UPPSALA UNIVERSITY Department of Theology
Master Programme in Religion in Peace and Conflict Master thesis, 30 credits
Fall, 2020
Supervisor: Tomas Poletti-Lundström
A soul without a body:
experiences of religious homophobia and transphobia
Anna-Sara Fire
Abstract
Several studies have shown that religious involvement has positive effects on human life. It creates a sense of belonging and hope for the future in the life of youths, it improves married life and prevents loneliness in the lives of older adults. However for LGBTQ people the effect of religious involvement is often the complete opposite experience. The majority of the religious groups in United States of America believe homosexuality is a sin and religious involvement for LGBTQ people results in being faced with oppression, internalized homophobia, anxiety, loneliness and depression. This study, through qualitative interviews, research shows how religious homophobia and transphobia have affected the participants' mental and emotional health and how it has affected their religious life.
Keywords: Religious homophobia, Religious transphobia, LGBTQ, Lived religion, Minority stress
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
1.1 Purpose and aim
2. Previous research
3. Method
3.1 Recruitment 3.2 Participants 3.3 Procedure 3.4 Research ethics
4. Theory
4.1 Minority Stress Model 4.2 Lived Religion Theory
5. Analysis
5.1 Love the sinner hate the sin 5.2 A soul without a body 5.3No way to hide from god 5.4 Sky-daddy was not real
5.5 Exorcise the demon out of me 5.6 Everybody is a sinner
6. Discussion
7. Conclusion and summary 8. Literature list
9. Appendix
1. Introduction
According to Smith and Pearce (2001) in the large American study, National Study of Youth and Religion religious involvement, religion has a positive effect on young people's well-being . The study shows that responding 12th grade students, that attend religious services weekly and have parents who are also involved in religious communities, are more likely to have a positive outlook on the future, a positive attitude towards themselves, feel as if their lives are meaningful and feel like it is good to be alive. These results were consistent across variables such as age, race, sex and family structures. Smith and Pearce drew the conclusion that religion has a positive effect on young people's self-esteem and also makes the challenges of the teenage years easier to navigate. However, the study does not give sexuality or gender identity as a variable. If it did, it might have shown something different. Oftentimes, sexual and gender minorities have different experiences with their upbringing in religious communities than their counterparts who
participated in the above study. Another study has shown that two-thirds of LGBTQ individuals experience conflict between their religious and sexual identity (Dahl & Galliher, 2009). So, while for some religious involvement is the source of happiness and hope; for others it is the cause of anxiety and identity issues.
Many religious organizations express heterosexuality as the norm and many also express that non-heterosexuality is a sin (Sherkat, 2002). When adult LGBTQ people attend religious communities, they often either hide their identity or attend the few LGBTQ-friendly
churches/congregations that exist; but LGBTQ children are often not in a position to make a choice of which religious community to attend. Many times, they are forced to be a part of a faith community that gives them hateful messages about themselves. Shuck and Liddle (2001) have shown how religious conflicts contributed to stress related to the coming-out process. They also noted that being forced to hear sermons in one’s religious community that are homophobic and transphobic contributed to young people being in a position to face their sexuality at an earlier age than they otherwise would have. Further studies show that when religious conflict is present
in a young LGBTQ person’s life, it impacts their mental health significantly (Ream &
Savin-Williams, 2005).
This study will investigate the consequences of religious homophobia and transphobia for LGBTQ individuals and how these shape their religious lives as adults. While transphobia and homophobia, without religious motivation, also creates trauma; I argue that religious
homophobia and transphobia result in a unique complexity. The combination of threats that extend beyond this life and homophobic and transphobic interpretations of religious texts, rites and rituals makes religious homophobia and transphobia complicated.
1.1 Purpose and aim
LGBTQ individuals are vulnerable in many ways. They are more often rejected by their families and many LGBTQ youth run away from home due to oppression and abuse and this put them at risk homelessness (Schmitz & Woodell, 2018). They also drink alcohol more than their peers and continue to drink excessively, at an age where many people replace drinking with family life and work etc (Rostosky & Danner, 2010). LGBTQ people are also at greater risk for mental health challenges, discrimination in the workplace, physical violence; and due to lack of communal support, it is even more difficult for LGBTQ families to stay intact (Meyer & Frost, 2013).
Religion is a cause of anxiety and depression for many LGBTQ individuals and a 2015 study shows that LGBTQ youth that grew up in a religious environment are more likely to have suicidal thoughts than LGBTQ youths that did not grow up in a religious community (Gibbs &
Goldbach, 2015). Previously, I stated that many times, religion is not a supportive factor in LGBTQ individuals' lives in the same way as it is for non- LGBTQ individuals, and that might be an understatement. Research shows that religion can be outright dangerous for LGBTQ people's mental and spiritual health (Escher, Gomez & Paulraj, 2018) . I believe it is highly necessary and important to document and research what religious homophobia and transphobia does to LGBTQ individuals' lives and use that research to shape the resources that are available for LGBTQ people.
Therefore, my purpose with this study is to look at how homophobia and transphobia impact LGBTQ individuals' lives. I am entering this study with the pre understanding that religious homophobia and transphobia are not necessarily tied to religious scriptures and religious
doctrines. Instead, I would argue, it is a part of the culture that the religion exists in or the culture that the religion over time has created. Religious homophobia and transphobia can be found in mostly every religion. The research questions that guided my interviews are: How do religious homophobia and transphobia impact the participants’ emotional and mental well-being? How do religious homophobia and transphobia impact the participants' religious life and view of god?
2. Previous research
To understand this topic and the life of LGBTQ individuals, one needs to look at previous research on both religious life of non-LGBTQ individuals and religious and spiritual experiences and attitudes toward LGBTQ indivduals.
Studies have show that religious affiliation benefits heterosexual individuals in almost every arena and stage of life. As I stated above, Smith and Pearce (2001) have argued that life quality tends to improve through religious involvement. However, seuxality and gender minoritiy youths' voices were not represented in their study. A study that interviewed couples that had been married more than 35 years showed that over 65% of them expressed that religion was important and had a positive role in married life (Mackey & O'Brien, 2005). The study Religious Belief and Practice: A Potential Asset in Helping Families, Family Relationsis based on
interviews with families from over 20 of the largest Christian denominations in the US. It showed that 80% of the participants reported that religion was important in giving advice and instructions about family life and the different roles within the family (Abbott, Berry &
Meredith, 1990). Studies have also shown that religious involvement in older heterosexual adults positively improves well-being and decreases depression (Kaushal, Cadar & Stafford, 2015). These studies and many others show that religious life and being affiliated with a
religious community strengthen heterosexual life in many ways, but it is important to understand that LGBTQ people experience a very different reality.
