I Was In Love With A Preacher Man (Part I)

On twitter last month, I was explain to my friend in Christ Jaymes Terence, how in 2001-2003 I was heavily into going to church. It was new and exciting baptized, filled with the holy ghost, speaking in tongues (though I'm not sure about that last two parts anymore), I was pretty much doing it all. Did that make me any less gay, the answer I give you then and I will you today is absolutely not . I was just not placing myself in the position to be seen as the messy church queen and that I up to this day will maintain. I never was the one on the hunt while the good word was being preached. Everytime I went to church it was just a wonderful thing to see Gods work at it's best

In 2001 I met a Minister and I don't know if I was fortunate to meet him or if he was a crossroads in my life. I met him casually on my way home from the club. And ours kept crossing paths and we exchanged hellos and I took his number and he took mine and we had been talking, dating, going to dinner, walks in the parks well little did I know he had a son that looked like a spitting image of him and the boy is absolutely adorable. Back then, I was into flirting with the idea of fatherhood (ask me what I think now). He was also raising his at the time seperated from wife's child from previous relationship. [Hold what you want to say because it's all going to come full circle]. Whatever problems The Minister and his wife had came way before I came into the picture and I was not introduced to her until much later in us dating. To make matters even more messy, I was introduced to his ex-boyfriend who I saw at NYC pride looking like a freak show, holy hot mess. Things were just a mess all around him but I didn't care he was everything that I was looking for extremely smart, very attractive, slim sexy, with all the essential goods you'd want but his personal life was a mess and his mess shortly became mine.

At one afternoon service during a church visit by Pastor Linda Reid, the controversy reared its ugly head like a boiling pot of water with the lid on it just boiling. She created a prayer line at the end of service and used her gift of "discernment" to call out the "spirit of homosexuality" out of me. I have never been so embarrassed and uncomfortable in my entire life. You just outed me in front of your entire congregation and the gasps that followed just made my back sweat and as he sat there just looking and I looked at him with the look saying Help Me I knew that my mind was speaking to his because it read in my eyes and he was crying because there was nothing either one of us could do. Yes, I let him have it and he explained to me that as a Minister there is nothing he can do about the situation because that was "Gods Work" and I explained to him my experience of being outed in the High School cafeteria and that shame, guilt and disrespect I felt along with the action of being an outcast. I'd be damned at 21, 22 years of age would I go through something I experienced at 16 & 17 all over again. He promised to stand by me and that's when I learned promises are meant to be broken.

Our last official date was at the marina that had once been shadowed by the Twin Towers and we walked around it was a beautiful night September 10, 2001 and we were outlining our future together. Even after the fall out of being called out in front of a major church like that I was still happy and in love with this beautiful Man of God.

As everyone knows the next day the terrorists attacked the United States by air. Communication was damaged and smoke, ash and debris filled the Downtown Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn areas. We spoke about a week later when phone service resumed and he told me that he had a "message from God" that he was hindering my growth as a Christian and that he could not continue being my partner. Up to this day, that was by far the most original break up line I have ever received. I witnessed him and his wife get back together and I slowly found myself out the picture for good. I did what a respectful person in my situation would and should do and thats walk away gracefully. While she was very aware of what was going on in his life, that was still her man, her husband, the father of the child that they have together and even thought they were seperated, I had no place there whether or not their problems existed before or during my dealings with him.

I don't have any quirks and qualms about going to church but i do know that I am just gay if not gayer now than I ever was when i was going to church and thought I love the lord and identify myself as a Christian, Because of the situation I put myself through I have a fear of going back to church. I don't want to go through the calling my homosexual spirt out and I don't want to get wrapped up into the church politics. This Jaymes, is why I have not been to church and why am I scared to see the inside of another church again.

There is a Part II...seriously CODE 10!