Words matter. They are the symbols by which we communicate our thoughts, feelings, and identities to our neighbors. I have found that the word “Christian” is not effective in accurately communicating my identity as a disciple of Jesus. Empires have used the word in order to justify immense violence on vulnerable communities for millennia. If I were to continue to refer to myself as a Christian without further elaboration, I would be communicating to the world that I am part of a brutal movement working to eradicate diversity, equity, and inclusion in order to promote the interest of tyrants. I would be communicating that I would be willing to accept the freedom and complete authority of a pedophile, a rapist, and a felon, so long as it ensures the kidnapping and imprisonment of immigrants or anyone who at least appears to be one.
I am, however, a Christian. And I consider myself a fairly orthodox one at that. I’m a Trinitarian. I believe in the divinity of Christ. I believe in a literal Resurrection, both of Christ and of the entire cosmos. I can recite the Apostle’s Creed without flinching or grimacing too much.
I do not, however, believe that one must believe as I do. Nor do I believe that I’m better than anyone who doesn’t believe as I do. All of theology is always at least somewhat wrong and so am I, always. That is what it means to dance with a queer multifaceted, omni-faced God who transcends all categories.
So, lately I have sought to find a way to more accurately communicate my way of life.
I have settled on Queer Progressive Christian for now. Categories are always going to be insufficient when describing a person, but when asked what I do as a vocation, I cannot simply state “Christian pastor,” not in a MAGA state such as Oklahoma. Not with a world that has suffered so greatly under colonialism proliferated by people claiming the Christian faith. No, I am a Queer Progressive Christian pastor.
I am a queer leader within a subversive counter-imperial movement under the discipleship of Jesus Christ, dedicated to lifting up the marginalized and being an alternative community to the Empires in which we find ourselves in the name of Christ, who was murdered by the state for doing just that.
I have been a Christian for twenty years. I was baptized by my dear friend in the swimming pool at Pettijohn Springs Christian Camp in August of ‘05 when I was fifteen. Little did I know that I was on the cusp of having my new-found religion undergo the process of completely disaffiliating itself from the teachings of Jesus in favor of Christian Nationalism – the enforcement of a facsimile of Christianity onto a nation under the guise of spreading the Good News of Jesus.
I have, over the last fourteen years or so, been making political statements alongside my theological statements. I have been told that doing so is harmful – that Christianity mustn’t be political. That is a category error. Christianity is deeply political in that Jesus preached and demonstrated an alternative “polis,” or state, within the walls of the Empire. Christianity is a movement that subverts imperial understandings of wisdom in favor of uplifting the vulnerable.
This is cruciform politics; political engagement that is cross-shaped. My faith and theology have not been blunted by politics, rather they have been sharpened to a point focused on truth, justice, and co-suffering love. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is Good News for the outcast, the poor, the voiceless, and anyone whom the MAGA regime deems inferior and subhuman. Just as it was during the first century Roman Empire so it is now.
I am a Queer Progressive Christian. I serve a queer God. I serve a queer humanity.
Photo by Marek Studzinski on Unsplash