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I am overwhelmed. I was in tears as I tried to start my acceptance speech in front of so many people, not only the hundreds packing the Abbot Lopez Hall of San Beda College Manila, but I felt humbled in the presence of my awesome fellow awardees.
Photo courtesy of Fr. Regen Luna’s Facebook page
I was worried how I could thank so many who had cooperated with the Lord to get done what the Lord wanted over the years.
First of all I am honored by Pastoral Servant Leader Caesar Patrick Bonales and Pastor Fr. Regen Luna of the Church of God of the Catholic Diocese of One Spirit for nominating me for the Elderly Awards of 2013. They further brought me to tears by so many from the church [http://ecogph.weebly.com] coming all the way from Dasmarinas, Cavite for the awarding ceremony, Sunday October 6, 2013 at San Beda Benedictine Monastery and College in Manila.
Photo courtesy of Fr. Regen Luna’s Facebook page
When Patrick first informed me I had been selected by COSE with nine others for the “Sampung Ulirang Nakatatanda 2013” (Ten Outstanding Elderly Award of 2013 [of the country]), I was stricken with the same thought told by Pope Francis about when he was elected, “Me? A sinner?”
I researched COSE on Facebook and elsewhere. COSE is doing wonderful work in advocacy for the elderly from The Mountain Province in the North to Davao in the south. Their VISION is impressive: “An equitable society that upholds the rights of older people, respects cultural diversity, nurtures their potentials, recognizes them as a significant sector and ensures that they remain healthy, self-reliant, secure and free to love God and people.”
How they carry that out is spelled out in their mission (http://cosephil.wordpress.com)
I sat down and wrote a thank you acceptance speech. Of course I soon realized it was too long to be delivered, so I sent it to them by email.
Each awardee was introduced by a short “Youtube-type” video showing a glimpse of their work for humanity. The five before me were excellent videos. I wondered what could possibly be done for a video about me. I was amazed. There on the mammoth screen before the eyes of hundreds was a very professional two or three-minute “movie.” I later found out it had been researched, compiled, directed and produced by COSE with a lot of resources from Fr. Regen Luna.
Photo courtesy of Fr. Regen Luna’s Facebook page
(Photo is by Kiki Ahmad Harmoko from COSE’s Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10200368255519888&set=a.2199103188008.2094091.1560122244&type=1&theater)
At the ceremony each of us was given a few minutes to speak after the presentation of the trophy and award.
I spoke, at first hesitantly, only the basic contents. I wanted to thank more people. For example, I was so grateful when Pastor Egay Constantino and the good people my friends from the church I founded in 1991, now called MCC Makati, came out to San Beda to support me at the ceremony. [https://www.facebook.com/mccph.makati.9]
The official program places this caption under my photo, “Bishop Richard R. Mickley, 84, from Pasig [in Metro Manila], for 22 years proclaiming God’s love and acceptance of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender [LGBT] community members.”
Here’s an introductory youtube video posted on my Facebook by Fr. Regen Luna from a local TV newscast, PTV PH. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSyrHSJn098&feature=youtu.be
The following is part of what I would have said if each of us could have spoken as long as our heart desired.
Thank You, COSE (Coalition of Services of the Elderly, Inc.)
(by Bishop Richard R. Mickley of the Catholic Diocese of One Spirit, Co-coordinator of The Well)
(Prepared in gratitude to COSE for recognition in the colorful, spectacular ceremony at Abbot Lopez Hall, San Beda College, Manila, as one of the outstanding older persons of 2013, October 6, 2013.)
Thank you. Hello, my name is Richard, and I am an alcoholic. I am accustomed these days to “being the oldest.” I am the oldest in our barangay senior citizen 7:00AM tai chi class (MWF). But today I am a junior to Lolo Julian Siarot from Davao, over there on the end. Did you see him walk right up the steps to the stage with no cane? He is so old that he is a veteran of World War II. I only came along six years later and served in the Korean War in South Korea.
I had my last drink of beer when I was 43 just before I went to rehab when Rizal was 110 and you were very young. There in 1971 I learned to drink the everlasting water Jesus offered the Samaritan woman at the well. The Well became significant in my life.
There I learned also the 12 Steps to Recovery of Alcoholics Anonymous. But I learned them under the watchful eye of Tom Powers, one of the authors of the now world-famous 12 Steps to Recovery which have literally saved the lives of millions. So for 42 years I have been able to share this awesomely spiritual recovery program with many many people in three countries.
At that rehab program, which was so life-saving for me, they had ideas of healing my sex addiction, too. I had a wonderful wife, mother of nine amazing kids in the suburb, and a boyfriend or two in the inner city. But I went to that rehab for alcohol. I did not think their sex rehab idea had anything to do with my recovery from alcohol problems.
Well, for the next ten years I worked on that in therapy, prayer, and study. I published my first book on the subject, Christian Sexuality, in 1975. Then I was able to start helping other people sort out their sexuality, dealing with problems arising from both homophobia and compulsive sex. Thus, I gained experience because of my own life events in working with all kinds of addiction as well as sexuality issues of all kinds.
By 1981 my gay friends were starting to die, 50 of them, one after another, from a strange unknown disease, then often thought of as a gay disease. About all I could do was be with them, cook for them, wash their clothes, clean their bathrooms, and hold their hands when they died.
