Is it Safe?

“Aslan is a lion- the Lion, the great Lion.” “Ooh” said Susan. “I’d thought he was a man. Is he-quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion”…”Safe?” said Mr Beaver …”Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Throughout my ministry, I have often wondered back to this scene from my favorite childhood books. During one of my talks in Houston, someone asked, “Is your queer theology safe?” My answer was swift and unrelenting, “In a world of constructed and demanded dualisms and dichotomies, there is nothing safe about a theology that dares question and deconstruct our categories for the sake of saving and liberating the individual.” I don’t care anything about being safe. I believe it is our safe spaces that have led us away from the dangerous love of God. Following Jesus is what I care about the most and I know where that path leads…to death by love. Why do we keep trying to sanitize the message of Jesus? Jesus is not safe…and Jesus is better than anything that is. Jesus shows us that the work of liberation will always be dangerous…and if it ceases to be…then we should question whether it is liberation that we are truly working for…

Amen.