Queering Genesis: "Male and Female (And Others) He Created Them"

The first, most obvious, feature of Genesis 1 & 2 has to be that it is a celebration of God's creation - all of it. Before we get to the "male and female" bit, let's consider the rest.

On the first day, "God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness night." Does this imply that there is nothing in between? Of course not. There is twilight, there is gloaming. Night can be well lit by a full moon, day can be dull and cloudy. But still, there is night and day, darkness and light - which do not deny the existence of intermediate states.

On the second day, God "made a dome that separated the waters under the dome from the waters above the dome...and called the dome Sky". We know from science that there is not a "dome" above, as a fixed object, but we accept the existence of something we call "sky", even though we cannot say where precisely it begins or ends.

On the third day, God separated the land from the waters. "God called the dry land Earth, and the waters he called Seas." Again, we know from simple observation that this simplifies the picture. On the land there are also rivers and lakes, as well as marshes, swamps and deltas that are not clearly either wet or dry, or may vary in state with the seasons. At the coast, there are intertidal zones, which are land at low tide, and sea at high. On the oceans, there are arctic zones where frozen sea creates ice shelves, a form of "dry" land. Yet none of this negates the concept of a difference between dry land and sea - and the use of the concept does not deny the existence of intermediate states. Also on the third day, God created the plants:

Then God said, "Let the earth put forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with their seed in it." And so it was.

But where, in this description, are the plants that do not bear seeds or fruit? Are they not also part of creation?

On the fourth day, God said, "Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night", and so he created the sun and the moon and the stars. From science though, we know that this does not complete the picture: what we commonly call "stars" include the real stars of astronomy (which in fact are all suns, like the one which is familiar to us, but vastly more distant), but also includes nearby planets showing only a reflected light, and galaxies so distant from us that to the naked eye they resemble single stars. At times, the sky also includes what seem to be shooting stars, meteorites entering the atmosphere, and comets. Here too, the reality of creation shows an abundance of forms beyond those included in the simple description "the sun, the moon and the stars".

On the fourth day, God created the animals. Here, there appears to be recognition of the diversity of life:

And God said, "Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky." So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm, and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good.

Yet even here, the list is not in fact complete. By specifying the "creatures that move", what provision is there for the mussels and limpets of the sea that do not move, but cling to the rocks for stability? What of those living creatures we sometimes prefer not to think about, the bacteria and viruses? Are they not also part of God's creation?

Joseph and His Fabulous Queer Technicolour Dreamcoat.

Sometimes, stories and images are so familiar to us, that we completely fail to see their significance. The story of Joseph and his coat is familiar to us all from childhood Bible stories - and even more familiar as Lloyd-Webber's Joseph and His Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat. Ignore the main story for now, and just focus on that coat of many colours.

In the modern world, colour is everywhere, so much so that we hardy notice it unless it is used particularly well, or until it is unexpectedly absent. It was not always so. In the Biblical world, clothing was mostly drab: dyes of all kinds were costly , brightly coloured cloth of any kind was an expensive luxury. It is not surprising that Joseph's brothers would have been jealous of the special favour shown by their father, and wished to sell him into slavery.

Joseph sold into slavery, Edward Knippers

But there could be more to the story than first appears: this was not just a coloured coat, but a very specific type - a coat of many colours, in stripes. Just such a coat was typically worn by a specific group of people - a distinctly queer group.

Coming Out as a Religious Obligation: Micah and Justice.

When I was reading some biographical notes recently about the Argentinian theologian Marcella Althaus-Reid, I was interested to note that she began her career working for the church among the poor of Buenos Aires, applying the techniques of liberation theology to the "option for the poor". Later, she applied those same techniques in slum communities in Scotland, before starting to apply the same techniques to the situation of the equally marginalized communities within the church itself, its sexual minorities.

I have never been engaged full time in this work, not worked directly with the poor, but in South Africa I did get involved as a volunteer in some of the activities of the Catholic Church Justice & Peace Commission, and attended several meetings and training workshops on the subject. A standard Scripture verse to open those meetings was the well-known words of the prophet Micah:

Do justice, love well, and walk modestly with God

-Micah 6:8

I clearly remember one major workshop at which these words were elaborated as a paradigm for the very concept of justice, as as set of three related relationships: relationships with God, relationships with others, and relationship with oneself.

