I Can't Date Jesus Page 4

  Though at first I sat eye to eye in front of Father Marty and confessed the sins I didn’t mind divulging, the small dimly lit beige room we were in began to feel smaller and darker as my confessional went on. I could tell in that moment that this wasn’t going to be a routine confessional. The topic of which sins I may have committed shifted abruptly toward my take on those who committed their lives to God. I responded by saying individuals who chose to dedicate their lives to God ought to be commended for making the ultimate sacrifice. Translation: yes, it was very commendable and quite noble, but better them than me.

  Evidently, my response further piqued his interest, and for a few moments he sat there in silence, seemingly pondering over what to say next. He began to stare at me in the midst of this silence. It was as if he were searching for something inside of me. Something that wouldn’t lead to an investigation and a multimillion-dollar lawsuit and subsequent settlement later, mind you. He then questioned me about my age. I let him know that I was twenty, otherwise known as the best time to start engaging in the worst sins. He claimed that I appeared more mature than my age suggested. He added that he could feel a strong sense of spirituality in me. He noted that in these trying times, God needed the most capable of servants.

  As we neared the end of my confessional, Father Marty looked at me and hit me with it: “I see a priest in you.”

  At that very moment, I felt my heart stop.

  I’m sure Father Marty and me breaking into “Ave Maria” or the choreography from Kirk Franklin’s “Stomp” might have been a more festive reaction, but I opted for muted shock and awe instead. Muted because I was at church and I couldn’t yell, “You gotta be out of your rabid-ass mind, Father!” I guess hearing a religious person look at you and say you seem like a decent enough guy to serve God was quite the compliment. Yet all I did was question whether Father Marty suffered from cataracts or was starting to display early signs of dementia. How could he see a priest in me? Sure, I thought I knew a lot about Jesus and kept the recommended amount of Catholic guilt prescribed to parishioners. But me? A priest? At that period of my life, I saw my future self as something more along the lines of “Katie Couric with a dick.” She had coanchors with penises, but as a longtime Today viewer, I preferred Katie over Bryant Gumbel, who seemed stiff and whose name select classmates would sometimes call me as a pejorative, and Matt Lauer, who often just came across as a dick. (Now, I had no idea he was that bad, per the accusations that led to his surprise ouster, but good fucking riddance all the same.) Katie was both serious and fun, and I saw myself being the same on the morning news one day. Father Marty was convinced otherwise, saying he felt strongly about his suspicions and advised me to give real consideration to ultimately joining the priesthood.

  I was unsure as to whether he genuinely felt he saw a priest in me or he was he simply filling my head with thoughts of joining so that he could produce his yearly goal of one parishioner to the priesthood. His follow-up question made me wonder if I was special or if he merely said this to any male of applicable age: he asked me about college. I told him I was attending Howard University.

  “You should pledge Omega Psi Phi. I will pay for it.”

  So not only did Father Marty see a priest in me but he also saw a fraternity guy. And not just any frat; he saw me as a Que Dog. In terms of Black fraternity and sorority stereotypes, I had been likened to an Alpha because they were smart or a Kappa because they were considered to be the pretty boys, but never a Que. Granted, I did have a habit of sticking out my tongue while dancing, but most wouldn’t have pegged me as the type to be stepping to George Clinton’s “Atomic Dog” and barking. (This is not an insult to them, ’cause there were quite a few Ques that were on Howard’s campus that I would have taken down. But yeah, no. I’m not sure whether Father Marty was a Que, but he did often wear a purple priest’s robe, which might have been a shout-out to that frat’s colors?)

  As I exited the confessional and proceeded to kneel before the pews to pray for forgiveness, I started to think of all the reasons I would not be right for the priesthood.

  First, profanity and I had been in a committed relationship since childhood.

  Second, while I had followed my mother’s instructions to attend mass up until I went off to DC for school, no way could I attend seven times a week—much less perform it.

