Ritual Reconstructed: Challenges to Disconnection, Division and Exclusion in the Jewish LGBTQI Community

在全国范围内，据估计约有75%的犹太人隶属于犹太教堂。对许多犹太人来说，宗教实践涉及现代性与公民自由/人权信仰之间令人不安的紧张关系；Torah要求拒绝非异性恋规范。这个项目旨在让LGBTQI犹太参与者参与进来，将传统犹太人和LGBTQI人群的二元叙事复杂化，并以此探索社区、归属感和社区（dis）和（re）联系的本质。“重建仪式”是跨学科的设计，包括神学和哲学概念的核心，结合了对“社区成员”的性质和影响的理论理解（以及与之脱节），通过创新的艺术实践来观察和理论化。然后将对调查结果进行神学和实践分析，并作为在犹太人和其他信仰社区内制定政策和可转移的宗教实践发展的工具重新提出。犹太教（延伸到基督教和伊斯兰教，它们有着共同的根源）是一种宗教，在这种宗教中，传统的仪式和实践往往会使LGBTQI社区的成员边缘化，因为他们被推定为异性恋。尽管如此，宗教传统通常在塑造身份方面发挥着关键作用，为信徒提供了一套价值观、希望和意义感。对于那些经历过与社会脱节、歧视和排斥的历史，并且在某种意义上仍被视为“他者”的少数民族群体成员来说，基于民族信仰的与“主流”社会脱节的感觉，也可能加剧与LGBTQI社区其他成员的“差异”和分裂感。这可能表现为与LGBTQI规范的社会期望和文化价值观的距离感（例如，希望在犹太文化/社区环境中度过周五晚上；或者在广泛世俗的LGBTQI社区中被视为“宗教”的紧张关系），增加了寻求平衡竞争身份和社会需求的个人的多层脱节。新兴的进步犹太思想和围绕仪式实践的话语认为，以一种可能不会与传统破裂或与早期形式的拉比思想不同的方式“奇怪的哈拉卡”是可能的，这使得该项目能够考虑非线性和面向未来的方法，以增强社区福祉，并将LGBTQI犹太人重新连接到更广泛的犹太社区。该项目将在整个仪式周期中跟踪LGBTQI参与者，与社区成员一起创作和展示（在电影中）重现仪式的过程（例如LGBTQI哈夫拉节、“酷儿家宴”、另类普珥节派对，以及将另类翻译融入传统的Haggim（赎罪日/犹太新年）礼拜仪式）。重建仪式的过程将导致一部电影，以“章节”的形式呈现，可能用于教育环境，这将在项目结束时发布，哲学家，神学家和LGBTQI参与者（其中一些可能是拉比成员）将讨论这种重建仪式在重建交织的LGBTQI-犹太人身份中的意义和过程。此外，参与者将参与一个“仪式拼贴”项目，通过电影、故事、音乐或造型艺术（由参与者自己决定的形式）（重新）观看和呈现个人有意义的仪式对象，最终以展览的形式与电影产品一起巡回展出。

Nationally, it is estimated that around 75% of Jews are affiliated to Synagogues. For many Jews religious practise involves an uneasy tension between modernity and belief in civil liberties/human rights; and Torah mandated rejection of non-heteronormativity. This project sets out to engage with LGBTQI Jewish participants to complicate the binary narrative of either observant Jew or someone who identifies as LGBTQI and in so doing explores the nature of community, belonging and community (dis) and (re)connection.'Ritual Reconstructed' is inter-disciplinary in design, and includes a core of theological and philosophical conceptualisations, wedded to theoretical understanding of the nature and impacts of 'community membership' (and disconnection therefrom) viewed and theorised through innovative arts practices. The findings will then be treated to theological and practice analysis and re-presented as a vehicle for both policy and transferable religious practice development within the Jewish and other faith communities.Judaism (and by extension Christianity and Islam which share a common root) is a religion in which traditional rituals and practices often marginalise members of the LGBTQI communities as a result of a presumptive heterosexuality. Despite this, religious traditions often play a key role in shaping identities, providing adherents with a set of values, hope and a sense of meaning. For members of minority ethnic groups who have experienced histories of disconnection, discrimination and exclusion and who are still regarded as in some senses 'othered' a sense of ethno-faith based disconnection from 'mainstream' society may also exacerbate a sense of 'difference' and division from other members of the LGBTQI communities. This may manifest as a sense of distance from LGBTQI normative social expectations and cultural values (i.e wishing to spend Friday night in a Jewish cultural/community setting; or tensions around being seen as 'religious' within broadly secular LGBTQI communities) adding to a set of multi-layered disconnections for individuals seeking to balance competing identities and social demands. Emergent progressive Jewish thought and discourse around ritual practice considers that it is possible to 'queer Halakhah' in a way which may indeed not rupture with tradition or be distinct from earlier forms of Rabbinic thought, enabling this project to contemplate non-linear and future oriented approaches to enhancing community well-being and re-connecting LGBTQI Jews to the wider Jewish community. The project will follow LGBTQI participants throughout the ritual cycle engaging with community members as they create and illustrate (on film) the processes of recreating ritual (e.g. LGBTQI Havurah; 'queer Seder'; alternative Purim parties and the incorporation of alternative translations into traditional Haggim (Yom Kippur/Rosh Hashanah) liturgy. The process of recreating ritual will lead to a film, presented in 'chapters', which may be used in educational settings, which will be launched at an end of project event in which philosophers, theologians and LGBTQI participants (some of whom may be members of the rabbinate) will discuss the meaning and process of such reconstructed ritual in recreating interleaved LGBTQI-Jewish identities. In addition, participants will engage with a 'ritual bricolage' project in which personally meaningful ritual objects are (re)viewed and presented through film, story, music or plastic art (in a format to be decided by the participants themselves), culminating in an exhibition which can be toured alongside the film product.