For as long as I can remember, I’ve known two things to be true: I am queer. I am also deeply spiritual.
For years, I couldn’t say those sentences out loud together, and certainly not without shame. My religious community didn’t give me the language to explore queerness without guilt. And the queer spaces I began to enter as a teenager didn’t always know how to hold the complexity of faith.
This tension of being both queer and devout is one that many young people live with every day. It’s a quiet push and pull, a heartbreak and a homecoming, and a constant negotiation of two identities the world most often insists must cancel each other out. And yet, across faiths and generations, young queer people are carving out sacred space for themselves. Not by choosing one identity over the other, but by reclaiming the right to belong fully to both.
Let’s be honest: sometimes this whole spiritual journey thing feels less like a beautiful unfolding and more like yelling into a cosmic void. You light a candle, say a heartfelt prayer, maybe even cry a little, and all you get is… crickets.
“Honestly, sometimes I feel like God left me on read,” says Mae, 18, a pansexual Buddhist-raised teen who’s been struggling to make sense of karma and queerness. “Like, I’m out here meditating, trying to reach nirvana, or at least peace, and the universe is like, ‘New phone, who dis?’” It’s funny until it’s not. That feeling of spiritual silence can be crushing, especially when it’s layered on top of shame, fear, or being actively rejected by your community. But often, that silence isn’t the absence it feels like: it’s spaciousness. A pause. A clearing for something new.
Or as Mae later put it: “Maybe God’s just a really slow texter. Like, on divine time.”
In the in-between spaces where traditional elders often fall short, some queer youth are finding guidance in less conventional forms: drag queens who quote scripture, TikTok theologians who do lip-sync sermons, poets whose prayers sound like spoken word.
“My queer godparent is this 40-something former nun-turned-drag-artist named ‘Sister Praise the Gays,’” says Rio, 20. “They taught me how to read tarot, break generational curses, and not flinch when someone quotes Leviticus.”
Is it irreverent? Maybe. It’s also deeply sacred in its own way.
“I finally understood the Holy Spirit when I saw them vogue in full habit to Beyoncé’s Heaven,” Rio says. “It wasn’t just camp. It was church.”
These unexpected mentors become spiritual lifelines. They remind us that holiness doesn’t only reside in stained glass windows or dusty old scrolls. Sometimes it shows up in sequins and sass, in memes and mixtapes, in hugs that feel like home.
What It Means to Come Out—To Yourself
Before coming out to anyone else, most queer religious or spiritual youth first have to come out to themselves. That’s not usually a one-time event. It’s more of a long conversation, often full of awkward silences, renegotiations, and internal debates that sound like:
“Is it really that bad if I still believe in angels and also like kissing girls?”
“Can I be trans and still call myself a child of God?”
“If God made me, does that mean They have an excellent queer taste or just a wildly experimental phase?”
This inner dialogue can feel exhausting but it’s also formative. It invites us to define identity not by doctrine, but by discovery. Not by the labels others assign us, but by the stories we tell ourselves.
The wild part is that for many, those stories become even more beautiful not in spite of, but because of the contradictions. Being queer and devout often means living with paradox, and paradox demands maturity. It means living in mystery, and mystery, at its heart, is spiritual.
The friction between faith and queerness can get especially noticeable during religious holidays, those charged calendar moments full of ritual, expectation, and passive-aggressive comments from relatives.
“My grandma still prays the gay away at every Christmas dinner,” says Devon, 19. “She also thinks Harry Styles is straight. So I take it with a grain of communion salt.”
Devon’s way of coping? Bringing affirming friends to church as “study buddies,” queer-plating the nativity scene (Joseph and the shepherd are clearly a couple), and using Advent to count down to RuPaul’s Drag Race premieres instead of Christmas.
Other youth create alternative rituals altogether: queer Passover seders, queer Ramadan reflections, or even “coming out confessionals” where friends light candles and share stories like sacred offerings.
These reimaginings aren’t just cute. They’re powerful. They say: we are not outsiders looking in. We are insiders reshaping the frame.
The Beauty of Not Knowing
If there’s one thing queer young people of faith know intimately, it’s uncertainty. Will my family still love me? Will I be welcome in this space? Can I ever fully belong?
These are heavy questions but they’re also deeply spiritual ones. They echo the questions asked by prophets, mystics, monks, and seekers throughout history.
“I used to think I had to choose between knowing and believing,” says Arin, 23, who grew up in a conservative Hindu household. “Now I realize belief is what I lean on when I don’t know. And queerness taught me that. It taught me how to sit without knowing and still have hope.”
In that way, queer faith is not a contradiction. It’s a training ground in spiritual endurance, radical love, and the courage to claim joy even when joy feels out of reach.
“There’s this stereotype that you can’t be queer and religious, especially not devout,” says Eli, 22, a nonbinary Jewish educator. “But my queerness has actually made my faith deeper. It’s made me question more, and connect more.”
