Queer Prayer at Fordham

Queer Prayer At Fordham

CHAPELS AND PRAYER ROOMS AT FORDHAM

Rose Hill

University Church

Our Lady’s Chapel (University Church, lower level)

Sacred Heart Chapel (Dealy Hall)

St. Robert Bellarmine, S.J., Chapel (Spellman Hall)

Keating Blue Chapel (Keating Hall)

St. Ignatius Chapel (Loyola Hall)

Our Lady, Queen of All Saints Chapel (Queen’s Court)

Madonna della Strada Chapel (Tierney Hall)

North American Martyrs' Chapel (Martyrs’ Court)

St. Kateri Tekakwitha Chapel (O’Hare Hall)

Muslim Prayer Room (Faber Hall, first floor)

Lincoln Center

Blessed Rupert Mayer, S.J., Chapel (Lowenstein, Room 221)

Muslim Prayer Room (Lowenstein, Room 219)

Church of St. Paul the Apostle (60th Street & Columbus Ave)

Westchester

Blessed Miguel Pro, S.J., Chapel

QUEER RESOURCES AT FORDHAM

Campus Ministry

PRISM retreat

Queer Spirit Community (RH)

DevOUT (LC)

Office of Multicultural Affairs

The LGBTQ and Ally Network of Support

LGBTQ History Month Committee

Student Groups

PRIDE Alliance (RH)

Rodrigues’ Coffee House (RH)

PRISM Fordham (LC)

Counseling and Psychological Services

LGBTQ+ Community Support Space

“The first thing taken from us, from LGBTQ+ people, is our spirituality, is God” — Billy Porter

Queer

At Fordham

Billy Porter, a Black gay actor and activist, was asked in an interview: “What’s the worst thing anyone’s said to you?” He answered, “When I was young, my church community said I would never be blessed as long as I chose to be gay. And we know it’s not a choice.” (January 2021)

Later, he expanded on these thoughts in another interview: “The first thing that’s taken away from us as LGBTQ people, from everybody, is our spirituality, is God. ‘God hates fags’—No, he doesn’t!” (May 2021)

I’m struck by how the worst thing that was said to him wasn’t a racial insult or a sexual slur. It was being told that the only way God could accept him was if he denied his sexuality. It was being told that a core reality of his life was unacceptable to God. It was being told something that he knew to be a lie.

Why was this so devastating? Because our sexuality is not just about who we have—or want to have—sex with. Or the clothes we wear to express our gender. Or what we do in bed. Sexuality is a fundamental dimension of who we are as humans. It is what compels us into relationships. It’s how we express ourselves in relationships.

For example, when I love my friends, I relate to them as a gay man who is attracted to other men. When I relate to my family, I do so as a cisgender man. When I express myself in speech or action, I do so as someone who embodies traits that are sometimes considered masculine and at other times as feminine. When I place myself in the presence of God who is Love, I do so as a man who strives to love all people of all genders.

Sexuality is not something we can turn off. Or only perform through certain genital acts. It is the life force within us that propels and enables us to be in relationship with others, ourselves, and with the Mystery that we call God.

“God.” That’s the essential part of Porter’s response. Whatever “God” is, for many the word points to a Reality beyond naming and human comprehension. So much so that humans have developed images that gesture toward but do not constrain this reality. For me, as a Christian, I believe that “God is Love” (1 John 4:16). Ultimate Love. Infinite Love. The Source of All That Is. It is by loving others

and ourselves that we participate most fully in this Awesome Loving Reality.

That is why Porter’s answer resonates with so many LGBTQ people. Because we know the pain of being told that who we are and how we love are wrong. Because we know deep down if we cannot come to God with our sexuality, then we cannot come to God at all. Because deep down we understand that despite the teachings of many religions and religious people, if God is Love, then God does not and cannot reject us when we strive to love, even if how we love is rejected or misunderstood.

For many LGBTQ people, we’ve discovered -- sometimes after lots of searching and despite the teachings of religious leaders -- that we are embraced by the love of God.

The prayers and reflections in this book are testimonies from LGBTQ spiritual seekers. They are testimonies of how we articulate our spirituality or search for “God.” We approach this Reality in different ways. We call It by different names. But we resonate, each in our own way, with Porter’s refusal to let others rob us of our spiritual quest.

You hold in your hands the thoughts of LGBTQ people who are on a journey. We are on a sacred quest to unite our sexuality and spirituality. We offer our thoughts, reflections, and prayers to you, the reader, in the hope that they might inspire you in your own journeys. We hope these thoughts and prayers help create a world where people like us will no longer be told that the Loving Infinite Mystery does not and cannot embrace us all.

Fr. Bryan Massingale Professor of Theology Fordham University

On my bedside table sits two books, Fordham at Prayer, a booklet of prayers significant to the Fordham community, and Love Poems From God, a collection of poems by a range of mystics from Aquinas to Rabia. In my life, both serve the same purpose—they point at a transcendent emotiveness, a profound humanness, where God resides. For LGBTQ+ people, we are often told that God is not with us, but the emotions we feel and the prayers, poems, and songs we participate in show that is not true.

Inspired by friendships and encounters with the amazing LGBTQ+ people at Fordham and intentions for them while reading those books on my bedside table, this booklet aims to affirm that God is with LGBTQ+ people—to push the boundaries of who is spiritual and who is part of Fordham’s spiritual community—by offering windows into the spiritual lives of LGBTQ+ students, staff, and faculty.

