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Items of
Note
Gay
Spirituality: Gay
Identity and the
Transformation of Consciousness
A New Vision of Spirituality
What gay people are here for
Click here for New Book Reviews
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FINDING
GOD IN THE SEXUAL UNDERWORLD: The Journey Expanded 2020 Revised Version.
The Fourth Quill
Two
Spirits is available as an
audiobook narrated by Arthur Raymond. Click
here
The Myth
of the Great
Secret: An Appreciation of Joseph Campbell. This
was the second edition of this book.
To order books from the
author
(autographed) or find links to gay booksellers
To order books from amazon.com
A Bifurcation of Gay Spirituality
The Scriptural Basis for Same Sex Marriage
Drawing a Long Straw: Ketamine and Psychedelic Vision
"Monastic Homosexuality" offers a model of gay consciousness
Why "Gay Spirituality" is different from gay people being religious
Common Experiences Unique to Gay Men
Toby's historical account of the development of some of the famous gay identifier terms: Wouldn't You Like to Be a Uranian?
Advice
to Future Gay Historians
Innocently naughty story
about how Toby got the first whistle in the Castro Neighborhood Whistle
Campaign
Toby has laid out the wonderful Mandalas drawn by the late Austin
artist Geoffrey Graham for a book on amazon.com.
Click on the category names
for more articles
About Spirituality, Science Fiction, Myth and Wisdom
The Techniques Of The World Saviors
How Gay Souls Get Reincarnated
In honor of Sir Arthur C Clarke
Toby's friend and nicknamesake Toby Marotta.
And many more, including Michael Talbot. (Click on People category above)
Here's a wonderful quote from Joseph Campbell that explains it all:
…the objective is to be born from the womb of myth, not to remain in it, and the one who has attained to this “second birth” is truly the “twice born,” freed from the pedagogical devices of society, the lures and threats of myth, the local mores, the usual hopes of benefits and rewards.
______
Toby was interviewed
by Coach/Counselor Buck Dodson for the Life Lab podcasts. There are
lots of good podcasts on the website. Gay Spirituality with Dr Toby Johnson.
Toby
was interviewed by podcaster, writer, workshop leader Johnson Chong,
who now lives in Sydney Australia. On his Truth, Wisdom
Freedom YouTube blog, It's Episode 19: "Gay Spirituality and Sex with God with
Toby Johnson" 
Toby
joined in a wonderful conversation with Brian McNaught and Hayley Evans
on their YouTube videocast series called Can You Be Happy Without the
Movie? (I gave a new spin to the meaning of their title by talking
about my hope that Secret Matter would someday be made into a
movie.)
Brian is an important character in the development of gay consciousness
from a religious perspective. 
Toby
and Kip Got Married 
Lifecoach
Raymond L. Rigoglioso was running a monthly telephone discussion
group, occasional weekend Intensives (at Easton Mountain) and a website
about understanding gayness as a spiritual and life-positive,
contributing vocation. He has published his discoveries in a book
titled Gay Men and The New
Way Forward.
Toby
Johnson contributed a Foreword to this book.
LGBTQ+
historian Eric Cervini offers
brief lessons in gay history on Instagram AND on DiscoveryPlus TV. He
is author of The Deviant's War, the life of Frank Kameny.
Cervini is
entertaining and cute! A great way to present unknown history.
Asking Answers, Finding Questions by Don Hall is
an autobiographical account of the nature of religion and spirituality
from a gay man's perspective.
Making Room
by Carl Siciliano tells about the development of the Ali Forney Center
in New York City for homeless LGBTQ+ youth. It is also a moving account
of gay sanctity.
The Secret That is Not a Secret
by Jay Michaelson is a collection of stories and myths all told with a
Jewish accent, and a smile that says the author knows something big!
Bernhard &
LightWing by
Damien Rowse is a description
of a six-week meditation retreat completed by a gay male
couple in a simple nature hut. By offering the body limitless rest and
limitless loving energy both non-sexual and sexual, they experienced
remarkable healing and spiritual awakening. Damien Rowse has a website
about the spirituality group in Auckland, New Zealand with a worldwide
network: TwoEye
Brotherhood. 
Tantric Psychophysics
by Shelli Joye presents a theory of consciousness through investigation
of altered states of consciousness and modern quantum theory.
The Hidden Dimensions of Consciousness by Shelli
Joye expands on her theory of consciousness with Ervin László's
Cosmology and Quantum Brain Dynamics. 
