Who knew the finale of Parks & Recreation would lead to a unique mission within the Church? Just as Leslie Knope found her ‘mission,’ so to speak, in that very finale, two young women would go on to find theirs after a providential evening of quality television.
Friends that met through ministry in Milwaukee, Anna Carter and Shannon Ochoa had planned to get together to finish the iconic television series.
Instead, Carter asked to run an idea by Ochoa.
She had been thinking and praying about writing a letter to young Catholics from a young Catholic, in which she would share her unique experience of faith as someone who experienced same-sex attraction and who wanted to live the Catholic faith.
“I just remember thinking, ‘Oh. Someone else, someone else like me,’” Ochoa shared. Like Carter, she too experienced same-sex desires and wanted to follow Christ.
“I was just shocked to find someone else who wanted to be a faithful disciple, but who also wanted to be really free and open about their experience,” Ochoa said, recalling that providential encounter.
For the next few hours, the two shared their stories and began dreaming of a ministry that would serve others like them.
While they did eventually watch Parks and Recreation, the show – as good as it may be – paled in comparison to the story God himself would write in and through their lives. From that evening, Eden Invitation was born.
“This was something that I don’t think was talked about as much at the time. Testimonies from people with same-sex desires and gender discordance were on the rise, and we weren’t hearing a ton from the Church,” Ochoa said of the start of Eden Invitation. “We started to talk about founding a ministry, because we realized people really needed community. We didn’t want just another talking head or just a blog. People needed others to share life with.”
Now seven years old, Eden Invitation “creates space to receive the whole person, grow systems of mutual support and empower for creative discipleship” through in-person and online means among “striving disciples with LGBTQ+ experiences,” all while “building community with those who desire a way of life in congruence with Christ and his Church.”
The organization’s Statement of Belief emphasizes its fidelity to Christ and his Church. “We firmly accept and hold each and everything definitively proposed by the Catholic Church regarding teaching on faith and morals,” it states, enumerating a number of concrete points of belief.
Concluding the statement, Eden Invitation reminds that “Every person is called to holiness and to chaste integration of their sexuality according to their state in life.”
While there are other ministries serving individuals who experience same-sex attractions, like Courage, Eden Invitation is unique in that it is wholly comprised of these very individuals and seeks to speak God’s truth, beauty and goodness into the experience of same-sex desires from a place of personal testimony.
“From the earliest days of Eden Invitation, one of the biggest movements of my heart was for people to know that they are good, and that they didn’t need to be afraid of themselves,” Ochoa said.
It is those very people that Ochoa wants to remind of their beloved unrepeatability, one of Eden Invitation’s core values.
Made in God’s image and likeness, the human person is unique among creation and possesses a profound dignity, she said, pointing to the Scriptures.
“I think part of what we’re trying to do is bring people back to the root of their creation, which is good in and of itself,” Ochoa said, referencing the organization’s connection to Genesis and the Garden of Eden. “To do it in an invitation is to receive the whole person, to receive their whole story, to see it and to say, ‘You are good.’ And to call people on from being afraid of their experience.”
In receiving each’s testimony and experience, Ochoa is reminded of Pope Francis’ exhortation that each person’s heart “should thus be considered ‘holy ground,’ a bearer of seeds of divine life, before which we must ‘take off our shoes’ in order to draw near and enter more deeply into the Mystery’” (Christus Vivit (2019), 67).
In short, each of us belongs to each other, and we are our brother’s keepers, Ochoa said. As such, we are called to receive God’s children with reverence for their inherent dignity, recognizing each’s belovedness.
With a profound dignity in their belovedness, God’s children are called to a deep, abiding relationship with him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life, and to abundant life in and through discipleship with Jesus.
Part of that discipleship is wrestling and coming to accept the joy-filled invitation to live in accord with the Lord’s plan for each’s life, though that process of discipleship may take time.
Drawing from the General Directory for Catechesis, Ochoa said Eden Invitation sees a progression of faith as a believer becomes a disciple and chooses to follow Christ and his teachings intentionally. To help facilitate that growth in faith, the ministry strives to walk with individuals as they come to know God and his unique call for them, especially in and through their experience of same-sex desires.
“Our Church has a rich tapestry of teaching around sexuality that’s rooted in Christian anthropology and what we learn from Genesis and things like Theology of the Body,” Ochoa said of the ministry’s efforts of accompaniment. “Eden Invitation is deeply rooted in the Church’s teaching, and we also know that not everybody is there or on board yet.
“We want to accompany people who might not be in that place or maybe who are curious and trying to understand what it all means or are just dipping their toes into a relationship with God,” she continued. “We try to leave room for people to move along accompaniment in their belief. I think that’s something unique about us, that we’re deeply rooted in the traditions and teachings of the Church, which also includes accompaniment along places where people might not know where they land.”
As she and Eden Invitation walk with individuals and “make disciples of all nations,” Ochoa works so that the Lord’s “Great Commission” in Matthew 28:19-20 will continue to extend to the Church today.
“I’m reminded of how Jesus calls Peter and Andrew from their own context,” she said. “Jesus used some of the framework of their life to call them into discipleship, and it would be a part of their discipleship and his accompanying them in so many ways. I think that also applies for people with LGBTQ+ experiences. That doesn’t exclude these experiences because we too are called to be disciples, and the Lord can use and wants to use our experiences to invite other people closer to the Lord’s heart.
“So I think there’s a real opportunity in the Church by giving space for some of these voices to be integral parts of their ministry,” she concluded, pointing to the ways that God uses all things for his glory, and to reach his children. “Our ministry and missions are not limited by sexuality, because we are whole people.”
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For more information on the ministry of Eden Invitation, click here.