Contributors have called upon St. Michael the Archangel to respond to the sexual abuse crisis and Joseph Tetlow, S.J., to develop trans theology. Others have written their own poems and prayers or found new layers to queer spirituality.

We offer these prayers and reflections as both a resource to be used as the contributors have and as an inspiration to re-examine your own traditions through the lens of queerness and your own queerness through the lens of spirituality.

Perhaps you too might find that there is a particular, intrinsic spirituality to the Queer experience.

Benedict Reilly, FCRH ‘23

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Prayer Spaces & Queer Resources at Fordham | inside front cover Chapter 1

Queer Prayer | 8 Chapter 2

Prayers of Welcome | 22 Chapter 3

Prayers of Queerness | 30 Chapter 4

Prayers of Saints | 44 Chapter 5

Prayers of Our Own | 56 Chapter 6

Prayers of Action | 68 Sources | 79

QUEER PRAYER

What does it mean to pray as a queer person? Does queer prayer exist?

Each time we pray, we are coming from a different location, informed by different experiences.

Each prayer, whether said or unsaid, in private reflection or as part of a crowd of hundreds, reveals something new about the Divine and transforms our experience and understanding of creation, calling us to live life anew.

As it is often a lifelong journey for queer people to find ourselves, we are used to the constant transformation that prayer asks of us.

The search for transformation is intrinsic to all existence, but particularly the queer experience.

Can you remember when you realized you are queer? When you accepted it? Those are moments of transformation.

Queer prayers gaze upon the Divine from a unique perspective,

providing new and extraordinary revelations about the Divine Mystery. In journeying to find

ourselves, we see God from many angles, revealing a fullness that affirms God’s immanence.

Therefore, our Queerness can help our spirituality.

It gives us insights into the strength, hope, and resilience of the Spirit. Most importantly, it teaches us new ways of loving others, God, and ourselves.

And our spirituality helps our queerness.

It fills our souls, enabling us to love more fully and serve more radically. Through spirituality we affirm our membership as queer spirits in the web of life.

We invite you to join the queer mystics in this book,

affirming their humanity and yours, developing a positive queer spirituality, and transcending ourselves through love, laughter, resilience, and the many other gifts of the queer experience.

PRAYERS

We pray for welcome and as a sign of welcome.

ALL ARE WELCOME (ALL BELONG)

All are welcome in this place, behold love’s amazing grace, all are welcome.

Bring your hopes, bring your dreams, mercy flows and love redeems, all are welcome, all belong.

Welcome all the broken hearted, all who sorrow and despair, you are not alone, for you are God’s own.

Together we sing and we proclaim: all are welcome in this place, behold love’s amazing grace, all are welcome, all are welcome.

Bring your hopes, bring your dreams, mercy flows and love redeems, all are welcome, all belong.

Ken Canedo and Jesse Manibusan

I remember when I first heard this song; I was at the new student orientation mass on the lawn in front of the University Church. I was just an incoming freshman in an unfamiliar city called New York City, one that I had never been to prior to my weekend at Urban Plunge. I was incredibly nervous and somewhat terrified, but this song made me feel, as it says, welcomed. No matter how scared I was of this unfamiliar place, it was comforting to know that the place that I would spend my next four years would accept me with open arms.

This song has further significance to me now that I identify as queer. I had always questioned my identity, but my faith was something that kept me back. I was scared that being queer and Catholic at the same time was something that wasn’t allowed, especially when numerous religious people I trusted had told me so when I opened up to them about my identity crisis. However, I have realized during my time at Fordham that it is possible to be authentically queer and authentically Catholic, as God will love and accept me regardless of how I identify.

This song is something I find great comfort in, since it emphasizes the fact that even as we continue to find ourselves we are welcomed and belong.

I hope everyone knows that all are welcome at Fordham, in our Church, and in God’s creation, no matter their identity or origins. And if you ever feel otherwise, maybe you can listen to this song and find comfort in it like I do.

Esther Han, FCRH ‘25

You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.

Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.

Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?

If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.

If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.

If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.

Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139:1-12; 23-24, NIV

FOR THE DIRECTOR OF MUSIC. OF DAVID. A PSALM.

Going into my freshman year of high school, I went to a youth retreat with my church. Like every teenager, I was looking for a place to belong, and my religion granted me that. We sang hymns and danced and stayed up all night sharing stories and becoming family.

Like every good retreat, this had a theme: You are named. You are chosen. You are wanted. God has a plan for you.

For queer people, that naming, that choosing, that wanting, and that plan can seem elusive. As I discovered my sexuality, I was unable to pull away from my church. My church family wouldn’t let me—they knew me, named me, chose me, wanted me, and loved me with all their hearts. God’s plan was for me to be me, for me to be loved. I never did come out to most of the people I knew in that context of my life, but the message I received from them was clear: first and foremost I am family, I am me.

This psalm gives me strength because the family I have made through that church, and now through Fordham, are gifts from God that I cannot lose because of who I am. I am me. And you are you.

You are known, even if you feel unknown.

You are named, even if you do not know your name.

You are chosen, even if you are in the dark.

You are wanted, even if you feel deserted.

And God has a plan for you: to be you.

Lilly Gieseke, FCRH ‘23

IF GOD INVITED YOU TO A PARTY

If God Invited you to a party And said, 'Everyone In the ballroom tonight Will be my special Guest...'

How would you then treat them When you Arrived?

Indeed, indeed!

And I know There is no one in this world Who Is not upon His Jeweled Dance Floor Hafiz

Whenever I am asked to lead a spiritual discussion, I always start off with this poem—and then I ask everyone to get up and join me in dancing the Macarena!