Heavenly
LGBTQ+ by Jan Haen continues the stories of saintly LGBTQ+ people,
this time more of them outside the Church
My Life
As a Boy, Priest, Gay Man, and Artist by Jan Haen tells the Dutch
priest/artist's own story in cartoon art.
I
Came Here Seeking a Person by
William Glenn is a book of autobiographical chapters on significant
spiritual events in this devout gay Christian's life journey.
Queer God de
Amor
by Miguel H. Diaz queers the mysticism of St John of the Cross by
taking seriously the sexual imagery in the poet/monk's writings.
Our Time: San
Francisco in the ’70s by Chuck Forester is a novel about
gay/queer genre literature and the importance of gay history and
culture.
Toby Johnson reviews A New Now
by Michael Goddart, a book of seriously good advice/wisdom about how to
think about your experience, your life, and yourself. 
Where's My
Pizza? by
Larry Armistead II offers techniques for changing your consciousness so
that what you expect for yourself manifests itself in your real life.
Toby
Johnson wrote a Foreword to Shokti Lovestar's autobiographical account
of his healing from AIDS and transforming his vision of life in From
AIDS To Eternity. (link to Shokti's site)
The Sum of All the Pieces by Paul Bradford is a heartrending but ultimately uplifting account of an older gay man's struggle to be true to himself in spite of horrendous odds.
What
Is the
Grass
by Mark Doty, a literary analysis of Walt Whitman's poetry, into which
is beautifully blended a series of meditations and musings on the
nature of sex, love, and especially the Self, with a capital S.
How to be an Excellent Human Being
by Bill Meacham, a wonderful book that truly explains everything from
the nature of reality to consciousness to how to live well and be happy
the best and right way.
Stay Woke: A
Meditation Guide for the Rest of Us by Justin
Michael
Williams offers
instruction in meditation and life-improvement for a young hip-hop,
digital, woke and aware generation. 
David's
Story: Healed by faith,
love, inner strength and the strong will to survive by
Marie
Rothenberg & Mel White is a moving account of the tragedy of young
David Rothenberg, a 5 year old boy terribly burnned at the hands of
his father, then nursed back to life by his mother. Disturbing,
but also uplifting and inspiring. Toby Johnson assisted with
publication of the 2022 edition.
The
Flip by Jeffrey J. Kripal, a
book about changing
perspective to see that consciousness is bigger
than just the human brain, and the world we all live in is just the
surface of a greater "super natural" reality.
Toby enjoyed the ABC-TV movie written by Dustin Lance Black based on the book by Cleve Jones When We Rise. Toby Johnson recognized several intersections of events in the movie with his own life. Here's a link to his reminiscences
Toby's
friend Dennis Paddie has
a novel out from Lethe Press. It's a
doozey! See Dennis Paddie
Here's a
webpage presentation that Toby showed to illustrate his talk, "Gay
Perspective & the New Myth" in London, Oct 2014. Toby's talk
at LoveSpirit 2014
This is a
good summary of Toby Johnson's basic theories of gay
consciousness and of religion and myth, and an explication of why
Johnson thinks of himself as "Joseph Campbell's Apostle to the Gay
Communty." Among the organizers of LoveSpirit 2014 was Mark Whiting who
uses the Faerie name Shokti Lovestar. He writes extensively about gay
men's spiritualites. Here's a link: Gay Consciousness changing the
world by Shokti LoveStar. 
Toby's Coming Out Story tells the story of the dramatic and wonderful moment in Toby's life when it all made sense.
Toby's experience of learning "The Secret of the Clear Light" from Joseph Campbell and the real meaning of afterlife.
How to Understand the Image of the Clear Light.
Finding Your Tiger Face: Joseph Campbell's story about the great secret of life.
The Nature of Religion according to Joseph Campbell. A very wise statement from The Hero with A Thousand Faces. (Links to The Joseph Campbell Foundation and the Campbell Gimbutas Library and Archives at Pacifica
Read Toby's article on gay spirit titled "The Evolution of Gay Identity"
Read about "St. John of the Cross and the Dark Night of the Soul."
Toby tells the story of meeting Avalokiteshvara at the Baths.
