AUB Homosexuality Conference: Homosexuality and Religion – Can They Meet?
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On Tuesday March 9th, 2010, AUB held a conference in Auditorium A on Homosexuality and Religion. This conference aimed to answer the question whether religion and homosexuality coincide. The panel reinforced the idea that it is possible for homosexuality and religion to be in harmony together.
The student-faculty cooperation of the Conference sent out a unique message to the audience, this wasn’t scientifically factual, or a study of the homosexual psyche, but a civic and social initiative by staff and student to dispel a stigma that is actively harmful to our society, both inside and outside of AUB.
Rita El Haddad, Psychology Masters student at AUB, introduced the topic and contributed a personal story of how she was a believer that homosexuality and religion can never be reconciled. She believed that it would be hypocritical of a religious person to also be actively homosexual. After meeting and speaking to religious homosexuals, she admitted to being proved mistaken when the common misconception was dispelled.
With a powerful introduction, the discussion moved on to Philosophy professor Dr Joshua Andreson, who gave an in-depth analysis of religion’s role in society, and how it came to judge sexual behavior, emphasizing several times that “sexuality and religion are completely different concepts” and referring to how “few and ambiguous” the verses related to human sexuality are in religious text. The moment blind religious belief was challenged, several people left the auditorium. Dr Andreson concluded by reaffirming that “our religion calls us to love and respect our homosexual brothers and sisters, and not to condemn them”, met by a stream of applause across the auditorium.
Dr Michael El Khoury, psychologist and counselor for the LGBTQ organization ‘Helem’, stated that through his experience working with homosexual people, he has come to identify two main obstacles that surround homosexuals: Family acceptance, and religious acceptance. He also made a point of dispelling the myth that most homosexuals deviate from religion, citing that most of his patients are both homosexual and religious, and do not want to get rid of their religion. Dr. Khoury later emphasized how homosexuality should not be viewed as a disorder, since, in an ideal setting, it does not display the characteristics of a disorder. It is because of the stigmatization of society towards homosexual people that clinical disorders arise.
Sam, a human rights activist and homosexual woman in Lebanon, well-versed in Christian teachings, related, in an astounding and moving speech, how she correlated her religion with her homosexuality. She explained the absence of her last name on the conference information by humorously stating, ‘knowing the impact of names on society, I didn’t want anyone to know my religion before they came here’. ”How could God love me, being a gay person?” She asked the audience and herself, conveying the emotional crisis she was going through when her priest, whom she confessed to, told her that God will never forgive her for her sins. She related years of depression and confusion, needing God and the religion she participated in so heavily, but at the same time unable to deny to herself her homosexual feelings. “Because of their [the homophobic] attitude, I started to think, that if these are the representatives of God on Earth, then I don’t want to believe in him” Sam paused, the room tense with the audience’s bated breath. “My research and struggle lasted for 6 years” she continued, describing how she reached an epiphany, the conclusion that “the God I know is not a God that can hate.” Her speech was met by enthusiastic applause from the entire auditorium, there is no doubt that everyone was touched by her struggle and her story.
The audience was, for the most part, supportive and inquisitive, most of them being faced for the first time with an open public discussion on homosexuality.
Some of the questions included the religious perspective, the pro-gay perspective and general questions about article 534, gay/lesbian life in Lebanon, and other people who just congratulated Sam for her courage to speak out.
Near the end of the conference, a student stood up and delivered a statement that sums up the positive and inspirational attitude of some Lebanese youth towards homosexuality. “We’ve discussed how homosexuality cannot be a disorder because it doesn’t qualify as deviant, dysfunctional, and distressful” she began, “but it seems that it is homophobia that fits these characteristics” she was met with the longest applause yet. On the same note, there are perhaps 3 verses of the New Testament that might be interpreted as anti-homosexual, but there are many more that call for justice and freedom, for anti-discrimination, for love free of judgment. Since homosexuals are forced to reconcile homosexuality with their religion to remain religious, it seems only right that homophobic heterosexuals must do the same with their equally unreligious, if not more-so, homophobic discrimination and aggression towards homosexuals.
It is with great pride and happiness that pro-gay supporters concluded the conference, knowing that Lebanon is finally on the move in the path of anti-discrimination, acceptance and love. It is with great enthusiasm that we hope for this message to spread, and for the eventual abolishment of article 534 of the penal code, and the end of systematic oppression of homosexual behavior in a society that is becoming more and more actively involved in human rights in Lebanon.
- Contributed by Amar and Anthony
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