How can you be gay if you're a Christian?

This is the big question that a lot of Christians have about our channel. They have never heard of a gay Christian before, or they don't believe that such a thing could possibly exist. "Don't you know that homosexuality is an abomination to God?" they ask us. "If you are truly Christians and want to do God's will, then why would you choose to be gay?" This page is to answer that question. If you already see a flaw in that question and want to know instead why we would choose to be Christians, then you should click here.

The last part of that second question is really the key to the answer. "Why would you choose to be gay?" Why, indeed? Leaving Christianity out of things all together, why would anyone choose to be gay?

Before we answer that question, let's define our terms so we know exactly what we're talking about. When we refer to someone as "gay", "straight", or "bisexual", we are making a comment about the object of that person's attractions. A straight person is attracted to members of the opposite sex. When a straight man looks at a pretty woman, he feels attracted to her. Although he may suppress that feeling (for example, if he is already married), he cannot help feeling the initial attraction. Straight men are (let's face it, guys) aroused by the sight of a beautiful woman in a bikini. It is an involuntary reaction which is not the same as lust (the Biblical definition) but which can easily lead to lust. Am I right, guys? On the other hand, a straight man is not attracted to a cute guy walking by him on the beach. He does not have some desperate moral struggle to undergo in order to keep from falling into lust; he simply is not attracted to another man at all.

A gay person, by definition, is the opposite of a straight person in this regard. A gay man simply does not find women attractive. He is, instead, attracted to other guys. Like a straight man, he can control whether or not he lusts, but unlike a straight man, he finds himself instinctively physically and emotionally drawn to males instead of females.

So these are the definitions we are using on these pages. "Gay" or "Homosexual" refer to men or women who are attracted to members of the same sex. "Straight" or "Heterosexual" refer to men or women who are attracted to members of the opposite sex. "Bisexual" refers to men or women who are equally attracted to both sexes. "Lesbian" refers to a gay female. You may have heard other definitions for these words in the past, and you may associate other meanings with them in conversation, but these are the definitions we are using here for purposes of clarity.

Now, with these definitions in mind, let's return to the question. Why would anyone choose to be gay? If someone does indeed choose to be gay, then they must have been straight to begin with. A straight person, by definition, is attracted to the opposite sex and is *not* attracted to the same sex. Why would a person who is attracted to members of the opposite sex suddenly decide to stop being attracted to the opposite sex and start being attracted to the same sex? If you are straight, stop and ask yourself: do you have any desire to be attracted to members of your own sex? If not, then what would cause other people to have such a desire?

There are two standard answers that people give to this question. Some believe that people choose to be gay because of rebelliousness. Homosexuality has been glamorized in the media, they say, so rebellious teens decide to become gay as a means of rejecting old-fashioned morality. But there are a number of problems with this theory. First of all, it is clear that a number of very non-rebellious people are gay, and a number of very rebellious people are not gay. Rebellious straight teens might go out and have a lot of promiscuous sex, and it's possible that they would even experiment with same-sex relations out of sheer rebelliousness, but they do not stop being attracted to members of the opposite sex, nor do they develop a genuine attraction for members of the same sex. Secondly, the testimonies of many, many gay people tell us that they did not choose to be gay and in many cases did not want to be gay. Sadly, some go as far as suicide because they cannot rid themselves of same-sex attractions they do not want. Thirdly, we know from decades past, when homosexuality was considered a mental illness, that many gay men sought treatment, desiring at all costs to be rid of their same-sex attractions. In that time, there was certainly nothing chic about being gay. And finally, it should be obvious to anyone who is truly honest with himself or herself that we have no control over whom we find attractive. We cannot say to ourselves, "I think I will choose to consider *that* person attractive and *that* person ugly." We simply are or are not attracted. It therefore follows that no matter how rebellious the person, a straight individual cannot *choose* to stop finding the opposite sex attractive and *choose* to find the same sex attractive. (Married straight men should know full well that it is not possible for them to simply turn off their attraction to other women, no matter how much they might like to.)

