Gay and lesbians from Catholic backgrounds have struggled to reconcile their sexual orientation with the Church's strong anti-homosexual stance for generations. Some leave the church in despair while others suppress their sexuality in order to remain in the Church. Priest Shinnick argues that homosexuality should be seen as a gift from God, not a curse. He shows how attitudes to homosexuality have developed in different Christian denominations around the world and offers a careful re-reading of Catholic teaching. He calls for a genuine dialogue between the Church and gay and lesbian people and offers a guide to the paths such a dialogue could follow.

"Perez is certainly not the first writer to try to find a unique mixture of alternate sexuality and religiosity, but his memoir has the heat and immediacy of the blog from which it developed. As Perez comes to terms with illness, loneliness, and the spirit, he also shows us a part of the future of reading and publishing—the voyeuristic thrills of blog diaries and a continual dialog between print and electronic media."—Library Journal

Every chapter in this book is an invitation. Its thoughts and stories carry you over and over again into a deeper place where you can reflect on your own life and, indeed, universal life. At one point, its author observes (that) ...religious talk is about religious talk. Life becomes a footnote. Life is never a footnote for Michael Kelly. His close experience of the engaging of religion with life is both challenging and inspiring. I could not put this book down, not just because it relates to my own story but because it is authentic, vulnerable, yet life-giving. It does not demand that you agree, but gently and profoundly opens up the questions within a brave and faithful journey. Rev. Dorothy McRae-McMahon

With the removal of sexual orientation as a bar to ordination in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), pending approval of a majority of presbyteries, and the Episcopal Church's 2009 General Convention, at which sexuality issues (ordination, rites for blessing of same-gender couples) will be debated yet again, sexual orientation, especially with regard to marriage, is a central issue. Secularly, too, the topic is front-page news with the recent California same-gender marriage ruling and subsequent Proposition 8 vote and the update of the Massachusetts same-gender marriage law. This book sets forth the case for religious institutions' blessing of same-gender marriage, positing that same-gender marriage does not detract from the sacredness of heterosexual marriage, but rather enhances and nourishes the institution.