Queer Theology

What was your upbringing regarding your belief in Satan or the Devil? How were you taught (or scared) growing up about the fallen angel, the demon, the serpent, Beelzebub, and the many other names? In this throwback episode, we will discover where our idea of Demon or Satan comes from and see how your beliefs or ideas about the devil line up with what scripture says. Satan in the Hebrew Bible: Numbers 22:22 Satan in the Garden of Eden as the serpent: Ezekiel 28:12-19 Where the term “fallen archangel” come from: Isaiah 14:12 Pop-cultural resources about The Devil: Inferno by Dante Aligheri Paradise Lost by John Milton The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis A few images depicting Satan Florence Baptistry mural Detail of Satan from Hans Memling’s Triptych of Earthly Vanity and Divine Salvation Devilish propaganda William Blake’s depiction of Lucifer in Paradise Lost   Resources: Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community    If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (10s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts From Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how tuning Each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hey Friends, and welcome back to Queer Theology Podcast. You know, we’ve been doing this work for a really long time and over the years we’ve amassed just a trove of episodes. And so we are gonna throw it back today to one of our favorite episodes, which is part of a larger series, which is called The Scary Things Series, scary Things You Might Have Learned in Church. (53s): And today’s episode is The Devil and His Many Names we’ve found from lots of talking to lots of folks over the years that a lot of people are really afraid of Satan and the devil and demons and have heard a lot of different things about those entities. And so we wanted to tackle them and talk about them and talk about why you might not need to find them. So scary. So thanks for tuning in and enjoy this throwback episode. Welcome to the second episode of Scary Things that You might have been taught at church. Today we are gonna be looking at Satan and I did all the research on this episode. (1m 34s): And so this episode is sort of, I’m Coplay as the host of You’re Wrong About Maintenance Space. Two of my favorite podcasts Shay has. Normally we have, we both know what we’re talking about, but I’ve, I’ve given Shay no information and I’m going to take us on a journey And I will either be very excited at how this goes or it will be a dumpster fire train wreck. So hopefully, hopefully this goes. Well, Shay, before we get started, there’s this famous quote, the greatest trick the devil, devil devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist. Do you know who said that? (2m 16s): CS Lewis from screw tape letters. That is what I thought. It is not in CS Lewis’s screw tape letters. Oh, interesting. So actually where it is most popularly, I that’s exactly what I thought so too, it’s from the Usual suspects. Kaiser Soce says it in the 1995 film, but actually it was first said in Quakerism Explains by John Wilkinson in 18 36, 1 of the artifices of Satan is to inducement to believe that he does not exist. And then a number of other people throughout the years said different versions of it. And eventually it ended up in the 1995 film, the Usual Suspects, and then it got implanted into bor and MA’s memories as being by CS Lewis. (3m 6s): So today I, I feel like there was a, there was a, like, there was an element of Yeah, Screwtape letters that is, is around that concept. If it’s not the exact quote, if I’m remembering Screwtape letters correctly, yes, There is something about also like, sort of like distracting people with church work and busyness and idleness rather than trying to like be sort of bold allegiances to the devil. So in over the course of this episode, we are going to set out to convince you that life along with the devil, but the devil does not exist. And So just sort of tip our hat. (3m 45s): Shay, what do you know about Satan devil, et cetera? Well, I think there’s two questions there, right? There’s the what was I taught? Sure. And so very much what I was taught was that Satan was a fallen angel, was Lucifer, right? That the two were the, were intertwined that Satan was definitely a like being that existed, that was personified and was an individual, right? Yeah. That it, it wasn’t a, a conglomerate that Satan was a, that’s a thing that Satan could tempt and lead people astray, but that Satan couldn’t be in more places than one. (4m 38s): So Satan could only be in a singular place, but he had minions and demons that were doing his bidding and that Satan couldn’t get inside your head, right? So if you thought, thought Satan didn’t have access to them, if you prayed silently, Satan didn’t have access to that. But if you prayed out loud, Satan could hear that. Yeah. So that was like, and that we were really like, we should definitely be afraid of Satan and demons because they were trying to tempt us and get us to stray. (5m 18s): My church didn’t really go in for the idea of like demon possession. Like that wasn’t really a thing. We didn’t really do exorcisms. I, but, but there was de there was a sense that like a demon or Satan could persuade you to do things and could even do that to Christians. Like if you weren’t, if you were backslidden at the moment. So that was definitely a huge source of fear for me. I mean like my whole childhood was like not, not only do you have to like believe, but you have to like do it really, right? (5m 59s): Yeah, Yeah, yeah. There was a lot of fear and anxiety. Yeah. Yeah. So that is all very similar to what I had learned as well. There’s different names that people have used for Satan, Satan, Lucifer, Biba, Diablos also referred to as belly, prince of Darkness, prince of demons, angel of the abyss, father of lies, accuser, adversary, evil, one destroyer slanderer and ancient serpent. And much like you, I was sort of taught that all of these different various ideas were like one person. It’s just like different, different personas or different figures, but like there was like one like ruler of like, there was like one arch villain, right? (6m 47s): And so we’re, over the course of this episode, we’re going to sort of explore where our ideas about Satan, the devil, et cetera, come from. So the Hebrew Bible, there’s a few references to Satan or Haitin. The word Satan actually only appears twice. And both times it’s in the story of Baalam, the seer who is asked by the Moabite King Bach to curse the Jews. And Is that the one with the talking donkey? Yes, I believe so because there’s a, I wish I had the longer, I wish I had the full quote pulled, but there’s a, I have a 14 page outline, so I just pulled one quote. (7m 38s): So this is like numbers 22, 22, would you read it for us? And God’s anger was kindled because he went and the angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him. Now he was riding upon his ass and his two servants were with him. Yeah. So here it’s just this adversary, right? It’s not this epic mythical creature. It’s, you know, Can I ask a question? Yeah. So is the language used for angel of the Lord an adversary? Those are two different Yeah, it’s the adversary is words. The words. Yeah. So oftentimes Satan just means adversary or accuser, right? (8m 20s): And then only twice in the Hebrew Bible. So this is like an adjective, right? Like it’s a, it’s a, a general sort of like an adversary or an accuser. And then only twice in the Hebrew Bible does Satan appear as like a specific figure. Ha Satan, like the Satan. And one is a brief reference in the book of Zacharia where the high priest is described as standing before a divine angel while Satan stands at his right to accuse him. And the other is in the Book of Job where Satan was like the, has that sort of like central role in the story as a, the well in the story of job, right? That like Satan and God sort of argue about what to do with job. (9m 4s): And the book of job is sometimes cited to support the claim that the, the Jewish view of Satan is different than the Christian view. Because in this story like Satan only inflicts suffering with God’s permission. Like Satan is very much subordinate to him and like argues with him. But like ultimately not like in Christianity where it’s viewed as this sort of like wrestling match and like God’s gonna prevail but think Satan like thinks that he is more powerful or could possibly be, right? So that is Satan in the Hebrew Bible, obviously we’re not Jewish folks But we share up some of our scripture together. (9m 49s): And so Christianity, early Christians, Catholic church, Protestantism, since then, all of that obviously like references are shared common interest or in ancient Judaism. And so some of our ideas about who Satan is or like what the devil does reference back to the the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament. I know that for me one of the things that I was taught was that the devil was the serpent in the Garden of Eden story. But if you like actually read the text of the Garden of Eden story with Adam and Eve, like it’s just a serpent, right? (10m 32s): That that that the Hebrew Bible itself isn’t making these connections from the serpent there to Satan, a sort of general accuser to Haan this specific figure. And one of the thing, one of the pla reference points for this idea that Satan, the devil, et cetera, is the serpent comes from Ezekiel 28 19 which many Christians interpret as sort of like pointing back to the devil in the garden of Eden. And so this is Ezekiel 28, 12 through 19 You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. (11m 15s): You were in Eden, the garden of God, every precious stone adorned you, cornelian, crystalite and emerald topaz, onyx and Jasper Laos, zuli, turquoise and barrel. Your settings and mountings were made of gold on the day you were created. They were prepared. You were anointed as a guardian cherub for so I ordained you, you were on the holy mount of God, you walked among the fiery stones, you were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you through your widespread trade. You were filled with violence and you sinned. So I drove you in disgrace from the mounts of God And I expelled you guardian cherub from among the fiery stones. Your heart became proud on account of your beauty and you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor. (11m 60s): So I threw you to the earth, I made a spectacle of you before kings by your many sins, a dishonest trade. You have desecrated your sanctuaries. So I made a fire come out from you and it consumed you And I reduced you to ashes on the ground in the sight of all who are watching all the nations who knew you are appalled at you. You have come to a horrible end and will be no more. Yeah. So at first blush because of you know, the serpent being there in the garden, it sounds like if you just sort of like took this on face value out of context, it might sound like this, you is the serpent or the devil, right? He’s talking about devil. And so like you the devil were there like in the garden. (12m 42s): But actually if you just back up 18 verses, eel 28 opens by saying the word of the Lord came to me, son of man stage, the ruler of tire. This is what the sovereign Lord says. And so that whole passage that you read is not directed at the devil, it’s directed at this king in at the time of Ezekiel. And like, so obviously it’s a callback to Genesis and it’s using like it’s playing with the imagery from the garden to talk about how this person is like bad. But it’s not talking about Satan, it’s talking about like an actual literal ruler. I mean, so this is like another one of those cases where like context matters both like if you like know the historical context of like what was going on at that time, but also if you just move, like scroll back up the page 18 verses, it tells you who this U is and it’s the U is not actually the devil. (13m 37s): So that’s one person. And then sometimes you might have heard Lucifer being one of the names for the devil. Do you know where that I like name comes from There. There is a, there is a passage that it’s like, And I saw Lucifer fall from heaven, but I don’t actually, yeah, Yeah, yeah. And I know it’s in the Hebrew scriptures, but I don’t actually know where it’s Good job. It comes from a certain passage in Isaiah 14, how you have fallen from the heavens, oh mourning star, son of the dawn, how you have been cut down to the earth, you who conquer the nations and Isaiah’s writing about the king of Babylon. Like again, this is like one of those things where it’s like Isaiah’s writing about the king of Babylon, but some Christians are like, no, actually this is the devil one. (14m 22s): It’s like very clearly not. And the person who was addressed as oh morning star is a reference to the planet of Venus, which at the time was like thought of as a, looked like a star and sometimes was called a star. And the Romans called Venus Lucifer, which means light bringer. And so that is how we got that because in the King James version it reads, oh, how are you falling from having Lucifer son of the morning? How you are cut down to the ground. So look at you Shay put that seminary degree to work. So that is a brief history of both like the actual appearances of the word Satan ha and has Satan in the Hebrew Bible and some of our misguided ideas about where Satan does or does not show up in making Hebrew scriptures. (15m 14s): And now let’s turn to the devil in the New Testament. What do you know about the devil showing up in the New Testament? Well, some folks have said that the devil shows up in the gospel of Luke when Jesus is in the wilderness, there are references right? To people being possessed that I think that’s where we get some of the Beelzebub stuff. And Jesus is like, and they accused Jesus of possessing people and he is like, that’s ridiculous. (15m 56s): House divided against itself cannot stand. And then I’m sure Paul makes some kind of references though, probably not as many as we think. And then I would assume that a lot of it comes from the book of Revelation. Great, great, great, great. So the word like the devil as opposed to like Satan is kind comes from Satan and Hasan from the keeper Bible, the devil comes from the Greek word diablos, which just gets translated as devil. That word appears 36 times in the Christian scriptures. (16m 38s): It’s usually about the devil, but it’s not always in first Timothy three 11 Diablos is translated as slanders. And in second Timothy three, three it’s translated as false accusers. And in both of those passage us, it’s like definitely talking about groups of humans, not actual like, not like a mythical devil. So like it’s again this, like this word has some nuanced meaning of an archetypal sort of evil figure and also just like literal people doing bad stuff, right? Like you, you are right. (17m 19s): Like it’s also de is also used in both Matthew and Luke when Jesus is in the wilderness. And then there’s also these like demons, right? That like are possessed by by that, that Jesus encounters. And I think like that’s really interesting because in Mark 15, in mark five, the collective name of the demons being driven out by Jesus’s actually Legion, which, And when we do our series on Mark, I got, I have a whole thing on the garrison demonic and the herd of pigs and it’s gonna be juicy. So stay tuned for that. (18m 0s): Yeah. And so some foreshadowing here that like yes, demon, but legion is also very clearly a nod to the Roman army and the Roman occupiers, right? And so this is one of those moments where you sort of are mixing political and religious language and using metaphor because like you can’t say we should drive out the Roman army, but but you can, you can drive out this like spiritual demon and it’s, but it’s not saying that our faith should not be political, it should only be spiritual. But that like we use spiritual metaphors to make political claims, which I’m so excited for your series, our series on Mark coming up next month. (18m 50s): But so this is another, another one of those moments where like there we, my my childhood Sunday school imagination of all of the demons that Jesus drove out, it was like literal demons that were sent from the devil. And the idea that it could actually be a very blatant political metaphor was like, like was never, was, never taught to me. But now looking at it, it’s like, oh, that’s definitely what this, what this is what’s happening here Happen. And it’s, it’s also a bit like, you know, our conversations about original sin, right? That it’s that we are born into systems that are unjust and like there is a, there is an element of this demon possession of like systems that we are a part of Yes. (19m 43s): That get into our heads Yes. That we have to fight against that, but that aren’t like literal demons that are but are systems. Yeah. But that have spiritual impact, right? I think that that’s important. Yeah. And I think it, this is a, a tricky part or like a a a complicated part to name, but it feels important that Jesus’ death in John’s gospel was sort of attributed to the Jews who can never attribute salvation because they are children of their true father, the devil in some translations is how it is put. And so like we just like need to name that like some parts of the Christian writings are like super anti-Semitic and Especially the gospel of John. (20m 34s): So like, let me just have a yeah. Rant about the gospel of John. It is not surprising to me that evangelical’s favorite gospel is the gospel of John. It is the latest of all of the gospels written though they will tell you that it’s the first that is incorrect. It’s the most theological and it’s the most antisemitic. And I think that like those three things are important. They’re intertwined and it’s like why evangelicals love the gospel of John. Yes. And I’m sure, And I do not, I’m sure we will get into Mark versus the other gospels next month. And then also, I believe it’s in May, we’re doing a whole month long series with rabbis and Jewish leaders and content creators, which we’ve already recorded some of them and it’s so good. (21m 25s): And a few of them sort of touch upon antisemitism within Christianity and what to do about that. So stay tuned. But one of the places that the devil quote unquote shows up is John accusing the Jews, the Jews of being children of the devil. And so last week we reference, we, I think I referenced the Carmen of the Carmen song about the the Champion. I’m, I’m also, I’m really sorry to anyone who wasn’t familiar with Carmen and who then watched that and or Googled Carmen and watched any of his other videos. (22m 5s): Just, I’m sorry. But so I think that on behalf of, I think that Carmen’s song sort of like symbolizes is indicative of an idea that Christian, some Christians, many Christians our childhood, but the adulthoods of lots of Christians have about sort of like what’s going on with God slash Jesus and the devil. And so can you sort of like summarize how the devil and God slash Jesus are sort of like, how do those relate to those figures? These like big archetypical figures like relate to each other cosmically? Yeah, I mean there’s this idea that like God and Satan are in a battle for the souls of people that Jesus’ death is the thing that will eventually put down Satan, but that like Satan is allowed to run rampant in the world. (22m 57s): And then also when, you know, we talked last week about the end times when the rapture and the end times come, Satan will be given even more power until finally Satan is bound and thrown into a pit for a thousand years and we have peace, but then Satan comes back again and then it’s Armageddon I think, and then, and then we like really get rid of Satan forever. But the, you know, the Carmen video was very much about like this boxing match almost between Jesus and Satan. So this idea that like Satan has a lot of power, but also that like, that’s with God’s permission, which always seemed a little sketchy to me now seems a real sketch. (23m 45s): And I do think, I think this is also another moment to say that I think so much of our conception of Satan comes from Christian pop culture. Like I’m thinking of Carmen right now, I’m thinking of Frank Pereti and all of his this present darkness books I’m thinking of, you know, the left Behind series. Yeah. Like all of these things that are like presumably amusing air quotes like based on scripture, but like aren’t Yeah, they’re, they’re just not. Yeah. So I think this idea of like the boxing match gets, gets pulled from, so in acts of the apostles, Luke makes the claim that even like Hades or shale, which we will get into next week when we talk about conceptions of hell could not hold the crucified Christ. (24m 35s): And in one Peter it says that Jesus made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits who disobeyed long ago. And also the gospel is preached even to those who are now dead. And so like by the second century, the church was sort of like starting to fill in the details of like what was going on between Good Friday when Jesus was crucified and Easter Sunday when he was resurrected and like, what about all of the righteous people of the past? Like what happens to ’em and how could they be saved if they had like, never had an opportunity to know Jesus? And so that’s where this idea came started to generate that like Jesus descended into hell and sort of like battled for the souls of the ones of the righteous down there. (25m 24s): And this is something that perhaps we’ll get into next week that we talk a little bit about in our workshop. You know, like why did Jesus die? Sort of different like theories of atonement, but like Christ is Victor, right? This idea that like Jesus like went down to hell to like bust us all out and had this, had this fight. Like I actually really love, it’s that idea of Christus Victor is like much older than Latino, substitutionary a atonement, which is basically like Jesus, we we’re supposed to be punished and slaughtered. Jesus stands in our place and Jesus got punished and slaughtered instead of us. And so like he’s our punishment substitute. And so the Chris’ Victor idea of like Jesus going and waging war on our behalf is to, to break it out is is older than penal substitutionary atonement. (26m 12s): And I kind of like, but also like, like this boxing match is maybe taking it a little to the extreme. And then when we get to Jude and Revelation, that’s where we really get to start to see these sort of like epic mythic i ideas about the devil that like maybe aren’t about the devil at all actually, but also a lot of our sort of like popular imagination of the devil gets pulled from stories and revelation. I know Shay you, I think you’re familiar with Revelation. Could you talk a little bit about Revelation? (26m 52s): Well, I mean it’s weird, right? Like, you know, there’s seven headed beasts rising. There’s a horror of Babylon, there’s Satan, there’s like the four horsemen. There’s Jesus riding in, there’s bloodshed like massive bloodshed up to like the bellies of horses, right? There’s all of this stuff and then we get at the end kind of a new, a new Jerusalem. And I think that like a lot of our conceptions both about the end times about what eternity will be like and about Satan all come from this text that is very much, it’s not a fortune, it’s not, it’s not a fortune telling text, right? (27m 42s): Yeah. And, and so like, but I think that we have this conception that, that this is a, this is a text that tells us what’s gonna happen in the future. That none of these things have happened yet, but they are like signs and way points that if we just watch Will will experience we’ll, we’ll see what what we’re gonna get. Yeah. So all the stuff that we’ve talked about thus far are a bunch of like scattered references from across lots of different books. The Serpent in the Creation story, these like metaphors talking about the king of tire, about like the Babylonian kings, about Ha Satan, about the Roman Empire, all this like weird mythical stuff that’s a lot of like allegory in in ju revelation. (28m 30s): And so it’s really easy for us to then like look at all of these like quote unquote like bad people, especially like when we’ve been told by people in power, like, oh, these are all the same person, but like that’s like not actually what the text says. The text never actually makes those connections. And so for all of the homophobic, transphobic, fundamentalist conservative Christians in our comments talking about how we’re doing like is of Jesus, which is like a, just like a doomed like fratty way of saying like, I don’t, I disagree with you, but trying to like make, use the language of academia to disagree is like reading your own sort of like interpretation into the text and sort of like making the Bible say quote unquote, like making the Bible say what you want it to say. (29m 19s): But really in order to connect all of these people, like the angel that gets in the way, like the adversary that gets in the way of the angel of the Lord in numbers Hasan who accuses a high priest in Zacharia like the Diablos who tempts Jesus in the wilderness. Like those are all three different characters and you have to decide, you have to decide to connect those if. And so I think like one of the points to note, right, is that like, well, where do these ideas come from? And I think like when we think about like what scripture it is and is doing, it’s sort of like the story like of the people of God trying to make sense of themselves and their place in the world and their relationship to God. (30m 6s): And like this there, it’s this like big looming question of like, why do bad things happen and like what motivates bad people? And so I think that that’s sometimes why we use these like metaphors to describe, you know, like the king of ti the king of Babylon. ’cause it’s like you’re, it’s just like what you’re doing is so terrible. Like it’s hard to imagine that like you’re still human, right? Or like to show my own like modern bias is like Donald Trump, right? Like how are you And I part of the same human family? Like there must be, it’s just like too, too big of words, you know? And so these are the ways that which Judaism and Christianity have sort of like wrestled with why you bad things happen. (30m 49s): You know, in Greek and Roman mythology there’s like a pan of gods like Buddhism, Hinduism, like various other religions sort of all get at the existence of bad things in their own way. But obviously that’s beyond the scope of this podcast. And so like I wanna share to sort of call back to maintenance phase, and you’re wrong about is like, one of the things that Michael Hobbes often says on maintenance phase is like specifically around like fat phobia and medical quote unquote, like medical science and stuff like that is what ideas are we already willing to believe and what biases allow us to take shortcuts and see things that aren’t really there and to not even bother to dig beneath the surface to see if there’s any evidence to support that claim. (31m 43s): And I think like while bad things happen, and so like these are the sort of our ideas about Satan and then evil, I think for many of us are sort of the biases that we come to and the things that we’re just sort of like unquestionably like willing to believe. And so this is I hope, an opportunity to begin to scratch beneath the surface a little bit and see like, is there actually evidence there? And when it comes to like biblical support, like there’s really not much evidence to support our ideas about Satan. We’re almost getting done. (32m 24s): I I do wanna say, yeah, you know, I, I think also the idea of Satan is really easy, right? It’s, And I, I think it’s especially why it, the idea of Satan is really appealing to evangelicals because it gives you this external force to blame things on, right? And so the this idea that, well, it’s Satan’s fault, like I can’t tell you how many times I heard that as a kid or you know, even this idea, even this idea in popular culture like the devil made me do it, right? It’s, it’s this idea of us being able to put off our own guilt and responsibility for things onto this other being that we can then blame and say, well, you know, not only like could we not help it, but also this like super, super powerful being did this to us or did this in the world or is causing these things. (33m 21s): And like when you take away the ability to do that, you’re faced with the fact that like, oh no, like sometimes I do really shitty things. Yeah. And that wasn’t Satan, like that was just me. And I have to like own up to that and make amends for that. And like that is much more challenging to both face emotionally, but also to like move through the world knowing that you are responsible for your own actions that you can’t blame some mythical being Ugh. Yeah, exactly. And so I think like as you’ve, as we’ve explored thus far, these ideas of sage and the devil that we sort of think of aren’t coming from the Bible necessarily. (34m 5s): And so where are they coming from? Shaa, like you made reference, like a lot of it’s coming from pop culture And I think it, it like comes a lot of, comes from modern pop culture that we’re just sort of all swimming around in. And I think our modern pop culture rather than actually drawing from the Bible draws a lot on medieval paintings and like medieval and colonial era literature, like the big ones are Inferno by Dante Paradise, Lost by John Milton and the Canterbury Tales by Jeffrey Chauser. And then more modern theologians like CS Lewis pull upon a lot of that to sort like make their case. (34m 44s): And then like that gets trickled down to us. It’s like, reminds me of that scene in the Devil Wears Prada where she’s got like the two different types of blue and it’s like, oh, you think you’re making a choice, but it’s like it’s not actually coming. The the origin isn’t the, the bible, the origin is like this medieval literature and paintings and they sort of like get money laundered down through the millennia and then like, then it gets presented to us as like it was a game of telephone. It was coming from the Bible. And so we just, I feel like we can’t talk about the, the devil without talking about screw tape, the Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis or just so, so big in the popular imagination. (35m 25s): And so in letter 22, toward the end of the letter screw tape goes through a transformation and it’s literally from Paradise Lost. Shay, can you, can you read it out? We will make the whole universe a noise in the end. We have already made great strides in this direction as regards to the earth. The melodies and silences of heaven will be shouted down in the end. But I admit we are not yet loud enough or anything like it. Research is in progress. Meanwhile you disgusting little here, the manuscript breaks off and is resumed in a different hand in the heat of composition. (36m 8s): I find that I have in inadvertently allowed myself to assume the form of a large centipede. I’m accordingly dictating the rest to my secretary. Now that the transformation is complete, I recognize it as a periodical phenomenon. Some rumor of it has reached the humans and distorted account of it appears in the poet Milton with the ridiculous edition that such changes of shape are a punishment imposed on us by the enemy. And I just like, I read this And I was like, I can’t believe I used to like think the CS Lewis was this like titan of faith, but he is like, oh, let me like, I don’t know, copy John Milton’s Paradise lock. (36m 49s): It’s also, it’s also very kafkaesque, right? With guy waking up as a cockroach. Like it, it feels very derivative of that as well. I don’t know what the timing is on that, but Yeah, I dunno either. But I also thought of Kafka and that and that as well. And also just like it reminds me that like it’s, yeah, CS Lewis is all sort of the Chronicles of Narnia. There’s something very sort of like juvenile about this whole story. And so it’s just sort of like CS Lewis not is like sort of like tipping his hand to like a lot of his ideas about Satan are coming not from the Bible but from John Milton and Paradise Laws. I’m like, yes, he’s critiquing it, but like you, he is also sort of like very much informed by it. (37m 31s): And so I just like want to go on a journey of representations of of the devil. We’ll put a link to all of these in the show notes for this episode, which you can find at Queer Theology dot com slash 4 2 4. Shay, can you describe to me what you are seeing? This is a mural by Florence and from the Florence Baptistry in 1260 by Kapo de Markal. We’ve got a horned being a naked horned male being with a, oh yeah, you could see his penis Half, Yes, half, half in and out of his mouth. (38m 22s): There’s like a two-headed snake coming out of his ears and he’s also maybe sitting on a two-headed snake, unclear if that’s part of his body or if he’s sitting on it. And all of the snakes are are eating the peoples. Yeah, it’s wild. And then I’m gonna send you another one Again. We’ve got a like partially horned but also maybe just funky ears, some fur on the face of this one, but also a face in the stomach area, talons on the feet, which are like standing on and gripping a human. (39m 6s): But then it’s