The Jewish lesbian Rebeccah Alpert expands on this idea in her contribution to  Robert Goss's "Take Back the Word: A Queer Reading of the Bible", and emphasises an implication to this injunction that I believe is a key to resolving the difficult choices facing us as lesbian, gay or trans people of faith - the importance of coming out.

What Was the Real Sin of Sodom?

Theologian and Minister Says That the Real Sin of Sodom Was Inhospitality.

I've covered the same ground before, but the mistaken conflation of "Sodom" and "homosexuality" is so commonplace, with such appalling results in providing a pseudo religious cover bigotry, gay-bashing and even homicide, that it deserves to be repeated as often as possible until the message sinks in. The story of Sodom has nothing to do with loving homosexual relationships. The "sin of Sodom" is not homosexuality, but the refusal of  hospitality and kindness to strangers.   Those guilty of the sin of Sodom are not "homosexuals", but the homophobes who persecute them.

There have been many good rebuttals of the standard, misguided  misinterpertation. This exposition of it is from theologian and ordainied minister, Rev Patrick Cheng, at Huffington Post. In it, he shows how the words of the Hebrew text have here been misrepresented as referring to  "having sex with", rather than the actual act, which was gang rape, a different matter entirely. He also shows how the Bible itself, in otehr passages, quite explicitly describes the "sin of Sodom" in terms which have nothing to do with homoerotic relationships, but are rather concerned with radical inhospitality.

He reminds us too, that responsible Biblical interpretation must go well beyond simply looking at the bare words (in translation) on the page, but must also consider the historical and social context. In Catholic theology, the Pontifical Bible Commission says also that we need to consider always the Bible as a whole, and not just isolated passages.  Looking at the context, Rev Cheng shows just why absolute observance of hospitality to travellers and strangers was so important in the Jewish desert environment, and how the theme continues in the New Testament. (Indeed, one could argue that it is the supreme commandment of the Christian Gospels). Following this reasoning, he concludes that it is those who refuse to extend hospitality and inclusion to "homosexual" are those who are truly guilty of the sin of Sodom.

What Was the Real Sin of Sodom?

To many anti-gay Christians, I'm nothing more than a "sodomite" who is damned for all eternity. It doesn't matter that I've spent the last decade immersed in the Bible, ancient biblical languages, and the Christian theological tradition. It doesn't matter that I've dedicated my life to preaching, teaching, and ministering to all people, including the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community. The simple fact that I'm an openly gay man makes all of that irrelevant. To anti-gay Christians, God's destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in chapter 19 of the Book of Genesis is a warning to people like me.

Ironically, I believe that these anti-gay Christians actually have it backwards. The true sin of the Sodomites as described in the Bible has nothing to do with same-sex acts per se. Rather, the ancient Sodomites were punished by God for far greater sins: for attempted gang rape, for mob violence, and for turning their backs on strangers and the needy who were in their midst. In other words, the real sin of Sodom was radical inhospitality. And, ironically, it is often anti-gay Christians who are most guilty of this sin today.

........

So, who are the real Sodomites today? Who are the people who turn their backs on the strangers and the least among us? Ironically, I believe that anti-gay Christians are often the ones who are most guilty of committing the true sin of Sodom. These include the Roman Catholic cardinals and bishops who are trying to scapegoat LGBT people for the horrific crimes of child rape that were committed by their brother priests. These also include the Mormon leaders who are secretly funding campaigns to fight marriage equality for LGBT people, despite the fact that their founders practiced polygamy. Finally, these include anti-gay politicians and self-appointed "family values" advocates who insist that LGBT people are categorically unfit to serve as parents or judges (because they are sinners and morally flawed), but are too blind to see their own sins and moral flaws. 

The bottom line is that nowhere in the Bible does Jesus Christ ever condemn LGBT people. However, Jesus does expressly condemn people who turn their backs on strangers and on those who are the neediest among us. In the Gospel according to Matthew, Jesus says that whoever fails to welcome such people has failed to welcome Jesus himself (Matthew 25:43). In my view, the anti-gay religious leaders, politicians, and "family values" advocates who turn their backs on LGBT people should spend far less time obsessing about LGBT people and far more time thinking about the true sin of Sodom: radical inhospitality.

