According to the Divine Principle everything and everyone can be eventually restored to God's original intention. This 21-year course has a new focus that of taking more personal responsibility for our own restoration and that of our families. It seems to me to be consistent with the providence at this time that certain issues and problems which church members have "put aside" for awhile are now demanding resolutions. In working in the Blessed Family Department, I do extensive personal counseling, in person, via phone, and by correspondence. This close contact with the more intimate life and struggles of members has led me to take a closer look at what members are facing and to seek methods of help which are more extensive rather than giving simplistic answers. One of these issues is homosexuality. Although it is seldom talked about openly, it is something which I feel needs to be dealt with. I also feel that Heavenly Pather wants to help us find answers and work out the problems we face.

Many fine, talented, wonderful people who have had this orientation join the church, believe the Divine Principle, and live a celibate life, having put homosexuality in the past and look to the future for a new life. As a Church, our ideal is to create God-centered families in the four position foundation. Yet between the ideal and the reality a large gap may exist. Certainly, the confrontation becomes intense as we move closer to married life and the realization of the four position foundation. Most of us have had the attitude, that there is nothing that God, working with a loving family, cannot overcome. That must be true. But wherever there is a gap between the reality and the ideal, we must find hope and practical steps to begin closing that gap. Thus, as a counselor and therapist myself, I have felt the need to do some research, seek out methods of self-help and therapy and be informed of the potential resources for those members who feel the need and desire to seek help and change. An understanding of the Divine Principle and God's intention for man is one step, but there may be deep-rooted emotional struggles for which practical day-to-day help is necessary. The following article is excerpted from a paper done for a class at the Unification Theological Seminary and contains numerous helpful suggestions as starting points in considering this problem. Also included in this issue is an interview with Mrs. Shin Wook Kim (Lady Dr. Kim) on this topic. /Nora Spurgin

"Homosexuality" means sexual proclivities toward those the same as oneself.

Dr. Ruth Tiffany Barnhouse, M.D., author of Homosexuality, a Symbolic Confusion, uses the word homosexuality to refer to "an adult adaptation characterized by preferential sexual behavior between members of the same sex."

For Dr. Charles W. Socarides, M.D., "Homosexuality is a pattern

of sexual behavior wherein individuals repeatedly and out of inner necessity engage in sexual acts with partners of the same sex." And he adds: "This is not a sexual preference as there is no choice. This desire is determined by uncon- scious mental processes." Generally, those who are dealing with homosexuality find it important to make the distinction between "situational homosexuality" (i.e. men isolated together in prison or at sea may adopt homosexual behavior) and a true homosexual psychological condition. So does John J. McNeill, S.J., author of The Church and the Homosexual, who writes: "Today we use the word homosexual primarily to refer to the psychic condition of the individual, and not just to occasional behavior." As John Cavanaugh remarks in his book Counseling the Invert: "It is important to accept the concept that homosexuality is a way of thinking and feeling, not merely a way of acting. The performance of homosexual acts is therefore not in itself evidence of homosexuality." This distinction is important because other scholars, notably D. Sherwin Bailey, author of Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition, will use this argu- ment to observe that strictly speaking "neither the Bible nor Christian tradition knew anything about homosexuality as such both were concerned solely with the commission of homosexual acts."

Already, just through looking at these different definitions, we see that it is not so easy to grasp what is meant by the word homosexuality. Alan Bell, psychologist, speaks of homosexuality as a kind of "umbrella term, both meaning- less and misleading." Insisting on the variety of experiences covered by this term, he says: "There is not such thing as homosexuality. I mean by this that the homosexual experience is so diverse, the variety of psychological and social and sexual correlate so enormous that it is better to speak in terms of homosexualities." Bell reacts very much against simplistic views of homosexuality, especially the point of view of the man-on-the-street "who is put off by complexity of any kind." He adds that even the homosexual-on-the-street "thinks that he or she knows exactly what it is all about." Bell concludes that the label homosexuality is somewhat arbitrary. Some will define themselves as such because they find it easier to become emotionally involved with a partner of the same sex, some because their lack of interest in sports will be labeled as such, and others because they wish to make a declaration "which amounts to more a political statement than a true indication of their sexual orientation (i.e. women's liberation)". Bell also states: "The homosexuals are as different from each other as heterosexuals are from each other even after it has been decided that a given person is homosexual there is almost nothing that could be said about the person on the basis of that label." This does not mean from Bell's point of view that no study can be done on the subject. It is more a warning against oversimplification and an encouragement for us to deepen our understanding of each individual situation.

