The rest of the story

In the general sense everyone is in the same boat with HIV infected persons. Everyone is slowly dying of something. Everyone eventually dies from the wear and tear of age if nothing else. We have not escaped the second law of thermodynamics. We all live in a universe that is dying. Everything eventually runs down. Physically all orderly systems sooner or later decay into disorder. Our bodies havent been redesigned yet to conquer aging and the weaknesses inherent in such a process. The HIV virus is bringing disorder and dissolution to the normal order of my immune system. Like old age HIV eventually wears a person down.

The illusion of health is not the only thing that causes people to be unsympathetic toward those with HIV infection. The majority of those diagnosed with the disease (at least in the U. S.) are homosexuals, drug addicts who share blood through contaminated needles, prostitutes and the sexually promiscuous. Even in Africa, Haiti and other places where there seem to be more heterosexuals with HIV, there are questions as to some of the sexual practices involved. While a faithful monogamous heterosexual woman is HIV infected by her husband, if that husband was unfaithful, bisexual and/or promiscuous; can we truly say that the woman represents merely a heterosexual example of HIV? It would be enlightening to know how many of the heterosexual statistics of HIV have a homosexual/promiscuous connection hidden somewhere in them.

While there is proof that HIV can be passed by heterosexual practices there still lingers the mystery of why HIV has been so predominate among male homosexuals. All the medical evidence and printed brochures telling us that anyone can get HIV infected has not eliminated the mystery of the homosexual stigma on the disease. There has been an effort made to arouse sympathy in everyone for HIV infected people by suggesting that everyone can get the disease.

Rather than being sympathetic for someone with an HIV condition some are more likely to be suspicious of what one has been doing with his or her life. The misplaced logic follows: If 70% of those HIV infected are homosexual males, it seems reasonable to assume that any HIV infected male has a 70% chance of being homosexual. If we include the categories of intravenous drug users sharing needles, prostitutes and the promiscuous to the percentages, then an even higher percentage of suspicions about ones lifestyle follows disclosure of the disease to others.

The disease is not simply associated with a virus but with a lifestyle. Is it any wonder that disclosure of HIV becomes a private matter that by law others cannot talk about in public? A strange twist in all of this is that there is no law against publicly outing someone for being homosexual but one would be breaking the law to out an HIV patient. Such contradictions are normal to the reasoning inherent in many present day legal circles and politicians. It is so common to hear lawyers and politicians speak two different ways from opposite corners of their mouths that it almost seems natural. Learning law today seems to be that of acquiring the art of making contradictory statements sound logical and acceptable.

At this point I am straying from my original theme. I began writing about me and what it is like to be HIV infected and now I am making comments about lawyers, politicians and society in general. I do have a purpose in mentioning all of this. I dont simply live with a virus I live with the assumption by many that perhaps I deserve the disease if I happen to fall into a category of being homosexual, an intravenous drug user, a prostitute or promiscuous. While another can have the Magic of being famous and therefore called a hero for telling the world he is HIV infected most of us lack that Magic. We are looked upon as anything but courageous heroes by the people around us when we disclose our HIV condition.

All of this discussion comes down to an age old challenge. How do people hate the sin (wrongdoing) they see in others while somehow managing to love the sinner (wrongdoer)? Of course many would say that such a question does not apply today. There are those who would say that such a question does not apply today. There are those who buy the logic that wrong behavior is only a personal matter. Each one must decide for oneself what is right and wrong. In other words right and wrong dont really exist anywhere except in the human imagination where we imaginatively feel for ourselves alone what is right and wrong. Following this reasoning right and wrong have no foundation other than the fluctuating waves of my emotions; what I happen to like or not like; what I happen at any moment to thoughtfully feel has value or doesnt have value for me. In essence the foundation for my conduct or the stability of society is based only on what each one imagines to do that springs from the inspiration of ones emotions. Could this shifting emotional foundation for human conduct have any connection to people such as lawyers and politicians trying to justify legal contradictions? We think so. Could this shifting emotional foundation have anything to do with failing marriages? Isnt it true that individuals who have nothing more than their emotionally charged and imaginative thinking to hold them together actually have nothing higher than their limited and faulty selves to socially bind them?

Of course Im straying from myself by discussing what others think about the sources of right and wrong for humanity. I did this in order to say more clearly where I am. I want you to know how the sense of right and wrong relates to my life and ultimately to my HIV infection. I believe that right and wrong exists apart from me. Right and wrong are standards that rise higher than me and therefore cannot be created from my limited imaginative thoughts and feelings. I am not the creator of right and wrong anymore than I am the creator of my physical existence. While I am not the creator of right and wrong, I can be a knower or right and wrong as I reach beyond myself to that which is greater than me.

