GYC SE Fall Conference 2019: “The Wife of Jesus”

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GYC Southeast

Breakout Session

Michael Carducci

Homosexuality and the Church with Michael Carducci Part 1

Lord, I just thank you for this time and I ask Father that you would open up our hearts and our minds, that you would send your Holy Spirit in a large measure, not only to be with my heart and my words, but also Lord with the heart and the minds of those that are listening.

I pray Father that you prepare us for what's coming not only in the church, but the things that are around the world that are designed to help us, Lord, but also to distract us and to avert, Lord, the perfect plan that you have for each 1 of us.

Alright, so Coming Out Ministries was started 9 years ago and it was designed, or started by 5 different individuals that already had individual ministries was 2 women that were sisters and then 3 guys of which myself and Ron Woolsey are the originators that are left now.

But we have other people that have come into the ministry and gone during that time in the last 9 years.

And what's really amazing, I find, is that there's a lot of people wherever we go that come to us privately or openly and talk about how they also have been on their own unique journeys.

Our ministry, I think, is really kind of telling, and we have a lot of popularity, not necessarily because we're that dynamic, but because the subject matter is.

Now we know that this is going on around the world, and there's just no way that the church can even avoid this anymore.

And unfortunately, the reason why my colleagues and I walked away from church culture was because there wasn't anyone talking about this issue.

And so we basically felt no other choice but to leave the church.

What I find amazing is that through somebody's prayers, each 1 of us came back into the church through a relationship with Jesus Christ and then found the meaning and purpose.

However, there still weren't any resources in our denomination or in Christianity that were really helping to guide the conversation.

Now that gay marriage is legal and we have LGBT rights knocking on the doors of Christianity, the church has no choice.

We just can't sweep it under the rug anymore.

And so I find that amazing that God can even use adversity as a way to also force us to talk about these things.

And I want to use this quote from Testimonies on Sexual Behavior, Adultery and Divorce, chapter 11, if you read it, is amazing because she really talks about the issue that's going to be at the end of time.

Licentiousness, this is the quote, 1 of Satan's enchantments.

The licentious practice of the Hebrews accomplished for them that which all the warfare of nations and the enchantments of Balaam could not do.

Their covering and protection were removed from them.

So many of the princes and people were guilty of licentiousness that it became a national sin for God was wroth with the whole congregation.

The very same Satan is now working to the very same end, to weaken and destroy the people who claim to be keeping the commandments of God as they are just on the borders of the heavenly Canaan.

He has but little time left now in which to work, and he will work with tremendous power to ensnare the people of God upon their weak points of character." This whole chapter is, in my opinion, really the revelation of the Internet Society and how we've been bombarded by Internet pornography and things that are on the Internet.

I have young people coming to me that were saying that they were 7 and 8 years old when they became addicted to pornography.

I've had young students, young women in their early 20s, coming to me in Europe talking about their addiction to pornography and masturbation, knowing that they were not ready for marriage and the commitment of marriage.

And these were attractive young women that were smart and intelligent, and yet they were addicted to pornography.

It's also an issue that women struggle with as well, not just young people, but also old people as well.

It was really difficult managing and trying to find answers to the questions that I had, thinking that the onslaught of not only the history of spending 20 years in the gay culture, but also many years addicted to pornography, how was I going to find the victory over these things in the church, especially from a church that wasn't talking about it?

Thinking that I was the only 1, as I started this ministry, talking about the LGBT issue, I realized that the pornography issue is really number 1 in the church.

I want to share, this is a picture of me, I was about 12 years old there.

I was already struggling with many things, identity issues.

I wasn't necessarily struggling with same-sex attraction, but there was things that were going on that at 40 years old when I came to Christ I said, I want to know how, I want to know why, at my earliest thoughts that I was a girl trapped in a boy's body.

That's probably the earliest thought that I can actually remember now as an adult.

I just thought that God had made a mistake.

I acknowledged that God existed and I asked Him to change me.

But each and every morning, imagine the disappointment of that little boy waking up as a boy again.

And so this followed me until I was 20 years old.

I didn't develop through it or work through it.

And instead, as I recognized God more and became an Adventist Christian in my early teens, I remember thinking to myself that a sex change is really the answer.

When same-sex attraction came my way, when puberty came, I thought, well, if I was a woman, then my attractions would be okay and my body would be okay.

So what that did is that had a driving force even more to reject the body that I had, Also the thought that if I was female that men would love me and that also I would be able to express myself according to the thoughts and the attractions that I had through puberty.

So again at 20 years old, unable to find that I could change those attractions, I was in a relationship with a girl, I broke up with her, I moved to Florida, and I remember thinking to myself, after I ran into a girl that was also a lesbian, we decided we were going to go back to the church once and for all and find out if the church had any answers for people like us.

So I handpicked this 1 guy I watched after several months and I sat down with him and as I started to share what was going on, he said, well Mike, what's up?

And I said, well it has to do with women.

