You know that old saying...."You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family." Well, I wish I could say I can pick my family.

I went to a family dinner over the weekend to celebrate my aunt and uncle's birthday! We had a lot of family members to help in the festivities, including my second cousin, Shirley. Shirley is a very conservative Christian, in her fifties, who likes to spout lines of Christan love to all her family. She's the type that goes over to everybody to give them a big hug and kiss. At first she may seem like the one who loves everybody.....but I saw a dark terrible side of her this weekend.
A few of us were sitting around in the foray, including me, Shirley, my great Aunt Nanny, and my cousin Dee and her boyfriend. Well, at one point, Dee asked me how my friend, Luis, was doing. I told her that he was fine last I heard, and engaged to his boyfriend....yes, he is gay. But you know it doesn't really matter to me....I love the guy, he's one of my best friends, and I'm happy for him. Dee knows that my friend is gay but somehow Shirley overheard this. It was at this point that I felt angry and appauled with Shirley. She blatently yelled out that he is going to HELL! I was so angry with her because of this outburst....and she has even meet him before. She even said she liked him....everybody did when they meet him. Even though I respect the opinions and lives of others, I just could not feel any sympathy for her or her beliefs. It is my belief and opinion that everybody has the right and free will to believe in what they want, who they are, and what they do. The only thing that really matters is that someone's free will should not alter or interfere with the free will of others.
Just wait....there's more! I start to say that Luis is one of the most spiritually blessed people I know and that he is Catholic. Well, she had words to say about Catholics too. She said that they were evil and are not true Christians and that they did some aweful atrocities! I was continually appauled!!!!! First of all, almost every culture, creed, and nationality have committed some sort of atrocity at some point...not just Catholics. Secondly, I don't know if she realized this when saying that, but we were in the home of my cousin and her husband Bruno.....and Bruno is Catholic, and so are my family memebers on my dad's side, including my grandmother who Shirley has meet. Shirley is on my mom's side of the family.
It hurt me deeply to hear this from her! Now I should understand, and everybody who reads this, that my family is very narrow-minded and not open to many facet's of the world. I understand that they are crude in their views and beliefs and I respect them for that. However, when someone like Shirley blatent shouts out her bigoted views, it hurts me deeply. I am open minded and I many types of friends......straight, gay, bi, white, black, asian, hispanic, Protestant, Catholic, Jew, Muslim, Wiccan, poor, rich.......and it all doesn't matter to me but their character!
So, I feel I must apologize to my friend Luis for this. I love you man and I am sorry that you have to hear this but I wanted to let you know. And please don't judge my family.....not everyone believes what Shirley believes. And to everyone else, I wanted you to know that I am not one to judge on belief and custom. I judge by character and that's how should be in a perfect world. But we all know that this is not a perfect world that we live in.