Though Hafiz is a 14th century mystic from a different tradition than myself, I find he provides two important insights into spirituality and the nature of God’s creation.

First, is that God wants you to be here. Here in the world; here in our communities; here at Fordham.

Second, is that God wants you to be joyful while you are here. God wants you to dance, sing, laugh, and love.

There is an intense joy to a positive spirituality. When we sing, dance, and love alongside each other God is manifest in nearly visible ways.

Knowing that you are God’s special guest, join God on “His Jeweled Dance Floor” at the Rods drag show, laugh with God in the Black Box theater, and celebrate with God in the University Church.

Benedict Reilly, FCRH ‘23

PRAYERS

Thank you for today, thank you for tomorrow, thank you for yesterday.

HOLY SPIRIT

Holy Spirit, come into my heart; draw it to Thee by Thy power, O my God, and grant me charity with filial fear. Preserve me, O beautiful love, from every evil thought; warm me, inflame me with Thy dear love, and every pain will seem light to me. My Father, my sweet Lord, help me in all my actions. Jesus, love, Jesus, love. Amen.

St. Catherine of Sienna

This is a daily prayer exercise that I was taught by a friend in high school. Typically you would say this beginning as written above and then name specific factors of your life that you hold gratitude for. I have found it useful throughout the years to focus this general prayer on specific topics on life, in this case queerness.

As I approach this prayer from a place of queerness, gratitude can be sent to every part of the journey. I send gratitude to my past self who struggled with so many unanswered questions and finding my identity. I express gratitude for my present self today, who continues to struggle with identity and conformity and living authentically, while also naming the progress that I have made in showing this to others. Also for those around me that continue to reveal to me the beauty of queerness and help me self-discover and grow in community. I send gratitude to my future self and the future of the world that there may be greater acceptance and care for our queer counterparts.

The reflection is centered on sending gratitude to where you’ve been, where you are, and where you’ll go. Practicing queer gratitude regularly, specifically naming my gratitude and focusing on past, present, and future, creates a pattern of holistic gratefulness and affirmation to myself and the challenging, beautiful, and queer life I am blessed to live.

Triona Delumpa, FCRH ‘22

YOU HAVE CALLED ME BY NAME

Oh, Lord my God,

You called me from the sleep of nothingness merely because of Your tremendous love. You want to make good and beautiful beings. You have called me by name in my mother’s womb. You have given me breath and light and movement and walked with me every moment of my existence. I am amazed, Lord God of the universe, that You attend to me and, more, cherish me. Create in me the faithfulness that moves You, and I will trust You and yearn for You all my days.

Joseph Tetlow, S.J.

In the queer community, names are important, especially for trans and nonbinary folx. While theologians have developed a robust queer theology surrounding sexuality, a theology of transgender liberation is both lacking and sorely needed. I usually think about trans theology from the context of the body, because the stories of Christ provide such a resource, but this prayer has given me the new lens of our names.

As this prayer reminds us, we are each called by name by God, and God knows our name. This is not to say that we are far from God while we are searching for our names — God accompanies us on our journeys even when it may seem like we are lost — but that God wants us to hear our names. When we say our names, when others say our names, and when our names are affirmed by our community we experience a shimmer of God’s love.

Anonymous, FCRH ‘22

THE WONDERFUL EFFECT OF DIVINE LOVE

"My God, my love, You are all mine and I am all Yours. Give me an increase of love, that I may learn to taste with the inward lips of my heart how sweet it is to love, how sweet to be dissolved in love and bathe in it.

Let me be rapt in love. Let me rise above self in great fervor and wonder. Let me sing the hymn of love, and let me follow You, my Love, to the heights.

Let my soul exhaust itself in praising You, rejoicing out of love. Let me love You more than myself, and let me not love myself except for Your sake. In You let me love all those who truly love You, as the law of love, which shines forth from You, commands."

Thomas à Kempis Excerpt from The Imitation of Christ

Those of us who grow up queer are in a special position to contemplate the mystery of love. We feel the weight of the sterilized and normalized version of love that leaves us not only disenfranchised, but also drains the beauty of God’s love for us.

Precisely because love is denied to us in so many ways, queer people have become sensitive to love’s virtue. The queer experience causes us to crave and cherish human love. This desire for touch and tender words, to be loved for oneself, runs deeper in the heart than many of us expect: so deep that it may be ultimately outside the power of humans to provide.

Many thinkers would have us abandon earthly love for a chaste love of God. However the greatest theological power of the queer experience is our inherent resistance to this choice. Our intimate familiarity with longing produces deep wisdom that cannot discriminate between love on earth and love transcendent.

As queer persons, we are told to look upon our sexuality as an alternative choice to loving God. However, when we give up the compromise, the sanitized distinction, love for God looks different. Intimacy with God works to shake away shame, not engender it. We can look at our God as a place of comfort rather than silent scorn. With God, we can be selfish and angry, rude and ignorant - there is no necessary performance with God, from whom nothing is truly hidden. When we open ourselves to the possibility that we are sanctified, not despite our queerness, but in part, because of it, a more genuine understanding of God’s love flowers in our minds and hearts.

Philip Wines, FCRH ‘22

PRAYER OF TRUST AND CONFIDENCE

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end.

Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.

And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.

And I know that if I do this, you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.

Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

Thomas Merton

I think I first became aware of this prayer while I was in college on a retreat. It was a difficult time in my life. I was confused about my life path and unsure of the career options I faced. This prayer gave me an inner confidence that somehow I would be guided to make the right choice, even if so much was unclear to me at the time.

