Fundamentals of Media Messaging Blog Post

I was taught to hate who I am.

Until my sophomore year of college, I attended small, conservative Catholic schools. my educators taught me that members of the LGBTQ+ community are sinners; I was indoctrinated to hate part of my identity.

 

This education was justified in their minds because they genuinely believed they were teaching me morality. They were simply following their catechism and satisfying the evangelical aspect of their faith-based mission.

They convinced themselves they were justified because they weren’t teaching us to hate gay people; they taught us to hate their actions.

 

In eighth grade, a priest informed my class that Catholics are called to love anyone in the LGBTQ+ community, but that they are also called to acknowledge LGBTQ+ “lifestyles” as sinful. When a student asked why these lifestyles are sinful, the priest said that God intends sexual intimacy to exclusively be partaken in for procreation purposes; thus, same-sex partners are partaking in sinful actions.

 

The student then asked, “What about heterosexual couples who can’t have kids?” The priest explained that marriage is intended to be between a man and a woman—a sentiment that Pope Francis himself corroborates (despite later saying he supports same-sex civil unions).

 

This conversation was not an isolated incident. My high school journey was riddled with them.

 

I listened as theology teachers continually informed me that members of the LGBTQ+ would be loved and welcomed with open arms as long as they vowed to live a life of chastity.

 

They taught me that love is conditional.

 

They vowed to love me as long as I vowed to not be my true self. They vowed to love me as long as I deprived myself of the ultimate act of love.

 

Catholics are called to love all of God’s children (even those who don’t believe in God), yet they do everything in their power to exclude an entire sect of God’s children. Catholics’ inability to address this irony continually harms God’s children.

 

I eventually learned to love who I am, but it took unlearning years of Catholic education to get there. I transferred to a large, liberal public school my sophomore year of college. There, at Kent State University, I was loved for exactly who I am.

 

At Kent, I learned that true love, unlike Catholic love, is unconditional.