Recently, I had the privilege of attending an Oriented to Love event, a dialogue about sexual diversity in the church. I had no idea what to expect when I signed up for the event, but I knew that it would be something important and life-changing.
The dialogue included people of all ages, both gay and straight, and of differing opinions on sexual diversity within the church. What was amazing about this dialogue was how it was able to bring all of these people together and form close relationships between them. But how did it do that?
The interesting thing about the first night was that we didn’t talk about sexuality much. Instead, the dialogue was focused on our vulnerabilities and burdens. This led to one of the key takeaways from the dialogue: If we want to have effective dialogue, we need to see people as people, not as opinions. If we had started the dialogue by jumping into discussion about sexuality, it wouldn’t have been as effective (and may not have been effective at all). Instead, by first focusing on seeing each other as people, we developed relationships and mutual understanding of each other that allowed us to effectively communicate with, empathize with, and show grace to each other.
When we reconvened the next morning we started discussing issues of sexuality.
The morning was dominated by a single topic: language is important. The language that we use when discussing sexuality has a tremendous impact on how we are understood and how we understand others. Unfortunately, Christians and LGBT people frequently define words differently; this leads to misunderstanding and causes dialogue to break down. If we want to have effective dialogue, we need to understand what everyone means—and this means that we must develop a mutual understanding of what various words (such as gay and queer) mean. Further, labels matter. The way that a label is applied also matters. A label that a person chooses for himself can have a different meaning from a label that someone else imposes upon him—understanding labels, why people use them, and what they mean to that person are essential if we want to know and love them.
My final takeaway was also the most personal: that we must be vulnerable if we wish to effectively love and dialogue with others. This was the most difficult thing for me—I have spent a large part of my life building and maintaining emotional walls intended to protect myself. However, when we choose to be vulnerable, we also open ourselves to loving, life-giving relationships. When a couple or group chooses to be vulnerable with each other, an environment is created in which people feel welcome to share personal stories and differing viewpoints freely, openly, and gracefully—the walls that we use to protect ourselves in discussion (such as harshness and defensiveness) can drop and we can actually talk to each other instead of talking at each other.
For me, learning to be vulnerable took almost the entire weekend. However, when I did, I found myself loved and accepted by everyone there. As a result, I was not only oriented to love, but also oriented to be loved.
Derek Kaser is an IT administrator by profession, and a volunteer technical director and sound engineer at Life Church in Greensburg, PA.
