Will Roscoe is one of the most important writers in the area of queer history, anthropology and particularly in the area of Native American two spirit traditions. On an equal footing with the late John Boswell (Christianity, Social Tolerance and Homosexuality) Roscoe's writing in The Zuni Man-Woman, and The Changing Ones have won the most prestigious awards and have added invaluable scholarly work to the canon of queer history. His continued study of same-sex sensibility in myth and religion in Queer Spirits, to say nothing of his close work with Harry Hay and John Burnside, include Harry's papers in Radically Gay and, in collaboration with Will's late partner, Bradley Rose, their classic A Radical Fairy's Seedbed, make his books must reads for anyone seriously interested in reclaiming GLBT history.

So a new book by Will Roscoe is nothing short of a major event. We are so excited about it that all three members of White Crane's editorial staff engaged in a conversation with Will Roscoe to discuss his newest-and perhaps most personal-work, Jesus and The Shamanic Tradition of Same Sex Love.


Bo Young: Will, there are few people whose work means as much to me as yours. Harry Hay's work, of course, Randy Connor (who also has a new book) and Joseph Campbell. That about wraps it up. Almost everything I have ever read or written I try to pass through the test of how it stands up to the things you and these others, have explained. That's pretty good company.

Will Roscoe: I'm delighted to hear you like the book. It was written, painstakingly, over six years basically in isolation. Since I wasn't writing to win over academics or start a movement or even sell books, but just to put into some form what it was I felt I had learned from the AIDS epidemic, I didn't really circulate the manuscript for feedback. I just wrote it until I felt I had said what I had to say-and when I realized that my rewriting had become compulsive. Long story short, not many folks have actually seen it yet, so I'm kind of holding my breath.

Bo Young: I'd have to admit my first reaction was "Why Jesus? Who cares?" I have found myself so divorced from even caring what the Islamic-Judeo-Christian traditions have to offer anymore. But, like Neil Douglas-Klotz's work, you "reground" those theologies in the earth-based shamanic traditions in a way that makes a great deal of sense to me. I wonder if anyone who really needs to hear what you've written is capable of hearing it?

Will Roscoe: "Why Jesus?"-That is, why return to a tradition I abandoned years ago and remain convinced is the primary source of the historical oppression of same-sex love and those who practice it? In my preface I outline my approach to queer history: rather than concede the ground to conservative and heterosexist readings of the Christian heritage, my choice is to respond with counter-readings and counter-claims in which homosexuality and same-sex love are not marginalized.

Another approach, the one now dominant in queer studies and feminism, is to remain in the critical-negative stance of the outsider and rather than claim a place within the current cultural configuration, to critique it, to reveal its contradictions and the play of its power in our lives. This viewpoint does not require making claims about queer presence in history. It's happy to accept the culture's representation of itself as not allowing gay identity, social roles, forms of culture, etc.

Now, there was a time when critiques of the existing social order were linked to proposals for a new social order, but the negative-critical mode is now so entrenched that proposals and movements for social reform are critiqued as being just as oppressive and power-ridden as the existing system.

As I state in the preface, I've never been willing to concede that we weren't in history and we haven't contributed to the human story. I believed this in a vague way before I met Harry, but my years of work with him turned it into a solid conviction backed up by a lot of research and reflection.

What I do in Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition that's somewhat different from my earlier work, especially on the berdache/two-spirit tradition, is that I try to find a middle ground between the negative-critical and strict social constructionist viewpoints and an unreflective, anachronistic identity politics that seeks to find "gays" and "lesbians" et al. living gay "lifestyles" in other times and places. And so I don't claim or even offer an argument that Jesus was gay. This is not important to me. What's important are his ideas and practices. What's important is not who had sex with whom, but what having sex with the same sex means and contributes-socially, culturally, economically, spiritually.

Although it's hard for us today to appreciate, because of the rigid construction of sexual identities and the nature of modern homophobia, but in the ancient world and in traditional cultures it could very well be that a man whose sexual preference was heterosexual would engage in same-sex intimacy if it was considered an efficacious magical practice. Perhaps Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene-although the evidence for it from the gospels is basically zilch, while the evidence for arguing that Jesus was gay, or at least loved men intimately, is rather persuasive-but his RITUAL used the magic of same-sex love and was embedded in a tradition of mystical speculation about same-sex love as I try to show.

This is what is valuable to us today-what Jesus' teachings together with the new light shed by the Secret Gospel reveal to us about same-sex love-its meaning, its power, its contribution. Who cares how many dicks he sucked? That doesn't get you to heaven-it's love that gets you to heaven and that love is the unconditional, unfettered love of equals and sames. The ecstatic love that erupts when differences are erased, separation is healed, and power-over is transformed into power within.

