Mark & David McCoy

Mark’s Story

First of all, I was raised Presbyterian. Not Baptist. I didn't realize what a difference that made in my life until I started really listening to the stories told by the many Baptist friends I have made over the last 12 years or so.

My parents took me and my three younger brothers to church every Sunday. We were active in youth group, sang in the choir, all the usual stuff. In retrospect, I realize that our church was probably one of the most progressive in our northern Indiana town, although I didn't really think about it or appreciate it at the time. Thank you, Mom and Dad!

Comparing notes with Broadway and Royal Lane friends, I feel very lucky not to have been subjected to the same hateful anti-gay messages that they were when growing up. I had a general sense that being gay was "wrong" from school and sports and society in general, but not from my church. I can only imagine how painful that would have been.

Growing up in the 80s, I remember Freddy Mercury and Elton John and Boy George. And lots of gay men dying of AIDS of course. But I never really felt the impact personally. I didn't think that was me. I was blissfully ignorant.

I stayed in the closet through high school and college, even joining a fraternity and dating women. I also stopped attending church during college, as many people that age do. I honestly only had a couple gay friends, and I was not even out to them. My younger brother came out many years before I did, and I never said a word about myself.

Between not identifying with the gay caricatures portrayed on TV and in the movies, fear of dying, and fear of disappointing my family, I had plenty of reasons to stay in the closet. But fear of burning in hell wasn't one of them.

I didn't come out until a few years after college, when I finally got so lonely and miserable that I couldn't stand it. I had come dangerously close to marrying a woman and living a lie because that was the script that had been laid out for me. That was a close call.

So I quit my job and sold my house and moved to Austin to start my life over as a gay man. Over the next ten years and two failed relationships, I learned a lot about myself and what real everyday gay people are like. Turns out I’m not as different as I thought.

I also went back to church and got back on the tennis court, and found good people both places. We had a wonderful gay tennis club in Austin that was about much more than tennis. It was a kind of ministry in its own way. We didn't read scripture, but we made meaningful connections and became each other's family of choice.

In 2008, I met David and moved to Dallas to be with him. He says he's the best thing that ever happened to me, and he's right! We were married in 2015.

David and I became Baptists thanks to the good people at Royal Lane, and happily transferred to Broadway when we moved to Arlington. We are grateful to have found such a warm and welcoming church home, and the Ragamuffins (Aubin and Mark's Sunday school class) are a huge part of it. As is Another Story. Life is good.

David’s Story

As a child, I enjoyed going to church and when playing with my cousins, we would often play church.  That usually consisted of someone being the song leader because singing was so important in my church.  Never, in my family, did anyone ask on a Sunday morning, are we going to church today?  It was the Lord’s Day and we were going to church.  It was an expectation, it was a commandment.  We had lots of commandments.

I loved to sing and Jesus Loves Me was one of the first songs I learned along with Jesus Loves the Little Children.  Those songs taught me that not only did Jesus love me, he loved all the children of the world.  I believed that and I believed everything I was told in church. 

The church of my youth taught me that we were right and everyone else was wrong.  I always thought it was interesting that we had salvation figured out, to the exclusion of others, but even in our absolute correctness, we really weren’t very sure about our own, individual salvation.  Questions were not really welcome so we all believed what was preached to us.

I always knew that I was different and didn’t quite fit in like everyone else.  I didn’t know what the difference was but I knew that I just wasn’t like the other kids.  But that was of little concern as I continued to grow up and I felt fortunate to be a member of THE church that had everything scripturally figured out.

Going to church every Sunday morning stuck with me.  I enjoyed church music and developed my love of southern gospel music.  I continued to enjoy singing in church and I would also enjoy watching some services on television.  I wasn’t a religious zealot out to save everyone’s soul, I just loved the music and enjoyed churchy stuff.

Remember that unidentified feeling of difference I had?  As I entered my teen years, I discovered what it was.  I was attracted to other boys!  There were really no positive terms to describe me back then.  The love message that came from the church of my childhood had faded away.  I was now an abomination.  Guys like me were described by preachers as vile sinners, lower than a dog.  When you’ve been taught all of your life that the church is right and infallible, they must be right about this too.  It’s pretty rough for a teen to hear.

God, fix me!  This is not what I want!  Please take this away from me!  I don’t want to live in sin!  I prayed fervently and tearfully about being changed but there was no change.  I still liked the boys…and hated it.  Through my teen years I felt like everything was so unfair.  I was in agony because I was doomed to live a miserable, tortured life and then what I had to look forward to was burning in hell for all eternity.  Hopelessness was an understatement.

In my early thirties, I moved from my native Oklahoma to Texas.  It was my first weekend here and it was Sunday morning.  As usual, I got up and went to a church similar to the one I grew up in.  I heard the usual negativity and condemnation and I knew I could never go to that church again.  The following Sunday, I decided to visit a Metropolitan Community Church (MCC), a denomination known for its outreach and ministry to the LGBT+ community, and my life began to change. 

Over the next several years, I started to divorce myself from a legalistic, fundamentalist mindset.  How was it that I knew a lot about the Bible but didn’t know much about Jesus?  What I have learned is that the reason God did not heal me of my gayness is because it is not a sickness.  I read Genesis with a new understanding of God’s creation.  When God created something, God took a good look at it and said, oh, this is very good.  If God created me just as I am, then I must be pretty good too.  It took several decades from my childhood for me to confidently sing again, Jesus loves me, this I know. 

The weight of the world began to lift from my shoulders.  My MCC church started a small group ministry and I was invited to join one of the groups.  As we studied, shared, and prayed together, I continued to heal from the sadness and despair I had always felt.  I loved the small group concept and its ability to create family of choice.  I asked my group leader if he thought I could lead my own group some day and he made me an apprentice leader.  When the group I was in became too large to meet in anyone’s living room, we multiplied the group into two groups and I was now a leader of my very own group. 

I was like the dog that chases cars.  When he catches one, what is he going to do with it?  Now that I have a group of my own, what am I going to do with it?  I don’t have any formal schooling in theology.  I’m not a biblical scholar.  Fortunately, I remembered the saying, nobody cares how much you know until they know how much you care.  Since many are ostracized from their biological families, all I had to do was provide a safe space for people to assemble, enjoy fellowship, let them know I loved them, was there for them, and let the Spirit do the rest.  This was something I was going to do or bust because I never forgot the sadness, loneliness, and hopelessness I had felt.

So, fast forward to the current time and there is a happy ending to the story.  I met the most wonderful man in 2008, and we were legally married in 2015.  Mark has been kind and patient and supportive through all of my shortcomings.  In the early, unhappy days of my life, I had no idea that God would bless me in so many unexpected ways; with a great husband, many close friends, and an accepting and affirming church family.  It turned out alright.  May it be so for you.