Queer Theology

I should note that, since I identify as straight (and I'm a black cisgender man), I don't pretend to speak with any authority on queer theology. Since this essay arises from my own reading of selected writings on queer theology and therefore inevitably reflects my own perspective on those writings, I don't pretend to write from the perspective of someone who knows from personal experience what it means to think theologically from a queer perspective. I don't present this essay as anything more than a summary of selected writings on queer theology that I've recently read and have found important to take note of and think about.

      What is queerness? Annamarie Jagose (1996) says "its definitional indeterminacy, its elasticity, is one of its constituent characteristics."¹ She says this fundamental indeterminacy makes queerness a difficult subject of study. It may suggest a range of possibilities, evading programmatic description and resisting conventional notions of gender and sexuality.² 
      Rosemary Hennessey (1993) says that queer theory calls into question obvious categories (such as gay, straight, man, woman), oppositions (such as man vs. woman, heterosexual vs. homosexual), and equations (such as gender = sex) upon which conventional notions of sexuality and gender identity are based.³ By embracing the word "queer," queer theory refuses to be shamed or dismissed by the terms of the dominant discourse, and defiantly rejects heteronormativity.⁴
      "Queering" a text or system of texts may therefore be a way of questioning its uncritical acceptance of conventional notions of sexual and gender identity.  Queering theology, for example, may be a way of liberating it from the patriarchal, sexist, and homophobic notions that have historically been reflected in the teachings, liturgy, and institutional structure of the church.
     Alexander Doty (1993) explains there are "queer positions," "queer readers," "queer readings," and "queer discourses."⁵ There may also be queer elements within basically heterocentrist texts or discourses, and queer moments or experiences in the lives of basically heterosexual, straight-identifying people. Just as queer people may negotiate their way through straight cultural spaces, straight people may negotiate their way through queer cultural spaces. In this sense, the use of the term "queer" takes up the standard binary opposition of queer and nonqueer (or straight), while questioning its viability.⁶
      Doty also says that queer spaces or positions aren't the only ones from which queer people read and produce mass culture. Just as with nonqueer people, such factors as race, ethnicity, gender, social class, occupation, education, religion, and nationality are important to social identity construction and contribute to the positions queer people take as cultural producers and reader-consumers.⁷
      What is queer theology? Patrick Cheng (2011) explains that it's the place where queer theory and Christian theology meet, and that it's queer talk about God.⁸ According to Cheng, radical love is at the heart of both queer theory and Christian theology. In queer theory, radical love challenges existing boundaries with respect to gender identity and sexuality, and in Christian theology, it dissolves the boundaries between life and death, time and eternity, the human and the divine.⁹
      Cheng says that queer theology may be defined as (1) theology done by and for LGBTQ people, (2) theology that is self-consciously transgressive in challenging societal norms about sexuality and gender, and (3) theology that is rooted in queer theory, and that critiques binary categories of sexual and gender identity.¹⁰ Christian theology itself is queer, says Cheng, insofar as it challenges and deconstructs--through radical love--binary categories (such as life vs. death, finite vs. infinite, human vs. divine) that are superficially fixed and unchangeable but ultimately fluid and variable.¹¹

      Womanist queer theology may be situated at the intersection of womanist theology and queer theory, and it may arise from the (personal, social, and theological) insights, perspectives, and experiences of black LBTQ women and other LBTQ women of color. It may also arise from the struggles of black LBTQ women and other LBTQ women of color against racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, and other cultural oppressions. Pamela Lightsey (2015) describes it as a theology committed to black LBTQ women and other marginalized groups, and to their full inclusion as members of churches, communities, and society.¹²
      Marcella Althaus-Reid (2003) explains that

      "A queer theologian has many passports because she is a theologian in disapora, that is, a theologian who explores at the crossroads of Christianity issues of self-identity and the identity of her community, which are related to sexuality, race, culture and poverty.¹³
       "...Queer theologies are usually biographical theologies. One needs to follow that diasporic movement which allows us to understand the paths crossed, and the ways in which theological identities are still challenged, transformed, retracted and disguised in Christianity. Queer theologies are tactical theologies, 'using tactical queerness to cruise places occupied by normative straightness.'¹⁴ Queer theologies go into diasporas by using tactics of temporary occupation; disruptive practices which are not necessarily to be repeated, and reflections which aim to be disconcerting...Queer theology is, then, a first person theology: diasporic, self-disclosing, autobiographical and responsible for its own words."¹⁵

