Catholic Family Ties: Sustaining and Supporting HIV-Positive Canadian Gay Men’s Faith, Mental Health, and Wellbeing

Renato M. Liboro

doi:10.3390/rel11080391

Abstract

Research has documented that sexual minorities and people living with HIV/AIDS have successfully used religious coping to help them overcome life challenges related to their sexual orientation and HIV status, including religious struggles surrounding their faith brought about by stigma and discrimination that have historically been promoted by organized religion. Research has also documented how sexual minorities and people living with HIV/AIDS have utilized family support as a vital resource for effectively coping with life challenges associated with homophobia, heterosexism, and HIV stigma, which have historically been perpetuated in certain family and faith dynamics. The aim of the community-engaged, qualitative study described in this article was to examine the synergistic effects of religious coping and family support, particularly in the context of Catholic family ties, as a unified mechanism for supporting HIV-positive gay men in the face of religious struggles and other life challenges. Confidential, semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine HIV-positive, gay men from the Greater Toronto Area of Ontario, Canada, to obtain their perspectives on how and why their Catholic family ties have helped support them through their religious struggles and other life challenges. Utilizing a modified Grounded Theory approach, interview data were collected and analyzed until data saturation was achieved. The findings and lessons learned from the study’s analysis are discussed in this article, which elaborates on the unique synergy of religious coping and family support as interconnected mechanisms that could be of significant value for supporting HIV-positive gay men experiencing religious struggles and other life challenges.

Highlights

Many Catholic gay men living with HIV/AIDS face religious struggles and compounding challenges related to their sexual orientation and HIV status during their lifetime (Berg and Ross 2014; Bird and Voisin 2013; Gravend-Tirole 2009; Land and Linsk 2013; Liboro and Walsh 2016), which when experienced simultaneously, or even sequentially, can prove insurmountable even with the best of coping mechanisms
This study explores the potentially synergistic beneficial effects that religious coping and family support could have on efforts to overcome the deleterious consequences of heterosexism, homophobia, and HIV stigma and discrimination have on the life challenges, faith, mental health, and wellbeing of HIV-positive, Catholic gay men
The findings of the study presented in this article, the participant testimonies, support previous assertions that have been documented in academic literature explicitly pertaining to the effectiveness of religious coping or family support as important coping mechanisms for people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWH) struggling with life challenges

Summary

Introduction

Many Catholic gay men living with HIV/AIDS face religious struggles and compounding challenges related to their sexual orientation and HIV status during their lifetime (Berg and Ross 2014; Bird and Voisin 2013; Gravend-Tirole 2009; Land and Linsk 2013; Liboro and Walsh 2016), which when experienced simultaneously, or even sequentially, can prove insurmountable even with the best of coping mechanisms. Religions 2020, 11, 391 and Catholic, the religious struggle to keep and sustain one’s faith and practices, which promote internalized homophobia and self-loathing (Cerbone and Danzer 2017; Kitzinger 1991; Pietkiewicz and Kołodziejczyk-Skrzypek 2016; Ward 2015), becomes painfully apparent when the emerging sexual and religious domains of their developing identity inevitably clash to create a dissonance, and distressing identity incongruity (Calimlim 2013; Cerbone and Danzer 2017; Liboro 2015; Pietkiewicz and Kołodziejczyk-Skrzypek 2016; Wedow et al 2017). Research has documented that greater religiosity, especially among Catholics, has been associated with increased rates of homonegativity, stunted development of identity, delayed disclosures of sexual orientation, internalized homophobia, precarious subjective wellbeing, and depression (Kappler et al 2013; Wilkerson et al 2012)

Methods

Results

Conclusion