When the same research is done with LGBTQ participants, the results are completely different.
According to Schuck and Liddle (2008), two-thirds of all LGBTQ individuals experience a conflict between their religious and sexual identity. The study shows that the most common response for LGBTQ individuals when they experience oppression and conflict in their religious community, was to stop attending the religious institution altogether. Some tried to find
alternative congregations that were more accepting, while others left religion altogether. Many attempted to find a way to not have to separate the religious and sexual identity. The study
shined a light on the internal emotional conflict of losing one’s faith community and the
emotional scarring of being rejected, that will stay with the person long after the original fracture has occurred (Shuck & Liddle, 2008).
The conflict that the inability to combine religious identity and sexual identity presents is fundamental for many religious LGBTQ individuals. In the study, LGBQQ Young Adult
Experiences of Religious and Sexual Identity Integration, the question was posed: to what degree do LGBQQ young adults experience conflict between their religious and sexual identities while coming out? One hundred and five LGBTQ youth participated in the study and 54% reported that they never experienced being congruent in their religious identity and their sexual identity.
A personal relationship with god, the belief that god made them LGBTQ and an increased knowledge of biblical or religious readings and texts, were factors that played a role for those that experienced integration between their religious and sexual identity. The study also shows that another important factor that aids in integration between religious and sexual identity integration is support from family, friends and community (Dahl & Galliher, 2009).
LGBTQ individuals tend to keep their religious and sexual identities separated for their whole lives. Escher, Gomez & Paulraj (2018), show that being out in your religious community, as an older LGBTQ adult has a positive impact on mental health, if they switched to a more accepting religion than their childhood religion. At the same time, this study showed that higher levels of religious engagement for LGBTQ people were related to higher levels of loneliness and
depression. It is worth mentioning that the researchers stated that there is a risk that those that faced depression, while having high levels of religious engagement, might have had the same levels of depression, even before the religious engagement and looked for religion to make them feel better; the religious comfort hypothesis (Escher, Gomez & Paulraj, 2018) . It is complicated to know what is what in this situation since many LGBTQ individuals are experiencing high levels of minority stress from every aspect of society. According to the minority stress model, it is almost unavoidable to develop a mental health disorder when one is living under a great amount of stress related to one's identity. In a heteronormative society, LGBTQ people
experience minority stress from every direction; religion is one of them. It is likely that an older LGBTQ person experiences minority stress just from a lifetime of existing in a heteronormative society.
Sherkat did a revised version of the study, Sexuality and religious commitment, that was published for the first time in 2002. The anticipation was that religious institutions would have followed what Sherkat is viewing as the more accepting American society for LGBTQ
individuals, but that was not the case. The hope was that over the two decades between the first study to the second, the Christian American institutions were going to be more accepting of LGBTQ people as full worthy members of their congregations, never came true. This is
important research because the common notion that LGBTQ people are becoming more accepted just because they obtain some rights, protections and visibility in society is in many ways not true or helpful (Sherkat, 2017). LGBTQ people still face a lot of challenges in their everyday life and in many countries in the world, western countries included, they are getting less rights instead of more and previously gained advancements are being taken away.
The results of discrimination and maltreatment that LGBTQ people face are not limited to physical violence. To understand the oppression and trauma that LGBTQ people experience, it is of utmost importance to understand the concept of microaggression. Microaggression is a subtle form of aggression that is focused on a minority identity. Many of the religious homophobia and transphobia that LGBTQ people face are characterized as microagressions. Lomash & Galupo (2019) wanted to explore how LGBTQ people experience microagressions that are framed in a religious or spiritual context. The participants were asked to describe microaggressions that existed within their religion or spirituality. They reported that microaggressions made them feel invisible in religious and spiritual space. They also reported that microaggressions often came disguised as caring statements like: God still loves you, you are so much more than gay etc. The findings of this study show that microaggressions are extra hurtful because they come from the group where you are connected and at times, supported; or the microaggressions are delivered by leadership, the same leadership that is said to represent god .
Religious homophobia and transphobia are two of the many factors that cause stress in LGBTQ people’s lives. Minority stress comes from general environmental circumstances that LGBTQ individuals face on a regular basis, and for many, it exists in every arena of life. It might be difficult to distinguish that religious homophobia alone is the cause of depression.
Dahl & Galliher (2010)wanted to study the relationship between sexual minority religiosity and mental health outcomes, namely sexual orientation conflict, self-esteem, and depression. The results from the study argue that negative religious experiences do contribute to depression and low self-esteem. In this study, the wider view on the lives of LGBTQ individuals is missing and with that the wide range of oppression that LGBTQ people face .
3. Method
This study was done through semi-structured qualitative interviews. When planning and conducting those interviews, a significant focus was on sensitive research and cultural competency. This section presents how I located and interviewed the participants.
3.1 Recruitment
The participants for this study were recruited through a Facebook post that was shared by the organization TransFaith, an interfaith organization that creates religious and spiritual space for LGBTQ people. It operates through social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter), but also organizes workshops at LGBTQ conferences, like the Trans Wellness (formerly Trans Health) Conference, the world's largest transgender conference that take place in Philadelphia every year.
In the Facebook post I stated that I was looking for individuals that identify as LGBTQ+ and grew up in an environment with religiously based homophobia and transphobia. It stated that the participants would take part in an interview via Skype or Facetime and they would be completely anonymized in the study.
The post generated 11 replies and 9 interviews were conducted and 8 interviews ended up being used in the study. The one that was not used was because the participant had misunderstood the topic so they did not end up being a good fit for the study. All of the participants reside in the USA. There were a few reasons for this. Firstly, I am particularly interested in religious homophobia and transphobia in the American society, due to the significant role of religion in that culture. I wanted to study a society where religion has an important cultural and societal significance, in which the consequences for leaving or being excluded out of religious life are greater. I was interested in the internal and external conflicts that occur when one is being
subjected to religious homophobia and transphobia. Something else that impacted my decision to study this topic in America is that I lived in America for 15 years and that is where I have my primary connections and community. It is easier to recruit participants for a study in which they
need to be vulnerable and discuss personal and private issues, if they feel comfortable with the person that interviews them.
