Gay Catholic Bloggers

To those of you who follow and read blogs that cover both gay and Christian issues (among other topics), may I recommend John Heard aka DREADNOUGHT - Australia’s very own answer to American bloggers Andrew Sullivan (who now blogs with 'Time', author of 'Virtually Normal: An Argument About Homosexuality' and 'Love Undetectable: Notes on Friendship, Sex and Survival') and David Morrison (author of 'Beyond Gay' and founder of Courage Online, an online support network for same-sex attracted men and women wishing to live chaste lives).

I had the good fortune of discovering DREADNOUGHT through another friend Ron Belgau whose very own website is also worth a visit. Several articles mentioning John Heard or about his opinions have also appeared in ‘The Age’ in recent times and he has also featured on John Safran’s show ‘Speaking in Tongues’ with Father Bob Maguire on SBS earlier this year. Click here to go to the SBS ‘Speaking in Tongues’ website.

One of John Heard’s most recent commissioned article was on gay marriage and it has appeared in this month’s ‘DNA’ magazine, in which he articulately argues against gay marriage without bible-bashing the reader – something not easily achieved by many Christians.

Apart from being authentic and raw, DREADNOUGHT also has some excellent writing in it. A recent Palm Sunday entry by DREADNOUGHT moved me and here’s a snippet of it to whet your appetite for more of his stuff.

On 8 April 2006, DREADNOUGHT writes:

“Same sex attracted men know better than most the longing that hides and sometimes overwhelms the human heart. All men are born to bond, to seek out someone who will reflect, however imperfectly, something of what is precious about us. Our secret joys - the song that says that, then and never anything else again - are collected about our person. We touch these things gently, feel deeply about them and offer them up to the hard world. Those of us with any hope left try not to trample ourselves, and we try to avoid being trampled by others. We try, despite the inexorable assault of crap, to maintain the spark in the expectation that someone, somewhere will flare back at us.

When Christ entered Jerusalem, the formerly indifferent caught fire. They burned with love for a new Man. They celebrated the rumoured heretic, the One Who said such wild things. They threw down their finest for the Nazarene to walk on, even though He spent time with outcasts, whores, lepers, tax men and foreigners.

It must have been an incredible sight, and Catholics repeat the scene every year on Palm Sunday. It is one of the most sublime liturgies ever devised by man.A week later the cheering crowds turned. They beat Christ until He cried blood. They hammered Him onto a tree and screamed obscenities. Even when He made manifest His love, even when He reached out to those who pierced Him, they rejected Him in the most extreme manner.

Any man who has been dumped, rejected, overlooked by an object of affection, any woman who has been ignored or shunned, must see in his or her sorrow the magnificent suffering of Christ crucified.

Somewhere though, in all the pain and fear, all the heart-hurt and startled tears, the Lord rises. Christ vindicated death, He bore down on evil and triumphed for, and as, the Light. In the deepest pit of despair, even after the Jews and Romans tore Christ, the best parts of Him were resurrected. How can we fail to hold Him before our eyes, tears swept and hearts prepared for joy: even if it feels like a mockery now?”