As I became more aware of my sexuality and accepted being gay, this prayer took on new layers of meaning. I was in the seminary and struggled with how to reconcile my sexuality with my deep sense of vocation. I believed I was called to serve people as a priest, but couldn’t see how to be honest about who I was in a church that said that openly gay men couldn’t be ordained to the priesthood. I felt conflicted -- forced into choices that would frustrate important parts of who I am.

A wise mentor told me to stop trying to force an answer to the questions rolling around within me. Instead, live with them, and let the answers come in time. That’s when this prayer became even more real for me. I might not know or see the path forward. But I realized I could trust that God – a.k.a., my Inner Wisdom or the Spirit working within me -- will make the way clear in time. Because no matter what may come, I am never alone. And never unloved.

That’s why I believe this prayer can resonate with LGBTQ faith seekers. So often, we are told our sexuality can’t be reconciled with a deep religious faith. And we get that message not only from church leaders, but also from other LGBTQ persons who have been hurt by their ministers and wonder why we bother with a faith quest.

This prayer continues to comfort me. As long as I am sincere in my desire to follow the promptings of my heart and spirit, I believe I will come to “the right road” regardless of what others may say or think. I believe that God walks with us, even when we walk on unfamiliar paths to a destination that seems unclear. Even when we feel lost and unsure. The desire to seek God is enough.

Fr. Bryan Massingale, Department of Theology

MY LIFE WAS THE SIZE OF MY LIFE

My life was the size of my life. Its rooms were room-sized, its soul was the size of a soul. In its background, mitochondria hummed, above it sun, clouds, snow, the transit of stars and planets. It rode elevators, bullet trains, various airplanes, a donkey.

It wore socks, shirts, its own ears and nose. It ate, it slept, it opened and closed its hands, its windows. Others, I know, had lives larger. Others, I know, had lives shorter. The depth of lives, too, is different.

There were times my life and I made jokes together. There were times we made bread. Once, I grew moody and distant.

I told my life I would like some time, I would like to try seeing others.

In a week, my empty suitcase and I returned. I was hungry, then, and my life, my life, too, was hungry, we could not keep our hands off our clothes on our tongues from

Jane Hirshfield

A poem about oneself may not seem like an obvious resource for queer prayer, but the relationship with oneself has always been a central part of what cultures have understood by the term “spirituality.” The injunctions to know oneself and to cultivate oneself reverberate through Western philosophy and Christian spirituality from the ancient and medieval through the modern periods. And the practice of looking deeply at and sitting with our perceptions without judgment is crucial to the Zen practice that is a major, though often implicit, influence on Hirschfield’s poetry.

The project of fashioning one’s life may be universal, but I believe it impinges upon queer people in a distinctive way. Finding one’s path amid the cacophony of external expectations can be by turns painful and exhilarating. As we grow up and grow into ourselves (a journey with no destination), queer people (and perhaps especially queer religious people) are presented primarily with models of self, relationship, and family in which we cannot recognize ourselves and to which we do not aspire. Models are important, but how miraculous, even for a moment, to simply sit with the bare, beautiful fact of our lives as they are, and not as others imagine they should be.

However Zen its influences, this poem also evokes for me the spirit of that great queer poet and prophet, Walt Whitman, in its ecstatic, erotic embrace of immanence as a vehicle to spiritual transcendence.

Prof. Robert Davis, Department of Theology

THE

PRAYER

Holy One, our only Home, blessed be your name, may your day dawn, your will be done, here, as in heaven. Feed us today, and forgive us, as we forgive each other. Do not forsake us at the test, but deliver us from evil. For the glory, the power, and the mercy are yours now and forever. Amen.

Holy Wisdom Monastery

The sisters at Holy Wisdom Monastery, an ecumenical Benedictine community in Madison, have developed this version of the Jesus prayer for their community worship. For me as a woman, a theologian, and a queer Catholic, two elements of this prayer are especially profound.

First, it invites us to envision God, our Home, in whatever form or gender feels like a gift and a refuge to us.

Second, it replaces "kingdom" with "mercy." Monarchy does not feel like salvation to me; God's overflowing, unconditional love does.

As queer Catholics, we can't be reminded of this too often. It's the grace we need to be vessels of that love in a world that often takes offense at one or the other of our identities.

Prof. Cristina Traina, Department of Theology

We turn to the hero’s of our traditions for

and

THE HAIL MARY

Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.

Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.

Amen.

When I was first told I could relate to this prayer, I felt angry and defeated. As an asexual, you’re often faced with the tired jokes of how you’ll have to reproduce like bacteria or through immaculate conception. This often leads to a false connection that I want to adopt merely because I’m on the Ace spectrum, but I have always wanted to adopt and said that publicly. My sexuality and my future children’s origin are two distinct elements of my being. I do not wish to adopt because I’m Ace. I wish to adopt because there is love I can provide to those already here. There is no flow chart that connects my sexuality and my desire to adopt.

Mary and I are bound not by her chastity, nor my abstinence, but by the role of motherhood. As she cares for us sinners from our birth to our last breath, I will fight and care for my children, who were lost or without a home. The Lord will stand with me not for the fruit of my womb but for the actions of my heart. Someday, I hope when I’m old and graying someone will relate me to this prayer for my motherly love, not my virginity.

Madison Ryan, FCRH ‘23

PRAYER TO ST MICHAEL THE ARCHANGEL

Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil; May God rebuke him, we humbly pray; And do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God, thrust into hell Satan and all evil spirits who wander the world seeking the ruin of souls.

