The Biennial SGI Lecture

THE 2024 INAUGURAL SGI LECTURE ON CHRISTIANITY, SEXUALITY, AND GENDER

Dr. David Bennett

GAY CELIBATE ASCETICISM: An Exploration of Eros and Desire in the Theologies of Augustine and Contemporary Anglicanism

The inaugural SGI Lecture on Christianity, Sexuality, and Gender was held on Tuesday, October 8, 2024, from 7–8 p.m. in Barrows Auditorium, hosted by the Sexual & Gender Identity Institute at Wheaton College.

In this lecture, Dr. David Bennett explored how a distinctly Anglican Augustinianism could provide a non-stoical or non-repressive theology of gay celibacy. By probing concepts of eros, desire, and the Trinitarian relations (particularly Christology), he journeyed through Augustine’s theology of desire and virginity, Oliver O’Donovan’s ethics of moral order, Sarah Coakley’s new asceticism, Richard Hooker’s Lawes, and Graham Ward’s queer approach to redemptive erotics, affirming a renewed account of orthodox sexual ethics, which could lead to flourishing for LGBTQI+ people while remaining continuous with historic orthodoxy.

Dr. David Bennet comes from Sydney, Australia where he studied journalism and then international relations. He moved to Oxford to pursue his studies in theology and train as an apologist from a skeptical, atheist background as an anti-Christian gay activist. David now holds postgraduate degrees in theology from Oxford, a master’s degree in theology from the University of St Andrews, Scotland, and completed a doctorate (DPhil) in theology at Oxford in 2023.

He specializes in the relationship between queer theory, asceticism and contemporary Anglican theology, especially ethics, and the role of desire in knowing God. He currently works as a visiting theologian in residence with churches in San Francisco and New York, and is the Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Theology and Ethics for the Faculty of Theology and Religions at the University of Oxford. His thesis is in the process of being published, tentatively entitled, Queering the Queer: A Theological Ethics of Same-Sex Desire and Gay Celibacy in Contemporary Anglican Thought.

 This inaugural lecture was sponsored and hosted by the Sexual & Gender Identity Institute, directed by Dr. Mark Yarhouse.