Growing up gay as the son of a conservative Christian pastor meant Timothy White knew his parents were praying every day for his future wife. But Tim also knew his parents loved him deeply, publishing a New York Times opinion piece in 2025 about how his father, Bill White, could go from “hating homosexuality more than just about anything in the world” to fully accepting him.
Both Timothy and Bill are now featured in a recent edition of Oprah’s Book Club, in her conversation with author Douglas Stuart, whose latest book, John of John, explores another complicated father and son relationship.
“I have profound gratitude that I got to experience something that few gay people get to experience, their parent changing their mind,” Timothy tells Oprah.
Meanwhile Bill admits that his love for his son had a “but” attached to it, at least at first. But Bill spent a year, wrestling with God and “wrestling with myself.” The result was that “Jesus ended up being a lot better than I thought he was, than the God that I thought he was.”
Bill concluded he could and should love his son unreservedly, because “Jesus was that kind of loving with others. Jesus was like, ‘it’s okay. You can love him. You can really love him.’ ”
Watch the full Oprah Book Club conversation with Douglas Stuart here (45 minutes) or click on the video below to watch Timothy and Bill share their experience.
Read the New York Times article by Tim White: How My Dad Reconciled His God and His Gay Son
Read a review of John of John by Douglas Stuart in The Guardian.