Hello world,
Here is my friend Seamus’ testimony story. Please don’t judge, it takes enormous courage to write so openly and vulberably. May God use it to reach out to those lost like he was and bless him for his courage!
My Story. The truth.
Oh lord and my beautiful Father in the heavens. As I sit here in my local coffee bar, places the holy spirit often sends me. I sit around the youth, the future of our broken and sinking church. I cant help but feel their empty and sad lives. Lives without the gifts and charisms of the Holy Spirit and his superior healing powers. Their empty monotonous lives without Jesus. I was one of them after all and have empathy for them and a love for them through Jesus’s eyes.
As I reflect through a very tough and trying week spiritually and physically in my own healing and growth from horrible attacks and persecutions from friends in Ireland God is preparing me to go back with no fear, confidence, trust and complete holy boldness in what we are doing.
Considering it has only been 4 years since my conversion it is so awesome and miraculous to look back and see the full glory of God in my life at work.
I have been struggling all my life to accept the fact I have been born with homosexual tendencies. I have known from the age of 5 years old. What a very young age to discover this and try to deal with it. I had strong feminine characteristics in my youth. I even had a very high pitched voice. This got me called names like girly girl, woman, sissy and freak etc. I had these awful names and faced extreme bullying from I was 7 years old right up until I was 20 years old. I never felt like I fitted in anywhere. I had a complex and awkward way of fitting into various social groups. Due to this extreme bullying and not fully accepting my sexuality I became a mad over exaggerated caricature of myself and I hid behind this mask of people pleasing and wanting acceptance for most of my life.
Unfortunately this way of acting and behaviour lead me further away from the truth and the church. The wanting to be loved and hunger for acceptance in social circles lead me into a web of total self destruction. In my later teens I had become so depressed with suppressing my sexuality and my true self, the only way I felt that I could fit in was smoking weed at work with other people who felt the same as me. This was the start of my downward spiral into the world of drugs and sexual promiscuity.
I had already experienced masturbation from the age of 8 and was already fantasising about being with men from that age. It continued right up until my 30’s. I had already tasted the forbidden fruit.
This over exposure to a fanatical sexual imagination made me want to have sex with a man in reality. So already I was a sexual addict at an early age. A lot to deal with as I was an early teen masturbating at least 3-4 times a day. Obsessive behaviour for someone so young. Satan had his paws on me and kept them there for a long time.
So my thirst for sexual encounters grew. I wanted desperately to meet someone. It was hard to meet other gay guys at this stage of my life as not many gay guys in my area where exactly shouting they were gay. I lived in a small town and no one ever came out and stayed put. They moved to the city or left the country. I knew that once I was older I wanted so badly to come out and move away to somewhere like San Francisco or Machester places I knew that where gay capitols and places I knew I would be accepted.
So after many trials and tribulations on gay chat and date phone lines I was already planning to meet someone for a sexual encounter. I was very much excited and the thoughts of sin were far from my heart and mind. I did fond a man an older guy on the chat line. I was 17 and already had his phone number. It was long before gay social media on the web and smartphones. I only heard this mans voice and didn’t know what he looked like.
After a long pause of a week I decided to text this man. He was older than me. I was 17 and he was 38. I liked the idea of him being older. I felt like I had no older brother to look up to or communicate with and my relationship with my dad was very distant because he wanted me to be a clone of him. A boxer a footballer and macho. These were so far from the timid guy I was. This kept me and my father at arms length. This guy could help me gill this emptiness as he was older masculine and sporty. So he told me. I managed to go to meet him. I escaped my home and my parents always asked where I was going. I managed to lie and say I was going into town. I got the bus and was already feeling shame and guilt fill my heart and over anxious mind. I had told lies and was going to meet an older man for sex. Was I actually going to do this? Im going to meet a total stranger for sex? This is mad mad?! I got off the bus and I was 20 miles from home. I never lied like that before. He told me to meet him at his clothing store. My heart was racing and I couldn’t breath. I was outside the shop. I went in and in my nervousness I asked for bus times back to my town. He answered there is a timetable next door. I left. I got a text from him saying was I the guy with the red hair asking about buses? ( i died my hair to stand put more and be different.)I said yes. He said wow you are hot and please wait we can have fun. I was so ashamed and guilty I never replied and got on the next bus home.
This worry and fear didn’t last long. A short time later I had a sexual experience at 17 with a guy I knew. We met at a party and left in his car and the rest is history. I was launched into the world of gay sex. I was then catching buses to Belfast regular to the gay clubs and the cruising areas near by. I was having sex every weekend with regularly with different men. I was introduced to poppers a sex enhancing drug and got addicted to that. I was so addicted to that drug I couldn’t masturbate without it. Then pornography became an issue in my student days and poppers were a heavy used substance.
