In the beginning those least attached to the norms, the mores and the conventions of a particular time and place become the vanguard of change. It is almost inevitable. Isn’t it? And… Birds of this type of feather flock together. We know it. This is what is constituted by the term “margins”.
The Harlem Renaissance, the New England Renaissance, the Italian and English Renaissance… who were their drum majors? Some speak of a Queer Renaissance of the 1980s and 90s. I do not disagree. However, it seems a bit redundant. Renaissance is queer. It is bringing a margin or margins to center; even making something out of nothing. And still Renaissance is always a return.
For me Queer Renaissance is a return to the primacy of unity, of source. (Not religion mind you.) A return to the PRACTICE of presencing spirit. Those practices that linger in the most ancient of cultures. Those practices that seekers from the so-called west venture to the so-called east (as humanity always has and still does) for the wealth of this form of knowledge. The primary practice I find in this sort of return is service.
For me Queer Renaissance is a return to service as spiritual practice; both the path and the goal. The path to service is spiritual practice. The path to spiritual practice is service.
My triumphs and my traumas in this life have all collaborated to teach me this lesson. I believe it is my calling, my mission and an awesome gift that I get to share this perspective (one of many) with the world. From my upbringing at home, to my upbringing in the Black Baptist church in the Carolinas, to my initiation as a Priest (Olorisa) in an African derived spiritual tradition, there is a consistent call to peaceful and loving service.
The text we call The Bible, The Torah begins with what I perceive with a transcendent really ^1. It is non-binary. It gets dispersed into form. But it is united, whole, trans*cendent… in the beginning.
Queer Renaissance seeks to bring the margins to the center. Those generative perspectives that are considered marginal come from the prophets, the seers, the queer. Those nurturing spaces where mothering, care and healing happen are the domains most suited to practice service as spiritual practice.
This is just one of the reasons why our retreat center and retreat experiences we create are committed to generatively nurture BIPOC, Queer/LGBTQ and elder practitioners of growth and transformation.
This is our practice to sustain a Queer Renaissance until service one spirit (whoever they are) to another is the norm. This is how it was in the beginning.
Peace,
Sangodare
^1: Genesis 1:26-28a
Then God said, “Let us make an earth-being in our own image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created humanity in God’s own image, in the image of God, God created them; male and female God created them. And God blessed them.