Toby explains how Being Gay is a Blessing (in an excerpt from his book Gay Spirituality)
This article appeared in the book by Judith Pastore, Confronting AIDS through Literature: Facing the Edge: AIDS as an occasion for spiritual wisdom
Recollections from Toby's life -- Buying the house from the Gadpailles & Being God on ketamine -- Two stories about Drawing Long Straws
The modern American idea of Freedom of Religion reveals a deep secret about the nature of religion and God.
Gay Saintliness is a review of Donald Boivert's Sanctity and Male Desire. The article contains a stirring gay positive paragraph by Boisvert.
Christian
de la Huerta,
author of Coming
Out Spiritually: The Next Step, identifies ten spiritual functions of gay and
lesbian people.
A succinct description of the subtle
workings of the spirit in gay men's lives.
The so-called "Priest Pedophilia scandal" reveals truths about the nature of homosexual consciousness and errors in Christian teaching about sexuality that are missed when the focus is put on findng who to blame
A wonderful story called "I Want to Know Them All" by Toby's straight hippie friend L. Houston Wood in the early 70s that appeared in an issue of White Crane Journal about the Bodhisattva identity
Read
Toby's whimsical
piece about Adam
and
Steve. This essay on biblical history appeared in the Fall
2004 issue of Ashe Journal 3.3
Read about the Gay Spirituality Summit, the Gay Spirit Culture Project,
and the "Statement of Spirituality"
with Toby's
commentary
Toby's speculations about gay retirement and the "freelance monastery"
Toby comments appreciatively on Andrew Harvey's concept of Spiritual Activism and his new book THE HOPE
The Mysticism of Andrew Harvey In Son of Man, Andrew Harvey offers a Christian mysticism of sex.
Is It Time to Grow Up? Confronting the Aging Process— This article appeared in The Advocate, March 1984. The central ideas are still relevant 30 years later. Interesting discussion of how homosexuality seems to retard aging.
Notes on Licking (July, 1984) was published in Blueboy Magazine. It's a partly tongue-in-cheek argument for practicing good hygiene while still relishing gay sex practices. Precocious for 1984 and still good advice today.
Toby Johnson had an article in the L.A. Weekly as part of a series for Gay Pride 2012, titled "What does it Mean to be Gay?"
Pleasure as a Spiritual Path is Toby's Commentary on Bruce P. Grether's The Secret of the Golden Phallus, a remarkable book about pleasure, arousal, and mindful masturbation.
Toby Johnson's 1988 article SPIRITUAL QUESTIONS IN GAY COUNSELING from The Sourcebook on Lesbian/Gay Health Care
A
Different Take on Leathersex
features an excerpt from an Interview with Alexander Renault about a
spiritual explanation for S&M, B&D, etc.
Seeing
Pornography Differently offers a very positive and enlightened way
to understand gay men's pornography.
Scroll down for more articles
Toby describes the quest to find The Great Secret
How the Great Secret underlies all religion and spirituality
What's true about Religion is the deep religious experience that belief and "faith" are intended to generate
Toby's account of the mystical experience in 1969 at Our Lady of Riverside Priory—Benedict Castle—that transformed his vision of life and God.
A Most Remarkable Synchronicity in Riverside tells Toby's only partly tongue-in-cheek story of being picked up hitchhiking by "God the Father."
How to get to heaven tells a marvelous and insightful story by French Existential playwright Jean Anouilh: the way to get to heaven is to let the other people in too.
Seeing with Different Eyes: How we human beings see the world is based more on our expectations than on what's really out there (an excerpt from In Search of God in the Sexual Underworld).
Spinning Straw into Gold tells the secret of changing consciousness to change the world (excerpted from the Introduction of Charmed Lives: Gay Spirit in Storytelling).
Eckhart's Eye is a meditation on the evocative "koan": "The eye with which I see God is the eye with which God sees me."
Teenage Prostitution and the Nature of Evil, another excerpt from In Search of God in the Sexual Underworld, recounts of Toby's discovery of spiritual wisdom in the oddest of places, the Tenderloin district of San Francisco.
God and Sex The Introduction to the book In Search of God in the Sexual Underworld about the importance of giving spiritual meaning to sex.
Rescue in the Night, another excerpt from In Search of God in the Sexual Underworld, recounts Toby's experience of trying to rescue a therapy client in the middle night--when everything goes wrong and Toby almost gets murdered.
The Life is in the Blood: Toby Johnson's Biblically-based answer to when life begins.
The Commandment "Thou shalt not steal" is not a basis for private ownership of property. The Buddhist precept "No Stealing" is about compassion for others' feelings, not property rights.