In 1983 scientists discovered that it was caused by a virus they named HIV. Doctors began to develop medicines, and we began to develop wholistic well-being programs to keep the virus from doing harm. I worked with my friends in wholistic well-being. I served as coordinator of the Interfaith AIDS ministry of churches and faiths in New Zealand, and coordinator of the Faith-based program of the Aids Society of the Philippines. Thus, thank God, I gained experience in dealing with every angle of wholistic well-being for persons living with HIV.
Twenty-two years ago in 1991, although I was already retirement age, 43 people had signed a petition for me to come to Manila and help them with the sexuality message I had been teaching for almost 20 years. One person wrote to me, “I have been kicked out of my church because I am gay. There is nobody here in the Philippines helping gay and lesbian people who love the Lord.” I gave up my home, car, salary, and job as pastor in New Zealand, and came to Manila.
After ten years I received a letter from a young lawyer in the Bureau of Immigration telling me that I must leave the country within a week for violating the Constitution with my blatant homosexual advocacy. I had founded the first openly gay and lesbian organization in the country. I had been an organizer of the first gay and lesbian Pride March in Asia 25 years after such marches were popular all over the world. And I was publicly teaching at university symposia and TV shows that it is not a sin to love the person you love, and I was even blessing their love in wedding ceremonies.
Leave the country within the week. My fellow LGBT activist friends, of whom there were many by that time, suddenly caused an avalanche of letters to land in the Immigration Commissioner’s office about the work I had done in the country to bring to LGBT people a new understanding of justice and freedom from the shackles of homophobia.
That was in 2003. Before long I received a letter from Commissioner Andrea D. Domingo to the effect that I was not being deported, but rather was being made a Filipino by permanent residence “for the valuable work you have done for the people of the Philippines.”
In 2009 I met Argel Tuason. He was looking for a prayer partner. We prayed every week for four years. We meditated on the Gospel. One day we pondered the parable of the Good Samaritan. We felt like Jesus was speaking directly to us. A man was wounded, in need of help. A priest and a Levite passed him up and rushed on to the temple to pray. Jesus did not praise them. But a despised Samaritan man stopped and helped the wounded man get started on his recovery. Jesus praised him, even though the religion of Jesus rejected the marginalized Samaritans as a despised minority, just as the religion of Jesus so often does to LGBT people today.
Argel and I asked ourselves, “What is Jesus telling us? We have been smugly proud of ourselves for praying together for four years. In the meantime uncounted numbers of our LGBT friends are struggling with serious life difficulties.”
We prayed and planned. We opened The Well in May 2013 to help wounded people get started on recovery programs. We knew it is time to get off our knees long enough to do what Jesus urged us to do when he told the story of the Good Samaritan.
Thanks to our fabulous volunteer staff, there is no charge of any kind. The Well is about healing, not money. We don’t have an office or meeting rooms. We do have people with serious life difficulties and we have support groups for them. For persons living with HIV to live fully with wholistic wellness, addicts of all kinds of addiction to step out and live in wellness. People who want relationships happiness to learn how to live in a happy adult love relationship. And all in wholistic wellness.
The seriousness of an HIV support program became very clear to me when a beloved member of my own family informed me that he was HIV positive. I could not just tell him, “Do everything right, and you will be ok.” I put in writing exactly what I mean by “doing everything right.” And I developed support group programs. In The Well we welcome people living with HIV to support each other in a program of wholistic health and well-being.
People with sex addiction were very enthusiastic, dedicated and committed to stepping out of the problems their compulsive sex was causing them. One such person was so serious he wanted to be in a support group several times a week. More meetings were scheduled. He is coming every time. He is making wonderful progress.
More groups, more support, similar stories of sincere people and dedicated staff members. I am grateful to COSE for the recognition that should be shared by my bishop, Jim Burch, for his faith in me and his encouragement; to Co-CDOS priest, Fr. Regen Luna Pastor of ECOG Dasmarinas; to my nominator, Pastoral Servant Leader, Patrick Bonales, of ECOG Pasig; to my co-founder of The Well, Argel Tuason; and of course to my ever supportive life partner.
Ako si Richard, a sinner, an alcoholic. I share my journey with its experience to help others help themselves in their journey to wellness, happiness, and fulfillment. If I can help one person with HIV to live in wellness and fulfillment, I shall not have lived in vain.
Thank you.
Email: saintaelred@gmail.com
Mobile: 0920 903 4909
http://www.facebook.com/thewellphilippines
http://www.onespiritcatholic.org
All four photos above are courtesy of Fr. Regen Luna’s Facebook page
The last few days at The Well have been exciting and eventful days. First we had the wonderful experience of meeting the friendly and very special people of She Planet.
A few days ago we had just finished an HIV support group get-together where we discussed the 10 essential elements of a personal plan for wellness when living with HIV, and more excitement was in store.
It was followed by a support group for problems with homophobia, stigma, and coming out. It was an emotional and moving time of talking with a young professional accountant who had never discussed his gayness with anyone who was positive and affirming with him.
He was extremely fearful of coming out, but he did not want to continue a double life. He had had several traumatic experiences with people meaningful to him who quoted the Bible and described his ultimate and eternal doom if he chose a gay lifestyle.
Flashback: I remember that was just where I was in 1971 when I discovered the Gay Liberation Front.
Just like the accountant, I had been wandering in a confused life of great love for my family and church on the one hand, and an emerging reality of my sexuality (which in those days had absolutely no recognition in society in TV or movies or anything). The only thing that was loud and clear was the dictated, imposed sexuality approved by the church and its scornful denunciation of what we would call same-sex love today.
