Christians deny BDSM's historic link to spirituality. So a queer author is writing a book about it. - LGBTQ Nation

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence began in San Francisco in 1979 as queer drag nuns opposing conservative anti-LGBTQ+ politics. During the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s, the group strengthened ties with kink and leather communities by raising funds for HIV patients, promoting safe-sex practices, and protesting religious anti-gay and anti-sex stigma. Dr. Melissa Wilcox, an LGBTQ+-identified professor of religion, investigated connections between spirituality and BDSM or leather practices. She found few organizations focused on BDSM and spirituality within gay or lesbian communities. Her research included interviews with kink masters, visits to the Chicago Leather Archives, and attendance at BDSM gatherings and play spaces across sexual and gender spectrums. She observed a long-term shift toward broader religious openness that connects spirituality with embodied practices.

"When the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence first emerged in San Francisco in 1979, the group of queer drag nuns arose in opposition to the so-called Moral Majority of conservatives who pushed anti-LGBTQ+ measures nationwide. However, as the AIDS epidemic devastated thousands throughout the 1980s and '90s, the Sisters forged a stronger bond with the kink and leather communities: fundraising for HIV patients, advocating for safe-sex practices, and protesting against religious anti-gay and anti-sex stigma."

"Curious about that connection, Dr. Melissa Wilcox, an LGBTQ+-identified professor of religion at the University of California, Riverside, began talking to some Sisters and realized the significant connection some people make between spirituality and BDSM or leather practices. She's now working on a book entitled Devotions: Spirituality and Religion in LGBTQ Leather and BDSM Communities."

""Relatively quickly, I realized that there weren't very many organizations that focused on BDSM and spirituality, specifically within gay or lesbian communities," she told LGBTQ Nation. To better understand these communities, she interviewed various kink masters, including Cléo Dubois, the widow of Fakir Musafar, a bisexual artist who explored spirituality through body piercing, bondage, and sensory pain play; she visited the Chicago Leather Archives, a repository of BDSM historical materials; and she attended different BDSM gatherings and play spaces, like bars, camps, and venues whose attendees weren't exclusively male, female, or heterosexual, but rather somewhat "expansive" across the sexual and gender spectrum."

""There's something happening, over the past at least 50 to 60 years, with a shift to religious openness toward a broader sense of spirituality... something happening that is bringing bodies in some way," she said."

Read at LGBTQ Nation