Amen.

My church prayed this prayer to St. Michael the Archangel after each service during the height of criticism of the church for the sexual abuse crisis. The crux of the prayer, as I understand it, is the second line: “defend us in battle.” But who is “us”? And, as a reflection of that, who is “the devil”? Standing in the pews as the congregation reverberated with “defend us in battle,” it was clear to me that “us” was the church.

The devil was queerness or sexuality or whichever forces of modernity that targeted us, the church. It was not the beliefs, practices, and institutions that enable and conceal sexual abuse within the church, that perpetuate it in the temporal world, and that make queer people most vulnerable to it.

It has been most powerful for me to reread this prayer changing the implicit “defend us, the Church” into an explicit “defend us, the Children.”

St. Michael the Archangel, leader of the Army of God, carrier of souls, warrior of the children of Israel, defend us, the Children, in battle.

Please pray with us.

Anonymous, FCRH '23

THE MEMORARE

Remember O most compassionate, Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to your protection, implored you for your help, or sought your intercession was left unaided.

Inspired by this confidence, I fly unto you, o Virgin of virgins, my mother; to you do I come, before you I stand, sinful and sorrowful. O Mother of the Word Incarnate, don’t despise my petitions but in your mercy hear and answer me.

Amen

This prayer has been my go-to prayer for a very long time. I learned it as in the second grade in Holy Name of Mary school and over the years I have prayed it in times of crisis or struggle. I feel a great connection to Mary. As a queer person there have been many times of struggle and I have always found solace in praying to Mary, both in the words of the Memorare and in words addressed more personally to Mary. It is not that I don’t pray directly to God, but this prayer has been very meaningful to me. I connect with her very human story and pray for the openness and humility that she had. I believe that she intercedes for those who struggle, and know and pray she will intercede for you.

Dr. Joan Cavanagh, Campus Ministry, GSE '06 and '17

PRAYER TO ST. THERESE

Little Flower, in this hour, show your power. NOVENA ROSE PRAYER

O Little Therese of the Child Jesus, please pick for me a rose from the heavenly gardens and send it to me as a message of love.

O Little Flower of Jesus, ask God to grant the favors I now place with confidence in your hands . . (mention intentions silence)

St. Therese, help me to always believe as you did in God’s great love for me, so that I might imitate your “Little Way” each day. Amen

When I was younger, this first very brief prayer to Saint Therese of Lisieux was one of the first I could memorize and recite on my own. It was easy for me to hold close to my heart not only because it was simple enough to remember, but because I admire Saint Therese greatly. She is recalled for her little way, a method of acting with love even in the small things we do.

At the point where I began to think about the intersections of my Queer and Catholic identities, this prayer came to mind because I am reminded that acting with love is does not have to be a grand statement. I understand that being Queer is a statement within itself, but it is not a facet of my identity that necessitates grand action. Being able to love and be loved is a gift that manifests itself in a million different ways, and being Queer only accentuates my ability to act with love in all that I do.

Gemma Fahy, FCRH ‘23

THE UNFAILING PRAYER TO ST. ANTHONY

Blessed be God in His Angels and in His Saints

O Holy St. Anthony, gentlest of Saints, your love for God and Charity for His creatures, made you worthy, when on earth, to possess miraculous powers. Encouraged by this thought, I implore you to obtain for me… [insert your request here].

O gentle and loving St. Anthony, whose heart was ever full of human sympathy, whisper my petition into the ears of the sweet Infant Jesus, who loved to be folded in your arms; and the gratitude of my heart will ever be yours. Amen.

Oh Holy St. Anthony, I implore you to obtain for me… myself.

St. Anthony is special to me because of his gentleness, charity, and willingness to intercede for others. He reminds me of my father.

St. Anthony is not only the patron saint of lost goods, like your car keys or your grandparents dentures; he is also the patron saint of lost people and lost souls. Though sometimes we may feel lost, St. Anthony is always there to help us in the search.

As queer people, our lives are often ones of searching: searching for a partner, searching for community, searching for ourselves. But this last form of searching is a lifetime affair.

When I pray for St. Anthony to obtain for me myself, I am not asking to be and discover the entirety of who I am right this moment, even if sometimes I think that is what I am asking for. Instead, I am asking St. Anthony to give me the confidence to be me in all my partiality and unfinished-ness. I often end up finding that I already have all of myself that I need right now.

P.S. For those of you interested, I will add that St. Anthony is also the patron saint of finding one’s spouse.

Anonymous, FCRH ’22

PRAYERS OF OUR OWN

We create or find our own songs, prayers, and dances that articulate God as we see God.

ME AND GOD TALKING

God said, "prepare yourself for a thick loneliness; lock the doors, dry out your tears, paint my name on the doors to let them out." And I did not, and so it came; dry lightning and thunderstorms you could feel with your tongue and always the tension in my bones. And God said, "Foolish child, you have not listened. You have to pay the consequences. You must learn from your mistakes." And with his words

I grew into a small flower, and I rose up amongst the weeds and I bloomed and cried and bloomed and said, "I thought I'd be dead. Lord, oh, lord, I thought I'd be dead."

Sadly, a large part of the young, queer, and spiritual experience is feeling lonely and abandoned by God, family, the Church… There are common adolescent and young adult experiences we miss out on because of the closet, shame, and personal safety. I wrote this poem when I was seventeen and feeling more comfortable with myself. Out of the weeds of shame, the simple acts of prayer, poetry, and reflection allowed me to bloom like a small flower, realizing that I was always welcome in the warm light of God's grace. In prayer, I found solace. I found freedom. I found strength. I found love. I found God, and with God I found myself.