Allah Hu: "God is present here" -- a secret Toby learned from the Sufi Dancing classes in San Francisco in the 1970s.
Joseph Campbell and Ken Wilber's critique of the "Pre/Trans Fallacy": Three important themes in Campbellian thought.
In the article Sex with God, Toby Johnson describes a method for reconciling and merging sexuality and spirituality. With a nod to Jeff Kripal.
Merging Religion and Sex Toby Johnson offers a simple technique for spiritualizing and expanding sexual pleasure.
God as a Metaphor offers several salient images for thinking about God: as America, as love.
More Metaphors for God as music, as mystery, as space.
A non-personal metaphor God explains how to have a personal relationship with a non-personal God.
A Presentation (and nice summary of Toby Johnson's thought) on Psycho-Spiritual Development in LGBTQ Lives.
Fish on Friday tells of Toby Johnson's partly whimsical, partly devout practice of not eating meat on Friday in recognition of the Catholic rule of his childhood.
Scroll down for more articles
Scroll down for more articles
How Gay Souls Get Reincarnated, a cute piece, a little tongue-in-cheek, but with a profound meaning about gay identity and gay spirit.
Wallwalkers
& Gatekeepers is about the perspective of the outsider,
wall-walker who can see both sides of the wall.
Jesus
and Avalokiteshvara compares the two great World Saviors to
discover the true meaning of both.
Bonobos, Family Values, and Gay Reincarnation
The "Mobius Strip" as a topological image for gay consciousness.
C.S. Lewis describing "The Great Dance" of mystical realization.
Speculations on the phenomenon of Alien Abduction
Driving a car as spiritual practice: Driving Samadhi
Read about Toby's inspiration for where the Visitors' come from in the revised edition of Secret Matter
What are you looking for in a gay science fiction novel?
The best gay science fiction novel ever in Toby Johnson's opinion.
Some ideas for gay mythic stories
The Marian Doctrines: The Immaculate Conception and the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in historic context.
This quotation was on the wall in the Novicemaster Office. It begins: "Man was not born to have his hands lashed to the prayer-post" and ends: "There is no place for me in hell." It's a wonderful lesson. (I don't know who composed it.)
An essay celebrating growing up Catholic, with a twist: The Importance of Having a Church to Leave Interview with Henry Seale about the nature of gay spirituality, "gay separatism," and Deep Consciousness. This page is a tribute to Peter Grahame and Henry Seale (Henry passed away in February 2019).
Jesus and the Wedding Feast tells what Toby Johnson realizes what really happened with turning water into wine.
Tonglen in the Radisson Varanasi reports on Toby's strange experience of smelling smoke in a hotel in India.
The Closet of Horrors, an excerpt from The Fourth Quill about the nature of suffering; a remarkable mystical experience.
What is Truth? offers a simple test for the "truth" of religious beliefs — Do they make you a better person?
Scroll down for more articles
The San Francisco Public Library James C. Hormel Gay and Lesbian Center is a national archive for gay and lesbian history. That's where our various collections of memorabilia should be donated. Our lives are "history."
Advice to Future Gay Historians offers suggestions for how to think about and study gay life in the pre-AIDS 1970s.
Most of what Toby Johnson knows of gay history he learned from his work with Toby Marotta. Marotta has a website with historical gay political posters for sale and with an exhibit of gay liberation documents called Revisiting Stonewall.
In February 2017, ABC-TV ran a miniseries about gay liberation activity in San Francisco. It as mostly centered on the life of Cleve Jones. Toby Johnson's experience in S.F. in the 70s intersected with a numbers of the events shown. Read Intersections with the movie When We Rise
Along with Patrick McNamara, Duncan Teague, Craig Harwood, Dave Nimmons, as well as Mark Thompson, Christian de la Huerta, David Frechter, Michael Sigmann, Bo Young, Dan Vera, and others, Toby Johnson assisted with the calling of a "Gay Spirit Summit" in Spring 2004 at Garrison Institute. Read about the Gay Spirituality Summit and the "Statement of Spirituality" with Toby's commentary.
Interesting article from the 1981 West Coast Christopher Street Parade magazine by L.A. gay pioneer Jim Kepner, titled The Search for Gay Spirit. Everything he wrote about in 1981 is still current 30 years later in 2011.
