Out Spotlight XXXI

The story of Mary Griffith and her son Bobby is now being made into a made for TV movie for Lifetime Television, and it has been a long time coming. There had been talk since the mid 90's about making the story Prayers for Bobby for television. Sometimes it takes the right champion for the project, and Sigourney Weaver stepped in as that champion. But who is the champion for gay teens, called Mary Griffith?

The mother of a gay son, Mary Griffith's reaction was one that is unfortunately not that uncommon, and one with tragic consequences. But through tragedy comes triumph and now Mary Griffith is an advocate and has helped many who are upset, confused, uninformed , and closed to talking about homosexuality and faith.

Mary Griffith was a devoted mother to two sons, living in Northern California and a parishioner in the in the mega church, Walnut Creek Presbyterian Church. She was devoted to her family, her faith and her church, but all of that changed, when her son Bobby told them about his homosexuality.

When Bobby was 15, he told his older brother Eddie he was gay, but made him promise not to tell anyone. After Bobby unsuccessfully tried to kill himself with a bottle of Bufferin, Eddie broke his promise.

Mary Griffith says Bobby was "humiliated" that they knew he was gay.

Things got better for Bobby when he went to a junior college which had a gay group on campus. He dated and did have boyfriends, but his mother says he always fought a battle between what he felt in his heart and what he taught was proper.

"The thing with Bobby is that he could not separate from his religious teachings," she says, adding that he felt "anything positive about being gay was from Satan and it was not valid. The psychological terror just tormented him.

Those feelings came from their faith. They felt that homosexuality was sick perverted, sinful and condemned by God. For her part, Mary just knew that homosexuality was "an abomination to God." And even before she knew Bobby was gay, she conveyed her feeling to him in no uncertain terms."You can't love God and be gay," she told Bobby. The family Bobby felt was a sinner, that he had to be cured by prayer and Christian counseling. Mary told him he had to repent or God would "damn him to hell and eternal punishment." She had faith that God would come to Bobby's rescue, but only if he read his Bible.

The Christian counselor recommended prayer and suggested that Bobby spend more time with his father. But Bobby's diary revealed that nothing was changing. "Why did you do this to me, God?" he wrote. "Am I going to hell? I need your seal of approval. If I had that, I would be happy. Life is so cruel and unfair."

His mother kept telling him he could change. "It seems like every time we talked, I would tell him that," she says. "I thought Bobby wasn't trying in his prayers." When Bobby became more withdrawn, she simply chalked it up to God's punishment. "Now," she says, I look back and realize he was just depressed."

When Bobby was twenty, in desperation the Griffiths decided he should move to Portland, Oregon, and live with a cousin. At first, the move seemed to help. He later took a backflip off a overpass bridge into the path of an oncoming truck. The guilt, the shame was too much for him.

The family devastated. The Griffiths met with their pastor for grief counseling. In her despair, Mary was seeking ways to atone for the loss of Bobby. She told the pastor she knew there were "other Bobbys out there" and asked how she could help them. The pastor merely shrugged his shoulders—and Mary never again returned to that church.

Mary did not lose her faith, but found a very different God from the one she worshiped at Walnut Creek Presbyterian. She reread her Bible with fresh eyes, and sought out secular books about homosexuality. She concluded that there was noting wrong with Bobby, that "he was the kind of person God wanted him to be...an equal, lovable valuable part of God's creation." She says now, "I helped instill false guilt in an innocent child's conscience."

Shortly after Bobby's death, Mary Griffith discovered PFLAG. For some years, she was president of an East San Francisco Bay PFLAG chapter and appeared frequently on television talk shows, usually wearing a button with Bobby's picture and another with the PFLAG message, "We love our gay and lesbian children." She has cooperated in the filming of documentaries about the Griffith family tragedy, and is the subject of a the book Prayers for Bobby: A Mother's Coming to Terms with the Suicide of Her Gay Son, by Leroy Aarons, founder of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association and a former national correspondent for the Washington Post. Now being filmed for Lifetime. She campaigns tirelessly for the cause of public school counseling supportive of gay teenagers, believing that Bobby would still be alive if his high school had had such a program.

She testified before the House Economic and Educational Opportunities subcommittee investigative hearing on Parents, Schools and Values, trying to prevent any sex education from being taught in the schools, especially anything to do with homosexuality. "I gave them a description of my son and how religious ideology and their stands on homosexuality caused him a lot of guilt and depression, and how the dehumanizing and demoralizing slander led to his suicide," she said.

"Seeds of fear are planted in the mind of ignorance," she told the subcommittee. "From then on, ignorance listens, and believes without question the demoralizing and dehumanizing slander spread about our children. This rhetoric destroyed our son's life, and countless children today. I have learned all too well that hell has no fury like that of ignorance and fear. Special interest groups use them to promote prejudice, discrimination, rejection, and violence against our children.

"Suicide is the ultimate form of censorship," she continued. "Daily, our children are being accused, judged, convicted and sentenced to a life of spiritual poverty, degradation of self-esteem and personal worth. An epidemic of violence and suicide among our children is the ultimate result. All because of hearsay, ugly rumors, half-truths and outright lies."

She has taken such tragedy and turned into triumph helping parents, friends, family and those coming out understand, accept, and embrace the gift of life and their creation just as they are.

Mary Griffith has since accepted that there was nothing wrong with Bobby in the eyes of God. "God had not cured our son. Why? Because Bobby was created in God's image. There was nothing to cure."