And before I could say another word, he said something very derogatory about women I knew I wasn't safe to share and I walked out of church that night after I listened to him, unable to share my issue, and I walked out of church and I said to God, I'm done.

I can't get my sexuality and my religion to come together.

You haven't healed me and this is what you send to help me?

And so it was from that point on that I went into the gay life.

They have laws on our books that would basically protect a child like me that thinks that they're in the wrong sex.

They can actually go against the will of the parents and allow this child to take these body morphing hormones to prevent not only the puberty process, but to allow them to develop in the sex that they desire against the will of their parents.

Now, if that was available for me in the 60s when I was a kid, I would have been standing first in line.

Fortunately for me, it was not, because then when I was 20 years old and went out into the gay culture, what I needed was male affirmation.

He was in the Navy, so my father wasn't home a lot.

So then when my dad was home, he was angry and abusive.

So in this little boy's mind I could see my mother who was stable, she was quiet, she was consistent and then here's my dad, this crazy man that's abusive and I thought, well if that's my sex, I reject that.

And in my defense I detached from my father and I wanted to be just like my mother.

I didn't have a brother or uncle to give me any influence or to give me an example of what masculinity looked like that was safe and attractive and so I patterned after my sisters and so that followed me until I was 20.

So imagine now being in the gay culture and all of a sudden realizing that masculinity is more valuable than femininity.

So if I butchered up a little bit and work out in the gym, I found that I got all the attention from men that I desired.

Now this did cause a, this did take away the struggle for identity, thinking that I was a girl trapped in a boy's body, but it didn't take away the same sex attraction.

But what it did do is by the time I was in my mid-twenties, I realized that I was completely comfortable as a male.

I had no more desire to be a female and that had left.

Imagine the trauma that would have happened if all of a sudden in my 20s, if I'd have had a sex change at 16 or 17 years old, realizing now that I'd really messed up and my body would have been mutilated beyond repair.

And every person's story is completely different than somebody else's.

I was transgendered, I believe, because of the rejection of my father.

I've heard many stories that are all over the map about how they may have been rejected by the mother.

I know someone whose mother wanted a girl, not a boy, and so when he was born a male, he was rejected.

So for him, his thought was, well, my mother would love me if I was a girl, so that also started the transgender process for him as well.

I think it's unsafe or unfair to assume that everybody's situation is the same.

You know, we all have different fingerprints and therefore everyone's story and how they get to where they are is completely different as well.

I'm standing in front of my uncle's truck.

I talk about how the devil was putting these knots in the rope of my life, even at an early age, even before I was conscious, the rejection of my father, being surrounded by girls.

I had 3 aunts that were about the same age.

So you can imagine, most of the time, I hung out with the girls, but I was fine with it.

The boys in school that called me sissy, queer, faggot, homo, What that did is it pushed masculinity even further away from me and that was what I needed to be affirmed in my own masculinity.

So again, these are all some of the different pieces that put together this puzzle for me for why I was transgendered and same-sex attracted.

Not every person that is transgendered is homosexual.

As many as transgenders that are gay are also heterosexual in their attractions.

So you can't make that assumption either that just because somebody is transgendered that they're homosexual.

Homosexuality and the Church with Michael Carducci Part 2

Alright, I'd like to open with a word of prayer.

Father, I just thank you for this time to present at SEYC, and I know, Lord, that there are many questions that we have, And if the presentation didn't bring up questions, I know that many came with questions that they already have.

Lord, I just want to answer them honestly, and I want to answer them according to your word, and I want to answer them with compassion, but also compelling truth, Lord, from your word.

And so I pray, Lord, that you will guide us.

So the first question that I have is If someone who has engaged in oral sex or masturbation no longer a virgin like someone who has had General intercourse Wow This is a really great question.

I want to read the question again because now I understand it.

Is someone who has engaged in oral sex or masturbation no longer a virgin like someone who has had genital intercourse?

And I think that that's a really interesting question and I don't know that I have the complete answer on that.

I'm not a theologian, but I'm also not a medical doctor or a psychologist.

But I think that according to the Word, the Word says that lust begins in the mind.

And So I think that women that have husbands or husbands that have wives that are engaging in pornography and masturbation, is that adultery?

You know, I think that the fine line is it's not a physical adultery, but it has very similar effects on the mind.

And so I think that, I don't know that that would be an excuse for divorce, but I think it definitely is a very serious issue that probably needs to be addressed.

I don't have a full theological answer for this question, but I think that in situations where people are addicted to pornography, that premarital sex is usually much easier to engage in, but for occasionally there are people that have looked at pornography or engaged in masturbation or oral sex and still maintained that they were still a virgin.

Maybe not technically or maybe you are technically from the standpoint that you haven't had vaginal intercourse but there's a lot of mental things that I think that you really have to look at, spiritual and mental things that you're going through by engaging in these other behaviors.

Okay, so you know, let me give you an example.

