When two young Amish men find love, will they risk losing everything?
In a earth where every detail of life—down to the width of a hat brim—is dictated by God and the all-powerful rules of the community, two men dare to envision a different way. At eighteen, Isaac Byler knows tiny outside the strict Amish settlement of Zebulon, Minnesota, where there is no rumspringa for exploration beyond the boundaries of their insular world. Isaac knows he'll have to officially join the church and detect a wife before too long, but he yearns for something else—something he can't name.
Dark tragedy has left carpenter David Lantz alone to support his mother and sisters, and he can't put off joining the church any longer. But when he takes on Isaac as an apprentice, their attraction grows amid the sweat and sawdust. David shares his sinful secrets, and he and Isaac struggle to reconcile their shocking desires with their promise to faith, family, and community.
Now that they've found each other, are they willing to forget it all?
Contains mature themes.
GENRE
Romans et littérature
ÉDITIONS
Tantor Media, Inc
Les utilisa
Why a Gay Man Serves the Old Order Amish
On the importance of dialogue with—rather than withdrawal from—those whose theological understandings differ from ours.
The question was posed with deadly calm. The poise and care as he looked past the other members of the group and into my eyes alerted me that it had been considered for some time, awaiting the right, doubtless prayerful moment to be spoken aloud.
“Jim, based on some of the things you’ve said, I have to ask. Are you gay?”
I was. Not only queer , but out to the immense majority of friends and coworkers.
The man asking so bluntly about my sexual orientation was an Old Order Amish minister, primary a group of Amish men with whom I had built an alliance and worked for some time. His question was a challenge in what had, until then, been a neutral forum. I alternately told myself that I remained discrete to respect the Amish belief that homosexuality is a sin, or struggled with the cowardice of an ultimately untenable secrecy. However, at that moment my motives no longer mattered. I could blatantly lie (an impossible moral choice), or say a little prayer, tell the truth, and accept the consequences to follow.
And so, t
When someone asked what books I had been reading, I mentioned James A. Cates’ Serpent in the Garden: Amish Sexuality in a Changing World.
“Why would anyone want to write about the Amish and sex?” my interlocutor responded. Turns out, Serpent in the Garden answers this doubt well. Cates approaches gender and sexuality within the Amish community as a subject to be treated with attentive respect. His measured work hinges on the idea that the Amish occur as sexual minorities in their control right, with cultural and spiritual expectations that set them apart from the predominant understandings of sex and gender.
Like anyone else, the Amish “cannot divorce themselves from their sexual desires, nor from the complex demands that sexuality creates.” And, even though the Amish endeavor to remain separate from the influences of mainstream culture, “they cannot help but be aware of the sexuality that plays out around them.” These two premises guide Cates’ exploration of Amish sexuality.
Cates’ research is rooted in significant research and in relationships he has built with Amish families as a clinical psychologist in northeastern Indiana. His previous novel, Serving the Amish (2014), h
What’s It Like To Be Gay And Amish
At 17, he was removed from his home and group. He was sent, by his parents, to an ex-gay religious counselor. He was not allowed to visit his parents and to this day, his extended family and collective do not know why he “left.”
This doesn’t reach as a complete shock to a lot of LGBTQ people. We acquire familiarity with discrimination and what it feels appreciate to have those lock to you, turn away.
Many of us feel enjoy we lose our personal faith because we’re taught that religion doesn’t receive us.
We grow accustomed to finding new support systems and a new animation. But there are others where coming out can mean losing everything you thought was your life.
But what if you grew up in a population that never talks about homosexuality? What if they only see it as a problem that doesn’t affect them only others? You might respond that you have heard that happen in other countries, not here in our own.
Would it surprise you to find out that it happens not that far from Cleveland, OH?
Growing Up Amish
Ohio has the largest Amish population in the United States. That isn’t a surprise if you are driving around the Kirkland area or even further d