Università Roma Tre

LGBT believers and queer theologies in Christian churches from the 1960s to today

The sexual experience and conjugal life have represented the terrain on which the Christian churches have opposed the greatest resistance to the social and cultural transformations from the late modern age to the most recent processes of secularization. The question of the relationship between Christian faith and homosexuality, especially in the contemporary age, has triggered a lot of short circuits between the official positions of the Churches and those experiences that have favored the visibility and acceptance of LGBT believers signed by a new pastoral sensitivity and a theological thought attentive to accepting the requests coming from the social sciences and from the movements that claim full civil rights for homosexual people. In some Christian churches, at an official level, homosexuality was considered unnatural and out of the norm, an obstacle to the natural function of generation and to marriage. But the agency of LGBT Christian groups certifies the possibility of reconciliation with the institution and comes to the attention of the historian as a new religious subjectivity.
The course of study will address the topic by proposing a three-phase path: a) to offer a historical overview of the positions taken by the Christian Churches in the twentieth century on a global level on the question of homosexuality, in particular the Catholic and Protestant Churches; b) to analyze some pastoral experiences of groups and movements formed by LGBT Christians since the 1960s, especially in the United States, France and Italy, with the support of recent sociological studies; c) to follow the evolution of the so-called "queer theology", starting from the studies on the relationship between faith and homosexuality up to the most recent contributions.

1. Dossier of historical documents and articles proposed by the professor
2. F. TORCHIANI, «Il vizio innominabile». Chiesa e omosessualità nel Novecento, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino 2021
3. M. MENNINI, Credenti LGBT+. Diritti, fede e chiese cristiane nell’Italia contemporanea, Carocci, Roma 2023

Non-attending students are invited to agree on the program with the professor.