Table of Contents

Foreword xi
Preface and Acknowledgements xiii
Introduction 1
1 ‘This is Our Story, This is Our Song!’ 13
2 Grace Enough for Thousands? 46
3 Grace Crucified 61
4 Grace and Queer Black Bodies 92
5 ‘I’m tired of this Church!’ 132
Epilogue 163
Appendix: Sustaining Grace: Seated at the Right Hand of Zaddy 168
Index 175

About the Author

Jarel Robinson-Brown is a theologian and Assistant Curate at St Botolph's-Without-Aldgate. He has served churches in Cardiff, South Wales and South East London, and most recently as Associate Chaplain at King's College London. Prior to full-time ministry Jarel studied classical music as a pianist and organist at the London College of Music, and privately in Paris.

Reviews

'A liberation theology for the twenty-first century. Jarel's black queer Christian voice challenges the straight white church with a call to overturn its long history of racism and homophobia - and to embrace love, diversity, inclusion and equality for all. Bravo!'
*Peter Tatchell, Journalist and Human Rights Campaigner*

'Jarel Robinson-Brown's book is a deceptively simple text. Either grace is free and unmerited for all people or else it isn't grace. This is not new, and yet, as my friend's wonderful book demonstrates, for LGBTQI people, the church has too often offered a polluted and debased model of Christianity that has corrupted the very notion of grace. Partial or conditional grace is an oxymoron. Jarel Robinson-Brown's book is a bold restatement for the rich traditions of an inclusive and generous faith that mirrors the joyous grace of Jesus Christ, in whose name Christianity proclaims her truth.'
*Anthony G. Reddie, Regent's Park College, University of Oxford*

'Black, Gay, British, Christian, Queer' excels in offering a vision of what love and radical inclusion could accomplish. In a deeply personal and pastoral voice, it challenges the Church to invite and embrace the wholeness of LGBTQ+ persons.'
*Nyasha Junior, Author of Reimagining Hagar: Blackness and Bible*

'Jarel’s is an enormously courageous and necessary voice. To all who are starving in the famine of grace that he rightly identifies, or responsible for it, he provides here a vision 'of repentance and reparation, of truth-telling and truth-hearing'. I have been challenged and awakened and, I hope, inspired to action by the hard story he has told and the hard thinking he has done.'
*The Rt Revd Paul Bayes, Bishop of Liverpool*

'Books like this don't come around very often. In this tour de force, Jarel Robinson-Brown's prophetic voice cries out not from the wilderness but a place of profound richness and life. It is both heartbreaking and breathtaking. At times deeply challenging and at times so beautifully-written that it made me want to weep. With deep theological insight that shines a light on much of the exclusivity we have seen - and some of us have been part of - in the Church, it is a rallying call to a faith that invites every single one of us in, without exception.'
*Chine McDonald, writer, broadcaster and author of 'God Is Not A White Man: And Other Revelations'*