(Read the full article)

See also previous posts at Queer Scripture:

The Sin that Cries Out to Heaven for Vengeance

The Abomination of Heterosexual Intercourse: The Sin of Gibeah (Judges 19)

Books:

Boswell, John: Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality: Gay People in Western Europe from the Beginning of the Christian Era to the Fourteenth Century

Countryman, William L: Dirt, Greed, and Sex: Sexual Ethics in the New Testament and Their Implications for Today

Helminiak, Daniel: What the Bible Really Says About Homosexuality

Rogers, Jack Bartlett: What the Bible Really Says About Homosexuality

The Gospels' Queer Values.

The opponents of gay same-sex marriage and of the "gay lifestyle" (whatever that is), like to claim that their opposition is rooted in traditional family values, "as found in the Bible."   This claim is so completely spurious, is is remarkable how seldom it is challenged.  Just a little thought and reflection shows not only how the Gospel values have little to d with modern Western conceptions of the "traditional" family, but they are so far removed from it, that the real values espoused can certainly be described as "queer", if not quite as specifically gay.  In reaching this conclusion, I have been reading and reflecting on the social context of the 'family' as experienced in Jewish society and the broader social environment, at Jesus' own 'family' in childhood and maturity,  at His actions, and at His words.

The Jewish Family.

It is important to recognise that traditional Jewish society did indeed place enormous importance on the idea of family, both in the narrow sense of the immediate biological family, and in the broader sense of the ethnic Jewish community. 

Was Jesus Gay? Mark, and the "Naked Young Man".

Discussion of the question "Was Jesus gay?" usually revolves around the references in the Gospel of John, to "The disciple Jesus loved." These are well known, and have been widely discussed, here at QTC and elsewhere.  My reservations about these references are that they all come from the author of John's Gospel, talking about himself as writer. I would be more easily convinced by the argument if there were corroborating evidence from the other Gospels:  if Matthew, or Luke, or Mark, also made the same references to one specific disciple who was "loved" in a way the others were not, andsimlarly noted how he rested his head on Jesus' breast, or in his lap, and appeared to have inside information on Jesus thoughts and intentions - as John does.

Theodore Jennings, in "The Man Jesus Loved", might just have some such corroborating evidence, from the Gospel of Mark, and from infuriatingly fragmentary evidence from what just might be a lost,  more extended version of that Gospel: something known as the "Secret Gospel" of Mark. In the first part of the book, Jennings offer an extensive examination of the evidence from John's Gospel, and concludes that yes, the evidence is clear: there was indeed an unusually intimate relationship between Jesus and the author of that Gospel (whom he does not believe was in fact John). But then he continues, to look for further evidence from the other Gospels.

In Mark, he first draws our attention to a well-known passage which is seldom remarked on for homoerotic associations - the story of the "rich young man", drawing attention to the words of the text,:

Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said....

Alone, this these words are not particularly remarkable, except that elsewhere in the Gospels, Jesus is not said to "love" specific individuals outside of the "beloved disciple" of John's Gospel. It becomes more interesting though, when read together with some other lines from Mark .  Jennings first discusses the curious matter of the "neaniskos", or "naked young man", in Jesus company in the Garden of Gethsemane:

And they all forsook him and fled.

And a youth ("neaniskos") accompanied him, clothed in a linen cloth ("sindona") over his nudity ("gumnos").  And they seized him.  And he, leaving his linen cloth, fled nude ("gymnos").

(Mark 14: 50 -52)

Who is this youth? What is he doing there? Why has he stayed behind, "accompanying" Jesus, after all the others have fled (at least until he is seized, and then flees, naked). Why is he so lightly clothed, that his garment can fall away so easily (the "sindoma" was not properly an item of clothing at all, but just a loose linen sheet)? And why use a word, "gymnos"  for nudity, which is strongly  associated with the homoeroticism of the Greek gymnasium - where young men exercised naked, and older men came to admire them?