While we were in the support group with the accountant that flashback reminded me that after 42 years the battle is not over. It is still going on for people pulled way and pulled apart from their God-given self by doctrines. It comes up in all the support groups of The Well.
When I joined the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) in 1971, Fr. Paul Breton (who consistently sends us LGBT news of the world) was already serving in MCC. But at that point in time GLF was a bright light for me, an alternative to the vacuum every place else in my world. For the first time I saw it spelled out. There is an alternative to the rejection and damnation. GLF pointed out that human nature does include people with same-sex love and these people do have human rights.
For me, though, there was something missing. Where is God is this puzzle of life?
Troy Perry had filled in that part of the mystery of life already since 1968, at least a year before Stonewall and the Gay Liberation Front.
In response to my observations about GLF the other day, Fr. Paul, who has been there, done that, and knows everything, emailed me his memories of GLF. I include them below. But first let me complete the story of my own journey away from wilderness and ignorance and self rejection along with church and society rejection.
Fortunately, at the same time I was meeting with some gay Lutheran pastors and other gay and lesbian Christians. We discovered Rev. Troy Perry and the Metropolitan Community Church. And eventually that same year brought MCC to Detroit.
From Troy I learned how to round out the picture GLF had begun to reveal. It filled in the essential part about God’s unconditional love and the whole theology of creation and the goodness of all God’s creation. Now there are five MCC parishes in the Philippines: Makati, Marikina, Quezon City, Olongapo, and Baguio. And Fr. Regen Luna in the Church of God of the Catholic Diocese of One Spirit in Dasmarinas, Cavite bringing that saving message to God’s beloved people who are LGBTIQ.
I want to share Fr. Paul’s observations and comments about GLF to show how GLF was a backdrop and introductory stage for me to make the transition to the full answer of liberation and truth which was presented prophetically by the Rev. Troy Perry.
********************
from: Paul Breton
to: Richard R. Mickley, CDOS, OSAe, PhD
date: 13 August 2013 02:16
subject: Re: From Gay Liberation Front 1971 to MCC Manila 1991
The GLF was a movement which grew out of the enthusiasm of Stonewall. The movement presented itself as open and inclusive. Most of the young people who joined the movement (there was no actual method of membership) were concerned about the Gay issues. Underlying the movement was the politics of the movement, which were clearly and definitely Marxist. Early political leaders encouraged people to go and spend time in Cuba to help with the sugar harvest. Then stories started coming out about how gays were persecuted in Cuba. The GLF was thoroughly disorganized - much more so than the Democratic Party. Little was being accomplished by the movement. Some of the early members started the Gay Activist Alliance or the Gay People's Alliance. Each became an organization which was more focused, more directed. The Gay Activist Alliance of Washington DC still exists and owns property in the city. The early GLF had virtually no tolerance for religion, in spite of the fact that they often found meeting space in Episcopal or Unitarian churches. The Marxists actually promoted antireligious propaganda. But it was a necessary development. Across the US, the GLF was assisted greatly by reporting by the "free press" and inexpensive classified advertising in the same.
I received an email the other day from the Peter Tatchell Foundation. I was fascinated by it. It described Peter Tatchell joining the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) in 1971.
That’s the year I joined the Gay Liberation Front. I came out in 1971, and the only organization I heard of was GLF. I joined. Wow. I was excited.
Before long, my friends, meaning my gay friends, began asking me, “Why do you belong to that “leftist” organization?”
I said, “I don’t know anything about Leftist, but I do know they are fighting for the gay and lesbian cause, gay and lesbian rights (LGBT was not coined yet then).” And that is what I want.
That was two years after Stonewall and three years after Troy Perry started the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC), but actually I heard of GLF shortly before I heard of MCC.
The interesting story of the early years of GLF and Gay activism in New York is told well in this link -- A Brief History of the Stonewall Riots and the Gay Rights Movement (Gay Liberation Front, Gay Activist Alliance and Early Gay Rights Organizations) = http://gaylife.about.com/od/stonewall/a/stonewallhistory_3.htm
The story of MCC (http://www.mccchurch.org), of course, was better rooted and more enduring. I heard of MCC by 1971 and became a member of the pastoral staff of MCC Detroit after helping a group of Christian pastors and Christian gay and lesbian people to find Troy and to get MCC set up in Detroit.
I have never regretted joining the Gay Liberation Front, and most especially I thank God that we found a tape recording of speech Troy Perry gave in Buffalo, and we determined to find him and bring his church to Detroit. I remained in MCC ministry for the next 24 years until I passed the MCC retirement age by two years, and I will cherish the love and friendship of Rev. Perry till my last breath -- after serving in MCC ministry in Detroit, Chicago, Phoenix, with him in his office in The International Headquarters (in LA at that time), Pomona, Auckland, New Zealand, and Manila.
The 1971 Gay Liberation Front Manifesto was read by Oscar Atadero when we held the first Pride March in Asia in 1994 (25 years after Stonewall) with a Pride Mass and rally in the Quezon Memorial Circle.
---------------------------------
What follows is the email I received from the Peter Tatchell Foundation...
Gay Liberation Front Manifesto, London 1971
London, UK - 8 August 2013
“The London Gay Liberation Front Manifesto 1971 transformed my consciousness and shaped modern LGBT identity. It gave us pride and vision. We dared to dream of a different, better world - with liberation for all of humanity,” said human rights activist, Peter Tatchell, a GLF veteran from 1971.
