of ever-rising healthcare costs, we agree that when human beings are not able to receive healthcare without going bankrupt that is indeed a problem. If any kind of life situation places someone’s healthcare access or other basic needs in jeopardy, it is not difficult to find a Catholic priest (or brother, nun, or layperson for that matter) who is willing to help that person find solutions for meeting those needs. The Catholic faith teaches us that we are to stand in solidarity with all who suffer, and that we are to do what is possible to relieve the suffering of others. The bottom line is, we care for one another. And I consider that the most meaningful form of support for any person’s calling.

Speaking of callings, another gift from Catholicism that I cannot speak of highly enough is openness to certain variety within Christian vocation. We recognize marriage and religious life, but also a variety of pathways that are neither. Lay Catholics can commit their lives to secular institutes and other movements within the Church. Certain Catholic women choose to become consecrated virgins living in the world. Then, there’s the general category of “vocation to single life in the world” that has not yet been discussed thoroughly by the Church, but holds so much possibility for people who are called to give of themselves in a way that is different from both marriage and religious life. The idea of vocation outside of marriage and monasticism is not foreign to Catholicism. I’m eager to see how the idea of vocation for unmarried laypeople will continue to develop. Certainly those conversations will not be swift or easy, but they are important as more and more people remain single.

The ability to engage in these kinds of difficult conversations is a third gift I have received from Catholicism. Though scholasticism arose within the context of the western Christian tradition and I am quite fond of the eastern approach that is less academic, my time away from the Catholic Church has led me to value more highly the theological and philosophical approaches of the West. One disadvantage of the western approach is that western Christianity can appear more argumentative and less unified. But it’s impossible to ignore the advantages of engaging in reasoned conversation about hundreds of different life-in-the-world issues. The core truths of the faith will never change, but how we apply those to life may look slightly different as the world changes. Being part of a Church that values both tradition and continued learning from many academic disciplines is an incredible gift. Engaging deeply in the hard discussions is one of the most spiritually and intellectually rewarding aspects of being Catholic.

As someone who feels a deep connection to the spiritualities of both East and West, I consider the Church’s worldwide presence another of the greatest gifts Catholicism has given me. Most Latin rite Catholics I know will say this and follow it up with, “No matter where you go in the world, even if you don’t know the language, we can follow the Mass because it is always the same.” Fair enough. That’s true to an extent when one is speaking within the context of a particular rite. But it’s not what I’m talking about here. I am thankful for the presence of 24 autonomous particular Catholic Churches throughout the world, 23 of which are Eastern Churches that offer Divine Liturgy rather than Latin rite Mass. Some of these were formerly Orthodox, but others — the Maronite Catholic Church, Italo-Albanian Catholic Church, and Syro-Malabar Catholic Church — have always (or almost always) been in communion with Rome. The Maronites gave me my first experience with Eastern Catholicism, and I am grateful for every opportunity I had to learn from them when I lived in a different city. As a Latin rite Catholic who has returned to Catholicism from Orthodoxy, at present I find myself struggling to integrate what I love most about the western tradition with my most beloved aspects of eastern Christian spirituality. But on the bright side: I don’t have to attend services only within the Latin rite or only within an eastern rite. If it seems fitting, I can celebrate Advent within a Latin rite parish where English is the liturgical language, visit the Ukrainian Catholic parish down the street for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, see a deaf priest for confessions in American Sign Language, and go to vespers with the Maronites even though I can’t lip read Syriac. There is plentiful room in Catholicism for the spiritual treasures of both East and West.

I’m probably stating the obvious here when I say that these are not the only parts of Catholicism that I consider to be gifts. I love the way we do confession in the Catholic Church. There’s just something the immediate outpouring of grace that gets me every time. I can’t think of any place I would rather spend a lazy Friday afternoon than in a Eucharistic adoration chapel hanging out with Jesus, then attending a daily mass. The rosary, particularly praying the Glorious Mysteries on Wednesdays…no other prayer practice I have ever attempted has succeeded so thoroughly at getting my racing mind to slow down. And I have quite an emotional soft spot for the May Crowning ceremonies and First Communion Sundays that come in springtime.