  Third, I was not a fan of uniforms. I just couldn’t see myself dolled up in one of those priestly dresses they were required to wear. I mean, I can appreciate how popes often dress like a bad bitch heading to an all-white party, but you know.

  Reasons four through forever: I was a virgin and not keen on the idea of committing to a life of celibacy. You can’t give up sex before experiencing it a couple dozen times. I’ve never understood the requirement that priests and nuns be celibate anyway. The rationale for it is well-known, but it doesn’t make sense all the same: Jesus never talked much about sex, so why was sex sold to us as so impure and wrong outside of procreation? It was one of many questions I used to have in catechism, but rarely if ever were those questions answered with anything other than the sentiment that it was “God’s way”—which was shorthand for “the hell if I know.”

  Father Marty was seeing me in ways I couldn’t see myself. He believed in me, and even if it was confounding, it was flattering. As a result, it made me stop and reexamine the image I was projecting to others. I mean, several years prior to that day, I had looked at another priest during mass and daydreamed a bit about what it would be like to be him. (Note that around that same time, I contemplated a career as Batman too.) For a teensy bit after Father Marty’s recruitment pitch, I felt like an ingrate for trying to think of reasons to deny what he had told me. I battled the question: “How dare you not at least consider it, after all your faith has done for you?” Catholic guilt never leaves you and follows you everywhere; it’s the herpes of your conscience.

  But the more I thought about it, the more I wondered if the religion I was so devoted to was more of a hindrance to my growth as a man than it was helpful. Much of my own dedication to my faith stemmed from fear of God’s wrath in addition to the guilt and shame I suffered for harboring feelings that were in direct violation of God’s will. I hadn’t really challenged any of those beliefs until I was called upon to perpetuate them by joining the priesthood.

  —

  Once I went back to school, I began to seek information about God and sexuality beyond the prejudices I had been conditioned to accept. In time, I realized just how spiritually unaware I was. With a better understanding of the history and culture behind the words I used to cite for why I needed to never embrace or act upon my urges, I was reminded that the meanings of words could transform over time—even the word “abomination.” And even if I were to disagree with that, technically all of the crawfish, shrimp, and crab I had been fed over the years made me just as hell-bound, if not more so, than the gay sex I wasn’t having.

  Then I reflected on my own immature ways of religion. Meanwhile, things never tempered down between my parents. My dad’s anger and his troubling coping mechanisms never subsided, and I started to wonder increasingly whether religion kept my mom composed or captive. I admired her strength and faith tremendously, but I also speculated how much better her life might be if she focused more on what she could change now as opposed to waiting to be rewarded for her virtues in the afterlife. When you’re suffering, faith can be an integral part of your survival. In my eyes, my mom was the strongest person in the world, and her religion had a lot to do with that. Even so, I didn’t want to wait to die to live. I didn’t want to keep bottling up who I was for the mere possibility that I might get a treat in the afterlife. Most of all, I never wanted to be in the position of causing some other person to feel as conflicted as I had been and continued to be.

  I did not want to join the likes of Ted Haggard and Eddie Long, who were revealed to be harboring the very same-sex attractions that they consistently condemned from their pulpits. Had I actually
listened to Father Marty, I might have gone on to face similar ordeals. Funnily enough, by the time Bishop Eddie Long was accused by former male congregants of sexual misconduct, I had an essay published in which I called upon Christians to consider placing homophobia among other biblically justifiable prejudices now deemed antiquated. Afterward, a college friend proceeded to email me what seemed like two years’ worth of Bible study material. A year later, she found my new email address through my blog and wrote me again to say that she had met someone who prompted her to acknowledge that she liked women a whole lot more than she ever cared to admit. Despite the revelation, she closed her message with: “It’s not something I broadcast. That’s why I’ve always admired you. Being true to yourself is not easy.”

