Toby
has four new books out: an updated, revised and expanded edition of
his
classic soft sci fi romance novel
SECRET MATTER
-- with its quirky and mystical spin on what it means to be gay. Click
on the title for info.
An historical novel, written in collaboration with
historian/anthropologist Walter L. Williams,
set in the Old West TWO SPIRITS: A Story
of Life With the Navajo. And a collection of gay positive stories
contributed by more than 30 writers titled CHARMED
LIVES. And his beloved spiritual romance novel
GETTING LIFE IN PERSPECTIVE has just
been rereleased by Lethe Press.
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Table of Contents Search Site Home Also on this website: Toby
Johnson's books: TWO SPIRITS: A Story of Life with the
Navajo, a collaboration with Walter L. Williams GAY SPIRITUALITY: The Role of Gay Identity in the Transformation of Human Consciousness GAY PERSPECTIVE: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe SECRET
MATTER: updated, revised & expanded edtion from Lethe Press
with Afterword by Mark Jordan PLAGUE:
A NOVEL ABOUT HEALING. Books on Gay Spirituality:
Articles
and Excerpts: Read
Toby's review of Samuel Avery's The
Dimensional Structure of
Consciousness Funny Coincidence: "Aliens Settle in San Francisco" The
Simple Answer to the Gay Marriage Debate Why gay people should NOT Marry What's ironic What Jesus said about Gay
Rights What the Bible Says about
Homosexuality Mesosexual Ideal for Straight Men Waves
of Gay Liberation Activity Why Gay Spirituality: Spirituality
as Artistic Medium Easton Mountain Retreat Center Andrew Harvey &
Spiritual Activism "It's Always About You" Joseph Campbell's description of
Avalokiteshvara Emptiness & Religious Ideas Experiencing experiencing experiencing Going into the Light Meditations for a Funeral Meditation Practice The way to get to heaven Advice to Travelers to India & Nepal Nate Berkus is a bodhisattva John Boswell was Immanuel Kant The Joseph Campbell Connection Campbell & The Pre/Trans Fallacy Gay Spiritual Functions The Sinfulness of
Homosexuality "The Evolution of Gay Identity" "St. John of the
Cross & Religious Articulations of the
Secret Teenage
Prostitution and the Nature of Evil Allah
Hu: "God is present here" The Life is in the Blood What
are you looking for in a gay science fiction novel? The mystical experience at the Servites' Castle in Riverside The
Great Dance according to C.S.Lewis The Techniques Of The World Saviors Part 1: Brer Rabbit and the
Tar-Baby How Gay
Souls Get Reincarnated In honor of Sir Arthur C Clarke Toby's friend
and nicknamesake Toby Marotta. About
Michael Talbot, gay mystic Book Reviews Be Done on Earth by Howard E. Cook Pay Me What I'm Worth by Souldancer The Way Out by Christopher L Nutter The Gay Disciple by John Henson
Art That Dares by Kittredge Cherry
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What is "Gay Spirituality"?
The natural evolution of
consciousness leads us to understand the human religious impulse to be
not about adhering to strict purity taboos and rules and restrictions,
especially about sex, OR about believing in certain mythological
doctrines, but about living in such virtuous ways that the problems and
suffering in the world clear up in the course of evolution itself AND
that human beings come to understand the world's mythological heritage
as metaphors, not dogmas, that are clues to the nature of consciousness
and of our oneness with "God." World changing, world saving, world
serving activism flows naturally from the realization of who we really
are at the level of spirit.
The goal of gay spirituality, I think, is to find for ourselves--and to assist other gay people to see--how our homosexuality can be understood as a clue and an operative practice to experiencing that oneness with "God." The goal of the spiritual life is to experience being in heaven now. Meditation and spiritual practice serve to reveal this transcendental reality; they transform experience so that the world DOES appear and BECOMES heaven now. For gay people spiritual vision sees how the styles of gay life can be perceived as--and thereby transformed into--clues to heaven. Gay spirituality, for instance, sees that a frivolous whimsy of gay life, like drag (from Radical Faerie-style genderfuck to stage drag and serious female impersonation, from Halloween costume to personal effeminacy) resonate with age-old myths of androgynous, bisexual gods and cross-dressing shamans. Gay patterns of free and anonymous sex resonate with the mystical poetry of the Sufis and of, specifically, St John of the Cross whose poem "On a Dark Night" is about discovering that the man he has had anonymous "park sex" was Jesus--for all of us, mystically, we are Jesus and Avalokiteshvara and God-incarnate to one another, and should behave so! The gay encounter with AIDS in the last decades resonates with myths of asceticism, voluntary suffering, mystical substitution and self-sacrifice for the salvation of others--by both the "victims" and the caregivers. Talents of gay personality, like style, design and artistry and, perhaps even more important, sensitivity, compassion and drive to service, show us the virtues we can and should cultivate for our spiritual growth. Our gayness gives us a perspective on life and cultural convention; we understand the world, other people's lifestyles AND religious tradition from over and above; we should strive to be visionaries and world-transformers. Our attraction to same rather than opposite potentially makes us less distracted and obsessed with duality; we are blessed, if we want to be so, with clues to nondual vision. Our spirituality must resonate outward from us to save the world. This is where the evolution of consciousness is taking us all as Earth/Gaia wakes up and we all see heaven now. And, I think, it's a gay thing to point the way. This is how we, as gay people, give good service by being openly gay AND by transforming what it means to be gay so everybody understands us not as sinners but as saints. This is how we become saints. Spirituality IS self-fulfilling prophecy IS activism in service of humankind. Toby
Johnson, author Gay Spirituality: Gay
Identity and the
Transformation of Human Consciousness
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Toby Johnson, PhD is author of eight books: three non-fiction books that apply the wisdom of his teacher and "wise old man," Joseph Campbell to modern-day social and religious problems, three gay genre novels that dramatize spiritual issues at the heart of gay identity, and two books on gay men's spiritualities and the mystical experience of homosexuality. In addition to the novels featured elsewhere in this web site, Johnson is author of IN SEARCH OF GOD IN THE SEXUAL UNDERWORLD and THE MYTH OF THE GREAT SECRET (Revised edition): AN APPRECIATION OF JOSEPH CAMPBELL.
Johnson's Lammy Award winning book GAY SPIRITUALITY: The Role of Gay Identity in the Transformation of Human Consciousness was published in 2000.
His Lammy-nominated book GAY
PERSPECTIVE: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature
of God and the Universe was published by Alyson in 2003.
