Chris Adams is a young Liberal Democrat and prospective parliamentary candidate from London. He’s also a Christian. And gay. In a deeply personal new op-ed published by Pink News, he talks about the struggles he faced when reconciling his faith with his sexuality.
“Prior to coming out I had always been taught and accepted … that acting on gay sexual desire was wrong,” Adams writes.
Related: Christian college students are taking a stand against antigay bigotry on campus
Because of this, he says, he married a woman when he was in his mid-20s. Spoiler alert: It didn’t work out.
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“I convinced myself that I was bisexual, because that was OK: I could still get married and have kids that way.”
Turns out, it wasn’t OK. The marriage was miserable. Adams was unhappy the entire time, feeling trapped, guilty, and even suicidal. Not to mention, he put his wife “through hell.”
“She didn’t deserve what I put her through,” he reflects.
Eventually, he decided enough was enough. About two years ago, he came out to his wife and his church.
Related: 10 Bible-Based Reasons Why Christians Should Love Homosexuality
He recalls:
My decision to leave was not taken very well by my church. My pastor rang me and said I couldn’t be a Christian if I was doing this. Friends who had previously said I could crash on their sofa any time of day or night suddenly said they had no time for me. I’m just incredibly grateful for the small group of friends (some Christians but unrelated to my church) who rallied round me to support me. I know that having been rejected by my church, I couldn’t have survived this without them.
As a result, Adams say, he suffered extreme “turmoil.”
“It was an identity crisis,” he says. “I felt as though I had two incompatible identities: neither of which I could deny or give up. … My faith is an integral part of my identity: as deeply personal and unchangeable in nature as my sexuality.”
Today, Adams is in a much better place. It took some time, but he has learned that is is possible to be gay and Christian, despite what some religious extremists might say.
“I know God loves me just as I am,” he writes. “God loves me for who I am. He accepts me and cherishes me. I have known that for each of the last 13 years. Nothing and no-one is going to separate me from the love of God.”
Related: Christians rally around gay teen struggling with his sexuality, offer love and support
And to anyone who still doesn’t believe him, Adams has this to say:
So let me be honest with my fellow Christians, and all those who would dare to judge me for who I am: God is my judge, not you. You have no right. Take the friggin’ log out of your own eye before you start pointing at the speck in mine. Read your Bible and actually try to live by it instead of judging me and making moral declarations about issues that frankly have nothing to do with you. And if you decide to start making those pronouncements, have the guts to say what you really believe: that you believe gay people to be defective and inherently sinful because of the way they are. At least then we can call it the hate crime that it is.
Hop over to Pink News to see Adams’ piece in its entirety. It is definitely worth the read!
h/t: Pink News
Notright
Well good for him. Check out https://therainbowright.com its another political blog. Just more proof that bisexuality is mostly bullshit
Brody
So what if this guy “struggled”?
What about about the people he deceived for years?
Good luck getting people to vote for someone who admitted to defrauding loved ones for years.
Nowuvedoneit
One only needs to look in the mirror and see how much your homophobic and in the closet self is hurting. So get off this website and go more mingle with your Christian straight women.
robert_moore
I should think that is between him and them. He deceived himself for a long time, but once he stopped deceiving himself, he stopped deceiving them. For all you know, he might have done everything he could to make amends to others who were also deceived.
Self-righteousness is not a good look for anyone, cupcake.
JaredMacBride
God is a fictional character, like Vito Corleone.
ChrisK
Yeah, it’s complete Bronze Age BS. He’s still trapped trying to appease a fictional character and still concerned what fellow nutcases think of him.
Kangol
It’s good he’s finally come out and is learning to accept himself. Religious fanaticism and homophobia are a toxic combination, whatever form they come in. I do wonder whether once he learns to accept himself even more he’ll switch from the Liberal Democratic Party to the Labour Party, or whether there’s something in the Liberal Dem platform he agrees with more than Labour. The potential next Conservative leader, Jacob Rees-Mogg, is on record as being proudly anti-gay and anti-same-sex marriage.`LGBTQ Tories have even spoken out against him.
EdWoody
And just think – if he’d grown up without any religion, he would have never gone through all this nonsense and been much happier all along.
Kieran
Not necessarily. Homophobia is prevalent throughout society and in the culture at large. It isn’t just confined to religious institutions. Having a foundational faith in God may have ultimately given him the strength and wisdom to be himself.
Kieran
I sometimes wonder how long heterosexual men would belong to a church that told them they could NEVER have sex with a woman, but only marry and have sex with another man?
There are scores of prohibitions in the Bible that most Christians pay no attention to. Divorce was once a major sin in most Christian churches. Leviticus 11 describes eating ham, shrimp and lobster as abominations. The Bible instructs women to remain silent in church. There are many other examples that have been overruled or considered outdated. But for some reason heterosexuals really like the prohibition on homosexuality. They like it so much that they’ve made it into the worst sin of all.
Brody
But they still don’t hold a candle to Islamists, who continue to pitch us off of rooftops while the so-called humanitarians stand by doing nothing.
Rex Huskey
Yo Kueeran: in a democratic society majority rules.
Goforit
Hey Huckypuck: This is not a democracy. If it were, you would be saying “Madam President”
robert_moore
Confusion is understandable, but a Lib Dem? Good heavens. At least, you’re not a full on Tory just half a Tory. You made it out of one closet, now, you have another process to come out of your political closet.
IWantAFullBeard
Cute guy