Will there be hearers ready to hear? We'll see soon enough. If I succeeded in this book, however, it will work for Christians and it will work for radical faeries. Because it is gay-CENTERED-which is the other important element that I think connects the work I've done over the years. When it comes to gay spirituality, I've always looked first to our own inner lives for direction and to those few gay spiritual mentors who have done the same. If I'm right, then the TRUTH of our lives that this book is based on will speak to queers across whatever other affiliations they have.

Toby Johnson: It seems like you're suggesting that "gay sensibility" or "subject-SUBJECT consciousness" is-or should be-at the heart of everybody's religious/spiritual consciousness.

Will Roscoe:Well...I don't think subject-SUBJECT consciousness comes from our DNA or that we're God's chosen people or anything like that. I believe it arises from the circumstances of our lives and the relationships our desires lead us to. I've always said, as did Harry, that non-gays can learn to relate subject-to-SUBJECT, too, but that the crucial precondition to that is the liberation of women. Only then can straight relationships become relationships of equals, of one subject to another SUBJECT.

Is it, should it be, at the "heart" of everybody's consciousness? I wouldn't presume to say that. I just know that it has value for me and at least some other folks, and I'm happy to leave it at that.

Toby Johnson: What about popular gay culture? Do you think this spiritual dimension you uncover is obscured by mainstream gay life?

Will Roscoe:You know what, I don't think this. Although I used to think this back in the 1970s when the faeries came forward and I embraced them as an alternative to mainstream gay life. But now the idea that there is gay spirituality, that gays are involved in religion, traditional and nontraditional, and that they had spiritual roles in other times and places-this is really pretty much accepted in the gay world I think. Of course, the gay mainstream rules these days-there's not much gay counterculture left to speak of-but I think it's absorbed certain values. Compare to the American mainstream it's not mainstream.

Toby Johnson: Do gay youth today know anything about this rich history? Should they?

Will Roscoe:No and this concerns me a lot. This is something I think about everyday. There is no transmission between generations in our world. The public schools don't teach gay history and culture, and the idea that there are gay 8 and 9 and 10 year olds is still inflammatory. I think about it especially in terms of the generation of us that went through the eye of the AIDS/HIV hurricane. What we say that never should have happened, what the world is missing because all those we lost, and what we did to get through it. This is the subject of my book, the Jesus book, of course. I encounter younger folks these days (i.e., under a certain age) who (1) don't (think) they know anyone who's HIV+ or (2) know anyone who has died or (3) seen a late-stage AIDS patient. Those who've survived don't want to talk about it because we're still traumatized. I'm traumatized. I had an experience two weeks ago that was a classic example of a post-traumatic stress triggering--suddenly and involuntarily reliving experiences of the epidemic I had almost forgotten.

Well, you get the point. I think a lot about how we can transmit our experience, history, learning, culture-everything-to subsequent queer generations. I think the web represents one way we can do an end run around the cultural censorship, and if I didn't have to be working full-time that's the first area I'd put energy into-trying to get educational stuff up on the web.



Bo Young: Well we certainly intend to do that with White Crane. We're not only a hardcopy magazine, we're on the web and getting significant traffic. How would you consider using this tool?

Will Roscoe: Well...these are just my daydreams while riding the bus to work in the mornings...but over the years I've collected a lot of visual material for my slideshows, especially on the two-spirit tradition, but on my other research as well...since I was always committed to reaching a broad, popular audience. With time/resources (the main resource being the digitization of my slide collection) I could easily develop content for your website or others on queer spirituality subjects. Since I'm computer-oriented, I'd love to develop the web design and other skills, but someone who knows how to could probably take text and images I provide and do some fun things. Hey, sadly, books are being eclipsed. It's all about multi-media now.

Dan Vera: Your work has such a lovely intimacy to it. It is not only your words and presence but the words of those who have given you their wisdom. We lost Harry just two years ago (October 24, 2003) and I'm wondering what kind of presence he had on your writing this book? You worked with him for a number of years. I recall him talking about "little Faerie Jesus" in the heart circles and I couldn't help but think of him as I read your book.

Will Roscoe: Dan, there's a story here about my relationship with Harry that probably needs to be told but in some other context. He saw early drafts of the work and gave me a lot of encouragement. The book is, let's face it, a kind of paean to Harry's ideas about gay consciousness. It is emotionally, as well as historically, grounded in the period of my life when Harry, John, Brad and I were in almost constant communication, whether in visits or during the time we lived with them or by (it sounds so old-fashioned now) letter and phone call. At the same time, I didn't set out consciously to do that. I just started with the Secret Gospel. It was like a loose thread in my own history that I just started pulling at. The four of us spent so much time going over it, and it really started both Brad and I on the path of doing research and writing, learning languages and all that. So when I returned to it, I picked up where I left off-first reviewing Morton Smith's work, tracking down as many of his sources as I could, reconstructing the secret rite then asking the next question, which was, "where did this come from?" Since I'm an historian, Jesus is for me an historical figure, so I assume his teachings come out of a social and cultural context.

