Queer Theology and Human Dignity

Craig Ford is the one who

relentlessly pushes, pushes us forward with a queer natural law

that does not let gender essentialism stand intact.

I can only cite, because of time, four of his works.

As he moves the field forward, he aims to dismantle unanal-

unanalyzed claims that hold us back, and more importantly,

helps us to see that sometimes what seem like advancement in

Catholic sexual ethics are really nothing more than a stopgap

that later trips us up. He endorses powerfully a queer

natural law in an article called Transgender Bodies, Catholic

Schools, and Queer Natural Law. Arguably, the best paper I ever

heard at a conference is his ongoing battle against gender

essentialism in his Born That Way?

The Challenge of Transgender Identity for Catholic Theology.

But if you want the beginning of Craig, then see What Makes Jesus

Salvific for the Queer Community, a multiman-inspired

essay in Christology. Finally, as you see him looking

at matters of race and gender, look at his Black Queer Natural Law on

brownness

and dis- uh, identification.

Okay.

Finally, Flora Tang makes clear in what queer

theology taught me about the saints, that the saints are often

themselves instructive as queer saints, yet she prompts us to go

beyond clinging into narratives of queer certitude and to move

toward an openness to fragmented narratives that do not tidy

up voices of mourning and unfilled hopes for a queer and

decolonized church. I need to write an essay

about the prudence in queer theology and how it can help us today to

look at reality as it is, and not to try to tidy it up,

as Tang reminds us. We should neither be dogmatic nor

impatient. The queer argument should be queer, but

prudentially doing this will take considerable challenges, though,

though those leading the way are themselves growing in prudence.

Let me add that I do not think that the prudence of the LGBTQ,

uh, or queer theologians is much different from the prudence of

civil rights activists, nor of Catholic peace activists-

Yes

... nor of Catholic fe-feminists.

That's the prudence I want to espouse here, a strategic,

forthright, forward-looking, deliberate prudence

about vulnerable and rightful recognition and human

dignity. I'll read that again. That's the heart of my talk.

Uh, the prudence I want to espouse here is a strategic, forthright,

forward-looking, deliberate prudence about vulnerable and

rightful recognition and human dignity.