Erin Healey, FCRH ’23, wrote both the prayer and the reflection

THE THRESHING—FLOOR

“This sound had filled John’s life, so it now seemed, from the moment had first drawn breath. He had heard it everywhere, in prayer and in daily speech, and wherever the saints were gathered, and in the unbelieving streets….

Yes, he had heard it all his life, but it was only now that his ears were opened to this sound that came from darkness, that could only come from darkness, that yet gore such sure witness to the glory fo the light…..

Yes, the darkness hummed with murder: the body in the water, the body in the fire, the body on the tree. John looked down the line of these armies of darkness, army upon army, and his soul whispered: Who are these? Who are they? And wondered: Where shall I go?”

James Baldwin Excerpt from Go Tell it On the Mountain (Part Three: The Threshing—Floor, pp. 172-173)

As a queer, mixed, Christian I have absolutely had my qualms with the Church. Not only in the systems that it perpetuates but also in the ideals that it pours into the congregations’ bloodstream. Values that give life to some and reject it for others. The institutionalized ideals of primitive traditions persistent in modern practice continues to have the agency to either help or harm; I’ve seen both. What do you do when you live in a world, in an ontology, not “destined” for you? My journey in answering this question was expanded through my introduction to James Baldwin as a theologian. His selfdetermination in his own black, queer being reinvigorates his audience, turning their attention to one’s own self-determination and the role (and responsibility) others play in that determination.

As a theological juggernaut, Baldwin transcends the contemporary notions of being queer; of being black; of being human. Often times people reject Baldwin’s role in theological discourse because of his own denouncement of the Church, but I ask: how does one grow if not from another’s critique? Baldwin’s Go Tell It On the Mountain tackles the hypocrisy, brutality, and abusive collaboration of American society and the Church, critiquing an institution that epistemologically “molded” him. It serves as a powerful theological and autobiographical narrative on the dangers that lurk in the dark corners of the Church. Approaching secular humanist discourse as theology applies the insights of what it means to live in a temporal world while consciously seeking spiritual transcendence. In my own spiritual journey, “opposite” opinions have brought me much more spiritual value than traditional notions, primarily in their validation of “the other.” Baldwin creates space for the queer, the black, the disabled, the poor, and the human within the pews and even on the pulpit. Baldwin, as an atheist, has helped me grow closer and fonder of my Christian testimony, and he will continue to do so for those willing to listen.

Mathew Matthais, FCRH ’21, GSAS ‘22

A PRAYER FOR THE OUTCASTS

This prayer is for the outcasts, The rejected

We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

For those who have been questioned

And for those who are questioning

We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

For those who grapple with their identity And for those who grapple with whom they love We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

For those who have been angry at God for the body they were born in And for those who embrace it

We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

For those who have died at the hands of evil-doers

Ridden with hatred in their hearts

We honor you. The Lord welcomes you.

For those who love boundlessly

And for those who love in fear We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

For those who have found a home in the church

And for those who have been rejected by it

We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

This prayer is for the outcasts The outspoken The broken and the brokenhearted The lost coins The rainbow sheep God seeks you out God’s love is abundant You are fearfully and wonderfully made

We are all God’s queer children

We are all the body of Christ We welcome you. The Lord welcomes you.

I wrote this prayer to welcome everyone in the queer community, especially those who may have felt rejected by the church. In recognizing my queerness within the past few years, I have been on a journey of reconciling this with my faith, spirituality, and religion. I have never felt like my queerness is antithetical to my Christian beliefs, yet so much of the church disagrees. I have always felt that Christians who are homophobic and transphobic are not true Christians, as they use parts of the bible to weaponize them against others. This is not acting in the true spirit of Christ, who loves and welcomes all.

Within this spirit, I wanted to write a prayer that acknowledges all the ostracization and harassment that queer people have experienced in the church, and have them know that the Lord still welcomes them. I have many queer friends who no longer feel God's love as they have been rejected by the church or religious family members. It is time that this evil cycle be broken.

Bette Danganan, FCLC ’23, wrote both the prayer and the reflection

GREATEST LOVE OF ALL

I decided long ago, never to walk in anyone's shadows If I fail, if I succeed At least I'll live as I believe No matter what they take from me They can't take away my dignity

Because the greatest love of all Is happening to me

I found the greatest love of all Inside of me

The greatest love of all Is easy to achieve Learning to love yourself It is the greatest love of all

And if, by chance, that special place That you've been dreaming of Leads you to a lonely place Find your strength in love

sung by Whitney Houston written by Michael Masser and Linda Creed

I was a retreat leader in high school and this was the song I played before my talk. It describes the unending power of love. Love is dynamic, constantly giving joy to those who partake in the act of it. In high school, I tried my best to love, but something was missing. Now I love in so many more ways, and have found my strength in love. Love has become a central idea in my own spirituality and definition of success.

As a queer person living on the fringes of society, living as you believe is core to creating your own happiness. I’ve never tried to fit into the norms of society. I would rather behave in the best way for me, and whether I fit in or not, so be it. If one conforms to norms, they walk in another person’s shadows as the song describes. I never wanted to walk in anyone’s shadows because I believe that uniqueness is special. Identifying as queer in both senses of the word (gender and sexuality) has included a lot of denorming the learned norms of society. This song empowers me to love myself and others, no matter if I fit into society or not. Queer people deserve that love.

