Announcing a New Book: Stories of Change

Adriaan van Klinken is co-author of the recently published book Stories of Change: Religious Leaders and LGBTIQ Inclusion in East Africa (Bloomsbury, 2024). The book, which he co-authored with David Kuria Mbote, Barbara Bompani and Damaris Parsitau, is available Open Access and can be downloaded for free from here.

How has this book come about?

This book has been in the making for a while. It is one of the outcomes of the Sexuality and Religion Network in East Africa, which ran from 2020 to 2023 with funding from the Arts & Humanities Research Council.

This network was a collaboration between academic researchers and community-based organisations in Kenya and Uganda, aimed at understanding and enhancing the role of religious leaders in the area of LGBTIQ equality and inclusion in the East African region. The aims of the network were to capitalise on the role of religious leaders as crucial actors in achieving social change, promoting equality, and building inclusive societies, specifically in relation to sexuality. We also sought to develop and enhance creative and effective resources and strategies for engaging religious leaders in promoting LGBTIQ equality and inclusion in East Africa.

In the course of this project and the related workshops and activities, we met many religious leaders who are actively involved in the advocacy for LGBTIQ people. Some of them identified as LGBTIQ themselves, while others identified as allies of LGBTIQ peoples and communities.

Thus, we decided to collect and document the life stories of religious leaders we had established contact with via the network, as a contribution to the building of African queer and religious archives.

What are the key argument(s) that the book develops?

This book is inspired by the idea that in East Africa, religious leaders are gate keepers in local communities and opinion leaders in society. It is true that many religious leaders are actively involved in perpetuating popular narratives that portray LGBTIQ experiences and identities as “un-African” and against “African cultural and religious values.” Yet, we wanted to draw attention to the other side of the same coin: of religious leaders who use their position and influence to make a positive difference in building a culture of inclusion and diversity.

The second key argument is that life stories of such courageous religious leaders both reflect, and stimulate, social and religious change. Narrating courage and vulnerability, resilience, hope and faith, they are powerful testimonies that are worth sharing. These stories offer critical insights into the personal, theological and social sacrifices and challenges that progressive and affirming religious leaders face in everyday realities dominated by conservative religious interpretations and theologies. Hence, this book presents the unique stories of 24 religious leaders, from Kenya and Uganda, and from both Christian and Muslim backgrounds.

What insight does the book provide into the relationship between religion and public life?

In many parts of Africa, including in countries such as Uganda and Kenya, issues of sexual and gender diversity have become deeply politicised in the public sphere. Religious actors often drive rhetoric and support policies that seek to marginalise and discriminate against LGBTIQ people and to deny them their dignity and rights. Yet, this is not the full picture. Religion also can be, and already is, a resource for progressive counter-narratives and socio-political mobilisations. The stories in this book narrate the pain and trauma caused by popular religious rhetoric that is dominant in the social domain. Yet, they also narrate that hope for a better world is possible, and how such hope is acted upon and engenders social change, even in a context of injustice.

Give us one quote from the book that you believe will make us go and read it?

Ah, it’s hard to choose just one quote! The 24 stories in this book all have powerful and moving quotes. Can I choose two?

One is from one of the youngest religious leaders included in the book – a trans pastor from Uganda, Mama Annette, who says:

“As a transgender woman and a mother of my community, I am here to give hope and to support people’s faith because we have a lot of queer Christians who have lost faith. Some no longer go to church. When I sit with my fellow transgenders and other queers, I talk to them with a voice of love, helping them to find love and regain their human dignity. I am here to encourage people; they must not lose hope. I believe in queer Christianity and I have hope for the future.”

The second quote is from the oldest religious leader featured in Stories of Change, the retired Anglican Bishop, Christopher Senyonjo, who says:

“Differences should not be an opportunity to advance hate but rather an invitation to seeking understanding. I believe that God is still creating. God continues to reveal things that we did not know before. Even at my age, God is still revealing. As a society, today we continue to see things we never saw before. … People may not have known about gender and sexuality the way we do now. We have discovered that there are people who are like that, we are discovering it now. There are many things we did not know and now we are discovering. So, when you discover, then face the reality and know how to deal with it positively.”