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Post-Colonial Gothic Dramas: Roman Catholicism and the Homosexual
Abstract
This essay argues that an original trauma of repudiation casts a long shadow over
historical Christianity, as it does over its mother-tradition, Judaism. This trauma,
repeatedly revisited in different eras and in different ways, characterizes institutional
curial responses to groups who in one way or another fall within its doctrinal
jurisdiction but which dissent from that authority, in whole or part. This
essay considers the colonial-style relations of power and abjection thus established
between church doctrines and functionaries and such groups as women
and homosexual persons—whose resistance it must co-opt and whose allegiance
it must gain.
historical Christianity, as it does over its mother-tradition, Judaism. This trauma,
repeatedly revisited in different eras and in different ways, characterizes institutional
curial responses to groups who in one way or another fall within its doctrinal
jurisdiction but which dissent from that authority, in whole or part. This
essay considers the colonial-style relations of power and abjection thus established
between church doctrines and functionaries and such groups as women
and homosexual persons—whose resistance it must co-opt and whose allegiance
it must gain.