Hate is not the way

Today it is raining and I am ironing my purple shirt and I am crying. Today we remember the victims of bullying, harassment, and hate crimes – particularly those victims for whom it got so bad that death was better than any form of life imaginable.

It is wrong. It is wrong that we have to have today. It is wrong that we need a day set aside to remember these poor children who have died because of the malice and cruelty of other people.

And I blame us all. Each and every single one of us.

We have failed to live up to our capabilities. We have failed to live up to what we are meant to be as divine creatures. Scriptures from every tradition teach us the same thing:

Those who act kindly in this world will have kindness. Islam. Qur'an 39.10


Those who do not abandon mercy will not be abandoned by me. Shinto. Oracle of the Kami of Itsukushima


Mencius said, "'Benevolence' means 'man.' When these two are conjoined, the result is 'the Way.'" Confucianism. Mencius VII.B.16

Have benevolence towards all living beings, joy at the sight of the virtuous, compassion and sympathy for the afflicted, and tolerance towards the indolent and ill-behaved. Jainism. Tattvarthasutra 7.11


The world stands upon three things: upon the Law, upon worship, and upon showing kindness. Judaism. Mishnah, Abot 1.2


Gentle character it is which enables the rope of life to stay unbroken in one's hand. African Traditional Religions. Yoruba Proverb (Nigeria)


He who can find no room for others lacks fellow feeling, and to him who lacks fellow feeling, all men are strangers. Taoism. Chuang Tzu 23


Treat people in such a way and live amongst them in such a manner that if you die they will weep over you; alive they crave for your company. Islam (Shiite). Nahjul Balagha, Saying 9


What sort of religion can it be without compassion?
You need to show compassion to all living beings.
Compassion is the root of all religious faiths. Hinduism. Basavanna, Vachana 247


The bhikkhu who abides in loving-kindness, who is pleased with the Buddha's teaching, attains to that state of peace and happiness, the stilling of conditioned things, Nibbana. Let him be cordial in all his ways and refined in conduct; filled thereby with joy, he will make an end of ill. Buddhism. Dhammapada 368, 376

"An Ye Harm None, Do What Ye Will". The Wiccan Rede

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these." Christianity, The Gospel of Mark, 12:30-31.

It’s not hard. Be kind. Be compassionate. This is what scriptures of all kinds tell us. And we are failing miserable.

Here’s the thing. I am gay. I am gender queer. I am green-eyed. I am short. I have freckles. I read science fiction. I play scrabble obsessively.

I don’t live or die by whether anyone likes any of these things. I will survive without acceptance. I will survive without tolerance. I have friends and family that will affirm me in who I am and in the choices I make.

In truth most of us in the LBGTQ community will find communities who affirm and support us. Most of us will survive without the “tolerance” or “affirmation” of a particular person or community. Some of us may want general tolerance and acceptance, but we can live happy and productive lives in our found communities without them.

But we cannot live without kindness. We cannot live without compassion.

It’s not hard. Kindness can take the form of non-action just as much as it takes the form of action. Just don’t tease or bully or harass us. Don’t stare at us when we go out to dinner with our partners. Don’t call us names as we walk past you on the streets. Stay silent when you disapprove of us. Leave us alone instead of mocking our gender expression.

Or be active – teach your children not to call us names. Take the hate-filled stickers off of your cars. Stop someone from making vulgar jokes at our expense. When you see children bullying others, stand up and say no.

These things aren’t hard. I promise they are not. And they don’t have to mean that you like or approve of anyone in the LGBTQ community. They are simple acts of kindness and compassion.

They are acts of kindness and compassion that can save lives, in very literal ways.

The world – not just LGBTQ communities – has lost Justin Aaberg, 15;
Raymond Chase, 19;
Zach Harrington, 19;
Billy Lucas, 15;
Seth Walsh, 13;
Tyler Clementi, 18;
Asher Brown, 13; and
Aiyisha Hassan, 19 among many others.

Could we have saved these children if we had been more kind? If we had had more compassion? Would these people still be walking and talking and living and breathing if any one or two or three of us had had enough compassion to care for them? What if each and every one of us had been that compassionate?

What if every one of us said ‘stop’ when someone made a joke at an LGBTQ person’s expense? What if every single one of us consoled someone with a broken heart, regardless of what gender broke it? What if we valued kindness and compassion more than power?

What if every single one of us stood up and said, ‘Hate. Is. Not. The. Way.’?

…We could save the world.

Staying in the Closet

Tomorrow thousands of LBGTQ people will celebrate our ability to come out of the closet and be who we are. We will celebrate being able to tell our stories. We will tell those stories over again. We will reminisce about painful experiences we have moved through and the relationships that saved us during those times. We will call others to come out of their closets. We will tell them to not be ashamed of themselves, their sexualities, their genders, their partners. We will tell that that we will love them as they are, and that they don’t need to fear making themselves known.

