You Can, If You Want to

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Navigating Christian Faith, Conscience, and Matters LGBTQ+

A deeply radical attempt to reorientate our scriptural understanding of homosexuality.

A few years back, Continuum published In The Closet of the Vatican. Frédéric Martel’s reporting exposed the hypocrisy of the Church and especially its cardinals on homosexuality. He reckoned that something like 70% of Vatican officials were gay and many of them living (fairly) openly with partners. There were tales of gay orgies and priests being so badly paid that they took to male prostitution to earn a living.

The Church today has had to face up to the huge progress made on LGBT issues in society and can no longer sweep it under the carpet. James Alison’s book is a serious, nuanced, but ultimately deeply radical attempt to re-orientate our scriptural understanding of homosexuality. It is an attempt, as per his subtitle, to allow the church to move on.

He does this by revisiting the biblical texts. Many believe that the Bible is clear. All homosexual activity is forbidden. Alison, who knows Greek and Hebrew, proves in this book that this is not the case. The meaning of the biblical texts is far more subtle and enlightening. In that sense he is following on from a revolution in theology which is exemplified by the documentary 1946. It may well be that the bible doesn’t forbid homosexuality at all.

About the author. James Alison is a Catholic theologian, priest and author. James earned his doctorate in theology from the Jesuit Faculty in Belo Horizonte, Brazil in 1994 and is a systematic theologian by training. James now works as an itinerant preacher, lecturer and retreat giver. He is currently a Fellow of Imitatio. He accompanies a wide variety of publics, through academic lectures, undergraduate, postgraduate and professors’ seminars, and adult catechesis courses.