I could continue naming gifts indefinitely, but getting to the point: when I left Catholicism for Orthodoxy, I was not running away from the difficult parts of being Catholic. I was not abandoning one Christian tradition for a different one that I thought would be utopia. I had my eyes open as widely as I could have at the time, and I made the decision that I had thought was best, going where I had thought God was leading. I may never know why God leads me in a particular direction. All I can do is listen and follow as best I’m able. But I believe that when transitioning from one Christian tradition into another (or back into another after having left previously), it is important to be running toward something rather than away from something. That is what I’m doing now. Catholics are no more sinless and no less judgmental than Orthodox Christians, and though some of our readers may be confused as to why I’m returning to Catholicism instead of looking for another Christian tradition, I do not find this matter confusing at all. My return to Catholicism is not a running away from problems in the Orthodox Church. Instead, it is my running back toward all of Catholicism’s gifts — these and so many more.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

Gifts from Orthodoxy

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A reflection by Lindsey

My previous post has generated a lot of conversation. I’ve learned about a lot of these conversations second- and third-hand, but I would like to offer some clarifications.

I am not abandoning the spirituality I found in the Orthodox Church. It’s hard to say that I have left when I have yet to find an alternate place to go. I remember having an in-between season after I realized that I no longer believed in the efficacy of sola Scriptura. I knew I couldn’t continue to be a Protestant, but I didn’t know where that conclusion would take me. On a theological level, nothing in particular has changed for me. I did my best to bring everything I could from my past as an Evangelical Protestant with me when I became Orthodox. I’ve received many gifts from the Orthodox tradition that I intend on keeping with me permanently, but I don’t know where I’ll be able to settle. I wasn’t looking to leave the Orthodox Church, but things have happened where I don’t see a way to stay.

I am profoundly grateful to the Orthodox tradition for giving me many gifts. I first started seeking Christ in the Orthodox Church in 2008, and my journey in Orthodoxy has had lasting effects on my spirituality. I am profoundly and eternally grateful to the Orthodox tradition. I have done my best to cling to what is good, and I will maintain forever that the Orthodox Tradition can be a wellspring of life.

The Orthodox Church taught me about how prayer shapes beliefs. Within the context of the Orthodox Church, I learned the principle of lex orandi, lex credendi. I loved the services of the church. Chanting the service made it so much easier for me to remember and reflect on various parts of the service during the rest of the week. I experienced the services of the Orthodox Church as a kind of atlas to the rest of Scriptures. If I had a question like, “What do the Scriptures say about the Mother of God?” I would look at all of the readings associated with feasts dedicated to Mary. I had never considered that the Burning Bush or Jacob’s Ladder were intended to point towards Christ Himself. Interpreting the Bible using typology literally blew my mind wide open so many times. Reading the marriage service of the Orthodox Church, and investigating all of the Scriptures referenced by this service to the best of my ability, gave me a profound vantage point to see that true Christian marriage is exceptionally rare and spurred me on towards redoubling my prayers for all married people I knew. It seemed to me that the Orthodox tradition supported the life of people married in the Church in countless ways, while also providing pastorally for people with failed marriages.

The Orthodox Church also challenged my understandings of pastoral care. Many discussions I had with people about sensitive pastoral matters included references to oikonomia. I understood oikonomia as trying to balance the principles of truth and mercy. Too much strictness could crush a person; too much laxness could stunt a person’s spiritual growth. Exercising oikonomia rightly is a fearsome task, with the burden falling almost entirely on priests providing spiritual care. I prayed, and prayed and prayed some more, for priests. I adopted the practice of praying for specific priests I knew while also praying for any other priest who bore the same name. Praying for all priests named Gregory or John asks that God guides a ton of people. I did my best to seek confessors with whom I could share my life, my heart, my journey, and my questions. I discussed particular matters with my closest friends, allowing them to call me out when something simply was not bearing good fruit in my life.