also in like a, a mouth of a serpent like oh yeah. Faced guy Yeah. Is standing on a human and all of them are in the mouth of a, of a serpent. And then there’s a banner that says like inferno redemption, something else above, above the fuz fuzzy faced guy. Yeah. So this is some like medieval era imaginations of the devil. And then in the like 15 hundreds we start getting some propaganda that sort of like mixes the devil with some propagated What, what was going on sort of around the 15 hundreds. (40m 4s): I was homeschooled, my history is not great. You, you’re gonna have to help me out. Okay, so around then as the like church of as like the reformation was happening. Oh yes, We started to get some, some, some anti-Catholic propaganda. I wish you could see shade’s face right now. I don’t even know how to describe this. It’s like a, it’s a bird looking thing is the Satan figure, but like playing bagpipes that are made out of the pope’s head, I’m assuming, I’m assuming that’s a pope. (40m 47s): Yeah, well the pope or a mon priest. Yeah, something like that. That’s Excellent. Yeah. The the, like the Catholic church in this depiction is like a literal instrument of Satan, right? And so good times, good times. And so then we start to move on to a more like enlightened devil. You know, this is like where like John Milton sort of like a more complex portrait of Lucifer in the Paradise Lost. And so here’s like some enlightenment era. It’s like very much ripped eight pack white dude with arms up raised, right? (41m 37s): Like very human looking kind of ideal body type, ideal quote, unquote. Yeah. As, as, as Michael Hobbs would say, there’s just like a marketably attractive like the, the the type of body that you use to sell like shaving cream, right? Yes. And that also, this is William Blake’s depiction of Lucifer in Paradise Lost, like rallying his rebel angels from 1808. Like, he’s like, he’s, you know, he could be an Insta, right? Like he’s very fu attractive. And so I think like you, it’s really this progression. If you go to the, to, to the show notes of this episode, again, Queer Theology dot com slash 4 24, you’ll see like there’s real progression from like totally wild out there in the 12 hundreds. (42m 31s): And it starts to get more and more like we understand the devil today from going from this sort of like wild colors horns to this more sort of like fiery version to then this like version that is associated with like political enemies. And then finally to this sort of like cunning smart shapeshifting and can’t take any form, like sort of enlightened the devil. And I, I think about like other like really recent pop culture where it’s like Satan in a business suit, right? Like he’s a businessman with like a rich tailored suit and fancy cars and yeah. (43m 14s): Moves through skyscrapers, right? Like we’ve, that progression just keeps on going. Yeah. And so this is a little bit of for so, so Shea, I guess like what do we, what do we do with all of this that we’ve covered sort of like, okay, like, so this is like the history of Satan. This is like Satan in the Hebrew Bible, this is Diablo and the Christian Bible. This is sort of like our popular pop culture conceptions and where it all comes from, like, so cool, like now I’ve got all this data, right? Like what does this mean for us as like modern people at faith, sort of like going about our lives and our spiritualities? (43m 57s): Well, I mean, I think it’s really important. I I think this is why it’s so important to know your history, right? To understand how these different conceptions got passed down, where they came from, And I, and like what we talked about in the deconstruction series, like this is a moment to like hold each card up to the light and see what stands right? And to, and to also, like you said, instead of looking at Satan and the devil as like a full deck of cards, right? We have to look at these different cards are not necessarily connected, so we have to pull them apart. (44m 42s): And then I think it’s also about thinking through, okay, what purpose did each of these different ideas serve in their individual forms, right? Like, what was the author of Job trying to say? What is, you know, the book of the author of Revelation trying to say and do What was Milton and CS Lewis trying to do, right? Like, these are all, people are writing things because they’re trying to make a point. And I think we can examine what’s underneath the point and figure out if, if that holds for us without having to like believe in a conception of Satan in a boxing match with Jesus, right? (45m 32s): I, And I do think that this is a moment to say this package deal that we’ve been sold about Satan in our, specifically in our evangelical churches, but in other churches as well that was used to like scare us into towing the line is like not something that we have to be afraid of. Yeah. And just like, you know, I now, I can’t remember if it was on the podcast or inside of Sanctuary Collective, but talking about like original sin, right? As this package that I was taught that I, I ultimately found like mostly unsupported by scripture and kind of like uncompelling, but then sort of came back around to like, oh, but there are ways to understand original sin that do make sense. (46m 16s): Like systemic injustice. Systemic racism. Like, oh yeah, like this thing that happened before I was born that I had no control over, but that like, even at the moment of my birth, like impacted me and that I impacted and that like, while I didn’t like create it back in the day, I sort of end up with the responsibility to do something about it. I’m like, oh yeah, like that does work. And so you don’t have, like, this is a little bit of like what, when you were saying shit like examining each card and like what’s underneath it and like what are they trying to get at? And like finding, looking at the ways in which what they’re trying to get at is like antisemitism. Like maybe you wanna discard that deck, that card. (46m 57s): But there there are some things like what do we do with evil and where does it come from and how do we resist it? And there probably are some really powerful ideas in there. And then how does that affect your theology? And so to sort of underline that sort of thought right there, and to close us out, I’m gonna share a portion of a quote from Desmond Tutu’s book Made For Goodness, which he wrote in 2010, which I read, and it, it blew my mind. And it’s a longer quote that I, I think I’m gonna save part of either for the hell episode or for the eternal damnation episode. But, but I will start it. And so we’ll stop to keep looking to the series to find out the rest of the rest of this passage. (47m 39s): But this is from Desmond Tutu’s Meg for goodness, God’s Pursuit of the Sinner is a risky gamble, but it is not a futile one. God is no fool. God would not risk everything on a gamble that was doomed to fail. In fact, the early Christian theologian origin would maintain that the odds are in God’s favor and time is on God’s side. Origin believed that God’s love is so irresistible that heaven will ultimately win us all. He scandalized even his contemporaries by asserting that at the end of time, even Satan would abandon hell to worship God in heaven. And so I just love this idea of like even Satan, this medieval that there’s, there’s room in like God’s transformative love for all of us, but not that we, not that we get to stay in our prejudices and evil, that it transforms us, but that, like I think about, you know, in Sanctuary Collective recently someone was talking about like, well, what do we do about like, people who do really awful things, or I think about like, you know, Donald Trump or you know Fred Phelps, sort of like these people that are devils of our time. (48m 44s): And I think the question of what happens to the devil? What happens to the people who do really bad things? What happens to you and me? What happens to people who don’t pray to, to pray to God and accept Jesus? All of these questions are things that we will be addressing in hell and in eternal damnation. So stay tuned. The Queer Theology Podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for L-G-B-T-Q Christians and straight cisgender supporters. To dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. (49m 25s): Marketing is hard, but I’ll tell you a little secret. It doesn’t have to be, let me point something out. You’re listening to a podcast right now and it’s great. You love the host, you seek it out and download it. You listen to it while driving, working out, cooking, even going to the bathroom. Podcasts are a pretty close companion and this is a podcast ad. Did I get your attention? You can reach great listeners like yourself with podcast advertising from Libsyn ads. Choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a preproduced ad like this one across thousands of shows. 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We are queering the whole chapter of Isaiah 58 in this week’s episode. There is so much in this chapter, especially when we look at themes of justice, community, and personal reflection. It’s especially interesting to look at how this chapter resonated with our younger selves and how we view it today. There is emphasis on the importance of treating marginalized individuals with care and the communal nature of faith. We feel called in this chapter to foster growth and imagination, focusing on our own unique gifts that come with queerness.  Takeaways Isaiah 58 calls for justice and community care. Personal faith should reflect how we treat others. Communal restoration is a key aspect of faith. Revisiting scripture can lead to personal growth. Navigating privilege is essential in faith discussions. Sabbath is a time for rest and reflection. Imagining a better world is crucial for progress. Articulating a collective dream is necessary for change. Community support is vital for individual growth. Engagement with scripture fosters deeper understanding.   Chapters (02:59) Personal Reflections on Faith and Justice (06:02) The Communal Nature of Faith (09:12) Revisiting Scripture: Growth and Reflection (12:07) Navigating Privilege and Safety (14:49) The Importance of Sabbath and Rest (18:04) Imagining a Better World (21:03) Articulating Our Collective Dream (24:00) Conclusion: Community and Next Steps   Resources: Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community  If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts From Genesis to Revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tune in each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. (2m 49s): Hello, Hello, Hello and welcome back to the Queer Theology Podcast. Today we’re gonna go back to our roots yet again, and we’re gonna queer a passage from scripture. Today we’re gonna be looking at Isaiah 58, the whole chapter. Shay’s gonna read it for us in just a moment from the common English Bible. If you would like to pull up your Bible and read along, we would love to have you otherwise. Here is Isaiah 58. Shout loudly. Don’t hold back. Raise your voice like a trumpet. Announce to my people, their crime, the house of Jacob, their sins. They seek me day after day, desiring knowledge of my ways, like a nation that acted righteously, that didn’t abandon their God. They ask me for righteous judgements, wanting to be close to God. (3m 30s): Why do we fast? And you don’t see why afflict ourselves, and you don’t notice yet on your fast day, you do whatever you want and oppress all your workers. You quarrel and brawl, and then you fast. You hit each other violently with your fists. You shouldn’t fast as you’re doing today. If you wanna make your voice heard on high. Is this the kind of fast I choose? A day of self affliction, of bending one’s head, like a read and of lying down in morning clothing and ashes? Is this what you call a fast day acceptable to the Lord? Isn’t this the fast I choose? Releasing wicked restraints and tying the ropes of a yolk, setting free the mistreated and breaking every yolk, isn’t it sharing your bread with the hungry and bringing the homeless poor into your house, covering the naked. (4m 14s): When you see them and not hiding them and not hiding from your own family, then your light will break out like the dawn and you’ll be healed quickly. Your own righteousness will walk before you and the Lord’s glory will be your rear guard. Then you’ll call and the Lord will answer. You’ll cry for help. And God will say, I’m here. If you remove the yoke from among you, the finger pointing, the wicked speech, if you open your heart to the hungry and provide abundantly for those who are afflicted, your light will shine in the darkness and your gloom will be like the no. The Lord will continually, the Lord will guide you continually and provide for you even in parched places. He will rescue your bones. You’ll be like a watered garden, like a spring of water that won’t run dry. (4m 57s): They will rebuild ancient ruins on your account and foundations of generations past. You’ll restore, you’ll be called mender of broken walls, restore of lable streets. If you stop trampling the Sabbath, stop doing whatever you want on my holy day and consider the Sabbath of the Lord honored and honor it. Instead of doing things your way, seeking what you want and doing business as usual, then you will take delight in the Lord. I will let you ride on the heights of the earth. I’ll sustain you with the heritage of your ancestor, Jacob. The mouth of the Lord has spoken. Oh, amen. This is the word of the Lord. (5m 38s): Oh, I love this passage. Yeah, it really brings me back this passage, or at least part of this passage, my first or second year in New York City. I observed lent for the first time, and every day on my lunch break, I would sneak away from my office job in my cubicle, And I would go to a nearby church And I would sit in the back pew. It was like it was open to the public, but like there weren’t services happening. And I would read the psalms and the prophets And I, I think that I like almost every day read a portion of this passage, if not the whole passage. And like the, is this, isn’t this the fast I chose releasing wicked restraints, untying the ropes of a yoke, setting free, mistreated, and breaking every yoke. (6m 20s): I would read at least that if not the whole passage, like every, every day. ’cause you know, lunch is a fasting holiday, I guess you would call a holiday. And so like, sort of like recentering, like this is the type of fast, right? And I remember being like, I was relatively newly out. I’d probably been out for, I don’t know, four or five years, And I was recently outta college And I was just sort of like, oh, it’s like so freaking hard to be queer and everyone is against us and the church misunderstands us and they’re focused on all of the wrong things and like, this is what we should care, But we should care about justice. And I remember being like, I am one of the oppressed and like God wants the yoke of my oppression to be broken. (7m 5s): And I do also remember being like, And I get to partner in other types of justice work to break other types of oppression. But like that the church, the church quote unquote, like writ large was sort of like missing the mark. And so I remember being really inspired by this and, and, but like sort of like schooled by a, like a righteous indignation sort of away. So I, this like really takes me back And I’m, it’s interesting now all these years later to see things I didn’t quite catch the first time around. Yeah. I, I love, I love this passage. I mean, the first part I like, the first response is always I read this And I’m like, are are evangelicals just like not reading scripture? (7m 49s): Like I don’t understand because I think about like how my church growing up would’ve interpreted this passage and it would’ve been, I mean, a, a shit show, but like Right, It, it would’ve been like, well then you just need, you’re, you’re doing too much on Sunday, right? That is the message that they would read, they would take out of this passage of like, you have to like honor the quote unquote Sabbath better and like, Go to Church more, which is like the total opposite of what this passage is saying, which is like, part of what you’re doing wrong is you’re like being a dick on the like the most holy day. (8m 30s): So like, get it together. But I’m, I’m so struck by how, once again, like how communal these, these prophetic texts are and how, and so many of the texts and scripture, like it’s not about me and my personal relationship with the divine. It’s like how am I treating my, am I treating the most marginalized in the mi in my, how am I treating people who are and who are without housing? And like that is the measure by which my and my religiosity. (9m 13s): Like that’s, that’s the yardstick, right? It’s not about like, did I fast and do my quiet time and go to church? It’s like how am I treating the people around me? And I think that this is such, also such a, one of my favorite parts of this, of this whole passage is, is verse 12, which is you’ll be called member of broken walls and restore of liberal of livable streets. And like this idea that for folks that are following in this way of justice, that like we will be the ones that will restore our communities, right? (9m 56s): It’s, it’s not just this sense of, I don’t know, personal piety. It’s this beautiful sense of communal restoration. And, And I think about like, we see this echoed in the Christian scriptures of like, they will know you are Christians by your love, which is so, it’s such a trite thing now. And now of course there are like tons of people who are saying yes. And the way that I tell people I love them is like by telling them their lives are sinful and that they’re like gonna, hell yeah. Right? And it’s, but it’s like no, like where, where is, where is the actionable good and care of community in the way that you’re living? (10m 38s): And, and this idea of restore of livable streets and member of walls in like, I I’m sure that you see this in the urban spaces that you’re living in. I see it in the rural spaces that I live in. Houses that are falling down streets that are, are in disarray. Like what does it look like to show up in a community and help rebuild and in and rebuild in a like life giving way, not in a gentrifying pricing out the poor people kind of way. Yeah. This is like, this is really taking me on a trip to memory lane. (11m 20s): This is why I love revisiting passage us of scripture over and over again throughout the years that like to, to read this passage that was so that I read in sort of the early days of my like queer, progressive faith life. Probably like the midpoint of my actual life, but like the early days of like my queer faith life and then to just come back to it now. Well, I’m old like, I don’t know, 15 years later, right? Like I think that if I was reflecting back on like my adult life since, since when I first like observed that for the first time, I think I would be like, oh, I think that there’s sort of like a solid core through line of my faith that has stayed like largely the same. (12m 1s): Like it definitely shifted a lot from when I was an evangelical to an adult. But like there then I sort of like settled into like, I’m a queer person of faith. I’m justice oriented. And like that has sort of like been consistent and the particularities of that maybe have changed in one, in one big way obviously, but like in general it feels like fairly consistent. And also I’m looking back and realizing that that’s like maybe not true. That I, maybe I like didn’t realize the ways in which my faith has shifted over time. ’cause I’m just like taken back to tho those pews and like, I really needed like the, the faith that sort of like got me free from oppression was like this, like righteous indignation. (12m 44s): They’re doing it wrong, tear it all down. Like I am seeing clearly I’m the oppressed. Like this is comfort to me. And in many ways that’s just like, that’s still true. But I think over the years I’ve, I’ve also began as I’ve become more certain in my faith as I become less and then not at all scared of God, I am more and more able to see conviction of myself in scripture and like, not in a shame inducing way, but just sort of a like calling me to a higher and better version of myself in a, a more inclusive and just community that we could be a part of. (13m 25s): So like, And I begin to shift from always having to be the victim in the story to sometimes maybe I can be the one that’s being challenged. And And I think that that then has like obviously like it’s good to be less shitty for the people who were, you were, who were, who were like maybe being shitty too, or it’s good to, you know, confront white supremacy for like, because of the targets of white supremacy. But, and also like in doing so, it like enriches my own life. And so like as I’ve been able to gently with my speech, I myself, but also allow my faith to convict me and not only not always comfort me, that also sort of paradoxically has enriched my faith and like then comforted me some more in the end. (14m 16s): So like that’s like one thing that I’m noticing that like, I think that I really needed to heal from being scared of God in order to see conviction in scripture, but like as I’ve done so it sort of does made my vision for like the way that the world could be even bigger. And, and then I, there’s like something about this like sabbath that I had had not noticed and that I’m noticing in a different way. Like perhaps unsurprisingly now that I’m Jewish, which I can talk more about, but I I that feels like a separate thought. So I’ll I’ll pause for now. Yeah, I I think that that’s like so, so important that there’s, there’s a nuance here, right? Because like queer and trans folks are marginalized and oppressed and especially like in the US as we’re recording this, like, it’s, it’s a scary time. (15m 4s): And, and also like I, something that I’ve been wrestling with a lot myself lately is that like as someone who is white and male presenting and like moves through the world with certain amounts of passing privilege, right? That there is, there are ways in which it’s not always, I have to, I have to be careful that I’m not always claiming safety when or claiming to be unsafe when in reality like I’m just uncomfortable and like, where are the lines in which I’m actually not at risk And I should be standing up or I should be putting myself on the line. (15m 47s): And like, where are the ways in which, no, this is actually an unsafe setting. And so like blending in or like choosing to be silent in that moment, like is, is a matter of, of safety and like, and how do I, how do I discern the difference and how do I like get, how do I even get comfortable being uncomfortable and, and potentially being unsafe when my safety is not the most important in a, in a particular room that I might be in. And I think that like, that has also been one of my journeys with scripture of like, where are the places, like you were saying, where I need to take comfort from the text, where I need to feel held, where I need to feel like God is on my side and, and gonna smite my enemies. (16m 40s): And where the places where like I need to maybe be smoking, right? Like not, not in a, not in a giant way, but in a, like a kick in the ass. Get yourself in gear, be a better achievement kind of way. And I, And I think that like there is right, that that’s like complicated. It’s not, there are no all of the time or easy answers. And I think that part of that is like growing in our faith and our maturity and our, both of our reading, but also our, our living And like you like, that is one of the reasons that I love revisiting texts and continuing to engage and to wrestle with and to grapple with scripture and tradition and community because like that is where growth happens Falls here. (17m 30s): And for me that means comfort meals, cozy nights and tailgating weekends and Omaha steaks makes it all easy. I love having their premium steaks and juicy burgers ready in my freezer. I recently grilled their filet mignon so tender, flavorful, and better than anything I’ve had elsewhere. Right now during their red hot sale, you get 50% off sitewide plus get an extra $35 off with code flavor at checkout, get fired up for fall grilling with Omaha steaks, visit omaha steaks.com for 50% off Sitewide during their red hot sale event. And for an extra $35 off use promo code flavor at checkout, that’s 50% off@omahasteaks.com and an extra $35 off with promo code flavor at checkout. (18m 18s): See se for details. Yeah. All, all of that. And so I mentioned like a little a moment ago that like this, this thing about the Sabbath trampling, the Sabbath stuck out to me in a way that maybe it didn’t before. And I, I think like, like you, my evangelical church would’ve like read it through the lens of like, the problem is is you’re not reading the Bible and you’re not coming to church on Sundays. And so then I I sort of would’ve been like, well that’s wrong And I would’ve like rejected that or maybe I even would’ve been like, oh, like observing the Sabbath is sort of like a legalistic practice that it was sort of, and Jesus did away with that and we don’t need that sort of thing anymore. And I would’ve used legalistic in a negative way. (19m 1s): And now as like a Jew who has sort of like taken on Jewish law and the whole like legal system and culture in addition to it, like a faith set of practices. I think that there actually, there’s like something about the Sabbath, it reminds me of all the stuff that we talk about like religious ritual and pr and spiritual practices that like, it’s not enough to keep the Sabbath, right? It just in the same way it’s like, it’s not enough to fast if you, if you are only fasting from food, right? And you’re not breaking the chains of injustice, like it’s a, it’s a fast that, that God is not interested in. Amos talks about like, I I hate, I despise religious festivals, right? (19m 45s): Like we’re, it’s clear in both the Hebrew and the Christian scriptures that like faith has to be a practice as well as sort of like religious piety. And also like there’s something about not trampling on the Sabbath and like honoring it and delighting in it that, you know, Jewish Jewish theology holds that, like on Shabbat you sort of get a glimmer of like the way that the world could be in sort of like the new world. And it reminds me of a little bit about what you were talking about, Shay you’ve reflected back to me that when I go to Fire Island for vacation with my queer chosen family, like yes, it’s a vacation. (20m 28s): And yes, also now it’s become sort of like a tradition and so it’s meaningful because we do it over and over again with these people that we care about. And also there’s like something about the particularities of fire island and the ways in which the queer people that I know like relate to one another on that island that it’s sort of like, oh, this is like a vision of the way that the world could be outside of the island as well. And so like there’s something about like you, it’s like a yes and like you can’t be just sort of like in go, go, go, go, go mode all the time. You need to rest. I think that the Sabbath is a weekly rhythm of resetting and resting and imagining like the way the world could be so that then you can go mend the broken walls and restore the livable streets. (21m 12s): But you sort of have to have like, you have to have a vision in mind about what you’re building. I think it sort of, here here’s where I got to right? That it’s like, it’s like not enough to just be like, the evangelicals are wrong. Donald Trump is not a real Christian. Like Sean Floyd is like terrible and an asshole and focus on the family is garbage. Like yeah. Like all those things are true. Like, but like we’re not like them. They’re like they’ve got it wrong. Like can’t be the beginning and the end of your beliefs about the way that the world is. Like what is your vision for the way that the world could be? And like in Judaism, like Shabbat is sort of like one of the times that we use to like recenter and refocus on that. (21m 56s): But like all religious traditions have practices by which you could reorient yourself. I mean, I think like communion and Christianity is like another sort of beautiful practice of, we talk about this in our rituals for resistance and resilience workshop, like remembering the body and like reorienting sort of our positionality in the world that like it’s, for me it’s like a yes and like making sure that I’ve moved towards a theology that says like, I’m not just going to be reactive, but I’m going to, I’m going to re And I’m not just gonna, I’m not just gonna like shake my fist or I’m not just gonna quote tweet to dunk on people, but I’m going to restore livable streets and men broken walls and create the kingdom of God on earth as in heaven. (22m 46s): Or like, as you would say, like the world to come. Yeah. I I think that’s so huge, especially in this moment, right? In this moment, yeah. Where everything is like sliding to shit and Yeah. And they’re so, I don’t know, I, there’s just, I I’m watching the political moment and watching who we’re championing and it’s concerning for lots of reasons. But like the biggest one is that it just feels like there is so little prophetic imagination. (23m 27s): And by that I don’t mean like a diagnoses of what’s wrong. Like I I think we have a really good sense of what’s wrong. I think like every single person can feel in their very narrow and being what’s wrong. And we even maybe have a sense of like, sense what would make it better. But I don’t know that we have a collective vision of like the kind of community we wanna live in and then have it like where is our communal dream of safety and goodness and celebration and art and collective care and all of these things. (24m 9s): And it’s like, I I think that’s, you And I talk all the time about the gifts that queerness and ethical, non-monogamy and transness have to offer. And I think that they absolutely have gifts to offer in this present moment. And, and one of the things right, is like a vision of a world, a way of being that we’ve been told shouldn’t exist, But we have proved over and over again that it does, right? Because we exist. And so in the midst of that, like where are, where, where can we lean even harder into that and say, what could our collective future look like and stop? (24m 55s): And I say this as like, I’m indicting myself as I say this too, right? There’s a lot of ways of, of which it’s, it’s easy to say, well, the dream is this obviously, but like that could never happen because right, because like X, Y, Z because we don’t have the money, because we don’t have the time, because we don’t have the power, because we don’t have the yada, yada yada. And I think that there’s like a yes and right there is a way in which we form coalitions that are practical and also in the midst of the practicality, if we don’t have the audacious dream, the like, what would we do and who would we be if it didn’t matter about the money or the politics or the coalitions or the whatever. (25m 45s): Like I don’t feel like we have articulated well what that is. And like that’s, that’s something that I am, I’ve really been thinking about for myself lately and like in my communities of like, what is the dream? And then we can talk about like, how are we gonna get there, you know? But if without the dream, we don’t even have, we don’t even have the beginning of the, of the steps. Yeah. Amen. All of that. I, I find myself wanting to like wrap up the episode with like a boat or like, and here is like, here are your like Buzzfeed listicle three next steps to do. (26m 24s): And like, I don’t have that, I’m so sorry dear listener, but I think like, maybe like the first, what I, what I can share for like things that have worked for me is like paying attention to all of this is like, I think like step one, right? And then like what are the practices that you can do to sort of help stretch your imagination for the way that the world could be? How can you, like what practices can you do? Just sort of like stretch yourself for the ways in which like you personally could be differently. Where do you take inspiration from? And like this work is impossible, impossible, impossible, impossible to do it alone. (27m 6s): And so like, who are you in community with and like, living alongside of? And that can be a combination of in person and online. And so like thinking through all those things, maybe we’ll sort of like move you in the right direction. And of course, as always, if like these are sort of like questions you want to like wrestle together with, we would love to have you inside of sanctuary collective or online community. You can learn more at Queer Theology com slash community. And if you’re like interested in like one-on-one sports direction or like coaching or anything like that, reach out and we’ll talk to you more about that. But Sanctuary Collective Community is a great place to start. We’d love to have you inside of there. The Queer Theology podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for LGBTQ Christians and straight cisgender supporters. (27m 53s): To Dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post Queering Isaiah 58: Communal Restoration and Justice appeared first on Queer Theology.