Read this edited Guardian article: http://bit.ly/14iD0is
Gay Liberation Front Manifesto, London 1971
By Peter Tatchell, Director of the Peter Tatchell Foundation
The Gay Liberation Front Manifesto, published in London in 1971, was a revolution in consciousness and it remains so today. It offers a radical critique of sexism and what we now call homophobia; as well as a pioneering, far-sighted agenda for both social and personal transformation.
Amazingly, it was not written by high-powered intellectuals but by a collective of grassroots activists, driven by idealism and passion for the betterment of queer humanity. They included anarchists, hippies, left-wingers, feminists, liberals and counter-culturalists.
The final text was a compromise between these different factions - and it shows. Some of it reeks of writing-by-committee. In places, the style and language is dated and inelegant. Some ideas are expressed too crudely and simplistically. Often you have to read between the lines to comprehend the full implications of what is being said.
Despite these shortcomings, the central theses stand the test of time. They remain fresh, innovative, challenging and inspiring; stratospheres above the frequent mediocrity of today’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) politics.
Although I did not write the Manifesto, I was a Gay Liberation Front (GLF) activist at the time and involved in the discussions - and rows - about it. Inspired by the ideas of the black civil rights movement in the US, I had already conceptualised LGBT people as an oppressed minority, similar to black people, and that we had a comparable claim for equal treatment.
But the GLF Manifesto went much further. It was an eye-opener; expanding my civil rights perspective into a more radical critique of heterosexism, male privilege and the tyranny of traditional male and female gender roles. It woke me to the fact that queer liberation involved both social and personal change; that we could, within the bounds of the existing society, begin to create a new alternative culture that would liberate everyone, regardless of gender, sexuality or gender identity.
I can vividly remember my excitement on reading the finished text. It was revolutionary and mind-blowing; challenging the straight male supremacism of centuries. The LGBT equivalent of the Communist Manifesto? Well, not quite.
Although it included demands for an end to heterosexist discrimination, equal rights was not the main focus of the GLF Manifesto. Equality was a far too limiting agenda. It went beyond mere equal rights; seeing society as fundamentally unjust and seeking to change it, to end the oppression of queers – and straights.
The Manifesto aligned GLF with other liberation movements, such as the movements for women’s, black, Irish and working class freedom. Although critical of the misogyny and homophobia of the “straight left”, it positioned the LGBT struggle as part of the broader anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist movement, striving for the emancipation of all humankind.
Most importantly, it argued that LGBT people needed to embrace and ally with feminism:
“As we cannot carry out this revolutionary change alone, and as the abolition of gender roles is also a necessary condition of women’s liberation, we will work to form a strategic alliance with the women’s liberation movement, aiming to develop our ideas and our practice in close inter-relation. In order to build this alliance, the brothers in gay liberation will have to be prepared to sacrifice that degree of male chauvinism and male privilege that they still all possess.
The GLF Manifesto articulates a radical agenda for a non-violent revolution in cultural values and social institutions. It critiques homophobia, sexism, marriage, the nuclear family, monogamy, the cults of youth and beauty, patriarchy, the gay ghetto and rigid male and female gender roles.
As well as opposing the way things are, it outlines an alternative vision of how society and personal relationships could be, including living communally, gender subversive radical drag and non-possessive multi-partner open relationships. The message was: innovate, don’t assimilate.
The Manifesto’s idealistic vision involved creating a new sexual democracy, without homophobia, misogyny, racism and class privilege. Erotic shame and guilt would be banished. There would be sexual freedom and human rights for everyone – queer, bisexual and straight.
In echoes of Franz Fanon and Malcolm X, it stated that the precondition for this social revolution is transforming our own consciousness and lives:
“The starting point of our liberation must be to rid ourselves of the oppression which lies in the head of every one of us. This means freeing our heads from self-oppression and male chauvinism, and no longer organising our lives according to the patterns with which we are indoctrinated by straight society. It means that we must root out the idea that homosexuality is bad, sick or immoral, and develop a gay pride. In order to survive, most of us have either knuckled under to pretend that no oppression exists and the result of this has been further to distort our heads. Within gay liberation, a number of consciousness-raising groups have already developed, in which we try to understand our oppression and learn new ways of thinking and behaving. The aim is to step outside the experience permitted by straight society and to learn to love and trust one another. This is the precondition for acting and struggling together.”
Revolutionary not reformist, GLF’s Manifesto went beyond overturning homophobia and transphobia. The aim was to end "male chauvinism" and the "gender system", which were identified as underpinning both sexism and homophobia.
Straight male hegemony was seen as the common oppressor of both women and queers. Subverting the supremacy of heterosexual masculinity was, to us, the key to genuine liberation for LGBTs and the female sex.
The GLF Manifesto argues that much LGBT oppression results from the way we queers deviate from the socially-prescribed, orthodox gender roles of masculine and feminine:
“By our very existence as gay people, we challenge these roles. It can easily be seen that homosexuals don’t fit into the stereotypes of masculine and feminine and this is one of the main reasons why we become the object of suspicion, since everyone is taught that these and only these two roles are appropriate....popular morality, art, literature and sport all reinforce these stereotypes. In other words, this society is a sexist society in which one’s biological sex determines almost all of what one does and how one does it; a situation in which men are privileged, and women are mere adjuncts of men and objects for their use, both sexually and otherwise.”