  It is not easy, and at the time I was approached to be a priest, it proved to be pivotal. I may not have seriously considered becoming one, but I was at a point in my life when I could have sunk myself into a system that didn’t embrace me as warmly as I once embraced it. A form of religion that would tolerate me, but only the parts of me that weren’t an affront to its misguided beliefs. The dangers in not using your God-given right of discernment were becoming painfully obvious. Although I was starting to open my mind and allow myself to see that not everything was as black and white as I assumed it to be, I wasn’t exactly ready to let go of my religion completely or to publicly acknowledge my sexuality—but I was ready to figure some things out. Father Marty gave me the push I needed to finally start asking questions and finding answers, independently. I knew in my heart that God was not the cock-blocker so many would like us to believe. I just needed to go out and prove it.

  The First, the Worst

  I should have known it wouldn’t end well, because our first date consisted of us seeing Crash and dining at a vegan restaurant. Although chicken is always the ideal option, the meatless food was good and far more satisfying than the film. As much as I loved Ryan Phillippe—his ass played a pivotal, defining role in my development—a film that examined racism and intolerance through narrative devices that recalled various after-school specials was not especially fulfilling to me. In my immediate feelings after leaving the theater, I found the film well-intentioned but okay at best. However, as time went on, the flaws about it became all the more apparent, and the experience of viewing it all the more regrettable.

  The same could have been said about this dude.

  We were at the Regal Cinema near Union Square. A rat ran up the theater steps at one point during the film. Of course, my clumsy ass dropped my phone in the dark as the movie played—technically, it was what I deserved for not having turned my phone off and opting to be present for the overpriced movie ticket I had purchased. While he used the light from his phone to help me find mine, I desperately hoped that Master Splinter’s ancestor wouldn’t try to bite me and/or steal the phone. In hindsight, the rat was probably trying to communicate the warning RUN, BITCH! RUN! to me about this dude.

  I first saw Jordan in passing while I was visiting with a high school friend who attended LIU Brooklyn. I was in New York to interview for an internship. I was a broadcast journalism major near the end of my sophomore year and was determined to get an internship in New York. I had already done a stint at Majic 102 in Houston and another at C-SPAN before that. But I needed an internship that could be directly applied to my major to get the credit I needed to graduate. However, by the time I started searching for one, it was starting to sink in that I was far too opinionated to play the role of traditional anchor. The veneer of objectivity in news was already fading, but not enough to convince me, the Black man with an increasingly slick mouth and strong point of view, that there was space for me. So while I thought someone needed to carry on the legacy of the late Ed Bradley and rock a single hoop earring on 60 Minutes, I realized that I wasn’t that person. Still, it was my major and I was not about to change it, which meant I needed to get it over with already, get my credit to graduate, and go about my business.

  After the interview, I linked up with Lawrence, who had attended the same high school as me but was someone I knew more as the younger brother of a classmate. I was finally ready to flip my curiosity about sexuality into action, but I was still not officially out yet. I had heard about Lawrence being gay, so I decided to reach out.

  I had wanted to go to New York City for multiple reasons. I, like many others before me, had dreamed of being in the city. I was a proud Howard University student, but my initial goal had been to attend NYU or Columbia. I wanted to be in NYC, not DC. I wanted to be free and successful, and New York represented the epitome of both to me. However, we didn’t have enough money for Howard, much less NYU or Columbia, which cost more than twice as much. I eventually found my way to Howard because when I saw how many Black people I admired had matriculated there, I knew it wasn’t a settlement of past dreams but a redirection into destiny.

  Upon greeting Lawrence, it quickly dawned on me that he was no longer just somebody’s little brother and very much a young man. He also made it clear that he was gay. Interestingly enough, we never discussed my sexuality directly, but based on how he spoke to me and discussed plans on where we would hang out that summer, he had already clocked me and possibly presumed that I would be far more forthcoming in due time. After hanging out in his dorms for about two hours, Lawrence walked me out so I could make my train in time.

