Bingo Allison is the Church of England’s First Gender-Queer Priest

Bingo Allison, a Liverpool priest of the Church of England, has a story that echoes with many queer Christians. Being raised in a “strongly religious” household where they were taught that acting on one’s non-heterosexuality was a sin, they sometimes projected their own internalized queerphobia onto others. “I was definitely in a lot of denial and some of that denial came out in denial of other people’s identities,” they say in an interview with the Liverpool Echo. However, when someone corrected them for speaking on same-gender marriage as if it was an “issue” rather than a topic that involved real people, they said it shifted their perspective.

Later, after hearing the term “gender-queer,” they claim “everything suddenly clicked.” The only problem was, they were only halfway through their seven-year vicar training, and putting off coming out was harder than they thought it would be. Previously, they had questioned their gender identity, but the environment they grew up in meant that they could not properly conceive of themselves outside of their gender assigned at birth. While writing an essay on the Judeo-Christian story of creation, they realized that the language which the Bible originally used in Genesis 1:27 spoke about “from maleness to femaleness,” a spectrum rather than a binary. “It was a deepening spiritual experience,” they say. “I properly felt God was guiding me into this new truth about myself.”

They say that they try to get involved with queer youth, not only within their role as a spiritual leader but in secular spaces as well. “One of the biggest things is just being a visual representation in my community,” they say. Their openness as their true selves normalizes the existence of gender-queer individuals to people who otherwise would not have that representation. “When I’m wearing my collar, it lets children know that… there is a place in church and the outside world for people like me.” Many queer people struggle to reconcile their faith with their identity, but Bingo has found a way to live their full truth in both aspects.