Unka Glen

Anonymous asked: I’m currently dating a guy who grew up in the bible belt of Nashville. His parents divorced when he was little, and he now has a mother as well as two gay dads. Because of this, he’s gotten a lot of flack from the Christian church, and is very very against Christianity/religion in general. I myself am pretty strong in my faith, and would love to share this part of me with him. He’s respectful of my faith, but the talks we’ve had about faith become kind of awkward because I don’t want to make him feel pressured or anything. How can I talk to him about this without preaching? I really like him, but I have always envisioned myself in a relationship with someone who shares my faith. Thank you so much!!!

Unka Glen answered: The problem here is, there will always be this question in your boyfriend’s mind: will she stay with me if I reject Christ? The bigger problem is, there is no good answer to that question.

If you say, yes I’ll stay with you no matter what, then you’re showing to him a willingness to put the relationship above your beliefs, which shows a disrespect to your beliefs (and maybe a lack of character). It’s hard for you to convince him to believe in something, if you don’t believe in it enough to fully assert it).

If you say no, I will eventually will leave you if you reject a relationship with Christ, then you put him in a position to either fake it, or get rejected by a Christian for not being Christian enough. Something that’s bound to turn him off of Christianity as well.

Choosing to date a non-believer sets up this no-win scenario every time. I know myself from bitter first-hand experience how heartbreaking this situation can be. Either way, you might as well decide whether you’d leave him or not, and give him a clear challenge.

First, he needs to know exactly how you feel, that it’s important that you end up with someone who shares your faith. Second, you aren’t asking him to believe in organized religion in general, or Christianity in particular, you’re asking him to believe in Jesus. And he should know that the only kind of sinner that Jesus harshly rebuked were the legalistic religious types.

For the record, I agree and sympathize with him about his dads. When I hear so-called Christians choosing homosexuality, of all the sins in the world, as a sin that deserves this kind of all out public attack, I think of friends of mine who are gay. Those Christians, whether they realize it or not, are talking about someone I love. And when that happens, it makes me want to find them in a dark alley, and “lay hands” on them. Chicago style.

But your boyfriend already knows and respects Christians who aren’t jacked up, like you. And he knows that shipwrecking his own spiritual life because someone else doesn’t know how to handle theirs, makes no sense. He’s not choosing to act, he’s choosing to react. You aren’t asking him to believe in the God of organized religion, you’re asking him to believe in the God you know and love. The God he’s already started to know through you.