Saturday, May 16, 2015

"Your Witness to Love is Key to Transforming Our Church"

Jason Steidl is a PhD student studying systematic theology at Fordham University in New York City. He identifies as an "LGBT Catholic." On May 15, 2015 he published in The Huffington Post's Gay Voices forum an open letter to a gay couple whom he recently observed at Mass. Following is an excerpt from Jason's letter.

Your presence did not go unnoticed. Many other parishioners saw your public relationship on Sunday, and many will see you in the future when you come again. Your love for each other is a prophetic sign before God and the world. Through your lives together you show that your love is the same as any other love that becomes concrete in self-sacrificing and life-giving relationship. This is the same love that Jesus Christ embodied when he entered the world and offered himself as the total and world-changing self-gift of God. This is the love that we celebrate at Mass.

Your witness to love is key to transforming our church into a community that welcomes all people and recognizes God's work in all loving relationships. Last Sunday, you showed our parish that you were okay being gay, married, and Catholic. Your participation in worship showed that your conscience is clean before God. Your comfort with each other and other believers was a sign that you, with all LGBT believers, are an integral part of the body of Christ. It was good for the church that you came to Mass. Your participation and presence were transformative.

– Jason Steidl
Excerpted from "A Letter to the Couple at Mass"
HuffPost Gay Voices
May 15, 2015


Related Off-site Link:
Author Colm Tóibín on Ireland’s Gay Marriage Vote: Nobody is Invisible – Griff Witte (The Washington Post, May 16, 2015).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Quote of the Day – April 21, 2015
Francis DeBernardo: "The Church is Better Because of the Presence of LGBT People"
Rediscovering What Has Been Written on Our Hearts from the Very Beginning
Marriage: "Part of What is Best in Human Nature"
The Many Manifestations of God's Loving Embrace
Getting It Right
To Be Held and to Hold
The Longing for Love: God's Primal Beatitude
Love at Love's Brightest


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Beautiful