An Upcoming Memoir by Bill White

From pastor to parent, from certainty to surrender, this is the story of one man’s journey to reconcile his faith with his son’s coming out.

On October 11, 2014, I wrote these words in my journal:

“I took a walk each morning at 5:45am this week – and that was a blessing. The moon was full most mornings, and it was gorgeous out and quiet, and consistently, you spoke. One morning it just struck me how you’ve led me straight into my deepest fear – that my son would be gay. After my brother came out in 1990 I’ve been living with a sense of dread about homosexuality – in so many ways it has seemed bigger than you, more immovable, more powerful… Each time I run into it, it seems to win. And now to have to face it in my own son – Father, it hurts my heart.

I was a good evangelical – a pastor, even – and yet God had not rescued me. I wrote those words in my journal just 5 tortured months before my son came out. 

And yet, on my journey I had a certain advantage over so many other evangelical parents. About a year before that entry I’d had a life-changing epiphany in the mall. Timothy and I were on a mission to the Apple store, and as we headed back to the car, gadget in hand, we turned the corner and faced a massive ad by the Michael Kors store. It must have been advertising handbags or something small like that, because that seemed to be all the two supermodels were wearing. I dipped my head, chanting to myself “Don’t look… Don’t look… Your wife is beautiful” as that 10-foot tall woman pulled at something primal in me. And then, out of the corner of my eye I saw 13-year-old Timothy, eyes lifted as if in worship. But not at the woman.

I’d go away a week later to my favorite retreat location to weep and scream at God for making my son gay. What I didn’t realize was the gift it was to have what ended up being a year and a half to prepare for Timothy coming out. Instead of being put on the spot that day he ordered his Tiramisu Frappuccino and sat us down to tell us he was gay, I had the privilege of knowing it was coming. I had 18 months to figure out how to respond – and it wasn’t going to be how I responded to my brother twenty-five years earlier.”

Timothy and I had the privilege to share a portion of this story in the New York Times article How My Dad Reconciled His Faith and Gay Son. 

This memoir tells the rest of the story.

It is a story for:

• Parents who feel afraid
• Pastors who feel torn
• Evangelicals who were taught there is only one faithful response
• Anyone who has wondered whether love and belief can coexist
• All who are curious how deep change happens in people
  

This book traces the long road from fear to freedom, from dread to relationship, from rigid certainty to deeper faith.

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