In many places, I’ve sought the Queer God. Sometimes I find divinity and sometimes divinity finds me. The nature of seeking is that God always finds us. Every journey is queer, unlike any other journey. The queerness of our lives is an emulation of the Queer God, in whose image we’re made. We are constantly living into God’s image…our own queerness. The queerer we become, the closer we draw near to divinity. To engage God in normative ways is to not engage God at all. Queer God is calling. Do we have ears to hear?
I got a phone call this morning. We hadn’t talked in many years. In fact, I believe we’ve only talked once before.
Our first call was contentious. Coming from a fundamentalist background, this person believed that they would go to hell if they lived into their sexuality. As the person quoted verse after verse, I politely listened. Then, I started talking about the love of God and our perfection in our creation. The more I deconstructed, the angrier this person got. When we went our separate ways, I assumed we’d never speak again.
I was wrong.
When the phone rang, I was chasing my kids around the house. Although I didn’t recognize the number, I decided to pick up. “Is this the Rev. Dr. Jeff Hood?” “Yes. Who is this?” When the person told me their name, I still had no idea who they were. As the person described who they were in great detail, our first call finally came back. Slowly, the person told me that they’d come to accept their sexuality. I rejoiced in the Queer that they’re slowly becoming. Before we hung up, the person offered a few closing thoughts, “I just wanted to tell you something else… When we first talked, I was suicidal. I couldn’t accept my queerness. I could only accept condemnation. You saved my life. Thank you.” When the call concluded, I was overwhelmed. In those precious seconds, I realized that I’d just experienced the Queer God calling.
Amen.
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