Allen Ginsberg discovered a line of "Gay Succession" from Walt Whitman to himself… and beyond.
Wouldn’t You Like to Be Uranian? Toby Johnson discusses the meaning of some of the terms used for homosexuals down through history.
My first Peace March tells of Toby Johnson's memories to marching on Washington DC to "Levitate the Pentagon," Oct 21, 1967
Innocently naughty story about how Toby got the first whistle in the Castro Neighborhood Whistle Campaign
Toby Marotta's book Sons of Harvard: Gay Men from the Class of 1967 and the connection to the modern-day Gay & Lesbian Review/Worldwide
Toby Marotta's Harvard dissertation became The Politics of Homosexuality, a brilliant analysis of political, cultural, and psychological themes and dynamics in the rise of gay liberation.
About Liberty Books, the Lesbian/Gay Bookstore for Austin, 1986-1996
The Stonewall Riots, Drag Queens, and Judy Garland's Funeral.
Was I (or you) at Stonewall? The events, referred to as Stonewall, have become truly mythic.
In 1979, Toby Johnson was a "parade monitor," stationed just below the newly-inaugurated Rainbow Flags that have come to symbolize transformation
Toby's recollections of San Francisco Gay Pride Marches in the 1970s
Toby Johnson learned his gay politics from his friend and nicknamesake Toby Marotta. Please read about their important friendship.
Waves of Gay Liberation Activity from hunter/gatherers to modern gay lib.
Harry Hay: Father and Founder of the modern gay movement; his thought summarized by Will Roscoe
About Arthur Evans, gay pioneer
One of the earliest expressions of "Gay Spirituality" showed up as the book The Divine Androgyne According to Purusha. Earlier in his life as a gay cultural activist, under the name Christopher Larkin, Purusha had made the gay romantic movie A Very Natural Thing.
About Harry Hay, the New Myth, "Spiritual, not Religious," through the Gay Window -- a panel presentation for the 2012 Centennial of Hay's birth Conference at CLAGS
About the Gay Spirituality Summit in May 2004 and the "Statement of Spirituality" with Toby's commentary
About the study of teenage prostitution Toby Marotta and Toby Johnson worked in for URSA in 1978-1980
Why I accepted the job of editing/publishing White Crane Journal in 1996 — wonderful synchronicity.
About Michael Talbot and the Holographic Universe
About Guy Mannheimer and the Mann Ranch Seminars. Guy was Toby's first lover, 1972-1976.
About Esther Bell. Esther was a 90 year old woman whom Guy and Toby befriended and visited and took care of a little for 3 or 4 in the mid-70s. We used to drive her to the grocery store.
About Toby Marotta, author of The Politics of Homosexuality and Sons of Harvard: Gay Men in the Class of 1967
About David Weyrauch, San Francisco painter and artist
About Fr. Bernard Lynch, Toby & Kip's friend in London and gay Catholic saint
About Peter Savastano and The Holy Art of Bricolage and the gay project of recreating religion on our own terms.
About Richard
Baltzell, literary editor, good friend and wonderful man. He
introduced me to A Course in Miracles. And changed my life!
About Dennis
Paddie, Austin/San Antonio playwright, poet, and vagabond bon
vivant. Dennis wrote a beautiful tribute to fellow Texas playwright Sterling Houston who died November 8,
2006.
About Toby and Kip's successful long term relationship and the Wedding Cake Liberation Event in San Antonio, June 16, 2005
About Michael Stevens and Patrick Kerr in the San Antonio gay community of the 1980s.
The Alamo Business Council was a social organization of gay & lesbian professionals in San Antonio. Toby & Kip were part of the original establishment of the group.
About Ralph Walker and The Loving Brotherhood. Ralph Walker was one of the Fathers of the Gay Spirituality Movement.
About Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, creator of modern gay consciousness. The firtst man to really "come out."
Tom Nash, a San Antonio lovable "character."
Bro. Martin McMurtrey, Toby's -- very influential and life-changing -- writing teacher in high school.
Kip Dollar & Toby Johnson participated with hundreds of other couples in a "group marriage ceremony" in front of the IRS Building during the Second March on Washington in 1987.
Eva Thayer, San Antonio wise woman, (Nov 21, 1914 - May 22, 2013) has a message for children of all ages about positive self-esteem. Read about Eva's Miracles. She led a wonderful life.
