Meet our Patrons - Pádraig Ó Tuama in conversation with Kieran Bohan
UPDATE: Pádraig Ó Tuama stepped down as a Patron of OTN in February 2022 to focus on new opportunities in the USA.
THE OPEN TABLE NETWORK (OTN) is becoming a charity. So we have asked several notable Christians who identify as LGBTQIA+, or as allies, to become our patrons.
They will be advocates for OTN, speaking about us and supporting us in the public eye. We are proud that these individuals believe in what we’re doing and want to have their names associated with us.
In the fourth of our Q&A webinars with our new Patrons on Wednesday 17th February 2021, Pádraig Ó Tuama, poet, theologian & reconciler, was in conversation with Kieran Bohan, Co-ordinator of the Open Table Network.
If you missed our Q&A webinar with Pádraig Ó Tuama, or want to watch it again, now you can catch up below or on our YouTube channel (60 mins).
Pádraig Ó Tuama is a compelling poet and skilled speaker, teacher and group worker. From 2014-2019 he was the leader of the Corrymeela Community, Ireland’s oldest peace and reconciliation community.
He is a regular broadcaster on radio on topics including conflict and faith, LGBT+ inclusion, and the dangers of so-called ‘reparative therapy’.
Pádraig’s published work includes poetry (Readings from the Book of Exile, Sorry for your Troubles), prose (In The Shelter: Finding A Home In The World, Borders and Belonging: Challenging barriers with the Book of Ruth) and theology (Daily Prayer with the Corrymeela Community, The Place Between).
With his partner, Paul Doran, he co-founded Tenx9, a storytelling event where nine people have up to ten minutes each to tell a true story from their lives. Begun in Belfast, this event now has satellite events in many other cities.
Pádraig was in conversation with Kieran Bohan, Co-ordinator of the Open Table Network. In 2020, thanks to a grant from the National Lottery Community Fund, he begun working full-time to raise our online presence to reach more isolated LGBTQIA+ folk. This funding has made these webinars possible.
Pádraig Ó Tuama answered a wide range of questions, including:
In your work with groups you’ve often asked them ‘If, right now, you were to write the story of your life, what would the first sentence be?’ What would yours be now?
In your autobiography, In The Shelter, you write about growing up as a Catholic near Cork, and that you knew from the age of 11 or 12 that you’re gay. How did you hold your growing awareness of faith and sexuality together?
You went through reparative therapy for a few years, which you’ve described as a ‘a groundless, invasive process designed to “cure” me of being gay’. How did you experience that, and when did you realise you didn’t need a cure?
As a young man, when you began studying for your Bachelor degree in Divinity, you felt a strong calling to priesthood. What put you off going to seminary?
You settled in Belfast in 2003, following a nomadic decade, moving from Cork to Dublin to Switzerland to Australia, via Lithuania, Uganda and the Phillipines. How did you experience being a gay man in other cultures?
You went on to become the first Catholic to lead Corrymeela, Ireland’s oldest Christian community dedicated to reconciliation and peace-building. How did you become involved there?
The Corrymeela Community has run ‘Blessed are the Brave’, an annual retreat for members of the LGBT community and clergy who are LGBT affirming, for more than ten years. How did that come about, and what’s it been like for you to co-facilitate it?
What does Open Table mean to you?
How can we sit together at an open table with people who would disagree with or exclude us as LGBT+ Christians?
Given your experience of facilitating reconciliation, can you offer any thoughts as to how to engage positively with processes like the Methodist Church’s God In Love Unites Us, and the Church of England’s Living in Love and Faith, if this is something you would encourage people to do?
In your sharing about leaving reparative therapy ,you said you lost respect for the people pushing it rather than a growing respect for yourself. What was the turning point for you to move into growing self-respect?
You’ve written about the experience of being in exile. Have you come to your ‘Promised Land’?
Many of us were amazed - and delighted - at how the referendum on same-sex marriage passed in Ireland. What do you think were the main factors which helped effect such a radical change in a largely Catholic state?
You’ve written that one of your great inspirations is in the words of St Irenaeus, the second century Bishop of Lyon: ‘The glory of God is found in a human being fully alive’. What helps you feel fully alive, and how do you help others to do so?
Catch up with Pádraig Ó Tuama in conversation with Kieran Bohan (60 mins):