Eli points out that Jewish traditions of wrestling with God asking hard questions, arguing with scripture offer a natural space for this kind of exploration. “I see being queer not as a barrier to faith, but as a different lens for interpreting it. And that’s beautiful.”
Sacred Texts, Queer Readings
One of the most painful barriers young queer believers face is the weaponization of sacred texts. Verses are cherry-picked and stripped of historical context to justify exclusion, even violence. For many, this is the first and deepest wound.
“I remember my pastor preaching about hell and looking directly at me,” says Jordan, 17, a gay Christian teen in North Carolina. “I was fourteen. I wanted to disappear.”
Jordan left that church but didn’t leave Christianity. With the help of a queer mentor, he began reading the Bible with new eyes. “There’s so much in there about love, justice, inclusion. About Jesus flipping tables in the temple and calling out hypocrisy. That’s the faith I believe in.”
This reclamation is not about bending religion to fit queerness, but about uncovering parts of tradition that were always there often hidden beneath layers of colonialism, patriarchy, and institutional control.
In Christianity, for instance, the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8 is a powerful symbol of gender variance and divine welcome. In Islam, the principle of rahma (mercy) has been invoked by queer scholars to emphasize a compassionate reading of the Qur’an. And in Judaism, the Talmud holds complex discussions about gender categories that go beyond a simple binary.
By reclaiming these texts and stories, young people are not abandoning faith they are reviving it.
Faith Communities in Transition
While some young people find healing by stepping outside their religious communities, others are working to change them from within.
“I didn’t want to walk away from the church I grew up in,” says Dani, 21, a queer Catholic organizer. “I wanted it to be better.”
Dani started a small LGBTQ+ support group at her university’s campus ministry. At first, only two people attended. Now, it’s grown into a regular gathering with over 20 members: some are out, some are still figuring things out. “I’m not saying the church has changed,” Dani clarifies. “But we’re building the space we need inside it.”
Other youth are turning to entirely new communities often online or interfaith where they don’t have to hide any part of themselves. Groups like Beloved Ariseexternal link, opens in a new tab, Q Christian Fellowshipexternal link, opens in a new tab, Muslims for Progressive Valuesexternal link, opens in a new tab, and Keshetexternal link, opens in a new tab offer support, theology, and connection tailored to queer people of faith. TikTok, Instagram, and Discord have also become unexpected sanctuaries places where affirming clergy answer DMs, where queer Muslims host Zoom iftars, and where Jewish teens swap gender-inclusive blessings. These spaces aren’t just survival strategies. They’re spiritual revolutions in real time.
The Quiet Work of Integration
For every queer young person marching at Pride with a rainbow prayer shawl, there’s another one sitting quietly in a pew, wondering if God still sees them. There’s no single path to peace between faith and identity only countless personal journeys, each with their own rituals, revelations, and reroutes.
Some, like Leila, find clarity through scholarship. Others, like Jordan, rediscover the divine in activism or art. For many, the process is ongoing a sacred kind of becoming.
“My spirituality isn’t about rules anymore,” says Ayo, 20, a queer Nigerian student raised in a strict Pentecostal home. “It’s about connection. I feel closest to God when I’m dancing, or laughing with friends, or helping someone who needs it.”
Ayo no longer attends church regularly, but they still pray. They still talk to God. They still feel held.
“That’s enough for me,” they say. “That’s faith.”
What Helps (And What Hurts)
For young people navigating sexuality and spirituality, the right support can make all the difference.
Here are a few things that help, according to the voices I spoke with:
- Affirming mentors or elders: Whether it’s a youth pastor, imam, rabbi, or older friend, having someone who says, “You can be both” is powerful.
- Access to alternative theology: Books like Radical Loveexternal link, opens in a new tab by Patrick Cheng, Queer Virtueexternal link, opens in a new tab by Elizabeth Edman, and The Inclusive Bibleexternal link, opens in a new tab offer fresh perspectives.
- Online communities: Even anonymous ones can provide a sense of belonging and safety.
- Creative outlets: Poetry, music, and visual art are spiritual practices in their own right and often a bridge between the personal and the divine.
- Permission to pause: It’s okay not to have all the answers. Faith isn’t a finish line, it’s a practice.
On the flip side, these are the things that tend to harm:
- Religious coercion or threats: Fear-based teachings can and do cause lasting trauma.
- Outing without consent: Especially in religious communities, this can be dangerous.
- Dismissing faith as being “just a phase”: Many queer youth genuinely value their spirituality. Reducing it erases an important part of who they are.
A Letter to Those In Between
If you’re reading this and feeling torn between what you’ve been taught and who you are I want you to know this:
You are a living testimony that identity can be complex and sacred at the same time. You are a living testimony that you don’t have to trade your queerness for faith, or your faith for safety. You are a living testimony that both can live in you uneasily at times, yes, but also beautifully.
There is no one right way to be queer and devout. No perfect prayer or doctrinal checklist. There is only your path, your peace, your truth.
And somewhere out there, someone else is walking it too.
You are not alone.