These 2 people, they were good Adventist Christians, 1, you know, they were Bible workers and they got together and so they had what I call veggie sex.

They basically stripped down to their underwear and they would rub up on each other until they had a sexual climax.

So technically, they didn't have sex or intercourse, but they had sex.

You know, so are you going to draw a line on certain behaviors are acceptable and certain aren't?

He's not calling us to heterosexuality, he's calling us to holiness, right?

So whether technically you've engaged in vaginal intercourse with a partner or not, still we have to recognize that this isn't the plan that God has for each 1 of us and that he wants us to be holy like He is.

So again, no, maybe you haven't technically crossed that line, but what you're doing isn't right either or isn't you know good either.

Because what it does is it destroys your ability to value other people, right, and to value God.

It disconnects, it breaks up our ability to communicate with God, and it also breaks up our ability to value other people as wholesome and valuable.

It's also some of these acts that are in this question are somewhat degrading.

You know, that when you engage in just oral sex, that that's degrading because God didn't intend for your faces to be apart.

He wants you to look into your lover's face.

We were designed to experience what true intimacy is.

How do you respond if someone who's a non-Christian asks, am I going to hell if I'm a homosexual or transgender, et cetera?

So again, if somebody is a non-Christian and ask you if they're going to hell because they are transgendered or homosexual, I think that it's a really delicate situation and I think that you have to make sure that the love is first and foremost.

We have to reach above and beyond the compassion of what most people have in the church because what I heard in the church for all the years that I was gay was that I was going to burn in a hotter hell than everybody else.

And even if those words weren't ever spoken, that's the message that I got.

And so when somebody asks a question like that, let's say in a situation where someone's a non-Christian and they ask you, and you say, well, let's look at the Word of God.

What does the Word of God say about you as a homosexual or a transgender?

There are so many wonderful verses that God loves us and that His love for us is, what is it, His thoughts towards us are as countless as the sands of the seashore.

Like affirm to them that God loves you, God loves you, God loves you, you know, show those verses first and then talk about the fact that when you look at some of the verses that talk about homosexuality or transgenderism, what was really especially loving to me was when I really looked at them myself and I said, oh, God doesn't condemn the homosexual, he condemns the practice.

And so he still loves me, but he says this practice, why does he condemn it?

Because it pulls me away from not only the identity that he blessed me with through my biology, because every time my aunt would take me into the bathroom and tease my hair and make it look like a girl, what that did inside is it made me more dissatisfied with my male parts and it gave me the longing to be more feminized.

What it did is it pulled me away from the gift of sexual identity that God gave me as a male, and it gave me the desire to want to be more feminine.

He just said that the act was an abomination.

That when I dressed up as a female, when I engaged in that behavior, what it did is it pulled me more away from what he intended for me to embrace.

It's like, Mike, I gave you this as a gift, you know, not to be hated or not to be shunned, but to embrace and to enjoy that.

So I would make sure that you make sure that that person, even before you answer their question about transgenderism or homosexuality, make sure that they know that God loves them and that even as a homosexual, God still loves you but he knows that this behavior is damaging and destructive for you.

And because he loves you, That's why he asks you not to engage in those behaviors.

So many of you are really young and so I wonder or question how many life experiences you've had but in the gay community you will never find somebody that is more hospitable than somebody that's gay.

And if you notice in the world, you know, it's your gays that are your waiters, gays that are hairdressers, they're in the hospitality industry, they work at the hotels.

You know, gay people, as I was 1 of them, I know how to really give good service.

And so we as Christians, we've got to bump up our game.

You have to let them know that a Christian-loving service has got to be better than that.

There was a waiter that was gay and he was waiting on a Christian family.

And the Christian family wrote on the ticket, you know how the waiter drops a ticket at your table?

And this Christian family said, we believe in Christian values and because of your conversation we assume that you're gay.

Therefore, we're not going to tip you because we know that this is not a lifestyle that God approves of.

Have a good day." Do you think that that was a good testimony of Christianity to that person?

It's like if anything you should have left them a larger tip and you should have let them know that that you love them and that you care for them as a human being because we don't reject people because they're gay, straight, transgender, bisexual because the Bible says that we're all sinners, that we've all come short of the glory of God, right?

So, and I use the, and maybe this will come up in 1 of the questions, but let me use 1 Corinthians chapter 6, very clear.

1 Corinthians chapter 6 talks about all the abominations that won't be in heaven, 9 and 10.

And it says, this is what won't be in heaven.

It says, homosexuals and effeminate people.

And as being a young Christian in church culture, you know, I was devastated by that and I thought, well, I can't help what I'm attracted to.

I prayed that God would change me and he never did that.

So at 20 years old, I walked out of the church, never to come back.

But you've been washed, you've been sanctified.

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Breakout Session

Homosexuality and the Church with Michael Carducci Part 2

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Parts

Homosexuality and the Church with Michael Carducci Part 1

48m

Homosexuality and the Church with Michael Carducci Part 2

55m

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