We are privileged – those of us who have come out. We have found support systems that love us. We have found families (by blood or by choice) that take care of us. We are safe – if not in all areas of our lives, at least in some. We have somewhere to go that isn’t threatening. Tomorrow we will celebrate that safety, and the struggles we went through to be safe and let our voices be heard.

Tomorrow, I will join in that celebration. Tonight, I want to say something different. I want to talk to a different crowd.

So here is what I have to say to you –

to the one who knows that it isn’t safe to come out in rural Appalachia right now; to the one who knows that coming out at 14 in a conservative Mormon family isn’t safe; to the one whose father has said “I will beat the gay out of you” –

Have no shame.

Choose safety.

Be strong.

I will love you as you are even if I don’t know you as you are.

Staying in the closet may be the valid choice for you right now, and I am fiercely proud of you for being able to make it. I know that I have an immense privilege because I am able to be out, and I know that that is not something that you have. I am sorry. I am sorry that you are not safe enough to come out. I am sorry that we live in a world where LGBTQ people are still beaten and abused.

Have no shame. Don’t let anyone tell you that you have to come out. Don’t let anyone convince you that there is nothing worse than staying in the closet. The closet is horrible, and no one should have to live inside of it, but I recognize that there is a time and place for all things, and that you might not live in a place of safety right now.

Have No Shame.

Do not let your decision to stay in the closet become a source of shame. Do not confuse a decision for safety with a feeling of shame about who you are. You can be proud and gay and fierce and still stay in the closet. You can be in touch with your sexuality, in conversation with your G…d, and still be in the closet. You can have your inner diva singing and dancing, and still be in the closet.

Your life, your body, your beautiful soul – these are treasures and you should keep them safe. There may be a time, a place, an occasion to come out. There may be a time, a place, where safety isn’t an issue and you have a support system in place. Then you can come out and join your voice with all of the others celebrating National Coming Out Day.

But this year, I want to celebrate you instead of retelling my story. I want you to know that I am proud of you for choosing safety. I am proud of you for valuing your life and your health. And I will fight for a world that is safe for you. And I will keep fighting until I hear your voice joined with mine.

Singing Hope

Sermon: Psalm 146

In 2001, over 57 members of the Meredith College community gathered to participate in Take Back the Night. They gathered at the college, lit their candles, and marched to the capital steps in downtown Raleigh, in an effort to break the silence about violence against women. Half way through this march, they met up in the streets with groups from Peace College, NC State, and Shaw College.

Thought there were allies in the group, the majority of people marching were women against whom violence had been perpetrated – both women who had survived violence and women who were living it daily, women who had left violent relationships, women who had been attacked walking home from class, and women who were struggling to leave abusive partners. These women told their stories as they walked. They told stories of husbands who had thrown glass jars at them. They told stories of being attacked on their way from the library to their dorm rooms. Men told stories of caring for loved ones who had been attacked. Allies told stories of sisters, mothers, cousins and aunts who had been devastated by violence. Stories were sung out that echoed pain and violence that has been pervasive since biblical times. Stories of lament, shame, and violence – these are to be expected at a gathering such as this, when we seek to break the silence.

There was another voice though, an unexpected voice, a voice that sang out:

Praise Adonai!


Praise Adonai, O my soul! 


I will praise Adonai as long as I live;


I will sing praises to my G…d all my life long.

Do not put your trust in princes,


in mortals, in whom there is no help. 


When their breath departs, they return to the earth;


on that very day their plans perish.

Happy are those whose help is the G…d of Jacob,


whose hope is in Adonai their G…d, 


who made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that is in them;


who keeps faith for ever; 


who executes justice for the oppressed;


who gives food to the hungry.


Adonai sets the prisoners free;

Adonai opens the eyes of the blind.


Adonai lifts up those who are bowed down;


Adonai loves the righteous. 


Adonai watches over the strangers;


upholds the orphan and the widow,


but the way of the wicked Adonai brings to ruin.

Adonai will reign for ever,


your G…d, O Zion, for all generations.


Praise the Adonai!

It wasn’t these exact words, but the spirit of the psalmist was there. In the midst of anguish, injustice, and violence, songs were sung of hope. Songs of peace, of love, of forgiveness. Songs of justice and songs of liberation. In voices wracked with tears and pain, the people gathered spoke of those who had cared for them, of healing and health, of the love of G…d in their lives. Praise was sung along side of pain.

