Renewing a Queer (Religious) Agenda

[rug]

Posted: 05/14/2012 12:17 pm
Rev. Cody J. Sanders.
Baptist minister

The last couple of weeks have been difficult for queer folk. The United Methodist Church took a vote on the legitimacy of our lives and the citizens of North Carolina took a vote on the legitimacy of our love. We didn't fare too well in either church or state.

Whether our lives are deemed "incompatible with Christian teaching" or our loving relationships are deemed sub-par to straight marriages, the message is clear: there are some among us who do not believe queer people should exist.

Religion is often at the forefront of these arguments -- in both affirming and denouncing the legitimacy of queer lives. Faith played a role in President Obama's evolution in understanding and affirming same-sex marriage. And faith certainly played a role in the decisions made by Methodists and North Carolinians.

As we continue to consider the role of religion in our thinking about queer lives and loves, the following are a few of my own developing commitments toward a renewed queer religious agenda:

I am not willing to have the same biblical arguments anymore.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rev-cody-j-sanders/renewing-a-queer-religious-agenda_b_1504197.html

Rev. Cody J. Sanders is an ordained Baptist minister. He is a graduate of Gardner-Webb University and the McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University and is currently a Ph.D. student in Pastoral Theology and Pastoral Counseling at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, Texas.

Cody’s current research involves issues pertaining to violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons. He is active in writing for both academic publications, as well as public theological articles addressing issues of wider societal concern.

Cody was a Fellow in the inaugural class of the Human Rights Campaign Summer Institute for Religious and Theological Study and was a participant in the Beyond Apologetics symposium on sexual identity, pastoral theology, and pastoral practice.

Cody lives in Fort Worth with his partner, Ben Curry (also a Baptist minister), and their dogs Suzie and Buddy.

[msongs]

1. more than half of jesus nut hetero marriages end in divorce n what does big J say'bout divorce? nt

[AlbertCat]

2. Religion is often at the forefront of these arguments

Often?

Is like 99.95% just "often"?

[edcantor]

3. Oftentimes religion is the last bastion

of phony rationalizations for any kind of inequality. It was so for slavery, it was so for integration, for inter-racial marriage, for women's place in the home as subservient and obedient to her husband, and then again for marriage equality for LGBTI.

I'm aware of many religious people who lend support for equality for all, and I am aware that there have always been some segments of the religious community who have been on the side of equality, whatever the victimized group was.

But when you back anti-equality people up to the wall, their last bastion of defense is always their religious "beliefs", based upon, most often, books in their religious texts, written over 1-2000 years ago.