Kim McKell, Toby's favorite teacher at the California Institute of Asian Studies. Kim was an accomplished painter. She created a set of Tarot cards of the Major Arcana. Here are photographs of her cards.
Adolphine Carole, Toby's occasional housemate, friend, and wonderful meditation teacher.
Clif Douglas was a cute and lovable gay man in Austin in the late 80s to mid-90s. He died of AIDS just before the drug cocktails came into use. Clif can be credited with starting the South Congress -- SoCo District -- shopping area.
24 Mandalas Hand-drawn by Geoffrey Graham is an art book displaying in small size the impressive set of drawnings of meditation-focus-style mandalas.
Toby Johnson, PhD is author of some ten books: three non-fiction books that apply the wisdom of Joseph Campbell, his teacher and "wise old man," to modern-day social and religious problems, four gay genre novels that dramatize spiritual issues at the heart of gay identity, two books on gay men's spiritualities, gay spirit, and the mystical experience of homosexuality, and an anthology which he edited with Steve Berman of gay-positive short stories.
In addition to the novels featured elsewhere in this web site, Johnson is author of IN SEARCH OF GOD IN THE SEXUAL UNDERWORLD and THE MYTH OF THE GREAT SECRET (Revised edition): AN APPRECIATION OF JOSEPH CAMPBELL.
For a more extended bio, click here. (More photos below.)
Toby Johnson and Kip Dollar have been partners since 1984. They have been advocates for and examples of successful longterm gay relationships. Toby and Kip were the first male couple registered as Domestic Partners in Texas (Austin, Travis County, Oct 11, '93). There's a write-up about them as a couple on the very extensive website on gay couples & relationships, Partners Task Force for Gay & Lesbian Couples. They were legally married on March 16, 2018 on their 34th anniversary.
(Click here for a high resolution .tif photo of Toby Johnson in B&W Or in color and For hi-res color photo of Toby Johnson & Kip Dollar by Tim Leary)
Kip Dollar
Kip and Toby have been partners since 1984. They were the first male couple to register as Domestic Partners in Texas. An account of their first 14 years together appears in Merle Yost's book on long-term gay relationships: WHEN LOVE LASTS FOREVER. They are included in Elisa Rolle's remarkable collection of over 700 gay and lesbian couples in history DAYS OF LOVE. And in Jeff Lutes' TRAILBLAZERS IN LOVE.
Kip Dollar is a professional bookkeeper and community activist. It was he who managed the financial matters of Liberty Books. He worked with numerous gay community groups and organizations in San Antonio and Austin.
He is a talented natural artist, working on paper inwatercolors, pastels, and charcoal (click on the link to see his portfolio) and in sculpture with clay. He studied pastels with protrait artist Susan Carlin and with renowned watercolorist Brad Braune. Kip is also a creator of marvelous Halloween costumes. Kip's a striking redhead.
For seven years, Toby Johnson and Kip Dollar ran Liberty Books, the lesbian and gay community bookstore in Austin. Toby and Kip sold the store to Crossroads Market in 1994. In Spring 1997, they moved to Conifer, Colorado in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains near Denver where they ran a gay B&B called The House at Peregrine's Perspective.
(While in Denver, they purchased a wonderful mantle clock, a statue by French sculptor Mathurin Moreau, titled Bucheron, i.e., the woodcutter. Bucheron was a sort of mascot for the B&B.)
In 2000, they moved back to Texas to operate a B&B called Casa Peregrino in the little artist colony/river resort town of Wimberley mid-way between San Antonio and Austin in the Texas Hill Country. And in 2003, they sold Casa Peregrino and moved back to their hometown to watch over Kip's parents. In 2009, they moved back to Austin and, in 2018, got legally married.
In 1996 Toby joined an EarthWatch expedition to videotape the spring equinox festivals in the rural village of Tigiria in eastern India. Toby returned with several "longees," the sarong-like garment the men in the area wear.
Here are Kip and Toby in the backyard in Austin, wearing the Indian longees. Toby looks like actor Ben Kingsley -- and so by extension, Mahatma Gandhi.
Toby
Johnson is past editor
of White
Crane: A Journal of Gay Wisdom & Culture Take a look at the
home page. 
Ko Imani
(Clayton
Gibson), formerly of MyOurSpirit.com, manages a Facebook group called 1,000,000
Spiritual LGBTQ People. Click on
the title to go to the page. 
