Only Love should have place on Earth

LGBT community versus religion. Why should there be such a thing? Why do people always have to be on one side? I wanted to make my own opinion about this and to come with a conclusion, first, for myself.

Source: sites.psu.edu

On the 15th of May 2018, Sheldon, a religious person and Ivan, part of LGBT community accepted our invitation to come to UBB Radio to talk about their beliefs and to share opinions and experiences. Surprisingly, they both accepted easily to come to the interview and I think that the positive answer came so fast because they have strong beliefs that they want to share to the world.

UBB Radio Online

First impression

When Ivan and Sheldon met there was nothing weird, they both accepted each other immediately. They did not talk about their beliefs until starting the interview and they even got along, even if they came from different parts of the story. I realized then that people do not have something against other people, but against their way of being and if people do not know about other people beliefs, then people do not have anything against each other.  

When asked about their relationship with religion they both had a very similar answer. Sheldon said “I have been brought up in the Christian organization, I am a fifth generation, part of the organization, my great, great grandfather fund it in Germany, almost a hundred years ago. So, I have a long history of people to look up to”. The answer of Ivan surprised me “I was born and raised in the Catholic church, actually my father is a Catholic priest, but when I found out that I am gay I was very little, I was about 11 years old. I started not to believe in what the Catholic church values are and now I can say that my religion is human rights, I believe in human rights”. Even if they both come from very religious families, they have grown up differently. At that moment I realized that the environment that you grow in does not matter.

 At one-point Sheldon stated, “I think as far as the church goes what is lacking there is…they have come away with the true teaching of Jesus which is to love everybody regardless and I think that this is missing in our society today”. I was glad to finally hear a religious person saying the truth, that Jesus made us to love everybody, no matter their way of being. Many religious people forget about this when they judge somebody who is different.

Cooperating

A small part from Sheldon and Ivan interview

During the interview they started to agree with one another even if it seemed impossible because of them having such strong and opposite beliefs. Ivan explained “You see, the church is against gay marriage, but we do not want to marry in a church, we just want a form of union according to the law”. Sheldon came with an answer “I think marriage in the church needs to remain as that and it is a union with God”, “I totally agree with you at that point” Ivan responded. I think starting with that moment they both realized that even if different, they still are alike.

Through the end of the interview they both had to explain what love means to them. “That is a tough question because there are many aspects to love, there is the human side of love and then is the love which comes from God and that is perfect love and that is hard for us as humans to understand. God sees and loves the soul of every person and that is the main thing”, Sheldon said. His answer was sincere, and it revealed the fact that he grew up with no hate in his soul. He loves himself, he loves everybody around him, and the other people ways of being are not he’s preoccupation. He truly follows the teachings of God. Ivan’s answer was “For me love resembles respect. If you respect someone, you start to love him, because you start to know what his ideas, what his beliefs are, and love could be between spouses even if they are two men, two women, or a man and a woman. Respecting each other they start to love and that is what I am trying to say”. I noticed that Ivan put accent on other values, like respect. He talked with his mind, while Sheldon talked with his soul. I think that these answers were different because they both received a different kind of love, Sheldon received unconditional love from his family while Ivan has been judged by his family, and that influenced the way they perceive love.

Do not judge a person by their beliefs

After the interview ended, the room was filled with smiles. They did not discuss about their beliefs anymore, they shared experiences about how they talked at the interview, they laughed about how they expressed themselves and made jokes about their grammar mistakes. Everything went normal, no mean jokes, no bad talking to each other.

I consider this interview a great experience in my life because I finally understood that not all religious people hate LGBT community or vice versa, there are just some people that have hate in their soul and unfortunately, bad people are the ones that are noticed in our world. There should be no place for hate on this earth, just love.

Source: Jubilee