I invite you to put down this book, turn on Whitney Houston, and love. Know that is an act of prayer, an act of queer prayer, and live your whole life praying.

Kelly King, FCRH ‘22

BREAD + WINE

what was your name?

i can't place it

i’m still wasted on the taste of your skin as we face the day your thoughts are racing and i see you hesitating to let me in

but you don't have to say you love me, oh, just stay i'm not saying we were heaven made but our maker gave me the wisdom to know you got what i've been missing

we've all got an itch that we need to satisfy and you satisfy mine like bread and wine

we've all gotta live according to our design and yours goes so well with mine we're classic, like black and white

....

raise a glass to mask the feeling of coming disaster try to act as if all you've given doesn’t matter the past is past, but I just have to ask is it really worth the way you feel walking home the morning after?

we've all got an itch that we need to satisfy and you satisfy mine like bread and wine

Joy Oladokun

As a Lutheran bisexual cis-woman, I have learned--from so-called Christians and from U.S. culture--that my sexuality is intrinsically disordered, intemperate, and dis/graced. But this queer artist, Joy Oladokun, reminds me that “our maker gave me the wisdom” to deeply understand that queer sexual love can be nothing less than sacramental. Joy sings about a lover, comparing their sexual experience together to “bread and wine.” I cannot help but remember Communion itself, ordinary bread and wine saturated with divine presence and shared in community. Just like bread and wine mediates grace, my own body overflows with God’s grace! And even my sexual experiences can be a way to “satisfy” deeper communion with others in the giving and receiving of pleasure, which is a gratuitous gift from the Creator.

I often weep when Joy asks: “is it really worth the way you feel the morning after?” A guitar solo begins, she lets out a soulful moan, and I allow hot tears to stream down my face. For a moment, I am suspended between shame and grace; I know Joy’s question all too well--in a profoundly embodied way. The music crescendos, and Joy even more emphatically repeats: “we all have to live / according to our design / and yours goes so well with mine.” In a way I just can’t explain, my shame is transformed through ordinary elements-instruments and vocals--which mysteriously make God present. I receive Good News of radical affirmation of my sexuality and joyful celebration of queer sexual communion.

Hannah Griggs, PhD Student, Theology Department

PRAYERS FOR OTHERS

We pray for the courage, fortitude, and generosity to live our lives for and with others.

PRAYER OF ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI

Lord, make me a channel of thy peace, that where there is hatred, I may bring love; that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness; that where there is discord, I may bring harmony; that where there is error, I may bring truth; that where there is doubt, I may bring faith; that where there is despair, I may bring hope; that where there are shadows, I may bring light; that where there is sadness, I may bring joy. Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted; to understand, than to be understood; to love, than to be loved. For it is by self-forgetting that one finds. It is by forgiving that one is forgiven. It is by dying that one awakens to Eternal Life.

The Prayer of St. Francis, though lovely, presents a challenge: how do we understand the concept of "self-forgetting" when queer people too often feel they must deny a truth about themselves? To combat this forced denial, perhaps it’s helpful to understand self-forgetting as something that follows self-acceptance. Within self-acceptance, there’s a trust that we were designed in the Imago Dei, and that we all have unique roles to play in the Lord’s plan.

From there, it’s easier to turn towards others. It’s powerful, in of itself, to assert that queer people, too, can act as channels of the Lord's peace, but we can go a step further and say that we can draw from the well of our experiences as queer people to better serve others. Maybe it's confusion, questioning, and re-questioning. Maybe it's harassment or bullying. Maybe it's strained familial relationships. Maybe it's shame. Maybe it's a constant sense of being out of place, or... well, queer.

Those very experiences, paired with the desire that others escape them, can be used to fuel action for social change. Importantly, this empathy isn't reserved only for members of the queer community but can allow us to better stand in solidarity with other marginalized groups as well. Our self-acceptance becomes self-forgetting as we strive to ensure that the society in which we live is one where everyone’s dignity is affirmed.

Anonymous, FCLC ‘23

PATIENT TRUST

Above all, trust in the slow work of God. We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay. We should like to skip the intermediate stages. We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new.

And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability— and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you; your ideas mature gradually—let them grow, let them shape themselves, without undue haste. Don’t try to force them on, as though you could be today what time (that is to say, grace and circumstances acting on your own good will) will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming within you will be. Give Our Lord the benefit of believing that his hand is leading you, and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ excerpted from Hearts on Fire

Being gay at a Catholic high school is hard but being a gay teacher at one is even harder. I mean, why is everyone so afraid of a single pride flag? Administration has told me things like, “We have to remember this is a Catholic school.”, “Maybe next year!”, or “Hopefully, we can do something like this in the future.”

Well, I’m tired of the “maybes”, “hopefullys”, and “one days.” I’m tired of waiting for people to just “get it.” For someone who’s waited 19 years to ask for the love that he deserves, I didn’t want to spend another year sitting in the dark. How could any of us live another day hearing, “That’s so gay, bro.” or “Why would I ever join the gaystraight alliance club?” I didn’t need God tomorrow, I needed His answers now.

But despite all the impatience I had for the world, I became a little bit more forgiving when I’d hear things like, “Mr. J, how do you have the confidence to wear feminine clothing?” or “Thank you for helping me be my true authentic self.” And then it hit me. Every day, we’re constantly told to set the world on fire, but what we sometimes forget is that that spark doesn’t have to be an action, it can also be a presence. I don’t have to wait for God’s love, or expect Him to answer immediately, because He’s already here. He’s in my bravery, He’s in my thank you’s, He’s in my waiting.

