Page:Ministry to US Catholic LGBTQ Youth - A Call for More Openness and Affirmation.pdf/3

 referring to the word "questioning," and can be appended at times to the acronym LGBT to read LGBTQ. "Questioning" refers to adolescents who are still discerning their sexual orientation and/or struggling with their sexual identity. The letter Q can also represent the word "queer," which has become more popular in homosexual literature and in queer theory (explained below). Therefore, it is not uncommon to see the acronym LGBTQQ, which includes a second Q-letter to represent queer understanding. The second Q-letter will not be part of the parameters of this work.

Understanding sexual orientation is an extremely important part of human development. According to the American Psychological Association, the sexual orientation of a person is an enduring, individual pattern of emotional, romantic, and physical (sexual) arousal and attraction to persons of the opposite gender or sex, the same gender or sex, or to either genders or more than one sex. These sexual attractions toward other human beings are generally categorized under heterosexuality, homosexuality, and bisexuality, although the category asexuality does exist, which is the lack or romantic or physical attraction toward others.

Lesbian, gay, and bisexual youth. A lesbian youth is an adolescent female who self-identifies as a person who has sexual tendencies, overtures, and attraction toward other females and women. A gay youth is an adolescent male who categorizes himself as a person who has sexual tendencies, overtures, and attraction toward other males and men. Conversely, bisexual youth are teenagers who self-identify their romantic and physical attraction, and their emotional and/or spiritual intimacy, toward people of both sexes and genders.

Transgender and queer youth. The term transgender is a broad term that covers various groups. It can include transsexuals, cross-dressers, drag queens, people who are intersex (people born with both male and female genitals), and straight people. Being transgender is not necessarily a reflection of sexual orientation. All transsexuals are transgender, but not all transgender people are transsexual. Young people who describe themselves as transgender are those persons who exhibit "gender-nonconforming" characteristics and actions)—that is, those individuals who transcend their typical gender paradigms. Many transsexual persons are in transition—either from hormone therapy and/or cosmetic surgery—to live in a gender role of choice, but have not undergone sexual reassignment surgery. The term queer was once a derogatory term used by heterosexuals; today, the term has become increasingly popular with LGBTQ youth as an empowering term that is consciously used as a way of reclaiming their uniqueness and power as outsiders and as sexual minorities. In past decades, and sometimes today, the term queer is associated with transgender persons. In academic homosexual literature the word queer is used to frame NTR