THERE IS no inherent conflict between religious and gay identities and agendas, suggests gay-rights activist and writer Jay Michaelson in a new book titled God vs. Gay? The Religious Case for Equality. Focusing largely on Christianity and Judaism, Michaelson argues that, far from being hostile to homosexuality, religious doctrines can be taken to justify the claims for full inclusion and equality of GLBT people.
MoreOVER THE LAST 25 years or so, there has been an amazing proliferation of thinking, writing, and publishing in the area of same-sex relations and religion. This work runs the gamut from highly specialized academic texts to run-of-the-mill scholarly articles, confessional memoirs, edgy pieces in magazines such as White Crane, and everything in between. One prevailing theme characterizes this massive output: it adopts a defiantly positive attitude with respect to the interface of same-sex desire and religion. Queer scholars and writers now rarely insist on defining religion as a uniformly oppressive force; instead, they prefer to examine the unexpected richness found in the encounter.
MoreIN HER RADIO SHOW, Dr. Laura Schlessinger said that homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22 and cannot be condoned under any circumstances. The following open letter to Dr. Laura was posted anonymously on the Internet.
MoreRELIGION, particularly Christianity, is often disparaged by contemporary gay authors, but passing attitudes are sometimes misread as eternal verities. Certainly history is filled with deeply religious gay people whose spirituality reinforced their same-sex affinities. Among gays, particularly gay men, marriage has undergone a massive shift in attitudes during the last forty years, moving from widespread scorn to passionate embrace. Is it possible that religion (including Christianity) will undergo a similar transition and become a more important part of gay lives in the near future?
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WAS your Sunday School teacher right about there being a loving God, or does the Bible condemn homosexuality as an “abomination”? Gene Robinson, the first openly gay priest to be elected a bishop of the Anglican Church, discusses this question at length in his new book, In the Eye of the Storm.
MoreDue to the impact of the lectures that I gave at Mahachulalongkorn University, Koen Kaen and Roi Et campuses, I was very lucky to be invited to participate in the Fourth Annual International Buddhist Conference, held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Bangkok on May 26-29. Mahachulalongkorn University and the United Nations were the chief sponsors of this conference. With over a thousand people in attendance, there were only six Americans present, and I was honored to be one of those six.
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