Recently, I had a conversation with a friend who was very surprised by (among other things) the fact that I haven't been to church (with a few rare exceptions) since 2010. To be honest, I also barely went to church in the last two years of college and my attendance between 2008 and 2010 was (with the exception of the 2009-2010 school year) mainly when I was going to school sponsored masses. What I want to do here is explain why I've haven't been back.
As you can probably guess, most of my lack of going to mass has to do with the fact that I am (honestly) not welcome by the church. Not the true me. If I want to go to church, I need to be a truncated, almost castrated, version of myself. I am deemed to be "intrinsically disordered" because of the fact that I am gay. Several times, when I went to Confession about my feelings for other guys, I was told to focus on women and how women and men were complementary, as if that would help me become straight. I was constantly wracked by guilt because of feelings I had little to no control over and had to hide and deny who I was for years. If I ever fall in love, I cannot marry him in the church, which has been a lifelong dream for me. Instead, I will have to go to through a civil ceremony which, while not bad, is not what I have hoped and dreamed of for as long as I can remember.
In a religion about love, it is remarkable to discover that not all love is valued. Yes, I know all of the religious arguments about homosexuality (remember, I have taught both Religion and CCD classes for several years), but none of that changes the fact that I am looked upon by many people (and by the Church herself) as secondary and less than other people, merely because of the fact that I love other men and not women.
When I was teaching Religion and CCD, I always felt as if I almost had a split identity because I had to pretend to be one thing while actually being another. I cannot tell you how many times I had to talk about "love the sinner, but hate the sin" in regards to homosexuality while talking with students about sexuality. It happened so often that I actually ended up internalizing the arguments and coming perilously close to hating myself and everything that I was.
I am sure that someone out there is wondering why I don't simply pick another church. The answer is that, other than this issue, I do believe that the Catholic Church has it mostly right. I cannot in good conscience go to a Protestant church. While I may be able to find a more inclusive Catholic parish, it would not change the fact that the Church herself would not be welcoming to me or others like me. So I am caught in an almost impossible situation. Either I go back to a church that looks down on me and who I am, I go to a church that I do not believe in, or I don't go to church at all. So, I settled for the last option. None of the options is something I particularly like, but sometimes that happens.
I know there are people who are going to remind of various aspects of Catholic teaching. Believe me, I have considered all of them and you are unlikely (at best) to change my mind. Until the Church becomes more accepting of LGBT people and who they love, I am unlikely to go back except for rare occasions such as funerals or weddings.
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