But the most intriguing passage of all is found not in the standard Gospel of Mark, but in the so-called "Secret Mark", supposedly found by Morton Smith in an eighteenth century copy of a previously unknown letter of Clement of Alexandria, found in 1958.  The authenticity is disputed,  but some scholars accept that it authentic, and is taken from an earlier, longer version of Mark's Gospel than the one we use today.  I'm not going to get into the details of the origin or significance of this fragment  - see Jennings for that - but here is the bit that intrigues:

And they came into Bethany, and a certain woman, whose brother had died, was there.  and, coming, she prostrated herself before Jesus and says to him, "Son of David, have mercy upon me."..But the disciples rebuked her.  And Jesus, being angered, went off with her into the garden where the tomb was, and straightaway a great cry was heard from the tomb.  And going near Jesus rolled away a stone from the door of the tomb. And straightaway, going in where the youth was, he stretched forth his hand nad raised him, seizing his hand.  But the youth, looking upon him, loved him and began to beseech him that he might be with him.  And going out of the tomb they came into the house of the youth, and he was rich.  And and after six days Jesus told him what he wast to do and in the evening the youth comes to him, wearing a linen cloth over his naked body.  And he remained with him that night, for Jesus taught him the mystery of the kingdom of God. And then, arising, he returned to the other side of Jordan.

This passage has two literary connection to the two earlier passages from canonical Mark: the verb used here for he youth "looking at "Jesus is the same ("emblepein") as that  that used to describe Jesus when he "looked at" (and "loved") the rich young man;  and here again, he is described as wearing just a linen cloth over his naked body.  (This is not on being raised from the dead, when such a cloth would have been expected, abut when he came to Jesus six days later.

Now, be honest:  if a young man came to you, "in the evening", wearing "nothing but a linen cloth over his naked body", what do you suppose he was after?  And if he came not to you, but to another man, and then stayed the night, what do you suppose your conclusion would be in the morning?

The fragment known as Secret Mark may not be authentic - but then, it may.  If so, the implications and connections to the other two passages, and to John are at least intriguing.  Is this the same rich young man who turned down the invitation to sell all and follow the Lord?  is he the same young man in a linen cloth who stayed with him after all others had fled? Is he, indeed, the "beloved disciple?"

The Queer Bible: Beyond Family Values

Under the heading,  "A Way Back Behind Christian Homophobia", Adam Kotsko writes at the blog "An und fur sich" about a trilogy of books by Ted Jennings: Jacob’s Wound: Homoerotic Narrative in the Literature of Ancient Israel, The Man Jesus Loved: Homoerotic Narratives in the New Testament, and the third in the set, Plato or Paul?: The Origins of Western Homophobia:

"The strategy here is clear, aggressive, and absolutely necessary: he absolutely abandons the defensive stance -of “explaining away” the supposedly “obvious” homophobic elements in the Bible that “everyone knows” about and instead presents us with a scriptural account that is deeply homophilic, even to the point of presenting us with a possible male lover for Christ himself."

Setting aside the weapons of hate

Even discounting the possibility that Jesus had a male lover (there are at least two candidates:  John, the "apostle Jesus loved", and Lazarus), this is an approach I love.  Given the way in which queers have for centuries experienced Scripture as a weapon of hate, it is understandable that after one has overcome a natural antipathy to dealing with Scripture at all, the first enquiry from lesbigay people is to  find ways to respond to the infamous clobber texts, to learn to set aside the weapons of hate.  This is technically relatively easy - the actual texts are few, out of 30 000 verse in a Bible written against a cultural background where homoeroticism was commonplace, and many scholars have shown how they have either been misinterpreted, or are of limited relevance to modern gay relationships.

More difficult is dealing with the residual emotional baggage: this is where books pointing to positive interpretations of Scripture are so valuable. Again, this should be easy - the fundamental message of the Gospels has nothing to do with hatred against anybody, but stresses love and inclusion for everybody - most especially social outsiders and the otherwise afflicted and oppressed.  Still, for people with a homophile orientation, we can go well beyond the simple message of generic inclusion. Writers on Scripture have pointed to specifically queer values in Scripture, while historians have shown that the roots of popular hostility did not lie in Scripture at all:  the Church followed popular prejudice, not the other way around.

I do not yet have personal knowledge of Jennings' books (but will explore further). There are other writers though who have covered much the same ground, with whose work I am more familiar.