In the recruitment post, I specifically requested participants with negative experiences of religion and being in a religious community. I recognize that this limits my study to only hear the voices of those who have had negative religious experiences and leaves out other voices. My study is too small to generalize LGBTQ individuals' religious experiences. Rather, it speaks to a few individuals who have experiences that in some ways are unique and in other ways might be typical of LGBTQ people that have been raised in a religious environment.
3.2 Participants
The participants ranged in age from early 30s to late 60s. 2 participants identified as cisgender female lesbians; one cisgender female identified as queer; 2 participants are female-to-male transgender individuals and one of them identifies as a gay man and the other didn’t want to talk about his sexuality; two are male-to-female transgender people and both identify as heterosexual women and one participant is a cisgender gay man. For all participants, religion was an
important part of their life growing up and for many it still was an important part of life, at the time of the interview. Only one does not have any current religious involvement. The rest retain a strong religious identity. The majority identified as Christians from different denominations (pentecostal, catholic, baptist, mormon and methodist) or had grown up in various Christian congregations, but there was also one participant who identified as Muslim/Hindu but grew up Muslim; one Jewish and one Western Sikh participant. Since the Facebook post specifically asked for participants who had experienced religious homophobia or transphobia growing up, all participants had similar experiences.
3.3 Procedure
The semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted via Facetime or Skype and they were recorded. The participants were asked a series of open-ended questions about their religious community growing up; how that community and religious tradition’s opinions of LGBTQ
people had shaped them and their religious or spiritual beliefs today. Based on my theoretical framework, I created a number of questions that focused on the individual experience. The majority of the questions were very personal and based on the Lived Religion theory that religion is to be understood in how it is expressed, practiced and experienced by the individual. I was interested in exploring how religious homophobia and transphobia shaped the religious
expression, experience and practice in the participants and I created my questions from that focal point. No questions were asked about how the religious homophobia and/or transphobia was justified based on doctrines or religious texts, but in some cases, the participants volunteered that information. Particularly for those who still were active in the same religious denomination that had oppressed them, some wanted to articulate that the oppressors were wrong in the way they interpreted religious texts, etc. However, this was not the focus of the interviews. Please see appendix 1 for a list of the questions that were asked.
I wanted to invite an open conversation and for the participants to feel safe and comfortable, but since this is an interesting topic that can be explored for a long time, I needed a time limit for the interviews. Therefore I told the participants ahead of time that the interview would only last for 30 minutes and in most cases, we kept to that time frame.
McGuire writes that all religion is a mixture of beliefs, practices, relationships, and experiences (McGuire, pg 185, 2008). When I analyzed the interviews, I searched for those relationships, practices, beliefs, and experiences in the interview material that said something about how it is to be an LGBTQ person in both overtly homophobic and transphobic environments and more covert religious environments. During the analysis, I read through the transcription of the interviews carefully, looking for codes that tied the experiences of the participants together. The codes I identified, based on greatest frequency and repetition in participant interviews were:
identity conflict, view of god, abuse, physical violence, finding their way back to religion, rejection, hope of healing homosexuality, sexuality, gender identity, sin, childhood, family relationship, depression, addiction, body, disembody, embody and importance of community.
From these initial codes, the following categories were created: Love the sinner hate the sin,
Embodiment and disembodiment, Beliefs about god growing up, Abuse, and Religious beliefs today. I identified the codes that I felt could be grouped together, based on which most related to my research questions. For example, the codes identified as view of god, sin and childhood together created the category Beliefs of god growing up. The categories were created to answer the research questions for this study and the categories, Love the sinner hate the sin,
Embodiment and disembodiment, Beliefs about god growing up, Abuse, and Religious beliefs today, became the foundation for the discussion in the Analysis section below.
3.4 Research ethics
Conducting the semi-structured qualitative interviews in a sensitive and culturally competent way was one of the most important aspects of working with this study. I identified the
participants as a vulnerable group. Vulnerable groups are identified as those who are socially vulnerable and therefore need special care by the researcher. To interview vulnerable groups about sensitive topics requires planning and finding the right gatekeepers that will help with access to participants (Liamputtong, 2006). I had a long established relationship with the organization TransFaith and this contributed to the participants ability to trust me and trust the study. Sensitive research is when the participants are giving information that normally is kept private. When one does sensitive research, it is important to know the consequences and impact of the research on both the participants and the researcher and it is important that the research does not further marginalize the vulnerable group (Liamputtong, 2006). In this study I used a framework for sensitive interviewing. I had questions prepared for the interviews, but I did always let the participants lead the conversation. I wanted to build trust and for the participants to feel comfortable. Doing sensitive research prioritizes understanding more about the person who is being interviewed and their whole life, since there is a focus on the relationship and the giving and taking between researcher and participant.
I identified four risks for the participants in the study. The first is the risk of being
“outed”/identified as LGBTQ. I identified the participants as a vulnerable group due to their LGBTQ identity. This identity makes them more at-risk in society and I recognized that keeping
their identities anonymous was important. If not done properly, there are risks for physical violence, loss of employment and housing and/or loss of community and/or family. The participants' real names are not used and only in the cases when a participant lives in a big city and the nature of that specific city contributed to what the participant was sharing, did I mention the name of that city. The second risk is that the participants could be being retraumatized. The topics of the interviews were sensitive, emotionally upsetting and in some cases traumatic. I recognized that this presents a risk for the participants to be retraumatized. I offered to send the participants a list of resources with professionals offering support and mental health counseling, but not everyone took me up on the offer. The resources included : Trevor Project
(thetrevorsproject.org, 2020), LGBT National Help Line (glbthotline.org/national-hotline.html, 2020) and Translife line (translifeline.org, 2020) . The third risk identified is that the participants might experience a pressure to share more than planned on due to power imbalance. Power imbalance between the researcher and members of a vulnerable group is something that often presents a risk for the participants. They might choose to participate as they feel it will be beneficial to them and then end up feeling this did not occur. It is important to assure the participant fully understands what it means to participate in the study (Pittaway, Bartolomei &
Hugman, 2010) . As I was conducting the interviews, I kept this power balance in mind when I related to the participants. Another potential risk is becoming too relaxed in the conversation and sharing more than planned on. Also a relaxed conversation could contribute to participants saying things they might not have planned on saying and this can potentially have safety and privacy consequences for them. I made sure I double checked so I didn’t use information that could be used as an identifier of a participant and checked in at the end of each interview to assure if there was anything disclosed that a participant did not want included in the research findings. The fourth risk I identified was the risk of the participants not fully understanding what the interviews were being used for. After the initial contact, made by the participants after seeing my post, I made a statement of verbal informed consent and they agreed to participate with verbal affirmation. See appendix 3 for Verbal Informed Consent. Two of the participants were in extremely vulnerable positions in their lives and I took additional time to explain about the study and about their rights. I believe they fully comprehended what their stories were going to
be used for and that all participants chose to be involved primarily because they felt that their experiences were important enough to be shared and wanted their stories to be witnessed.
