Why AM I gay after all?

I usually like to post humorous musings about “why” I am gay, but I can’t resist sharing this more serious article on “Why are you gay?” I found this today at Grace Unfolding, written by Anita.
I have been reading Anita’s writings off and on since about 2001 when I found her site under a search for “Christian Lesbian.” I was on the “sisterfriends” mailing list for years, and the things she wrote about were a lifeline of hope through darker years of working through the process of reconciling my sexuality with my spirituality. She was often the single voice of encouragement among the din of condemnation and “abomination” proclamations around me. Her writing, it seems to me, has evolved over time along her journey. I, too, have evolved on my journey of letting grace unfold for me, and over me. I am ever more ready to receive these truths and let go of the long programmed “Christian dogma” of my youth.

I know that I have recited about 5 of those 7 “reasons” myself through the years!
I’ll share part of her article here, with a link to read the entire post by Anita over at Grace Unfolding: SisterFriends Together

Why are you gay?

“What’s the first answer that comes to your mind?

• I’m being tested by God to see if I’ll remain obedient and faithful.
• I’m being tempted by the enemy who wants to destroy me.
• I was born with a defect in my personality or a genetic flaw.
• Something happened to me in my childhood.
• I gave into sin because I was spiritually weak.
• I was just born gay.
• I’m not really gay. I only fell in love with a woman.

Depending on where you are in the reconciliation process your answer to the question might be different today than it was last week or last month, and different than it might be a year from now. At some point early on in my own experience I tried them all on for size, sometimes all at once which made for some really crazy and confusing thinking and if these uncertain answers shared any common thread it was this, that the bottom line reason for why I was gay came down to being my fault. It was my choice, my weakness, my genetic makeup, my quirky predisposition, my sin.

In time I came to understand and accept that just as there exists indisputable diversity among our physical bodies, our emotional responses and our intellectual processes, it would then only reason that there are variances in human sexuality and how that sexuality was expressed from person to person. Homosexuality, heterosexuality, and bisexuality were then just separate points on the sexuality continuum. Simply put, God could have made all flowers on earth roses, but instead for no reason other than for the sake of beauty and for His enjoyment and glory, God splashed creation with a variety of flowers that number in the millions. And trees and birds and fish and fruit and on and on and on, so that it was no longer such a stretch to see that I was gay for no reason other than God’s an artistic genius and I’m one of God’s one-of-a-kind creations. As you are, perhaps for no more or less reason than for the sake of beauty and for God’s enjoyment and glory. Oh how God enjoys and glories in you!

So then, we’re gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered not by mistake or by sin, but this is who we are because we represent little pieces in the unique diversity of God’s creation, and for a season in my life that was my answer to the question, but I’ve come to another explanation. I want to suggest it goes further that God’s diversity of creation. Much further. And this is what I truly, absolutely, without hesitation or question believe.

I believe we are who we are and that we love who we love, because it’s by God’s design and for God’s purpose we’re the gay and lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people of God. This is our divine calling; a holy vocation. This is the very way in which God wants us to live in the world and engage with the world, to be queer folks living out the Good News of Christ in wholeness and truth.

When we can receive our sexual orientation or gender identity as God’s calling, it changes everything. No longer is this just my burden to carry through my life but this is a gift that’s been entrusted to me, a gift I’m called to share with the world.” … (continued at this link…)

PS– check out Anita’s “challenge” at the bottom of her post…

GLBT