“I am on this planet, not for myself, but for the betterment of humanity” – Mamma Tammye
(Queer Eye SO2, EO1)

 

It started a few weeks ago. The texts, that is …

“Have you started Queer Eye Season 2? OMG!!!”
“Ok – STOP what you are doing and watch Queer Eye Season 2, Episode 1 … now…. text me…”
“Can’t stop crying – you must have seen Mama Tammye on Queer Eye?”
“Now you know what I think about church, but you might just drag me along if Mama Tammye was preaching.”

So, needless to say, I positioned my derriere on the couch, a glass of red in hand, 2 fur children snoring loudly next to me and started watching Queer Eye – Season 2, Episode 1 as instructed. I nearly convulsed, I was sobbing so hard through the show. I love the Fab 5 and the way they seek to bring meaning and transformation to the lives of others. And who would not fall in love with Mama Tammye?? She reminded me of everything that was okay about religion – she was a personification of the Good News that Jesus talks about.

Watching Mama Tammye interact with the Fab 5 and her complete love and acceptance of her magnificent gay son, Myles, brought up much grief and disappointment for me. If only modern expressions of church and Christianity, held so tightly and loudly by powers and authorities that are often very conservative, privileged and exclusive, had more of Mama Tammy and less of fear and control. What would that look like? Is an ‘old wineskin’ of ecclesiastical methodology and tradition, shaped by the triumphant rise of Christianity as a super-religion under Constantine, even able to hold such a dream? Does it need a whole new wineskin? Could we imagine religious settings that are able to love as fierce and fearless as Mama Tammye? I know there are many that do. Unfortunately, they are not always the ones who are seen or heard. Fundamentalism, that undergirds so much of modern Christianity, has set itself up as the truth bearer – shaming those who do not heed its ideas or peddle its control. So silencing critics and dreamers becomes very important. Yet nothing good has ever come from shaming people into silence.

But back to Mama Tammye and her genuine love, welcome, and affirmation of the diverse expressions of what it means to be human. She is truly welcoming. A welcome that says – “You are loved, just the way you are.” Let’s be like Mama Tammye and open our hearts and arms to love and include for the ‘betterment of humanity.’ Let’s open our eyes to the harmful ideas that claim to be welcoming but not affirming. But what does that even mean?! It means LGBTIQ people can be lulled into a false sense of safety, that a space or group is welcoming, while the toxic ideas of ‘ex-gay’ are still the oxygen that people breathe. “You are welcome here … but you can’t serve or lead until you become straight or at least stay celibate.” The demand for LGBTIQ people to be celibate is the new ex-gay movement, and in the same vein as its insidious ‘pray-the-gay-away therapy’ predecessor (a belief that people who are gay can become straight and that it is God’s will for them to be straight) it continues to wreak havoc with vulnerable lives – to understand some of the heartbreak, please take time to listen to this excellent interview with Vicky Beeching. So let me spell it out – any religious space or group that claims to be welcoming, but not affirming, that sees LGBTIQ people as ‘broken’ and ‘not ideal’, but is motivated by a ‘burden’ to ‘love’ them with a messiah-like, saccharine approach is NOT a safe place. We can all exercise our freedom to go to these places but please do so with your eyes wide open.

I loved the way Mama Tammye repented of the idea that her son was anything but beautiful because he was gay. She rejected a dogma of exclusion that says you are accepted and affirmed by God if you are hetero or celibate. Dogmas of exclusion have been around for centuries. Politics and religion keep them alive. Study Germany when Hitler rose to power. We see similarities in the vilification and exclusion of people in the modern day phenomenon that is unravelling in Trump’s USA. I have witnessed it in apartheid South Africa and as a woman of faith, I very quickly realised that in some denominational circles it is only if you possess certain genitalia that you are fit to preach from a pulpit or be in any form of governmental church roles.

If you, like me, have been part of a more fundamentalist religious setting you have probably been complicit in some form of dogma that marginalised others. Nowadays, the flavour of the month for exclusion in religious settings is LGBTIQ people and it seems immigrants and asylum seekers are the favourites on the political front. We all love ‘others’ as long as they all look and think like us 🙂 We all love God – especially when God is male, white, conservative, and approving only of heterosexual orientation 🙂 The idea that the gospel is bigger than our constructed, socialised interpretation of sacred text is a terrifying thought. Mama Tammye repented from that fear and arrogance. What a breath of fresh air she was blowing into her church and giving that marvellous speech:

“How can I say I love God, but I cannot love the ones who are right next to me?”

Imagine a world filled with Mama Tammyes?
Imagine a world were people like Antoni Porowski and Bobby Berk are brought to tears as they are reminded that the love and face of Jesus are often very different to the words and actions of those who proclaim to be his followers?
Imagine a religious space that has let go of the fundamentalist idea that we need to control who people are and what they believe?
Imagine a group of people that simply spread the good news: that God is not the enemy, rather God is revealed in Immanuel – with us.

In the current climate of increasing political and religious exclusion – let’s be counter-cultural. Let’s be people of a different way. The way of Jesus. Let’s open up our arms wide, tell fear to get back into the box, and trust that love will win the day.

Be like Mama Tammye.

“But I need to ask you for your forgiveness because Mama has not loved you unconditionally.” Mama Tammye – speaking of her son, Myles.