There is more to Christmas than some fat bloke in a red, felt suit. And while elegantly-wrapped gifts and shiny, kitsch decorations may take priority, we tend to forget that the true meaning behind Christmas is the birth of Jesus Christ.
While many people in the LGBTI community still feel ostracised by the Christian faith, there has been a burgeoning movement since 1968 trying to find harmony between the two and close the gap.
Anthony Venn Brown is a former mega-church pastor from Sydney and now actively promotes the ideal of gay Christians.
Venn Brown flew over to Perth earlier this year for Pride month with the message that it was okay to be gay and a Christian.
He told OUTinPerth the relationship between the LGBTI people and the church had been an ‘adversarial’ one.
‘The relationship has been adversarial on both sides; they see each other as the enemy,’ he said, ‘but this does not have to be the case.’
‘The gay Christian movement before 1968 was non-existent but now there has been an increasing number of people who want to come out about their sexuality but also about their faith.’
Venn Brown offered up the World Wide Web as evidence; he said there were millions of gay Christian-related websites online now.
‘There has been an enormous growth in LGBTI people from faith backgrounds and they are an emerging group,’ he said.
‘We need to create a space for this new part of the community that is still emerging,’
This ‘space’ Venn Brown refers to is a new concept; a ‘dialogue’ for people from each side of the debate or perhaps both to come together peacefully.
He believes with an open dialogue will come understanding and eventually a true acceptance for this doubly-exclusive minority.
The necessity for greater understanding doesn’t just lie with the church though; Venn Brown said gender and sexual-orientation diverse people will also have to come to the table, and the faster, the better.
Venn Brown found from his own experience and from others he had consulted, that this group had an increased risk towards ‘self-destructive’ tendencies.
He said some of the major risks for this group included an increased likelihood of suicide, mental health issues and more risk towards compulsive behaviours or addictions.
He added that they were at a ‘high risk’ of sexually transmitted infections and HIV.
‘We have all this already in the community but if you come from a faith-background, it’s much more intense,’ he said.
The former pastor stressed that he wasn’t pushing any agenda with his work but tried to create awareness on both sides of this unnecessary fight.
‘I’m not into conversion,’ Venn Brown laughed, ‘I’m not trying to convert LGBTI people to the Christian faith.’
‘I work with LGBTI people from a faith background and I work with them to help them with any perceived conflicts they have,’
Venn Brown is well-aware of the perils that come from trying to force a square peg in a round hole.
He spent considerable time in gay conversion therapies while working as a preacher which ultimately failed.
Venn Brown is particularly aware of the negative connotations of homosexuality still floating around the House of God but believes the majority of Christians are now much more accepting.
He said only 30 per cent of Catholics surveyed in Australia believed homosexuality was immoral which was on par with the national surveys.
‘The LGBTI community perceives the Church as the enemy which is totally justified,’ he said.
‘Some high-profile evangelical organisations (Exodus) and churches (Westboro Baptist) and religious leaders like Pope Benedict VXI, have continued their conservative anti-gay stances despite public acceptance from clear majorities.’
There is some solace though, in the presence of people like Venn Brown who are encouraging those who may have exchanged their faith for their sexuality to have their Christmas cake and eat it too.
Benn Dorrington
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