Joseph Kramer is
one of
the most
important characters in the development of gay positive spiritual
thought. Through
his investigation of
Taoism and India Tantrayoga, he developed techniques for enhancing
sexual arousal (and particularly self-pleasuring) and for moving
sexual arousal into high mystical states of consciousness. He developed
The Body Electric trainings. This is one
of the most significant contributions of gay spirituality to the
evolution of religion. Kramer teaches through the Internet at The New School of
Erotic Touch.
Hunter has developed wonderful body positive
perspectives on the
spiritual life. One of his websites is titled "Embody God." (Isn't
that
the Secret? that
we really are
"God in the flesh.") "If you're reading this, you KNOW -- in the very depths of your heart -- that being "gay" or "queer" isn't just about who you're attracted to. It's not just about gender.
"Whatever we call it -- gay, bi, queer, trans, non-binary, 2spirit, walks-between -- we are a people with our own history, traditions, myths, and most importantly, gifts -- gifts that are meant not just for ourselves, but for our world.
"Throughout human history, cultures around the world have honored and cultivated the sacred gifts of people with Non-Binary Spirits, or walks-between people. Such people, referred to by contemporary First Nations Peoples as Two-Spirits, are found in every race and culture and epoch of human history. In many indigenous cultures we were recognized as children, and our gifts were cultivated over the course of a lifetime. Those of us who integrate male and female, light and darkness, immanence and transcendence in our own being, have served as bridge-people, shamans, scouts, storytellers, artists, healers, mediators and diplomats throughout human history. In modern times, we might be called gender-fluid, gender-creative, or transgender -- but our sacred calling goes far beyond our gender! Whatever our walk in life, we are called as walks-between people to overcome separation, conflict and duality, to seek peace, cooperation, and unity, and to embrace, nurture, protect and empower all that is true and beautiful and free." —Hunter Flournoy
~
The Flesh & Spirit
Community, managed by Kirk Prine and Donny Lobree,
is an intentional community of queer men based in San Francisco, who
bring enlightenment, love, liberation, healing,
knowledge, power, and
wholeness around issues of queer men's identity, spirituality, and
sexuality.
The Flesh & Spirit website offers "Conversations with the Queer
Tribe: Powerful Conversations with Queer Visionaries.
Kirk Prine has a YouTube channel with a wonderful video on the Erotic Spiritual Path.
Sal
Sapienza gave a
wonderful talk to a progressive church group in his hometown Saugatuck,
Michigan He
explains why being gay can be an occasion for spiritual insight and why
coming out is an act of anthenticity and truth telling. Watch his talk on
Vimeo. 
The
Missing Myth: A New Vision of Same-Sex
Love by Gilles Herrada is written in the context of Ken Wilber's
Integral
Approach. "With
astounding scholarship, Gilles Herrada provides a panoramic view
on the myths and mysteries of same-sex love. It will be a key work, for
sure, in the coming decades as society's understanding of LGBT people
deepens and evolves." — Mark Thompson, author of the Gay Spirit,
Gay
Soul, Gay Body
trilogy. 
OutHistory,
a website
devoted to the exploration of the
lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender past.
http://outhistory.org/
Beyond Marriage Equality:
QUEER FANTASY AND CHRISTIAN DISINFORMATION, WHAT DOES BEING GAY TODAY
MEAN? -- A very interesting article by Australian gay
theologian/New
Age thinker Rollan McCleary about gay consciousness, Christianity,
Biblical theology, astrology and mythic symbolism. McCleary comments on
a whole raft of issues from Marriage Equality to sodomy to gay
happiness and fulfillment.
Toby
Johnson,
PhD is
author of nine books: three non-fiction books that apply the wisdom of
his
teacher and "wise old man," Joseph Campbell to modern-day social and
religious problems, four gay genre novels that dramatize spiritual
issues at the heart of gay identity, and two books on gay men's
spiritualities and the mystical experience of homosexuality and editor
of a collection of "myths" of gay men's consciousness.
Johnson's book GAY SPIRITUALITY: Gay Identity and the Transformation of Human Consciousness won a Lambda Literary Award in 2000.
His GAY PERSPECTIVE: Things Our [Homo]sexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe was nominated for a Lammy in 2003. They remain in print.
FINDING YOUR OWN TRUE MYTH: What I Learned from Joseph Campbell: The Myth of the Great Secret III tells the story of Johnson's learning the real nature of religion and myth and discovering the spiritual qualities of gay male consciousness.