In most societies throughout most of history, men have been expected to act masculine and desire women. Likewise, women are supposed to behave feminine and be attracted to men. Instead of fitting in with these expectations, LGBT people subvert the gender system. Gay men love other men and are often disparaged for being insufficiently macho. Lesbians love other women and tend to be less passive, feminine and dependent on men than many of their heterosexual sisters. This is a major reason why we're persecuted. Our gender non-conformity threatens the gender system that helps sustain the hegemony of male heterosexuality and misogyny.
Queer men don't need to sexually subjugate women. Queer women don’t need men to fulfil their erotic and emotional needs. This failure to meet traditional gender expectations is profoundly threatening to straight male supremacism:
“The long-term goal of Gay Liberation, which inevitably brings us into conflict with the institutionalised sexism of this society, is to rid society of the gender-role system which is at the root of our oppression. This can only be achieved by eliminating the social pressures on men and women to conform to narrowly defined gender roles. It is particularly important that children and young people be encouraged to develop their own talents and interests and to express their own individuality rather than act out stereotyped parts alien to their nature.”
The GLF Manifesto positively celebrates queer deviance. It argues that the right to be different is a fundamental human right and this includes the right to disobey straight gender norms. The espousal of "radical drag" and ''gender-bender" politics is a call to opt out of passing for straight and seeking male privilege. We were attempting to subvert the oppressiveness of traditional-style heterosexual masculinity because we understood that it was one of the main sustainers of the subordination of the female sex and same-sex love.
The Manifesto posited that LGBT people were often in the forefront of breaking down the rigid, suffocating gender system:
“Gay shows the way. In some ways we are already more advanced than straight people. We are already outside the family and we have already, in part at least, rejected the ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’ roles society has designed for us. In a society dominated by the sexist culture it is very difficult, if not impossible, for heterosexual men and women to escape their rigid gender-role structuring and the roles of oppressor and oppressed. But gay men don’t need to oppress women in order to fulfil their own psycho-sexual needs, and gay women don’t have to relate sexually to the male oppressor, so that at this moment in time, the freest and most equal relationships are most likely to be between homosexuals.”
The core, ground-breaking message still rings true: that true queer emancipation involves changing ourselves and then changing society, rather than adapting to it. What’s required is a revolution in culture, to overturn centuries of male heterosexual domination and the limitations of traditional gender roles. Then, and only then, will queers and women be truly free. Bravo!
Peter Tatchell was an activist in London GLF, 1971-74 from http://www.petertatchell.net
The comments of Fr. Richard, including the challenge to action are given in full as follows…
Presentation: Bishop Richard R. Mickley, CDOS, Ph.D.
Bishop Catholic Diocese of One Spirit, Philippines
Coordinator, The Well, LGBT Healing Center
Prejudice, stigma, stumbling blocks to spirituality and true religious expression – have been my personal lifelong experience – and a target of my life work for the last 42 years, 22 of them in the Philippines.
After years of personal experience in psychotherapy for the stigma of being gay, and then earning a doctorate in clinical psychology, I devote my life to helping others with these issues.
It is only right that I should express in advance that I can only speak from my own perspective as a Christian, and a priest. I do not hold prejudice against other perspectives, which I hope will be expressed here.
I came to the Philippines 22 years ago to address the same concerns that you are addressing in this dialog. I opened the first openly gay and lesbian organization in the country. It was an affirming Christian church, within the organization, MCC, founded by Rev. Troy Perry in Los Angeles in 1968. When I started MCC here, TLF was already doing great work in the field of AIDS.
My experience with HIV started in the early 1980s. Before scientists discovered the virus in 1983, I saw 50 of my friends die from what was thought to be a strange gay disease. We were helpless then. All we could do was be with them. Now we know we can do more.
Ever since then, I have been trying to add my little bit to make a better, healthier, longer life for persons living with HIV. And that was given a big boost recently, I think you can understand my emotion, when my gay son, emailed me, “Dad, I am HIV positive.” Then I worked even harder to develop healing programs instead of just saying, “Do everything right.” I went to work to show him and my growing number of HIV positive friends what is “doing it right” to handle the virus.
The AIDS Society of the Philippines gave me a chance to be the coordinator of their Faith-based program. I met and dialogued with many sincere and compassionate church people who wanted to see an end to the stigma which not only distressed many vulnerable people especially in the LGBT community, but even contributed to the cause of the spread of HIV. At a forum similar to this I gave a prepared speech on this subject in 2005. It was published by the AIDS Society along with the other presentations given at the Forum.
It came to the attention of the Vatican. An emissary from Rome contacted me and sat down with me. He opened, “You are hard on the church.”
I replied, “Monsignor, I am not hard on the church. I love the church, the Mass, the sacraments. I find it necessary to fight the harmful, destructive sex-negative theology of the church which leads so many to AIDS or suicide, or lives of hell on earth.”
“What do you mean sex-negative theology?” he asked.
“I mean a theology of sex, of God’s supposed attitude toward human sexuality, which makes sex forbidden to vast segments of God’s people. It is based on St. Augustine’s theology of sex which in short is, All sex is bad except for a married couple once a year, under the blankets, with the clothes on; get in there fast, make the baby fast, and get out of there fast, and don’t enjoy it. Our modern description of that is: NO MASTURBATION, NO CONDOMS, NO SEX EXCEPT WHEN MARRIED TO MAKE BABIES, AND NO SEX EVER IN YOUR WHOLE LIFE, ANYWHERE, IN ANY WAY, IN ANY POSITION IF YOU ARE AN LGBT PERSON.”
The monsignor agreed to take my concern back to the Vatican. Hehe. To the Vatican where it will be archived in the vast Vatican library.