Rather right and wrong is something I humble myself before just as I humble myself before the Creator. And the Creator is not some mysterious evolutionary blind force that happens to have the free chance to work up my physical circumstances. I dont exist merely because a cosmic bomb exploded somehow, somewhere billions of years ago and just happened to fall out into the amazing genetic designs of life that support my body right now. An intelligent Creator designed my existence and my ability to intelligently know my existence. My mind has no way of grasping how random, chaotic, mindless forces acting alone could have created a world with minds in it. A mindless explanation for the creation of minds is not an explanation anyone with a working mind can understand. Because we act with some intelligence we are forced to accept the overwhelming truth that we have an intelligent Creator. Someone with a mind saying that mindless random forces caused minds to exist is basically throwing his mind away.

Evolution is an oddity of science, which tries to place rational explanations for existence on an irrational base. Anyone wanting to keep their minds intact would reject evolution as an acceptable explanation for human existence. All the mountains of scientific data of evolutionists crumble once one sees the meaningless foundation of the mountains. The trick with evolutionists is to never let one look directly at the mindless nonsense in the foundation of what theyre saying.

I say all of this to say that even though I am HIV infected. Even though I lived an active homosexual lifestyle for several years and even though it was by a homosexual contact that I became HIV infected, I see homosexuality as wrong in that it is against nature and against the Intelligent One who created nature. Homosexuality is wrong because it works contrary to the physical complement indicated in the design of male and female bodies. Male and female created He them is the explanation given in Chapter One of Genesis on how sexuality was physically designed.

In a sexual union a male and a female have the capacity to share themselves right down to the very genetic core and essence of their being. Even if the union does not reach to that genetic core and essence of their being. Even if the union does not reach to that genetic depth (a conception), the male and female who sexually unite, line themselves up in agreement with that ultimate pattern of physical union. Every heterosexual union does not necessarily lead to a conception but every heterosexual union follows in the path of such a natural possibility. Because heterosexuals are following the pattern of physical natures possibilities in terms of sexual union, they are going along with what is sexually natural. This is why Paul, in the first chapter of his letter to the Christians in Rome calls homosexuality a sin (wrong) against nature.

While heterosexuality naturally rises from the physical nature of human bodies in sexual combination, homosexuality rises from emotions and imaginative thinking (the consideration of alternative options). My homosexual practice was real in the sense that it truly reflected my emotions and my ability to imagine options in terms of sexual fantasies. My homosexual practice was unreal in the sense of how it failed to reflect the sexual design of male and female bodies in union. It does not take a reading of the Bible for one to know that homosexuality operates contrary to the physical nature of our bodies. We only need to understand how our bodies are physically designed to sexually unite to see what is sexually natural.

While the physics of our bodies points us in the direction of heterosexual union, the Creator of our sexual existence goes even further to refine and define sexuality as He speaks to humanity (the Bible) and tells us more guidelines for heterosexual behavior such as rules about incest, rape, promiscuity, etc. and the committed format for marriage and family. A heterosexual would not know the right and wrong of such activities simply by looking at the physical compliment of males and females. On the other hand a homosexual doesnt need the Bible to tell him or her that homosexuality is wrong for their bodies adequately indicate what is naturally right.

Danny's Conclusions

As a homosexual, I could easily ignore what the Bible says about homosexuality by dismissing the writings. I could say the Bible is merely the human opinions of others that have no more merit than my own opinions. But it is impossible for me to ignore what is written in my flesh in terms of sexual design and the physical complements that go with that design. If I sodomized another I would be placing a genetic living gift of myself (my sperm) into the place where another disposes of their solid bodily wastes. Such a sexual combination is just one example of how homosexuality is so physically mismatched. As a man there is no body cavity on another man that would complement what I have to sexually offer in the way a woman is made to complement. Physically I am made for a woman in terms of natural heterosexuality regardless of what my sexual fantasies might suggest as alternatives.

Of course there are those who would argue with my natural points against homosexuality. For beginners I can hear them citing how the womans cervix is hostile to male sperm. (Is that not the Creators design to insure that the healthiest and strongest genetically unite to keep the generations strong?) Ive heard many of the arguments for homosexuality. Probably the best one is to curb population. Overpopulation is the result human lust and greed. Homosexuality doesnt address those problems, but merely tries to direct them in a nonreproductive course. The lust and greed of the human heart must be addressed if were to seek a real answer. Many of the arguments for homosexuality border on the silly. I remember reading a gay article that said homosexuality was good because in terms of sodomy, a man could achieve better friction and therefore a better orgasm from another mans anus than from a womans vagina. Apparently the gay writer thought friction is the secret to a happier sexual and social life!