To keep the data safe and secure, the interviews were recorded with a cellphone and transcribed.
The recordings were deleted and the written transcripts are stored in a password protected computer file.
Suh, Kagan & Strumpf (2009) argue that cultural competency is important when one is doing qualitative interviews. Cultural competency is a process consisting of five constructs: cultural awareness, cultural knowledge, cultural skills, cultural encounters, and cultural desire. The first step in cultural competency is being aware of one’s own culture and how that might differ from the participants, what in your background will make the concept that the participants bring up feel foreign or hard to understand etc. When the researcher has the same cultural background as the participants, a lot of the cultural competency steps are not needed. As I am queer-identified, with long-term involvement in the trans-community, I am part of the LGBTQ community culture and this helped me in not only accessing participants, but also in building trust, through common connections and knowledge of my previous service to the LGBTQ community. In many
interactions, my identity as a group member and the previous service and engagement in the community served as a basis of my cultural competency in this framework.
4. Theory
This study was conducted with the theoretical framework of the Minority Stress model and Lived Religion theory. I found the Minority Stress model to be helpful because it explains the
consequences of homophobia and transphobia for LGBTQ people. Lived Religion theory argues that religion is created by those who practice it. This is important since this study focuses on the experiences of religious homophobia and transphobia and not on scriptures and doctrines.
4.1 Minority Stress
When one studies how homophobia and transphobia impact LGBTQ people, it is important to have a foundational understanding of how just being alive as a LGBTQ individual impacts one's mental health.
Minority stress model argues that LGBTQ individuals experience stress caused by
discrimination, stigma, prejudice, and violence or threat of violence, directly associated with their minority identity. Furthermore, this stress can lead to mental, behavioral and/or physical illness(es). Developer of the minority stress model, Ilan Meyer, argues that LGBTQ people and many other minorities, have more mental and emotional problems than heterosexual and
cis-gender white individuals, but the cause of this is the stress they live under from not being the norm (Meyer, 2013).
Mental health issues within the LGBTQ community have a complex history, both to LGBTQ people themselves and also to mental health providers and researchers. Being homosexual was seen as a mental illness until 1973 (HRC, 2020) and being transgender was considered a mental health disorder by World Health Organization until 2019 (WHO, 2020). DSM-V (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) continues to list Gender Dysphoria as a verifiable
diagnosis. Before 1973, LGBTQ people’s mental illnesses and behavioral health issues were seen as proof for psychologists and psychiatrists that homosexuality was indeed a mental illness.
This stigmatization of LGBTQ individuals caused lack of research about mental health issues
within the LGBTQ community because initially, it was believed everything was linked to sexual identity. Once homosexuality was no longer deemed to be a mental illness, there continued to be a dearth of research and acknowledgment of mental health issues, as there was widespread concern about the risk to feed into the historic mental health stigma of LGBTQ people. This is a reason why the minority stress model is a very welcomed approach to research minority groups’
mental health and life stressors. (Meyer, 2003) .
Minority stress is evident through the everyday challenges that LGBTQ people face, but also expectations of rejections and internalized homophobia and transphobia contribute to minority stress. Since rejections and potential threats and internalized homophobia/transphobia are constant in a heteronormative world, the stress is also constant. LGBTQ individuals are constantly bombarded with messages of their abnormality and what Meyer calls acute events, like gaybashing, are not uncommon experiences. Chronic minority stress events, like living places where same sex marriage is not legal or gay couples not being able to adopt children or in other ways are not able to participate in the foundation of a society that is built on family life, are also factors that also extremely damaging for LGBTQ individuals’ mental health. When same sex marriage was legalized federally in the United States, there was a dramatic decrease in LGBTQ people’s mental and behavior health symptoms and diagnoses. LGBTQ people who live in states/regions or countries where the protection of LGBTQ people’s rights are minimal or non-existent experience high levels of minority stress (Meyer, 2013).
Minority stress model presents the many layers of mental, emotional and behavioral health issues, among LGBTQ people, that are caused by outside stressors. Minority stress is a leading factor for risky behaviors that turn into physical health issues, like smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol, engaging in recreational drug usage and having unprotected sex. Studies show that smoking cigarettes is more common among lesbian and bisexual women than heterosexual women, but the knowledge about the dangers of cigarette smoking are the same. Minority stress is seen as a contributing factor to why lesbian women make the decision to smoke cigarettes, even if they have the same information about the dangers of tobacco use, as the non-smoking
heterosexual women. There is also research that argues suppression of emotions and hiding one's sexual or gender identity causes physical negative effects on the body. A study of HIV- positive gay men showed that those who concealed their HIV-status advanced more rapidly in their illness than those who were open with their HIV-status. Research also shows that gay and lesbians that have experienced direct discrimination were more likely to have serious physical health problems within a year of the incident, as compared to those who did not experience outright discrimination or prejudice (Meyer, 2013).
Hiding or concealing one’s gender identity and/or sexuality is a major cause of minority stress and it causes internalized homophobia and transphobia (or the hiding may be a result in part of internalized homophobia/transphobia). The expectancy of negative things that might happen if one shows their “real self” is a significant cause of minority stress, however LGBTQ people are placed in positions of having to protect themselves from the very realistic possibility of losing housing, jobs and/or being targets of violence and harassment. Choosing to be closeted is often deemed to be the best option. Minority stress is unavoidable (Meyer, 2003). Meyer argues that what helps with the symptoms of minority stress is community; finding groups of people where one does not need to be afraid of being stigmatized and feeling the need to be closeted in all aspects of life. This is proven to improve many of the mental, behavioral and physical health outcomes caused by minority stress (Meyer, 2013).
One criticism against the minority stress model is the idea that society has evolved and that many of the stressors that the minority stress model presents are not actual stressors anymore. The critic argues that the many improvements in western society for LGBTQ individuals make the minority stress model no longer a valid psychological model . This critique is being met with arguments that LGBTQ people still face a lot of challenges in their everyday life and in many countries in the world, western countries included, they are getting less rights instead of more and previously gained advancements are being taken away.
