Traditional religious concepts claim that queer and trans people cannot be compatible with religion. Moreover, conservative religious representatives view queerness as a mistake that does not deserve a right to exist. They state that LGBT people are far from God and that their behaviors and attitudes are sinful. Traditional concepts assume that only opposite-sex acts and cisgenderness are righteous, God-approved behavior. Nonetheless, queer and trans perspective challenges central categories of traditional concepts.
One of the main points of the LGBT religious perspective is that the concept of binarity was formed societally and historically by people. The binarity notion reflects neither the will of God, the teachings of Jesus Christ, nor the Bible. Traditional binarity assumes strict divisions such as male and female, divine and human, and life and death are the norm (Cheng, 2011). However, the life of Jesus does not correspond to this concept: his resurrection and the expectation of the second coming go beyond the binary. In addition, researchers consider that queers “can be found in several biblical narratives” (Cheng, 2011, p. 13). There are also suggestions that Jesus himself either was a queer or had a gender-variant identity (Cheng, 2011). The given data are the base of queer theology and LGBT people’s perspective on religion and the divine. For many people, the concept of queer theology appears controversial since “traditional Christianity has condemned… same-sex acts and gender-variant identities as intrinsically sinful” (Cheng, 2011, p. 11). Nonetheless, several factors determine that the existence of queer people is not a sin but pure nature as God created it.
Nature represents diversity and inclusivity, and all fauna and flora are God’s creations. Diversity can be found everywhere, nothing is identical in the world, and the same goes for people. Traditional Christianity claims that queerness is a deliberate sinful choice and unnatural. However, homosexuality is common in the animal kingdom (evidence of same-sex intercourse) as well as in non-binary genders (hermaphrodite mollusks). Queer and trans people are as natural as God created them.
Queer and trans perspective challenges the traditional concept of love as well. LGBT researchers claim that Jesus promoted ideas of pure or radical love (Cheng, 2011). The concept of pure love describes as “a love that is so extreme that it dissolves all kinds of boundaries, including those relating to gender and sexuality” (Cheng, 2011, p.70). The life and teachings of Jesus Christ maintain an incredible love for all of humanity, which implies that everyone deserves love and must give love.
Traditional religious ideas and concepts are beneficial for cis-gendered people since they promote binary relations. Cis-gendered people do not experience such challenges as queer and trans people do. They do not need to confirm that they are accepted by God, pure and righteous. Traditional Christianity does not question the fairness of the love of cis-gendered people, does not call their relationship sinful, and does not complain that they have left God. Such people do not contradict the traditional principles of Christianity. Therefore, they do not have problems with church marriage and church attendance. Cis-gendered people can be part of any Christian community without fear of rejection and without the need to prove their “purity”. This inequality is especially noticeable in less progressive and conservative societies. According to traditional ideas, it appears that cis-gendered people are accepted by God and deserve redemption for their birthright with binary gender identities and “accepted” sexuality.
Reference
Cheng, P. S. (2011). Radical love: An introduction to queer theology. Seabury Books.