Summary Of Reforming Sodom By Heather White

Reviewing Sodom: The history of gay liberation is a history of liberation from the church - or was it? Heather White challenges the commonly held notion that gay liberation was solely a secular fight against an oppressive church morality in her book, Reforming Sodom: Protestants and the Rise of Gay Rights, by examining how liberal protestants fought on all sides of the political debate over gay rights. Published in 2015 by the North Carolina Press, the events in Reforming Sodom took place well over fifty years beforehand. Nonetheless, White examines a chapter of the gay liberation movement that was previously left untold. Reforming Sodom is not only an essential read for the study of sexuality but also the study of religion as it tears down

In Mobilizing a Memory, we follow liberal protestant Craig Reynolds as he juggles the transition from the homophile movement to its “rebirth” as a gay liberation movement in the wake of the Stonewall riots. White reveals that from the very outset, Reynolds and other homophile leaders spearheaded the charge to commemorate Stonewall. While some queer activists saw this rebirth at Stonewall as a secular split from oppressive religious control, White argues that in the attempt to “divorce from a religious past,” they created new variations of what they thought they left behind. SHORT JUSTIFY In her next section, Freedom Revival in Lavender, White follows pastor Troy Perry of the Metropolitan Community Church as the remembrance of Stonewall transitions from a local story to a national symbol. Perry attempted to use the memory of Stonewall to merge gayness and Christianity into one practice. This reinvention of Stonewall, White argues, shows that the rebirth at Stonewall was not a secular divide from Christianity as its memory was used to create an establishment that fused gay activism with Christian

SHORT JUSTIFY PRIMARY SOURCES EMPLOYED Ultimately, White’s success is proven by the new questions the reader is eager to answer. Her final chapter leaves the reader with a sense that since queer and religious history did not diverge during Stonewall as they may have believed, the intersection must have continued long after. How did liberal protesters continue to support and infuse themselves with the gay community following Stonewall? What other “secular” movements were influenced by Christianity? How much history is still invisible or untold today? The reader can also direct their questions outside of mainline Christianity. How did Buddhism, Mormonism, or Islam influence the Stonewall memories? Furthermore, was the church's influence a global phenomenon? These questions are left to be answered in another book, or perhaps by the reader one