Setting aside family values

Chris Glaser, in his excellent book, "Coming Out as Sacrament", has a chapter on "Coming out in the Bible", in which he reads several well known Scripture stories, from Adam & Eve in Genesis to Pentecost in Acts,  as coming out tales.  Among these, he presents the story of Jesus Himself as "Coming out of Family Values".  The evidence he produces in support of this argument is that:

"his mother Mary was told that Jesus' own coming out would mean "that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed - and a sword shall pass through your own soul too (Luke 2:35)";

At twelve years of age,  Jesus ignored his family's departure from Jerusalem to sit  in the temple, his "Father's house" (Luke 2:49);

He left His family and as far as we know, never married and never "begat" children;

He called his disciples away from their families (9:59:62), told them he had no home (9:57) ,, and claimed that His gospelk would "set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother." (Mathew 10:35-36);

When His family came to see  Him, He declared, "Whoever does the will of god is my brother and sister and mother"(Mark 3:35);

Members of the new faith community addressed each other as brother and sister;

Jesus' own family of choice were three unmarried people - Martha, Mary and Lazarus;

In the New Testament, the biological, polygamous, prolifically procreative family of the Old Testament was superseded by the more vital, eternal and extended family of faith, a family to be expanded by evangelism and inclusivity rather than mere procreation;

Jesus had a special word of defence for the eunuch, who was an outcast in Israel because his body was mutilated, but more importantly because he could not procreate. "

I don't know about you, but to me, but none of this, neither Old Testament nor New, sounds particularly like the "traditional family values" that the fundies claim to be protecting because they believe them to be at the heart of Christianity.

Urban gay men as role models

Going beyond queer values in the Gospels to queer lives today, the American theologian Kathy Rudy argues that this Scriptural denial of modern "family values" implies that modern urban gay culture is more in tune with the Gospel message than the biological family which Christ's teaching rejected

"The church needs the model of gay sexual sexual communities because Christians have forgaotten how to think about social and sexual life outside the family".

Writing about Rudy's work, Elisabeth Stuart notes that

"The church has forgotten how to be a community, how to be the body of Christ and perhaps gay men have the grave task of teaching it to be a community wider than a family."

Wow!

How far have we come?  Instead of simply sitting back and accepting the knee jerk, unfounded  accusations of "Sodomy", we find that there are serious, credible Scripture scholars and theologians who have first, shown that the traditional use of the clobber texts to atack us is at best inappropriate, or possibly totally unfounded; that there are positive role models in Scripture, in both the Old Testmament and the New;  that far from encouraging traditional family values, the Gospel message opposes themwith what are quite frankly queer values, and that far from the fundies being in a position to lecture us on how to behave, we should be teaching them a thing or two about the Gospels and how to move beyond an unChristian "Focus on the Family" to a wider "Focus on Community"!

Beyond gender.

Rudy continues, says Stuart, to "construct a sexual ethic which is communal in nature and queer in its politics."  Because in recent centuries there has been so much emphasis on first reproduction and then on complementarity as the sole purposes of sex, the result is that "celibacy, singleness and communal life, which have been valued for so long in Christian history, no longer have a place in Christian life."

In a neat inversion of the story of Sodom, "for Rudy the story of Sodom teaches us that what is ultimately pleasing to God about sexuality is the quality of its hospitality.  This is not to say that every stranger must be offered sex, but that sex must cultivate an openness  and warmth to strangers, it must open our hearts, break down our boundaries, and push us beyond ourselves.  Hospitality is procreative, it expands and widens the community.  When we open our homes to outsiders, the private space of the home becomes the public space of the Church, and so not only is gender collapsed but so is the dualism between private and public. The cult of domesticity is destroyed and replaced by an ethic which subverts worldy concepts of gender and understands sex in the context of building up the body of Christ."

How far from James Dobson is that?

See also:

Queering the Church:

The Gospels Queer Values

Books:

Althaus-Reid, Marcella: Indecent Theology

Glaser, Chris: Coming Out As Sacrament

Horner, James: Johnathan Loved David

Mollenkott, Virginia Ramey:  Omnigender

Moore: God's Beauty Parlour

Rudy, Kathy: Sex and the Church

Stuart, Elisabeth: Gay & Lesbian Theologies

Clobber Texts: A New Reading of Leviticus

As I continue to investigate the issues around faith and sexuality, I am constantly in search of reliable information and analyses to set against the misinformation, selective quotations and misinterpretations that masquerade as the conventional wisdom on the subject. Recently, I was delighted when three different readers brought my attention to two useful sources, which between them contain some important, thoughtful material that deserves to be taken seriously.

The first of these that I want to introduce to you is an article by Renato Lings called “The Lyings of a Woman: Male-Male Incest in Leviticus 18:22”, in the peer review journal “Theology and Sexuality”. This journal, edited by the renowned theologians Gerald Loughlin and Elizabeth Stuart, carries an impressive range of scholarly articles, many in the fields of gay and lesbian theology, and of queer theology. (A second article in the same issue is on “Queer Worship”, which I have scheduled for publication tomorrow).