It is time for many to come out of the fog of sexual excitement in which theyve been living and see clearly sexual reality. I know that many homosexuals will hatefully reject what I say. Those who have frustratingly fought for years to convince themselves and everyone else that homosexuality is somehow natural for them will not likely embrace the facts. But my enemies will have to admit one thing, the argument I offer is greater than me and my personal feelings about homosexuality. The argument is also greater than them and their personal feelings about homosexuality. Thats why the argument of nature eventually overwhelmed me. Even while the emotional and imaginative homosexual framework that I had lived within for years still enclosed me, I could look at my body and its design and know that homosexuality wasnt right. There is a sense that homosexuality is not a sexuality as all for sex only has meaning in terms of the complements of male and female. Homosexuality is a mock-sex. Men with men acting out together with their sexual abilities is a mockery to the real physical complement.

Danny's Decision

It has been hard to walk out on so many things that Id given to feel and believe and act out sexually for so long. The struggle against HIV seems a skirmish compared to the sexual struggle Ive fought within myself for years. At least the sexual struggle is won. I know and accept the truth of my sexuality even though emotional and imaginative fires smolder out of my past occasionally. I die daily to my homosexual past in order to live anew and not guilty before the Creator of my sexuality. Its a clean, fresh, honest feeling to fit properly in the world God made. Although I am not and have no plans as such, I am heterosexual in that I support heterosexuality in terms of the Christian marriage. There is no requirement by the Creator for everyone to engage in sexual practices. Such a requirement would not be sexual freedom. However the Creator has left us with obvious guidelines in physics and in the Bible if we do choose to act sexually according to our freewill.

It is amazing to me how those who are sympathetic with my physical condition of HIV will also be sympathetic to my emotional and imaginative condition that created my homosexuality. They seem to reason that I have enough problems without adding to them the emotional stress of thinking I have lived my life the wrong way sexually. Just as I ignored the indications of how my body was sexually designed to complement, these comforters ignore those physical indications as well. They want to deal with me only in terms of what I am feeling and imagining about myself. They ignore the physical facts in order not to hurt my feelings. They tell me not to feel guilty. They tell me not to be down on myself. They value my emotional state more than the truth. They believe that I am already sick enough without adding depression to help HIV do me in. And I agree. I dont need depression dragging me down. (I need a Savior who has the loving attention to forgive me rather than loving one side of me, my emotions, while ignoring my guilty actions.) While I dont need depression I also dont need illusions to help me over these troubling areas in my life. I would be a fool to throw the truth away simply because it may hurt my feelings.

Im trying at this point in my life to be as real as I can. Im trying to have the courage to face all that is and not drown myself in emotional illusions or doctor things up with what I imagine or feel for myself alone. There is an amazing thing about TRUTH written in capitals as opposed to my personal truth written in small letters. Even though TRUTH greater than I can cause pain to the imaginatively structured emotions which Ive created for myself, the TRUTH brings something more solid and real than myself into my life.

Rather than continually trying to creatively dream up what might be right or wrong for me, Im learning to sit down on a throne of right or wrong thinking, with the Creator who is greater than me. I sit on that throne every time I conform to what the Creator says is the way to live, the purpose for which I was designed. I didnt realize it at first, but the longer I sit in this throne the more it becomes an easy chair. This comfort sure beats trying to continually seek for and create a meaningful foundation for my life with my unstable and fluctuating imaginations and feelings. In many different ways in the Bible the Creator says, learn of Me, conform your life to what I say and relax with Me on My throne and rule your life by the humility of self control and self restraint. I will never rise to anything higher in life until I recognize One greater and wiser than myself and trust the strength and wisdom of the Greater One who created my life.

Its either this relaxation or the continual restless fluttering about trying to find myself and my own sense of right and wrong; building my own limited self contained values, trying to define who and what and why I am because Ive rejected who and what and why I am by the Creators design. Those who reject a trust in God have the continual burden of acting like God when theyre not and pretending to be in control when things are beyond their control. How true is the saying, There is no peace to the wicked.! How peaceful it is to sit with the Prince of Peace once I surrender my efforts that keep defending my own way and my ability to create my life on my own terms in defiance of my Creator. Having no intelligent loving Creator and having the freedom to morally do as I please only let me with confusion and confusion and chaos (the evolution god).

I started out telling you about my physical condition and I ended up telling you about what is happening in my heart and mind. Hopefully you should know me and understand me at least a little. Hopefully you know what I mean when I say: I would rather be free with God than to be in the confinement of being captivated with myself and my own emotional imaginative abilities. I know I have rambled. I discussed science and evolution, law and the foundation of right and wrong for human behavior along with my HIV medical condition. While dealing with the HIV infection I also wanted to relate how Ive dealt with the infections working within the climate of human opinions. I live in that infectious climate as much as I live in my infectious body. Im looking forward to the possibility of healthy thoughts as well as a healthy body.