My Unfulfilled Desires
I have a lot of friends who have recently gotten engaged or recently gotten married. Believe me, I am happy for each and every one of them, but there was a point in my life a couple months ago when I just could not stand to be around them.
I was jealous, to be completely honest. Borderline envious, even. It made me angry seeing all of the happy couples around me just waiting for their time to finally be married.
Meanwhile, I was coming to grips with my same-sex attractions, and I was wrestling with the fact that I might not ever get married.
I longed not to feel alone; I longed to be with someone. And more often than not, I had a girl in mind that I was longing to be with. I walked around every day with my heart just feeling like a weight in the center of my chest pinning me down to my bed to the point where I wouldn't move for hours.
I would go weeks without anyone seeing me, and I would think nothing of it. I was far too miserable to go out, and they were just going to have to deal with it.
Looking back on it now, I realize that that's no way to live. Carrying around that much weight, not feeling capable to be around certain people just because I couldn't handle all the talk about their significant others --- that's not living! And that's not healthy, and I knew I needed to do something about it.
Still, I can't deny that it was hard. Those friends, they had someone. They were just waiting for the day to come where they could consulate their love for the other person.
Me, I really thought I loved someone, and I knew that I was never going to be able to do anything about it.
My desire to be with a woman, in and of itself, is not wrong. But, that desire was going to go unfulfilled.
My desire for intimacy and love is not wrong. It is an inherent, and beautiful desire.
Sexuality is a gift from God, and there's so much good that can come of it. I knew this and I believed this once I first started learning about God's plan for human sexuality, and I don't think that there's been a time where I've doubted the truth or validity of these teachings.
My issue was, I wished I didn't.
There were points where I would be so upset with God, and I just wished I didn't believe in the Catholic Church's teachings. I wished I could just do what I wanted to, because I wanted to be loved, and I wanted to feel good, and I wanted to be happy.
Ironically, doing what I wanted to try and make myself feel good and happy, was the exact thing that made me feel so much worse.
I am very well aware of what the Catholic Church teaches about homosexuality, and I completely understand why. I see the beauty behind it's teachings, and I see why Natural Law is what it is.
It's just very hard to adhere to those teachings when the pain is so great, and the attractions and desires are so strong.
In the past, I met a girl who is Catholic as well that also struggles with Same-Sex Attractions. I found myself becoming so attracted to her, and I wanted to be a prominent figure in her life. I want to be there to support her and I wanted her to know that she's cherished and loved.
That's all great, it really is, but I can't do that by kissing her.
I began praying about my friendship with her, and to this day I'm not sure how God wants me to be in her life.
But I do know that He wants me to be good to her, and to be a witness of His authentic love to her. He wants both of us to achieve holiness, and I would be stopping both of us from doing just that if I were to act on my desire for her.
What we have to realize is that some of these desires go unfulfilled, because they were never meant to be fulfilled in the first place.
The Catechism doesn't call homosexual desires "disordered" to be judgemental or harsh; it calls them disordered because they are very literally impossible to be filled.
My desire for sexual intimacy and love cannot be fulfilled by another woman because God did not design women to fulfill each other in that way.
The Catholic Church doesn't condemn Same-Sex "Marriage" because they don't want same-sex couples to be happy, she condemns it because she knows that it is impossible for that couple to be fulfilled in that way.
The design of man and woman's bodies very literally fit together. The design of marriage for the purpose of procreation and the communion of the spouses is the only way that marriage can work.
Man and man or woman and woman biologically cannot procreate; and if you take away one of the purposes of marriage, you can't authenticate it.
So yes, my desire to be with a woman will never be fulfilled. But that does not mean that I'm going to be unhappy for the rest of my life.
Is there a possibility I'll never get married? There sure is. But marriage is not what's going to fulfill me. God created me for Himself, and as a result, He is the only one that can bring me fulfillment.
It's there that my desire for authentic love and intimacy is going to be fulfilled.
The best way that I know to love her to do die to my desires for her. That way, I can love her like God loves her, and that's the kind of love that I am called to.