There is much love and compassion in the Catholic Church. The Camillians and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul and other orders have long exemplified it.
In another age, Jose Rizal spelled out the problem in his own expressive way. In a letter to Blumentritt, he said bluntly, “The Friars are the root of all the problems of the Filipinos.”
But, to the credit of his greatness and wisdom, he did not throw out the baby with the bath water. He condemned abuses, but he clung to the faith his mother taught him. Throughout the final four years of his life in exile in Dapitan he regularly and consistently attended Mass with the Jesuits at St. James Church there.
How sad he would be to see that the problem still persists in the official sex-negative church theology today.
Of course Blessed Pope John Paul II wrote a beautiful theology of the body – for married couples. BUT the rest of us are forever condemned to celibacy, not even masturbation.
Where does the stigma come from? Stigmatizing persons with HIV is not the only stigma in our country. Seeing a psychological professional causes raised eyebrows. Having many wives can cause election after election – mayor, senator, president, mayor. And how do you think dark-skinned human beings from the mountains feel when they are shunned and pushed around in our cities. A person with leprosy is avoided because of a physical condition. People with HIV are victims not only because of their perceived physical condition, but because of the perceived disgusting sexual angle.
Are these not concerns for faith-based people?
In 2005 I spoke to a faith-based forum on the same subject. What progress has been made in this area in the last eight years? Today we have heard excellent, positive, thought-provoking presentations from each of the speakers: Fr. Dan Cancino of the Camillian Fathers and the CBCP, Commissioner Salem Demuna of the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos, Pastor Kakay Palparan of MCC Quezon City, Merceditas Apellado of UN AIDS, Bicbic Chua of Catholics for RH. The concerns about the spread of HIV and the stigma attached to persons living with HIV have been well expressed.
But what will be our action plan? What will be the positive action that results from this very thoughtful dialog? I perceive we are one in spirit. I was particularly impressed by the quotations from the prophet of Islam about caring for the sick shared with us by the Commissioner.
Let me continue with a bit more background before I conclude my challenge to us today.
The church movement I set in motion in MCC Manila in 1992 to address the very same issues of discrimination and equality within God’s love that we are talking about today has now expanded to almost a dozen churches, several of which are represented here today by Pastor Kakay, Fr. Regen Luna, and myself.
They continue the Christian tradition in the sex-positive theology of Jesus and the Rev. Troy Perry. But they can reach only a small portion of the population. Even the Roman Catholic Church with its vast resources in the wonderful programs described by Fr. Dan cannot reach all the people.
Through the years, in my small circle, I have contributed in the Philippines with a cyber seminar in sex-positive theology. For counseling individuals from my perspective as a priest, I have boiled it down to Seven Spiritual Truths for LGBT Christians to guide them to know what God is really like: that God is Love.
My second contribution in recent times is The Well. Our servant leader counselors have moved beyond theorizing about the causes of stigma, and they offer direct hands-on life-saving support for persons who already have HIV. Other groups represented here today, such as long and wonderful work of the TLF do well with the prevention and testing aspects of HIV.
Our Prayer Partners decided that after four years of prayer, it was time to balance prayer with action. We invited persons already living with HIV to come together and support each other in living with well-being. In individual and group support, persons living with HIV joyfully support one another in wholistic wellness with resources provided by The Well and its Method – a sure way to conquer the power of the virus. And likewise The Well has programs for other serious life difficulties such as come with drugs.
I invite you to refer your friends for the free support offered by The Well, or email me for resources I will gladly share with you to evaluate for setting up your own HIV wholistic well-being support group or groups.
Anyway, in short what do we do about the stigma, the apathy, the inaction?
I do what I can in my little world. In New Zealand I was asked to coordinate the Interfaith Aids Ministry Network there. We came up with a plan for the country, a very clear action plan for the churches and society to work for the elimination of stigma and prejudice and they were successful. The National Council of Churches acknowledged that the churches, both Catholic and Protestant, had dealt with human sexuality poorly, and they made a plan for change.
In this country it is clear we are one in spirit, with similar prescriptions from Jesus and the prophet. Can we also be one in action to solve this societal problem?
Rizal made an action plan and wrote the Noli and Fili to get the plan started. In his day, the objects of stigma were “Filipinos.” Today there are new objects of stigma within the Filipino people – and the stigma now comes from Filipino people towards Filipino people.
I hope in this dialog today you will find the solution, for once and for all — to all the stigma and oppression of sex-negative theology.
Maybe we have to ask ourselves what is “faith-based”? Faith in whom? In what? For Christians, does the Jesus who never in his life showed prejudice have anything to do with our faith? The Jesus who defied his religion and talked with the Samaritan woman at the well? The Jesus who made Samaritans, hated by his religion, the heroes of his stories as in The Good Samaritan? The Jesus who healed the homosexual lover of the homosexual Roman Centurion – without prejudice? The Jesus who said that people were more important than the rules of his religion? Where does the example of Jesus fit into a faith-based ministry?
St. Matthew and St. Luke, for example, tell of many interactions of Jesus with persons with leprosy.
We must continue the healing processes started 120 years ago by Rizal.
But what does that mean to us today especially with regard to the marginalized, modern-day LGBT people of our religions? Perhaps it means some brainstorming, some study, some caring, some work.
For us Christians, it could mean no more statistics, just the compassion of Jesus put into a modern-day plan. Thoughtful, compassionate, Biblically-based approaches. It starts out with, “Here’s what we believe about equality, human dignity, and the Way of Jesus.” It then spells out, “Here’s what we are going to do about equality, human dignity and the Way of Jesus in order to eliminate stigma and build a better world.”
