Honey, we’re praying for you

[DonViejo]

My parents can't handle the fact that I'm gay, and we'll never agree on religion. But I've found acceptance anyway

BY AARON HARTZLER

“Honey, we’re praying for you.”

This is how my mother ends every email she sends me. Typed in italics and peppered with smiling emoticons, Mom’s electronic missives are as precious as she is — as earnest as the Empty Tomb Cake she bakes each spring on Good Friday. An edible replica of the cave where Jesus was buried after dying on the cross for our sins, the Empty Tomb Cake is the standard passion week centerpiece in my childhood home. It is frosted in gray, surrounded by a field of green coconut grass, and finished off with a Hostess Ding-Dong as the stone that was rolled away. On Saturday night, after everyone goes to bed, Mom steals into the kitchen under cover of night and rolls the Hostess Ding-Dong away from the door of the Empty Tomb Cake, then retouches the frosting. On Easter morning Jesus has risen — right there in the middle of the kitchen table.

As sweet as Mom’s loving messages and born-again baked goods appear at face value, there’s a silent threat in “we’re praying for you” that sticks in my craw. I came out to my parents the first time at the age of 19 when I was kicked out of the Bible college where my dad taught. Since then, their ongoing prayers for my “deliverance” from “Satan’s lie of homosexuality” have continued unabated in the presence of my four younger siblings and the unsuspecting wait staffs of Olive Garden restaurants nationwide. Indeed, my parents offer a never-ending stream of supplication to a God they’re certain is testing them with a son who has been blinded to the righteous pursuit of a female partner by the penis-shaped temptation of Satan.

“We’re praying for you” isn’t a harmless afterthought. It’s not a pleasant wish for my general well-being, continued physical health or financial security. No, my mother’s “we’re praying for you” is an italicized baseball bat, a silent plea for God to change her oldest son from something abhorrent and abominable back to the fresh-faced young man who dated the captain of the Bible college cheerleading squad, before it was discovered he was also sleeping with the captain of the boy’s soccer team.

more
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/31/honey_were_praying_for_you/

[lunasun]

1. sign all letters in tialics with - love is love

All gifts should come from Satan group PFLAG like the If God Hates Gay People Why Did He Make Us So Cute T Shirts!!!

[Kurovski]

2. Well now, ain't the the fuckin' truth.

Adorable. Inside and out.

[beyurslf]

3. I have a religious aunt and uncle like this. I always hesitated to go to their

house when we had gatherings because they always did the "we love you and are praying for you" thing. I knew what they meant. We usually go in January after the holidays so we can all have a dinner. This year, my aunt surprised me when I got there. She hugged me and said she loved me and just wanted me to be happy. I know it doesn't sound like much, but I know it is a huge difference. Made it so much easier to be there.