The Lambeth medal sat on my desk as I worked on the final draft of my book. Each time I saw it, it was a visual reminder that I was part of the wider church family, despite the evangelical movement still treating me like an outsider. We needed a title for the book and, chatting with my team at HarperCollins, I suggested the idea of calling it Undivided. We all agreed it was a great fit.
Writing the memoir had not been easy. It was hard to revisit all the difficult memories. I knew I had to do it, though; people needed to hear what many LGBTQ+ people of faith still face today. I also wanted to encourage anyone who’d traveled a similar path, reminding them that they weren’t alone. So I’d revisited the painful memories, and, armed with lots of Earl Grey tea, I was doing my best to finish the final edit.
To break up those long days of typing, and the emotional ups and downs of what I was writing about, I regularly walked to my post-office box and checked for new mail. Since August 2014 and the publication of my first interview, people had been writing from around the world, and they continue to do so now in 2018. Many said they’d discovered my writing or interviews online, and that my story had been the catalyst they needed to come out too. It was deeply moving to hear it over and over.
Reading those letters inspired me to keep going with the manuscript. When the process felt too hard emotionally, and when fatigue from fibromyalgia and ME was bringing me to my knees, I pulled out those envelopes and read. I loved the colorful stamps and diverse handwriting, all reminders that this is a global issue and that we need each other.
One particular day, I received a card from a teenage girl who I’ll rename Sophie to protect her privacy. She was fourteen, living in the US in a traditional religious family, and had been a Christian since childhood.
Sophie told me she’d felt a lot of shame when at the age of thirteen she’d realized she was attracted to girls and not boys. She’d sobbed, asking God to make her straight, because she couldn’t cope with the tension of being gay and Christian. Things had felt so bleak that she’d begun self-harming with razor blades, and one night she lined up two bottles of painkillers, planning to take a massive overdose. In a last-ditch attempt to stop herself, she googled, “Can you be gay and Christian?,” assuming from her family and church experience that the answer was no.
Her letter explained to me that, in her online search, she’d found my coming-out interview and read it in floods of tears. Hearing that others were embracing both their faith and their LGBTQ+ orientation was, she said, like switching on a light. The darkness, she told me, began to fade, and hope crept in. That night she didn’t take her own life.
Sophie came out to her parents a few weeks later and, although they disagreed theologically, they were working things through with unconditional love. Her card ended with one final sentence: “Thank you for keeping me alive.” I read it with tears running down my face.
I was humbled and touched by her words. I didn’t consider myself anyone particularly special; I knew if she hadn’t found me in her Google search, she would’ve found another LGBTQ+ activist, as there were many of us out there sharing the same message. But it meant so much to know my story had helped her.
I couldn’t help thinking how similar she’d sounded to my own fourteen-year-old self, battling with darkness, pain, and thoughts of suicide. It meant more than I could express to know Sophie’s life would play out so differently from mine. She hadn’t waited until the age of thirty-five to come out of the closet. She had her teens and twenties ahead of her to enjoy. She could experience dating and relationships alongside all her straight peers. She could grow into a person confident in her identity. She could be happy and fully alive.
None of us can go back and change our own regrets, but we can help others have a brighter future.
I closed Sophie’s card and saw it had a quote written on the front. It was from St. Catherine of Siena, a fourteenth-century Catholic theologian who had a passion for speaking truth to power. Sophie had scribbled a sentence above it saying: “This sums up how I’ll live my life from now on.” I read the Catherine of Siena quote and smiled. It said: “Be the person you were created to be, and you will set the world on fire.”
Sophie was, I could tell, one of many young people who were going to take the world by storm. I knew she represented a younger generation of LGBTQ+ people who would start their journey of self-acceptance far earlier than many my age had done. As a result, they would be even more courageous and dream even bigger. They would live to see the church and wider society move to places of inclusion that would roll on far beyond my lifetime. If this was a glimpse of the future, then things were headed in a hopeful direction indeed.
