Bernard Mayes - Escaping God's Closet

Escaping God's Closet

In 2001, the University of Virginia Press published Bernard Mayes's autobiography, Escaping God's Closet: The Revelations of a Queer Priest, which won the national Lambda Literary Award in the spirituality category.

The book tells the story of Mayes's life, culminating in his renunciation of both the priesthood and of religion. After life in the U.K. during the Depression and WWII, Mayes describes his emigration to the U.S. and the founding of several influential organizations, most notably the first suicide prevention service in the U.S (still operational); the non-commercial radio station KQED-FM in San Francisco; the network NPR (National Public Radio); and The Parsonage (an Episcopal-gay think tank. Along the way he gives an account of gay life in San Francisco during the period of the Flower Children and the assassination of Harvey Milk, reporting around the United States for the BBC, and finally his academic life and work in the University of Virginia. To explain his apostasy, Mayes articulates a philosophy that regards existence as a "soup" (he later dubbed the philosophy "Soupism" in lectures and elsewhere). Mayes argues in Escaping God's Closet that the state of the universe and our planet, together with the history and working of the human body, have now been satisfactorily explained by scientific methods of observation and experience to show that all things are assembled and come into being through the unending interaction, exchange and recyclement of preexisting energy.

According to Mayes, this implies that all things are interdependent and subject to constant, endless change. Mayes's philosophy of "soup" further asserts that that there can be neither a true beginning nor a true end of existence, and that belief in supernatural forces, gods, spirits and the soul is false, being the product of human imagination. To read more about Soupism, go to http://www.soupism.net

Mayes also argues that the interdependence, interaction and endless exchange within existence necessitate a particular ethic. This ethic is derived from the further belief that love for others, egalitarian government, universal education and respect for the planet and all that live upon it are critical for the continued health, well being and survival of the human species.