What does it mean for LGBTQIA+ persons to be part of the Body of Christ when for so long we have been severed from it? Does a new body emerge, or is the same theological body enlarged? Put another way, is there one Body of Christ or many? This ethnographic community-based research paper operates from the theological proposition that digital meeting technology makes possible one of the queerest claims of Christianity: that many bodies in many places can become one, the Body of Christ - and that this Body is itself continually transformed.
Through the stories of two members from Church of the Young Prophets, a virtual LGBTQIA+ church that meets on the Gather platform, this paper shares how these persons, from different geographical and social locations - a Black trans woman in Uganda in her 20s and a retired white gay man in Australia - experienced a sense of oneness with each other through the sacrament of Holy Communion. The paper further explores how this digital community and our practices queer of the Body of Christ as (1) LGBTQIA+ persons are affirmed and participate consciously as members of this Body and (2) the queer space and boundaries - drawing from the work of Judith Butler - as persons from different geographical regions participate synchronously in Holy Communion and pray together "make us one." Through the real virtual partaking of Holy Communion, the boundaries of physical and theological bodies are opened, and new modes of being the Body of Christ are made possible.