Your Queer Agenda for May 9, 2022
The world's on fire, but at least we're used to being flaming.
Welcome to the Queer Grace Agenda, an extraordinarily secret and coded dispatch for readers of the Queer Grace Encyclopedia and for anyone interested in ruining Christianity with *checks notes* radical welcome, communal integrity, self-responsibility, and a lot of laughter. Let’s get started.
Add To Your Queue: Recent Podcast Eps
Grab them from the links below or use your favorite podcast app.
- Brian and Shay of Queer Theology just launched a May series on the Queer Theology podcast speaking with Jewish leaders. This is obviously ESSENTIAL work for those of us trying to establish a new relationship with Scripture without simply stereotyping the Old Testament / Hebrew Bible as something we can ignore. Their first ep is with Dr. Amy-Jill Levine, who writes and teaches primarily on understanding Jesus and the first-century church through a Jewish lens.
- The lovely hosts of Yass, Jesus (Daniel Franzese and Azariah Southworth) sat down with Dusty Ray Bottoms — YES, a drag superstar on a faith podcast, we all need more of this! — to talk about their experience with conversion therapy.
+ Matthias Roberts has launched another season of fantastic interviews with queer people of faith on Queerology: A Podcast on Belief and Being. One of the things I deeply value about Matthias is his ability to have deep and transformative conversations with people all across the spectrum on what “queerness” and “faith” looks like. Just recently he chatted with Matthew Paul Turner, Bridget Eileen Rivera, and Jo Luehmann. Add this one to your regular rotation, folks.
Be There Or … Don’t, Because We All Have Differing Needs and Boundaries, But You Should At Least Know This Is Happening: Online Events
+ Transmission Ministry Collective presents “How the Sacraments Embody Our Faith” with Katherine Apostolacus. “Faith isn't just an intellectual activity; it involves our entire selves. It's easy to get caught up in our thoughts and forget to check in with the rest of who we are, especially for those of us who may already struggle to connect to our bodies! The sacraments are extensions of the Incarnation, where God meets us in the flesh, and so can act as an antidote to that disconnection. Join Anglican and trans theologian Katherine Apostolacus for a primer on the role of the sacraments in a life of faith that is practiced with both a body and a heart. Special attention will be given to how the sacraments reorient our relationships to ourselves as well as to others. This is a 60 minute lecture-based workshop with a time for questions and responses at the end. The workshop is open to everyone, and will be recorded.” Tickets are $15. Wednesday, May 25, 5pm PT / 8pm ET
Spin Me Right Round: Music Recs
My girl Lindsay Holifield has dropped an EP on religious trauma and mental health. So, you know, buckle up for that one. It’s called Fear of God and you can find it anywhere you listen to music.
Take Five: Suggested Devotion
“God does not create in binaries; God has always created with variance and variety throughout the world. Take this moment to reflect on nature and your part in the expression of God’s creativity in the world. The fullness of God’s imagination is being reflected in you. You are celebrated and loved for who you are.”
- Rev. Kalie Hargrove for the Our Bible App
Here’s my challenge based off of Rev Kalie’s devotion: Take five minutes each day this week to pay attention to the “in-betweens” in the created world around you. You might have a dog whose pedigree isn’t perfect, but whose personality absolutely is. The weather might not be terrible and might not be great; here in Minnesota, we’re finally into spring but not yet in the glory of summer. Notice where in creation there is a defiance of the binary, and recognize the beauty of humanity there too.
Come Out & Come In: Online Community Spotlight
Reclamation Collective Support Groups: Are you looking for a space to process faith deconstruction and reconstruction or experiences of spiritual trauma? The good folks at Reclamation Collective are providing a new Spring round of support groups that provide special support for people wrestling with these topics--plus, they're LGBTQ+ affirming and knowledgeable! Groups have a sliding fee scale, and will be starting in June, so get signed up now to join in.
Deconstruction Support Group - All Genders (Group 1, moderated by A. G. Wilson)
Deconstruction Support Group for All Genders (Group 2, moderated by Paige Ammerman)
“Come kind, come searching, come lost.
Come let me find you out.
Come with all your baggage mailed to our house.
Come be everything you are, my love.
Come love this world, come hate it too.
Come undone, come falling apart.
Come every age you have ever been.
Come tantrum in the grocery store.
Come screaming for what’s sweet.
Come willing to spill, willing to stain the windows of the angry church.
Come nervous brave.
Come tender as the trees forgiving the books for asking to be made.”