I imagine that this must have been the scene when the psalmist wrote these words. This psalm, written after the end of the exile into Babylon, would have been sung as Israelites made the march up to Jerusalem for festival days. Families from villages would gather together with their children, their cousins, their neighbors, and their friends. They would pack the necessities of their trip – bread and wine and water – and begin a long, dry trek through the mountains up to the holy city. It was a long and hard trip, and to pass the time, families would sing, much as families today sing with their children on long car rides.

They sang songs of liberation and justice. They sang to thank G…d for the ability to walk, once again, to Jerusalem, for the freedom from captivity that had been both promised and fulfilled. Families raised their voices together, off key and cracked from the heat and the pain and the tiredness, and they sang:

Praise Adonai!


Praise Adonai, O my soul! 


I will praise Adonai as long as I live;


I imagine that some sang praises because they had found their way home. Some sang because their families were returned to them. Some sang only because they were walking to Jerusalem. Those who were oppressed sang with those who were not. I picture that the poor and the rich all sang the same songs, in the same keys, and for a little while, those who had none were united with those who had a lot – united in praising G…d for liberation.

Psalm 146 asks us to do something complicated – It asks us to celebrate the prisoners who have been set free, those who have been unbowed, the care of the widows and orphans. No matter when this psalm was read, during the period after the exile or now, there are still widows and orphans. Women are still bent over from abuse and neglect. Prisoners are still wrongly incarcerated. How, then, do we begin to take seriously this call to praise?

We cannot deny that women are beaten. We cannot deny that female students are afraid to walk across their own campuses at night. We cannot deny that in our congregations, our communities, our divinity schools there are women, children and men in danger of domestic violence. We cannot be blind to the need for justice in the world. What we can do is recognize our roles in bringing G…d’s justice to the earth.

In Genesis we are given dominion over the earth – not ownership, but care and stewardship. The books of the Law give us rules and regulations for the right treatment of the orphan and widow. The Prophets call us again and again to care for the poor and the needy. These biblical imperatives are part of what Rabbi Heschel posits are our inalienable rights and inalienable obligations.

We are created in the image of parent G…d with the inalienable rights to safety, care, food, and relationship. We are also created in the image of G…d who brings justice to the world, and with this comes the inalienable obligation to act.

As a covenant people, regardless of whether we believe that covenant to be fulfilled or not, the obligation to act lives throughout scripture. Both the law codes of the Torah and the Gospels of Jesus carry through them imperative calls to care for and sustain those who are oppressed, those who are in need. We are given free will, and then given guidance about what to do with it. Love the Adonai. Walk rightly with G…d. Live with compassion. Fight for justice. We can and should do these things, and we can and should do them things while we praise.

* * * * * * * *

In Take Back the Night celebrations, we find one example of how to do this. People gather. They tell stories that are intensely painful. They make themselves vulnerable to old wounds and current pains. They make themselves vulnerable to attacks as they walk down the streets at night. They bring justice into the world by breaking a deep and deadly silence. In the midst of these stories they sing:

Praise Adonai!


Praise Adonai, O my soul! 


I will praise Adonai as long as I live;


I will sing praises to my G…d all my life long.

I imagine that some sang praises because they had found a voice to tell their stories. Some sang because their families were united in their pain. Some sang only because they were walking in the night. Those who were abused sang with those who were not. I picture that the beaten and bruised, the allies and the friends all sang the same songs, in the same keys, and for a little while, those who had found the voice to tell their stories were united with those who had come to bring justice through hearing. They were united in praising G…d for safety.

* * * * * * * *

Hendy David Thoreau said once that “it takes two people to speak the truth: one to break the silence and another to hear.” In this hearing and listening, we begin to create justice. Every time we tell our stories. Every time we listen to the stories of other. Every time we pass these stories along to other people, to other ears, we bring justice into the world. More than this though – every time we sing the praise of G…d, every time we remind people that justice is G…d’s will for the earth, we make this justice more real. We remind people that there is more to life than suffering, more to life than oppression. We remind people that it can be better than it seems right now.

This too, is one of our inalienable obligations. Not just to raise our voices and tell our stories, but also to listen.

To hear.

To deeply and truly open ourselves to the pain of others.

To be among women who have been taught by blows that there is no hope, and to remind them that there is.

To stand up and say, in the face of fists, that there will be an end to this agony. To be strong in the face of violence, and say unequivocally that this will end.

There can be no justice without the belief that justice is possible. There can be no hope for a better, less violent life without someone to remind us that this can exist.

We have all gone through unimaginable grief, and we have all had someone tells us that ”it would get better with time”. It seems trite and cliché. But can you image what it would be like if no one said this? Imagine the silence. Imagine the alternative response.