The Orthodox Church opened to me a deeper understanding of celibacy. My spiritual journey is a bit complicated, but before becoming Orthodox, I had an extremely limited understanding of celibacy. I thought it was a Catholic thing that nuns and priests did. I knew that there were male religious orders in the Catholic Church, but I tended to view them as a way of forming men who were eventually going to become priests. In the context of the Orthodox Church, I met many female and male monastics living in a range of situations. I saw monastic families in action when I visited small communities housing between 6 and 12 nuns. I recognized possibilities for celibate people living in the world when I met monastics who were attached to a local parish while working in the community. I learned about how monastics shared life together, especially as it relates to dimensions of caregiving and the daily routines of doing life. Being encouraged by an abbess of an Orthodox monastery to do my best to put the monastic life into practice as much as I could was instrumental in helping me define celibacy. Orthodoxy introduced me to the concept of skete monasticism, where sketes tend to be small communities of 2 or 3 celibate people committed to sharing life together.

I am incredibly grateful to people who opened up diverse spiritual truths to me while I was in the Orthodox Church. One of my favorite priests was known for encouraging people with “Pray as you can, not as you can’t.” I believe that God’s grace can reach each and every person striving to follow Christ to the best of their ability. One of my favorite icons in the Church is St John Climacus and the Ladder of Divine Ascent. Everyone on the ladder has their eyes fixed on Christ, and I like to think that Christ will reach much further down the ladder than we will ever succeed at climbing. The parable of the Prodigal Son convinces me that the Father will run towards his children who want to find His house.

The Orthodox Church challenged me to think sacramentally. What did it mean that God found it fit to dwell within our humble offerings of water, oil, bread, and wine? How could we offer God our hearts in addition to the work of our hands? My sense of spirituality has been forever changed by the idea that the bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Christ where He desires to unite His flesh with ours. I never want to regard participating in this mystery as an automatically conferred right, and I do not want to be a person who willfully neglects the teachings of the bishop responsible for overseeing the life of the church. I have deep and profound respect for the way various archdioceses of the Orthodox Church work together to teach people about Orthodoxy, especially as it relates to the canonical situation found in the Orthodox Church in the United States. I have always found the idea that an Orthodox Christian separated from communing in one archdiocese can go to another archdiocese exceptionally problematic, even though I have understood that people need to respect the particular communion discipline of the place where they are communing.

I started attending the Orthodox Church in 2008. I came into the church knowing full well that the Orthodox Church could never bless same-sex marriages. I spent time as a catechumen studying the marriage service to understand what the church taught about marriage. I read the Scriptures referenced by the marriage service and came to the conclusion that a marriage within the Orthodox Church has four requisite components: a man, a woman, an eternal commitment, and an openness to life. I developed the analogy that marriage is to relationships what the Eucharist is to food. It was possible to affirm many different kinds of relationships as gifts given to us by God, even if these relationships were not treated sacramentally. The Eucharist is real food, but the Orthodox Church also encourages us to bless every morsel of food that comes into our body. I took it as a simple truth that God would give me a vast array of meaningful relationships because I am a human being created in the image of a triune God. I knew full well that I did not have a vocation to marriage. I visited various monastic communities with an attitude of discernment towards a monastic vocation, but it seemed abundantly clear to me and everyone around me that God had plans for me that included living in the world. I threw myself, as best as I could, in the general direction of God’s merciful kindness, hoping that the Church would exercise oikonomia to help me along my way.

Many people in my life have recognized the value in the life I share with Sarah. Clergy intimately aware of my life story and situation have told me, “Sarah is a gift, given to you by God, for your salvation.” I believe this to be abundantly true, especially as we have continued to discern our way of life as a celibate partnership. We’ve cared for each other in times of illness and distress. I have lost count of the number of hours I have spent keeping vigil while Sarah has endured the ravages of Meniere’s disease. We share the same pool of financial resources. We support one another emotionally and spiritually. We have encouraged one another as we have sought to love and serve those we come into contact with in the world around us. We have navigated job loss and career transitions together. I believe earnestly with every fiber in my being that God is calling Sarah towards changing to a career in audiology, and so I am busying myself in an effort to meet the challenges associated with supporting Sarah going to audiology school next fall. My life and future is tied up with what God will call Sarah to do just as Sarah’s life and future is tied up with what God will call me to do. I’ve opted in 100% and I’m eager to see what God has for us. I can’t look at the life I share with Sarah without seeing how God has challenged me to grow towards Christ. We remain resolutely committed to celibacy, even though we don’t see any clear legal pathways forward. A friend recently suggested that we might consider moving to Canada where domestic partnerships still exist and universal health care coverage is a thing. I am a bit ashamed to admit how seriously I have considered exploring this option, especially because I know American Sign Language is used in Canada.

