Heather Matarazzo on Growing Up Gay and Religious

Out actress Heather Matarazzo wrote an article for HuffPost Gay Voices about being gay and religion, and how growing up going to a school where she had to attend religious education classes in order to learn about God, Jesus and the Saints and avoiding going to hell, affected her discovery and acceptance of being gay.

She points out many of the holes in structure and teachings of religion, such as being taught that God was “unconditional love,” but that there were countless conditions that must be met in order to receive that love; that knowledge is the root of all evil, along with curiosity, being naked and women. But that’s not all:

Also, it's important to know that God can hold on to resentment for a really long time. But then Jesus came and saved us all. Except only if we believe in Him because He is truly the only way to get to God -- unless, of course, you don't repent for your sins, or you question the teachings of the Church, or use birth control, or masturbate (that really screwed me up), or hurt God's feelings by using His name in vain, or eat meat on Friday (until that rule was changed), or have sex before marriage... the list goes on and on. Oh, and also, you definitely can't be gay.

Matarazzo discussed the first time she met a gay person when she was 11, and despite always being attracted to women, she had never realized what the feeling was until spending the summer filming Welcome to the Dollhouse.

Here I met a quite a few people who were gay, and were out, and for the first time I had a name for the feelings that I was having, a new sense of identity, and with that, panic, fear and, ultimately, utter rebellion.

She said that being gay and growing up attending school and religious classes created several conflicts for her to sort out, one of which became apparent very quickly:

In class that year was a woman who was our teacher, and she shall remain nameless. I don't remember when exactly it came up, or how exactly it did, but what I do remember was this: she had stated boldly, "God sent AIDS to gay people to punish them for their sins." I was aghast. I was shocked. I was sickened. That couldn't be true; it simply couldn't. She was talking about my friends. She was talking about me. Right there, I made a decision: if this was God, then I wanted no part of it.

Matarazzo also said that after years of struggling with debating whether or not her educators were right, that she should fear God and was going to hell, and forcing herself to date boys, she was introduced, via Many Lives, Many Masters, to the idea of reincarnation, everything being energy and everyone being connected. She was inspired to spend time at the library reading books about “a very different God, Universe, Divine Intelligence, Goddess, etc” which sparked her spiritual journey.

I also found out that at least for me, there isn't any "right way" to God, Universe, what have you. It's what's right for me. And what's right for me today might not be right for me tomorrow. And what's right for me might not be right for you, and that's OK. We each get that gift to unwrap as we see fit, whenever, if ever.

Matarazzo closed her article with this:

If there is one thing I wish for people, it is to recognize that we all have a divine right to be here as we are. To quote Oprah, ""[Y]ou're worthy because you are born and because you are here. Your being here, your being alive makes worthiness your birthright. You alone are enough."

Read the full As We Are post from Matarazzo on HuffPost Gay Voices.

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