Researchers that use the minority stress model have been criticized for how they contribute to the view of minorities as oppressed victims and they do not see the resiliency in minority
communities. This view is seen as hurting minority groups by not recognizing how they have won many battles with oppressors. Meyer responds to this criticism by arguing that if we focus on resilience and effective coping as a norm for minority groups and individuals, failure to cope will be seen as an individual failure and not a failure by society (Meyer, 2013).
4.2 Lived Religion Theory
In this study, I paid no attention to how the homophobia and transphobia was religiously motivated by scripture or other theological interpretations. There are plenty of efforts to argue against homophobic interpretations of religious texts. That was not a focus for this study. The framework for this study is Lived Religion theory and the idea that any religion can be made homophobic and transphobic.
The lived religion theory argues that we cannot find answers about religion by studying
scriptures, instead we need to study the people that practice religion. Lived religion gives a value to the individual's experience of religion and not solely the institution's definition of it. Mark Larrimore (2014) writes
The study of lived religion turns received notions of religious inspiration, competence, and purity on their heads by seeing ordinary people as creatively forming their own religious worlds, with or without the resources and authorities of religious traditions, if not indeed against them.
Religion is made up of a complex combination of factors and is affected and shaped by the culture it exists in; the sacred texts written long ago do not say much at all about religion today and what role it has in individuals’ lives. If we forget the intersection between religion and other aspects of society, we end up getting a view of religion that is strictly institutionalized and historically incorrect and potentially irrelevant. If we do not understand religion from various angles, except the institutionalized view, we cannot either understand non-western religion or religion from the view of minorities. This makes attempts to understand religious identity more complex than just studying scripture. Instead of looking at an individual's religious affiliation, lived religion theory suggests that we learn more about religion, with the focus on how
individuals experience their religion, religious identity and the concrete religious practices that they engage in, in their lives. Religion needs to be thought of as an ever changing set of practices and actions that are sometimes very far from the scriptures and the idea of religious institutions.
The same religion can be used to motivate huge financial donations to mega churches with pastors that own several private planes and also argue that living in poverty is a religious sacred sacrifice (McGuire, pg 5, 2008).
Sociologist of Religion and lived religion theorist Meredith McGuire argues that it is not possible to get significant information about individual religious practices through quantitative studies.
Rather, one needs to study religion through qualitative interviews with the religious practitioners.
Religious individuals' religious lives are not a mini version of the religious institution’s view of what the religion is. Instead, it is something more complicated and since a religion is, in essence, the people that practice it, the answer to the question “what is a religion?” can be found by interviewing people and not by looking at the religious institutions (McGuire, pg 187, 2008). We cannot assume that the religious experience is the same as long as you belong to the same
religion. For example, to know something about someone's religious identity, one also needs to know about things like the race, class, gender and sexuality of a person. A LGBTQ Christian individual, most likely has a different religious experience than a white, heterosexual,
middle-age man, even if they belong to the same religion. Many LGBTQ individuals need to reject doctrines that do not apply to them or that directly condemn them, and need to find views that are more affirming, even if they stay in a non-affirming religious community. Studies have shown that heterosexual couples that have religious involvement have relationships with high levels of marital satisfaction and relational support (Mahoney, Pargament, Tarakeshwar, &
Swank, 2001), while LGBT individuals do not rank religious communities as source of support (Bryant & Demian, 1994) . While religion and religious involvement serve to strengthen and support heterosexual family life; studies have shown that LGBTQ individuals prefer to
participate in more private forms of religious expression, due to the stress of rejection (Rostosky, Riggle, Kelly & Brodnicki 2008).
McGuire (2008) argues that we need to pay extra attention to how gender and sexuality shapes religious experiences and religious communities are where we learn how to perform our gender expectations and what is expected of us. This links to the role of the body in religion. With the concept of lived religion comes the concept of embodied religion. When religion becomes more than sacred scriptures, one needs to look at the embodiment of it to understand it. Western religion has, beginning in centuries past, created a separation between religious life that is happening in the head, and the lower part of the body. The goal is for one to overcome the body as much as possible and be in control of its impulses. In lived religion theory, the body becomes where the information about religious life can be found (McGuire, pg 187, 2008). The body will make sense out of the doctrines it has been taught through practicing rituals. McGuire (2008) writes:
Lived religion is constituted by the practices people use to remember, share , enact , adapt, create, and combine the stories out of which they live. And it comes into being through the often-mundane practices people use to transform these meaningful interpretations into everyday action. Human bodies matter, because those practices—even interior ones, such as contemplation, involve people's bodies, as well as their minds and spirits.
The gendered lived religion is linked to the body, since it is the body that in most cases, but not all, shows differences between males and females. There is in gendered lived religion that we can find most differences of how religion shapes us and how different religious experiences are, depending on one's gender expression. The potential biological differences between men and women are minimal, if one looks at all the cultural differences that have been created, especially in religious life. Most religions create different religious roles and experiences, based on gender and McGuire writes that religion is being used to defend and explain hierarchy and traditional gender roles, and with that, heteronormativity (McGuire, pg 166, 2008). McGuire argues that religious groups are social contexts where one can find an audience for the gender roles that they perform and even get specific religious training to perform those roles correctly. In many
religious traditions, religious rituals and tradition have had the role of socializing their members into the gender appropriate behaviors, feelings and sexuality. To not prescribe to those gender roles means to not have a place in the religious community (McGuire, pg 165, 2008).
To have control over one's body, its sexual urges and bodily functions was historically, and still is, seen as something of high religious value in many religions. The female body was, and still is, seen as not able to control its urges. It is seen as too human and cannot hide its humanity due to menstruation, pregnancy and lactation. Religion has been used to reinforce gender norms and hetero norms; the idea that women are the keepers of the private and men of the public has been strengthened by separating men and women’s religious spaces and communities. Women's religious life mirrors the role that they are encouraged to keep in society, while many religions have different offerings for men to encourage the male role and to not femininize men’s religious life. Historically, we can see this in groups like Freemasons, Odd Fellow and the Ku Klux Klan.
Religion was used as a way to create a sacred and mystic life for men and criticism states that this has encouraged the American male’s identity in the family to be absent and distant (McGuire, pg 170, 2008).
Queer lived religion happens when we invite in our bodies and their desires in our religious lives.
