Changing Devotions and Perspectives
Tony Dillon-Hansen
May 2014
Question was posed for the Deacons of Plymouth Church: "What
was God in your life in your youth; what changed; and what is God calling you
to do today?" As the question asks about experiences and how they have
changed, God, in this context, can be described as religion, faith or the
omnipotent being that one might call a deity.
A wide breadth of change in faith is most certainly the case for me. The
wealth of positive and negative memories and experiences of my life to this
question reverberated, and so, I pick to split an answer to the question into
two parts. This part will reminisce of the past youthful gaze and also consider
what has changed especially how I found myself in constant quarrel with
religion and my sexuality.
During my childhood, I was raised as a regular, Mass-attending
Catholic from a devoted Catholic family that also had strong ties to Missouri
Synod Lutheran via my dad’s side of the family. Religion was never a delicate
subject in the house, and church was a place of sincere reverence and worship.
Attendance was not optional, and I personally witnessed how important one’s
religion was. This was revealed to me at a young age when I tried to tell my
dad’s mother (strong Lutheran) about our first confession and communion
catechism, but Dad suggested that Grandma would rather not be reminded that her
grandchildren were Catholic.
I remember vividly considering an awe of priesthood, and
remembering the premise of the teachings that spoke of love, honesty,
compassion, non-violence, service to the community and of leading a “good-life”
that is the core of the Catholic teachings. With personal strong feelings of
loyalty and willingness to serve, I thought that God might be calling me to the
vows of Holy Orders. Therefore, I was dutiful to the Church as an altar boy and
then in high school, my duties included cantor and reading scriptures at Mass.
Yet, there was something different about me in comparison to the
teachings as I began to realize my attractions did not follow what seemed to be
expected of me as a young man. I was not immediately attracted to girls and
wanted so much to be a model son for my family but immediately felt guilty by
my mysterious sexuality. I could not why
understand those feelings were so considered disgusting and vial by many
leaders in the Church because those feelings were no less the reality of my
being. I was at pains to ignore them for fear of discovery or worse for disgracing
my parents.
During college, there was an effort to stay involved with the
Church, but that soon changed for a variety of reasons (e.g. attending regular
Mass was not convenient anymore, new town, and changing feelings in general). At
this time, I started finding myself aligning with members of the college gay
union (UI GLBTU) and studying martial arts.
Many would be asking why a person would hold onto such convictions and
devotion to a Church that denied the one’s very existence. That was crushing,
and especially when members of the family learned of my apparent change of
hearts, the extended family quickly labeled me as supposedly inferior and
unworthy.
All of the good nature espoused by the Church and all of the good
will that God was supposed to be was utter hypocrisy. Words were used at me,
lies told against me, and manipulations of religion as fictitious evidence was
destructive to me and my family. A massive collision of faith, family and
personal struggle lead to me truly understand bitterness and hate.
Yet, I pursued an aspect of martial arts via the underlying
teachings of the techniques. While my
skill and technique grew, I found strength in the new abilities and also in the
philosophies from Taoists and Buddhists, like Alan Watts. Partially in my mind,
I was trying to understand how these correspond to my home in Catholic
teachings, which they share many ideals despite their differences about
religion. What these philosophies would do was to show me a way to meditate and
to lessen the hate or bitterness that I developed. These philosophies also did
not seem to ignore the natural way of the world.
I found solace in the meditations and learned better ways of
connecting experiences instead of through bitterness. Natural logic of the cosmos and infinity of
what we do not know had a path. These no longer required to be controlled, and
God was no longer the conjured image of an old, wise man sitting on a throne
with perfect plans. There was a natural order to things, but the presence of
thought and action rested securely with the person conducting them. Focus turns
into the betterment of oneself.
Yet, I struggled because I was essentially exiled from the Church
with strong animosity towards those that professed good but proceeded to
inflict great harm on others in the name of a supposedly “Holy one.” The “holiness”
of religion was ridiculed by this, and I turned to despair about any existence
as a bag of ego and lies.
I rejected organized religion as a whole and the aspects therein,
especially as these parts of society sought to push their sinister hypocrisy
upon the whole of our legal system by conscientiously denying equal protections
or even the right to marry the one we love.
The loving and compassionate God I learned about in youth was
either a far-flung illusion or God was being mocked by what these people were
doing and professing. There are a number of people that share this exact
sentiment.
Yes, Christianity and Buddhism have perceptible differences of
perspective, but they have in them core considerations of what all people seek:
to find and to be peace. The leaders of organized religion seemed too often
interested in disturbing that peace.
May your June Pride be in Peace!
