Pieces of Ease and Grace

The success of the ATF publication Five Uneasy Pieces, edited by Nigel Wright, has prompted the desire to take the biblical hermeneutical exercise a step further. The book demonstrated clearly that the texts that have been used to slam gay and lesbian are in fact misused, with little or no regard either for ancient context or for contemporary hermeneutics. However, as all biblical liberationist projects have demonstrated, it is not enough to invalidate oppressive uses of selected texts. The obligation is to establish Scripture's hospitable inclusion of those who have been subjected to such oppression. Accordingly, a follow-up volume is being published Pieces of Ease and Grace. It is to contain creditable expositions of passages of Scripture that can be read as specifically welcoming of gays and lesbians in their own self-defined identities. is more than a generalized divine invitation to the world; it requires a retrieval of those texts that actively embrace gays and lesbians.