Do you ever

wonder who you are -- how you got to be you? Did you choose to be you?

Did you become you at the hands of fate? Were you born with everything

necessary to make you who you are today? Did what has happened to you

make you who you are?

I think it

may have begun for me with scripture like "many are called but few

are chosen." That of course is just one biblical reference that has

prompted me to wonder and question so much over the years.

There are many

great thinkers, and some not so great, who have asked questions like those

I propose today. Authors through the centuries explore these same questions

on the pages of fiction and non-fiction books alike. Poets have forever

posed these supposedly unanswerable queries.

Are they unanswerable?

The audible

debate, the one outside my own mind, began back in high school with a

discussion of the effects of heredity and environment. It began then.

It will never end. That I now know.

Among the latest

influences that have set me thinking about unanswerable questions was

a discussion with a young friend about homosexuality. This young friend,

eleven years old, said she had watched a documentary that had been helpful

to her. The film proposed that bisexuality is a choice while homosexuality

is something you are born with.

I listened

as she talked about the great number of gays and lesbians who have been

interviewed and who claim they knew as a young child that they were attracted

to the same sex, not the opposite sex.

I, too, have

seen numerous documentaries with similar content to that which my young

friend described. I was familiar with what she shared with me.

Over the years,

I have had a number of friends and acquaintances who were open about their

homosexuality.

Remember now,

my conversationalist is eleven. I listened at length. She is young. She

is impressionable. She is eager to learn and know. She asks hard questions.

A wisdom far beyond her years assures her there are no easy answers.

I asked if

she knew that homosexuality is condemned in the Bible. She said she has

never read the Bible and never been to church.

There is no

doubt in my mind that homosexuality is rebellion against the natural order

of things. I told her so.

But we talked

on because the question remains, does the individual choose homosexuality,

or is there a genetic predisposition to it? If there is, is it because

somebody else back in the gene pool chose it and passed his or her choices

on down the line? If that is the case, then is there a point where an

individual can choose not to give in to his or her genetic tendencies?

Yes, I'm talking

sins of the fathers here, and about the potential for breaking the curse.

God knows I have had enough sins of the fathers to contend with in my

own family. I think I have the right to enter into such discussion as

I propose today.

Then there

is the environment.

There appears

to be far more homosexuality these days than in my earlier years. Of course

I am told that many ancient civilizations also boasted of a strong tendency

toward homosexuality and bisexuality. In some instances I suspect that

among generations past there were those individuals who had it all, were

bored and sought higher highs and deeper thrills.

Today, it is

clear that the traditional monogamous relationship I have always perceived

to be "normal" holds little attraction. There are no lines of

demarcation. Man takes on woman's role, the woman chooses to carry man's

load. Feminism has demanded an equality that disturbs me.

Tell me, do

some cultures become so free to explore all options that we no longer

feel constrained to leave any door closed? Can unbridled freedom be a

dangerous thing?

Is there forgiveness

for those who choose lifestyles contrary to those set forth as "right"

even the leaders of some of those religions have chosen sexual lifestyles

contrary to that proposed as normal or godly in the sacred books on which

they base their teachings?

Have we all

become so godified that we feel free to take those sacred books and pick

and choose at will what can apply to us and what cannot?

In all honesty,

this column was not meant to be about homosexuality. I don't go there

often. The last time I wrote about homosexuality I received letters from

a number of people who said they would never read me again, that I was

not the open-minded, compassionate, loving person they thought.

I know there

is no limit to the love of God. There's just lots of things I wonder about.

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