This week we’re celebrating Brian’s new book, “Love Beyond Monogamy,” which comes out this month! In this book, he explores the themes of polyamory, spirituality, and the importance of love in various forms. Brian shares insights on how the book addresses both monogamous and non-monogamous audiences, emphasizing the sacredness of ALL relationships. The conversation also touches on the societal stigmas surrounding queerness and non-monogamy, and Brian reads an excerpt from the book that illustrates his perspective on spirituality and connection. This book is not just for poly folks or queer folks, it has so much for everyone.    Takeaways The book is about polyamory and spirituality. It addresses love in all its forms, not just romantic. Spirituality is a key theme in understanding relationships. The book aims to celebrate connections beyond monogamy. Brian emphasizes the importance of pre-orders for authors. Polyamory is often misunderstood as solely about sex. The book is for both monogamous and non-monogamous readers. Brian shares personal experiences with queerness and spirituality. The book includes a reading about finding God in community. Brian hopes the book will serve as a healing balm for readers.   Chapters (01:17) Exploring the Essence of the Book (04:57) The Role of Spirituality in Relationships (08:24) Reading Excerpt: The Polyamorous God (13:11) Dreams and Aspirations for the Book (15:43) The Gifts of Polyamory (21:15) Addressing Skepticism Towards Polyamory (24:26) Logistics and Upcoming Events Resources: Get Brian’s book, Love Beyond Monogamy: How Polyamory Can Enrich Your Spirituality, Faith, and Relationships Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community  If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (9s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts from Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tuning each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hello. Hello. Welcome back to The Queer Theology Podcast. This is a conversation I have been very much looking forward to because today we are gonna talk all about Brian’s new book, Love Beyond Monogamy, which comes out on September 18th. So as you are listening to this, if you’re listening to it the day it comes out or around the day it comes out, there is still time to pre-order. (55s): And I, I just wanna say, I, I know we’ve said this a million times, we’re gonna keep saying pre-orders are so, so, so, so important, especially for books from marginalized authors. So if you even feel like you might have the most passing of interest In this book, go and pre-order it, it would also be great if you could recommend that your local library picks up a copy. And also that your local bookstore stocks it. We love supporting indie bookstores, so order it from there. And today we’re gonna, we’re gonna kind of dive into to talking about this book. So Brian, I wanna start with probably every author’s worst nightmare of a question, which is like, if you had to describe this book in just a couple of sentences for folks that maybe this is the first time they’re hearing about it, they don’t really know what it’s about. (1m 47s): Like what is this book and who do you think it’s for? Yeah, when I stood out to write the book, I set out to write a book about polyamory in spirituality, And I called it Love Beyond Monogamy. And then when I finished the book, so then in my mind I was, I was sort of like focusing on like the beyond monogamy part of it. And then when I finished the book, I realized that it was like, yes, about like filter through the lens of polyamory, non monogamy, but it was really a book about love and all of the different ways in which love can be present in our lives. And so this is a book not just for non monogamous audiences folks, but for monogamous audiences folks as well. And it’s a book not just for spiritual or religious folks, but for non-religious folks as well. (2m 32s): It’s really a way, sort of like pulling upon the wisdom of both polyamory and spirituality to look at the ways in which like all of our various relationships and connections in our lives past, present, and future can be deeply meaningful. The word that I would use for that as like sacred, but you can use whatever word sort of resonates for you. And so honoring, you know, long-term commitments, but also honoring one night stands and casual encounters and not feeling like we have to cut off ourselves from our exes or, or draw divisions between friend and family. And sort of like booking, just like letting love be bigger than you imagined. Hmm. (3m 13s): And you know, there have been a lot of books, it seems coming out right around now, polyamory and non-monogamy, and I’m, I’m curious, you know, what, what you think sets your book apart. Like why is your book different from what is has already been published? And you know, we’ve seen some glimpses at at stuff that is coming out and I’m, I’m curious how, how you think your book is set apart. Yeah, I think there’s two ways. One of the big ways is, it’s sort of a cliche in polyamory nom monogamy circles to say, you know, you might be thinking when you hear polyamory nom monogamy, you might be thinking all about sex parties and throuple like, and it, it’s like, it’s really not about sex. (3m 55s): It’s about shared calendars and processing lots of feelings and, and all of that. And like, yeah, that can be part of it, but like, it also is for many people a lot of the time also about sex. And so this book like does not shy away from the reality that like sex is for many people a part of the nonmonogamous experience, but not in a like salacious way. It says that also the sex is also special, the sex is also sacred and all the different ways that folks form family and friendship and community and Relationships to partnerships, like they can all be special. And so it’s sort of looking at, it’s a very sort of like sex positive, king conclusive version of non monogamy. (4m 43s): And then of course, like, it just like touches upon spirituality. Er Winston, one of the hosts of the multi podcast and in author like in her own right in her sort of like review of the book, she, she pointed out that most books sort of like dance around the topic of like religion or spirituality. And this sort of obviously deals with it head on. And I really try to make it such that if you’re like a devoutly religious person, you’re like a devout Christian, like this book is gonna resonate with you. And if you’re like, no, no, I’m spiritual but not religious, I think this I’ve, you know, it’ll also be applicable to you. And even if you’re like decidedly like a secular humanist or an atheist, the way that I talk about religion and spirituality is such that I think you’ll find resonances there as well. (5m 24s): And so it’s, it’s really about not just, it’s like not a practical how to do polyamory, but the sort of a celebration of all the different ways that all of our different types of connections can be like deeply meaningful. And so it’s a celebration of, of love and connection in all its various forms. Why, why was it important for you to, to pull on this thread of, of spirituality in the book? I mean, for me as a queer man, I know that my queerness was like so stigmatized growing up. It felt like such a point of shame and a place where I didn’t fit in. And I at some point sort of intellectually knew that that wasn’t true, but sort of knowing something in your head and feeling it in your body or two different experiences and it took me a long time to get to a place where I like knew in my body that queerness was good. (6m 18s): And I had a similar experience all over again when it came to non-monogamy where I sort of like, I had read the books about like how to do it And I like read the research about, you know, the existence of non-monogamy in other animals and humans, other human societies. And so I sort of intellectually knew that monogamy could be like a good and ethical thing, but it was like easy to sort of like feel like I wasn’t living up to society’s expectations. The gay movements like gay, you know, the gay lesbian movements like ideal of what a gay relationship is supposed to look like, that might me, maybe I was missing out on something or I just like had internalized a lot of the messages from our mono normative culture. And so then again, sort of the distinction between knowing something in my head and feeling in my body, it took a little bit of time to get there. (7m 3s): And I think that for me, pulling on this like thread of faith, spirituality, religion is not about like trying to against people that you can be polyamorous and go to church. So like obviously you can be polyamorous and go to church. I know lots of church calling polyamorous people, including the increasing number of, of polyamorous like pastors and and rabbis. But for me it was about like taking all of those messages that told me the ways that I was forming relationships were less than, and not just not only rejecting those but replacing like proactively replacing those with positive messages that celebrated the special gifts that nom brought into my life. And by calling that deeply meaningful and particularly special And I think like sacred is just like another snappy way of saying that, you know, Paul Tillek talks about God as being one’s ultimate concern. (7m 59s): He was a Christian, writer, researcher, academic, and Rabbi Arab Joshua Heschel talks about awe and wonder and radical amazement being sort of at the heart of a spiritual person’s orientation towards the divine. And so like that’s the type of faith and spirituality that I’m getting at that like the divine is already present in and amongst the ways that we love and fuck. And like really honoring that was a key part of like believing in my body like, oh no, this is not just like a good thing, like an okay thing, but an actually like a good thing and a positive way of relating. Okay, before we go any further, I’m wondering, Brian, would you read a portion of the book for us to give people a taste of, of what this book is like? (8m 44s): Yeah, sure. Let me find a spot. Oh actually there is a spot that talks actually about sort of God and what God is or is not and and sort of maybe we’ll tie into the conversation that we just were having. So I’ll, I’ll, I’ll read that section. This is from the chapter called The Polyamorous God. Whenever I’m at a dance club with my queer friends, I like to take a break and grab some water and fresh air. When I return to the dance floor before jumping back into the action, I linger a little on the edge, I gaze out on the floor and spot my friends. They’re dancing not just with their partners but also with their friends. I watch them shower each other with physical affection, hugs and kisses, winks and nods, silly faces and singing along pinch cheeks even making out casually they throw their arms around each other and hugs and embraces while they ebb and flow. (9m 28s): Dancing in a circle, grinding against each other, weaving in and out, finding new friends to hug and sing along with and even to kiss. If you squint your eyes just right, you can see the Holy Spirit right there on the dance floor of a queer club. In these moments, my intense focus on my friends and the strangers who fill the dance floor, my intentional remembering of all the people who have danced to music just like this for ages and ages, my appreciation for just how precious it is that we can live and dance and flirt queerly and nom monogamously in public safely. It is awesome. I am full of awe. I have this intuitive sense that I could see God on the dance floor of queer clubs for years before I read the works of Abraham Joshua Heschel for Heschel, our perception of awe and wonder are deeply intertwined, synonymous even with our experience of the divine. (10m 12s): And I asked for wonder, a spiritual anthology he wrote And I quote awe as an intuition of the dignity of all things. A realization that things are not only what they are, but also stand however remotely for something supreme awe as a sense of transcendence for the reference everywhere to a mystery beyond all things. It enables us to perceive in the world intimations of the divine, to sense the ultimate and the common and the simple to feel in the rush of the passing, the stillness of the eternal. What we cannot comprehend by analysis we become aware, become aware of in awe. And I don’t know how to define the nature of God. I can’t put God in a bottle or under a microscope. I can’t measure God with a machine. Would it be like the ones the scientist, the Scientologists use? (10m 55s): Surely not. There’s nothing in what we know about the universe and we know a lot even there was, even though there’s a lot we don’t understand to suggest that there is a conscious outside entity that interferes in our affairs to bend or break the laws of nature to guide the course of human affairs. God did not give you that touchdown or clear skies on your wedding day or save your ant from cancer. And if God did, what would it say? But all the people who didn’t make the touchdown, who had rain on their wedding day, who died from cancer, but I meet God on the dance floor every time I go to a queer queer club. Many of my friends say that God helped rescue them from clutches of devastating addiction. I, by myself am not God. I have stood on protest lines, had vigil held vigils and gone toe to toe with a virulently anti L-G-B-T-Q, religious leaders to proclaim the good news of the queer gospel. (11m 41s): And I felt something in my bones. Jesus says in Matthew 18 that where two or more three are gathered, there he is. Two, when people believe in something together and come together for a common cause, something happens that is greater than the sum of its parts, something divine happens in community. I don’t believe that there’s a conscious force outside the universe bending to its will, bending it to its will. And yet I believe that quote, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice and quote as Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Said, paraphrasing Theodore Parker, not because an outside force bends it, not because it must bend, but because we bend it. I believe that love wins and justice prevails not because of puppet master on high decrees that it must, but because something in our very nature is primed for love and justice. (12m 27s): Because something that you can feel even if you can’t quite measure happens when humans come together, when we help each other, when we do what is right, when we are willing to sacrifice for a higher cause, whatever that is, that connection, that longing, that energy, that urge, that which draws us outside of ourselves, that which courses through us with the same energy that is spent of coursing through the universe since the Big Bang, that which is much like light, which is somehow both a particle and a wave. Two things at once. It is exactingly precisely physical right down to the atoms that make us up. And it is also completely unmeasurable, but no less real spiritual, we might say. That is what humans have throughout the ages have called God. (13m 9s): And I believe that God is within and among us and for us. Beautiful. Thank you for, for sharing that. I’m curious what your kind of biggest dream is for this book. Oh, what a question. I mean, some total stranger on Good Reads left a review and part of it said, Murphy’s writing is to love what the ethical slut is to sex a paradigm shifting classic. And I am honored and humble that some stranger that I don’t know thinks that. (13m 52s): And so like I, if I like, I just wanted to reach everyone who needs to hear it. I think that that in a world that is increasingly torn apart and fractured and fragmented, I would like this book to be a healing bomb that says we are stronger together. And like that is yes, about like the ways in which we relate sexually and romantically to one another. But for me the book is like not just about sex and Relationships, it’s really about drawing the circle wider and imagining a love that is bigger and that encompasses our friends and our neighbors and our coworkers. (14m 38s): One in one part of the book I I talk about like, I think that polyamorous polys are really sort of beautiful models of communal care and community and mutual aid and support and like the way we sort of take care of partners, of partners, of partners is like really beautiful. And also if we only limit that to people that we want to have sex with and the people that we wanna have sex with, want to have sex with, we just end up reproducing desirability politics and racism and sexism and pat phobia and, and wines that divide us. And so I would like to sort of take all of the best practices from polyamory and merge those together with all the highest ideals of faith and spirituality. (15m 21s): And I think that together that phone forms like a potent elixir that it, like I would like to sort of transform all of our communities and to sort of not be, to learn to practice taking care of one another, to learn to feel hard feelings, uncomfortable feelings and not be overcome by them. And that is like a practice that serves you when you’re like thinking about your partner sleeping with another person. And it also is a practice that serves you when you’re thinking about like the coworker that’s annoying you, that it’s also a practice that serves you. Like when you see a person who is unfamiliar and not like you on the street corner and you decide to be trusting rather than afraid. And so like, yeah, I think I would like it to transform the ways in which that we relate to ourselves and our sexual romantic partners, but also I think I would like it to sort of cast, cast a bigger vision for like the way of the world to be. (16m 13s): Yeah. I I feel like you And I have always said that our work from the very beginning was was about like what gifts, queerness, and transness have to offer the church in the world, right? That it’s, that it’s always been about focusing on that giftedness and also I I am struck by like queerness and transness and polyamory shouldn’t just be about like what non-queer and non-trans and non poly people can get out of it, right? Like, and so I I I think that there’s a, there’s a line here that we’re walking with this conversation even about like there’s so many gifts, right? (16m 54s): That that poly lives and loves have to offer and teach non non-poly folks. And, but I’m curious about like, can you talk just, just for a minute about like what I don’t know the cel celebration of, of like polyamory, like you’ve already hinted at this, but, but it’s been about like, well it’s it’s about more than just that, but so I like just yeah, sell us, sell us on polyamory for a minute, I guess. Yeah. So I think that like all of what I just said, I think also applies to non-monogamous folks because I think sometimes it’s easy for us even as we practice non monogamy to still internalize all the things that the world has said about us. (17m 36s): Yeah, I’m thinking about like in my coaching practice, I work with a lot of people who are in the process of opening up a like existing up until now monogamous audiences relationship. And I often hear from them is like, we just want an open relationship. We don’t want polyamory that like polyamory feels scary And I understand where it comes from. It comes from this place of like somehow polyamory when you add in like feelings feels like threatening to the existing relationship or they imagine polyamory means I have to have another co-equal partner and that that is like somehow a demotion of the existing partner or, or whatever it might be, right? (18m 18s): And then like they’ll be going at it for a while and it’s like, oh, well you’ve been hooking up with the same person somewhat consistently for like six months now. Like presumably you have, you’re not a sociopath. Like you have like some amount of feelings for this person, right? That like the line between just an open relationship and polyamory is actually quite blurry. Like what is the difference between someone that you hook up with a friend with benefit and like a partner, lover, boyfriend, spouse, right? It’s really all about how you choose to describe yourself in your relationships. And so like I’m not here to like force anyone to use the word polyamory to describe themselves, but in one of the opening lines of the book, I say at it’s roots polyamory comes from a Greek and a Latin root Paul, meaning many Anne Marie, meaning loves many loves. (19m 6s): We all have had many loves. Like even if you’re monogamous audiences, like most people have had at least one romantic relationship before the one that they’re presently in. Certainly if you include non types of romantic love, like we already all have lots of different types of love. And so part of the book is saying like, you don’t have to be scared of the connections that fall outside of sort of your one and only. And if you’re someone who is in a couple a diad that that is like meaningful to you. I’m not, I’m not here to sell you on suddenly becoming being in a triad and if you’re monogamous audiences, I’m not gonna to sell you on becoming polyamorous. But I think that there is like some value in loosening up those distinctions between there’s like me and my one and only and it’s us against the entire rest of the world and saying like, what happens if I honor all of these other connections in my life, life as meaningful? (19m 60s): Even if it’s like we are kinky hookups and we meet once a month to have kinky sacks and like that’s the extent of it. I think that like there’s, there’s like some real beauty in being like, and also he’s special to me and also this connection is like meaningful and also I am enriched because of this person in my life. I can think of multiple people in my life who I’ve only ever had kinky sex with and also like they transformed me also just as much as long-term partners of mine have had of mine have. And so like I think that there’s like a real power and beauty and like naming all the different connections that we have as special and not being afraid of that. And so I think also if you’re someone who’s like on board with a nom monogamy, but maybe polyamory scares you, I think that like this book is not setting out to convince you to be polyamorous, but I think it will sort of like demystify what polyamory like could be for you. (20m 53s): And there’s also good section In this book about commitment and covenant And I think there’s like some real wisdom about whether you’re polyamorous or open or monogamous audiences. I think it’s important that you proactively choose that for yourself rather than just take it on as a default. And really you’ve got to like, in order, you have to be able to say no in order for consent to be present. Like we recognize that when it comes to sex, right? Like if you can’t say no, like you actually can’t consent to it. And so I think similarly, like if you can’t say no to monogamy, did you like really choose it? And so really earnestly putting all the options on the table and saying, this is what I want, this is like what works best for us in this moment is so much more powerful than just sort of being like, well, I have to be monogamous audiences. (21m 41s): I’ve always have been monogamous audiences. My partner’s just some monogamy, so I just have to accept it. And that is like also some wisdom that we can apply to our relationship with the divine and or with our spiritual communities that like it’s important that those commitments being just as intentionally chosen as well and have a whole section on making commitments with the divine and your spiritual communities in there as well. I’m, I’m curious, there might be some folks listening who are just like not sure about ethical non-monogamy or polyamory maybe, maybe from theological reasons, maybe from past relational reasons, maybe just ’cause like it feels scary, overwhelming, icky, like insert whatever here. (22m 33s): I know that this is not a book about how to, and it’s also not about a book about like why, why people should consider this, okay. Quote unquote. Okay. Yeah. But I’m curious like how would you answer that question? Would you answer that question if someone was like, is this a book for me? Yeah, I mean I actually address that in, I want to say like the intro or the first chapter that’s sort of like, as you read through the book, you will notice that I don’t like go through a chapter in verse defense of polyamory non monogamy. (23m 14s): And I don’t say, here are all of the arguments that are sort of against polyamory, non monogamy. And I’m gonna sort of like give them a debate club rebuttal to them because I think doing so cheapens this sort of like beautiful love and commitment and connection that we have and also like it’s an a historical position like most animal species are not monogamous audiences. Like non-monogamy is present in basically like every human culture in many human cultures, non-monogamy was like the norm and or celebrated. So like actually monogamy is sort of like the unnatural way of being, which I don’t mean that, I don’t mean unnatural in sort of like a bad way, but like you have to choose to be monogamous audiences and most people continue to experience sexual attraction to people who are not their partners. (24m 5s): And then they, they like choose to not act on that. And if those are your, there’s a way that you can sort of like make that hot and sexy, right? Like, but like if, if you choose to, like, that’s great, but it’s like not actually quote unquote like natural. And so like if anything like the monogamous audiences, you be the ones defending themselves. So I think like that’s my cheeky answer to it. But what I say in, in that section of the intro or the first chapter is that like, I think that through all of the examples of myself, my friends, my clients research from polyamory, nom monogamy and relationship wellbeing combined with sort of like the stories and the ways in which we like ways integrate and see ourselves in scripture and in our faith traditions. I think that sort of like the goodness of non-monogamy and polyamory will become like evident to you by the end of the book. (24m 54s): And so in that sense, like the book is just like such a celebration of all different ways of connecting beyond monogamy that I think if you’re sort of on the fence about like whether it’s like quote unquote, okay, as long as you’re willing to sort of like go in it with eyes open and heart open, I think that, I think you will walk away convinced maybe not that it’s right for you, but you could be able to see the beauty in it for other people. I know that you’ve got a couple of pre-order bonuses for folks that pre-order the book, and so if folks are interested in grabbing one of those, where is the best place for them to do that? (25m 34s): Yep. You go to my website, which is, this is bgm.com/book. I’m also, this is bgm on all the social medias. It’s one, one phrase for everywhere. This is bgm.com/book. We’ll have links to all of like the major online places to buy the book from, as well as a few of my favorite local spots to order from. You can get it from literally anywhere books are sold. That page will also have a link to submit and claim the bonuses. I’m gonna send out some stickers that are designed by some queer artists and you also get some like digital resources around both relationships and spirituality. And if you’re interested in some more personal and more sexy slash scandalous reflections, I’d be happy to add you to my close friends on Instagram as well. (26m 17s): So all that is that, this is bgm.com/book And as a reminder, this book comes out on September 18th. I, it’s such a needed and exciting book. I’m so, so thrilled. I have pre-ordered my copy. I’m very excited to get my hands on it and, and dive into it. I also know that you’ve got a couple of launch events for folks that are on, on the east coast at this precise moment that is where the launch events are happening. So where, can you share a little bit more about those events? Yeah, if you are in or near or able to get to New York City, I would love to have you at the sort of like official release party. (26m 60s): It’s Friday, September 19th at Judson Memorial in New York City. That’s in the evening, I believe doors will open at six 30. We’re still at the time of this recording nailing down the logistics all. I’ll also like, make sure that this is bgm.com/book has a link to RCP for that. It’s free all, they’re welcome. Bring your friends and your partners and your metamours and your parents, whoever you wanna come with can come, I’m working on an event in DC at some point TBD and I’m also working on an event in Los Angeles, also TBD potentially in early October. So if you are are in one of those places, add join the mailing list. (27m 42s): Or on that page I’ll put a little, like, bring me to your city and I’ll start collecting locations and email addresses with folks in other cities. And then like relatedly, if you’re at a church or a synagogue or a school or a bookstore and you would like me to come do a book event in your city, if you and your folks can get me there, I will. I’ll come for for free. So just reach out. Yeah, so once again, Love Beyond Monogamy by Brian G Murphy comes out on September 18th. Pre-order your copy, get it, get one for your friends, get one for everyone in your life. It’s gonna be a beautiful book and you’re gonna wanna get it as soon as it comes out. (28m 22s): Ryan, thank you for this conversation and we’ll see you all next week. Thanks much. The Queer Theology podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for L-G-B-T-Q Christians and straight cisgender supporters. To dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post Love Beyond Monogamy appeared first on Queer Theology.