It was the well known and highly respected theologian James Alison, (who writes “from a perspective Catholic and gay) who referred me to “The Lyings of a Woman.” He wrote to me that he considered it an important article, and suggested that I get a suitable person to write a full review of it, for publishing here at QTC. I agreed fully with his assessment, and plan to publish a couple of such reviews shortly - one by John McNeill, and one by an Old Testament specialist from the Pacific Centre for Religion. I will publish these commentaries as soon as I receive them) .

Sunday Readings, 17th January: the Civil Partnership Celebration at Cana.

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.  Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding.  When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”  And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me?  My hour has not yet come.”  His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”  Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons.  Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.”  And they filled them up to the brim.  He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.”  So they took it.  When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (although the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk.  But you have kept the good wine until now.”  Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him. John 2, 1-11; Gospel for Sunday, January 17.

For a specifically gay reflection on the Gospel, "Gospel for Gays" is exactly what it says:  a site with a particular focus on Gospel  reflections by Canadian Catholic blogger Jeremiah. For this week's Gospel on the wedding at Cana, Jeremiah asks us to imagine the scene as a "gay" wedding. 

St John the Evangelist, the "Beloved Disciple": December 27th

In the catalogue of "gay saints", or pairs of supposedly "gay lovers" in Scripture, the coupling of John the Evangelist (the "beloved disciple")  and Jesus himself is surely the most controversial. Many people, including some of my friends from the LGBT Soho Masses, find the whole idea that this may have been a "gay", sexually active relationship, highly offensive. Others argue the opposite case.

In an explosive book, "The Man Jesus  Loved",  the reputable biblical scholar Theodore Jennings mounts an extended argument that Jesus himself was actually gay and that the beloved disciple of John's Gospel was Jesus' lover.  To support this provocative conclusion, Jennings examines not only the texts that relate to the beloved disciple but also the story of the centurion's servant boy and the texts that show Jesus' rather negative attitude toward the traditional family: not mother and brothers, but those who do the will of God, are family to Jesus.  Jennings suggests that Jesus relatives and disciples knew he was gay, and that, despite the efforts of the early Church to downplay this "dangerous memory" about Jesus, a lot of clues remains in the Gospels.  Piecing the clues together, Jennings suggests not only that Jesus was very open to homosexuality, but that he himself was probably in an intimate, and probably sexual, relationship with the beloved disciple.

-Daniel Helminiak, Sex and the Sacred

Noah's Queer Ark

Well, isn't the rainbow part of the story, as well as a major gay symbol? What other couples would you expect? Kittredge Cherry at Jesus in Love blog has some wonderful shots of a painting by Paul Richmond, depicting well -known gay coples, and same sex animal pairs, enjoying married bliss on the decks, with prominent foes of equality drowning in the sea.  Kittredge writes:

He was moved to create the work after California’s Proposition 8 banned same-sex marriage last fall. Demonstrations across the United Stin support of marriage equality inspired Richmond to paint a wickedly funny satire on the classic Bible story.

In Genesis 6-9, God commands Noah to gather his family and heterosexual pairs of animals into a boat to rescue them from the global flood sent to destroy human evil and the violence of nature. After the flood, a rainbow appears as a symbol of God’s promise never again to destroy all life on earth.

How appropriate that the rainbow has become a symbol of GLBT pride! Richmond puts a fresh twist on the Biblical epic with his sweeping vision of a gay-positive new world. A rainbow flag flies high on the mast of Noah’s gay cruise ship. “As the clouds begin to part, a heavenly rainbow appears in the sky to remind hopeful voyagers that full legal recognition and acknowledgement of same-sex love is just over the horizon,” Richmond explains.

This is huge fun, with the visual puns spelt out for those unable to instantly recognise each face.  Just what we need to cheer us in the aftermath of the loss in Maine:  a reminder that victory in the long run will still be ours. Treat yourself.  Go to Jesus in Love and have a look.


Apart from fun, of course, the idea of gay couples on the ark is entirely appropriate. Sexual diversity is everywhere in the animal kingdom, just as it is in human society. See "Natural Families: The Wildlife Rainbow", at Queering the Church.