Freedom, Glorious Freedom: The Spiritual Journey to the Fullness of Life for Gays, Lesbians, and Everybody Else [Paperback]

John J. McNeill (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 10, 2010

In Freedom, Glorious Freedom, acclaimed author John J. McNeill shows how lesbian and gay Christians can achieve full spiritual maturity and self-acceptance. McNeill discusses freedom of conscience and discernment of spirits, ancient teachings of the Christian church that have a special urgency for lesbian and gay people who need to free themselves from all the homophobic authorities and deal with God on a direct and personal basis. The liberating process of coming out of the closet is seen as a spirit-filled effort to achieve the glory of God by becoming fully alive. McNeill offers a twelve-step spirituality as a spiritual process of liberation from all addictions in order to experience the love of God in its fullness. The epilogue expresses in detail a philosophical vision, looking both to the past and to the future, of how gay liberation fits into the Spirit-directed evolution of human history and its role in the ongoing struggle for human liberation.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In Freedom, McNeill completes his trilogy (The Church and the Homosexual and Taking a Chance on God) and adds another block to the rising structure that reconciles homosexuality and Christianity. The author's nearly 40 years as a Jesuit lend a Roman Catholic context here, but the problems for homosexual people within all of Christianity are similar enough that this offering is applicable beyond the Church of Rome. Beginning with the principle of spiritual discernment (i.e., the authority of each human being to know the truth about his or her own relationship to God), McNeill, a psychotherapist, is convinced that coming out is necessary for spiritual maturity as well as mental and emotional health. To enable this, he lauds the 12-step process as "the most powerful spiritual liberation process in the world today." He argues also that the emergence of open homosexuality is evidence of a new synthesis in the balancing of the human personality-a replacement for the breakdown of the patriarchial archetype. While some of his postulations are mind-bending (e.g., Mary, Martha and Lazarus were possibly gay and represent Jesus' "family of choice"), McNeill's navigation from inside the human spirit to outside human history is graceful, learned and worthy of contemplation.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

For more than thirty-five years, John J. McNeill, an ordained priest and psychotherapist, has been devoting his life to spreading the good news of God's love for lesbian and gay Christians.

Product Details

• Paperback: 332 pages
• Publisher: Lethe Press; Reprint edition (January 10, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590211480
• ISBN-13: 978-1590211489
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,429,112 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gift of a faith-filled servant of God., March 13, 2001

By 

"teejaygee" (East Syracuse, NY, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Freedom, Glorious Freedom: The Spiritual Journey to the Fullness of Life for Gays, Lesbians, and EverybodyElse (Paperback)

This is an enlightening book and a gift to gay and non-gay people of good will. I found "Freedom, Glorious Freedom" to be both healing and a celebration of the love of God for all people. McNeill's scholarship, love of God and gift as teacher are as clearly present here as in his previous two books. I found Part 4 ("The Gay Love of God And God's Love Of Gays") most helpful in its eye-opening understandings of the New Testament. I doubt any reader could follow McNeill's explications in this section without forever seeing the New Testament in a new and more loving light - the love that Jesus not only preached but lived.

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pro Gay and Pro Christian!!!, January 8, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Freedom, Glorious Freedom: The Spiritual Journey to the Fullness of Life for Gays, Lesbians, and Everybody Else (Hardcover)

I am a gay, ordained minister of the gospels. This book is superbly written and researched. A must for me on coming out, and a must for anyone who ministers to the gay community. God bless this author for taking this chance in his life.