We’re going back to our roots and queering scripture for this week’s episode! We look at Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16 where we explore themes of faith, community, and the importance of engaging with marginalized groups, particularly those who are incarcerated. We reflect on the radical message of this passage, and how it emphasizes the call to hospitality and solidarity. We also discuss the complexities of building relationships with those who are different from us, but the absolute necessity of doing so. We must be willing to be vulnerable, trust others, and practice embodied love in our interactions with others.   Takeaways The lectionary provides a framework for exploring faith and community. Hospitality is a divine encounter that can change lives. Solidarity with the incarcerated requires deep empathy and understanding. Trust and vulnerability are essential in building relationships. Engaging with marginalized communities can be uncomfortable but necessary. Solidarity is not just about charity; it’s about deep relationships. Practicing love means showing up for others in tangible ways. The messiness of life is part of the journey of faith. We must be willing to step outside our comfort zones. Engagement with others can lead to transformative experiences.   Chapters (02:43) Radical Hospitality and the Divine in Strangers (05:29) Solidarity with the Incarcerated: A Call to Action (08:04) Practicing Vulnerability and Trust in Community (10:47) The Cost of Solidarity: Embracing Messiness (13:48) Transformative Relationships: Beyond Charity (16:42) Engaging with the Uncomfortable: A Journey of Faith   Resources: Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community    If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (9s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts from Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tuning each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hello. Hello. Hello. Today is Sunday, August 30th, and the reason why that date matters is because we are kicking it old school style here in the podcast, and we’re gonna get back to our roots and queer, one of the passage, us from this week’s lectionary. If you have been a listener for only the past few years, you might not know that for the first like eight or so years, we went through the Christian Lectionary every week for those eight, eight years. (56s): So it’s a three year cycle. So we went through it almost entirely three times. Obviously we had a lot aqua to do, so we’ve been doing topics and deeper dives into whole books and interviews and things like that for the past few years. But we just really love the Bible. And there’s something about pulling up the week and seeing what speaks to us. This is also practice that Jews do through the weekly Torah portion. They, they, we go through the first five books of the Bible, the, the Torah, the first five books, ofm, Moses, Genesis, EXUS, Leviticus, numbers, and Deuteronomy on a yearly cycle. And so there’s something about like, it’s, it’s kinda like akin to pulling tarot cards where you just sort of, you pull the card and you see what comes up for you in that moment. And so this week we’re looking at Hebrews 13, one through eight, 15 through 16. (1m 41s): We’ll be reading from the common English Bible as is our practice. Keep loving each other like family. Don’t neglect to open up your homes to guests because by doing this, some have been hosts to angels without knowing it. Remember prisoners as if you were in prison with them and people who are mistreated as if you were in their place. Marriage must be honored in every respect with no cheating on the relationship because God will judge the sexually immoral person and the person who commits adultery your way of life should be free from the love of money, and you should be content with what you have. After all, he has said, I will never leave you or abandon you. This is why we can confidently say the Lord is my helper And I won’t be afraid. What can people do to me? Remember your leaders who spoke God’s word to you, imitate their faith as you consider the way their lives turned out. (2m 26s): Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So let’s continually offer up a sacrifice of praise through him, which is the fruit from our lips that confess his name. Don’t forget to do good and to share what you have because God is pleased with these kinds of sacrifices. Oh man, this is so, so, so rich. I was like giggling because we, I, I have a book coming out in at this point, oh my God, like 18 days, 19 days. Ian Monogamy comes out on September 18th, and when we were looking, we were like, let’s just, it’s been a minute. Let’s look at the LEC to see if we might wanna do something of that. (3m 6s): And I, I don’t talk about this passage specifically in my book, but I do have a series of graphics for Instagram planned to promote the book that are a little bit spicy. So if you’re interested in some spicy Bible takes, follow me over at this is BGM on Instagram. And, and this is one of the passage us that I grabbed as around hospitality of Strangers. And in particular, like what, what stuck out to me was this bit about that like, because if you would like neglect to open up your house, you, you might miss out on hosting angels without knowing it. And so there’s like this something about angels, guests being angels, guests being God, seeing God in this stranger that really, that really sort of captured my attention. (3m 57s): And I have lots of sex positive and non-monogamous and polyamorous perspectives on that, but that I can, that I can certainly dive into. But I, I know also Shay, when I said, oh, oh, this passage jumps out at me, you also said that you were curious about this passage. So what are some of the things that come up for you? Yeah, I mean I, I’ve been doing a lot of work in, in regards to folks who are incarcerated lately. And so this Hebrews 13, three remember prisoners as if you were in prison with them really jumped out at me. You know, I think that’s a, it’s a verse on a lot of folks use in their kind of quote unquote prison ministry. (4m 37s): But I think about how often or how, how rarely I hear more progressive folks talk about this verse and, and really hold to that. And, And I, I, I was, I was actually thinking the other day about how how distant the lives of folks who are incarcerated are for so many people, particularly in like white, mainline more progressive traditions. Obviously that is not the case across the board, but in the, in many of the churches that I’ve been in, that has been the case. (5m 18s): Or if it wasn’t the case, the people who did have loved ones who were incarcerated or friends who were incarcerated, like didn’t really talk about that because they didn’t feel like they could or they didn’t feel like anyone could understand. Or maybe there was shame around that. And so I I, I’m just really struck by this, this line and, and especially like what it would do if we actually took it seriously to remember prisoners as if you were in prison with them. I mean, that’s a really strong statement of Solidarity. And I was also struck by, you know, I, I know that, I know in my experience, not a lot of people read out of Hebrews or spend a lot of time with this book. (6m 9s): ’cause I think it is a little bit of a quirky book, but I, I was just really struck by like how kind of radical this whole text is minus the like weird purity culture thing in the middle, but like, engage in radical hospitality, love each other, like family, remember prisoners and people who are mistreated, don’t love money. Be content with what you have. Like pay attention to the fruit of, of your leaders, not just like doing whatever they say, but like, consider the way that their lives turned out. (6m 57s): Don’t forget to do good, right? Like all of these, share what you have. Yeah. Share what you have. And like I, it just, I’ve been spending a lot of time around evangelicals and it just like boggles my mind that like they will pull out the sexual immorality verse and ignore everything else. And it’s like y’all, it says, it says these things, not so, Not so literalist now, are we? Yeah, it’s, it’s just, it’s just wild to me. But, but again, at the same, at the same token, like as I’m saying all of this, I’m also talking about how so many progressive folks like ignore the, remember those who are in prison. (7m 37s): And so I think Right, There is a sense of all of us pick and choose, but at least like, let’s be honest about what we’re picking and choosing and why we’re doing it. Because I think that like, that it’s that lack of honesty and transparency about how we’re engaging with the text, that is what makes it so dangerous to like pick and choose and, and, and enter into those kinds of conversations. Yeah, I I’m thinking about what you were saying about how for many people in white progressive churches that like people in prison feels like there’s at least one layer removed from that and it’s, I dunno, maybe it’s scary or it’s uncertainly dunno where to begin. (8m 24s): And I, I’m, I’m remembering our conversation a few weeks go about like rural God, city God. And one of the things that living in New York City has done for me is it like puts me in close proximity to lots of different types of people. And so there’s, I’m just sort of less immediately frightened by quote unquote the other, which is not to say that people in New York City like love prisoners and have good relationships with them, you could still have all sorts of shitty politics or theology around, around prison. And also I think that like, there’s something here about welcome and, and prisoners and even like these and sharing and these good fruits that there, that I think that we like really need to start practicing A getting comfortable being uncomfortable, and b, not being afraid of people who are different than us and people then are other than us. (9m 25s): And so, like in my book, Laiya Monogamy, I talked a little bit about like some ways that you might start do that. And I, And I, like, I don’t think that you have to have sex with Strangers to, to, to practice. But I, but what I will say is that like there is like an incredible amount of trust that anyone having a one night stand puts in the other person, but like in particular, right? Like queer men, we’re making lots of generalizations here, but like, there’s a culture of queer men having one night stands. We use Grindr, we use other apps to, to, to find hookups and then to just sort of like, I don’t, I don’t, sometimes I don’t even know your name and I’m inviting you over into my house. I’m gonna get totally naked with you. That’s incredibly vulnerable. And like if I can practice being trusting and vulnerable enough to have a one night stand, like certainly I can be, I can also practice tru being trusting and vulnerable enough to have a conversation with a person asking for money or to have a conversation or like become a pen pal with a prisoner or to get involved in like a local food kitchen that like these things take work and they’re gonna be outside of our comfort zone. (10m 33s): And also, like, one of the things that I recommend in my book is like if you can find one area where you’ve already practiced being a little bit uncomfortable or trusting in someone else a little bit more like that, they then you realize that that is a muscle that you can develop. And so then like where might you then also point yourself and try to develop or where you aren’t as comfortable or where you, your, your focus might need a little bit more attention. And I think, you know, all of us naturally have things that we’re more interested in, things that come easier to us. And I think that that, you know, we can’t, we can’t be doing all things all the time. We would be like, there’s just not enough time or energy in the day. (11m 15s): So we do, there is some amount of narrowing your focus that you have to do in order to like really do good work. And, and one of the things that I talk about in my book is to like make sure that that is like an intentional choice rather than I fall into the things that come easiest to me. I fall into the things that benefit me the most. I fall into the things that support people who look like me. I, I focus on the things that my, are important to my parents or that are important to, you know, the, the church that I’ve always gone gone to. And it, it might behoove us all to sort of look to see like, well, where are the spots that we’re not paying as much attention? And not that we didn’t have to become like full-time activists for those causes, but is there some learning that we could do around that? (11m 58s): Is there some sigma boosting that we could do around that? Is there some support we could offer in some way? Like might we pay like just a little bit more attention to some of those areas so that we can really, because I think like all parts of this passage from hospitality to being consolidated with prisoners to, I think also like even this like marish thing, like I think there is something that we could reclaim there that like they’re all sort of important ideals and like, I don’t want us to be single issue people of faith. And this can be like Audrey Lorde talks about that you can’t be single issue voters because we don’t live single issue lives And I don’t, I don’t want to fall into being a single issue person of faith. (12m 39s): Yeah. I I think the other thing that stuck out to me along with everything that you were saying is also like having a better understanding and practice of what Solidarity actually means and looks like. Because I, I think that along with getting uncomfortable, like Solidarity is also uncomfortable, right? Yeah. And so many of us, I I think again, speaking in general, gen generalities, gen generalities, there We go. Generalities. So many of us speaking in generalities, you know, have been taught about charity, right? Like donate, we give money, we volunteer somewhere, we quote unquote give back or whatever. (13m 29s): And, and again, that like keeps us at a remove. And, And I think that what this passage is calling us to is actually like not being at a remove, right? Welcoming the stranger into your home, remembering those in prison as if you also were in prison. And like, if we actually took that seriously. I, I think that changes our posture and it’s not just about, oh, I give money when I can. Yeah. Or I volunteer once a week. It’s like, no, I actually reorient my life so that I’m in deep relationship with people relationship and that then changes how I show up in the world. (14m 12s): And that is deeply uncomfortable, right? Because I think it’s really, it’s easier to think about like, how might I give to the less fortunate while also just then going back to my house. It’s a, it’s a lot different to think about like, oh, what does it mean to actually like be friends or family with someone who’s in prison? What does it mean to actually invite someone over to my house that I don’t know that well or that is really different than me? Like, what does it mean to share meals with people not from, you know, a soup kitchen counter where I’m on one side serving and they’re on the other side eating. (14m 56s): Like, what does it mean to actually break bread together? I think that those are the things that are, that we need to be practicing and that if we start to practice that, that like, that will radically change our lives. And that is very, very scary, I think. And also I think it’s going to be the thing that is gonna be necessary in the coming moments. Yes. Yes. And, And I like, that’s also like practicable. And so like, I think I sometimes take for granted that I, in my early twenties got like really intense civil disobedience, non-violence means training through from civil rights leaders. And that that really shaped me and that, that I was then thrown into activism in, in New York City. (15m 36s): And so like, this is like not work that you, one, I think the key Takeaways from that time of my life was like, this is like not work that you do on your own. And so there are already, wherever you live, there are people maybe not depending if you, if you live in a small town, like maybe not a five minute drive away, but like somewhat accessible to you, I’m sure that there are people that are organizing in some way. And so like if you need to get plugged into other folks to learn from them, like how do I like resist the police document, the police, like what are some places that I like might intermix my life with people who are different than me? Because like to your point earlier, it’s not about just like, oh, I give money or I volunteer and like, that’s enough. (16m 19s): But like, when I’m thinking about Solidarity, it’s like how do I use my body? Who am I friends with? Like where do I move to or do I not move to like if I have kids, like where do I send my, like kids to school, how do I like spend my money? Not just like, do I do, I give away a little bit when it feels convenient, but like, like a friend needs a new car, so I’m gonna, and I’ve got some extra cash, so I’m gonna like, I’m gonna shell it a thousand dollars and other friend’s gonna show out a thousand dollars somebody, I’m gonna show it a thousand dollars. And I’m like, buy this person a new car, or I’m gonna open up the doors to my house and house someone. Like sometimes Solidarity is uncomfortable and sometimes Solidarity costs something. (17m 8s): And like, and also it’s the right thing to do. And also like, you meet, you meet God there, you know? And, And I think too that there’s something about like, it’s often messy, right? Like you, there’s no guarantees that the person you’re supporting that just got out of prison like is gonna not go back. Right. And there’s, there’s no chance that there, there’s no like guarantees that the person you open up your house to like, might not steal something from you. Right. They might not, but like that could happen. And so, And I, I think that there is a a also a, a cost to weighing of like, it, this isn’t about perfection and it’s not about it. (17m 58s): It’s not about the shiny like, I don’t know, pamphlet picture that you get to post on your social media or your nonprofits website. Like sometimes relationships are messy and sometimes like you are gonna be the one that fails and lets someone down and does something that’s hurtful or harmful and like, that’s all part of it. Right. And I, And I think that, I don’t know, I, I think too often we, I get caught up in this idea of it has to be perfect before I can engage or like, if there’s a chance that it’s not gonna be perfect, I don’t wanna do it. And, and like we just don’t have time to be waiting for the perfect anymore. (18m 42s): Like I think we have to, we have to engage in, in whatever ways we can. And like you said, like not alone, like we do this in community and we do this, we do this as a practice and you don’t have to open your doors to a complete stranger tonight. Right. Like, that’s probably not the best thing for you to do. Yeah. But like, what are the ways that you can start on that journey of, of being in Solidarity in new ways? Like what is, what is the thing that you could do today to start opening you up to that journey of learning? Yeah. And also like, it might be that you open up your doors to a complete stranger tonight. You know, I’m, I’m thinking like, when I was in, in my twenties, my, like two of my good friends And I like, through these set of circumstances, we ended up like at a cafe. (19m 29s): Like one of them was in a, in a group program. We were all at dinner afterwards with people from the group. And the person who ended up at our table, we were like all chatting and hanging out and like, it came up like he like was planning on sleeping on the subway that night because he didn’t have stable housing. And one of my friends was like, no, like, you’re coming. Like, I just met you an hour ago at the start of dinner and like, you’re gonna come sleep at my place Sunday if you, if you would like a place to stay. Like, I’m gonna open up our couch to you. And like he ends up doing that. And over the course of the next, like many years, like, lived there for a while, lived with me for a while. At some point I ended up moving into that, that same apartment. And he moved away and then he moved back and we were all roommates together and like we’ve all, we’ve all since left in New York City and also like, we all still keep in touch. (20m 12s): And he became like a lifelong friend that I haven’t seen in probably a decade, but that we like text somewhat regularly. And there was times there where like it was uncomfortable and like we were, I was annoyed at him. He was annoyed at me. Like he left the state, I left the state. We came back like, it was like not, you know, like an easy story necessarily. Like, and also like, he’s like, like a good friend now. And that experience changed me. And it was, it took my, my other friend being like, no, like, this changes tonight. Or I’m thinking about friends that I know that have like fallen into addiction. And then because of that lost jobs then because of that, like lost housing and like, how do you like continue to show up for them and take care of them and love them. (20m 56s): Like even in the midst of addiction recovery, like relapse, there aren’t any like easy, clear cut like answers. And also I try to start with like, if I put love at the center and not this sort of just sort of touchy feely emotion of love, but like embodied love at the center of this. Like what are some ways that I can continue to show up for the people who I’ve known for a long time? The people who are crossing my path today, the people who I’m, who I’m, who I might meet in the future, the people that I share a city with. And it’s like, it’s, there’s not always the right answer and it’s definitely not always easy, but like, can you do something? (21m 40s): And it just like, it keeps coming back to like, it takes practice. So start wherever you are, like start practicing there and then try to take like one small step outside of your comfort zone. You can start by giving up Harry Potter. Like if you, I just, I was like listening back to, to a podcast episode I was on, I was like, you won’t stop reading Harry Potter. You think you’re gonna resist fascism or like confront the police or hide the Jews or the immigrants or like, or get trans people their medication. Like no, you won’t, you won’t, you won’t put on a book. Yeah, you are, you are literally watching Voldemort take over and you can’t even watch the, you can’t even learn the lesson from the book that you refuse to stop reading. (22m 21s): Yeah. Jesus. The Queer Theology podcast Is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for LBTQ, Christians and straight cisgender supporters. To dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post Strangers & Solidarity – Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16 appeared first on Queer Theology.

Fr. Shannon discusses his upcoming book aimed at youth, exploring the impact of traditional devotionals on young people's faith. He critiques their limitations, emphasizing context and the potential for harmful theology. The conversation highlights the importance of innovative spiritual practices, encouraging young people to engage critically with scripture. The book includes journaling prompts for reflection, promoting a communal experience and empowering readers to ask questions and deepen their understanding of faith.

