Rapping with Queer Homies

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In all the argument and vitriol surrounding the issue of gay marriage - particularly in light of the recent California Supreme Court ruling and Governor David Paterson's marriage recognition order here in New York - a key concern voiced by opponents turns on the need to preserve the "institution" of marriage, usually based in religious tradition.

Ironically, as the question of legal status gets engaged over and over again, what is falling away is any significant challenge, at least one publicly articulated, to the notion that two men or two women can fully love and commit to one another. Still, the alarm over a perceived threat to "marriage as we know it" remains, at its core, rooted in two verses in the Old Testament book Leviticus.

As many contemporary theologians, though perhaps not yet fully in the mainstream - notably former Newark Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong - make clear, a modern reading of Scripture and an understanding of the humanity embodied in divinity ultimately render such thinking obsolete. Even if that advance only arrives at what may seem a glacial speed.

Theater must also inevitably change to reflect new understanding and perspectives. Essentially a cathartic and didactic form, theater evolves to speak in the voice its contemporary audience can understand. Whether it's the intervention of the gods of Aeschylus, or, more recently, the flaying of racism in "South Pacific," theater, like church, though uniquely human, offers a potentially transformative experience that transcends what can be realized through other forms of social interaction.

 Rapping with Queer Homies
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