I placed her card on my window ledge, and it still sits there today, reminding me why I’m here and what matters most. It spurs me on, to keep going with my campaigning work, even when my health is up and down and when vitriol continues to pour in from those who oppose LGBTQ+ equality. I want to see lives helped and made whole, and I will never give up on that quest. It’s all totally worth it—Sophie and countless others remind me of that.
Wherever I find myself these days, whether at corporate conferences giving keynotes on diversity or in one-to-one conversations with pastors helping them embrace LGBTQ+ equality, my message is the same: We become our most beautiful, powerful, irreplaceable selves when we allow our diversity to shine.
This can only happen when we refuse to feel shame about the things that make us unique and different, when we gather together the fragmented pieces of who we are and boldly unite them into a self that is congruent and in harmony. Vulnerability is difficult, but crucial. Radical, raw, heartfelt authenticity is tough, but worth it.
Freed from shame and fear, we are finally able to live, and love, from a place of wholeness. We find peace. We become complete. We become people who are, at our deepest core, undivided.
Author’s Note
Resources and Disclaimers
To stay in touch with me and to support the work I’m doing, find me online here:
www.vickybeeching.com
www.twitter.com/vickybeeching
www.instagram.com/vickybeeching
www.facebook.com/vickybeeching/
If you’ve finished this book and are interested in reading more about LGBTQ+ equality, I’d love to help. Visit my website for a list of recommended books that explore what the Bible does and doesn’t say about same-sex relationships and marriage, that tell other people’s stories of reconciling their faith and their LGBTQ+ orientation, and that promote LGBTQ+ equality in wider society: www.vickybeeching.com/LGBTresources.
A few quick disclaimers: I do not claim to represent all gay people or all gay Christians—everyone’s journey is totally unique, and many will have had very different experiences.
I am aware that, despite my difficult journey, I am still a person with much privilege; I am white, educated, and living in the UK. Others face much greater hardships.
I acknowledge that evangelical churches are not a denomination or even a homogenous group. Rather, evangelicalism is a movement, and the expression of its values varies from church to church; some churches are, thankfully, more progressive than others, but these are still a small minority.
This is not a theology book or an academic essay; it’s a memoir. Because of that, my explanations of how to understand the Bible had to be extremely limited in word count. They are simply a light-touch, narrative introduction to what LGBTQ+ theology might cover, and are not intended to be substantial or academic.
I acknowledge that fibromyalgia and ME are very complex illnesses, as is scleroderma. Nervous breakdowns, likewise, are complicated and multifaceted. In this book I have only shared my personal experiences and have explained the conditions to the best of my understanding. This is not a medical textbook; other patients will have their own varying symptoms and experiences, and their own views on causation and treatment.
All the stories and memories in this book are remembered to the best of my ability. T
o protect other people’s identities, I’ve changed names where appropriate. Some of the timelines referenced in this book have been stretched or compressed to enable chapters to flow. Some of the interviews, letters, or meetings have been amalgamated into overall representative examples for brevity. Fitting a lifetime into a book is not easy, but I’ve done my absolute best.
A theological disclaimer: In this book, I refer to God solely with male pronouns. Personally, I prefer to alternate between male and female pronouns for God or to use something gender neutral, as God is beyond gender. I had to choose how many battles to fight in this book, and that battle felt like one too many: for traditional Christians, seeing “she” or “they” in reference to God would only have increased the difficulties of engaging with my story, so I chose to stick with masculine pronouns.
Referring to God in the feminine is not a recent invention. The English anchoress and mystic Julian of Norwich, writing during the Middle Ages, described God as “Mother.” For biblical examples of God’s feminine nature and genderlessness, see Genesis 1:27; Hosea 11:3–4; Isaiah 66:13; Psalm 131:2; and Matthew 23:37.
Acknowledgments
Writer and professor Askhari Johnson Hodari said, “If everyone helps to hold up the sky, then one person does not become tired.” I love that imagery; it’s certainly been true in the writing of this book. I’m grateful to everyone who has played a part!
First, thank you to my publishers on both sides of the pond. To everyone at HarperOne in San Francisco: thank you to Katy Hamilton, my amazing and infinitely patient editor, and to Mark Tauber for pursuing and signing me; to Anna Paustenbach, Suzanne Quist, Jenn Jensen, Courtney Nobile, Adrian Morgan, Ann Moru, Yvonne Chan, and Trina Hunn—you are all phenomenal.