Religious creativity is even more important for a queer person since the religious communities are not always welcoming. To find a way to “do” religion in a way that allows some kind of affirmation is vital. Religion is a cause of pain and stress for many LGBTQ people, but it has also historically been “used” as a way of not having to have the pressure of living a traditional heteronormative life with marriage and children. David Hunter writes how the early Christian view of celibacy as the ideal human behavior also devalued heterosexual life and a new ideal developed. This ideal was not attached to a heteronormative, binary idea of gender (Talvacchia
& Larrimore, 2014). There are other examples how homosexual individuals are making religious choices that will make them be questioned less for not living a heterosexual life. One example is the choice of joining the Salvation Army where two women could live and work together
without being questioned (Blomqvist, 2017).
5. Analysis
I ended up with five recurring categories that were the basis for my thesis. This chapter is divided according to these categories. The categories are: Love the sinner hate the sin,
Embodiment and disembodiment, Beliefs about god growing up, Abuse, and Religious beliefs today. There are five analysis categories and six headings. The category Abuse is being analyzed in two sections: Sky-daddy was not real and Exorcise the demon out of me. The reason for this is that I found two aspects of the abuse; the actual abuse and the results of it, in the participants' lives and felt while both related to the abuse, it was helpful to separate these from one another.
The results of the abuse were significant in many participants' lives so I determined it needed its own heading.
5.1 Love the sinner hate the sin
The saying “Love the sinner hate the sin” is a commonly used phrase that invites a separation between someone's actions, the body, and the soul. Love the sinner hate the sin is a saying that can be heard mostly in the evangelical christian tradition. Contrary to what many believe the phrase does not originate from the Bible instead it can be traced to Mahatma Ghandi’s
autobiography but some also argue that St Augustine, a bishop in North Africa during the fifth century, used the saying (James, 2017).
Many of the participants in this study expressed that they were “hit and caressed with the same hand” as Billie, a lesbian woman in her 40s, expressed it. They were given hope by religious leaders to be accepted if they only controlled their homosexuality and didn’t act on it. One woman, Susan, who came from a Pentecostal background, expressed that she was a very “good Christian” and she really wanted to fit in. She was told that as long as she didn’t act on her lesbian impulses, just as an alcoholic is fighting the urge to drink, she could still be a good Christian.
I spoke with a pastor and admitted my feelings and I was told that sometimes we are given things in life to test us. The thought is that the temptation and the act is the sin so it will be my life's work to resist that temptation. When I got into the teenager groups it was a lot of preaching about sexual sin in general and lust was a big topic of discussion; it was a big sin whether you were straight or gay. But being queer seemed way worse, it was just disgusting. The other sins people could understand, they seemed natural but being gay was unnatural. (Susan, 2020)
Susan was told early that homosexuality was a sin and she knew that what she felt for girls was abnormal. She also felt a very strong connection to her church and faith, such a strong
connection that it was worth it to spend a life resisting the temptation to be accepted and
included. She later went to conversion therapy to be able to control her “homosexual behaviors”.
She traveled to another state to attend a conversion therapy program that treated many different sinful behaviors.
The place was for anyone 18- 25 years old, that had any issues they struggled with. Some people were there because of drugs, some people were arrested and instead of going to jail they came here, some were pregnant and came here to spend the pregnancy so no one would know, they would have the baby and then go home. It was the throw away place for anyone who had problems (Susan, 2020).
Susan says that in her religious upbringing, homosexuality was equal with other sins, like using drugs or having sex before marriage. To be free from sinning, you had to learn how to control the impulses. Susan explains that homosexual was not something you were, it was a behavior and she saw that as a relief. When she was young and she wanted to be heterosexual, she found that the theory that she could be heterosexual just by not acting on homosexual impulses gave hope, but as time went on and she wasn’t able to stop her thoughts it made her feel like a failure and that increased her anxiety.
I hated myself because I disappointed god. That I wasn't perfect and that I made mistakes. The expectations from god were hard. We were told that if you die or if god comes back, and that could happen at any moment, and if you had sinned and have not repented on that sin you would go to hell. So I had this silent mantra in my head that was; please forgive me please forgive me from the
time I was about 3. Maybe 3 or 4 months ago it popped out, I noticed that mantra was going on in my head (Susan, 2020).
Susan grew up with a constant fear of god. Avoiding god’s fury, that had been triggered by her sexuality, was a full-time job that consisted of constant apologizing. The shame is so deeply ingrained in her that she can be surprised by the “please forgive me mantra” popping up in her mind. At the same time as she experienced this deep shame, she says that she did feel love and support in her community, as long as she was willing to not live as a lesbian. It was accepted belief in her congregation that humans will feel temptations and be misled by the devil, but you had to fight it.
Love the sinner but hate the sin separates the unclean body from the pure soul and that kind of disembodiment is a common foundation of religious homophobia and transphobia. Statements like Jesus loves the sinner but hates the sin, creates an illusion of being loved and fuels the possibility of being accepted into a homophobic/transphobic community if one only stops sinning. The idea that you can change your sexuality or gender identity to be accepted and loved by god creates internalized homophobia (Ream & Savin-Williams, 2005) and för an LGBTQ person it is most likely a set-up for failure. The biggest challenge is that it gives hope and like one of the participants said “it hits and caresses with the same hand”. Instead of being fully rejected for who you are, you are being partly rejected and given the hope of being fully accepted, once you master your sinful urges. Both Susan and Billie expressed that they felt the hope and the possibility of being someone else, and that is painful since that is not really possible. But both share that to be presented with the option to be loved as long as one was not acting on homosexual thoughts was first experienced as a relief and a way to keep on existing in the religious community.
Andre is a gay transman in his 40s. He was raised catholic and is still a practicing catholic and he goes to mass once a week. Andre also received the message growing up that homosexuality and being transgender is a burden that you are given from god and that you should fight by
controlling your impulses and behaviors. As an adult he still believes some parts of what he learned as a child to be true.
Yes homosexuality is a burden that god gives to some people but you have to deal with it. You could get cancer or other burdens and being gay is the same thing. God gave you it as a test but you don't act on it. It is ok to be gay but you just can’t BE gay. You can’t have sex, it is ok to be gay but you just can’t do what normal people do (Andre, 2020).
He talks about compartmentalizing between who you are, someone who is deeply loved by god, and the burden that you are given; a disease or an addiction or being gay. You need to control that burden, heal from it or not act on. Just as you can learn to live with other not-so-pleasant truths about yourself; addiction, health conditions etc you can have the same attitude towards your sexuality.
Billie is a lesbian in her 40s. She grew up in a very strict Pentecostal religious community that didn't allow girls to wear anything but skirts and shirts with turtlenecks and they were not allowed to listen to non-religious music or watch television. Her mother moved the family around a lot and they were members of many different religious groups.