When I read a sentence like “The Orthodox Church cannot and will not condone or bless ‘same-sex unions’ of any degree” I am left feeling like the Church has changed the goal posts. I respect the teaching authority of the bishops to draw the lines however they see fit, but in my heart I don’t see any space within the Orthodox Church left for a person in my situation. I did not go seeking out this statement from the Antiochian Archdiocese. I only read it because a friend praised it for its clarity and compassion. I thought that perhaps the Church gathered at the convention had authored a statement which maintained the delicate balance between truth and mercy. But as I read the statement, I came to an unshakable opinion that American Orthodox Christians had built a wall of truth around the Church where I found myself outside of its limits. I tested that opinion by seeking guidance from my confessor and my parish priest. I understood why they were reluctant to comment on the statement because neither of them are priests in the Antiochian Archdiocese. So I sought clarification from people I know who were likely to have attended the convention. It’s also worth stating that there are bishops within that archdiocese who had known of Sarah’s and my situation. The best critique I had of the statement was that “It seems like it’s clumsily worded, but they are simply reiterating what the Church has always taught.” However, another member of the clergy told me that I had interpreted the statement correctly, and it is binding for the entire Orthodox Church regardless of which jurisdiction authored the statement. When even members of the clergy have such differing interpretations of this statement, it should be no surprise that people like Sarah and me feel caught in the middle of an impossible situation.

I’ve always considered the Orthodox Church to be like a house celebrating Christmas. There is a roaring fire in the fireplace and a well-lit tree. I considered myself extremely fortunate to be able to be inside, joining in the celebrations to the best of my ability. I’ve never been the keeper of the house, and I never expected to be asked for my opinion if remodeling was necessary. I do know that I was doing my best to stand in identically one spot, but unfortunately all I can see now is that wall. When I look up, I don’t see a roof over my head. But it’s Christmas time, which means that it’s winter. It strikes me as unwise to try to drill through a brick wall of what the Church has always taught. So I’m out trying to enjoy the snow and hoping that God, in His mercy, provides me with shelter soon.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

In which I make my return to Catholicism

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A reflection by Sarah

Yesterday, Lindsey shared with our readers a difficult and painful decision that the two of us have reached after an extended period of prayer and discernment. As much as both of us love the Orthodox Church, we reached a point both individually and together of being unable to remain within that particular Christian tradition. We bear no ill will toward Orthodoxy or its people, and I certainly don’t intend to bash the Orthodox faith in this post. But I will say that as an individual, I could not continue in good conscience to be part of the Orthodox Church. There are many reasons for this, and most of them hinge on the fact that the spirituality I practiced as an Orthodox Christian was breaking me, and I was not able to find a viable path into a better way of life using the resources of the tradition.

The purpose of this post is not to offer an explanation for my leaving Orthodoxy, but I would like to offer some clarifications relative to issues that arose after we published Lindsey’s post yesterday:

Lindsey and I are not giving up celibacy. The reality that God has called us both to a celibate way of life is abundantly clear. That simply is not changing. We continue to understand our relationship as a way of life that combines elements of skete monasticism and partnership lived in the world.

We are not leaving Orthodoxy so that we can get a legal marriage, get a religious marriage in a different Christian tradition, or start thinking of our relationship as a marriage. A number of people seem to be under the impression that our plan is to run immediately to the courthouse and get a legally recognized marriage. A few seem to think we are now looking for a more liberal Christian tradition that will marry us. Both of these assumptions are false.

Leaving Orthodoxy does not solve our problem of insufficient legal protections. We have no idea how we are going to sort our legal affairs in the end. It’s a complicated question that has only become more complicated as non-marital forms of union between two people in the United States are going the way of the dodo.

Our story is not a weapon, and we will continue to call out anyone who uses it as such. Let’s be honest: Lindsey’s post yesterday was the post that many of our more liberal readers have been waiting for since the beginning of our blog. We’ve long known that at times, more conservative readers have used our posts to beat their LGBTQ friends over the head with a celibacy frying pan. But as of yesterday, we also have readers proclaiming, “If a celibate couple like Sarah and Lindsey aren’t even welcome in the Church, that definitely means it needs to change its abusive teachings!” Make no mistake, Lindsey and I are not on a smear campaign and are not advocating for doctrinal changes to any Christian tradition. Our story is not fuel for your political fire.