By the time I was 21 I was heavily into porn, men, sex and cruising. I was living the lifestyle I dreamed of. I was a sexually liberated male with no responsibilities and I was free as a bird or so I thought. I had come out as being gay to my friends at 20 and later told my parents at 21. They actually were fantastic. My mum went to a Priest and with todays shocking state of most priests and church his reply was refreshing and Jesus like. He said your child hasn’t got cancer or a life threatening illness, so its not the end of the world. My dads was actually a surprise too. He just hugged me and said you are still my son and I love you. So a week later after feeling like the only Gay in the village I packed my bags and moved to San Francisco.
It was in San Francisco I became introduced to the world of Gay Saunas. These were places that gay men came to have sex and also mix with other Gay men. They aren’t all sex mad perverts that I thought. I did meet some of the most caring, kind and gentle of souls in these places.
I so desperately wanted to stay In San Francisco but unfortunately a recession hit and work was tough I left and went back home. I stayed for a short time and later moved to Manchester to follow my dream of becoming an actor and entertainer. I was thirsty for more approval and love as I thought because I was Gay I was a disappointment to my family. I was actually very good at acting and got accepted into a very good acting school. I had the talent and dedication and left with a BA Hons in Acting. I was a professional Actor on paper. I had lived out my dream. Although drama school was tough so I did fall back into drugs, gay saunas, lots of poppers and porn and lots of sexual partners and sometimes unsafe sex. Its a miracle I never contracted a disease. So after a long stint of sex and drugs I took a huge breakdown and had to come home. My dream of making it big as an actor had been shattered. I was an absolute mess.
After long strenuous and deep counselling sessions in Ireland I was still using. Although functioning to a point. I got my old job back in the factory I worked at before leaving for England. I was still heavily involved in sex more. I was using my smartphone to access local gay guys and inviting them over for sex everyday. This world of gay sex was becoming as normal to me as having a cigarette. I was in way over my head and couldn’t stop it if I tried.
I was now 34 and at a crossroads in my life I was so alone and depressed, anxious, filled with fear, lonely and had no love. Every encounter with these men made me feel worse than before but my need for sex increased. I was addicted to the company and sex was the catalyst. Where was I. This dream was an illusion and wrapped like a perfect gift. A very huge and overwhelming deception. All of this and my deep routed traditional catholic fear rose to the surface as I searched online for answers. Unfortunately I started to read the wrong literature online from religious fanatics that it pushed me over the edge. I wanted to kill myself so much. I even said this to my dad and younger sister. Good love them they said to me stop talking like that and never say that again. They were filled with fear and didn’t realise that talking about it is actually a step into healing. I didn’t know where to turn I felt so lost and confused. I had another breakdown this time huge.
My grand mother had recently passed away she lived with us from we were kids. She was a second mother to us and she had huge love and respect for us. I loved her dearly. She always said to me that If we ever have a problem to call on Mary our mother in heaven and she will help more than any human can. I laughed at this fairy-tale idea at the start. Now this was like my last and only remedy left to try. What had I got to lose? I was dancing with death. After being taken to a priest with my extreme worries and fear about going to hell for being gay and shame etc. This beautiful priest calmed me down. He gave me a rosary from Lourdes an apparition I was fond of from a young age. I started saying the rosary every day that evening. Something happened when I touched them. I felt an overpowering motherly protection when I began using them and a euphoric peace I found in drugs but more of a supernatural sense. I even sensed perfume and the sweet scent of roses. I was addicted to Marys rosary and God helped me haha. I was reading about here everywhere in books online etc. Fatima I loved too. I even did the Saint Louis de Montfort 30 day total consecration to Mary. It was during this time I went to Adoration everyday and got the grace to go to confession. I was hungry to go to Medjugorje after reading Fr Slavcos book pray with the heart. It was sitting on my seat when I entered the adoration chapel in my parish. Was this a sign from the virgin? I wanted to go so after praying for a picture of her that I wanted from her, I received a huge picture of her Immaculate heart a few days after I asked her. So I plucked up the courage to ask her to take me to Medjugorje. So I waited on the virgin like a little boy waiting on his mother to say yes to go to the local disco. I went to mass later that same day or shortly after and to my amazement not only was it the feast of the Immaculate heart of Mary the priest was wearing vestments with Our Lady of Medjugorje on the front of it. I knew this was her yes. I was falling deeply in love with her love for me. I started going to mass regularly at my local parish and I began to sit at the back after a short while there I began feeling the urge to sit at the front. I know this was Mary my pushy and loving mother. After a while I began to visit the Priest who wore the vestments. He not only became a dear friend and mentor he ended up taking me to Medjugorje a few months later.
I finally got to Medjugorje and I just knew it in my heart that I had to go. It was there I felt Our Lady touch me and speak to me on apparition hill. All of my fears, worries, anxieties, addictions seemed to have vanished. I came down that hill filled with the Holy Spirit. I had been given a miraculous healing and a second chance in life. I even said to Our lady can I help bring souls here to you so you can lead them and bring them to Jesus? I didn’t realise how powerful and meaningful this prayer would become in the future.
