Here we are in the advent season and also honoring world AIDS Day. 33 years ago I had come to San Francisco to come to terms with my sexual orientation. I came at the suggestion of my spiritual director at Boston College who was a closeted gay man and a Jesuit. I was grappling with the question of whether I have a vocation for the priesthood. He nipped that in the bud and said if you are questioning your sexual orientation you ought to head out to San Francisco. This is the kind of spiritual direction every young gay Catholic guy needs! And that was exactly what I needed because my 1st relationship was one that would have an impact on me for the rest of my life. His name was Bill and he walked me through my self-doubt and self-hatred in a loving yet firm way. The message and theme of many of our conversations became the foundation and standard that I would attempt to live my life. The message was profoundly freeing and healing… “Gregg, this man Jesus that you love so much identified as the truth and the light. That living one's truth was so important that that's how Jesus identified himself. And the amazing responsibility that each of us has to be our unique light.” It was as if some switch had been turned for me. That I began to recognize that each one of us is this unique and profound gift. That each one of us has a responsibility to be our essential self. And that this journey of self acceptance and self love was a sacred journey. But what can seem like a selfish or egotistical goal is actually more humble than anything else. Because it is this faith and this trust that there is something precious about every single one of us. And that each one of us as we begin to honor and love who we are we recognize that we have a personal ministry, a life mission to be fully who we are and to give generously of this gift. That who you are is not only acceptable but indispensable.
So when you are 22 and newly aware of this amazing gift that you are to the world :-) It would be incredibly selfish not to share it! Even better, give it to your parents living peacefully on Long Island as their Christmas present! (Years later my mother would laughingly say "Timing is everything.") My little brown paper that I hold here is the torn grocery bag on which I wrote my notes which was my Christmas present to my parents. It talks of everything that I just said. My parents had been leaving to the mall to go Christmas shopping and I was sitting on the sofa watching TV and it hit me. I have come to tell Archie and Edith Bunker that their son is gay. I have a critical decision to make… Take a cab to JFK while they were out shopping or tell them that they're getting their Christmas present when they get back. Clearly I chose the latter. I went into the attic and grabbed baby pictures, first-grade pictures and my high school graduation picture. I wanted a reference point for my parents. I wanted something that reminded them… As they received this life-changing information, that I was still that beautiful little boy that they love so much. Is every gay person's worst nightmare–to lose the love of a family. My parents came home I share my story and looked into my father's eyes… My father the 6' 4'', 300 lb. construction worker “My gift to you this Christmas is to share with you that I am a gay man.” Silence. Then my father stood up and with a big sigh said “Come here”. And my dad leaned forward and enveloped me in a gigantic bearhug with his face pressed against the side of mine and whispered into my ear “Son, I love you so much. It must have been so hard all of these years. I wish you could've told us sooner.”
All this came in handy a few years later when given another challenge of acceptance and trust. In the mid-eighties I found out that I was HIV-positive and like for many of us, it was devastating news. It was not only terrifying but for a period of time I carried great shame, feeling like I was a pariah, diseased and unlovable. I searched for healing. Another powerful, life-changing moment for me was attending a workshop for people with AIDS. It was the simplest things that I found transformative. We really are healed by one another, that is why it is so important to hear one another's stories. One part of the workshop was just people taking turns standing up and telling the story. The only have a short period of time and it could be anything that they wanted to say. And I remember sitting in the front row and leaning forward and taking in every single story and thinking to myself “Oh my God, I love that guy''. And the next one “Oh my God, I love that guy.” And the next one, and the next one, and the next one,… And then I realized–they are all lovable, they are all worthy of love, they are all innocent. I must be too.
I realized what healing took place as we came together to be supportive of one another, finding comfort and inspiration in one another. By joining together we could 'find our way' even in the middle of this horrifying and devastating epidemic. Lots of people came, and a lot of people died. While preparing for this talk today I thought I would just start writing down a few names… And here are some of my losses.
I never had the courage to even consider writing until yesterday morning. So on this World AIDS Day, I fill my mind and heart with some of my sweet ones whom I've loved so much and lost way too soon. But who left me with more than I thought one could be left with after so much loss.
PHILIP - friend, support, roommate, like a brother to me, no an older sister a really strict one who calls you on your stuff, expects the best of you, walking through the Castro your face covered with lesions-the biggest on your nose, we sat in the middle of the restaurant I was prepared to be in a corner with you facing the wall "I want to face out." you said. I never was prouder of a friend, I hear your voice still requiring so much of me. And I can't forget the gift/miracle of holding your cold hand after you passed and in my other hand your Mom and Dad's hands, remembering you saying the night before "Be the bridge for my parents, help them understand this is my 'healing' - And we did and it was.