Rev. Mark E. Fowler from the @tanenbaumcenter joins us this week and discusses his journey from a Presbyterian upbringing to becoming an interfaith minister. Rev. Fowler guides Tanenbaum to the fulfillment of its mission to promote justice and build respect for religious difference by transforming individuals and institutions to reduce prejudice, hatred, and violence. He is a graduate of the One Spirit Interfaith Seminary, is an ordained Interfaith/Interspiritual minister, and is a Dean of second-year students at One Spirit Interfaith Seminary. In this episode, he explores the concepts of interfaith and interspirituality, emphasizing the importance of community and understanding among different faiths. Rev. Fowler shares insights from his work at the Tannenbaum Center, which focuses on combating religious prejudice and promoting justice. He reflects on personal experiences with spirituality, the impact of wounds from religious traditions on peoples’ spiritual journeys, and the intersection of faith and activism.    Takeaways Reverend Mark Fowler emphasizes the importance of community in interfaith work. Interfaith work involves knowing one another as neighbors and supporting each other. Interspirituality transcends traditional interfaith concepts, focusing on shared humanity. Tannenbaum Center aims to combat religious prejudice and promote justice. Personal experiences with religion can shape one’s spiritual journey significantly. Wounds from past religious experiences can influence current spiritual exploration. Christian privilege can be an invisible barrier to understanding religious diversity. Engagement in interfaith work can lead to healing and community building. Joy can be found in spending time with family and friends. The importance of investigating the relationship between culture and religion.   Chapters (04:23) Understanding Interfaith and Interspirituality (09:13) Personal Journey and Spiritual Background (18:21) The Role of Tannenbaum Center in Interfaith Work (27:31) Navigating Privilege and Spiritual Identity (33:12) Finding Joy and Community   Resources: Tanenbaum Center: https://tanenbaum.org/ Mark E. Fowler on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-fowler-9468b36  Follow Tanenbaum Center on IG: @tanenbaumcenter Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community    If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (9s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts from Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tuning each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hello. Hello. I’m excited to bring you another guest interview on the Queer Theology Podcast. Today we are talking to Reverend Mark E Fowler, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Tannenbaum, a secular non-sectarian nonprofit, providing thought leadership, innovative trainings and comprehensive solutions that foster respect for religious and non-religious beliefs and practices. (52s): Its mission is to promote justice and build respect for religious difference by transforming individuals and institutions to reduce prejudice, hatred, and violence. As CEO, Reverend Fowler is responsible for all of tenant bomb’s departments, the design and implementation of all tenant bomb trainings and the expansion of tenant bomb programs nationally and internationally. Reverend Fowler is a sought after keynote speaker and facilitator in all of tenant bomb’s core program areas, and has addressed organizations globally on issues of equality in race, gender, sexual orientation, and religion. Recently, Reverend Fowler delivered the keynote at the 2020 Diversity Best Practices Emerge Conference was featured in a fireside chat with Robert Cook, CEO, and president of F IRA’s 2020 Diversity Summit, and continued in his role as navigator at the 2020 unveiling of out Next’s latest curriculum outta the closet and into the C-suite. (1m 42s): Reverend Fowler earned a BA in English and Education at Duke University and was trained as a mediation and conflict resolution specialist with the NYC Department of Education. Reverend Fowler is also a graduate of the One Spirit. Interfaith Seminary is an ordained Interfaith slash Interspiritual minister and is a Dean of second year students at the One Spirit Interfaith Seminary. We are so glad to have you here today, Reverend Fowler. Thank you so much for joining us. Well, Reverend Mark, thank you so much for being here with us today. It’s just a joy to get to talk to you and share your story and share your work, And I know our listeners are gonna be really jazzed to hear about it. Thank you. It’s a pleasure to be here. So we’d like to start these interviews by asking if we were out at a queer dinner party or maybe like a church coffee hour, how would you introduce yourself to someone that you’re just getting to know? (2m 30s): Those is probably two different locations. Sure. Give us both of those answers then I wanna, I wanna hear the, the coffee hour and the cocktail party answer. Right. So at a, at a cocktail party or at a, a dinner or something like that. I’d probably say that I’m Mark, that I’m a native New Yorker, have been doing work in and around the community from a spiritual perspective for probably about 20, 25 years. And that includes being members of various different religious communities. I think if I were just kind of like hanging out at the church social, I’d probably talk about or say that, you know, I’m Mark Fowler, native New Yorker. (3m 15s): My journey started in the Presbyterian Church in Harlem and has kind of made its way through a number of spaces to now being a practicing interfaith Interspiritual minister. Yeah. And so can you talk about what interfaith means to you? I know lots of, it’s kind of a buzzwordy thing And I think lots of people, especially from Christian backgrounds, have good intentions when they head into interfaith work. But so what does that, what does that look like for you? Yeah, so personally, first I think I would say that I was not a person who was necessarily looking or searching for an Interspiritual path, and primarily because I grew up in a Christian environment, Presbyterian in Harlem, as I said. (4m 5s): And there is sometimes this, there are lots of assumptions and stereotypes about the difference between the black church experience as a theological precept and black people going to a church. And there’s kind of like this idea that, you know, there’s always, you know, tambourines and Hammond organs and you know, visitations of the Holy Ghost and all of that. And that was not my early experience. My experience in our Presbyterian church was one, things were a little bit more solemn, there were anthems, but it was a much more kind of relaxed, if you will, worship experience. (4m 46s): And for me, there weren’t other members of our family that practiced a faith different than the one that we all generally like went to. And so even in growing up in Harlem, like there was a Catholic church, which was predominantly InCorp, you know, had black congregants. There were places where other religious organizations gathered, but there wasn’t a lot of interaction between them except for if people happened to know each other in the buildings or the neighborhoods in which they lived. But there wasn’t a lot of visitation back and forth as I would grow older. Interfaith really did have to do with coming in contact with having some understanding of, and in some instances, beginning to practice or consider practices in traditions outside of the ones that I was familiar with. (5m 40s): When I think about interfaith work today different than in interfaith experience, interfaith work is often because we’re in the United States, most everything is kind of colored by Protestant Christianity in particular. But they generally, they tend to be spaces where people kind of like put their toe in the water at the, the very highest level of just meeting and knowing people of other traditions in deeper practices. It is communities that consciously and actively come together to know one another as neighbors and to be able to be of support to one another in times of trouble. (6m 22s): So an example of this for me, several years ago, there was a rabbi who was taken hostage in their temple via gunman himself and two other congregants. While that was going on, he had been a member of an interfaith group of religious leaders in their community. Nobody called them. As soon as they heard that the rabbi was in trouble, they self dispatched to that location to take care of his people while that horrible situation was being dealt with. And for me, that’s kind of one of the highest levels of interfaith experience and interfaith cooperation because you are no longer just like a representative of your faith. (7m 10s): You are a person that I know you are a member of my extended family and community, and if something happens to you, that’s wonderful, I celebrate that. But if there’s something that happens that’s troubling or there’s trouble, we are here for that as well. And I would say that inter spirituality is even a different construct than interfaith. Oh. So I, I love the distinction that you just made between an interfaith experience versus interfaith work. And not to like, I dunno put words in your mouth, but it, it’s, it sometimes feels like interfaith experiences might be a little bit like a melting pot, whereas like interi work is like everyone still remain retains their distinctiveness, but you’re working sort of together honoring those differences and working together like amongst and within them. (8m 1s): So yeah. Yes. And then, so I had a follow up question, but now I wanna know more about this inter spirituality. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So into spirituality is an ideal theological concept that I think really came into more knowledge, or at least was published about in the late nineties, early two thousands. There’s a book called The Mystic Heart, and then there’s another book called The Interest, the Becoming Interspiritual Age. And in both of those books, it talks about kind of like the condition that would exist beyond interfaith work as, as we were just been talking about it. (8m 41s): So where the concern for human humanity and the concern for human beings is outshined by any individual theological concept. And if anything that which we say we believe is actually in service to this larger ideal of global community, that there is no separation between people. There may be differences, but there’s no separation, there is no experience superior and inferior. And that whatever the goals and challenges we have of the day are for all of us to meet in a place that leaves us all. (9m 26s): Well, I love that. I love that. So the example that you shared of interfaith work was obviously a very sort of heightened emergency situation in your work at the Tanenbaum Center. Like what does that interfaith work look like on sort of an ongoing basis? Yeah, so at Tannin Bombs, first of all, we are a secular and non-sectarian not-for-profit. So we are not a religious organization ourselves. And that can get, you know, weird because people hear the name Tannenbaum and they automatically think that we are a Jewish organization aligned with Judaism, et cetera. We’re named after the Rabbi Mark Tannenbaum, and in particular because of his interfaith work before his death. (10m 12s): But we are not a religious organization. So a lot of our approach to this work is from a practical perspective. And how do you build, well, our mission is to combat religious prejudice, to promote justice, to build respect for religious difference. And so some of the ways that we do that are providing people with tools, resources, skills, so that they can navigate the religious diversity or the religious environment that they find themselves in. And with a goal of people being able to build bridges, relationships, coalitions, et cetera, that honor their individual faith journey. (10m 57s): Or even the journeys of people who don’t ascribe to a particular faith who are unaffiliated or atheist, agnostic, spiritual, but unaffiliated. All of those that we are trying to provide in the content areas in which we work an opportunity to consider what are my own biases and obstacles to really understanding and respecting the experience of someone, and how do we actually build, how do we address the concerns that we have, the communal concerns that we have where we find ourselves. Yeah, I know with this type of, you know, values driven work that the, the personal and the professional are often very much intertwined. (11m 37s): And so I would love to sort of rewind a little bit for you and can we sort of dive into you, you touched upon it a little bit, but sort of what is your background and experiences with religion like growing up and into adults? Yeah. And how has that shifted? What stayed the same? Yeah, what, what was the journey to hear? Yeah, so as I said, I, you know, grew up in a Presbyterian church in Harlem. I went to a Catholic junior high school in my neighborhood in the Bronx, where at the time, in seventh grade is the year, usually people participate in confirmation. And so I remember coming home and there are classes that are like built into the day, like there’s religious instruction classes. (12m 18s): So I remember coming home at one point and telling my mother, oh yeah, we’re getting ready for confirmation. She’s like, yeah, you’re not gonna be doing that. Like, you can go to the class all day long, but you’re not gonna be pre, you’re not gonna be like confirming yourself as a Catholic. Yeah. And I was kinda like, oh, okay. I mean, I didn’t know that there was anything, there wasn’t, it wasn’t presented as something that was wrong with Catholicism. It was just kind of like, you have a faith tradition and that’s the one that you’re going to follow. Was a little bit unchurched for a number of years because my mother decided, and we just, my sister And I didn’t really get along with some of the other kids in the church that we went to. (13m 2s): So we were happy to not go. And my mother had some concerns about like the church leadership at the time. So through high school I was pretty much unchurched. When I went to college, I started singing in the gospel choir And I had never sung in a gospel choir before. I’d never had that experience. And so during that first year, there was like, you know, learning this different wonderful music, but then there was this inner experience of God that I had not experienced before. And that was something that definitely continued through college and through that experience. (13m 42s): And then I joined new church that my mother had become affiliated with in the Bronx, and they refer to themselves as a non-denominational church that’s welcoming of all people. And so you had still, the majority of the majority to almost all of the congregants were black, but had come from a variety of experiences. Yet the church itself really kind of modeled the pastor’s training. And so it kind of operated as a Baptist church to a certain degree. And that church still exists. And I’ve had the honor of now preaching there after having been a member more than 20 years ago. (14m 24s): What, and then personally like, yeah, and then personally like meeting, like, you know, a friend of mine who is an AAN priestess and who was doing, who had been trained in and was doing indigenous practices and work and doing readings and things like that, which was also something that I had not experienced before my barber at one point. And at that time I actually had dreadlocks who was a Buddhist, who invited me to come to the temple to, you know, to meditate and chant. So I was just being introduced to other people’s experiences. (15m 4s): And I would say, again, it wasn’t so much that I was on this journey to find various experiences, but they were kind of finding me. And then in the early nineties, I joined a church called Unity of Fellow Unity, fellowship of Christ Church. Church started in Los Angeles as an AIDS ministry because at that particular time, as people were dying of aids, churches were not always funeral realiz people who had died of aids. And so within the LGBTQ plus community, there were people who had been ordained in a variety of traditions, and they started providing that service that grew into a church and social movement. (15m 52s): And I was a member there for many years. And that one was very much kind of like spanning a little bit of indigenous African ancestral tradition to Baptist and Pentecostal moments. So there was a lot that was happening inside of that experience as well. And I would say when I started working at Tannen Bound, what I started to experience in a different way, not necessarily so much from the personal expression, but really considering all of these traditions and people that I had never really thought about or knew about in depth or detail before, what was their lived experience in terms of how they were being treated equitably or not in the areas in which we work, which are education, healthcare, the workplace, and in peace building, or some might refer to it as conflict resolution still. (16m 52s): So that’s kind of been the journey. And then at in 2010, I decided to go to One Spirit, interfaith Seminary. And while I was a member at Unity, I had thought about pursuing, becoming a deacon. That did not happen while I was there, but there had been this earlier call to be of sacred service. And when I decided to fully answer that call, the interfaith model was one that was really appealing to me. Yeah, that’s really cool. I, my, my mom is a big, big, like we also grew up, I grew up going to Presbyterian Church and now I’m Jewish, but she’s like dabbling in Unity Foundation. (17m 42s): It’s much more her speed. I know when you were talking about sort of the ways in which different traditions were sort of like finding you, I I’m thinking of two different types of progressive Christians, LGBT Christians, and one is the sort of like, bring it on. I wanna like sort of sample everything. And then there’s another sort of archetype where I think it’s like, oh no, I can’t sample other things because like, those aren’t mine to, to take. And so I, I’m like curious sort of like your thoughts on the, like the, like what are people who are maybe grew up Christian and are sort of, maybe I’m still Christian, maybe I’m not still Christian, like maybe I’m curious, but I’m not exactly sure And I don’t know how you feel about religion. (18m 29s): Like what are some words of wisdom that you might have as they sort of deconstruct, reconstruct, find their spiritual footing? I don’t know how wise they’ll be, but Sure. The, the words that I’ll share. So I think there are a couple of things. One is if there are experiences that people have, and this is regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression. But if there are experiences people have had where there is a wound or there is some kind of spiritual injury, that can often be what’s determining and deciding where and how to follow and what I want to explore, what I don’t think is open to me, et cetera. (19m 14s): And I do think that there, it’s important to at least be able to identify those wounds and consider how there might be some ongoing healing around that wound so that it closes over maybe the course of your life where there’s a scab for a period and then the scab falls off and then there’s new skin and then the skin feels in. Like I feel that to connect two different bodies of work I’ve participated in for a short period, I was, I worked in an organization that supported people who were HIV positive and or trying to remain negative. (19m 57s): And one of the things that I learned as I was being introduced to case management was for some people in recovery, depending on when they started using a particular drug, their emotional development stopped at the time that they began using and became addicted. And I have found that model to be helpful in thinking about how people pursue their spiritual life. So depending on where and when and how that wound happened, some people may find themselves wanting to explore a spiritual life, but emotionally may be responding to it from six or 10 or 13, 20, 25, whatever moment that was, that kind of interrupted, that natural experience is something that has to be like dealt with and adapted. (20m 47s): And I do think, in my experience, I, I’ve served as a dean at one spirit, and one of the things that I’ve often seen kind of consistently in classes is that people come to, into spiritual work in some ways because of that wound or being disassociated from a tradition that they were a member of. And what ultimately people find is that there is some reconciliation that was really beyond their imagination of reconciling with the tradition of their, their, the beginning of their journey or where that wound happened as a way for them to move into sacred service. (21m 31s): So there are any number of traditions, including non-Christian ones that require an adherence and almost a rejection of other traditions. But I think what people find in their lived religious and lived spiritual experience is that you can try and not see similarities in the ways in which people worship and believe, but you’re gonna see them. And the question becomes how are you gonna respond? Where what is black and white and right in front of you appears because it will. Yeah. It’s like we all use candles, lots of us use scents. (22m 13s): Most of us use our bodies in some way. Like Yes, yes, there are, there are all of these places of convergence that have to do with the experience of human beings seeking the divine in the ways in which they give language to that. Yeah. You’re also, And I love how you were like, I don’t know how wise this will be. And then it was just, I mean, just fire. So I, I often tell this story. I first told it a million years ago, close to 20 years ago when I was doing some activism on the equality ride, speaking at a conservative Christian college about, and we sort of like merged the story of the Garden of Eden and Genesis and this sort of my first gay relationship, but as a teenager, And I, like, I keep coming. (23m 0s): I mean, I keep on coming back to it partly because it really resonates with folks, but it’s sort of become like one of the cornerstone stories of mine. And I, And I think actually in coming up with that talk for this school was like when I really shifted in my head from like, I think it’s okay to be gay, to like I know it. And I had, And I had never until this moment realized like, oh, well, when I was a teenager was when I first had that conflict between my faith and myself. And so it like makes sense that EI was in my twenties by this point, but like going back and revisiting that moment and saying like, here’s how this is holy was so, yeah. (23m 45s): Like, oh yeah, of course, of course. That’s why that story in particular Yes. Means so much to me. And so, oh, that’s just, I’m, I love it. I’m seeing it on, anyway. It’s really cool. Thank you for that insight. I wanna talk more about like tenant balm and your work there in particular, we’ve sort of, given that the high level, I know that you do, you know, some events on life, some events in person in different cities. Like what is, for someone who’s not yet a part of the work, like what is, what are some like ways in or Yeah. Yeah. So there are different ways in, in our education work. So first of all, one of the things I just want to shout out my communications team for is that they do an amazing job maintaining all of our social media presences, our website, our YouTube page, all of those are places where there is, there are resources, recordings, et cetera. (24m 37s): In our education work, it’s pretty much directed towards teachers, But we increasingly are doing more work with parents and doing more work with school personnel broadly defined and occasionally more work with students. And so there are, there’s all of the resources that we have, but there are often trainings that are done online where people can participate in our workplace work. We do a lot of work with global corporations, large not-for-profits and government agencies. We have two convenings a year. One of ’em, which is gonna be next week, excuse me, our Religious Diversity Leadership Summit. We’re gonna be holding it in Philadelphia at the Franklin Institute. (25m 20s): And that is our general audience conference. So people who are intrigued and interested in the idea of religious diversity, inclusion, and belonging in the workplace. We often have people who are members of, or leaders of employee resource, group of faith-based, employee resource groups, chief human resources officers, chief Diversity officers. And we’re really just presenting information from a variety of speakers and panels on what are some of the current trends and topics that are of interest to people. We also convene what we call the Religious Diversity Symposium. And that is particularly for senior leaders to really think about and strategize what’s the long-term vision and goal within their companies and their institutions on building a culture that is respectful of religious differences, including the experiences of people who are completely unaffiliated from religion altogether. (26m 19s): In our healthcare work, we do a lot of webinars for healthcare professionals and those involved with providing care to people who are not medical providers on the ways in which patients and families make decisions for their care that are based in their religious and spiritual beliefs. And in some instances, those who do not have a belief and may be in a healthcare institution that is faith-based in some way. And how do they navigate their experience. We’ve created curriculum for nursing students, medical students, residency programs, and we have a book that we wrote called The Medical Manual for Religiou Cultural Competence. And then in our Peace building work, I think the most direct access is through the case studies. (27m 3s): So we’ve written two books that are volumes of the work of our peacemakers in action who are women and men religiously motivated working for peace in active conflict zones. Their life or their liberty may have been at risk. And one of the things that we found was most important was that finding people who were relatively unknown, who you are not gonna see on CNN, you’re not gonna hear on religion news service or W or NPR, but they’re doing the work at the grassroots level and their commitment is inspired by their religious and spiritual beliefs. So now, we actually, a couple of years ago started moving towards a podcast model for our case studies. (27m 44s): And so we have two of our peacemakers, Dani Jira from Sri Lanka, and the Reverend Jackie Mana Puti from Indonesia. Their case studies are actually podcasts that people can listen to and can hear their story and their voice. And where can folks find that? On our website@tannenbaum.org. And you can just tool around to the different programs and you can find, if you go to tannenbaum.org/peace peace building, you’ll find access to the ca to the podcast case studies. Great. And we’ll put links to all of these things in the show notes. Of course, yes. You mentioned, you mentioned religiously motivated, and so I Yes. (28m 25s): Obviously, you know, as you said, Nan Baum is a non-religious, non-sectarian nonprofit, but of course, the people who are do the work, I imagine many or most folks are religiously motivated Yes. In some way. And so, but I, And I know also for many people, sometimes justice work or activism or peacemaking feels like maybe something separate from like their religious or the religion that they were, are used to. And so in what ways does sort of your faith or religion motivate you towards this type of workout? Like how are those intertwined for you personally? Hmm. No one has ever asked me that question before. Brian. That’s a great question. So the first job that I applied for at Tannenbaum was to be the educator and trainer for what then was called the Religion and Diversity Education Program. (29m 17s): Hmm. I had been a public high school teacher for 11 years here in New York City. I had been a trainer in a program at the Anti-Defamation League called the World of Difference Institute. I had actually done some work around coaching people and professional development, but, and had never really, and had been a spiritual person or involved in religion and spirituality my whole life. But I was never, ever seeking a job that had anything to do with religion. And when I saw the job description, I was like, that is really interesting. It wasn’t something that I was looking for, but when I came across it, I was kind of like, huh, this is an interesting way to kind of, you know, spend time while you’re making money. (30m 0s): So when I started at Tannenbaum, it wasn’t so much driven because I felt like it was, being at Tannenbaum was fulfilling a spiritual mandate for me. As much as this is a topic that, or this is an, an area religion is something that has been helpful, useful, has supported me, And I wonder what it’s like, Hmm. Within the first two years of working at Tannenbaum, one of the things that I came across was an article that was written around white Christian privilege and Christian privilege in particular. (30m 43s): And it was built around the idea of Debbie McIntosh’s article on unpacking the in invisible knapsack around white privilege. But this author identified that, so I can identify as white, but I’m also Jewish and there are some privileges that come with Christian privilege that I don’t get. So he then kind of took the concept and personalized it as a, a clinician, because I believe he’s a, he was a, a therapist, I believe. And just talking about like his lived experience that also is impacted by Christian privilege. I had never thought of my religious identity as one in which I experienced privilege. (31m 30s): Hmm. So being, being a black man in the United States, being a gay man in the United States, I was all kinds of, of acquainted and had all kinds of evidence as to the places and moments where I was not treated equitably and didn’t have to surrender any of that. But this was a moment where I had to, I, I really came to this thing like, huh. So as black as I am, and as gay as I am, because I come from a Christian background, not even practicing as I did as a child, there are things in life that I have privilege around. There are concerns about daily living that I do not have simply because I come from that background, not even fully fully practicing it any longer. (32m 20s): So I would say for me now, my kind of like moral drive around being a tannenbaum and leading tannenbaum has to do with that realization that I probably had about 16 years ago. That there’s a responsibility that I had and have as someone who was raised Christian in the United States and even has had an education in what it means for me personally to be a person who respects various religious and spiritual traditions and the experiences of people who are not connected to religion at all. (33m 1s): Yeah. It’s, you know, that’s one of the ways privilege operates right. Is that you don’t see it when you’re the beneficiary of it. Right. And I, you know, I, I know that I, my friends who are trans have talked about, especially who’ve been like, oh, when I transitioned, I suddenly, I like really got a crash course in it because I like saw the ways in which the world treated me differently. Yes. And I, as I’ve been, as I converted to ju to ju to Judaism a few years ago, I’m like, oh, I like, I, I, yeah, I see it. And I, I, I think that, like, I oftentimes hear people say like, well, America’s like not a Christian nation. And I’m like, I don’t know, like ask any non-Christian, right. (33m 42s): Like, ask anyone who’s like something else, right? Like, if you’re like an atheist, but your parents celebrate Christmas and you celebrate Christmas, like Yeah. Yeah. Like, you’re not Christian in some ways, but like in other ways you kind of are. And so like yeah, I think one of Those things that’s really interesting, sort of be on the other end of it and be like, oh yeah, like the America in particular is like really oriented around Christianity, whether that’s Jesus Christianity or Christmas Christianity. Like they’re, they’re both expressions of, of it. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that there’s, there’s something about when things become implicit, and we generally tend to focus more on the explicit because that tends to be the shiny ball that people can kind of like look at and scream at and react to. (34m 30s): But what we don’t necessarily take enough time to consider is how long it took for things to, that were and are religious to become such a part of the culture and the experience that nobody even thinks about its relationship to religion any longer. It’s just the way it’s or the way it’s supposed to be. And those are usually good catchphrases as to, oh, there’s something going on, there’s something more that I need to investigate here. So your work at Tannin Bomb, obviously there’s like very specific sort of channels and areas of focus for people who are gonna be the, the most likely to get involved. (35m 16s): You know, healthcare professionals, corporate leaders, things like that. If there’s just someone at home listening and they’re like, I don’t know, I’m just like a, I’m like a queer person and I’m like really interested in what Reverend Mark here is saying, And I like, I, I’m like, I’m hungry for more. Like, what are some suggestions for of steps that those folks might, might take? Like is it getting involved with you somehow? Is it practices for themselves? What does that look like? So I think one of the things that, well, there are a couple of ways. So one is we have had a Faith and Pride series for going on for a couple of years. And I would really encourage people to check that out just to see not just, you know, my mad rantings, but you know, what are other people from other traditions talking about in terms of their experience of faith and pride. (36m 3s): Because we really are trying to, and would really welcome, like if people wanted to share, we have kind of like a, it’s through a device called a system called Memory Fox, where people can like, respond to some prompts about their experience of their intersection, of their life, of faith and, and their life and pride and like how does, how do, what are some of the lessons they’ve learned and experiences that they’d wanna share. So that’s one way for people who just wanna learn more about Tannin Beum. We have something called Coffee with Mark. I mean, I, I, it, it just, I can’t barely get it out of my mouth ’cause it’s just so crazy to be talking about yourself in the third person. But it’s the opportunity for members of our community, both old and new, to find out kind of like, what are the new things that we are doing and what are some of the projects that we’re working on? (36m 55s): And really to ask people, answer people’s questions about, about our work. So those are two really good, immediate ways to get involved. Cool. And it also might be that they could nudge folks at their work, people and leadership, or at the employee resource group representatives to go to go check you out too as well. They, you know, you know, if it happened that way, that would be okay. Like it wouldn’t be a bad thing. Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure, sure. Well, so if like folks want to stay connected with you personally and or tenon bomb as the organization Yes. Like, what are the best ways to do that? Yeah, so I am on LinkedIn, so anyone can find me as Mark Fowler, Mark E Fowler on LinkedIn. (37m 40s): We also have an Instagram account, which is, I believe at Tannenbaum Center. And I we’re, you know, constantly posting. And that’s an account where there’s, it’s, you know, you’re gonna get a response immediately. We’re also on Facebook and on X so people can follow me and follow us there as well. Awesome. And we like to close out by asking like, what’s one thing that’s bringing you joy these days? Oh, definitely spending time with friends and family is, is bringing me joy. This past weekend I was at my grand and niece’s, if that’s the way you say it, my niece’s daughter’s second birthday party. Mm. (38m 20s): Nothing better than, you know, two year olds and other kids running around, jumping in and out of the pool, eating stuff that they shouldn’t, all of that. And spending time with, you know, my sister and her children and my mother. And you know, this is a time for community And I really do, I’m mindful of the numbers of people on the planet that do not have an experience of community. So when, when I I, I don’t take for granted the numbers of places and spaces where I am welcome as that line from Cheers where everybody knows my name and they don’t necessarily care about what I do, but they just know and appreciate me. (39m 9s): So that’s something that gives me joy. I love that. Well, thank you so much for being here, Reverend Mark, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much, Brian. The Queer Theology podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration, fort LGBTQ Christians and straight cisgender supporters. To Dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post Exploring Interfaith with Reverend Mark E. Fowler appeared first on Queer Theology.

We’re showcasing another throwback episode for this week and this one is the beginning of a series we did on the Gospel of Mark. Mark is one of our favorite books of the Bible. There is so much richness to the history in Mark and for this first episode in the series, we look at the context and time in which this gospel was written. We had such a good time diving deep into this sacred story, and trying to pull out new insights for today. There is so much relevance that can be carried into our own lives from these ancient texts.    Resources: Listen to the full series on Mark Week 2: What’s the Deal With the Pigs? Week 3: Healing and Oppression Week 4: When Empires Crumble Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community  If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology The post Throwback: The First Gospel – Mark  appeared first on Queer Theology.

