Radical Love. Patrick S. Cheng
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In recent years, there have been a number of anthologies of the voices of LGBT people of faith, including From Queer to Eternity: Spirituality in the Lives of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual People; Recreations: Religion and Spirituality in the Lives of Queer People; Queer and Catholic; and Sanctified: An Anthology of Poetry by LGBT Christians.44 These anthologies are helpful sources in terms of articulating experience as a source for queer theology.
Queer theologians of all backgrounds and perspectives have used experience as a source of theology. For example, Robert Shore-Goss has written provocatively about his erotic love for Jesus in constructing a queer christology. Shore-Goss tells us that, while a novice with the Jesuits, he imagined a “naked Jesus as a muscular, handsome, bearded man.” Shore-Goss wrote that, later on, during “passionate lovemaking, I felt Christ in a way that I only experienced in my solitary erotic prayer.”45
Carter Heyward, an openly lesbian theologian and professor emerita at the Episcopal Divinity School—and one of the first female priests in the Episcopal Church and the wider Anglican Communion—has written about finding God in her sensual and embodied connection with nature while walking with her dogs. She writes that, in observing the “trees’ gnarled roots at the water’s edge, the wind-chill whipping my cheeks, the pile of dog shit I step in, the crows harping from the fence, the joggers and other walkers,” she knows that her sensuality is her “most common link” to the rest of the earth and “can be trusted.”46
Laurel Dykstra, an openly bisexual theologian and member of the Catholic Worker movement, has written about how, as “a Canadian living in the United States, a bisexual person, [and] a theologically educated lay person,” she is always living in “in-between spaces.” As such, her sexuality and spiritually are closely connected. Indeed, Dykstra’s in-between experience actually helps her to “live and love joyfully and defiantly, like Jesus embracing the glorious ambiguity and refusing to be held by purity codes, gay or straight.”47
Finally, Justin Tanis, a self-identified transman and ordained Metropolitan Community Church minister, has written about how his theological work arises out of the intersections of his personal experiences as a “transsexual person” and his “professional life as a clergyperson.” Tanis described how his calling in terms of gender was “remarkably familiar to me; it was like my experience of discerning a call to the ministry.” Like his vocational call, the journey of transitioning for Tanis was a “journey to authenticity, a deeply spiritual process.”48
By writing about their experiences of encountering God within their particular social contexts, each of the above queer theologians have shown that experience is a central source for “talking about God” and doing queer theology.
Example: Same-Sex Marriage as Sacrament?
This chapter will close with an example of “doing” queer theology in light of the four sources of theology described above. Specifically, it examines the issue of same-sex marriages and whether such marriages should be treated as a sacrament (that is, a formal rite of the church) in the same way as opposite-sex marriages.49 This, of course, is an issue that is creating much division in the mainline Christian churches, particularly as more civil jurisdictions in the United States (for example, Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont) permit same-sex couples to marry under civil law.
With respect to the first source—scripture—a queer theologian might turn to narratives in the Bible about intimate same-sex relationships, including Jonathan and David (who made a “covenant” together),50 Ruth and Naomi (whose vow to follow each other is traditionally used in opposite-sex marriage ceremonies),51 and even Jesus and the Beloved Disciple. Nancy Wilson has written about these same-sex relationships,52 as has Robert Williams, who hypothesized that Jesus was gay and that the Beloved Disciple was not only his lover but also another name for Lazarus. 53
With respect to the second source—tradition—a queer theologian might draw from John Boswell’s work on same-sex rites of blessing throughout the history of the church. Boswell hypothesized that these rites were based upon ancient Roman “brotherhood” rites and arose out of an early Christian fascination with same-sex saint couples, including “military pairs like Serg[ius] and Bacchus” who may have been in romantic relationships.54 Similarly, such a theologian could draw upon the research of Alan Bray, a University of London historian, which focused on an Anglican tradition—dating back to at least the fourteenth century—of burying two same-sex friends, complete with marital imagery, in the same tomb.55
With respect to the third source—reason—a queer theologian might turn to queer theory and poststructuralist thought to challenge the notion that, as a result of “nature,” marriage must be restricted to one man and one woman. As noted above, there are hundreds of animal species that engage in same-sex acts and gender-variant behaviors. Also, as in the case of sexuality and gender identity, the definitional boundaries with respect to marriage are socially constructed and do change over time.56 For example, polygamy was recognized in biblical times, and the antimiscegenation laws that prohibited interracial marriage were not declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court until 1967.
Finally, with respect to the fourth source—experience—a queer theologian might turn to experiences of LGBT people in long-term relationships and examine how such relationships are in fact a visible manifestation of the invisible grace of God in the lives of such individuals. For example, Richard Hardy, a professor of spirituality and a gay man, has written about the lives of gay male couples who are touched by HIV/AIDS, and how the men in these relationships are “saints” who “live and love passionately, each in their own way, place, and time.”57
As this example shows, “doing” queer theology is not simply a matter of advocacy or determining the “right” answer. Rather, it is an engagement with the four theological sources of scripture, tradition, reason, and experience, and reflecting deeply upon how LGBT people “talk about God.”
Study Questions
1 How do you react to the definition of queer theology as “queer talk about God”?
2 How have you used the word “queer” in the past? How does it make you feel to use “queer” in the context of theology?
3 Describe each of the three definitions of “queer” as (a) an umbrella or collective term; (b) transgressive action; and (c) erasing boundaries. What are the three corresponding ways of understanding “queer theology”?
4 How does queer theory erase boundaries, particularly in the context of traditional categories of sexuality and gender identity? How does Christian theology also erase boundaries?
5 Which of the four sources of queer theology—scripture, tradition, reason, and experience—appeals to you the most? The least?
6 Which of the various theological sources mentioned in support of same-sex marriage do you find the most persuasive?
For Further Study
Queer Theory
Buchanan, Oxford Dictionary of Critical Theory, 393–94 (“queer studies,” “queer theory”).
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