Seeing Ourselves in a Whole New Way
With all the gains we have made in thirty years of activism since Stonewall, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered Americans are still second-class-citizens in our own country:
- denied the estimated 1,047 rights and protections that go with marriage
- denied the right to serve proudly in the military without fear and harassment
- denied the right (in most states) to nondiscrimination in employment and housing
- denied the right (our adversary’s current goal) to adopt or provide foster care for children, even to retain custody of our own birth children
- denied the right (in most churches) to full membership, ordination or marriage
- denied the right to be a boy scout or a boy scout leader
- denied the right to be included in national hate crime legislation, even though we are among the primary victims of a still-growing siege of violence across the nation.
As a result, we are ten times more likely to suffer from alcohol and/or drug addiction.
Our young people are seven times more likely than their peers to commit or attempt suicide.
And the 50,000 letters we’ve received from people who have read my autobiography, Stranger at the Gate: To Be Gay and Christian In America, indicate that most of our sisters and brothers still live in closets of loneliness, self-hatred, guilt, and fear.
We are grateful for the progress we have made and deeply indebted to those who have led the way. But we still have a long road to travel.
Step 1 on the journey to soulforce begins when we experience the suffering but refuse to let it cripple our soul.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered people often believe the untruth that they are inferior, sick and sinful, unloved by God. Real freedom begins not in the courts or the Congress. Real freedom begins in your head when you believe the truth about yourself. For many of us it means seeing ourselves in a whole new way.
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Let these six Soulforce truths help set you free
Six Soulforce Beliefs About Myself
- I am a child of a loving Creator, a daughter or a son of the Soulforce at the center of the universe.*
- I am loved by my Creator exactly as I am. My sexual orientation is not a sickness to be healed nor a sin to be forgiven. My sexual orientation is a gift from my Creator to be accepted, celebrated, and lived with integrity.
- I am not an accident. I have a purpose. I was shaped by my Creator to love God and to assist in God’s eternal struggle to win justice for all Her children who suffer injustice.
- I will not discover my purpose nor realize my power (my own soulforce) until I join my Creator in doing justice (making things fair for all.)
- When I join my Creator in doing justice, my own life will be renewed, empowered, and made more meaningful.
- In serving others, it is as much my moral obligation to refuse to cooperate with evil as it is to cooperate with good.
* Neither Gandhi nor King required sectarian allegiance to any one statement of faith or religious practice. Soulforce welcomes you to do justice with us.
Can you affirm this Soulforce Credo About Myself?
Take your time. Think about it.
Read Gandhi and King.
Read the primary sources that inspired Gandhi and King, for example Jesus and the other great pioneers in faith.
You can go on to Step 2 without believing the Soulforce Credo About Myself, but both Gandhi and King remind us that we can never really be free until we see ourselves in this whole new way.
If you believe the Soulforce Credo About Myself, (or if you are trying to believe it), print it. Sign it. Post it on your mirror. Memorize it. And next time when your parent or your pastor, your teacher or co-worker, a televangelist or a politician, or that rotten little voice in your head tries to get you to believe that you are sick and sinful, let these truths set you free.
If you have signed the Soulforce Credo About Myself, you are ready to go on to:
Step 2: Identify the Cause of Suffering