      What episodes in the life of Jesus might cause us to wonder about his sexuality or about whether he had any sexuality at all? In John 4, when Jesus meets a Samaritan woman, his disciples come upon them, and they marvel that he is alone talking with a woman (John 4:27). In Mark 14, when Judas betrays Jesus, Judas kisses him on the cheek. In John 11:5, we are told that Jesus loved Lazarus, and that he loved Lazarus's sisters, Mary and Martha. In John 12, after Jesus has come to visit them in Bethany, and they have served him supper, Mary anoints his feet with ointment, and wipes his feet with her hair (John 12:3). What exactly was the nature of Jesus and Mary's relationship? 
      What exactly was Jesus's relationship with some of the women--e.g. Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Susanna (Luke 8:1-3)--who traveled with him during his ministry, along with his twelve male disciples? 
      Luke 10:38-42 tells us that when Jesus visited Mary and Martha (of Bethany) in their village, Mary sat at his feet, listening to his teaching, and that when Martha asked him why Mary wasn't helping her serve supper, Jesus affirmed that Mary had acted rightly by not accepting the subordinate role assigned to her.

      If we want to further examine what may constitute a queer Christology as well as a queer theology, then in what ways may Jesus be described as "queer"? Jesus may be described as "queer" in the sense that he's a celibate unmarried preacher who surrounds himself with male disciples, but who also loves women (Mary, Martha, and others). He's "queer" in the sense that his teachings often take the form of parables whose meaning at first seems uncertain or puzzling. He's "queer" in the sense that he's a prophet who refers to God as "my Father" (John 6:40). He's "queer" in the sense that he rides into Jerusalem on a donkey and is hailed by a large crowd as the King who comes in the name of the Lord (Luke 19:37-38, John 12:12-15). He's "queer" in the sense that he tells the crowd outside the temple at Jerusalem, "Destroy this temple, and I will raise it up in three days" (John 2:19).
     God may be described as "queer" in the sense that he transcends sex or gender categories. Jesus calls God his "Father," but God is actually neither male nor female, neither man nor woman. Or maybe he's both male and female, Father and Mother. God created man and woman, but he himself doesn't belong to any sex or gender category. He's "queer" in the sense that he's indefinable and nonbinary.
      But there are at least two problems with the notion of Jesus being asexual or desexualized. (1) Can Jesus be described as fully human if he has no sexuality? If he's fully incarnate, and if he's really "the Word made flesh" (John 1:14), then how can he have no sexuality? (2) If he's "a virgin born of a virgin,"¹⁶ and if having sexual intercourse would somehow debase or degrade him, then sex is considered something impure, unclean, or dirty, and the desexualized Jesus becomes someone whose human nature has been partially erased. Sexuality becomes something incompatible with holiness or sanctity, something that must be erased or expunged from the life of the spirit.
      On the eighth day after his birth, the baby Jesus was circumcised (Luke 2:21), as a sign of the covenant made by Abraham with God that all of Abraham's male descendants be circumcised (Genesis 17:10).
      Mark D. Jordan (2007) describes the typical crucifix depicting Jesus wearing a loincloth and nailed to a cross, with Jesus's body delineated in agonizing detail but without any suggestion of male genitals under the loincloth. Such partial erasure of the body of Jesus is an example of how Christian theology attempts to manage some of the more awkward implications of the incarnation, says Jordan.¹⁷ In paintings depicting the crucifixion, Jesus is almost never presented totally naked; although he was probably naked on the cross, he cannot be portrayed that way. Jordan says,

      "In many traditional readings, sexual shame began in Eden after the fall into sin...Adam and Eve made loincloths because they had sinned. Why do we make loincloths for our images of Jesus, in statues or in paintings? Because we sin. We have to cover him up because of what we have become in our fearful denials...
      "...For the most traditional Christian theology, it would be a sign of full redemption to represent Jesus naked on the cross. His nakedness would be a sign of a redeemed--that is, a humanly mature--community of believers. But we are afraid to look at the body of God as it was...We cannot let Jesus' body be whole, either in death or in life."¹⁸

     Leo Steinberg (1993) explains, however, that it has only been in the period since the Renaissance that Christ's genitals have typically been erased or concealed in works of art. In hundreds of Renaissance paintings, the genitals of the Christ Child or of the dead Christ are openly displayed. Steinberg explains that Renaissance artists had no theological difficulty depicting Christ's genitals, because of Christ's sinless nature and exemption from genital shame as the penalty for original sin.¹⁹
      Susannah Cornwall (2011) examines contemporary debates in queer theology regarding such questions as: What is queer? Is queer theology synonymous with gay or lesbian theology? Is queer theology inherently white or western in outlook? Is the bible queer? Is the Christian theological tradition queer? Given the history of discrimination against LGBTQ people in the Church, should LGBTQ people remain in the Church?"²⁰
      Cornwall says that

"queer has sometimes been called an ethically empty referent, since it rejects any static link between signifier and signified, and seeks to resist and critique regulatory discourse, including normativity...The questions are these: have the queer theologians over the last decade in particular been any more successful than those of the 1980s and early 1990s at negotiating queer in its definitional recalcitrance rather than freezing it into another regulatory identity? Has queer shown itself in practice to be a truly different methodology for theologians, or simply one cut from the same basic cloth as feminist and liberationist theologies and perhaps, therefore, unable adequately to critique or interrogate them?"²¹

