To Lie or to Love

St. Norbert senior Paul Utterback and Paul Mitchell, 2008 graduate of Oklahoma State University, have been a couple since last December. In a society that still holds many stereotypes against homosexuality, both struggled with acknowledging what would truly make them happy. In order to find their happiness, they had to break out of strict religious doctrines that oppose being gay. Their stories of coming out highlight the importance of finding and acknowledging one's true identity, and show the courage it takes to act against societal expectations. It was in the fall of 2006 when Paul Utterback realized that he couldn't maintain his status-quo anymore. A couple of weeks into his sophomore year at SNC, he was trying to keep up his usual routine: daily mass at either 6:45 a.m. or 12:20 p.m., Latin masses in Green Bay on Sundays-people called him Captain Catholic. He considered services at Old St. Joe's as too liberal and less legitimate than the services he was used to.

Today Utterback knows that he was using his religion to fight against something he has been aware of since elementary school-he is attracted to men.

"It's like the default choice," Utterback says. "If you're gay, you can live in a community with other people in a celibacy setting and have a fulfilled life." It was when he had a crush on a boy in fourth grade that he decided that he was going to join a religious order. Although a 10-year-old boy would hardly make the choice to feel a sexual attraction to another boy-especially not in a society that teaches him that he must get married and have children one day-Utterback soon developed the idea that he could repress his feelings.

"It's hard to underestimate the influence of the Roman Catholic Church in my growing up experience," he says. In 18 years, he missed Sunday mass only two or three times and prayed the rosary every morning.

One might ask what happened to Utterback that made him change his life. In 2006, the facade he had been putting on for so long started to break; although he was putting all his efforts towards fighting against something that his faith told him was a sin. When he withdrew for a semester, he knew things had to change, one way or another.

"I left school sophomore year and came back a different person. I knew I had to find a more constructive way to deal with it."

The process of establishing a different, more true-to-self identity began. He contacted "Courage," an organization that is headquartered in New York and supports people who struggle with being gay, while promoting celibacy. But he also was in touch with "Dignity," an organization that promotes being gay and condemns the official views of the church.

"I began seeing a relative morality in all organizations," says Utterback. "That was my watershed moment."

While he says that he was not particularly angry at the church or his former self, he recalls that "it was a huge relief." He told a handful of people at school, came out on Facebook. Then he published an essay entitled "Not Quite Yet," which deals with his sexuality, in Graphos, SNC's literary magazine. As expected, reactions among people varied.

"My mom cried a lot," says Utterback, whose parents are practicing Catholics. "They wanted me to go to therapy, which I did, but then the therapist confirmed that it would be best if I lived the life I considered true for myself."

Similarly, some people on campus applauded his decision, while others were reserved about it.

"Some people were very excited, notably faculty," says Utterback. "Some people were disappointed, notably some priests." However, he also received support from some Norbertines.

The criticism from some ends did not wash away the relief he felt when he had started to finally be honest with people and with himself. Today, he wants to encourage people in the same or a similar situation to follow in his footsteps.

"My advice is to just do it, and St. Norbert has been very kind to me. I was friends with the most conservative people on campus, and the fact that they are still friends with me is a sign of their kindness." Then he grins and says, "I know that deep down inside they want to hold the beliefs I do, but the Pope scares them." Utterback himself has left the Catholic Church and joined the Unitarian Universalists.

Like Utterback, Mitchell grew up in an intensely religious environment. The couple met at the Sigma Tau Delta English Literature Convention in Louisville, Kentucky in March of 2008. Unlike his partner, Mitchell didn't have the option of entering celibacy. He was a member of the Church of Christ; his father is a minister there, and Oklahoma Christian University promotes marriage at a young age. Mitchell saw no way of escaping the ideal of a "good Christian family" that he learned about all his life.

The Church of Christ, according to Mitchell, is "now catching up with other conservative churches, saying that you can be gay, but that you can't act on it." Mitchell sees this dogma in relation to struggles with alcoholism, where an individual wants to drink, but should stay dry-an analogy he used to buy into.

In high school he dated a few girls, but he knew that he was different.

"I didn't know what it was when I was younger," he says. "In middle school I began to look at guys, but immediately, my upbringing started to suffocate me. I cried myself to sleep every night because there was this issue I couldn't overcome. I didn't even talk to anyone until I was a freshman in college and, even then, I said I would now grow up and master it."

But even before college, rumors were catching up with Mitchell. While in high school, he dated a girl who used one of his online journal entries and spread the rumor that he was gay. Lucky for Mitchell, the rumor disappeared quickly. But a few years later, now in college, it caught up with him again-and led to a decision that made him commit even more to the expectations of people around him.