Gay Marriages Don’t Last, Right?
Life lessons of a loving gay Christian
Three years ago, I was a celibate gay Christian. Everyone in my tribe told me that “gay marriages always fail.”
Now that I am married to my gay husband, I was curious about the reality of the gay marriage divorce rate. Read on, and you too will learn what I have discovered.
Before answering the title’s question, though, I want to provide you with some cultural, religious, and personal background. Here goes.
Cultural Background
The reality of gay marriages is a recent phenomenon. In America, such legal unions began in 2004 in Massachusetts. Furthermore, gay marriages did not become legal in all 50 states until a Supreme Court ruling in 2015.
The Pew Research Center “is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes, and trends shaping the world. We conduct public opinion polling, demographic research, content analysis, and other data-driven social science research. We do not take policy positions.” In 2019, they published “5 Facts About Same-Sex Marriage.”
One of the research’s facts indicated a huge shift in Americans’ support of same-sex marriage. Case in point, in 2004, 60% of those polled opposed gay marriages, while 31% were in favor. Amazingly, 15 years later, the numbers had literally switched: 61% favoring and 31% opposing!
Interestingly, since 2017, both camps (i.e., “favor” and “oppose”) have remained stable. In other words, those in the “oppose tribe” are remaining firm in their opposition — while those who approve of gay marriages stay put. Stop me if you have heard this before: America seems to be entrenched in bipolar attitudes regarding gay marriages! Traditionalists hold their ground; progressives appear to have reached their ceiling for now.
Another fact is that there are distinctly different demographics regarding who supports gay marriages versus those who oppose. First, there are political disagreements. Three-fourths of Democrats favor same-sex marriages, compared to 44% of the Republicans. The large differences between political tribes are well known.
Relatedly, there are still large age gaps on the gay marriage issue. Specifically, 45% of those Americans of age 77 or older remain in opposition. In contrast, 74% of those aged 41 or younger promote gay marriages. Predictably, as America ages, a stronger percentage will side with pro-gay unions.
Another interesting fact from the Pew Research Center is that (as of 2019) nine out of every 10 LGBT individuals were not in a gay marriage. Thus, within the gay community, it is still quite rare to find a same-sex marriage. And yet, ever since America’s Supreme Court made gay marriages legal, there has been an increasing number of gay marriages.
If this trend continues, Americans will increasingly be exposed to men who are actually in a gay marriage. And science indicates that as non-supportive people actually meet a gay married couple, their attitudes change more positively.
Religious Background
Readers should not be surprised that white evangelical Protestants oppose same-sex marriage. Explicitly, the Pew study indicates that only 29% of this particular evangelical tribe approve of gay marriages. And it would be logical to deduce that the 29% who support are primarily those of younger ages.
In contrast, 66% of white mainline Protestants and 61% of Catholics approve of gay marriages. These facts raise a dilemma for those two Christian faiths. For example, while virtually the only Protestant denominations that conduct gay marriages identify as “mainline,” not all mainline denominations support such unions. Another conundrum is that the specific position of the Catholic Church opposes gay marriages — and yet the majority of their congregants approve of it!
What does all of this data mean for Christians (of all faiths and denominations)?
It means that the older, white evangelicals are entrenched in their opposition to gay marriages. As evangelicals “age,” it would be logical to presume that more evangelicals would then favor same-sex marriages.
As for mainline Protestantism, it means that more and more denominations are forced to consider whether they approve of gay marriages. And the more mainline denominations that affirm gay marriages, the more the public will become familiar with gay married couples.
Finally, for Catholics it means cognitive dissonance. Increasingly, more Catholics favor gay marriages, yet the Pope and highest leadership influences whether gay marriages may be conducted inside the Catholic churches. Thus, gay Catholics’ who long for gay marriage approval are dependent upon one day having a more progressive Pope arise and sanction gay marriages.
Personal Background
My own story is a microcosm of the larger trend within America concerning gay marriage. In short, from 2017 (when my wife of 41 years died of cancer) until now, my sexual identity and belief about gay marriage have changed.
In 2018, my sexual identity was “I experience same-sex attraction.” Also, as a single man, I conceived myself as having a celibate identity (i.e., I presumed to remain single until I die).
By 2019, however, I shifted my sexual identity to “gay.” That term, for me, no longer had such a negative valence. I stopped considering that word to mean a nefarious “homoerotic promiscuity.” Instead, I embraced the matter-of-fact, universal meaning of “possesses same-sex attractions.”
