Tuesday 22 June 2010

The new Director of Changing Attitude Nigeria reflects on the relationship between parents and their lesbian and gay children

Davis Mac-Iyalla, founder of Changing Attitude Nigeria (CAN), who was granted asylum in the UK in 2008 has recently nominated Uche Sam as the new Director of CAN. Uche lives in Jos and tells me that he is formulating a strategy and vision, plans to visit and support the groups meeting in Nigeria and to consult about the way forward.

He has sent the following message to the members of CAN:

Warm greetings to you all and I hope you are having a splendid weekend. I just want to update you on my encounter with a young gay man who I happened to meet yesterday. He told me a lot about how he has suffered at the hands of his parents. Parents are the ones who are supposed to protect us from harm, but I have found out that most parents have a lot on the negative side towards their gay children.

This young man told me how his parents neglected him after they discovered that he was gay and since then life has been hell for him. They even took him to a deliverance house where he was told to fast for seven days to be delivered from the spirit, as they put it.

After this young man told me of his encounter, he later asked me what would be my advice to him and that he already has evil intention for his parents.

I was still for a while and later told him that the only way he can win his parents love for him is to show LOVE, because that is the best attitude you can display. It is not his fault that he is gay and neither is it his parent’s fault that they don’t understand because they lack wisdom. I gave him a place in the Bible to read, from the book of Hebrews 12:15 which says “looking diligently ...... lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you”.

When you are faced with a hurtful, offensive situation, refuse to let a wrong attitude take a root and produce bad fruit.

Most of us have faced serious neglect from our parents and the truth is that they will always see us as the bad egg in the family and we are also not valued among our siblings. This attitude from our parents has to be changed and worked upon. We need that love and care and attention from our parents and when we don’t get such, we tend to look for it elsewhere.

They may think that they are correcting us , but at the end we get hurt and some people begin to keep a lot in their mind which brings about bitterness.

Changing attitude should look at the home which is our first place of upbringing and see how we can make a change at home. I look forward to a time where parents will love and care for their children despite their sexuality. I have also noticed that most young gay people don’t live with their parents due to their sexuality but struggle on their own to make it in life.

The very reason weeds take over a garden is because the gardener doesn’t pull them in time. When your garden is choked by weeds you can't say, I don't know how it happened. But when you look diligently you will see them. This is a message I wish to pass to all parents.

When in time they notice their children's sexuality, they will start to bring them up in the way of the Lord and to accept who they are and also teach them how to live with their state of mind. At the end they will be happy to know that they have produced good children.

I am so sure that God is not happy with the way most parents treat their children who are gay. It is time for a change and we are here to make that change happen in our time. We must all show love and forgive whatever our parents or anyone has done to us. Change starts from us.

More blessings to you all.

Uche Sam
Director Changing Attitude Nigeria.

1 comment:

  1. WE must get the HELL out of untenable/harmful/dangerous codependent relationships no matter how ¨binding¨ and financially ¨secure.¨ The solution is to TRUST GOD that WE will find our way to safety (forgiveness is fine but it´s better done when one is alive/sound and emotionally/spiritually healthy) as we remove ourselves from the insanity of ABUSE (self and outside)!

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