      Elizabeth Stuart (2002) argues that queer theology differs from gay and lesbian theology in not being an identity-based theology and in fundamentally questioning the notion of stable gender identity. According to Stuart,

"queer theology...is not really 'about' sexuality in the way that gay and lesbian theology is about sexuality. Queer theology is actually about theology. In gay and lesbian theology, sexuality interrogated theology; in queer theology, theology interrogates sexuality."²²
       
      Robert E. Goss (2002) describes the importance of queer Christology and queer theology to the struggle for LGBTQ liberation. He says,

      "In his message and practice of the coming reign of God, Jesus embodied a preferential option for the oppressed. In his social practice, he modeled a new basileia [from the Greek term, basileia tou theou, "Kingdom of God"] network of social relations that were nonexploitative, nonhierarchical, and nonoppressive...Jesus was radical in his practice of solidarity with oppressed men and women...
      "...For centuries...the crucifixion stripped Jesus of his sexuality, his humanity, and the sociopolitical reality of his death. Christian discursive and nondiscursive practices have repeated Jesus' crucifixion. They remain acts of violence against the sexually oppressed. However, God's revelation on Easter aims to bring an end to crucifixions, not perpetuate them in the deployment of oppressive power relations.
      "The gay and lesbian reclamation of Jesus and his basileia practice becomes the generative matrix for reinterpreting Jesus' death and the Christ event in a nonhomophobic, nonheterosexist, and nonoppressive context... 
      "Jesus was put to death for his basileia solidarity with the poor, the outcast, the sinner, the socially dysfunctional, and the sexually oppressed. Jesus died in solidarity with gay men and lesbians. His death becomes a "no" to closeted existence, to gay/lesbian invisibility and homophobic violence...Easter becomes the event at which God says no to homophobic violence and sexual oppression...
       "Easter becomes the hope of queer sexual liberation. The queer struggle for sexual liberation will triumph; this is the promise of Easter...
      "On Easter, God made Jesus queer in his solidarity with us. In other words, Jesus "came out of the closet" and became the "queer" Christ...
      "...To say Jesus the Christ is queer is to say that God identifies with us and our experience of injustice. God experiences the stereotypes, the labeling, the hate crimes, the homophobic violence directed against us."²³ 
   

FOOTNOTES

¹Annamarie Jagose, Queer Theory: An Introduction (New York: New York University Press, 1996), p. 1.
²Ibid., pp. 96-99.
³Rosemary Hennessey, "Queer Theory: A Review of the differences Special Issue and Wittig's The Straight Mind," in Signs, Vol. 18, No. 4 (Summer, 1993), p. 964.

⁴Ibid., p. 967. 

⁵Alexander Doty, Making Things Perfectly Queer: Interpreting Mass Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), p. 2.

⁶Ibid, pp. 2-3.

⁷Ibid., p. 5.

⁸Patrick Cheng, Radical Love: Introduction to Queer Theology (New York: Seabury Books, 2011) p. 2.
⁹Ibid., p. x.
¹⁰Ibid., pp. 9-10.
¹¹Ibid., p. 10.
¹²Pamela Lightsey, Our Lives Matter: A Womanist Queer Theology (Eugene: Pickwick Publications, 2015) pp. 1-2.
¹³Marcella Althaus-Reid, The Queer God (London: Routledge, 2003) p. 7. 
¹⁴Benigno Sanchez-Eppler and Cindy Patton, "Introduction: With a Passport Out of Eden," in Queer Diasporas, edited by Cindy Patton and Benigno Sanchez-Eppler (Durham: Duke University Press, 2000), p. 14.
¹⁵Marcella Althaus-Reid, The Queer God (London: Routledge, 2003), p. 8.

¹⁶Tertullian, On the Flesh of Christ, Chapter 20, translated by Peter Holmes. From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 3. Edited by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1885). Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. Online at http://newadvent.org/fathers/0315.htm. 
¹⁷Mark D. Jordan, "God's Body," in Queer Theology: Rethinking the Western Body, edited by Gerald Loughlin (Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2007), p. 383.
¹⁸Ibid., pp. 384-385.
¹⁹Leo Steinberg, The Sexuality of Christ in Renaissance Art and in Modern Oblivion (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983) p. 18.
²⁰Susannah Cornwall, Controversies in Queer Theology (London: SCM Press, 2011), p. v.
²¹Ibid., p. 39.
²²Elizabeth Stuart, Gay and Lesbian Theologies: Repetitions with Critical Difference (Brookfield, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2002), p.102.
²³Robert E. Goss, Queering Christ: Beyond Jesus Acted Up (Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 2002), pp. 166-168.