Research seminar: "Re-storying the Bible with Ugandan LGBTQ+ Refugees"

Research seminar hosted by the Centre for Religion and Public Life.

In the seminar series of the Centre for Religion and Public Life, on 4 February 2021 Professors Johanna Stiebert and Adriaan van Klinken (Leeds), will speak about their Sacred Queer Stories project, and their forthcoming book Sacred Queer Stories: Ugandan LGBTQ+ Refugee Lives and the Bible.

The seminar will take place online via MS Teams. Please contact Hollie Gowan (h.g.gowan@leeds.ac.uk) for the meeting link.

Re-storying the Bible with Ugandan LGBTQ+ Refugees

In many parts of contemporary Africa, the Bible is held in high regard as sacred Scripture and is an influential socio-cultural text. Although the Bible is often used to fuel homophobic attitudes, it can also be mobilised as a tool to bring about social change and empower LGBTQ+ communities. In this presentation, Johanna Stiebert and Adriaan van Klinken talk about their ‘Sacred Queer Stories’ research project. Based on methods of contextual bible study, the project centres on reading the Bible with a group of Ugandan LGBTQ+ refugees based in Kenya, through the lens of their life experiences. Using the story of Daniel in the Lions’ Den as a case in point, we will explore the communal and creative process through which participants re-storied the biblical narrative in the contemporary context in order to achieve liberatory and empowering results of striking originality. The analysis of the process and findings is framed in terms of a hermeneutics of trust, as contrasted with a hermeneutics of suspicion.