Declaring an interest – letting others know of personal circumstances that might affect your judgement – is part and parcel of life in various decision-making jobs and voluntary roles. You are letting others know how your own experiences, or relationships, might impact what you say or do.

I guess the whole of this website should come with a declaration of interest: the majority of its contributors are same-sex attracted Christians writing about our own experiences of faith, identity, gender and sexuality. Our personal circumstances, and relationship with Jesus, massively impact all that we write and say – we are not neutral voices but are heavily invested in everything you’ll read or hear.

Our personal circumstances, and relationship with Jesus, massively impact all that we write and say.

To most visiting this website that is exactly why you’re here – to connect with our personal stories, the unique perspective we bring to both Christian and secular conversations about each of those contested topics. But some might argue that our lived experiences are in danger of clouding our judgement, giving us a bias that is not acknowledged enough. I’ve recently heard some good criticism of what was described as our ‘experience-based, narrative approach’ that has got me thinking about the advantages and disadvantages it brings. 

Some advantages

 Here are some advantages that immediately spring to mind:

• The cultural power of personal stories. We started Living Out because our culture has been transformed by powerful gay stories, but these stories left our perspective out of their narratives. We wanted to share our contrasting accounts so that others would hear of the possibility of real and lasting intimacy outside of sexual relationships – from those who’d personally experienced it. 
• We know what we’re talking about. Too often Christian sexual ethics have (outside of Roman Catholicism) only been articulated by married heterosexuals. Very few Christians speak personally about their own struggles with faith, identity, gender and sexuality, and we have been willing to share our own painful experiences, successes and failures. We are, at one level, the experts.
• Something has happened. If we’d waited for others to start something like Living Out my guess is that we’d still be waiting. Ideally, a website exploring these experiences would have been started by a strong mixture of experienced pastors, biblical scholars, wise theologians and learned apologists, people with a complete range of different experiences, but the task was left to us and, as result, there’s at least something in place, imperfect as we are.

Some disadvantages

But there are some obvious disadvantages to our approach that it’s good to consider:

• Personal stories can unhelpfully trump biblical truth. In cultures where our personal experiences often trump God’s revealed reality, there is a danger that our stories could have more power within the Church than they should. We want local churches to shape theology and pastoral practice in accordance with Scripture, rather than by our own opinions, but we are aware of the possibility that this isn’t always the case.
• We don’t always know what we’re talking about. When it comes to being Christians who experience same-sex attraction, we have a degree of authority, but we are not necessarily authorities on biblical exegesis, pastoral care, cultural analysis, or systematic theology. We are not totally ignorant of what others have taught about sex and sin at other times and places (to give one example), but none of us has a PhD on the subject, and that will sometimes show.
• Criticism of us will always seem personal. Our willingness to share so much of what we think and experience when it comes to our faith, identity, gender and sexuality means that any pushback will inevitably feel like a personal attack. I don’t write or say anything into this space in the abstract. That is both a strength and a painful weakness when (rightly) people sometimes want to challenge my perspective. There is a danger that our honesty (seen as bravery by some) puts us dangerously above contradiction.

What would it be good for us to do going forward? As a team at Living Out we need to keep declaring our interest and be sensitive to the advantages, and disadvantages, that brings. We will continue to seek out input, and listen to criticism, that exposes our bias and questions our judgment – there is plenty of it!

But at least we have declared our interest – it is out there for others to factor into their assessment of all that we produce. You know about our personal circumstances and can think about how they might impact our judgment. Very few others speaking into this space have declared how their own experiences, or relationships, might affect what they say or do and that makes it hard to assess the different bias everyone, inevitably, brings to our continuing conversations about faith, identity, gender and sexuality.

What declaration of interest might you need to make?