Not long ago, the two of us gave an evening devotional at a retreat with about 30 of our brothers who are also celibate LGBTQ Christians from a variety of traditions. At the end of our talk, we asked those gathered to reflect on what might be next in their lives relative to their faith communities, interpersonal relationships, new callings, and so on. Given our announcement that we are leaving Orthodoxy, I’m sure that many of you are reading and wondering what is next for us. That’s a difficult question, considering how we came to Orthodoxy from very different backgrounds and left for our own individual reasons, but we’re grateful for the opportunity to have meaningful conversations with our readers as we sort the answers.

As for me, less than a week ago I approached a Catholic priest who used to hear my confessions on occasion before I became Orthodox. Though I had intended nothing more than to engage in a conversation about some controversial issues in Catholic ecclesiology, things changed about an hour into our discussion. He told me that I appeared troubled and asked what was on my heart. There was something about the way he said it (or at least what I got from lip reading) that led me to think about a truth I had not considered in a long while: the decision to follow Christ within the context of a particular Christian tradition is as much a matter of the heart as it is a matter of the head. And I had known for quite some time that when I took my analytical theological brain with me to Orthodoxy, I left my heart behind in Catholicism. Living in a neighborhood with over 40 Catholic institutions has been a constant reminder of this: one can’t walk more than a few blocks in this area without bumping into a priest, brother, or nun in full habit. As we continued to talk, I found myself forgetting all about my angels-on-pinheads theological misgivings…and before I knew exactly what I was saying, tears filled my eyes and I blurted, “I want to come back!” In a moment of impulsive yet entirely free decision, my theological conversation became a sacramental confession. Soon after, I was welcomed back to the faith where I had first experienced a meaningful relationship with Christ. And for the first time in a very long while, I felt like a free woman.

I didn’t return to Catholicism because I see the Catholic faith as easy, or because I believe that I can do it well after doing Orthodoxy so poorly. When I look back on my faith journey so far, I can say with confidence that I have spent more years of my life being a bad Catholic than a good Catholic. Read this post if you don’t believe me. I have not yet sorted all of the theological issues where I find myself far more in agreement with the approaches of the East than the approaches of the West, and I expect there will be frequent occasions when I attend a Roman Catholic Mass or Eastern Catholic Divine Liturgy and abstain from the Eucharist. But I see no problem in taking that approach because Christianity is not supposed to be easy, and the Church does not give up on her children when they find themselves in situations where reasoned argumentation and the internal spiritual experience aren’t matching.

I can be Catholic without being perfect. I can be Catholic without engaging in obsessively legalistic thinking about my faith. I can be Catholic while sitting in the tension as other Catholics disagree with my way of life and the bishops try to sort out what kinds of non-marital legal protections they can support for people in my situation. I can be Catholic while viewing my hearing loss positively, even attending deaf parishes and receiving spiritual direction and confession from deaf priests. To be Catholic is to be part of a worldwide family that is as dysfunctional as it is delightful. It means participating in the tough conversations as much as it means being obedient. And at the end of the day, I’m grateful and relieved to be home.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

Some Thoughts on Sympathy, Suffering, and the Paschal Mystery

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A reflection by Sarah

In many of our past blog posts, Lindsey and I have discussed some of the different kinds of reactions other people have when they find out we are a celibate couple. Some folks are skeptical of us, others supportive, others cautiously optimistic about our claim that we really don’t care to discuss our sexual ethic in terms of, “Is gay sex a sin?” Lately, one of the most common reactions we’ve been receiving is sympathy. We have readers, friends, and family members who feel sorry for us because we are celibate. Occasionally people outside our Christian tradition tell us that we’re missing out on one of life’s greatest pleasures because of blind obedience to authoritarian religion. During our series on sexual abuse last week, one person told me that she is sorry for what happened to me and will be praying I’ll heal completely from my history of sexual trauma so that Lindsey and I will finally be able to have sex. At the same time, plenty of people inside our Christian tradition believe that the kindest words they can possibly say to us are, “I’m sorry you’ve been given such a heavy cross to bear in life.”

