Ben joins Tom in-studio to share about being married to his best friend, a woman, for the last 15 years and why he opts for queer over bi as his primary identifier. He discloses some of the challenges in this identification as he explains (or defends) himself with certain Christians. He also reveals the joys of his orientation, including how he and his wife have opened their home as a refuge for other queer folks.
You know, after fifteen years of blogging about gay things and masculine things and all the other intermingled, messy faith things, I often feel like I've run out of stories to tell here. Gay kisses, wet dreams, fetishes – what on earth is there left to say?? Ah, but then I wake up one day and suddenly remember that time another "Side B" guy from a Facebook group asked if he could do something to my genitals. Ah, yes – a new story to tell. Glory be.
Alex answers whether he's felt like a "minority of a minority" in our YOB community as a bisexual Christian, and he shares his long journey coming to terms with his bisexuality – both with himself and the Holy Spirit. He dispels the myth that he and all other bi people are 50-50 attracted both to men and women at all times and in all seasons of life. He shares why it isn't necessarily "easier" being attracted to both sexes rather than exclusively attracted to the same sex as a Side B person.
Marshall joins us as another "OG" contributor and cofounder of YOB to share his perspective on sexuality, why he doesn’t identify as gay or SSA despite only experiencing attraction for men. He also discusses a marriage conversation he once had with a woman he dated. He shares the time of his life that presented his greatest struggles with gay temptation, as well as the thing that’s brought him the most joy in his sexuality.
We kick off a new summer ConvoCast series exploring the diverse sexual identifications within our YOB community. We start with Matt who identifies as gay and Christian, but not those two identities together. He tells of his journey from "SSA" to gay and how he recently experienced feelings for a girl for the first time in his life. He shares about going to a source outside the Church to learn whether his sexual identification is as rigid as it seems.
We conclude our 7-values series by exploring our other "ship" of discipleship! How do we define this spiritual term? Is discipleship meant only for our own growth, or is our discipleship also for the people around us? How organized or structured must discipleship of believers look? And how have we felt disqualified from discipling others in their walks with Jesus because of our sexuality?
Once upon a time, Your Other Brothers held to the value of brotherhood! But we've since shifted this value to one of kinship. Why the change? What does kinship evoke, both for this life and the next, and how do we build or "practice" this value of kinship? When have we felt that sense of belonging outside our blood family, and when have we felt the opposite with our sexuality and masculinity, as strangers and aliens?
How do we walk with integrity as Side B people? Must it include a wide-scale coming out, an authenticity of the external matching our internal selves? Which experiences have defined our convictions and courage to follow Jesus as we’re doing? Join Tom, Aaron, and Will for this discussion on YOB’s fifth value, including the origin stories of incorporating more Jesus into our content as well as determining our symbol for integrity: cairns on a path!
I'm not sure the "vulnerability hangover" has ever hit me as strongly with a blog as it did that one. It's been one thing to confess I'm attracted to men as a sort of "blanket confession" for all the world to see; it's another to invite people into the specific workings of my sexuality. Particularly with something as personal and hardly-talked-about as masturbation.
Vulnerability is uncomfortable, even scary, so why do we value it so highly in our community? Sharing our story, including our sexuality, may have once felt like the most daunting or impossible task. And yet what would have been the cost to our lives had we not been vulnerable? What if we had stayed silent, closeted, cut off from such a significant aspect of ourselves with ourselves, God, and other people? Indeed, what if vulnerability that feels like weakness is actually strength – especially when practiced in a community?