Brief Explorations into Faith

 Queerness

Queerness is the rejection of all binding particulars in favor of the Universal. It rejects the fanatical relativism of modernity, while at the same time embracing free flowing desire as an expression of Universal Truth.

Free flowing desire isn’t just any desire. It is a desire that refuses to be imprisoned within the artificial categories of this world, a desire that refuses to be divided, and as such, a desire that fully embraces the idea that truth is by necessity revolutionary. In this way, free flowing desire is dogmatically anti-authoritarian, and it can only be anti authoritarian by embracing a totalitarian dedication to said truth. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” (John 1:1). Implication: follow the word, and you are with God. So long as you continue to follow the Word, you cannot stray from God.

To be queer is to be other. It is to be foriegn, alien, unknown, a stranger in a strange land… it is to renounce all things in this world (“if anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters - yes, and even his own self - he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross cannot be my disciple,” [Luke 14:26-27])  and fully embrace the next, side by side with those you love, sharing with them both your mind and your body; “Now the entire group of those who believed were of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions were his own, but instead they held everything in common,” (Acts 4:32). It is to give up all static identities and become a vessel of pure Faith: “For those of you who were baptized into Christ have been clothed by Christ. There is no Jew or Greek, slave or free, male and female; since you are all one in Christ Jesus,” (Galatians 3:19).

Renouncing This World

Paul tells those who wish to follow Christ that through Christ all the titles and positions which have been imposed upon them by this world are let go, and the human being enters back into the Universal. This is true and good. Yet, he then goes on to assign privileges to other people and create new roles, directly violating the egalitarian nature of the Holy Spirit, through which the presence of Christ exists among his latter day disciples? He says that through Christ there are neither men nor women, yet orders women to sit down and be silent, and to not teach or speak over men? It is obvious that Paul was wrong regarding these latter things, for Jesus himself says that his followers must renounce their earthly titles and become one in the Spirit, (Luke 14:26-27). [to be continued…]

It is very clear that we must actively renounce all that currently exists in order to make way for what will exist. We must hate our mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters and even ourselves (Luke 14:26). This doesn’t mean we literally hate them and ourselves  It means we hate the positions that have been imposed on them and us, the position of mother, the position of father, brother, sister. Through the forgiveness of all sins, Jesus effectively abolished the current moral order, in order to make way for a new one [to be continued…]

The Tragic Hero and the Knight of Faith

Hope, which separates the individual from that which he wishes to change and which leaves him psychologically powerless, must be rejected in favor of faith, which, by tying the individual to the Universal, makes all things, even the absurd, impossible; “faith finds its proper expression in him whose life is not only the most paradoxical conceivable, but so paradoxical that it simply cannot be thought. He acts on the strength of the absurd; for it is precisely the absurd that as the single individual he is higher than the universal,” (Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 85).

Through infinite resignation, Kierkegaard argues that the individual can raise himself above the Universal and become that which pushes it forward. “Infinite resignation is the last stage before faith, so that anyone who has not made this movement does not have faith; for only in infinite resignation does my eternal validity become transparent to me, and only then can there be talk of grasping life on faith,” (75). For Kierkegaard, the Knight of Faith is a lone warrior. But how can this be so, when the Spirit can only be grasped in the other? Kierkegaard says that the Tragic Hero sacrifices all to the Universal, but that the Knight of Faith raises himself above it. But again, how is this so? If the Universal is expressed in all Particulars, including the individual, must not the individual first bow to the Universal himself before he can be raised above it? Kierkegaard even says it flat out; “Then why does Abraham do it? For God’s sake, and what is exactly the same, for his own,” (88).

Not only that, but if to raise yourself above the Universal, you must first bow to the Universal in yourself, must you also bow to it in others? (Acts 4:32).