  That’s when I spotted Jordan. If you ask me now who he looked like then, I would speedily say Bruno Mars. But Bruno Mars wasn’t famous back then, so when I would describe him to friends at that time, I’d tell them he looked like a spare DeBarge. He spoke to Lawrence in passing while walking wherever he was going, and I got on the elevator and went back to DC. I couldn’t shake his face out of my head, but fortunately, I had heard his first name.

  It did not take long at all for me to comb Lawrence’s Facebook friends and find him. Make note that this was Facebook in 2005. These young thots have no idea how good they have it now. Anyone can sign up for Facebook these days—including various democracy-soiling bots from a fake news factory based in Macedonia and founded by the Russians. Back then, you needed a college email address and the student-loan debt that came with it in order to sign up for the service.

  I sent him a message that I had seen him. I mentioned how cute he was and that I was interested. He responded to my messages, but his responses were noticeably short. I was taking the hint, but decided to continue flirting for the sake of convincing myself that I was finally about this life and making real efforts to gain a footing in it. Not long after, Jordan shut me down by telling me that he was not gay. I gave myself credit for at least trying and then let it be. But days later, he circled back into my private messages, suddenly with an acknowledgment of having same-sex attractions and newfound interest in conversing with me. He said something about being private, and considering that I had hit him up out of the blue and only saw him in passing by way of a person who also lived in his dorm, he was somewhat suspicious.

  Discretion was one thing, but secrecy was its own type of monster. For the sake of my own interest in him, I leaned in on the idea that he was being discreet rather than secretive. We continued talking on Facebook, then graduated to text, instant messenger, and occasional phone calls. He didn’t give me a lot of information, but I thought he was cute. Damn cute. So cute that I decided to jump on a bus to go hang out with him in New York.

  I took a bus from DC to see him in New York literally a day before I was to fly back to Houston for a week; after that, I would return to New York for my summer internship (not at GMA, oh well). I probably could have waited until I was actually living in New York for the summer, but I really wanted to see him, and, honestly, I wanted to finally go out with a boy. It was an impulsive move, but not the wrong one.

  After we ate that vegan food, he took me to the Christopher Street Pier. Then we walked up Christopher Street a bit more until it was time for me to catch my bus, pack my stuff, and take myself to Houston before coming back
to New York for the summer. As we were walking back up, two things happened that should have signaled to me that he was probably not going to be the person I imagined him to be—or someone I needed to be around. The first thing was some very assertive woman—clearly a native New Yorker—surveying us and saying, “Y’all look good together.” I smiled, looked at him, and said, “I like her.” As nervous as I was, I laughed a lot with him, and I smiled the entire time. I wasn’t out yet and I wasn’t sure what life as an admitted and eventually open gay man would look like, but in these moments, I felt the sort of assurance that I had been depriving myself of by not owning those feelings for so long. But then came the other thing: Jordan saw someone he knew and instantaneously became uneasy. As if he had something to hide. When I asked if there was a problem, he barely said anything about it. It was more like a gesture—a shrug—and it was not reassuring. I didn’t have time to ask more because I needed to get back to DC.

  —

  During those summer months when I was in New York, it was difficult not only to get in touch with Jordan but also to physically see him. He worked a lot. He was also taking summer courses. He was “busy.” Too busy for me, anyway. When I did see him in the flesh, I was reminded of why I liked him, but if someone is really into you, they behave differently, more enthusiastically. I did meet other dudes in the meantime. There was one in particular who had also gone to Howard. He wasn’t my type, but he was handsome, smart, and, to some extent, amusing, in that he was trying to convey a certain hardness. It was the sort of abrasive, traditionally masculine posturing in which overcompensating Black men often engage. Given my background, that performative nonsense didn’t draw much reaction beyond a chuckle. Like Bless your heart, little boy, you ain’t hard, and even if you were, I am no way shook. But since we had gone to the same school, I was open to dating when we got back on campus.