Because of so many mixed messages from my mom about religion there were times when I thought;
yes I am gonna go to hell for being a lesbian and I can do better and I need to pray and ask god to please forgive me and help me be who I am supposed to be (Billie, 2020).
Just like Billie was hoping that she could pray her homosexuality away many participants expressed growing up with the idea that change was possible, if only one was a devoted enough religious person. This was described as something that felt hopeful. However, after a while most participants expressed that it started to feel like too great a task since there were so many
“relapses” when they tried to live without acting on the temptations. The relapses were described as anything from “unclean thoughts” to having sex with someone. The relapses also cause stress and anxiety.
Ken is a 60 year old gay male living in New York City. He says that he is living a “gold star gay life”, which for him means living a life with mostly other gay males as friends and a lot of culture, restaurants and clubs. But this has not always been his life. He was raised as a Mormon, in the state of Utah, and spent 30 years of his life fighting “the gay demon”. His wife knew he was gay when they got married and she had no problem with it, since she and the rest of his religious community, didn’t believe in homosexuality.
It was like marrying someone with cancer or that was a recovering alcoholic. As long as you know what treatment plan is put in place and that the person plans to follow it to recover most people don’t see it as a problem. We never called it “being homosexual”, we called it having a homosexual behavior. It was that whole “Jesus loves the sinner but hates the sin” thing. It was just a behavior, like eating too much candy. It really messed me up though, I was trying for so long to control that behavior from when I was really young. I got married young as an advice from the elders to not get deeper into the homosexual thoughts. We had a family and had a church life like everyone else. I was the head of the family and was a stand-in for god in the family life and made all decisions, just like it is in Mormon families, but on the side I had hookups with guys. I hated myself. I knew I was gay from the age of 7 years old and I was always told that as long as you are not acting gay it is fine and that Jesus loves you just not your actions. To say that to someone really messes them up! (Ken, 2020)
In Ken’s life, religion was used to strengthen gender roles; heterosexual family life was presented as the only option and a important aspect of religious life. Religion is a place where one learns how to perform gender roles and what is expected, based on your gender (McGuire, 2008). Even if many conservative religions preach the inherent differences between the two biological sexes and how traditional gender roles and heterosexual family life is natural, there does not appear to be much trust in that this will happen without intervention. Rules and supervision need to be in place to reinforce the heterosexual ideal. A lot of emphasis is put in place to make sure heterosexual life happens in a prescribed fashion: traditions, ceremonies, rituals, clear instructions of how each gender role should be played and how they should interact with each other. The performative aspect of gender becomes even more undeniable when one look at the instructions Ken got of how to play the role of a heterosexual married man.
Both Andre and Ken were told that homosexuality was no different than other burdens one could be given in life and it was explained in a way that put very little blame on the person who carried this burden; as long as they wanted to control it and wanted to be heterosexual. They both created alternate ways of existing where their gay identity was something that existed, but needed to be on the backburner. Like Andre said, “you can be gay but you can’t BE gay”.
Studies using the minority stress methods have shown that concealing one's identity does not only cause psychological stress, but also physical health issues and risky behavior (Meyer, 2013). Ken shared how this feeling of trying to not be gay and failing led to a lot of shame and that it made him make unsafe decisions for himself. Ken reports that his partying was a result of trying to live with the conflict of having two identities, one Mormon identity in an heterosexual family and another that was a life with random hook-ups with other homosexual men. This internalized homophobia and hiding is, according to the minority stress model, associated with substance use and other risky behaviors (Meyer, 2013).
Love the sinner hate the sin invites internalized homophobia and creates a separation between identities. Meyer and Dean identify internalized homophobia as “the gay person’s direction of negative social attitudes toward the self, leading to a devaluation of the self and resultant internal conflicts and poor self-regard” (Meyer & Dean, 1998). Susan describes how she hated herself knowing that she would disappoint god and that she kept on asking for forgiveness for the sinful behaviors. Love the sinner hate the sin is a microaggression and a microagression is a subtle way to discriminate that usually results in the victim having a hard time putting their finger on exactly how the discrimination is happening. It might be intentional or unintentional and related to a societal power structure. Microaggression has a negative impact on minority groups' health and it has the most impact when the victim shares an identity with the aggressor, like a religious identity . This kind of microagression shows that being an LGBTQ person and also a religious person are incompatible (Lomash, Brown & Galupo, 2018).
5.2 A soul without a body
When a separation happens between the “sinful” urges of the body and the purity of the soul, a disembodiment is taking place. The verb “disembody” is explained by the Oxford English Dictionary like this: To separate (a soul) from the body; to deliver or free (anything) from the form in which it is embodied. Disembodiment is an aggressive word that speaks of a forceful action. I will use the term as the opposite of embodiment to describe what happens when
LGBTQ people are actively separated from their bodies to be able to have access to the religious sphere. McGuire argues that bodies matter in religion since humans are not disembodied spirits (McGuire, pg 118, 2008).
The body’s limitations and by nature “sinful” urges are something that many religions try to control and avoid. At the same time, most religions recognize that embodiment is important in religious practices (McGuire, pg 102, 2008). The human body is needed in religion; it performs rituals, sings, dances and is dressed in ritual clothing to show religious identity and position.
Religious texts prescribe advice on how to live and how to take care of the body. Religion has opinions about abortion and sex before marriage; about covering one’s hair or head and cutting facial and body hair; how much of the body can be exposed and what foods are acceptable to eat.
Many religions have declared family life as an important part of the religious practices and having children as a part of god’s will for his people. In lived religion theory, religion becomes lived only when it is expressed through a body and humans are not only souls disconnected from the body (McGuire, pg 97, 2008). Embodied religious practices are often a tool to socialize people into gender roles and sexual identities and it is through embodied religion that most LGBTQ people discover that they don’t belong. In this study, I also discovered that it is both through the process of embodied and disembodied religion that LGBTQ people discover that they don't belong.
Many times, LGBTQ people’s experience is that they are only their sexuality; that it becomes their identifier in the larger community, instead of being seen as a multi-faceted individual.
However, in religious communities, they often experience the opposite; they are de-bodied or disembodied. If embodiment is what happens when the body is invited into the religious experience, disembodiment is what happens when the body is unwelcome, ignored or hurt in religious communities, only because of one's LGBTQ identity. Most of the participants expressed an expected rejection; they knew what the religious community’s opinion of their sexual or gender identity was and some were thinking about it in the same way. For LGBTQ individuals to live with expected rejection, something that most LGBTQ individuals do, has shown to increase anxiety, sadness, anger and overall mental exhaustion (Rood, Reisner &
Surace, 2016).
