"Onlythegoodieyoung"

This past Shavuot, my son and his friends were sitting around the table, and the discussion turned to their families and the struggles that their parents were facing. They played a game to see which family had more issues. Of course the discussion included being gay in the modern orthodox world, the so-called shidduch crisis, the rapidly growing divorce rate, the economy....you name it.

Then one of his friends told the group that his parents were sitting in a hospital in Los Angeles with his younger brother who was dying of cancer. The friends sat back and declared him the winner.

His brother, Gilad Schwartz, succumbed to his illness. Yesterday, my son and his friends attended his funeral in Baltimore.

Recently, I have been in an email discussion with someone who was having a difficult time dealing with his parents. The parents were having a hard time struggling with the fact that this accomplished young man is gay. I suggested that his parents read the blog that Gilad wrote from his hospital bed.

It is www.onlythegoodieyoung.wordpress.com

May The Almighty comfort Gilad Schwartz's family among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.

Saul David

"Gay until proven straight." - Naomi Toby

It's time for a little reality check......thanks to my children!

We were sitting around the Shabbos table with two of our daughters, my eldest daughter who is visiting us from Israel and my youngest child who is home from camp for week before she returns to Stern College.

The topics of discussion were varied and sometimes intense, and very often they center around the "shidduch crisis" and of course, being gay and Orthodox.

It is a sad commentary of our time that so many marriages of young people are dissolving after a relatively short period of time.

Being a single-minded person, I made a comment that maybe some of these marriages are dissolving because one of the partners are gay (since I now view everything through "gay lenses").

It was at this point that my youngest daughter looked at me and said that I paint everything with the same "gay" brush.

She then stated that my motto should be "Gay until proven straight."

Be well.

Saul David