So...if people do not become gay out of rebelliousness, then what does make people gay? The second standard answer many people give is that there must be something that happened to certain people that caused them to desire things which most people do not desire. Perhaps it was because they were molested as children...or perhaps a chemical imbalance in the brain...or perhaps something genetic...or perhaps because they never developed the right relationship with their parents...etc. The list of possible reasons goes on and on. The interesting thing is, once you have accepted one of these as the "reason people become gay", then what you are really doing is admitting that there *is* something going on besides a conscious choice. Since we have seen that it would not be possible for a person to simply *choose* to be gay for whatever reason, there must be something beyond their control that is causing them to have the feelings that they do. In other words, gay people are gay because they are attracted to members of the same sex, for whatever reason. It is not something they can help, or that they can choose to feel or not to feel.

We can reach this conclusion purely through logical reasoning. And when we check this against the testimonies of thousands upon thousands of gay people, we can see that it does indeed match up. Many gay people struggle for years and years with their private attractions to the same sex before ever admitting that they are gay. Some never admit they are gay; they say instead that they are "struggling with same-sex feelings" even though they meet our definition of a gay individual. Many gay teens are horrified to realize that while their friends are becoming more interested in the opposite sex, they just don't feel the same way. They want desperately to feel what their friends feel and to be straight, not only for religious reasons, but also because it can be lonely and very painful to be a gay person. They want with every ounce of their beings to be straight, yet they have no way to change what they feel, even after years of desperate prayer. And yet the one place they should be able to turn for support -- the church -- all too often turns a deaf ear on them, because many Christians don't realize that "being gay" isn't a choice and homosexuality isn't something that someone can just opt out of if he or she so desires.

Okay, that's a lot of words to make a simple point. But already we have answered our own question. "How can you be gay if you're a Christian?" Well, one doesn't have a choice of whether or not to be gay. We are gay because all our lives we have been attracted only to the same sex. (Believe us, most of us have tried almost ANYTHING to be attracted to the opposite sex instead. None of it worked.)

But if this is true, then why do so many Christians have such a hard time believing it? Many Christians are highly skeptical of the claim that gay people do not choose to be gay, despite the fact that we as gay people have testified to that fact, and despite the statements of many respected Christians (from the Pope to conservative Christian psychologist Dr. James Dobson) who admit that gay people do not choose to be gay. Obviously, many people believe that the statement, "Gay people do not choose to be gay," violates some basic principle of Christianity. Why is this?

It appears that the conflict stems from two major sources: 1) a failure to differentiate between a feeling and a behavior, and 2) a misunderstanding of the Bible's teachings on homosexuality.

We can see how source #1 comes into play when we consider the logic some people use. "Being gay must be a choice," they say, "because I believe it's a sin to be gay and I don't think God would make anyone sin without giving them a choice." The error this person is making is that he is failing to see the difference between a feeling and a behavior. When this person says, "I believe it's a sin to be gay," what he really means is, "I believe it's a sin to engage in same-gender sexual acts." But there is a world of difference between the two statements. Not all gay people engage in same-gender sexual acts, and God certainly does not force anyone to engage in such an act, so if it is the *act* that is a sin, then being gay would only be a *temptation* towards this particular sin. Temptation itself is not a sin (for even Christ, who was sinless, was tempted), and we do not choose to be tempted, although we can do our best to stay out of tempting situations.

But there are still some people who will insist, "No, when I say I believe it's a sin to be gay, I really mean it's a sin to be gay, not just to engage in certain sex acts." These people have fallen into the second trap, misunderstanding the Bible's teachings on homosexuality. The Bible, in fact, never mentions "gay people" or sexual orientation; it only contains a few references to sex acts in particular. As we've said, performing a gay sex act is not the same as being gay, nor is lusting the same as being gay, so people who want to believe that it is a sin simply to be gay will have to turn to some source other than the Bible for their evidence. At that point, not only does it become a question of mere conjecture, it also becomes a very theologically unsound position (since it equates temptation with sin.)

So we can see that being gay is not a choice, nor is it a sin. And this explains the existence of a channel called #GayTeenChristians. But the next question that everyone wants answered is, "but what do you believe about behaviors like gay marriage and gay sex?" It's an issue that's very important to gay Christian teens who are trying to decide what to do with the rest of their lives, so we've provided a whole separate page dealing with it. Click here to read more about Homosexuality and Christianity: different views on a controversial subject.

Click here to return to the GayTeenChristians homepage.