We have both found ourselves living in really different communities – Brian in New York City, and Shay in rural Kansas. That got us to thinking about the contrasting religious experiences of living in urban and rural settings and reflecting on how these environments shape understandings of community, spirituality, and the presence of the Divine. There has been a theme of going to the desert or the quiet of the country to hear God, but what if paying attention and tuning in helps us find God in everyday city life as well? We emphasize the need for connection and community in both urban and rural contexts, ultimately leading to a deeper understanding of faith and presence in diverse spaces.   Takeaways We are living in two very different places. The spaces we inhabit shape our religious imagination. Cities are often seen as sites of wickedness compared to gardens. Urban areas provide more safety nets than rural communities. There is a sense of community in rural areas that can be lacking in cities. Religiosity can feel overt and uncomfortable in rural settings. Community hospitality is often stronger in smaller towns. Finding God requires training our attention to the divine in everyday life. Paying attention to the details can reveal the presence of God. Both urban and rural settings have unique challenges and opportunities for faith.   Chapters (02:20) Exploring Urban vs. Rural Spirituality (05:03) The Role of Community in Different Spaces (11:32) Finding God in Everyday Life (16:57) Attention and the Divine in Our Environments Resources:.  Say Yes by Andrea Gibson Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community    If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (9s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts from Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tuning each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hello there. And welcome to August. If you’re in the Northern hemisphere, I hope that you are staying cool. It’s blistering here where I am not sure about where you are, Shannon, of how hot it’s where you are, yet it’s blistering there too. He’s nodding his head. And for our southern hemisphere friends, I hope you’re enjoying your winter. I saw on a update from someone that we follow in Australia and he was saying it’s like five degrees Celsius there. (54s): So that’s, that’s wild. ’cause I’m like, that sounds delightful to me right now. And so before we started recording this, Shannon And I were just sort of like catching up on our lives and it occurred to us that We are living in two very different places and we were just sort of like reflecting on the sort of like what it, what it means to like be somewhere. So I am at, at the time of this recording, I’m living in New York City and it’s a population of like around, I forget like 9 million, 8 million. And Shannon is living in independent, Shannon is living in a small town in Kansas, which is a population of about 8,000. So wildly different experiences. (1m 36s): And I think that like, I don’t know, there’s like something about, we both live in America obviously, and there’s something about like real America and like what is real America when people say that they probably actually mostly mean like suburban red states. And I’m obviously in a blue state, but not in the suburbs and neither is really in the suburbs. And we’re just thinking about like the ways in which God has talked about being present in cities, not in cities in the desert, not in the desert. And we just think there’s like something there about place and location. And so we want to sort of explore that together. So like sh anything else to sort of add to that sort of setup, Shay? So I, I just think it’s also interesting in this current moment that we’re in to like reflect upon how the spaces that we’re in shape our religious lives and, and in some ways like our religious imagination and also like how we might be able to both find God in all of the spaces that we’re in, but also like help to potentially challenge the imagination of the, of the space we’re in if it needs it. (2m 40s): Right. Yeah. Yeah. And I I I would actually probably posit that like both the spaces that we’re in need some kind of challenging. Yeah. It’s just gonna look really different. Yeah. First off, what I was thinking, what prompted this was I had was journaling a little while ago And I was reflecting upon the ways in which desert imagery gets used in religious texts that, you know, the Israelites wandered in the desert, Jesus went out into the desert. And then even like post post scripture, like especially within Christianity, there’s like the desert fathers sort of Christian monastics, Christian hermits. There’s sort of like this sort of the sense that sort of aloneness can be like one way that you access God. (3m 24s): And there’s sort of I think a romanticizing about the countryside, the country solitude from Walt Whitman to like classic American paintings, just sort of, when we talk about quote unquote real America, what sort of, what image sort of conjures that to mind there. And I don’t know, I was just thinking like there’s like a hustle and a bustle and an electricity sort of in the air in New York City and like what if God is just as much in like the sparks on the subway track and in the hiss of the steam coming up from the manhole and in the honks of the taxi cabs as God is in the rustling of the wind and the pitter-patter of drizzle on the riverbed. (4m 12s): And yeah, so I think that there’s, so I was like wanting to like reclaim urban life thinking about the ways in which, you know, Gotham in, in Batman comics is sort of like this like place of decay and crime and Sodom and gamar, these like, sort of like cities being dangerous. And the reality is I just Googled it, like 82% of Americans live in cities and urban areas. So like real America is like cities like this is like where people actually live. And so there’s like something there, which is not to say cities are perfect, there’s like gross economic inequality in many cities, especially like in New York City. (4m 54s): But so I, yeah, so there’s, but like, so I yes. I’m just like noodling on on that. And so like, I guess like what are the ways in which like, ’cause Shay you’ve lived in both cities Yeah. And rural areas. And so like what are the ways in which, and you, you like what from like rural to city back to rural, and it’s like what are some ways in which your understanding of like what it means to live in the country or in the city have like shifted and also how you’ve experienced God in in those places? Yeah, I mean, just to, just to touch on a couple of things that you said, you know, one of the things that jumps out at me in thinking about imagery, right? We see in, in the things that you mentioned, Gotham, Saddam, and Kimura. (5m 34s): But in general, like all throughout scripture there is this sense of cities as sites of wickedness as opposed to gardens, right? That there is always this like juxtaposition between the, the city and the garden, which I, I find really kind of fascinating and, and like you said, we do know that there are gross economic inequalities in cities and yes. Also in rural communities, like yeah, totally be rural. But one of the things that I think is, is interesting is that there’s also much better safety nets Yeah. Inside of cities. And like we can talk about like there are lots of reasons for that. (6m 17s): Not all of them good, right? Like there there has been like a massive, you know, economic pull out of rural communities that has like devastated many of the things that yeah would have been historically safety nets in the past. And, and so like that’s a problem. But I do think that there is just simply because of like not only density of population, but also like density of resources that there are more protections for you should you need it, right? There are, there are shelters that you can go to, there are organizations that can possibly provide for your needs in ways that like don’t exist in, in the town that I’m in, like I think there’s maybe a shelter. (7m 10s): And yet there is also like poverty and people experiencing homelessness in a city of 8,000 people. And so one could also say like, the failures of the rural community to not take care of, of their population is higher. So like that was one thing that kind of stuck out to me as you were talking. I also reflect upon how, especially where I am, I, I think that there is a combination, particularly here in Kansas and in Oklahoma where I’m spending some time where we’re not just rural, we’re also, it’s still kind of considered the Midwest, but it is, it feels south to me in a way. (7m 56s): Like I’ve never lived this far south before. There is an overt religiosity everywhere I go. Like I have never been told to have a blessed day more in my life than the last like two years in a not sarcastic way, right? Like, I think people have told me to have a blessed day on the internet and in, in yeah. Urban spaces, but it was sarcastic here it’s like actually genuine. And so, but so I think about like how that overt religiosity kind of plays out and, and also it is expected that everyone is on the same page and, and on board with that religiosity, with those expressions and that you are grateful for them. (8m 46s): And so I find myself often deeply uncomfortable in both like, oh, that was a very sweet and encounter at the quick trip, but also like, why are, why are we saying that to people and what is the assumption behind that? And not to mention like the fact that there are, I often joke about the town that I’m living in, it feels like there are more churches than people and like how, how does that play out? And like the assumption is that you go to church, but there are all of these tiny churches, right? And like how does that impact how we’re taking care of our community and showing up for each other and, and is there a sense of I take care of the people in my congregation but not this other congregation. (9m 26s): And I think that that’s really fascinating too, all while saying I, I do feel like there is definitely a more community minded spirit here in Kansas than I experienced in Minneapolis. And I think partially that is ’cause like Minneapolis is kind of a weird beast of a city in that it is very Midwest and like lots and lots of people grew up in Minneapolis and so like they have their friends that they’ve had their friends since kindergarten. So, and, and so as someone who moved there, it was very hard to find and make community. It was just not set up for that in, in the ways that like when I moved to Kansas, even before I moved, I already had a community here. (10m 14s): Yeah. Because they were just so like excited to welcome people and especially excited to like, welcome outsiders and that was not something I experienced in Minneapolis. And so I think that like there is a hospitality here, right? That is not the hospitality that I experienced in, in the city of Minneapolis. It also reminds me like when you show up to a small church or a small synagogue, like often, especially like if you’re younger, like, and like that, they’re like just like so excited that it’s like there’s someone new. And so I could see moving to this small town, you are like not young, but you’re not old. You’re like in your forties, you’re queer, you’re an artist. (10m 56s): And so I could imagine those types of people in your small town being like, PE people, people like you don’t move here. So we’re like, we’re so excited about that. Whereas like in Minneapolis it’s like, oh, you’re like a queer artist, like moving to a city like cool. We got, we have a lot of those already. Yeah. Yeah. So there’s an element that just like, I, I see that parallel there. Yeah, I, I remember when I was living in Los Angeles, another like, yeah, the other, one of the other largest cities in America, I remember my, my predominantly LGBT synagogue was partnering with Sage, the sort of nonprofit for LGBT, older adults and elders to do like a Hanukkah party for like the Jewish folks, a part of that organization. (11m 40s): And I remember being like, oh yeah, like if you’re old and you live in a city, like, especially like if you’re a queer person, like you can be part of sage and then like the 20 somethings and the 30 somethings and the 40 somethings from like the queer synagogue will come and celebrate Hanukkah with you. Like, and they can just like hop on the bus and get there. Whereas like if you live somewhere else, you have to drive further. You’re just more spread out. There might not be like a d there’s only so many queer people in your, in your small town that there is just sort of like a critical mass of people that makes, especially for queer life, there’s like a vibrancy there that there’s not, there’s a, it’s a different type of vibrancy in small, like small town gay bars. (12m 22s): And so I was like sort of struck by that element of it. And I do think that like, it’s really easy in big cities to feel surrounded by people and alone. I think because people have their lives and their friends or like, and sometimes in big cities like their careers and so they’re just sort of like go, go, go, go, go. And so like, it can be harder to plug in and make those connections and also if you like, are able to sort of take the time and find those people that like, there’s something really special about being able to, I don’t know, like I live in the same building as two of my friends, right? (13m 11s): Like when I, I’ve like often lived within walking distance of like seven friends, eight friends, which is when I lived in the suburbs, like I had some, like a few friends in my neighborhood, but most friends I had to drive to get to. And so there’s just sort of like this closeness that, that makes like casual connections easier or like spur of the moment connections easier. And that, because especially in New York City, it’s a very public transit heavy city like millionaire CEOs and homeless people are like riding the same subways together. And so there’s like no illusions of like separateness, like we are physically smushed together and have to figure out how to occupy the same space together. (13m 52s): Which is like, not to say that like the millionaires are like suddenly like more generous or like not racist because of that experience, but there’s just sort of like a, it’s like a different, it, there’s like orients you to the other in a different way. And I, you know, I it’s, it’s interesting when folks come from other places to visit of all different types of backgrounds that there’s like the, the city can like feel scary to them ’cause there’s just like people everywhere and it’s loud and there’s someone asking for money and there’s like someone sleeping on the corner and like, what do you do with all of that? And it’s like someone who’s lived in a city my entire adult life, it’s just like, oh, these are just like the people that make up the city with me. You don’t actually have to be scared of them. (14m 32s): I’m scared of being in, in the suburbs or, or, or like in a rural place where it’s like there’s no houses for as far as I can see. It’s dead silent. Like that’s terrifying to me. Like I want, I want to like be able to hear the person on the other side of my wall and then there’s like this, like this closeness that there to me feels like some sort of Divine synergy. And it’s interesting because as you’re talking, I I think that that same communal closeness is in rural communities, right? And it’s the sense of there are only so much of us, so we have to figure out how to get along, right? Like yeah, if you, you can’t, if you get mad at the one person who owns the one restaurant in town, like you gotta figure that out because there’s nowhere else to go. (15m 21s): Or like there’s one guy who, you know, mows lawns or shovel snow. So like yeah, you gotta, you gotta, it’s like the town mechanic. Exactly. You know, there aren’t a lot of choices and there is beauty in that, right? It’s you like figure out, you know, like you said, how to get along, you figure out how to build community informed community. And I think that like the difference, right? People I think often conflate rural with suburban, which is like very different. Like there is a, there is a, an illusion of self-sufficiency that one can have when you live in the suburbs that is like not possible in either urban spaces or rural spaces. (16m 4s): Like it’s just not, there is no illusion that like I’m making it on my own when I have this community around me. Right? And I, I look at, I look at that And I, there was a, I I think I’ve told this story before of like when I first moved here and the bed that I ordered like wasn’t getting put together correctly and within 10 minutes someone had found like someone with a metal grinder to like fix the bed that I had ordered from Amazon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. And in a way that like had I been in another space, I would’ve, you know, driven to loads in the suburbs and like, or purchased a new whatever and this was a real sense of community like gathering around to make, make this possible. (16m 51s): And I also think that there’s something here in, And I don’t know, I don’t know what this is exactly, but like I’m thinking about like for queer progressive people of faith, there are challenges in both in finding and making community and like living out your religious life in both urban and rural spaces. Like here the closest like overtly affirming church that I feel like would have my back is almost an hour away, right? And so like if I want to make, if I wanna be a part of a church community, like I’m probably going to have to travel in, in a different way and in the, in the midst of the like overt religiosity, which in some cases seems like it would make engaging in faith easier. (17m 45s): It actually sometimes feels like for a trans person in rural America, like it actually feels less easy, right? That they’re, that that overt Christian display like sometimes makes me feel unsafe or like excluded. Yeah. I’m not in a space where I can, where I can worship. Whereas like I think in, in urban spaces, right? Like you have options, there are options of congregations and synagogues and all different sorts of, of places to engage in worship. And also there are so many options of so many things that like engaging in religious community is a choice and it’s not a choice that people are always making. (18m 29s): And so like how do you build that community? Which I think brings me to like my larger point in all of this. And I was thinking of this in the very, from the very beginning when you were talking about, you know, God in the his of the subway and the manhole covers that like, all of this brings me back to an aspect of attention and like how do we train our attention to find the divine where we are? Right? And I think that like there is this sense of back the monastics, right? There was this sense of like, there is so much happening in the city that I have to go to the caves and the desert and the whatever in order to have the space and silence to like hear the voice of the divine. (19m 14s): Yeah. But I think that almost all of them would then say it, the intention was never to then remain there. It was always to then train yourself to then come back to the community with a new musculature to be able to hear right where you are. Yeah. And I think that that is the, the work that’s in front of us of like how do we train ourselves to tune in and pay attention where we are to finding the divine. Yeah. I’m, I’m, that really resonates with me this sort of like paying attention piece that, so I turned 40 like a few weeks ago at this point and Andrea Gibson actually died the day before I turned 40, which was like just weird clusterfuck of emotion for me. (20m 3s): But I was just like thinking about the ways in which they, Andrea Gibson, like really like paid attention and it was like in the particularities and the specificities of their poems and their observations and their musings like that I think is what really like crackled and sizzled for people. Like, I, like I, I remember the first, the first poem I think that I ever introduced me to Andrew Gibson, like, I don’t know 15 years ago was, was probably say, I think it’s called Say Yes When Two Violins are placed in a room, if a court on one violin is struck, the other violin will sound that note. (20m 45s): If this is your definition of hope, this Is for you. And it’s like it starts with this like specific thing of like a string on a violin and then like that becomes like hope. And I don’t know, like a violin isn’t inherently hopeful, right? But like there’s, they, they noticed something in this like two violins strings resonating togetherness of it. And it reminds me of like Mary Oliver’s poem, instructions for Living a Life Pay Attention, be astonished to Tell about it. And that like, I think that’s the work that we have been doing here. What that that we before like rambling about before, before I started recording this was like that I, as I was turning approaching 40 and turning 40, I’ve just been like reflecting on my life and very, very content with it and very pleased with it. (21m 35s): And there’s been a lot that’s gone really well and a lot that’s gone really terribly. And I think that my life today looks like absolutely nothing like what I hoped it would look like when I was 12 or 16 or 18 or 22 or 24. And also like, it’s so fucking fabulous. Like it’s just fantastic. Like, I’m so grateful for it. And, And I think that so much of that is because of the paying attention that queering theology has done for me, that I’m so thankful that I’m queer because it like forced me to question everything around me. (22m 15s): And even before we Shay you, you And I started doing this work together, I was like, I really had to like figure out like what is my life? Who am I, what is the purpose of life? What is God? What is the universe? Where do I fit into all of this? I didn’t have all of the answers to all that figured out, but like queerness and not fitting into the culture at, in 1998, 2003, whenever like forced me to this sort, like forced me to pay attention And that like, the more that I do this work, it’s like I feel like that’s where the juicy stuff of life is. And I think that this, this work, like we have a podcast, we have a book coming out next year. (22m 56s): We don’t, it’s spoiler alert, we don’t make very much money from it. So like, we’re certainly not doing it for the money, but like, it, it is sort of like a work that we bring ourselves to, but like it’s, we started this work because we were sort of doing it as a personal practice already on our own and we found immense value in it and we wanted to share that with others. And so like, I know this started with the city and the country, but like I think that there’s like something here about the paying attention to it. Like God is already everywhere. It’s if you’ll pay attention and look for them, will you, will you find God? And so like, yeah, I’m just, I would love to hear from y’all also like where are the ways in which like God shows up like in your particular place because like, I only in the same way that we’re always talking about, like, everyone has different experiences of queerness and so we need them all to fully understand the divine. (23m 49s): I’ve only ever lived in suburban Maryland in Los Angeles and New York City and with some stints in, with some stints in like, not like suburban Boston and a little bit of time in, in small town Michigan. But like I’ve, I’ve only have a handful of experiences, right? And so like where are the ways in which like God is showing up in y’all’s life? I dunno, send us an email or come onto Instagram and, and share that with us. Anything oth other, any other like sort of like musings on God in cities and God in the country. For you, Shea I just echo what you said. You know, I think that we can find the divine everywhere and, and part of the work then is like, how do we, how do we tune ourselves to, to notice better? (24m 41s): And I, I think, you know, reading poetry is one way and dabbling in writing poetry, even bad poetry is another way. And, you know, going to, again, the, the artists always can help us point the way forward. And so what, who are the, who are the artists that you’re looking to right now as, as people who are helping you to see in new ways? And would love to hear that too. If you wanna share. The Queer Theology podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for LGBTQ Christians and straight cisgender supporters. To dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. (25m 22s): You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post Rural God, City God appeared first on Queer Theology.

Andrew Gurza (@andrewgurza) joins Brian this week on the podcast to talk about sex, disability, and his new book, “Notes From a Queer Cripple.” Andrew is an award winning Disability Awareness Consultant and the Chief Disability Officer and Co-founder of Bump’n, a sex toy company for and by disabled people.  Andrew uses they/he pronouns and identifies proudly as disabled.  He is also the host of Disability After Dark: The Podcast Shining a Bright Light on Disability Stories. In this conversation, Andrew shares their journey as a queer disabled person, discussing their experiences with sexuality, disability advocacy, and the importance of creating inclusive spaces. They delve into their work as a speaker and author, emphasizing the need for open discussions about sex and disability. The conversation highlights the challenges faced in the community, the impact of critiques, and the joy of connecting with others through shared experiences.   Takeaways Andrew has been a disability consultant for 14 years. They emphasize the importance of discussing sex and disability openly. Andrew’s book is a love letter to queer disabled people. They advocate for the inclusion of disabled sexuality in mainstream conversations. Andrew’s experiences with sex work have transformed their relationship with intimacy. They believe that disabled people deserve to explore their sexuality freely. Andrew’s journey includes creating a sex-positive community for disabled individuals. They highlight the need for more accessible spaces for disabled people to express their sexuality. Andrew’s work aims to challenge societal norms around disability and sexuality. They encourage others to see the beauty in their bodies and desires.   Chapters (02:40) Talking About Sex and Disability (05:37) The Journey to Disability Advocacy (08:29) The Book: Notes from a Queer Cripple (11:19) Sex Work and Intimacy (14:09) The Importance of Connection (17:01) Embracing Sexuality and Body Positivity (19:50) The Power of Humor in Disability Advocacy (22:52) The Influence of Queer Media (25:10) Creating Inclusive Spaces for Disabled Queer People (28:32) The Impact of the Deliciously Disabled Party (31:07) Navigating Critiques and Misunderstandings (34:35) The Complexity of Disability and Sexuality (37:21) The Importance of Community and Support (40:19) Final Thoughts on Sexuality and Disability   Resources:. Notes From a Queer Cripple by Andrew Gurza Learn more about Andrew Gurza https://www.andrewgurza.com/about Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (9s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts from Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tuning each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hello. Hello. Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Queer Theology Podcast. Today we’ve got a really exciting interview with Andrew Gza. Have been a fan and follower of Andrew Online. I think I first saw him through the website, hammer Rose, and I’ve been following his Twitter and his Instagram listening to his podcast for many, many, many years now. (50s): And so I’m just like a little, little bit of a fanboy over this interview. Andrew Gurza is an award-winning disability awareness consultant uses they he pronouns and identifies proudly as disabled. Their work has been featured on A-B-B-C-C-B-C Daily Extra Gay Times, uk, Huffington Post, the Advocate Everyday feminism mashable out.com, and several anthologies. He was a subject of an award-winning national film board of Canada documentary called Picture This. Andrew has guested on a number of podcasts including Dan Savage’s, Savage Love, and Cameron Esposito’s Query. He has spoken all over the world on sex disability and what it means to be a queer cripple. He is also the host of Disability After Dark, The Podcast Shining a Bright Light on Disability Stories, which won a Canadian podcast award in 2020. (1m 36s): One was a queer tea award nominee and was chosen as an honoree of the 2020 Web Awards. The show is available on all platforms. Andrew’s also the creator of the viral hashtag Disabled People are hot and relevant to today’s conversation. He’s the author of a new book, Notes From a Queer Cripple. I so enjoyed talking with Andrew And I think that you are going to enjoy the conversation as well. So let’s dive in. Andrew, thank you so much for being here with me today. Brian, thank you for having me here today. It’s such a pleasure. I am like a little bit fanboying. I first, this is, I think, I think you know this. I first like found out about you years ago, I think by way of Hammer Rose. (2m 16s): I think I saw you in in a adult film on the internet. That one. Yeah. Yeah. And I was like, he’s hot and fun and interesting And I wanna like, I like checked you out on social media And I was like, oh, you’ve got a podcast. So I was, I subscribed to your podcast and I’ve been following your Instagram and your tweets for like, at least since 2016 if not longer. And so thank you. When we start, when you started following me back and we started talking online, I was like, ah, this is so cool. And then I found out we have, we both independently got booked deals and then found out we have the same editor. And so that’s like been cool that that sort of like serendipitously worked out. And so you’re a podcaster, a disability advocate and educator. (2m 58s): You’re now a published author and like an all around like really like rad person. And so I’m, I’m so glad to have you on this podcast. Thank you so much. So today, like just set the stage for where we’re going. I wanna talk about like your experiences like as a like queer, disabled person and also like in general and also about your like book in particular. So let’s get started. Cool. And ready? Yeah. Let’s do it. Yeah. So can you like, share, one of the ways that we like to start the interview is by asking folks like, imagine that you’re out like a, a fun queer dinner party or a cocktail party. (3m 39s): Like how would, how do you introduce yourself? I would say, hi, my name’s Andrew. I’m a freelance disability consultant And I give talks about sex and disability. I’ve been doing it now for 14 years, which is really weird and a long time. But I’ve been doing it for, yeah, freelance for about 14 years now, which feels like such a long time. But I talk predominantly about sex and disability ’cause no one else does. Yeah, totally. You know, I think that for many folks listening who have like some sort of religious background, like talking about sex in public can be kind of scary. And I, I, you know, we at Queer Theology com talk about it a lot. (4m 20s): And so like can you share what it was like for you to start talking about sex, like in a public way? I was, yeah. I was never afraid of it. I was never scared of it. I’ve always been a very sexually open person. From the time I knew that I was queer at like six years old to going through puberty, I always knew that like, this shouldn’t be a scary thing. But what I probably didn’t, didn’t count for is that people would be afraid of me and my disability because of it. And so I made the choice when I was done school, I went to school for legal studies and law. So I made the choice when I was done school to, I was looking for jobs And I was looking for work And I said, I wanna do disability consulting. (5m 5s): I wanna be a speaker on disability. And everybody went, that’s a nice hobby, that’s not a real job. Hmm. And I kind of went, well fuck you, I’m gonna make it my job. Watch me make it my job. And I made a card up this to print, printed my name on it, said I’m a disability awareness consultant, having no idea what that was. And said I wanted, here’s what I do. And I started contacting HuffPo and the Advocate and, and like men’s health magazines and every, every magazine where a queer person would go. And I said, I wanna write for free, not anymore, but at the time when I was up for free, I wanna write about sex and disability. Do you have anybody that does that? And they were like, no. (5m 45s): And I was like, great, can I be the one that does that for you? And so I just started putting it out there publicly because I wanted to do education, but also I wanted to be honest, I wanted to get laid. I wanted gay men and queer men to notice me. And I was like, if I put my body out there and, and push that I’m a sexual being, maybe finally I’ll get laid or I’ll go on some dates or I’ll meet somebody. Yeah. And so there was a professional reason for it and there was a sexual reason for it. It was like, I want people, I want queer men specifically to know that I’m here too. Yeah. And to get paid while you’re attracting queer men to have sex with you. Yeah. So that’s a double win. And to like, make some money. (6m 26s): ’cause everybody said, oh, it’s a hobby, it’s not a real job. It can be your hobby. And I kept being like, well, I don’t want to be a hobby. It’s, it’s what I wanna do. And so I was really disheartened by the lack of community support. But I also was thankful because there was nobody doing it in my area at the time. I mean, I was in Toronto and I’m still in Toronto because there was nobody at the time doing it. I, I kind of cornered that market locally and said, okay, I’m gonna be the guy. And that led to like, I was on one girl five days for a season, which is a little Canadian pop show. It happened like 10 years ago. (7m 6s): I did a season of that Talking About Sex and Disability. I’ve done porn, I’ve done like tv I’ve done like, because I refused to be like, I’m not going to, I’m not gonna listen to you. I’m gonna do this. Yeah. You sc was my follow-up question, which was gonna be, so you’ve, you’ve talked about like writing. What are some of the other ways that you do disability advocacy and consulting? I have a great podcast called Disability After Dark where I talk, I talk, I used to talk only about sex And I got bored. So now it’s an Everything Disability podcast, but for the first like 200 episodes, it was predominantly sex and disability. So I do that once a week, once, once every other week. (7m 48s): And I do consulting And I do writing And I do tweeting. And I do like so many different things free. The joy of freelance is, it’s very flexible. You can do so many different things in one day for your job. And I love that. And so I do so many different things from talks to tweeting to, to Instagraming, to like doing lives, like doing stuff like this. It’s really, really cool that I can use my voice to talk about sexuality, queerness, and disability and in so many different ways. Yeah. Thank you for all of that. So one of the things, so you’ve got a book coming out or you have a book that is already out Notes From a Queer Cripple. (8m 30s): Yes. I Now I know that the like unsexy story is that like the publisher approached you