I kept working backwards, continually asking "where did THIS come from?" and it finally led me to Siberian shamanism and from there back to my starting point, Native Americans. Once I saw the connection between shamanism and the Mediterranean traditions of heavenly ascent and same-sex love, I saw the connection between what I witnessed during the epidemic and these very traditions. And then, finally, I saw how all this connected to Harry's ideas from what I consider to be his "high period"-the late 1970s, when he wrote the series of essays that helped launch the faerie movement.

When I started, though, I had no idea I would end up writing about the epidemic, and it had never occurred to me how Harry's idea of subject-SUBJECT connected to shamanism or to Jesus.

Ironically-and I've never really said this before-it seemed to me Harry drifted away from his most powerful ideas in his later years. It seemed to me he stopped talking about subject-SUBJECT consciousness, which I always felt was his most exciting contribution. It was the culmination of all his historical research, which was rather vast, combined with a rigorous theoretical orientation grounded in materialism. This means, among other things, that he was concerned not with whether this or that one in the past was homosexual, but with the social role filled by homosexuals or homosexuality within a socioeconomic system.

Anyway, the impact of Harry's thinking on me in the late 1970s and early 1980s was and is indelible. At the time I decided to retrace his steps, and pretty much envisioned the whole course of research that I'm now, 20 years later, finally finishing with this book. I don't know if Harry truly appreciated how much I was always working with his ideas in my own work, how I was trying to get a hearing for them in broader circles-and how hard he sometimes made it, for various reasons-and what it cost me. But that's another story.

What I've tried to do in Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love is to tell the best possible story I can to show the validity and value of Harry's thinking.

Dan Vera: Your work in Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition is based on the lesser known Gospel of Mark. How is the Gospel of Mark different from the canonical gospels most Christians grew up with and what new things do they tell us about Jesus?

Will Roscoe: Well, I suppose most Christians grow up with Matthew as the prototypical gospel. It tells the most complete and coherent story of Jesus' life and ministry, taking the middle ground on many of the controversies within early Christianity. However, we now know that Mark is earlier and that the writer(s) of Matthew relied on some early version of Mark along with other material. Mark lacks Jesus' miraculous birth and childhood, which does not seem to be part of the earliest traditions about him. In Mark, Jesus is a powerful healer and exorcist, and the magical elements of his practices are in the forefront. For this reason scholars sometimes refer to Mark as more "primitive" than the other gospels. However, it fits within the genre of the Hellenistic novella.

It's also clear that Mark has been subjected to some heavy-handed editing. A long section at the end of Mark (I can't remember chapter and verse right now,) is missing in some of the earliest manuscripts, so it's unclear how the original actually ended. Then there are details like the naked youth at Gethsemane. This is supposed to be scripture-God's words written down by human hand. So why is the confusing and seemingly salacious detail present? There has to have been more material, somewhere in Mark if not here, that makes sense of the naked youth. The Secret Gospel material discovered by Morton Smith offers such a perfect explanation of this passage that it's easy to understand why many suspect the Secret Gospel is a forgery, if not by Morton Smith then by some other clever devil centuries ago.

Dan Vera: I loved your talking of the way that same-sex loving can transform the relations of all men. It seems that we have forgotten that this is a story of men being loving to one another. You referenced Whitman and his "adhesion," and I thought of Ginsberg and his writing of Kerouac and Cassidy-their ability to be intimate and loving with other men. I remember Ginsberg mentioning it in terms of lament-that men cannot be tender with one another. The Jesus narrative seems to hold up that necessity to be tender-hearted.

Will Roscoe: All these writers were so important to me as a young man...In the Jesus book I'm really just returning to my roots, reiterated what I've already iterated, but hopefully in a more developed, refined and compelling way. 

Bo Young: Will, clearly White Crane thinks of you as one of the most-if not the most-important writers about gay culture and spirituality. We've brought together all the editors just to talk to you, like we've never done with any other writer. So I guess what I'd like to close this with is by asking: If you could say anything to the readers of this journal...and to anyone who might be reading it...what would it be? How would you encapsulate your own work?

Will Roscoe: What Jesus and the Shamanic Tradition of Same-Sex Love suggests is that while rituals and spiritual practices can be valuable elements of a spiritual practice, as gay people the most concrete way we can connect with our spiritual heritage is by simply loving: Loving everyone, but above all loving each other, others like us, 'sames' and equals; because we seem to have this particular and powerful way of loving. It is when we love in a subject-SUBJECT way that we connect ourselves most concretely and directly with shamanic and mystical states of consciousness, with, in Christian terms, holiness.

This means there are a lot of gays out there who are already shamans and don't know it. We're all shamans. We need only love-freely, unconditionally, promiscuously, indiscriminately, selflessly, foolishly. Love is the ladder to heaven and it is heaven.