IS YOUR NAME ON THE LIST?

The stuff about the Ashley Madison website leak got me thinking in a completely different direction than most people. The news has been filled with gossip about what celebrities are on the list, or fear mongering about whether or not you have been outed as seeking an affair.

Oh, I guess I should back up – in case you did not know, Ashley Madison is a web site, sort of like a dating web site, for people looking to have affairs. You register, upload a profile, and see if anyone wants to step out with you...

Seems that a hacker got into their database and stole the email addresses from every single profile. Many people used their mail addresses linked to their names, brettanningson@ for example – but nonetheless if you know your significant others email accounts you can check out online whether or not they strayed.

32 million email addresses to be precise.

So this is what got me thinking... do you know how many married couples there are in North America? Although it probably changes daily – especially after this leak – but we are talking somewhere in the vicinity of 59 million married couples in the US while there are somewhere around nine and a half million in Canada.

So we all know that only about 50 % of marriages last. Now it seems that 50% of the remaining are having affairs. (I know, there is overlap there – but go along with the reasoning because it is a staggering amount of people arranging affairs on ONE dating site... so how many are doing it at work, on the bus, or with their ex?)

The morally outraged all immediately started yelling, “What is wrong with people?!”

I want us to look at the other side, “What is wrong with marriage!?”

Because this is where I suspect the problem lies...

We live in a world that is getting more and more private and small. Groups of friends are diminishing and marriage has become THE place where you are supposed to find love, support, companionship etc.

What we have actually set up in the modern world is a guaranteed formula for loneliness.
(and yes, people who have affairs are lonely. That is the whole thing. They are not morally bankrupt or sexually deviant, they are looking for someone to make them feel less lonely)

Somewhere along the way society bought into the fairy tale that one day I will meet the one person, the soul mate, the ideal companion, and then I would not need anyone else... ever... then I would never desire another woman or man... then my eyes would not even stray, nor would I feel any desire to share emotional or intimate details with anyone else....

I think most of us can count our friends on one hand. And most of those friends are people we socialize with, not intimate companions on the journey of life....

And this is WRONG!

I cannot be everything for one person, and neither can one person be everything to me. I need someone to complain about work to, I need someone to complain about my spouse to, I need someone to flirt, with when I am out dancing, I need someone to compete with, I need someone I look up to... and the list goes on.... we all need a variety of relationships for a variety of reasons... and we need them with a variety of people.

I have long said that this whole two person and kids lifestyle we have created is crazy making – we should have larger families, multiple partners, many friends, communal living – whatever it takes to get to a point where we create a world of fulfillment instead of loneliness.

This is what I am taking from the Ashley Madison leak.

There are more than 32 million people out there in North America that feel fundamentally lonely. And until we change relationships to be more than they currently are – this is just going to continue, and that is just sad.

AFFIRMING Those people over there...

This past week I was part of a process which led to a whole region of the United Church of Canada becoming Affirming.

This means Maritime Conference is now part of a specific organization whose stated mandate is this:

Affirm United

Working for the full inclusion of people of all sexual orientations and gender identities in The United Church of Canada and in society.

Who We Are

Affirm United/S’affirmer Ensemble is a justice-oriented organization of people in The United Church of Canada.  Membership is open to those who support our work, regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity.

We Draw Our Vision from Our Faith Tradition

Affirm United/S’affirmer Ensemble is a voice and a support for people of all sexual orientations and gender identities.  We draw strength and hope from biblical stories of liberation; from the prophetic call to live justly, love tenderly, and walk humbly with God; and from Jesus’ witness to God’s inclusive love.


The process of joining this group, and of officially working through how a court of the church becomes affirming of different aspects of sexuality and gender was a long one - like, years long, and an interesting one involving group discussion and dissent.

There are a few bits of learning I took away from this...  the first should be obvious but it is not...

We sat at table groups of about 8 people... that is like, 700 people divided by 8 in case you are wondering how many round tables you can fit in a hockey rink... and at each table I sat at over 3 years, people always talked about them... I don't know who they are, the gays? the lesbians, you know, those people over there with their agendas and ideas who just want to make waves.

In fact, at one meeting someone actually named names - this is just because x and y want to feel included...

What shocked me about this is that people really think that out of 700 people 2 of them are gay, bi, questioning, non gender binary etc,... not only is that not true. I bet there was someone at each table who fits the non traditional gender sexuality stereotype.

Secondly, and I admit this took me a day or two to think through, there was a move to water down the impact, perhaps with good intention, in order to get it passed. So affirming sexuality became affirming disability, affirming language, affirming ethnicity etc. I mean, you cannot say that you are going to discriminate against black people, so... if we make it an omnibus bill then people will pass it based on something else other than the so called gay agenda...

What I did not see until someone had the courage to speak it aloud, was how hurtful this had become to those of us with non traditional sexuality who were finally supposed to get accepted and once more just became part of the crowd of those who are discriminated against. The focus was lost - and so was the justice and forgiveness aspect. It was hurtful to say that we only care about sexuality as a small part of identity.

Again, we can only do that because we think there are two or three of them over there against the other wall.

When I first came to New Brunswick to work in the church I had a conversation with a church clerk of session. They did not want me to put a gay pride parade advertizement in the bulletin. They told me that they have never met a gay person, and that it did not apply to their church because there were no gay people... no gay relatives... no one. I was truly shocked at the level of denial.

I personally have come to barely believe in straight people. I mean, there might be a couple of them out there. But my experience tells me that almost no one is completely heterosexual, or completely masculine, or completely feminine.

I once read a book about South Africa. It was a novel, but it had this point woven into the storyline that stuck with me. The book was about the settlement of South Africa by the dutch, and centuries passed, and the apartheid system made racism a state mandated truth... and then someone took some blood samples... it seems there was not a single dutch family that did not have black DNA. After all, we are talking hundreds of years here... surely someone fell in love with a neighbour in all that time?

You see, they are almost always us. Those people over there... whether we are criticizing their race, their earnings, their intelligence, or their sexuality... they are not really different from us at all, they just seem that way.

And we need to accept that there is a part of us in them. That Jesus guy once said something about anyone who thinks they are without sin casting the first stone.... and if we are honest, there would never be a stone cast at anyone.


Thank God that we sometimes rise above this need to draw lines in the sand. And thank God there are people and places like Affirm and Maritime Conference, which seek to make the world a little more filled with love.