My conversion was messy and dangerous. I lost friends and cultural capital. I did not lose my job because I was tenured, but I did have to go before my tenure board and explain what happened to me. That was fun. I was now despised by the people I loved, but one thing was clear—I was once God’s enemy, but now I was God’s friend. 

Editor’s Note: The following article is adapted from a transcript of Rosaria Butterfield’s speech at IFC’s Kingdom Come Conference in April of this year. Rosaria Butterfield is scheduled to return for the Kingdom Come Conference in March 2026. Learn more and make your plan to join us here.

I was converted to faith in Jesus Christ twenty-six years ago when I was a tenured associate professor of English, Women’s Studies, and Queer Theory. I was in a lesbian relationship with a woman who was an adjunct professor of psychology at a nearby university. I had been in and out of serially monogamous lesbian relationships for a decade and had been a gay rights activist for two.

I was a nineteenth-century scholar, and my courses in feminist queer theory included the study of Freud, Hegel, Marx, and Darwin. I co-authored the university’s domestic partnership policy, which served as a bellwether and frontrunner for gay marriage laws in New York. I spoke at New York gay pride rallies at the New York State Legislature. I met famous gay rights activists. I hated the Bible and its teaching, and I taught thousands of college students to do the same. 

I did all of this because I believed with my whole heart that I was gay and that gay was good. And let’s be clear, if you think I am angry, I am because I created the evil in the world that you all have to deal with. 

I know that my conversion to Christ came with the loving offense of the gospel, shared over hundreds of nourishing meals at the home of Pastor Ken Smith and his dear wife, Floyd.

After two years of meeting and feasting with Christians, reading through the Bible, and learning to sing the Psalms, I committed my life to Jesus, and I studied the covenant of church membership to prepare to take vows to join the church. I broke up with my lesbian partner, and I started to grow out my butch haircut and tried to take out all of my piercings. 

[I asked myself,] “How was Jesus going to deal with my persistent lesbian feelings and my patterns of thought, not to mention [the fact] that I was tenured in queer theory?

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