Welcome to the Quack!
Welcome to the Quack!, a zine exploring the intersection of queerness and Catholicism.
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For years, I ranted to anyone who would listen about the lack of spaces by and, more importantly, for queer people of faith in the Church, spaces where we LGBTQ+ Catholics could explore, question, celebrate, and create without having to cater to non-queer people of faith.
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So often, well-intentioned platforms that talk about LGBTQ+ issues in the Catholic Church do not imagine an LGBTQ+ audience; they discuss how to minister to queer people, publish biblical interpretations that legitimize queer people, and promote testimonies that humanize queer people. The goal of such discourse is almost always to convince, to convert, to explain, to rationalize, to theologize, to justify our value and goodness to the non-queer faithful.
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So instead of continuing to rant into the void, I decided to make this zine with the aim of recasting queer people of faith as both the author and audience of our work; of building a space where our value is not contingent, where our dignity is a foregone conclusion, where our experiences are shared and not displayed, where sharing our traumas serves as more than just a means to an end.
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I believe zines (short for magazine) are a particularly apt setting for this task given that this genre has long served as an expressive outlet for marginalized communities. And within the history of the American Catholic Church itself, we can look to publications like The Catholic Worker which have championed change and forged new visions for the world and for the Church.
I hope this serves as an invitation for all queer Catholics to contribute their talents and actively shape the voice and vision of this platform.
Pax et bonum,
Brody McCurdy
Brody McCurdy (he/him)
Linguist, y'all expert, mediocre banjo player, aspiring playwright, and saver of dance floors living in the South
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Jeromiah Taylor (he/him)
A free-lance writer from Wichita, Kansas and founder of Vulnera Christi Catholic Worker
More Information
How often will the Quack! be published?
For now, I'm envisioning this being a quarterly zine with Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall issues. This may change, however depending on interest and engagement as well as personal capacity
Can I use/reprint the artwork from the Quack!
You are more than welcome to use/reprint/repost any of the artwork from the Summer 2023 issue as long as you credit the zine. Please note, this standard may change for future issues.
How do I get more involved?
Interested in taking a more active role in shaping the mission and vision of this zine? Have an idea or feedback for future issues? Send an email to thequack.qatholic@gmail.com
the Quack! as in...
A blend of “queer” and “Catholic,” forming the somewhat jarring portmanteau “quatholic” /kwæθlik/. Subtract a few letters, and add one to the end, and you get:
QU(eer) (c)A(tholi)C+K = QUACK
The irritating sound of a duck
A reference to the way “duck” is used cross-culturally and cross-linguistically to refer to queer people (e.g., “pato,” in Spanish, “duckie” and “queer duck” in English, and “feygele” in Yiddish)
A harsh, attention-grabbing sound; a sound that cannot be ignored; a sound that must be contended with
A DUKW or “Duck,” an amphibious vehicle; someone who is able to navigate and traverse two worlds (e.g., queerness and Catholicism)
A sound adjacent to laughter; an expression of joy and/or defiance in the midst of adverse conditions