Help with our way forward
Hello! Really unique situation here. I was born catholic, went away from the faith for a while, but really came back hard about 3 years ago. My teen daughter also became Catholic within the last three years. My husband is Lutheran & teen son was baptized after birth but doesn’t practice anything.
About 4 weeks ago, my husband of 15+ years came out to me as gay. This sent my faith into a tailspin. There was no cheating, no scandal, just born gay and suppressed it. He tried to do what he thought was the right thing, and we had a decent enough marriage that produced 3 children (1 ended in a miscarriage early on). I’m sad, hurt, and grieving, but I don’t hate him. We’re in the process of moving, so we’re kind of in a holding pattern until we get to our next place, but we plan to start therapy to see what our futures will look like (do we stay married and “lavender” for.. ever? do we separate but stay married? do we get divorced right away, etc).
Attending daily and weekend mass has helped reorient my response from one of anger and hate to one of love and compassion. He struggled for so long and I do love him. Yes, he absolutely needs to atone for the problems he caused in our lives, but he doesn’t deserve to be punished for his sexual orientation. While mass has helped, I still can’t wrap my head around how to be a part of a church that would condemn us both to a life of celibacy? I don’t even know what the church’s stance would be on all of this. Would I be eligible for an annulment?
Should I keep my faith surface level from now on? Do I still pursue a deep connection to the church? I don’t know how to do that second one anymore. I’ve talked to my priest but only vaguely (I don’t want to out my husband to people he has to see regularly). We are moving to a heavily Catholic area, so I will be able to find a lot of priests and churches to attend or seek out guidance from… but in the meantime I’m hoping to get guidance from the online crowd, for better or for worse haha.