about it, but like when you were thinking about what this book might be, how did you come up? Like why, why The Book that you ended up writing? Like why that book in that way? Well, that, that was in The Book that I wanted to write initially. I had written a, my spec outline was a lot broader, a lot more like, how do we make the queerness accessible to everyone? And they were like, that’s very nice. Can you hone it into disability and your community? Please can you just talk about your community? And I was like, okay. So I had to pivot and they were like, just tell stories like you would in your tweets and just talk, like those things you talk about in your tweets, make them longer for an essay. (9m 17s): Go. And so, like, that was really daunting for me ’cause I didn’t, I forgot how to write long form. I forgot how to do like, oh, I have to write pages and pages of this to make it make sense. And so like they said, we wanted you to write a love letter to queer, disabled people, but also give queer, non-disabled people a place to land. And so that’s kind of how The Book came to be. And really it’s a collection of seven Chapters of a bunch of stories of my formative years trying to be queer and disabled, trying to access sex, trying to, like trying to go to clubs, trying to go to, trying to make a porn, try like doing all these things but infusing disability in a way that I don’t think we’ve seen before. (10m 1s): And being unashamedly like queer about it. And I am disabling queer. I suck, I do this. I, and it’s very, very direct. And a lot of people who have read it, they love it. But there have been some that have said like, oh, it’s too heavy on the sex work. It’s too heavy on the sex chat. Why? And I think that’s important because so much of disability writing or queer writing doesn’t put the two worlds together of it. It’s very sanitized. Yeah. It was No time to do that. Yeah. One of the things that I, I noticed as I was reading your book was that like, obviously you have had very different experiences for me. (10m 44s): And also I recognized like my myself in many parts of it and sort of like parts of my own queer experiences and that like, there are some like through lines between many of our queer experiences and queer lives that are sort of like resonate across differences or ways in which your like experience with a disability. Like remind me of other experiences like not related to disabilities that I’ve had. Right. And so like, not to, not to universalize a, a particular story, but I feel like this is one of those moments where like disabled justice like helps everyone and like learning from disabled folks can sort of help you see your own self in a new light while also helping you see disability in a, in a new light as well. (11m 30s): Yeah. And I think, you know, I I, that was kinda the point of The Book. I wanted to tell everybody, like, you will become disabled, disability will be a part of your story. You might run into like the hottest disabled person at the club, and then disability becomes better, your story. And like how do you sleep with them? How do you have in with them? How do you get to know them all? All the stuff I talk about in The Book gives a non-disabled queer person, particularly queer men. And that’s kind of who, that’s kind of the community that I was speaking to was really queer men because they have so much ableism to unpack. So I wanted them to see queer, disabled sex is a possibility and how like sexy can be. (12m 13s): Yeah. How has your relationship to sex changed over like the course of your life? Oh, the course of my life. Well, as I share in The Book, my first sexual experience wasn’t super great. The guy, the guy that I was with call me a pity fuck Oh my god. To my face, which was, you know, real fun for me. Fuck Yeah. And so that was really, that was, I was 19 when that happened. It was a really hard thing to experience and things to kind of compartmentalize. And so it’s changed because I started using sex workers about nine years ago And I decided to hire a sex worker to have my needs met. (12m 57s): And it’s given me so much more confidence because I don’t have to wait on, I don’t have to like hope that some guy’s gonna like me. I can hire somebody to have my needs met. It’s turned my sexuality into a much less desire based thing and more of like a therapeutic thing when I see a sex worker, like, yes, there’s desire and there’s playfulness there and all those things, but because my body is has different needs, I treat it like going to see a physio every week or going like, I’ll see my sex worker every three months or something as a part of my therapeutic process. (13m 37s): So like I am, I went from wishing guys would, would write me back wishing guys would date me, wishing guys would like talk to me. And I still feel that way a lot of the time, but now with sex work as an option, I feel like, oh, I can get my knees met this way And I can at least have an orgasm or have intimacy the way that I want without worrying about all the other emotional stuff that comes along with that. Yeah. So before the podcast, before I started recording, I was complimenting the color of your wall, which I can see, but if you’re listening you probably can’t see. It’s, it’s this, this really beautiful bluish ish color. And you shared that like your regular sex worker came over and painted it for you and painted it naked. (14m 20s): And so I, I would imagine like many people listening when they think about sex work or imagining someone coming over and fucking and then leaving, and you’ve used words like therapeutic and also I know that like he also painted your wall for you while naked. And so like, can you talk about like, yes, it’s about sex, like, and also like what else is a part of that experience? Like, And I love that question. Sometimes it’s about intimacy. Sometimes, like he comes over and we watch Bob’s burgers and cuddle and like have a laugh. And sometimes we have sex and sometimes we don’t. And sometimes, like he sleeps over and we just watch a show. Like it’s, it’s so much, yes, there’s a sexual component there. (15m 3s): Of course there is. But we’ve been seeing, he’s my main sex worker. I’ve been seeing him now for almost eight years. So we’re really well attuned to each other. And it’s nice to have somebody that I can be like, I just wanna spend time with you. I don’t necessarily want us to mess around. I wanted to spend time with you. I wanna talk to you. Like sometimes we’ll just text and they’ll be like, Hey, how are you? How’s your day? How are you doing today? How are you feeling today? Like people think it’s this dark, dirty deed that’s happening, but really it’s building connection with somebody. And also, like, I’m aware that a lot of sex workers are students and teachers and, and people with three jobs trying to make it, trying to make ends mean. (15m 48s): So I’m aware that like by me helping him out transactionally, I’m actually supporting another marginalized person. And that’s like, there’s something really, really beautiful about that symbiotic relationship we have together. And I am, so like, when he came over and painted my house, that was right after COVID, not the COVID iss over, but like right after the first, the last big wave. So in 2021, like right after we were allowed to see each other again, and we hadn’t seen each other from March, 2020 to October, 2021. And we, we would have sessions like once every month, honestly. And so we didn’t see each other for like a year and a half and we were both like, we miss each other. (16m 31s): So in that session we talked for an hour about our lives and we like hugged and we tried a little bit and it was, you know, it was a nice like moment to have together. And so for me it’s so much deeper than just I’m gonna have the sexual experience, I’m gonna pay this guy for it, and then that’s it. Part of me, which is I didn’t have to do that. But I know that I, I think it’s the same as like any relationship. They all have. They all have, and we talked about this a minute ago, they all yeah. Have transactions somewhere. So if by me giving him 300 bucks an hour allows him to feed himself and for me to feel sexually fulfilled for an hour, like that’s a really cool thing that I got to do. (17m 16s): Yeah. And Be a part of. Yeah, I mean we, we talk about this on your podcast, but like my, like the line between like a spouse who works and a spouse who doesn’t work versus like a sugar baby, sugar daddy versus like quote unquote sex work. Those are like, those are blurry lines and whether it’s monetary transactions that are happening or like care, like we are all caring for one another. And so I think what, you know, what I I’m hearing from you is like, this should be an option for folks who wanna be able to take advantage of it. I mean, I’m gonna say it quite bluntly, it should be funded by the government, it should be funded by, like in Australia they have a disability support program called the National Disability Insurance Scheme. (18m 3s): And up until a while ago, they were funding sex work. Yeah. They were allowing, they were giving you a stipend every month to hire a worker to have your needs met. Like that is so critically important. Yeah. Yeah. And it’s, again, all we do sometimes is watch TV and have a laugh and yeah, we might get naked and be naked while that’s happening, but it’s not One time we went to the grocery store and he, he helped me buy groceries. Yeah. And we just had a laugh. It’s like, it’s so much more than what people think it is. Yeah. And I wish that they would see that like, these connections are important and when you have severe disabilities like I do, where my body doesn’t look quote unquote normative, when you meet somebody who paid or otherwise wants to spend time with you, you have to like capitalize on that as best you can. (18m 54s): One of the things that I’ve noticed about you over the years is that you’re able to talk really boldly and matter of factly about sex in general, about like your desires and experiences like about your body and your body parts and how they’re hot. And like I know that I’m, I would imagine like many people, people listening to this podcast, many of us have come from like more restrictive backgrounds where like talking about sex was like super taboo or we were like, felt ashamed about our bodies or our sexual desires. And I know that’s pro potentially also like part of your story as well. But like, how did you get to a place where you could just like, so boldly be like, like, this is my sex life. (19m 35s): I’ve got a, like a big dick and it’s really hot and like my body is sexy and like let’s have, like this is who I am. How, like how did you get there? Okay. Know, we’re not supposed to flirt, but every day you see I get a huge giant smile on my face. So just So, just so it makes very aware of that. Thank you. You know, some days I’m there and some days I’m not there. Like it’s, it’s really ebb and flow. Like some days I hate my body. Some days I hate my experience, but I know that if I’m vocal about my sex life and somebody with severe disabilities, somebody else with severe disabilities will listen to that and think, oh, if Andrew can talk about it so openly, maybe I can too. (20m 16s): And so I don’t always do it because I believe it. It’s sort of like a fake until I believe it in myself kind of thing. If I constantly push that I’m the sexiest disabled person you’ll ever meet, which I know is not true. There are way hotter disabled people than me. But like if I push that pretend thing around it, maybe eventually I can believe it too. And then it’ll be true. Yeah. And like did, like, did you just like, like how did you get that idea to do that? Or did like, were you inspired by someone else or did you like read it in a book? Did you like think it up yourself? I’ve always been provocative. I’ve always been somebody who like, who likes to push the boundaries a little bit. And so one time I was doing a magazine shoot for a magazine in Toronto called, now they’re now defunct, I think. (21m 3s): And they were doing like a Love your Body shoot. And so you had to go and be naked. And I went down with my friend to the studio And I got naked and they covered my bits And I did it. And so they, they put, they, they did the magazine, they went all over Toronto and then Global, the, the news called me and said, would you come on a segment? And I was like, okay, sure. So I did. And they were like, oh, why did you do this? And I jokingly said something like, oh, I think I’m deliciously disabled like funny. And I just like made the joke on the air as a joke because I like to be, you know, funny and quick. And then I was like, oh wait, there’s something there that I, And I can play with that And I can make the idea of being disabled really hot and really fun. (21m 47s): And then from that grew, the Disabled people are hot hashtag that I created. And then from that grew like the offer to be on TV. And like, I just was recently, I didn’t get it, but I was asked to audition for like that movie about Judy Human that’s coming out soon. And so all of my stuff has been to be like, you need to look at me, you need to see who I am. And I did it partially as a joke because I didn’t believe anybody would actually care. But then it turned into something. So like I didn’t do it thinking it would actually happen. I did it. Oh, let’s try and see what happens. Yeah. I love that. I’m guys, so every time you say something I have like three questions as a result. (22m 28s): ’cause it’s just so interesting. But so you, you, you mentioned that like at first you didn’t necessarily believe it and it’s like, I’m wondering like how it feels different. And you mentioned that you still don’t always believe it, but like, how does it feel different now than when you say like, I’m really hot or talk about your body or deliciously disabled or whatever it might be now versus like the first time you sort of like tentatively said it out loud. Well, now I know when I say it, people will pay attention to it. And now I know when I talk about it, it will, it will garner a response. Whereas when I first did it, I was like, nobody cares. Like, when I first put out Deliciously Disabled the first time, no one cared. (23m 10s): Like it wasn’t a big thing, but it, that turned into a sex party that I threw four disabled people and like, it, it’s just a ma It was a matter of me just trying stuff and seeing what, and I’m, I love Silly Punt and like, alliteration and like silly stuff. So like on apps like Grinder and Scruff and Sniffy, my name is either bar in a chair or like Big Dick trip or like, you know, super ballsy or like funny stupid stuff to make myself laugh because I think we take disability and that’s part of what Dly Disabled was too. We take disability so fucking seriously and it’s okay if we make fun of ourselves, it’s okay if we play with it a little bit. (23m 56s): And especially when it comes to our bodies and our desires and our, our sexual worth. It needs to be a bit of a game, otherwise it’s so not fun. Not fun. Yeah. And that feels very queer and the ways in which queer people have always used sort of like camp to like subvert things and to like lighten our spirits and keep us going. Yeah, exactly. And I I, I love camp. Like, I was raised on like ab fab And I was raised on like, you know, the bird cage And I was raised on so many, so much queer media that I didn’t realize was queer at the time. That looking back on it, I was like, of course I would go this way. Of course I would be this like flamboyantly queer, queer person. I remember like the very first queer movie that I watched that was like pointedly queer with my mom was was Priscilla Queen of the Desert. (24m 47s): And like I, we watched that the night I came out to her. And so like queerness has been all around me my whole life. And so I I And I love doing big silly gestures And I think disabled queer people deserve big, silly, sexy moments. And so when I do things like do a porn or do a, a show about sex and disability or do a post where I’m half naked and on Instagram or do a post where I’m like kissing and doing in my wheelchair, all that stuff’s important because it deserves a space just like everything everybody else does. Yeah. I think you’re like, I think you’re like a prophet. I think you’re a queer prophet. You’re doing really important work. (25m 27s): Wow. Wow. That that’s, that feels very nice but also very big. Wow. Yeah, I mean like, like in the, in the Jewish Bible, like with the, the prophets almost like they’re, they’re these, one of the things they do right is they like, they do these big gestures that are like meaningful in and of themselves, but also sort of like call attention to a larger issue. And so I think like what, what you do when you like post sexy pictures of yourself, it’s like both like you being sexy in and of yourself like, and also as like part of a larger thing that’s happening. And I know that you’re like inspiring and lots of other folks on the internet to, to see themselves in sexy ways or to see people who aren’t like them in, in other, in new sexy ways. (26m 9s): Yeah. Like, you know, And I, I, I hope that I can use my privilege as, as a white disabled person for somebody of color with disabilities to be like, I wanna do the same thing. I want to show that I ha that I deserve to be sexy too. And so I try to, I try to remember my privilege all the time and remember that in doing the work that I do, yeah, it’s fun and flirty and whatever, but it’s also, there’s such a bigger meaning behind it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about deliciously Disabled at the party and like what it was like to it plan this party and like what it was like to be at it? Yeah. The person And I that threw it, we had a falling out so I won’t speak to her part ’cause we don’t talk anymore. (26m 53s): Sure, sure, sure. And the, the shady is real. And there are many things I could say that I won’t because I’m a good podcaster And I know I’m not a great jam, but I also kind of wanted to, so there I sort of did. Yeah. But that was really fun to do that. We did it 10 years ago. We did it at a theater here in Toronto called Buddies in Bad Times Theater, which is like an iconic Toronto theater space. ’cause we couldn’t find a sex club that was accessible. So we needed to use a theater space. So they, they let us, and then we were just gonna do a play party, a simple play party that that honored disabled folks. (27m 33s): And that was all supposed to be. And then somebody did a press thing and they called it a disabled orgy. And I was like, oh, I don’t love that. But like that, that ran like wildfire. And then yeah. People from Howard Stern to the BBC were calling us to be like, can we come and film? And we were like, no, this is not, it’s not a joke to us. Like yeah, this is the real thing. And so we sold out, we had people on the night, we had people from around the block trying to get in that we had to say no to. Wow. And so, like, there were probably, I can’t remember exactly ’cause it was 10 years ago, but there were probably like 150 people there, which in that, in that space feels like a lot of people. (28m 17s): And it was packed. And I didn’t actually have sex that night, like a lot of people didn’t have sex. But it was a place to explore desire, explore sexuality, explore sensuality. And it was the first with kind. And I know there have been sexy ish play parties around that, but still there are not enough parties that uplift disability access and sexuality. And that’s what we wanted it to be. And that’s what it was like, we really tried to be like, oh, disabled. We had beds for if disabled people wanted to have sex, there were options. We had like lifts. We had things ready to go in case we wanted to have sex. And what I love about that party, we did that 10 years ago And I haven’t done it since. (28m 60s): But that party was the, the reason why in the new queers folk season that died, RIP they had a party disabled people fuck party that was based on the party that I threw. Oh, that’s so cool. So like, I am forever. And I remember going to the pretend party and seeing like a bunch of disabled folks and Hoyer lifts and like all the things that we had at my party. And it was so awesome that like this thing that I created that I never thought anyone would care about Yeah. Is now immortalized on a like iconic queer television show. Yeah. That’s incredible. (29m 39s): And I think that what you said just a moment ago where like this thing that I thought nobody would care about, like, and then there was 150 people. There was a line around the block that I think that that sometimes the, the we, we can feel so alone or like we’re the only one who wants this or who is this way and then, or that is a silly idea. And then just like, we’re not alone. And there’s like so much like potential impossibility out there if you’re willing to put yourself out there and take like, take some big risks. Oh yeah. And I, and almost every time I do a talk, somebody will say to me, Hey, would you ever do another one? Like what would you? And I, I always say like, well are you gonna pay me because Yeah, yeah, yeah. (30m 22s): We like, we didn’t get paid the first time and it was a lot of work and like I would do it again if you paid me real money. Yeah. And, and you guys dealt with all the logistics and then I got to just be the host. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. But like the reality of that and the backlash we got from queer people who said it was a bad idea. Artistic people. Artistic people who said How dare we use a theater space to have sex. Which is ironic because a lot of theater is Yeah. Very sexual. Yeah. Disabled people who told me that how dare I the party is a bad idea. Don’t do it. Like the backlash that we got from all sides of people. Yeah. We didn’t understand what we were really saying was disabled sexuality has value. (31m 6s): Let’s showcase that. Yeah. It’s all we were saying, it’s all the party really was like, I didn’t know sex in, i, I didn’t fuck around. I wa I wanted to a lot, but I was busy running around saying, oh my God, hi, thank you for being here. Oh my God. But like, it was just running Into sex party takes a lot of hard, practical, boring work science. So much work. And I am a bad hostess man. I did not want by like the 10th person, I was like, I don’t wanna say hi anymore. Like hop fun, bye. Like I wanted to fuck. And I didn’t get to do that ’cause I was working. But like the whole point of the party was people, disabled people deserve spaces to be obtusely sexual. (31m 47s): Yeah. Overtly sexual. To be slutty, to be dirty. Yeah. To be quote unquote inappropriate. We deserve spaces to do that. And the media backlash from all sides reminded me that we’re not quite ready to talk about sex and disability yet. Which is why I think my book also kind of rubs some people the wrong way. They’re not ready for how sexual it is. People have critiqued that they’re not ready for my discussions of sex work. People have critiqued that. My newest favorite critique is there’s a section in The Book where I talk about asking my care worker to help me set up a sex toy and like to help me use a sex toy. (32m 30s): And she did. And there’s a critique that I’m exploiting her. And I was like, well this, this, like of course I asked, I asked her if it was all right, of course. Like I checked before I did anything. Like this idea that disabled people can’t be sexual and have no, should not be allowed any avenue to ask for help to be sexual is really a problem. And so that’s why my book is so loud and so in your face and doesn’t hold back from the telling the truth. And I think people were afraid of that. I had somebody who critiqued it who also said like, oh, well if they’re not binary ’cause I use they, that they, and he pronouns, if they’re not binary, why are they only talking about men? (33m 13s): And I was like, because it’s my story and men are who I choose to sleep with. Like Yeah. And your gender is different than who you wanna have sex with also. Yeah, exactly. So I just, I find some of the critiques really narrow-minded because it shows that we have a lot of work to do. And it reminds me, And I’m thankful for the critiques, it reminds me that I’ll never behalf of a job, I’ll never not be working Yeah. To push these narratives and to push sex and disability positivity. And you know, I, but I’ve had also great reviews where people said, like The Book woke me up to things I didn’t see before The Book opened Something in me that I didn’t notice before. (33m 56s): Like really powerful reviews too. And it’s hard when you and you know, from also writing Yeah. Writing stuff. Like when you put something that is so personal to you out in the public sphere, it can be really hard. Yeah. I mean like, I I, that’s one of the things that I love about The Book. I mean, listeners will not be surprised that I love that book That’s very boldly sex, like sex word or sex positive. But like, it’s just like so, so needed and like such an antidote to like the shame and secrecy that so many of us has been like going indoctrinated to Yeah. To believe it is like that we should carry, carry around with us And well, you know, one of my favorite parts of The Book is, is you know, just talking about sex work in The Book, talking about like, my experience with my sex worker talking about the porn I did. (34m 49s): Like, it’s so bold. And I remember when I did my book launch a couple weeks ago, by the time this comes out, I don’t know how many weeks it’ll be, but I did it about a month ago. I did a book launch for The Book and my college prof my favorite pro, I invited her to say a few words ’cause she inspired me not to write The Book, but she inspired me in the work that I do And I just adore her. So she came and she’s like a, she’s like a really cool hip, like just one of my favorite profs in the whole world. And she came on the Zoom and talked about how great it was. And I like teared up and to know that my like 60 something was reading a book about me very explicitly talking about like, yeah, sex made me so happy. (35m 35s): ’cause I was like, see everybody, it’s fine. We’re all, it’s good. Everybody can understand this. Yeah. I, I think that that’s a reminder that like there are like allies in unexpected places and that like, sometimes the people like, just like not make assumptions because like sometimes it’s the people that we think like should be on board or not. Like I know I’ve also gotten critiques of my work, like when I talk about sex positivity or a polyamorous spirituality and like sometimes like from queer people or queer young people. And then there’ll be like a straight cis like 65-year-old rabbi is like, this is inspired, you have to keep doing this work. Right. Or like a priest like gets it and I’m like, yeah. Like there’s like, there’s some ageism and thinking like, oh, only young people. (36m 19s): Like the young people are sex positive and the old people aren’t sex positive that like, oh yeah. There’s a ton of ableism that way. It’s, It’s all old people can be awesome and young people can be terrible. Yeah. It that’s really true. And and the same with disabled folks. Like we think that all disabled folks are these ubic angelic beautiful souls that are so innocent, blah, blah, blah, blah. But dude, there are some really shitty disabled people out there. Yeah. Like sometimes like you’re just a shitty person. It’s not because you’re disabled, because you’re queer, because you’re, you’re a woman. It’s just like some people are shitty. You’re a shitty person and like I’ll conduit sometimes I can also be a shitty person. Sure, sure, sure. We all can do that. And so I think this idea that one of my favorite critiques that I’ve gotten so far is the latest one that I got on my neck alley again. (37m 7s): ’cause I I shouldn’t read my critiques. Thank you. So the latest one that I got was they said, no, no, no, I don’t like that he exploits care workers. I don’t like that he pays for sex. And then they said sometimes the writing felt immature. And I kind of laughed at that because I was like, why does everything, why does everything we write about disability have to be steeped in seriousness and like intensity? Why can’t somebody with a disability write a little immature thing? Why, why? Yeah. And it’d be lighthearted. Yeah. Yeah. I wouldn’t say it’s immature. It does not strike me as an immature book. Like there are many parts that are lighthearted, but it’s like so much mature content you’re talking about just in a lighthearted, very approachable, accessible way. (37m 54s): Really smart choice. Yeah. I wanted to write back to her and be like, well actually I, back to what you said I wanted write back and be like, well actually it’s just that, you know, accessible. But then I was like, okay, you’re gonna have your opinion no matter what. There’s something I can do. And that’s hard for me because like, I want all my stuff to be loved by everyone. And I’m quickly realizing that’s not true. Yeah. There’s this, there’s this quote from Jesus in one of the, the gospels where he’s like sending out his followers to go like, preach the gospel. And he’s like, if you get to a city or a town or a house and they like won’t listen to you, just leave and like dust the dust, the shake the dust offal to, to try and like convince them of your goodness or the rightness of this message. (38m 39s): And I think that’s like a message for, but, but Shannon And I here are constantly harping on and it’s like, I think for you also it’s like it’s, it’s just kinda like not land with some people and those aren’t the people that you’re gonna be talking to. But I know that your work really lands and transformative for so many people. Well that feels so nice to hear. ’cause you know, you know, and I’m sure you understand this, we work in a vacuum. Yeah. We do a lot of the, we do a lot of the stuff. We do solo, we do a lot of it by ourselves. We do a lot of it for nobody but ourselves. And so when somebody says like, oh, it something you did meant something to me, it’s like, oh wow. That’s so nice. Thank you. Okay, great. Wow. Wow. Yeah. And like, you know, you asked earlier how I got, how I got talking about sex. (39m 23s): I wanna change the question a little bit. Like Yeah. Because of comments like that, there have been so many moments where I’ve been like, oh, I should just give it up and get a real job, or I should just give it up and not do this anymore. And then I get comments like that and I’m like, okay, there’s another reason why I gotta keep going. I just have to remember this and it’ll be fine. Yeah. One of the things I talk about in my book I see like a real synergy here is like hospitality being like a core sacred obligation across traditions and the ways in which like queer people and non-monogamous, like slutty sex is a practice of hospitality, of welcoming a stranger into your house, into your bedroom, into your body. (40m 4s): And there’s a lot of like trust and care there. And I think what happens on like an individual, like on any given like individual hookup or experience, but also I’m like thinking about it with like deliciously disabled, like what an incredible model of hospitality and inclusion and belonging. And it’s like a vision of like the kingdom of God. Like the way that the world could be where sort of it’s sort of like come and like bring your whole self and your bodies and have like your needs met and your desires seen and maybe you’ll have sex or maybe you won’t. Or maybe let’s complicate what it even means to have sex and be in a sexual space. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be fucking in a particular way, but it can all, it can be, it can be blurry and sensual and sexy and that there’s like some power in in coming together and that like that like I, I dunno, And I what you just said, there’s, there’s a ton of power in coming together. (40m 59s): Yeah. Yes. Oh my god. Yeah. There’s a ton of power in coming together and you know, we, we are so I am still 10 years later so fucking proud of that party. I’m so proud of what, what we did, even though I didn’t get to have sex the night at all And I was so fucking tired and so busy and so exhausted from the whole thing. But it set the world of blaze because it remind like fucking Howard Stern wanted to come and film it and the BBC wanted to come and film it and like yeah, they wanted to make a mockery of it. But it started a conversation that disabled people before me have been talking about and after me, long after me. We’ll talk about, Yeah. (41m 40s): Of like Disabled people. Fuck. And we want intimacy and it shouldn’t be, why are we only allowed to talk about accessibility when it’s about ramps and elevators and buttons? Why can’t I talk about access to like the hot guy that I wanna fuck or the bedroom or the shower room or the dark room that I wanna be. Yeah. Why is access not relegated to those places too? Putting together a sex toy that works for you. Like all those things. Yeah, yeah. Like I created a sex toy. RIP to that too. It’s no longer a thing, But we, you know, tried to get that going and like I’ve done so much to, to continue the conversation that will happen long after I’m gone. (42m 21s): And I hope that in the brief blips that I’ve had here, it’s made an impact. Yeah. Well I think so. So your book is called Notes From a Queer Cripple. Folks can get it anywhere. Books are sold, right? Anywhere. Anywhere. Books are sold if you wanna go And a book Yeah. Go Ahead to Amazon or you know, Barnes and Noble. Yeah. Basically anywhere books are sold. The digital and physical copy right now I have no idea if they’re gonna do an audiobook. I’ve been asked multiple times I the answer, I dunno, how does even work? Yeah. Audible, if you’re listening, I’m right here. I’ll do one. Just call me. Yeah. And so like what’s like one thing that you hope readers take away from your book? (43m 2s): I hope they take away that sexuality and disability is way more nuanced than I think they realized. It isn’t just about getting that guy in the wheelchair off. It isn’t just about getting that guy in the wheelchair laid. It’s about how you see your body. It’s about how you see your sensuality and it, I hope people that are disabled take away that they see a part of themselves in there. And I hope that people who are not disabled take away that they have a lot of work to do. Awesome. Thank you so much. And where can folks, if they wanna keep in touch, whether you or follow along or support your work, how can folks do that? Yeah, I’m most active on Instagram. They can go to Andrew Gza on Instagram. They can go to Andrew Gza on Blue Sky. (43m 43s): I did have an ex account, but I killed it because don’t wanna support the fascist regimes that we’re dealing with right now. So just Instagram and Blue Sky. They can go to andrew gza.com to book me for talks, book signings, readings and all those great things as well. Awesome. Thank you guys for Being here One more time. Sorry. They can listen to my podcast, disability After Dark, wherever you get podcasts every other Sunday. I love it. I’m a subscriber to that. So thank you again so much for being here, Andrew. Thank you for having me. It was such a pleasure. The Queer Theology podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for L-G-B-T-Q Christians and straight cisgender supporters. (44m 25s): To dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post The Journey of a Queer Disabled Advocate with Andrew Gurza appeared first on Queer Theology.