Unfortunately, my vision of visibility won’t come to life during my time here, but at least I can light the path for someone else — a student who can and will set the future ablaze. Though things aren’t always what I want when I want it, God has shown me time and time again that His promises are always delivered, just not in the form I expected. And because I trust in Him, I’m learning to trust His process, too.

Jeffrey Pelayo, FCRH ‘21

WHEN PROTEST BECOMES PRAYER

Hail Mary, full of grace, Make me a channel of your peace,

No justice, no peace, Hail Mary, full of grace.

excerpt from Renée Darline Roden’s article “When Protest Becomes Prayer”

FAITH WITHOUT WORKS IS DEAD

What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him?

But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.

For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

James 2:14, 18, 26, NRSV

This article was written specifically about the summer protests in 2020 after the tragic deaths of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd. At the same time there was an increase of brutal murders of black trans women and none of those deaths were being televised or even spoken about on social media.

When this article came out it had already sparked something in me that I always felt when attending protests. I would arrive to a site and want to hold that person in prayer who was wronged and then participate in songs and chants back and forth that felt like a responsorial psalm to me. “We shall overcome.” “Lord, make me a channel of your peace.”

More often than not, during times of strife and turmoil folks turn to God and lift those up in prayer. When a community gathers during protests like this — it too is a community coming to lift that person up in prayer. We ask for healing, we ask for forgiveness, we as for compassion, we ask for answers.

I am often reminded of the passage from James 2: “faith without works is dead." I take that to mean that we can't simply pray in our houses or worship but must take the church to the streets towards the work of social justice.

Anger is real and valid when we take to the streets — but I try and approach the protest how the individual who was wronged should have been treated — with reverence and grace and by holding their name as sacred.

John Gownley, Campus Ministry, GSS ‘20

THE PRAYER FOR GENEROSITY

Lord Jesus, teach me to be generous; teach me to serve you as you deserve, to give and not to count the cost, to fight and not to heed the wounds, to toil and not to seek for rest, to labor and not to seek reward, except that of knowing that I do your will.

Amen. St. Ignatius Loyola

I love the statues of St. Ignatius that grace Hughes patio and the entrance to the Lowenstein Building. To me, they are a reminder of the constantly in-motion process of transformation towards God and others that we are called to live by. This book being printed in the Ignatian year, 500 years after Ignatius’s conversion, gives special meaning to this prayer and those statues.

Let’s look closely at those statues, specifically Ignatius’s limp. After Ignatius was gravely injured at the Battle at Pamplona, not even the best doctors in Iberia could properly fix his legs. Even in committing to and living his life finding Christ in All Things he still walked with this imbalance.

He could have nursed his wounds for longer or used his injury as an excuse to stay home.

Many queer people are faced with this option too. Why keep fighting for others, why keep trusting God, when for many it took so much suffering to just be us? When many of us are still limping from our personal battles?

It can be hard to live our lives for others when many of us have just started living our lives for ourselves. But in this prayer, those statues, and the practice of Ignatian Spirituality—and, personally, even in the queer experience—we find that humans are fundamentally otheroriented beings. We grow into ourselves out of love, community, and service for and with others.

Just as Ignatius lived with his limp and Christ arose with the five piercing wounds, the impacts of our personal struggles are still there, proving our humanity. They must be cared for, but also used to inform our worldview towards tenderness and welcome. We may still be limping & nursing our wounds, but this humanity only gives us a heightened reason to respond to the call to serve.

Benedict Reilly, FCRH ‘23

SOURCES

Chapter 2

Prayers of Welcome

Canedo, Ken and Jesse Manibusan. “All Are Welcome (All Belong).” Spirit & Song, 2016. Hafiz. “If God Invited You to a Party.” In Love Poems From God. Rendered by Daniel Ladinsky, 158. New York: Penguin Compass, 2002.

Chapter 3

Prayers of Queerness

Tetlow, Joseph. You Have Called Me By Name. Chicago: Loyola Press, 2021. Thomas, Kempis. “The Wonderful Effect of Divine Love” in The Imitation of Christ. Translated by Ronald Knox and Michael Oakley. Chicago: Loyola Press, 2019. Merton, Thomas. “Prayer of Trust and Confidence” in Thoughts in Solitude. Boulder: Shambhala Publications, 1993. Hirschfield, Jane. “My Life Was The Size Of My Life” in The Beauty: Poems. New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2015. Benedictine Women of Madison. “The Prayer of Jesus.” Madison: Holy Wisdom Monastery, 2007.

Chapter 4

Prayers of Saints

“My Novena Rose Prayer.” Society of the Little Flower. Ontario, Canada. “The Unfailing Prayer to St. Anthony” in Prayers to St. Anthony from Approved Sources. New York: Paulist Press, 1929.

Chapter 5

Prayers of Our Own Baldwin, James. “Part Three: The Threshing—Floor” in Go Tell it On the Mountain, 172-173. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1953. Masser, Michael and Lina Creed. “Greatest Love of All” sung by Whitney Houston on Whitney Houston. Arista Records, 1985. Oladokun, Joy. “Bread + Wine” on Carry. Well, 2016.

Chapter 6

Prayers for Others

Chardin, SJ, Pierre Teilhard de. “Patient Trust” in Hearts on Fire: Prayer with Jesuits, edited by Michael Harter, S.J, 102. Chicago: Loyola Press, 1993. Roden, Renée Darline. “When Protest Becomes Prayer.” America Magazine, June 5, 2020.