After this wonderful time in Medjugorje I was on fire with the love of God and filled with the Spirit of God. I went back to my parish and God used me as a little light. I became a Eucharistic minister after receiving a vision of it in prayer then I was asked. No surprise as these little confirmations and miracles became so normal that i found it weird if they did not happen. It was not even a month later that I was asked by my local parish priest who had taken me to Medjugorje would I like to be a group leader and help him bring pilgrims to Medjugorje. Of course this was Marys plan I had been given a special gift in Medjugorje that I feel her telling me and communicating her ideas with me. This would grow enormously over the years and be the cause of many of my close spiritual friends thinking I am a mental case and cookoo.
After a few years leading groups and not having as much sexual falls into sin. Mainly because my traditional friends and that evil spirit of Traditional Catholicism. Which is good disguised as masonry. Its like a weight of suppression and fear. My friends enslaved by this fear influenced me to stay away from them gays you will only be lead to damnation and sin by them. I never felt comfortable with this demanding and loveless command. Its not living your neighbour is it?
I spent the next few years praying for Our Lady to explain Homosexuality to me and mention it in her Medjugorje messages. Well these prayers were answered in the style of my mother who is the Queen of heaven after all. But she is an exorcist, fierce, terrifying to demons, she will stamp Satan with her heel and send him to hell once and for all. This is my mother wow! I love her so much and I am coming to know her more because of my ever growing prayer life and daily communication with her. So I go to Medjugorje last year for a month and my God did my mother call me with a cliff-hanger. About 2 weeks in Jesus comes to me in a vision in Gold more extraordinary like any picture his hair was better groomed than any hair stylist could manage. He was more attractive than any male I had ever been attracted to. My attraction was above sexuality it was in a pure and holy way. He came off the alter and walked straight down to me I was overwhelmed and in tears. He spoke oh my God I melted. Oh he is beyond our human comprehension for once I can not say what or how else I can put this to paper. He said “ I choose you my special and anointed servant. You are my John. I choose you. Will you accept this cross?” He took a large golden and beautiful golden cross and it was covered in a brilliant light even jewels were shining in its brilliance. I was captivated beyond belief. I of course said yes I love Jesus. He makes it impossible to day no. But I did joke with my one and only true best friend we have that relationship. I told him to hurry up and give me the cross because it means a lot of suffering. He laughed so hard that tears ran down his face. He has a great sense of humour. What a friend that was God and became man so he could die so we could live? In what other religion did God become human and be nailed to a cross and be humiliated in such a way and die? This goes beyond our humanity and way of thinking how dare I say no. I couldn’t. Then I heard a voice later that week telling me to leave Ireland, leave my good comfortable job, my friends and my family! What? No way Jesus this is too much I just got my life in order and now you want this?
Ok I said. If this is from you then give me confirmation. He did boy does he deliver. Jesus is cool as a cucumber when it comes to catching your heart. I ran into a young and beautiful man Michael Moloney on cross mountain. He was like an angel. He had a supernatural glow about him. I knew he had a sensitivity and gay tendencies my spirit can sense it. I wanted to meet this guy. You never meet other Gay guys in Medjugorje. I met him on my last day of course. He asked me to join him for coffee. I did. He immediately opened up to me about homosexuality and his brush with the church, suicide etc. Then he shocked me with a message from Jesus. He said Seamus you need to leave Ireland and everything behind I hear Jesus voice and Our Lady strongly telling you to leave Ireland and everything behind and come back out to Medjugorje. I did. I am glad because it has changed my life. Jesus also told me that I would lose friends and they would become Jealous and hate what I am doing. It happened I had to give them up I cant take them on this journey as they are attachments. This is why I no longer use Facebook and have healthy contact and boundaries with my family. This life is extreme and radical so was the lives of Jesus, Mary and the saints. Our lady then came to me in a vision at the blue cross in Medjugorje I will never forget it. I had an out of the body experience. I heard her voice plain as day and continue to hear it daily for direction. She said this “ Seamus my chosen soul and my special child. This is the church today( i see the church represented as a beautiful and large cross emulating a beautiful and supernatural light with colours not from this earth. It opened and to my horror all wicked spirits of all kinds flew out of it. Also all kinds of snakes, spiders and scorpions all kinds crawled out. It was disgusting. I felt our Holy Mothers immense sorrow at that moment as she continued.) It is in a worse state a state like the world has never seen. Seamus will you help me heal and fix the church of my Son? “ I immediately said yes. From that moment I completely gave my mother and Jesus control of my life. I know live under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. I was asked by Jesus to live on divine providence.
I live with Michael and we have been living a life of purity, prayer, reparation and evangelisation. We feel guided strongly to reach out to the Gay community. With Gods great blessings we have gained support from various priests and religious, made friends with a local charismatic community and have become members. We feel that a small community is growing from our home here where we have sheltered and look after a young transgender boy. We calked our home hose of love because we want young people like him to experience a life of prayer, acceptance, love, purity and Jesus.
I feel that the church needs to change her attitude towards the LBGT community. It doesn’t say in the catechism that they need an exorcism or that they can be cured. We are all called to chastity Gay or straight. With love, community and support from church and church community this can be possible and achievable. This is why my calling is making sense and this is a message of hope to all. God bless us all. Amen
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