ABSTRACT

This book enters a new liminal space between the LGBTQ and denominational Christian communities. It simultaneously explores how those who identify as queer can find a home in church and how those leading welcoming, or indeed unwelcoming, congregations can better serve both communities. The primary argument is that queer inclusion must not merely mean an assimilation into existing heteronormative respectability and approval.

Chapters are written by a diverse collection of Asian, Latin American, and U.S. theologians, religious studies scholars and activists. Each of them writes from their own social context to address the notion of LGBTQ alternative orthodoxies and praxes pertaining to God, the saints, failure of the church, queer eschatologies, and erotic economies. Engaging with issues that are not only faced by those in the theological academy, but also by clergy and congregants, the book addresses those impacted by a history of Christian hostility and violence who have become suspicious of attempts at "acceptance". It also sets out an encouragement for queer theologians and clergy think deeply about how they form communities where queer perspectives are proactively included.

This is a forward-looking and positive vision of a more inclusive theology and ecclesiology. It will, therefore, appeal to scholars of Queer Theology and Religious Studies as well as practitioners seeking a fresh perspective on church and the LGBTQ community.

chapter |23 pages

Introduction

Angels in human drag: alternative queer orthodoxies

part I|45 pages

Provoking church

chapter 1|7 pages

Toward radical inclusion

chapter 2|17 pages

Queer church

Failure and becoming in the body of Christ

part II|41 pages

Repainting saints

chapter 4|21 pages

Nahum Zenil

“The Virgin Mary became my mother”

chapter 5|18 pages

Queering ecclesial authority with Mechthild of Magdeburg

A Roman Catholic perspective

part III|79 pages

Liberating flesh

chapter 6|22 pages

Discovering the missing body

Incarnational inclusivity

chapter 7|17 pages

Queering violent scenes

A Eucharistic interpretation of BDSM

chapter 8|20 pages

Unfaithful noxious sexuality

Body, incarnation, and ecclesiology in dispute

chapter 9|18 pages

Deafinitely different

Seeing deafness, Deaf, and healing in the Bible from Deaf perspectives

part IV|40 pages

Expanding eschatologies

chapter 10|20 pages

Gay eschatology

A postsecular rethinking of Christian and “Asian Values” metanarratives in Singapore’s contexts

chapter 11|18 pages

Embodied sexual eschatology

Escaping the cage and dreaming a world of desire and longing

chapter |10 pages

Afterword

Erotic dreams, theology, and the word-(re)made-flesh