- by our friend Andrea Gibson in their book Lord of the Butterflies
That New Book Smell: For Your To-Be-Read Shelf
Love, Violet: “Of all the kids in Violet's class, only one leaves her speechless: Mira, the girl with the cheery laugh who races like the wind. If only they could adventure together! But every time Violet tries to tell Mira how she feels, Violet goes shy.” IT IS A CRUSH STORY OF TWO GIRLS WITH A SECRET LESBIAN FLOWER REFERENCE. You should get it.
Mother God: "You know God the Father, but God is your Mother too. With lyrical, rhyming text and exquisite illustrations, Mother God introduces readers to a dozen images of God inspired by feminine descriptions from Scripture. Children and adults alike will be in awe of the God who made them as they come to know her as a creative seamstress, generous baker, fierce mother bear, protective mother hen, strong woman in labor, nurturing nursing mother, wise grandmother, and comforting singer of lullabies.
This gorgeous picture book welcomes children into a fuller, more diverse understanding of what it means to be made in the image of God.”
Hot Dog!: Suggested Soci Follows
- Are you following the belonging table on Instagram? They’re doing some good and holy work around spiritual care and mysticism and deconstruction and queerness.
“Oh Honey, No”: Cursed Searches
The Queer Grace Encyclopedia got 6.9k hits last month. Not all of them might have intended to find it. A few selections from the search terms:
“does adam and eve accept paypal”
No. Only ApplePay. *ba dum tss*
“what is the y in lgbtq”
I had to google this. It does not appear there is a Y. Yet. Wait, is the Y for yet??
“what dose bi mean”
I know this is a simple misspelling but I do like the idea of dosing bi. A bi boost in your day. Bi protein powder in your smoothie. Bi meds at night to help you sleep and give you pleasant dreams of being accepted just as you are and celebrated within the queer community no matter your sexual past or current relationship structure. Just a lil dose of bi.
“is adam a gay name”
My first reaction: That is … not a great question.
My second reaction: I mean, technically, it’s the name given to a human creature that doesn’t experience a gender binary until it’s split in half to create Life, soo….
“who said the famous quote " hate the sin and love the sinner".”
NOT JESUS, THAT’S FOR DANG SURE
“what does it mean to have the g or the b”
Google wanted to send this searcher to the entry on all the letters in LGBTQIA+, which is … not right and also not wrong. It’s a line in the Lil Nas X song “That’s What I Want”: An afro, black boy with the gold teeth With dark skin, looking at me like he know me I wonder if he got the G or the B Let me find out and see, coming over to me, yeah. There’s a good amount of debate on the internet on the meaning of the line; one of the most common is Nas wondering if the guy is gay (g) or bi (b), hence having some interest in Lil. So the letters entry might have satisfied their curiosity… maybe.
“is leanbeefpatty trans”
From a quick google, LeanBeefPatty is apparently a buff girl who runs an active social media platform of her getting and being buff. I didn’t find pronouns listed in her insta but their fans appear to refer to her with she/her, so that’s what I’m using. I also didn’t notice anything about her gender identity and therefore, I think this search may be some “girl cannot have muscles and be strong! girl must be trans!!1!” b.s., in which case I’m glad the searcher ended up at QGE and maybe learned something about making assumptions. Let’s send the searcher good thoughts about getting Surface Pressure stuck in their head for hours on end so they can learn that ladies can be gorgeous and strong af too.
In My Own Little Corner
Hidey ho, neighborinos! Emmy here. I’m doing OK, as much as I can be. My wife and I are expecting our first baby this fall, so my life and priorities have been ENTIRELY UPENDED in the best way. Our two-plus-year journey to get pregnant accidentally coincided with a global pandemic, so we’ve chosen to shrink our lives a lot for safety: fewer restaurants, very little travel, and seeing friends a lot less regularly. We are really grateful to be in our dream home by a city lake with weather that is starting to look warmer, so we can at least go out for walks and ice cream. So keep us in your positive vibes for life feeling a little easier.
Also, I got a cat backpack for my 37th birthday. Refuse to grow up, my babes.
What’d I Miss?: Send In Your Suggestions
What other things should be on the agenda? Drop ‘em here. (Not all suggestions may be included for space, time, or content clarity.)
You can also vote on potential future content!
What do you want to see on the Queer Grace Agenda?
+ A deconstruction guide, in PDF and printable form
+ 101 videos for churches: the letters of LGBTQIA+, basic overview on each clobber passage, etc
+ New articles on the encyclopedia: "what are pronouns?", etc
+ Video series (live on YouTube or Twitch) helping people find a queer-affirming church in their area
+ Random thoughts from Emmy