I don’t know your processes for making such plans. Committee? Task force? In the workshop that follows immediately after these remarks, you have a chance to make an action plan that has never been made before. I hope today finds the answer. The response of people of faith will be a testimony to our faith.
God bless you all for what you are doing to build a better world and a longer happier life for God’s beloved marginalized, stigmatized LGBT people living with HIV.
NOT SPOKEN FOR LACK OF TIME:
The heart of the HIV Wholistic Well-being Support Group is supporting each other in the following ten essential elements.
Ten Essential Elements of a Well-being check list:
1. I take care of myself with around balance and harmony in the good things of life.
2. I take care of myself by maintaining a balance of my intellectual, physical, spiritual, and emotional parts.
3. I take care of myself by conquering HIV with all around health and wellness.
4. I take care of myself by following medical advice and taking medicines and therapies prescribed.
5. I take care of myself by maintaining a lifestyle that boosts my medicines and does not cancel them.
6. I take care of myself with a priority to build up my immune system by study and practice.
7. I take care of myself with proper sleep and proper exercise and proper nutrition.
8. I take care of myself with positive thoughts, a joyful outlook while I pursue the meaning and purpose of my life.
9. I take care of myself by having friends and being a friend with sexual enjoyment as appropriate.
10. I take care of myself by supporting myself and my friends in our “Doing Everything Right” Support Group.
The leader invites one by one to share which of the Ten Essential Elements of a Well-being check list
* anyone may be having trouble with,
* what are the obstacles,
* what are the helpful things to do in any one’s experience.
Successes are welcome.
And closing with an optional and agreed-upon prayer.
The following prayer is inspired by the “Spiritual Survival Pamphlet While Living with HIV” of Rev. Dr. Steve Pieters, 30 year AIDS survivor:
This is How it is, Lord, And You are My Friend.
Lord, first of all, I want to be honest with You.
I know I can find meaning and purpose with your help.
You are not only my Lord and Savior.
Most of all, you are my Friend.
I know I am living with a real virus,
but I fully believe, even when I am sad and down,
that you did not give me this challenge.
A virus did.
I know you are with me as my Friend
and you want to help me to be fully alive
and have a full life.
And you want me to do my part,
to do everything I can
to defeat the power of this virus,
to work as best as I can
on the important elements of maintaining wellness.
I know I am responsible for my health,
and I need to collaborate with my health care providers.
I know you want me to continue
toward my goals, dreams, and unfinished business.
You want me to overcome obstacles
with new-found coping skills
in a support group with like-minded friends –
and to add my own support to all my friends.
I will do my best,
with your help, Jesus,
to live the 10 essential elements of well-being.
This blog is about our annual day out of the city. Let me first mention that our Tai Chi class “performs” every Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 7 AM in a beautiful city park in our neighborhood (barangay).
In May 2o12, I was invited to join the club. It turned out I was the oldest and the only guy till my Tai Chi barkada Buster joined a month or so later.
Today I celebrated one year of almost “no miss” participation (except for a passport renewal appointment at the embassy and a wedding in Laguna). I thank God for my good health. I thank the entire club for welcoming me and giving this opportunity for exercise and friendship. (Only much later I joined the Yoga for Life (http://www.facebook.com/yogaforlife.ph) class. But that is another story.)
We did not have Tai Chi today, but we sure had a super day, May 10, 2013.
The organizers did a magnificent job of planning and organizing everything – to the finest detail.
I was amazed. They said meeting time was 6:30 am. I did not rush. When I arrived at 6:31 everybody was there, raring to go. That was a 22-year first for me, when time did not mean Filipino time.
We were on the road well before 7 am in my Tai Chi buddy, Buster’s, van (with another passenger truck following).
I was elated to join the Friday Mysteries of the Holy Rosary on the way to Antipolo. Then, lo and behold, it was Mass at National Shrine of Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage Pilgrimage Church in Antipolo, the cathedral of Antipolo. It was a Friday, a huge domed cathedral, packed, no seating room. People flocked from everywhere for the Marian month of May devotion.
The photo above is from -- http://lakwatsero.me/2010/05/22/our-lady-of-antipolo-shrine-antipolo-city-rizal-may-22-2010
My brother Bud’s funeral in Ohio is tomorrow and I was pleased for another chance to offer Mass for him – and in a national shrine at that.
Next stop into the mountains of Rizal Province was another pilgrimage shrine with the huge Statue of Regina Rosarii (The Queen of the Rosary). After prayer and lighting candles, we took photos at the foot of the expansive statue and admired the mountain beauty.
On the road again, I was amazed at the primacy of rice in the province. Off on and on for miles were 20-40 meter patches on one lane of the two-lane hi-way – patches of newly harvested palay – drying in the sun on the hi-way. (The police call it “palay solar dryers” — not with praise.)
Winding through the mountains, I was reminded of the beautiful hills of Ohio, the beloved hills of my youth.
Well before 12 noon, we arrived at the rustic acreage of the resort owned by a husband and wife, Ferdi and Minda Fuentes, members of our Tai Chi club.
After the prayer before the meal, lunch was a fiesta in itself. Very tasty Filipino “ulams” brought all the way from Pasig, but a culinary delight, topped with fresh fruits of every name and taste.
The photo above is taken from the Rotary Club of Pasig South Facebook account; Album Name: Outing at Minda's Sanctuary 26Feb2011
Some went swimming; I think some were praying; maybe just maybe, some others were gossiping (sure did a lot of talking talking).