I can’t help but make a connection to another circumstance in which I’ve received a great deal of sympathy lately. As I’ve become increasingly open in discussing my Ménière’s disease and the resulting hearing and vestibular loss, more and more people in my life have been telling me, “I’m sorry you’re stuck in such a bad situation. But good on you for making the best of it!” In truth, I do see my vestibular loss as a bad situation. Because I can no longer balance my body in the way most people can without even trying, my mobility is limited. I used to swim every day, and now I can’t do that anymore. I love socializing and getting out of our apartment to go on adventures by myself or with other people, and most of the time I can’t do that anymore either. I’ve gained lots of weight and have no endurance at all because most days, I can’t move very much. I can’t work right now either. But I’m not “making the best” of anything regarding this issue. I’m irritable all the time, I snap at Lindsey when I become frustrated with myself, and I try to do more than I’m able and end up hurting myself in the process. Nothing in that is making the best of a bad situation.

That said, I don’t see my hearing loss as negative in even the slightest way. Sure, I’ve gone through (and am still probably going through) a grieving process because it’s unsettling to lose one manner of interacting with the world that I’ve had access to for my whole life. Working on accepting myself as I am rather than trying to “fix” it has been painful in some ways, but pain is not always a bad thing. In the process, I’ve gained so many new ways of understanding the world around me — things I never would have experienced as a hearing person. When I’m participating in Liturgy by feeling the choir’s vibrations and noticing how those induce images of synthetic color, I’m not making the best of a bad situation; I am communing with God in a way I couldn’t have before my hearing loss. It’s common for members of my tradition to speak of monasteries as places that offer people a unique opportunity to encounter God in silence. Monasteries are indeed wonderful places, but my question is: how many monks, nuns, and monastery lovers truly know the experience of total silence? I’m talking about silence that is free from every possible distraction — no leaves rustling, no birds chirping and flapping their wings, no water running…not even the sound of one’s own breath. Assuming that there are no rock bands, gunshots, or jets around, when I take off my hearing aids I can experience the gift of total silence on some days. Even the best custom-designed earplugs will not give a hearing person that gift. I think that’s amazing.

I’m taking some online coursework this summer to help me keep my mind occupied until July when I’ll have my next ear surgery. Last week, the professor in one of those classes suggested that my Ménière’s is part of how I experience the paschal mystery. I’ve lost and I’ve grieved, but I’ve also seen the birth of many new and wonderful things. There are some days when, where my vestibular loss is concerned, I still find myself feeling much more connected to the crucifixion than to the resurrection. But is there anything wrong with that? There are also times when I feel deeply connected with the resurrection and other people tell me this isn’t theologically or emotionally right because I’m “romanticizing” my suffering. It has never made sense to me how someone else can claim to know better than I do when I am suffering and when I am not.

I’ve been thinking about how celibacy is also part of my paschal mystery. It hasn’t been easy for my to accept that I will never give birth to children. It’s definitely not easy to accept that I live in a society where marriage has become the default vocation for all people, and those who choose celibacy tend to be viewed as odd and repressed. It’s challenging to be so committed to a Christian tradition where there is little guidance for living celibacy outside a monastery. Nonetheless, I am joyous about continuing to cultivate a celibate vocation in the world alongside Lindsey. Celibacy is one of my callings. I didn’t ask for it any more than I asked God to make me deaf, but I’ve found both of these realities to be life-giving rather than limiting. There are days when I feel more connection with the binding of Isaac than I do with the Annunciation, but that’s how it is with any calling and any long-term state of being.

Sometimes, we don’t know what to say to another person except, “I’m sorry.” I include myself in that “we.” There are occasions when sympathy is a helpful response, and I don’t always know for sure how to differentiate between those occasions and others. But I do think that at times, sympathetic responses can miss the mark when it comes to understanding how callings and life experiences work differently for different people. What would it be like to spend more time discussing our callings and life experiences in terms of the paschal mystery? Several questions run through my mind. To name a few: what if we offered fewer condolences and made more effort to understand what we perceive to be another person’s cross? How might offering support look different if we could accept that what looks like a cross to one person can appear as a crown to another? Do we have to see crosses as negative in the first place?

What callings and experiences from your own life are part of your paschal mystery? If you feel led to share, the comments are open.

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