We’ve hit another milestone on the podcast – 600 episodes!! That’s 600 weeks of looking at the Bible, faith, God (and a lot of other things!) through the lens of queer theology. We’ve grown. The community has grown. The world has changed. And all that will continue. But what will still remain, is that there is so much richness to be discovered in scripture. In this reflective episode, we celebrate 600 episodes and discuss the evolution of our faith, the power of sacred texts, and the changing landscape of queer and trans Christian spaces. We explore personal growth through spiritual practices, the moral challenges of today’s society, and the relevance of queer theology in a world that continues to grapple with issues of faith and identity. Under it all, the continuing thread we find is the importance of community and the ongoing journey of understanding our own spirituality.   Takeaways The podcast has been running for 12 years, reflecting on faith and spirituality. Polypossibilities cohort explores the intersections of polyamory and spirituality. The power of sacred texts continues to resonate in new ways. Queer and trans Christian spaces are evolving, facing both progress and regression. Personal growth is deeply tied to spiritual practices and community engagement. Moral moments in society call for reflection and action. The relevance of their work highlights both positive and negative aspects of faith today. Surprises from the journey include a deeper engagement with traditional practices. The importance of community in exploring spirituality and identity. Looking ahead, the hosts are excited for future episodes and continued exploration.   Chapters (01:21) Reflecting on 12 Years of Podcasting (02:11) The Evolution of Faith and Spirituality (04:55) The Power of Sacred Texts (08:00) Navigating Queer and Trans Christian Spaces (11:04) Personal Growth Through Spiritual Practices (14:54) Moral Moments in Today’s Society (18:11) Surprises from 600 Episodes (23:25) Looking Ahead to Future Episodes   Resources:.  Register for Poly Possibilities at queertheology.com/poly-possibilities  Join our online community at  Sanctuary Collective Community  If you want to support the Patreon and help keep the podcast up and running, you can learn more and pledge your support at patreon.com/queertheology   This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors or omissions. (9s): Welcome to the Queer Theology Podcast. I’m Brian G Murphy. And I’m father Shannon, T l Kearns. We’re the co-founders of Queer Theology dot com and your hosts from Genesis, revelation. The Bible declares good news to LGBTQ plus people, and we want to show you how Tune in each week on Sunday for conversations about Christianity, queerness and transness, and how they can enrich one another. We’re glad you’re here. Hello? Hello. Hello. Before we dive into this episode, which spoiler alert is our 600th episode, which is just mind blowing to me. You can’t see Shea, but he’s shaking his head in disbelief. Just a quick reminder that we are running a three week poly possibilities cohort that starts next week. (52s): It starts on Tuesday, July 29th, three Tuesday evenings Eastern time, Wednesday mornings, Australia, Japan time, and various time zones. Depending on where in the world you are, it’s gonna be looking at the intersections of obviously polyamory and spirituality and really with an eye towards what a polyamorous perspective, how that can enrich all of our types of relationships as well as our spiritual and faith lives. And so this is great for you, certainly if you’re a polyamorous or non-monogamous person of faith, but also, even if you are not polyamorous or not open in an open relationship of some sort, but you just wanna learn from the wisdom of polyamory, we would love to have you, you can learn more and register at Queer Theology dot com slash poly possibilities. (1m 35s): There are sliding scales, and if you can’t or you don’t wanna join the calls live, there’s always the option to watch the replays. I would say like about half the folks do it that way. Anyways, so you’d be in good company, whether you join live or watch the replays. If you have any questions, shoot us an email, connect ology com or send us a DM on Instagram. And with that said, let’s dive into this episode. This Episode, 600 episodes. I can’t believe it. We’ve been doing this podcast pretty much every week for 12 years, 13 years. I don’t, I’m not quite sure what the Math is. Yeah, I think 12 years. Yeah. That is wild. It is wild. And so today we just wanted to reflect a little bit on, you know, over the 12 years, obviously we spent the first six or seven years of that queering a bible passage every, every, actually longer, longer than six or seven years, maybe the first nine years. (2m 31s): Yeah. Because I feel like we did the lectionary in total three times anyway, you know, queering a bible passage. And then we’ve talked about all sorts of other things impacting the lives of queer and trans people of faith. And I wanted to talk a little bit today about, you know, what has stayed the same over those 12 years? What has changed? Obviously both of us have been through a lot of life and a lot of, Oh my god, So many locations. We’ve moved quite a bit in those 12 years. You, you converted. We’ve done, we’ve done lots of things over the 12 Years. (3m 12s): Yeah, you were celibate, now You’re married, you started. Yeah. So lots, lots of lots of differences. So I’m, I’m curious for you, Brian, as you think about like the last 12 years and particularly this podcast, what are some of the first things that come up for you, maybe as, as just general reflections, things that that stand out. Yeah, I mean, I think that I still really love the Bible, which is, I don’t know, wild, like maybe like, I don’t know, not fashionable in progressive circles anymore, but I think there’s like something really cool there about sacred texts and wrestling with them and wrestling them with them together with you, Shannon, on this podcast with the listeners of this podcast in the emails that they send us or in the discussion threads inside of our Sanctuary Collective Community to sort of like, have these conversations together with people. (4m 1s): Or like when we do the type of work in person at speaking events at churches or synagogues or, or conferences, colleges, that there’s like something about not just like reading the Bible and isolation, but like reading it together with other people that feels like really juicy and interesting. And I am just like, never, like, I’ve never been more convinced, like my con my conviction only grows that queerness is already holy and that the world is in desperate need of like the queer gospel, the queer good news. And that like, that there’s like something about whether or not you s stay religious or a particular version of, of faith that like, there’s like something really powerful about saying like, how I do life as holy. (4m 49s): And then also like making sure that like, but like bringing sort of a greater attention and intentionality to how you do life together, just like really adds like a richness to life. Life. And I dunno, I was t in my twenties when we started this And I just turned 40. So it’s like weird that this is not spinning the decades and lots of love and loss along the years. And that like, there’s like, something about sa like having spiritual tools is not just like, I don’t know, forgetting into heaven. Like who the fuck cares. Like, I don’t mean lots of people really care a lot, obviously that’s like not a question that these days like captivates me anymore, but I think that like, it’s not just fairy tales and make believe that like, I, I’ve now like seen the real power of having both practices and communities to lean on when times are really good and when times are really bad. (5m 42s): And I want everyone to have that sort of well to draw upon. So there’s just some initial reflections. What about you, Shea? Yeah, yeah. You know, I, I think one of the things that comes up for me and, And I know that I’ve said this before is that there have been so many times when we, especially when we were queer in the lectionary every week, where I would, you know, read the text and be like, I, there is nothing new to say about this particular passage. Like, we’ve looked at it, I like, I’ve looked at it a million times over the course of my life and now I’ve looked at it a million times over the course of this podcast. And almost inevitably there we would figure out something new to say, right? (6m 26s): Or something that was still resonating or something that was resonating in a new way because of what was going on in the world. And I think that like, that is both the power of a practice that you return to over and over again, that it like continues to find new ways to be meaningful. I I think that’s also the power of returning to these stories over and over again, that you find new ways to, to engage with them because you have changed, The world has changed. But I think that’s also like the power of a sacred text, right? Is that it continues, it finds ways to continue to speak even in a very different world and society and culture. (7m 14s): And I think that that’s like something that’s really special and powerful, so that, that resonates for me. And I, And I’ve been noticing even in myself lately, e even though we’re, we’re doing less with, with querying the Bible on the podcast, like we still obviously engage in that in our work. And I’m still like finding ways to be sub surprised by these stories and yeah. To be changed by these stories. And I think that that’s like a, a really special and powerful thing. And, and, and I’m grateful for that. I, I also feel like, you know, I’ve, I’ve studied the bible my entire life and went to seminary, like have done all the things and also like I’m still deepening my understanding of these texts and that like, that’s both in a academic way, but it’s also in a, a personal spiritual practice way. (8m 6s): And that’s been, that’s been really special too. I I also feel like it’s been interesting to watch the queer and trans Christian space change slash not change slash regress over over the last 12 years. And I think that that’s a really, we’re in a really interesting time, right? I think that there, when we started this podcast, no one was really talking about deconstruction or the, that word had kind of like just entered the lexicon. (8m 47s): Yeah. And, and, but lots of people were kind of in that space of trying to figure out what Christianity could look like. And we like made a ton of progress as like a queer, trans Religious Group. Like there was just so much progress being made. And then I think it feels like then there was like another wave of massive deconstruction and that really impacted like the, the progress that we were making. And, And I’ve seen, I’ve seen a bit of, of regression in the organizing in queer and trans religious spaces in particular. (9m 28s): And that’s like both sad to see and frustrating. And also because I’ve seen it change before. I believe that it can change again. And so like that’s kind of this space I’m finding myself in of like, how might I be able to be involved in the change moving forward. Yeah. I, you know, when you were talking about being like going to seminary, it reminds me that when we started this podcast, you had your, had had completed seminary. I think you had like shortly before we started become a deacon, or maybe shortly after, like right around the time. And then of course like not too long after that we’re like ordained. And so like, when we started, it was very much like, you are the seminarian, you’re the Bible expert. (10m 11s): I am the like, lay person that has nothing that does not like, I like, that’s, I like studied religion in undergrad a little bit, but like I minored in it. I didn’t like even have a bachelor’s in it, right. And like that was like a bit of a dichotomy and that like two things have I’ve noticed been like really powerful for me. And that is that like bringing myself to scripture and to tradition has like opened my eyes to how I understand like my faith. And that like bringing those to myself has like enriched the way that I understand myself and my body and my desires and my sex life and my romantic relationships and my friendships and life and death and all of the things. (10m 57s): And also I think that part of what has like enabled me to do that is by like, learning from you and your sort of like seminary wisdom and also along the way, like reading a lot of books and watching a lot of movies and listening to other podcasts of people who like more learned it than me on like how to read the Bible and what the Bible means and how various communities have engaged with like the Bible in particular and sacred your texts in general. And that there’s a little bit of like, like tending to the soil and then you like sewing the soil and like, you kinda like reap, you reap a little way down the line. But I think like I am able to in the moment sometimes, like I, I had this tweet go like that people really liked about seeing like the Holy Spirit on the dance, a gay club. (11m 49s): And I feel like I was like able to spot that and articulate that because for the past like six years I had been reading the bible every week with you and like read a bunch of books about it and was like thinking about it and, and journaling about it. And so there, there also is sometimes like when I’m like reading a book or reading the Bible, I’m like, sometimes it feels like really inspiring and engaging and exciting and sometimes it’s just sort of like, oh, okay, like this is like neat I guess. But it’s like later when I’m like outliving my life that I’m like, oh, like this is what it was talking about. Or like, oh, I like see this new connection. And I think that like, what has like struck me is I, for the most part I have like, now that I’m like Jewish, actually I have like some religious Jewish friends, but like before my conversion, like basically none of my friends were religious. (12m 40s): And even still most of even my Jewish friends are not particularly religious. So I mostly around non Christians or like, hey, like the, so like Christmas and Easter Christians are like culturally Christian, but like not, people would not describe themselves as religious. And like whenever my work comes up and like either like the podcast or books at first I’m like, oh, I work at the intersections of like queerness and and spirituality. And they’ll be like, oh, that’s like probably really like needed. But it like, seems like it’s like not for them. And then if they ask a follow-up question And I get to sort of like give an example and I’ll sort of like draw upon like something that I know will be relevant to them, they’re like, oh, that’s like really meaningful. Or like, oh, I’ve like never thought about the ways in which like sex can be sacred or like, oh yeah, like you’re right. (13m 21s): Like there is something like really beautiful about queer friendship And I think that like, I don’t really care if you’re a Christian. What I, I mean I know some people do, but like, I don’t really care if you’re a Christian, but what I care about is that like you have some sort of like connection to the divine and the transcendent. And I actually do think that like Christianity, if you were like a raised Christian or Judaism and you were raised Jewish or whatever, like, or you wanna convert like, I think like there these like ancient pathways like do offer like some meaningful inroads and like where you go from there and how you follow that is sort of like up to you. But like, I don’t know, they’ve been around for a couple millennia because I think that there’s like some, some like wisdom and some like useful tools in there. (14m 5s): And so like that is why I continue to engage in this work. And who knows if we’ll be here for episode 1200, but like I think that there’s like some real there, there when it comes to this type of work, whether you want to sort of just heal from Christianity and your spiritual or baggage and move on, or whether you want to like become an active Christian again or whether you just wanna sort of like find God on on the dance floor like this, it, it just all feels like interconnected for me. Yeah. And I, I feel like those tools that you’re talking about, you know, I’m, I’m seeing a lot of folks in, in this current political moment that we’re in, especially in the United States, it really having this sense of, of like, well two things. (14m 48s): One, they’re seeing how Christianity is being used in order to do a lot of harm to people. But two, on the flip side, I I think that there’s a lot of people who are sitting in this space of like, I feel like I should do something, but I don’t know what that something is. And I, I feel like, you know, these practices that, that we’re both talking about, like really help in those moments to help you figure out both how to settle yourself enough that so that you can look at and figure out where you fit in and, and where you can be useful and helpful, but also like help us to know that these patterns of history, you know, ha have their patterns, we call them patterns for a reason they keep coming back. (15m 43s): And so like figuring out how, how our faith and our spiritual practices speak in this particular moment is I, I think is also something that I think a lot of people are hungry for, but maybe aren’t necessarily knowing how to tap into and, and connect with. And that feels like an important, important thing to be engaging with these days. Yeah. I’m reading a book about the prophets and like, oh my god, talk about palsa, all this has happened before all this will happen again. It’s like, oh, like you’re like mistreating women. Oh, you like, don’t take, take care of the poor needy, like, oh, you’re like abusing immigrants. (16m 24s): Oh, like people don’t have enough to eat. It’s like, fuck man. Like 2000 years ago they were like wailing about this and like, here we are 2000 years later still dealing with this. And so like in, in some ways that’s like quite depressing that like humanity has not like, I dunno, gotten to a better place. And also there’s like something about this moment and all moments that like, I, I think that even people who like are no longer the type of Christian that we used to be, and maybe in some ways are like, have been like burned by like that sort of language. I think like if you look around at the world and you’re like, things are like not right, this is like not right. (17m 8s): Like that is a like moral judgment that you are making and that’s okay. It’s that maybe like a good thing to make moral judgments about some things. And I think that I’m like interested as we like look at this moment and the moments that come after it. Like I don’t, I don’t know, like I’m not trying to start a cult, right? But like, but I do think that that like, this is a moral moment that we’re facing and there’s like some really powerful worldviews that are clashing with one another at like the way that not just the United States of America should be, but if this is happening across, across, across the globe, right? (17m 48s): That we’re seeing, like seeing what are our values and how, what’s like the vision for how we structure society and like I, it’s up to us, right? Like the people who are working to make the world in what is in my view a worse place, they’re like working, they spend, they spend their days and nights thinking about this. And so I feel as I’ve been reading this book about the prophets, like it’s one thing to like intellectually know, like I support abortion access, like I support queer rights, like I support like trans medical access, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like, and sometimes I like write my Congress people and like I protest And I, you know, talk to my neighbors, whatever it might be. But like there’s, there’s something about this sort of like life or deafness, Jeremiah, there’s like a fire burning in my bones that like, is like burning to escape that like this is like, this is a moment and it’s like, I don’t know, I just, I feel like there’s like, there’s like something about, about having both the tools and the inspiration and the motivation and the community and the history to draw upon and the sort of like, I don’t know, like I wanna like just be like, I’m just like fired up. (18m 55s): And that I think that like, it’s not okay to just sort of like sit back and we come from queer people and Christians and Jews, like we come from traditions that have like seen a world as it should, as like on fire instead of like, we can fix this. And so like I am, I dunno, just like, I just want us to all be part of that solution. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that there is something too in that our say traditions and practices help us a to practice for the world as, as we want to inhabit it, but also help us, I think in, in the example of the prophets to really like pinpoint what are the ways of protest of action, of intervention that are actually useful and helpful and what our, you know, just show. (19m 49s): I, I think that there’s, there’s, there’s some real wisdom in these ancient texts of saying, yeah, like, you might need to, to leave your house and go do some street performance art like Isaiah and Jeremiah in order to call attention to, to these yeah. Moments that we’re living in. And like, and that’s, there’s a, there’s a real beauty and power in engaging, engaging with that work in the public square. Yeah. So as we’ve been doing this for the past 600 episodes, what has been something that has like most surprised you? (20m 33s): Hmm. I mean I, I’m really surprised that we’re still going, I dunno if that is the most surprise, but, you know, we have both started other things in the intervening years and have shut other things down. And so I think that like both the consistency of this work over the past 600 episodes, but also the relevance of this work, And I think in relevance in both like really positive ways and also like, ugh, I wish we weren’t still relevant kind of ways is is both. Yeah, both legit. But, but yeah, you know, I I think that that’s, that’s been a really powerful thing And I, And I think it, what it, what it calls me do is to continue to be engaged and to be thinking about how can I be engaged in a way that is that uplifts the, the broader community and that continues to find new things and helpful things and useful things to say even, you know, for the next 600 episodes. (21m 47s): What about you? Yeah, you know, this, this is like probably not surprising to anyone else, but like a few, like a year or so ago, I said to my partner, I was like, you know, it’s like really interesting over the past few years I’ve like really started to become like religious. And he looked at me and he was like, are you serious right now? Like, whatcha talking about you’ve been religious like the entire time that I’ve known you? And it was like, it was genuinely shocking to me. I was like, no, no, no. And I, And I think that like, what I, what I meant by that was I think that I had in my mind like engaged with religion and as much as I like, have known intellectually that like my activism and my religion are very much like intertwined, I think that I would’ve said like, oh, well, yeah, I’m like kind of religious, but like in the blow jobs or blessing sort of way and in the like drag brunches worship sort of way, not in the like go to church every week. (22m 59s): And he was like, yeah, sure, that’s like how you live out your life. But also at like various points you’ve like prayed the daily office like every morning and every evening, like with other people and by yourself. You like observed like lent by going to a church at lunchtime and like reading the psalms and the prophets every day. You like fairly regularly like read your Bible, you like get up in the morning and you like read sometimes poetry, but sometimes the Psalms like, now you’re Jewish and you do like the daily liturgy. And I was like, oh, you are right. That I think that I, so I think like what has been surprising to me is like I, I very much feel like I don’t want to try to convince anyone else that like they have to be religious in any sort of like quote unquote traditional way. (23m 49s): And so I think that when I’m talking to people, especially in my day-to-day life, like outside of my work here, I think I like really emphasize like that empha that that angle of it, of like, but it’s okay if you don’t go to church. Like it’s okay if you don’t read the Bible. And there’s like lots of different ways to be like spiritual, spiritual or religious. And I think that like what was, I guess like surprising to me is that that is true and also that like co like that exists alongside of like, like there’s like power in praying the rosary where there’s power in praising like praying like davening the sea door and then like, yeah, like there’s like something about knitting, but, and there’s also something about having a prayer shawl and that like, you can be deeply religious and also super queer. (24m 35s): And it reminds me that like at the reception or the, not the reception, like the party part, the dance party part, at my wedding, one of our friends came up to, to, to me it was actually more, more to Peter’s friend. And he was like, that Brian, that was like so special. He was like, you had like a reli like a deeply religious ceremony at like the end of your, you had this like queer capric super non-traditional people told stories about Grindr and hookups and like, like Peter, Peter being in his underwear. And then you had this like deeply religious like ritual and like, now we’re having this like queer dance party and like you’re making out with all of your friends on the dance floor and like that all of that co can coexist together really special. (25m 20s): And I actually think that like, part of the reason I can be so like, yeah man, polyamory is awesome. Like being slutty is like divine is because I’ve like tapped into these like, traditional practices. And so I think, like I am, it’s surprising I guess is that I’m like much more, I like much more traditionally religious now than when we started this work. Even as I think like my theology is probably even more sort of like radical than it was before. I think when we started I was like, maybe there’s a God, maybe there’s, And I got, I wanna go to heaven one day. And so I think I probably have in some ways like a more non-traditional theology, but more traditional practices and, and language. (26m 7s): And I think that all kind of feels interconnected in some way. Well, we are looking forward to however many next episodes of this podcast. There are the next 500, 600,000. We, we shall see where the winds take us. Before we go, just a reminder that the Poly Possibilities cohort is starting up soon, so you can get all of the information by going to Queer Theology dot com slash poly possibilities three week cohort. One of the things that I love about this cohort every year is just seeing the community come together, who, many of them who it feels like at the start feel like they’re the only ones in their world who are interested in these intersections and find not only like a whole community of people who are also having these questions, but really see how their insights into relationships can be beneficial and meaningful to, to everyone poly, both poly and non-poly folks. (27m 10s): And so make sure that you get on board with that. Again, Queer Theology dot com slash poly possibilities. We would love to have you in the cohort this year. The Queer Theology podcast is just one of many things that we do at Queer Theology dot com, which provides resources, community, and inspiration for L-G-B-T-Q Christians and straight cisgender supporters. To dive into more of the action, visit us at Queer Theology dot com. You can also connect with us online on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram. We’ll see you next week. The post What We Learned From Reading The Bible Every Week for 600 Weeks appeared first on Queer Theology.