7 Reasons Why LGBTQ+ People Don't Want to Go to Your LGBTQ+ Inclusive Church [View all]

[Heddi]

7 Reasons Why LGBTQ+ People Don’t Want to Go to Your LGBTQ+ Inclusive Church

https://bookishbearblog.com/2018/06/11/7-reasons-why-lgbtq-people-dont-want-to-go-to-your-lgbtq-inclusive-church/

So your church is LGBTQ affirming. Congratulations, your denomination has most likely endured years of internal strife and division, and come out on the side of inclusivity. This isn’t something to be taken for granted – entire denominations have split over this question, and still others seem not at all willing to budge on their centuries-worth of LGBTQ intolerance. Yet, as you go to church week after week, you ask your gay or trans friends to join you and you receive a bewildering response. They’re just not interested.
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So let’s start with listing the reasons why LGBTQ+ individuals might not want to go to church at all. This isn’t to tell you in every case what to do about it, but to get you to understand and think a little deeper about the perspective of queer people in the face of religion, Christianity in particular. The more you understand that position, the more dialogue you can foster with us.
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1. In general, people aren’t going to church anymore
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2. As inclusive as yours may be, churches are overwhelmingly cisgender, heterosexual spaces
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3. Many LGBTQ+ persons have experienced religious trauma, some of it profound
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4. Religious belief in general fundamentally disrupts the ways that many LGBTQ+ persons have learned to find meaning in their lives
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5. Church institutions tend to submit everything and everybody to the “pastoral gaze”
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6. Churches tend to micromanage even healthy sexual expressions
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7. Your church isn’t as LGBTQ+ inclusive as it thinks it is
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THere is much more at the link than is allowed to be posted here, and I think it touches on issues that I personally have never seen discussed here in either the religion group or on DU.

As someone who is a member of the LGBT community, many of the issues the author points out are spot on, and while I am an Atheist and would not go to a church for many reasons, there are instances where friends or family have encouraged me to tag along for one reason or another, and used the 'but they're gay friendly" as a hook to get me to go. I feel that the author verbalized so much better what I never could beyond the "yabbut I'm an atheist and I don't believe in God" because it's much more than that. I can sit through a prayer, or a bible verse as well as anyone. It's more than that. Just because you hang a rainbow flag doesn't mean the chapel behind that space is welcoming and inclusive to the community. Many times, it feels like we're being thrown piecemeal offerings of "take this, we tolerate you, now shut up and be happy we're not calling you dirty sinners and throwing stones at you. What more do you want? You already have a seat at the table."