To everyone at William Collins in London: thank you to Carlos Darby, Katherine Patrick, Matt Clacher, Myles Archibald, Caroline Bovey, and Fliss Porter—you have all been incredible to work with; and to Andrew Lyon for getting the book’s journey started in the UK. I’m also grateful to Gail Ross, Howard Yoon, Dara Kaye, and Anna Sproul-Latimer for help with the book during my stay in Washington, DC.
To my family and relatives: thank you for your support and love, especially my mum and dad, who have always wanted the best for me and made many sacrifices to give me a great start in life; my amazing sister, Jo; my ninety-three-year-old grandad Ron (and “Nanny” Dorothy Davies, whom we all miss so much); Stan, Hilda, and Mary Beeching (who still live on in our hearts); the Van der Lindens, Linsells, and all my other relatives—your unconditional love means so much.
To my wonderful circle of friends: thank you for keeping my spirits up and sharing the journey. Wendy Beech-Ward, for so many years of being best friends, for brilliant memories through the highs and lows, and for playing a big role in me finding the courage to come out; Jo Squire, for being so honest, authentic, and supportive—you inspire me to be unapologetically myself; Tanya Marlow, for a friendship that’s lasted since we were eleven and for helping me understand ME/CFS and learn to cope with it. Brandan Robertson, Matthew Vines, Kevin Garcia, Matthias Roberts, Eliel Cruz, Amelia Markham, Justin Lee, Dianna Anderson, Jeremiah Stanley, Sarah Gallagher, and my many other LGBTQ+ Christian friends across the pond: it means the world to be able to talk about faith and sexuality with people who face the same issues!
Here in the UK, thank you to Katharine Welby-Roberts, Leena Norms, Natalie Burwell, Nuala O’Sullivan, Claire Harvey, Helen Semple, Dave Erasmus, Abi Barrett, Stephen Dixon, Heather Staff, Ruth Hunt, Jane Czyzselska, Gabe Stoutimore, and Helen Austin—every one of you makes my life brighter and I’m grateful for our chats! Thank you to Robert Song, Margaret Masson, Becca Dean, Maeve Sherlock, and Simon McMurtary (the wonderful Durhamites!).
Thank you to Patrick Strudwick for doing my 2014 coming-out interview and for your friendship and support ever since. Thanks to Jan Oakley (and Oscar the cat!) for the retreat in Devon. Thank you to Jonathan Merritt for your friendship and your help with my health. Thanks to Seven Graham for so much wisdom and support.
I will forever be grateful to my insightful team of beta readers: Wendy Beech-Ward, Natalie Burwell, Leena Norms, Professor Robert Song, Bishop Alan Wilson, Matthew Vines, Brandan Robertson, Peter Tatchell, Abi Barrett, Canon Mark Oakley, Gabe Stoutimore, Jane Czyzselska, and Brett Farrell.
Tanya Marlow—your role started as a beta reader and transcended into something way beyond that; you became a “book coach” throughout the entire process! You read the entire manuscript at least six times in its different stages and gave endless feedback, line by line, all of which made a huge difference; I’ve learned so much about writing from you.
Thank you to Matthias Roberts for both the US and UK book cover designs; you did an awesome job. Thank you to Nicholas Dawkes for the photo shoot, and to Baxter the “studio dog,” who made me laugh in the photos! Thank you to Micah J. Murray for the excellent book-related web design.
Thank you to everyone who showed me care and kindness during my music career in the US. There are too many to name, but I’m grateful to so many of you, including Bec Fink, Michelle York, David Smallbone and family, Matt Smallbone, Reid McNulty, Chris Nichols, Jen Scoggins, Mel Campbell-Goodson, and Edie Spain.
Thank you to everyone who has provided an endorsement for this book and to all who will help spread the word when the book launches.
My final thanks go to the amazing gang of people in my social media community! Your messages bring me so much joy, and I love that we are journeying through life as a giant group, scattered around the globe but brought together in our digital conversations. We are all in this together.