XAVIER - lover - for 25 years you've come to me in so many dreams(one recently) and after every one of them I wake thinking you're alive "I'm going to Paris to find you"-then I remember, you are gone. You were so 100% unconditional- I swear if you were alive I'd ask you to grow old with me, I'm sorry I couldn't stay.
MICHAEL - my dear, dear quiet roommate whom I let down, I got terrified when you got sick, I'm so sorry, I asked you to move out. Seeing you alone in Mother Theresa's hospice and you held my hand smiling, "Who'd believe it would come to this?'' If I got a do-over you'd die in my big green chair in the living room surrounded by Melinda and Karen and the other guys and I'd be making soup in the kitchen-still in denial that you or any of you were really going to die.
LUIS - BEAUTIFUL Luis! your profound love transformed Tom, and it lives on with him and Jim. I'll never forget you calling- just returned from a very hard Dr's appt, so sick, mouth and throat full of lesions and you spoke for about a half hour telling me how wonderful people are "Gregg, the nurse took my hand and held it so gently, she didn't have to do that." I was in tears the whole time I covered the phone thinking 'How could she not?'
JAMES - roommate, friend my beautiful sweet James welcoming my new partner & daughter David and Breauna here "Have them live here! I'll move out and live with Douglas!", and you did and WE DID! Thank You!
KEVAN - Breauna's first dad, never met you but I owe you. You gave the world- Breauna. No greater gift in my life. 1995 when it seemed every friend was dying, all hope was lost- into my life came Bree and David. No greater gifts. The luckiest day of my life. Thank you Kevan. .
MATTHEW - your generous incredibly broken heart. You forgave your mom who disowned you and sent back every birthday and christmas present you ever sent her. On your deathbed she took your call. Her loss was our gain.
MORRIS - like your best friend Matthew disowned by your parents. On your deathbed in the hospital your dad called. i begged you to talk with him. 'No thank you!'
DOUG - you sent me to that NY quack of a Dr 97 years old, eyes closed prescribing me something that i think was nail polish remover-and I drank it! Jeez!
DORIS - cried every time you told the story of your baby dying and laughed every time we watched the documentary you were in and the part where you shifted your weight and went 'Phrumph!! " Oh Lord Jesus, I'm going on a diet."
DAN Burlando - the toughest, most skeptical guy at group, scared the hell out of us, we were trying to heal and we knew nothing- Too sick to come to group we went to you, into the evening you said "Guys, this isn't BS, your love is really working, i haven't been able to eat solid food for a month and I've just eaten 2 slices of pizza and french fries!' Courageously lived with those KS lesions, the biggest on your nose…Burlando you became 'Fernando the Bull' in the children's book and the bee on the tip of his nose was replaced a butterfly sticker, to cover that lesion. Loved hearing from Lois that you sent away for a box of monarch butterflies and released them in your loft.
CEYRA - were you 16,17,19? TOO YOUNG! calling you 'Pickles' and 'Peaches' it kept changing. My goal- a smile on that face of yours. I never believed you'd die that young.
CAROL - it was breast cancer that took you but you were the one who we were 'booking to do our memorial services', each speaking gig you'd call and say a prayer and ended with "Well, we know God's no fool...you're the only man for the job Gregg, the only man for the job." It was crazy talk but it worked every time.
SCOTT F. - and then there was Scott, Healing Circle you brought with you only joy, your last gift to me was joining your Mom and Larry anointing your body with holy water and oils, singing, praying, crying, dressing you in your orange sneakers & an orchid blossom, lifelong lover of orchids
you carried that one for years from city to city, it never bloomed and you never gave up on it… Larry called to tell me you died, "And" he said "that orchid bloomed! Come help us with Scott." And I did. A few months after you memorial I was having a terrible time-too much loss. I needed some hope, a miracle…so I got out my monthly Day Book-each day had a poem, or prayer or a reading from something. What was the reading the day Scott died. Flipping through the pages I found your day.
"Silently a flower blooms,
And silently it falls away;
Yet here now, at this moment, at this place,
The world of the flower, the whole of
the world is blooming.
This is the talk of the flower, the truth
of the blossom:
The glory of eternal life is fully shining here.
And it all came back - the possibility that miracles can sweep in effortlessly and by surprise–and take care of you. That we are not alone. And that it's not all up to us, that the burden does not rest on our shoulder's alone. That there is this loving presence that will send in caring, caring that you are unaware of needing. And as a result faith is restored. Faith in the possibility of grace.
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