Siri was raised in a western Sikh religious community that practices yoga. She still dresses in traditional clothing, wears a turban and still identifies as a Sikh. She is involved in the
community, even though she has had many negative experiences related to being a lesbian.
It was no outright hate against gay people no, but gay people were not allowed to marry in the Gurdwara and to never feel seen is also violence. Ignoring is a kind of violence. Like when I brought it up to this teacher that I really liked that I am lesbian I was told my sexuality doesn’t matter, that they only see my soul and there was no reason to talk more about it. So my choice of partner and possible family life was of no importance to this person and they are only interested in my spiritual life. It was meant as some kind of proof of acceptance but this actually hurt me. (...) I was only seen as a soul without a body, like my body was so wrong so it couldn't be related to, but everyone else were husbands, wives, mothers and fathers. And this tradition has so many rules and suggestions when it comes to how to live, like everyday life things. I mean they have books that tell you what you should eat when you are pregnant, how many times a month you should have sex, what to wear and even how to take a shower but a LGBTQ person is only seen as a soul and nothing else is of interest? It felt like that homophobic saying: I don’t want to know what you do in the bedroom. (...) It is just interesting because the person who told me this probably considers themselves a liberal person with an open mind. They just don't realize what they are saying. This response to homosexuality is a common response in my religious community (Siri, 2020).
Siri further describes how this experience takes her body from her. She would have felt different if it was a religious tradition where members strived toward living in celibacy and where family
life had no importance, but in her religion family life and how to be in the physical body is considered an important aspect of the religious practices. McGuire argues that it is in religion that LGBTQ people learn that they are not the norm and this is what Siri learned (McGuire, pg 183, 2008). She was not only not the norm, she was also non-existing; there was no place for her body whatsoever and by only referring to her soul, the teacher wanted to pretend it didn't exist.
Siri’s experience with disembodiment was done in a way that was not outright aggressive, but still very oppressive and clearly expressed that Siri’s body as a lesbian had no importance or function in the community.
LGBTQ people are used to disembodiment and non-LGBTQ people are used to disembody LGBTQ people, without having to feel that they are homophobic and/or transphobic. The action of disembodiment has been normalized and it is part of societal structure. An example of this is the equal-marriage discussion and how many people felt that other people's level of readiness for same sex marriage was more important than giving LGBTQ people human rights. Another example is how transgender individuals were forced, as a part of the transitioning process, to be sterilized in Sweden until year 2013. In Sweden, trans individuals were still being forced to undergo sterilization at the same time it was decided that the members of the minority groups that historically have been sterilized by the Swedish state, were given compensation from the government (Lundgren, 2013).
To take agency over a LGBTQ individual’s body is the heteronormative society’s perceived right. “Normal” bodies have claimed the authority to make decisions over the “abnormal”
bodies, based on their comfort level with their abnormalities. To deny someone basic human rights, like family life or the right to make medical decisions over your own body, results in internalized homophobia and the ability to fully participate in society (Meyer & Frost 2013). I want to argue that it also results in disembodiment. Siri describes how she was not a full participant in her religious community and she believes that the person who disembodied her probably considered themselves open-minded and would not agree that this was a violent act with any bad intentions. These kinds of microaggressions have very unique and challenging
consequences, since a religious community has an importance as a place of healing and support.
To be denied access to this and instead met with microaggressions is traumatic (Lomash, Tabria
& Galupo 2019).
Jake has also experienced disembodiment. He is a 38 year old trans man who is a Unitarian- Universalist. Unitarian-Universalism is considered a very liberal religion and has been in the forefront for LGBTQ people’s rights. Jake was raised as a Baptist and experienced a lot of homophobia in his childhood religion, but he feels like even religions who claim to be welcoming have heterosexuality as a norm.
I visited a Unitarian Universalist church and told a lady that I felt out of place by being a minority in a group of straight people and the lady said : Oh no no honey I don't see you as different from us. On the inside we are all the same. She meant well but it didn't make me feel seen. We need people to see and care about all of us for who we are not for who they are comfortable with that we are (Jake, 2020).
Jake said that it is very obvious that he was different from the others in that church and that the person who was trying to comfort him took away who he is by employing the belief that they are in fact the same, which they obviously weren't. He thinks his differences could not be recognized because they were seen as negative, while them being more normative was positive. To claim that he was not seen as different was a compliment and a way to show that he was accepted. He is asking: why isn't it possible for me to be welcomed in a group even if I am a minority? Jake needed to be made the same to be able to belong, to say that they didn't see his “abnormality”
disembodied him. It robbed him of his identity.
Ken has had many experiences of people not wanting to relate to his physical body and he both got disembodied by others and disembodied himself:
Many people knew I was gay growing up so people only wanted to speak to the part of me that was not gay; my soul. It was like my body was disgusting and I thought so myself for many years. I think that contributed to why I was so sexually promiscuous. It actually made it easier doing things I
shouldn’t do, like I had this body that was betraying me and that wasn't really me. It was so confusing (Ken, 2020).
Ken’s experience of being sexually promiscuous in a way that was not good for his emotional and physical health, as a result of him being disembodied by his religious community, is a common consequence of homophobia. Studies have shown that the ability to take care of one's body decreases and risky behaviors increase when LGBTQ people are victims of homophobia and transphobia (Meyer, 2013).
All participants that were interviewed for this study expressed that they in one way or another were separated from their body to be accepted in their religious community. I found that all of the participants had experiences of disembodiment in the name of their religion. The
disembodiment had different expressions; it ranged from hate and violence to bypassing, but in every form it left the LGBTQ person separated from their body, ashamed, hurt, and/or unseen.
5.3 No way to hide from god
Karen is in her late 60s, identifies as United Methodist with a Native American heritage, and lived with the shame of being a lesbian for many decades. It started with not feeling normal in her church as a child. She has 3 children with her female partner and no one at the children's school knew that the children had two moms until the youngest was 10 years old. She described how she was terrified when the teacher told the parents of each child to stand up next to their child during a school meeting; this would make it clear that their daughter had lesbian moms.
Growing up I had a lot of shame from the religious community, but not so much in front of god.
Actually not at all in front of god. My religious belief was also based in the Native American belief that god is everywhere. I grew up on a farm and I saw god's miracles everywhere in the animals. I think that saved me in many ways- I didn't doubt god's love. I felt like I knew god very well and I still do. I think that was because I had found god elsewhere than the church (Karen, 2020).