Appendix
Although I no longer write songs, sometimes I write spoken liturgy for use in churches. The benediction below is one I created on the topic of faith and diversity. It’s part prayer, part blessing, part commission—a free-form thought, without any fixed rhythm or meter, that found its way onto paper. It sums up my hope for a church that will someday make all LGBTQ+ people feel welcome.
A BENEDICTION FOR INCLUSIVE WORSHIP
Words create worlds.
God spoke in Genesis, his language distilling into stars, oceans, planets.
And God still speaks today,
Always innovating and constantly creative.
He does not bend to cultural progress, rather he leads the way.
Not innovation for innovation’s sake,
But the plan of an upside-down kingdom where the last are first,
And the dinner table is set for the unlikeliest of guests.
His magnetic love draws in the outsider
And swings wide the doors for any and for all.
Religious elites look on, shaking their heads,
At this lavish outpouring of outrageous grace.
Words create worlds.
God spoke in Genesis, his language distilling into stars, oceans, planets.
And God still speaks today.
As his voice echoes and new constellations dance into view,
May we have minds that stretch wide enough,
To perceive the vastness of his imagination.
And may we have ears to hear,
Unoffended by the greatness of his grace,
Even when its boundaries venture farther than our own.
Notes
CHAPTER 7
1. Peter Tatchell, “Don’t Fall for the Myth that It’s 50 Years Since We Decriminalised Homosexuality,” The Guardian, May 23, 2007, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/may/23/fifty-years-gay-liberation-uk-barely-four-1967-act.
CHAPTER 9
1. Richard Reddie, “The Church: Enslaver or Liberator?” BBC History, last updated February 17, 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/abolition/church_and_slavery_article_01.shtml.
2. Felicia R. Lee, “From Noah’s Curse to Slavery’s Rationale,” New York Times, November 1, 2003, http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/01/arts/from-noah-s-curse-to-slavery-s-rationale.html.
3. The Canons of the Holy Fathers
Assembled at Gangra, Canon III (340 CE), http://www.tertullian.org/fathers2/NPNF2-14/Npnf2-14-40.htm#P2117_423984.
4. St. Augustine, The City of God, Christian Classics Ethereal Library, https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf102.iv.XIX.15.html.
5. St. Thomas Aquinas, The Summa Theologica, Christian Classics Ethereal Library, https://www.ccel.org/a/aquinas/summa/SS/SS057.html.
6. Leandri de Santisimo Sacramento, Quaestiones Morales Theologicae, vol. 4, https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=W0FFAAAAcAAJ&printsec=front cover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PP1.
7. Pope Pius IX, “Instruction of the Holy Office in Response to Questions from the Vicar Apostolic of the Galla Tribe in Ethiopia on the Legitimacy of Participation of Catholics in the Slave Trade,” June 20, 1866, in Collectanea Sacra Congregationis de Propaganda Fide (1866).
8. Maurice W. Armstrong, Lefferts A. Loetscher, and Charles A. Anderson, eds., The Presbyterian Enterprise (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2001), 214.
9. Armstrong, Loetscher, and Anderson, The Presbyterian Enterprise, 215.
10. Armstrong, Loetscher, and Anderson, The Presbyterian Enterprise, 215.
11. Armstrong, Loetscher, and Anderson, The Presbyterian Enterprise, 214.
12. C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1955), 215.
CHAPTER 11
1. Rev. Justin D. Fulton, The True Woman: A Series of Discourses, to Which Is Added Woman vs. Ballot (Boston: Lee and Shepard, 1869), https://www.loc.gov/item/93838311.
2. J. B. Sanford, “Reasons Why Senate Constitutional Amendment No. 8 Should Not Be Adopted,” The California Outlook, vol. 11, September 16, 1911.
3. Susan Fenimore Cooper, “Female Suffrage: A Letter to the Christian Women of America,” Harper’s New Weekly Magazine, vol. 41 (June–November 1870).
4. Cooper, “Female Suffrage.”
5. Jerry Falwell, “Segregation or Integration: Which?,” sermon preached in 1958.
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