Friday June 26 was a great day for us, but for some of us, our parents are not happy indeed.
I’ve been married in Oregon for about a year, and though my dad is very Evangelical, he can be mellow about some things when it makes for better relationships. When I came out to him years ago, he was displeased but not dismayed and not angry; he simply and rather gently laid out for me all the particular Biblical reasons he believes being gay is not okay with God (the usual set of clobber verses), and then more or less dropped the subject permanently. He knew my late ex, and has spent some time with my husband. When legal gay marriage started to pick up momentum, he brought up the topic with me and seemed to approve of it fully, as distinct from a Christian marriage, which abides by another set of rules and is administered by a different authority. He seemed so glad I was being civilly married that he actually came across country to our tiny reception. Since then we’ve been as close as usual. He and my husband don’t really talk, but greetings are always passed along both ways.
On Saturday the day after the SCOTUS decision, Dad wrote an email to his entire Bible study group, then forwarded it to several members of his extended family including me, our liberal elderly aunt, and his one gay friend. The title of the email was “Sorrow” and was a mournful eulogy for what once had been a great country, which now has lost its way and lost sight of the laws of God which are not vague, etc. etc… “Our community has said goodbye to its moral mooring.” Apparently he’d been doing all right all day Friday, but when he saw the news images of Nashville Pride on Saturday, he just lost it with disdain and contempt for the outrageous people, which he then channeled into Great Unfathomable Sorrow for Our Nation. It was very sanctimonious and icky.
And you know, I’m actually kind of angry about this. I’d actually thought he might call with congratulations, like my father-in-law did. I’m so angry that I’m not picking up Dad’s phone calls, and I don’t know how long it will be before I want to talk to him again. He has apparently mixed up the two kinds of marriages – the one before God and your church, where you follow those rules, and the other one before the State, where you follow that different set of rules. I always thought he approved of my second type of gay marriage; he never thought I thought I had a Godly, biblical marriage following the conditions of his church. But he seemed pleased that I availed myself of the benefits and responsibilities the government offered. Like half the country, he’s suddenly conflated the two different types of marriages and thinks SCOTUS is making a heretical statement about the Laws of God and how the Bible must be interpreted.
My younger half-brother, who is very straight and very very liberal, has it even worse. His mother, my former stepmother for many years before he was born, and before she later divorced my father and remarried (so, you know, a proper Biblical set of 2nd and 3rd re-marriages between various men and women) is of a much more virulent strain of Tea Party religious conservatism. She’s an activist; her second husband guests on Fox News from time to time; they are true-blue Culture Warriors. We haven’t spoken since I told her I was getting married, presumably because I failed to use scare quotes around “married.” She declined to offer congratulations or greetings to my husband, and pointedly sends holiday cards addressed to me only, which I destroy unopened as my way of dealing with the insult.
So on Friday she pre-emptively struck out at her son on his Facebook wall, telling him not to dare post anything positive about the decision, because seeing that would just hurt her too much and she’s sad, sad, sad to her core. He asked her if Dave and I were on Facebook and could see his wall, would she have posted that? and she cut him dead, blocking him from her Facebook page, telling him to not even bother trying to communicate with her in any way. Apparently her head has exploded and she will need time to find all the little pieces. Since I won’t speak to her anyway, I’m much less upset about this than I am about Dad, but wow, a little cold of her towards her own son, who is not gay! She is sad to the core because of Teh Gay, and now she is offended to the core because of somebody else who’s NOT sad to their core. I guess this is what happens when you run around in church circles; you don’t run into too many people who think unlike you do, even if they’re your own kids.
Anyway, whether or not anybody even skimmed parts of that-- my gay brethern and sistren, what experience have you had with your conservative or religious relatives since the SCOTUS decision?