Furthermore, I became increasingly frustrated with my evangelical tribe’s constant demonization of the three-letter word g — a — y. Such disdain, to me, seemed ignorant in its understanding, plus mean-spirited in its application. The more the evangelical leadership cursed the use of the word “gay,” the more I became outspoken as a “gay” Christian.
Relatedly, before 2021 I was an evangelical who believed in the Sola Scriptura worldview (i.e., that the Bible is the only inerrant source of Truth). Accordingly, I believed that the Bible condemned both anal intercourse between men, plus gay marriage. However, in that infamous covid year of 2020, I began reading for the first time about the gay-affirming marriage rationale.
The more I read, the more I could not dismiss the theological and biblical logic that supports gay marriages (i.e., applying the context of the meaning of homosexual verses, and the Bible’s ambiguity regarding the only permissible form of marriage). For me, my attention toward gay-affirming marriage had become the proverbial “splinter in my brain” that I could not ignore.
So, in August 2020, I announced that I now affirm gay marriages. Much more importantly, I came to believe that God affirms such unions. My primary reason for shifting my attitude did not center on the proper interpretations of the famous Bible “clobber passages.” Rather, my shift centered on three principles: 1) God’s apparent blueprint for all human relationships; 2) the abysmal record of homosexual men who tried to convert their orientation; and 3) God’s inherent sense of social justice.
Consequently, in 2021 I became a writer for the international news source “Medium,” plus created my own publication called “GAYoda.” I focus on one distinct topic: being a gay Christian.
Also, 2021 brought a shift in my worldview. I had increasingly seen the flaws in the inerrancy of the scripture (as applied to contemporary situations). Thus, I shifted my worldview from being Bible-centric to now being Jesus-centric. I no longer refer to myself as an “evangelical;” rather, I prefer a Christian identity of “post-evangelical.”
Now, my Jesus-centric worldview focuses on: faith that Jesus is indeed God; Jesus will never leave me, and I will never leave Him; and the evidence of my love for Jesus is that I love all others in Jesus’ kind, merciful, and unselfish manner.
The fall of 2021 also brought my biggest shift of all. I entered into a committed, monogamous love relationship with another gay man who was single. We were married on Valentine’s Day, 2022.
Before my gay marriage, I had personally witnessed the successes of several gay Christian marriages. Their relationships appeared to be wholesome, loving and thriving. And yet, what I was observing with my own eyes was very different than the evangelical belief that “gay marriages never last.”
My evangelical friends pronounced this fatalistic perspective as a “universal truth,” and their evangelical logic went like this:
The Bible disapproves of homosexuality. God created marriage as an institution only between one man and one woman. God does not approve of gay marriage and anal intercourse between men. And thus, life itself proves the Bible’s teachings: gay marriages fail.
As a psychologist, researcher, and author, my curiosity overtook me. So, I set out to uncover the facts: do gay marriages always fail (or at least fail more than straight marriages)?
Drumroll, please.
Here are the facts.
Do Gay Marriages Last?
Before unveiling the answer, allow me to make a few disclaimers. The science regarding gay marriages is still very limited (i.e., since gay marriages only became an American phenom in 2015). And the nature of a straight marriage is different than that of a “mixed-orientation marriage” — and both of those types of pairings are notably different than a gay marriage.
Furthermore, not all research is equally reliable. Some sources are more noteworthy than others. Thus, in attempting to uncover the answer to gay marriage viability, I paid attention to the more renowned research agencies (e.g., the Pew Research Center; the Williams Institute).
And here is what I found.
The Williams Institute found that “the gay divorce rate is half that of heterosexual married couples.” And of all the data that I was able to access online, the “worst-case” was that gay marriages divorce at an equal rate as straight marriages.
So, I propose we revise the urban legend amongst evangelical Christians, and instead focus on the facts:
Gay marriages do not always fail. Rather, same-sex marriages succeed at least as well as straight marriages.
And such facts support what we progressive gay Christians have known:
Gay Christian marriages can be a wonderful union and avenue toward thriving in life.
Dr. Mike Rosebush is the founder/author of GAYoda and writer for Backyard Church. He has a Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology and is a retired Licensed Professional Counselor with 45+ years of mentoring thousands of gay Christian men. Read the complete set of articles here. You may contact Dr. Rosebush at mikerosebush75@gmail.com.
