ARE PEOPLE QUEER BECAUSE OF “SIN”?
GENESIS 3:16 To the woman he said, “I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor, you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” 17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil, you will eat food from it all the days of your life 18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return. 20 Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living. 21 The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. 22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” 23 So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.
A primary theological concept weaponized against me personally has been the notion that I was “born sinfu”l and that my queerness was an attempt to reject Jesus and give into that sinful nature. The concept of a fallen world has been systematically leveraged against LGBTQ+ individuals repeatedly. A prime example was when I discussed my spiritual struggles with my gender identity with my pastors, a conversation that resulted in fifteen years of enduring Conversion Therapy. My experience is not unique; many within the LGBTQ+ community confront these challenges daily.
The spiritual aggression against the LGBTQ+ community, which can include passive-aggressive prayers, inappropriate comments at family events, and excessive Bible quotes sent via direct message or posted on social media, is rooted in misguided theological ideas and adherence to societal norms. We will begin by addressing some of the theological misconceptions and misuse of these ideas to impose heteronormative views on others.
Men’s inability to control themselves has been used against transgender women
Many anti-queer theological concepts originate from male preachers who have a historically poor record of self-control. The mandates that men impose on women within Christianity are often touted as central to their faith. The Church demands that women be submissive and places the blame for the actions of men on how women dress and present themselves to others. These ideas are deeply ingrained within religious contexts. Victimhood has become a default within heteronormative evangelical Christian structures, largely due to the concept of atonement theory.
Atonement theory makes the argument that Jesus, an innocent person, was killed for the wrongdoing of all humanity. Substitutionary atonement theory is not popular within queer theological circles. Atonement theology has been at the heart of religious scapegoating for too long; it has created a culture in which Christianity needs a victim in order to make its point. Discordant doctrine within Christianity has, in fact, created more victims through its misguided ideas of how the world changes. It has further made many LGBTQ+ people victims of a system that believes it is the victim.
Many Christian communities believe they are under attack by liberal ideologies that conflict with their conservative Christian values. This perceived threat is compounded by the unrealistic and often unfair standards that many Christian men have imposed on women, particularly regarding their image and societal roles. Psychopathological factors come into play when considering how women interact with media that influences their self-image, and these issues are further exacerbated by Christian teachings that dictate how women should behave in the world. Transgender women, upon entering these religious congregations, face even more intense scrutiny. When it comes to roles such as speaking or leadership, they are expected to adopt a posture of humility, similar to that expected of cisgender women within the faith. This dynamic is rooted in an attempt to control women, and these restrictive ideals extend to transgender women as well.
In situations where male Christian leadership feels threatened by women, they may adopt a rigid, literal interpretation of religious doctrine. In such contexts, a Christian man may view a transgender woman as defying traditional gender roles, particularly if she is perceived as moving from a position of privilege to one of submission, which is seen as incompatible with Christian leadership. These instances highlight the need for men not only to exercise self-control in their sexual interactions with women but also to regulate their ideological stances, particularly in relation to transgender women.
Not adhering to religious ideas doesn’t make you sinful, it makes you human.
Spiritual ideology and the love binary attempt to categorize the unexplainable and mysterious universe into clear and understandable systems. However, humanity and its behavior are inherently complex due to biological and psychological factors that create a continuum of human behavior and interaction. Religion, despite its good intentions, repeatedly attempts to confine human beings within ideological boundaries.
Spiritual systems could benefit greatly from the practice of positive psychology. If humanity's purpose is to help those around us reach their highest potential, our faith systems could begin to support human flourishing in unprecedented ways. For example, if Christian churches adopted a more positive view of humanity, they would likely become known for being more loving and kind within their communities.
Shame is a man-made idea. divine design had none
The concept of human shame is fundamentally a human construct. Within many religious structures, there exists a negative misconception about LGBTQ individuals, who are often believed to inherently experience shame due to their love for same-gender individuals or their gender expressions. This belief stems from theological ideas that view all human beings as born sinful. Henri Nouwen, a renowned philosopher and theologian, once remarked, "For a very long time I considered low self-esteem to be some kind of virtue. I had been warned so often against pride and conceit, but I came to consider it a good thing to depreciate myself." This reflects the negative psychological spiral that many have found themselves trapped in within Christian communities. By embracing the belief that we are inherently sinful or bad, we adopt a devaluing perspective of ourselves and others.
Humanity, with all its complexities, should realize that human flourishing is at its core. Humans should stop allowing their theology to tell them that they are "dirty, filthy rags," and instead, hear the embrace of the universe's divinity in their fullness and uniqueness. In the liberation from self-devaluation, one can find the inherent goodness that has always been present.