The mountain air, the well-landscaped resort for retreats, team building and seminars – all made a relaxing afternoon. Then from the owners’ home the helpers showed up with trays full of halo-halo, brimful of crushed ice and fruit delights.
Then came the signal to pack up and by 4:30 pm, all twenty-five of us, sad to leave, were headed back down the mountain and past the sign pointing to Daranak Falls, through Antipolo, and a sleepy ride home for many, and gorgeous mountain scenery for those who kept their eyes open.
A day of prayer, food, and relaxation, fun and friendship long to be remembered. Minda Fuentes Sanctuary, Barangay Niuagan Pililia, Rizal. I was thankful, not only for the Tai Chi, but for these wonderful senior citizen friends from our neighborhood in Barangay Kapitolyo, Pasig, Metro Manila, Philippines.
There has been a lot of speculation since my brother Joseph announced his retirement at 85 the other day. Somebody said, “How can you call him your brother?” I said, “Jesus said, ‘Love your enemy.’”
Some are praising his integrity and love for the “church.” All are guessing about his successor.
So, what do I think about me at 84? Can I say I am getting feeble and no longer mentally and physically able to attend to the calling?
This morning was my 9th-month anniversary in 7:00AM Tai Chi. Honestly it was the first time I felt unable to keep up with the other seniors. The teacher even gave me a wonderful reflexology treatment after the class. Now it’s seven hours later. I feel stronger and confident I can keep up with the other seniors in the next class. Incidentally, I am the oldest in the two dozen or more members.
Pope Benedict has 118 potential successors, capable of taking over.
I have to think about, not who could, but who would carry on the work? Who would be willing to carry on the ministry I have done in the Philippines for 22 years without salary? Who will teach sex-positive theology courses by internet for free? Who will be available for people with broken hearts, broken lives, and broken hopes? Well, I started that work in 1991, but, actually we now have at least a half dozen dedicated pastors doing that with all their heart.
There are limits to what a pastor can do (especially when he or she also has to hold a secular job for survival). That’s Pastor Regen in Dasmariñas, Pastor Egay in Makati, Pastor Jason in Marikina, Pastor John in Olongapo, Pastor Myke in Baguio, and the good people in Quezon City.
I am thinking, first of all, about all my friends who have tested positive for HIV. They are brave. They are courageous. They have a wonderful positive outlook. I want to keep on giving them every support I can so they can keep on “doing everything right when living with HIV.” I have shared my essay on that subject with them, but I want to see them come together in a self-help wholistic well-being support group — so they can go on and on and on like my friend Rev. Steve Pieters who has had HIV for more than 30 years. (Google his name.)
I am thinking of my friends who are tired of having their life, their dreams, their hopes shattered by addictions over which they have had no control. I want to continue to share with them my own life experience in overcoming addiction to alcohol in a wonderful 12-Step program that changed my life, saved my life. It could be anything powerful enough to upset one’s life.
At the same time some of my friends are working on sexual compulsion that’s bringing them to ruin. They say, “I have the most wonderful lover in the world, but I give in to drives that seem beyond my control.” Of course, as we work a recovery program, we find it is not uncontrollable.
Day after day people come to me for “help” when their relationship seems to be on the rocks, or at least bumping over stumbling blocks. I share with them my experience and the book I have written on this very subject — “how to,” how to make a relationship run smoothly and happily. Yes, a support group with others who are really sincere also helps. This is a work with the rewards of seeing happy couples — in love.
Yes, after 22 years, some of the 10 million LGBT people in the Philippines still have trouble with knowing and accepting God’s unconditional and non-judgmental love. The pastors do a great job when they have a chance to help these people wipe away the tears, erase the fears, and find peace and joy. Some people find our support group of people trying to swim out of internalized homophobia a tremendous help. I rejoice when I observe the transformation that takes place in people who finally come know what God is really like and overcome the trauma of being rejected by church and people.
A very big joy over the years (for decades now) has been when somebody comes to me and says, “Pastor, teach me how to pray.” The joy is fulfilled when that person sits down — anywhere, in a coffee shop, anywhere, and learns first-hand the presence of God always, and then finds the moment by moment friendship of Jesus who said, “I am with you always.” He also said, “Pray always.” My heart leaps at the wonder of it, when we sit down to pray. Just two or three of us, and FEEL the presence of our Friend Jesus, right there with us, just like He said. I have seen it happen in America, in New Zealand, and here in the Philippines. It never fails to be awesome.
Will I? Should I? Can I retire from all this overwhelming and awesome experience of God operating in my midst, right in my presence as my friends and I acknowledge together the presence or Jesus with us? Pope Benedict wants to retire to a monastery. I am sure I would like that, too. But what about all those wonderful people God keeps sending to me? I don’t have responsibility for a church of a billion souls. At the moment I don’t see who God is choosing to continue the care for the wonderful souls mentioned above with HIV, addiction, heart-break, internalized homophobia, and a yearning for the practice of the presence of God in prayer.
Maybe soon Good will raise up, not 118 cardinals capable of caring for God’s loved ones in Manila, but just maybe the one whom God is calling will say, “Yes, Lord, I love You and Your people, and I will answer your call.”
So, I see that it’s not at 84. I have a year to go to 85. Maybe then or someday God will make the self-help support groups strong enough that God will say, “OK, a servant leader has answered my call; you can retire to a life of prayer.”
