Attraction and Resistance in the Lives of Queer Catholic Teachers

• In Event: 61.038 - Queerness and the Catholic Educational Mission: Untold Stories

Abstract

Attraction and Resistance in the Lives of Queer Catholic Teachers -
Breaking Out and Breaking In: A Queer Kingdom of Attraction and Repulsion
Queer teacher lives aren’t easy! These educators experience isolation and bifurcation of their personhood on a daily basis. How much more difficult must life be for these teachers in the theologically heteronormative context of the Catholic school? This paper explores some findings from a participatory action research project undertaken with queer teachers from Catholic schools in California. The study sought to answer the question: How are the meanings and possibilities of queer identities constructed/maintained in a Catholic school? What is revealed is an intricate dance of attraction and repulsion around queerness in Catholic schools.
This work draws upon queer and critical theories to frame its analysis of the ways that power, privilege, and discourse are at play in the construction of “queerness” in Catholic schooling (Sedgwick, 1990; Freire, 2001). The research also marries these theories with the philosophical foundations of liberation theology, deepening the analysis to be inclusive of spiritual truths and beliefs (Gutierrez, 1973; Holland and Henriot, 1983). Seeking to be culturally responsive to faith, the research took place over the course of two retreats in which LGBTQ experiences were discussed using a version of the Ignatian Examen. Participants shared their narratives, which became the source of the data, and engaged in co-analysis with the researcher.
Queer teacher lives shed light on the binaries of good/evil, acceptable/unacceptable, right/wrong which at are work in their schools. This is first revealed in the performance of queer existence in Catholic institutions. LGBTQ teachers explain that schools privilege their public use of creativity and compassion while simultaneously mandating their silence about other facets of their lives. Teachers negotiate and transgress these mandates by acting in ways that validate queerness, particularly in students. Secondly, this paper examines the binary discourse on queerness in Catholic schools; while the dominant narrative paints LGBTQ existence as bad, these teachers develop a sense of self which is positive. Finally, the paper shows how power maintains these boundaries of acceptability and identity in the Catholic school system. Power is used to ensure that teachers are contractually and morally constrained to a limited expression of their queerness. Meanwhile, LGBTQ teachers are unsettled by their complicity with this system and question the effectiveness of their efforts to resist.
In conclusion, we look forward in hopeful possibility of the thriving of all identities in Catholic schooling. Acknowledging that binarisms are rigid and serve to limit new ontologies, we look to a theology of the Kingdom of God to offer some light on next steps (Sobrino, 1993). Catholic theologians, holding that the Kingdom is present, though not yet fully, step beyond binary thinking. Perhaps this spiritual framework, when applied to the multiplicity of human existence, can reframe our approaches to the inbreaking of LGBTQ personhood in our halls. Could we consider that humanity, like the Kingdom metaphor, is present among us, though not yet fully, opening us to embrace the new and unfamiliar? Could queering the binary be liberation for all?

Author

• Kevin James Stockbridge, North Dakota State University