Dr. Richard Lovelace, in his book Homosexuality and the Church, expresses the standpoint determined by the Committee on the Study of human Sexuality of the Catholic Theological society of America: "The Bible does not provide us with a simple yes or no code of sexual ethics. The sayings of Jesus and the writings of the New Testament church on sexuality are all occasional"... and in conclusion: "Homosexuals have the same rights to love, intimacy and relationships as heterosexuals."

Dr. Lovelace presents various arguments to define and justify homosexuality today. His arguments are useful to help us under stand the homosexual situation and to appreciate that the churches are confused about the issue. While Dr. Lovelace acknowledges the fact that for too long homosexuality has been discriminated against by the church and often confused with a willful depravity, he cannot agree with what he calls the "wholly situational ethic" of the homo- phile ("gay rights") organizations which is, acording to him, almost "entirely man-centered." He adds: "It is assumed (by these organizations) that God has not given us specific information about the way He wants human beings to behave, so that our only ethical norm is the requirement to care and please one another."

Dr. Lovelace brings up the question of God's ideal for humanity. What is this ideal? Is homosexuality included in it? Dr. Barnhouse, author of Homosexuality, a Symbolic Confusion, answers these questions in very simple terms: "We have forgotten for too long that this image of God in which the sacred myth tells us that humanity was created, includes man and woman." For Dr. Barnhouse, there is a principle or sacred order of the cosmos of which we are part. For her, the physical union of man and woman is the expression of the wholeness of the sacred order: "Such wholeness can never by sym- bolized nor approximated by sexual practices which are thus grounded in the denial of half of the image of God." John Dixon develops the same idea in his book The Sacramentality of Sex. Considering homosexuality, he says: "it is probably true that any love is better than no love in a loveless world. But love is not a single, lone act isolated from other acts. It is part of a whole, the ordering of relation...In sexual matters, fulfillment is completeness, the coming together of differences."

"Loveless world" that is true in many ways. The breakdown of families and the multiplication of pornography seem to stand in complete contradiction to the statements of John Dixon, Dr. Barnhouse, and many others. If it is the ideal, where is it? It is easy to conclude in looking at this world that hetero-sexuality has failed. The situation is confusing for many people, both heterosexual and homosexual. Sexuality, more than anything else, is an area of questioning. We definitely need a clear vision and deep understanding of life. It is obvious that man alone cannot be saved. We need to come back to the original plan of God, understanding both the ideal and the reason why it has never been realized. The Divine Principle is so valuable today as a reference point. The understanding of the fall is fundamental to the establishment of any sexual ethic.

But we must not forget that God's point of view is not just theoretical. Rather, God's point of view is also love. It is easy to judge and condemn in the name of an ideology. We must never forget that often in our own lives the ideal of God has been quite remote. For a long time, homosexuality has been considered, especially in the Christian Church, as the worst sin. In the medical field, it has been viewed so often as incurable that many homosexuals have been led to say that it is natural. The main question is: "How much has homosexuality been really understood, not just condemned to hell or to the impossibility of change? Which doors have been opened for those homosexuals who are willing to change?

Beyond all the different expressions of homosexuality, the quest for recognition seems to be a universal characteristic. John J. McNeill, in The Church and the Homosexual, observes that "the person with a homosexual orientation tends to accept his sexuality as his deepest self-identity image, the most important single fact about himself." Dr. Robert Kronemeyer, in his study Overcoming Homosexuality, notes that "once a person is known as a homosexual, any other identity becomes secondary."

