RELIGION and SEXUALITY Diversity and the Limits of Tolerance
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RELIGION AND SEXUALITY Diversity and the Limits of Tolerance EDITED BY Pamela Dickey Young, Heather Shipley, and Tracy J. Trothen Sample Material © 2015 UBC Press Sexuality Studies Series This series focuses on original, provocative, scholarly research examining from a range of perspectives the complexity of human sexual practice, identity, com- munity, and desire. Books in the series explore how sexuality interacts with other aspects of society, such as law, education, feminism, racial diversity, the family, policing, sport, government, religion, mass media, medicine, and employment. The series provides a broad public venue for nurturing debate, cultivating talent, and expanding knowledge of human sexual expression, past and present. Other volumes in the series are: Masculinities without Men? Female Masculinity in Twentieth-Century Fictions, by Jean Bobby Noble Every Inch a Woman: Phallic Possession, Femininity, and the Text, by Carellin Brooks Queer Youth in the Province of the “Severely Normal,” by Gloria Filax The Manly Modern: Masculinity in Postwar Canada, by Christopher Dummitt Sexing the Teacher: School Sex Scandals and Queer Pedagogies, by Sheila L. Cavanagh Undercurrents: Queer Culture and Postcolonial Hong Kong, by Helen Hok-Sze Leung Sapphistries: A Global History of Love between Women, by Leila J. Rupp The Canadian War on Queers: National Security as Sexual Regulation, by Gary Kinsman and Patrizia Gentile Awfully Devoted Women: Lesbian Lives in Canada, 1900-65, by Cameron Duder Judging Homosexuals: A History of Gay Persecution in Quebec and France, by Patrice Corriveau Sex Work: Rethinking the Job, Respecting the Workers, by Colette Parent, Chris Bruckert, Patrice Corriveau, Maria Nengeh Mensah, and Louise Toupin Selling Sex: Experience, Advocacy, and Research on Sex Work in Canada, edited by Emily van der Meulen, Elya M. Durisin, and Victoria Love The Man Who Invented Gender: Engaging the Ideas of John Money, by Terry Goldie Sample Material © 2015 UBC Press © UBC Press 2015 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior written permission of the publisher. Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Religion and sexuality : diversity and the limits of tolerance / edited by Pamela Dickey Young, Heather Shipley, and Tracy J. Trothen. (Sexuality studies series) Includes bibliographical references and index. Issued in print and electronic formats. ISBN 978-0-7748-2869-7 (bound). – ISBN 978-0-7748-2871-0 (pdf). – ISBN 978-0-7748-2872-7 (epub) 1. Sex – Religious aspects. I. Young, Pamela Dickey, 1955-, author, editor II. Trothen, Tracy J. (Tracy Joan), 1963-, author, editor III. Shipley, Heather, 1979-, author, editor IV. Series: Sexuality studies series BL65.S4R44 2015 201’.7 C2014-906107-2 C2014-906108-0 UBC Press gratefully acknowledges the financial support for our publishing program of the Government of Canada (through the Canada Book Fund), the Canada Council for the Arts, and the British Columbia Arts Council. This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Awards to Scholarly Publications Program, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. UBC Press The University of British Columbia 2029 West Mall Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2 www.ubcpress.ca Sample Material © 2015 UBC Press Contents Introduction / 3 Heather Shipley Part 1: Religion and the Construction of Sexual Minority Rights / 17 1 Beyond Tolerance: Sexual Diversity and Economic Justice / 21 Janet R. Jakobsen 2 “Severely Normal”: Sexuality and Religion in Alberta’s Bill 44 / 45 Pamela Dickey Young 3 “I’m Not Homophobic, I’m Chinese”: Hong Kong Canadian Christians and the Campaign against Same-Sex Marriage / 67 Lee Wing Hin Part 2: Sexuality and the Construction of Religious Identities / 93 4 Challenging Identity Constructs: The Debate over the Sex Education Curriculum in Ontario / 97 Heather Shipley 5 When Religion Meets Sexuality: Two Tales of Intersection / 119 Andrew Kam-Tuck Yip Sample Material © 2015 UBC Press vi Contents 6 Women, Sex, and the Catholic Church: The Implications of Domestic Violence for Reproductive Choice / 141 Catherine Holtmann Part 3: Sexual Bodies/Religious Bodies / 165 7 The Construction of a Sexual Pedagogy: Childhood and Saints in Roman Catholic Discourse / 169 Donald L. Boisvert 8 Corporeal Diversity in the Religion of Sport: The Debate over Enhanced Bodies / 190 Tracy J. Trothen 9 Strong Spirits, Abused Bodies: Social, Political, and Theological Reflections / 220 Nancy Nason-Clark Conclusion / 241 Pamela Dickey Young List of Contributors / 247 Index / 250 Sample Material © 2015 UBC Press Introduction Heather