The Hood Creed: A Queer Creed from A Queer Believer at Christmas

The Hood Creed: Queer Thoughts from a Queer Believer

Often, folks who disagree with my open interpretations of God will declare that I don’t really believe in anything.  Yesterday, I had someone tell me that I shouldn’t celebrate Christmas because I really don’t believe in all of that.  These statements are coming from political perspectives rather than spiritual ones.  Conservative evangelicals think that they have a monopoly on God and moral thought.  I can’t even begin to deconstruct the absurdity of such thinking.  However, I can state unequivocally what I believe.  Honestly, I am a fairly orthodox Christian…and always have been.  In the midst of such, I firmly believe with the rest of the church that God is beyond our wildest imagination.  The word “QUEER” has always helped me speak of such a place.  That place where words start to fall short.  So in the spirit of the season, I offer you the beautiful conviction that …God is the Queer, Jesus is the Queerest and the Spirit is the Queerer.  Such affirmation speaks of both the now and the not yet…that which has always been and that which will forever be.  Thus, The Hood Creed reads as follows…

I believe in…

The Queer,

The God Beyond God,

Maker of heaven and earth and all that is beyond,
Maker of us in the Queer’s image,

And of all things visible and invisible:

And in Jesus Christ,

The Queerest of God,

The Queerest of All Creation

Begotten of the Queer,

God before all creation,

God of God,

Light of Light,

Very God of very God,

Begotten, not made,

Being of one substance with the Queer,

By whom all things were made;

Who for all creation, and for our salvation dwelt amongst us,

And was incarnate by the Queerer in the womb of Mary,

And was made the Queerest,

And was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate.

The Queerest suffered and was buried,

And the third day the Queerest rose again,

And ascended into heaven,

And sits at the right hand of the Queer.

And the Queerest shall come again with glory,

To judge both the quick and the dead:

Such judgment will draw all into the Queer for life eternal

The realm of Queer reconciliation shall have no end.

And I believe in the Queerer,

The Spirit eternal and giver of life,

Who proceeds from the Queer and the Queerest,

Who with the Queer and the Queerest together is worshipped and glorified,

Who speaks through the Prophets,

Those who dare to speak honestly of the Queer.

And I believe in one Queer Church,

Hidden amongst the religious and nonreligious alike,

That grows Queerer and Queerer,

I acknowledge one Baptism as symbolic for the remission of all sins.

And I believe in the revelation of the Queer,

Passed from Queer to Queer throughout time and space.

And I look for the Resurrection of the dead,

And the Queer life of the world to come.

The return to the beginning.

The just restoration of all things.

World without end.

The God beyond God.

The Queer.

Amen.