Description
Book SynopsisForeword INDIES 2021 Finalist for Religion Religious faith reduces the risk of suicide for virtually every American demographic except one: LGBTQ people. Generations of LGBTQ people have been alienated or condemned by Christian communities. It's past time that Christians confronted the ongoing and devastating effects of this legacy. Many LGBTQ people face overwhelming challenges in navigating faith, gender, and sexuality. Christian communities that uphold the traditional sexual ethic often unwittingly make the path more difficult through unexamined attitudes and practices. Drawing on her sociological training and her leadership in the Side B/Revoice conversation, Bridget Eileen Rivera, who founded the popular website Meditations of a Traveling Nun, speaks to the pain of LGBTQ Christians and helps churches develop a better pastoral approach. Rivera calls to mind Jesus's woe to religious leaders: "They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them" (Matt. 23:4). Heavy Burdens provides an honest account of seven ways LGBTQ people experience discrimination in the church, helping Christians grapple with hard realities and empowering churches across the theological spectrum to navigate better paths forward.
Table of ContentsContents
Introduction
Burden 1: Sex . . . err . . . Celibacy Is Great!
1. The Protestant Sexual Revolution
2. The New Sexual Order
Burden 2: Sinners Saved by Grace
3. Perverted Identity
4. Freud's Lasting Influence
Burden 3: Folk Devils
5. Political Christianity
6. Hellfire and Judgment
Burden 4: The Bible Is "Clear"
7. Culture and Context
8. Double Standards
Burden 5: "Real" Men, "Good" Ladies
9. Effeminacy
10. Emasculation
Burden 6: Made in the Image of God Sex
11. Gender Essentialism
12. More Than Just Monkeys?
Burden 7: Jesus Saves Damns
13. Vessels of Wrath
14. Grace for Me but Not for Thee
A Better Way
15. Recentering the Gospel
16. Setting Down the Burdens
17. Weights of Glory