From that perspective, we can better understand why any judgment is considered by homosexuals to be a threat to their existence, especially when neither understanding nor ways of changing are offered. We have to develop an attitude of acceptance if we want to create any kind of communication. Of course, it is not always easy because of the social stigma, because of the fear which exists inside each of us in the face of something that we don't fully understand.

On the basis of this acceptance, dialogue can begin. But once again this dialogue requires some understanding of the homosexual situation. That is what Dr. Kroenmeyer have tried to develop.

In Overcoming Homosexuality, Dr. Kronemeyer devotes an entire chapter to the homosexual subculture. He starts with the question: "How really "gay" is the gay life?" He answers: "We who treat the problem are only too aware of the despair, loneliness, emptiness, lovelessness, violence, tension, depression and pain that make up the emotional core of gay life." Depression, bitterness and selfdepreciation characaterize the way that the gay is dealing with himself, with others and with the world. Rage, anger resentment, fear, and insecurity are other essential features. Dr. Kronemeyer concludes about the homosexual subculture: "The homosexual, whatever his accomplishments may be, is by and large an extremely tense, anxious, depressed and bitter person just below the glossy exterior."

Dr. Kronemeyer sees the roots of homosexuality in a disturbed infant-mother relationship which fills the infant, denied love, with rage and makes him unable to pass successfully through the separation-individuation phase of early childhood. That is why partners of the same sex are chosen for ego survival later on.

Because Dr. Kronemeyer views homosexuality as deeply rooted in the realms of the unconscious he has created a dynamic treatment that penetrates to the core of the "neurosis." His "syntonic" therapy employs the language of sound and movement to push beyond the limited verbalization of conventional therapy and enables the gay person to relive the damaging preverbal experiences of birth and infancy. Dr. Kronemeyer explains about his therapy: "Feelings are spontaneously mobilized through the language of emotions which consists of sounds, movements and breathing that the patient is encouraged to allow. Pain, anger and sadness surface. The rage to live, directed against the inner images connected with that rage, the negative mother and the negative father, will gradually heal the mind- body schism of the suffering patient." In that way, Dr. Kronemeyer explains that "the universal rage of the homosexual which is usually buried can be used constructively against these inner images." Then he describes how, as this rage is expressed, tension and fear decrease, guilt dissolves, and "the need for masochistic pleasure evolves into a capacity for genuine pleasure that comes with the ability to feel love, joy, hope, and true sexual gratification." Another interesting aspect of syntonic therapy is that it is dealing with the four dimensions of the person: body, mind, emotions and spirit which Dr. Kronemeyer is trying to reintegrate into a harmonious and healthy whole. He ex- plains about bodily health: Struggling for emotional freedom and overcoming the deep fear and anxiety that underlies symptoms such as homosexuality requires energy." So daily exercise is mandatory, proper rest is essential, and daily practice in good breathing techniques is advised. Also to encourage self reli- ance rather than an interminable dependence on the doctor, Dr. Kronemeyer sets up a self therapy, giving some specific assignments such as writing down some self-destructive attitudes that should be seen for what they are. For example:

1. How can I be happy in a world like this?
2. I want to be liked by everyone.
3. It is better to be safe than sorry. What's done is done. The cards are, stacked against me.
4. The people around me are my problem.

Meditation, which Dr. Kronemeyer calls positive imagery, is also helpful in maintaining a good spiritual health. He says: "Picture yourself as the healthy self; physically clean, strong, relaxed and a- live. See yourself in a loving state." Dr. Kronemeyer concludes: "We are liberated when as adults, we regain the wonder and spontaneity we knew as children and melt the armor of egocentricity and arrogance. Then we discover what we knew but could not previously experience: our separateness is illusory and we are constantly ex- changing energy with other beings and with the source itself. We are on an energetic and spiritual level, truly REBORN." There are of course other therapies. Of course, not everything has been said about this issue: the spiritual dimension especially needs to be explored in depth. Hopefully, the creation of a God centered psychotherapy can unify all the existing different therapies and understandings. In conclusion, let us remember that homosexuality is not the worst sin or an incurable disease. It is just one more aspect of human pain whose etiology and expressions may be complex but which, more and more, can be healed as all other wounds of the human heart. By Patrieia Gruzinski