Shipley Religion and sexuality often appear in conflicting relationships in the public sphere. In the 1990s religious groups were among those who successfully opposed the inclusion of gay men and lesbians in New York City’s “Rainbow Curriculum” (Myers 1992). In 2011 the inclusion of gay-straight alliances in the public education system in Ontario under the Accepting Schools Act (Bill 13) (Government of Ontario 2012) sparked a public debate about religion, religious identity, sexual identity, and youthful sexuality. In 2013 the inclusion of sexual minorities in Minnesota’s Safe and Supportive Schools Act was the subject of targeted opposition by religious groups that declared the act unconstitutional and by legislators who threatened a ten- hour filibuster that assured the bill would not be voted on or passed in session (Adkins 2013). Religious voices have also been at the forefront of opposition to same- sex marriage (Dickey Young 2010). In the Canadian context, this oppos- ition was evident in the debate over revision of the Civil Marriage Act in 2005 to include same-sex couples, after cumulative efforts to redefine marriage at the provincial level. It has also been evident in the State of California, which since 2008 has legalized same-sex marriage, overturned the legalization of same-sex marriage, and subsequently seen the ban against same-sex couples declared unconstitutional by a federal judge. Currently, thirty-two American states as well as the District of Columbia have legalized same-sex marriage, and although some states have not legalized it, they recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states. Sample Material © 32015 UBC Press 4 Heather Shipley In 2013 England and Wales passed same-sex marriage legislation, and in 2014 Scotland did likewise. These changes, too, came amid opposition that included religious opposition. All of these decisions and changes to law and policy have been fraught with controversy and continue to raise debate and discord among groups on all sides of the arguments. As these debates reach the public arena, often the strongest voices heard in opposition to equality rights for sexual min- ority communities and same-sex couples are religious voices. However, this emphasis on the conflict at the intersection of religion and sexuality can obscure the real issues. In the case of New York City’s “Rainbow Cur- riculum,” its creation to foster racial and ethnic respect was overlooked amid charges that a few passages on gay and lesbian identities rendered the curriculum dangerous homosexual propaganda (Myers 1992; Miller 1993). In the case of Ontario’s Bill 13, its creation to protect a range of identity categories from discriminatory behaviours in schools, notably from bullying and cyberbullying, was ignored by media coverage that narrowed both the bill and the debate to issues of religion and sexuality and their “in herent” opposition to one another (Artuso 2011; Talaga 2011). In the case of Minnesota’s Safe and Supportive Schools Act, its creation to further an anti-bullying agenda was overlooked amid religious opposition to its inclusion of sexual minorities, even though the Safe Schools for All Co- alition in Minnesota included religious individuals and groups who sup- ported the act’s inclusivity and protection of all students. Further, the emphasis on religious opposition to sexuality often mis- represents religion. As the Minnesota case makes clear, not all religious individuals or groups are unified in their approach to equality rights based on gender, sexuality, or sexual orientation. Yet moderate or liberal religious voices in support of these modifications are not prominent in public dis- course and media (Jordan 2009; Shipley, Chapter 4, this volume). As a consequence, the public debate, and subsequently what looks like a public “contest,” over religion and sexuality is narrowly portrayed and essentialized in ways that continue to perpetrate mistaken assumptions about both religion and sexuality, which also furthers the notion that they exist only in tension. However, the voices of those who are both religious and sexually “other” or religious and in support of sexual diversity are becoming louder, even though the assumption is often made that to be religious is to stand in opposition to same-sex relations and sexual diversity. Sample Material © 2015 UBC Press Introduction 5 Religion and sexuality evoke strong responses from individuals and groups because religion and sexuality are usually understood as core com- ponents of identity, categories through which individuals identify them- selves. Thus debates where religion and sexuality are involved elicit emotional engagement from members of the public and from policy makers and generate