Scared of going to hell

I’m happy for you. This can certainly be a great, life-changing thing. However, I’d also hope you realize this isn’t going to change your sexuality. They can shame you into attempting to ignore it for awhile, but church isn’t going to make it go away forever. @Chip can tell you that as can any number of Christians here.

 

You know, I've read the whole Bible, and I've looked at various translations and there's really no way to misread it. Ancient Judiasm called for the deaths of homosexuals. Leviticus 20:13 is pretty clear, it's very hard to misread it. Now, that said, when it comes to the New Testament, Jesus was silent on the issue of homosexuality and preached love and forgiveness, kind of negating the Jewish part of the Bible. I don't understand why so many Christians are so intolerant when it isn't even their religion that calls for the stoning of homosexuals. I guess human beings have a predisposition towards hate and violence. That said, religion is the opium of the people and I don't take it super seriously but if someone finds peace in being Christian and isn't hurting anyone else, I respect that.

 

Leviticus also tells us we shouldn’t eat shrimp, wear polyester, and rebellious teens should also be stoned to death. Few Christians actually consider the law spelled out in Leviticus to still be applicable.

I second Chip’s recommendation to read Matthew Vines. And I am a Christian and had to initially wrestle with this issue. To be honest, I’ve spent a lifetime wrestling with this issue and I tried the path you’re starting down. I would make sure it’s necessary before you put yourself through it because it’s a lonely, miserable path.

 

I would also point out, there are plenty of Christian churches that are gay affirming (who will accept you as you were made by God without asking gay people to love and die loveless and alone) and the number is growing.

 

I respect everyone's right to believe whatever they want. With that said, I personally believe that if there is a Hell, gay people and nonbelievers will not go there in death. Why I believe this would require too much info for me to post that would probably turn into one big wall-of-text that most people wouldn't read.
There was a time when my beliefs were put to the test: One day there was a shooting threat at a school I went to. The college was put on lock-down, and I had to hide in a locked room with a few of my classmates and instructors. No one died or was wounded thankfully, but I became 100% convinced to the core, with every fiber of my being, that I was going to die. I tried praying, but gave up. I didn't try a last-minute deathbed conversion, I was just filled with regrets over mistakes I made in life. Not the mistake of being in X-religion, and repressing my gayness to follow it - on the contrary - I regretted not being gayer!
I did use to fear Hell, some years ago, it did take me a while to get over it. In retrospect, I think it was more of an obsession than a spiritual journey. My mind was really dark when I feared Hell, a time when my depression was at its highest (or lowest? The most depressing, I guess). So naturally my mind went to a dark place. I invite you to consider the possibility that your fear of Hell is more of a distraction than a spiritual crisis. I know it sounds weird to think the mind would choose something morbid and horrifying to distract itself, but it happens. I'm not saying it's a guarantee, but sometimes reading a good novel, watching a good show, or playing a video game, can be just enough to get your mind off of Hell.

 

I'm not talking about Christianity. I'm talking about ancient Judaism. It's funny that a mixed-faith text like the Bible relies so heavily on Judaism when in the end it says to submit to Christianity or face annihilation. Here's some food for thought: If Jesus was a Jew, why isn't everybody Jewish?

 

There are other paths within the Christian faith. We’ve told you what they are. I’ve been down a variation of the path you seem to want to go down, was miserable and am now going through therapy to recover, and have zero intentions of going back. But, it’s your life and your decision. Enjoy.

 

Also, one more time (for the people in the back), you cannot pray the gay away no matter what some church tells you. You can marry someone you're not actually attracted to and make babies (because what girl doesn't dream of marrying a man who isn't capable of remotely find her sexually attractive...that's totally fair to her, right? Just ask the people extracting themselves from heterosexual marriages on the Late in Life Forum how much their spouses have enjoyed that). You can live and die alone. But, that doesn't make the gay go away. You can suppress it, but it involves a metric crapton of suppression, finding activities to help you ignore it, and (at least for me) lots of dissociation I'm having to unlearn. And if you go to those churches, you're spending time with people who will make you feel like ass for being who and what you are. I.am.in.therapy recovering from my time with those people. It was not remotely healthy. I was raised in it and didn't have a choice.

Also, one more time for the people in the back, being gay is not a sin. Living as an lgbt person is not a sin. There are books and organizations that explain it. You don't have to loath yourself or try to pretend you're something you're not to be gay and be a Christian. That's a crock.

 

Look, I spent the first 30 years of my life in evangelical (super homophobic) churches. (who are now the same kind of people who are convinced Donald Trump is a fine Christian man) I was incredibly devout. I bought every word they said during that time.

They made me reflexively hate myself and made me ashamed every time I saw myself being interested in women. When I realized partway through college I wasn't attracted to men (and was never going to be attracted to men) and, thus, couldn't be a good Baptist wife like I was taught by that church was my job...it made me have occasional thoughts of suicide. (There. I said it) I was outright depressed. I gained 60 pounds. I slept all the time. My classwork in college suffered. I didn't care if I lived or died. The way I finally got around that (clever me) is that I didn't really care if I lived or died, BUT if I worked 60-70 hours a week, obsessively practiced a musical instrument, or spent obscene amounts of time playing video games, I didn't have to think about it or feel anything so I could limp through. Sure, I wasn't living my life and sure, I hated myself and only marginally cared if I lived or died because I was convinced something was wrong with me that I didn't want to name (it was called "gay") and I was going to live and die alone having never even tried to know love (because the kind of love I could pursue was "a sin") but I was still a good Baptist girl living within their rules, right?

I'm just now trying to dig out of that. I wasted decades of my life living like that. DECADES. Gone.

People who go through conversion therapy (or restorative therapy, or whatever the hell name they use to try to mask that it's conversion therapy) come out screwed up. @Chip can probably tell you all about that.

If you want to live your life that way, that's your choice and great. But I don't understand why you keep coming back to this thread trying to convince us it's gonna be great. And I'm seriously hoping you're not trying to convince other people it's a good idea.

 

I have to agree with all of this. While I never dealt with any religious homophobia, I know what it is to hate myself. In my case it's because I'm homophobic AND on the LGBT spectrum. I couldn't believe I was what I hated so much. So in true statist fashion, I denied myself taking part in same sex sexual relations until I was twenty-eight years old. There's an old adage that proclaims "religion is the opium of the people," which to me, means that while religion has its place in the community in bringing people together, all it really offers people is comforting illusions of some lofty afterlife reward if they play by the rules. I don't know if there's an afterlife or not, but I don't think that if there is that it's achieved by following the rules of any specific religion. Don't get me wrong, I still hate myself, I have a lot of problems with my sexuality that I don't think any amount of therapy will ever be able to sort out. Hell, I think I might even be transgender. But don't hate yourself because some guy at church tells you to.