We need the reminder that our grief will ease, that our pain will subside. We need the reminder that there is more to this life than the agony of heart wounds.

We stand consistently in the face of injustice. We must fight this injustice with every story, with every chance to break the silence. We must also remind the world that there are breaks in the injustice. There are people who gather to speak the truth. There are people who gather to listen. These are moments of justice. These are moments when we live into the image of G…d truly and fully, acting to create justice in the world. These are the moments in which we must pause, praise the Adonai, and celebrate the justice that we find on earth.

The Indwelling Dwelling Place

Sermon: Exodus 35:1-29

We all have passages of scripture with which we fight. Relevancy is often hard to find. For me, this passage is one of those. Unlike much of Exodus, this passage is one that forces us to pull meaning out. It isn’t easy and it isn’t given. On the surface, it is a list of items to be used to make the Mishkan, the dwelling place of G…d. Chapters 25-40 of Exodus form an instruction manual about how to make the Tabernacle – a Tabernacle we don’t have. A Tabernacle we aren’t sure ever really existed. In order to find meaning we have to re-imagine, reinvent, and rediscover. This reimagining starts with a story.

Imagine we are a father, a mother. Imagine our baby. Imagine Egypt – dry and hot, sand blowing with every breath of wind. We hold our child close as a slave driver cracks a whip, yelling for everyone to get back to work. We quake, bent over, sheltering the baby as blows rain down. The labor is backbreaking. The work is impossible. The demands for perfection are unreachable.

Our leader has promised us freedom, and we know that the time is coming. The rivers of blood have flowed through the land. The darkness has come. Tonight, we will smear blood on our doorposts, and we will be safe. Our leader has promised.

Imagine, now, the call has come. Moses has told us that G..d has spoken. It’s time to run. From Ramses to Succoth, across the desert – heat beating down on us and our families. No water. No plants. No way to feed our baby. We hurl ourselves cross the Red Sea, surviving only by miracle. Then the Sinai Peninsula, living only on the gifts that Our G…d has dropped on us from heaven. Thirsty and tired, scratched from brambles, sore and stiff, bruised from falling from exhaustion. The babies are screaming; the young ones are too tired to walk anymore, and our backs are bent from the weight and ache of carrying them. We stop, as a people. Gasping, panting, wiping sweat from our eyes, praying that this break will last more than the single nights the other breaks have allowed us.

Moses calls us to gather. Again. All we want is to breath. To rest. We aren’t interested in another message from Moses telling us what to do. We want to focus on the air inside our lungs, hold our babies and pray that the Egyptians stop chasing us for just one day. One blessed day of peace and rest.

But we gather, because Moses is our prophet and we do what he tells us. He will lead us to safety. Here is what he says: We will be safe. Our G…d is with us. Our Sustainer, the Creator, has promised us life and peace, a nation and prosperity. He knows we are tired. He knows we are thirsty. He knows our babies are dying of hunger. But we are here. We are at Sinai and we can rest for a while. Not only can we rest, but G…d has given us instructions. We are to build a tent, a meeting place – a tent gold and silver, blue, purple, and crimson; linen, goats’ hair, fine leather and acacia wood. We will give all we have to this tent, everything we brought out of Egypt, everything we have struggled to carry.

It sounds ridiculous, but Our G…d has commanded it and he has promised that in this tent, in this sacred place, we will always know that G…d resides. Ours is a covenant and G…d is looking to uphold his side of our bargain. We are Adonai’s people and Adonai is going to live with us. For always. Reside and protect. This tent will move with us on the rest of our journey, and that means that G…d will follow us on the rest of our journey. We will never be alone again.

This is the importance of the Tabernacle, the importance of the Tent of meetings. It is a promise. We will never be alone again.

Now imagine another story. Twenty years ago. A woman. Battered and bruised, shades of black and blue that aren’t meant to be on a child of G…d. Three ribs broken. In the hospital, she tells the nurse she fell, but he doesn’t believe her. He holds her hand as she weeps, tells her that his strength is there if she needs it. They sit, not speaking, not praying, but it is enough. She goes from the hospital, not home, but to her sisters and a support group. The silent nurse has saved her life.

Another. A fifteen year old boy, homeless, hungry. Lost from his family, wandering in his own wilderness. Sleeping on the steps of any church in any city, because every city has lost ones. Imagine the pastor who finds him there in the morning, takes him in, makes him coffee, gives him breakfast. It is the first meal he has had in three days. He will never forget the taste or the kindness. Six months later, he is running the meal program out of that church, giving other lost ones the same first taste of safety that he was given.

Another. A celebration. A new baby, a gift to a family. Three women stand together, two in their late thirties, one only 14. She loves her baby enough to give it a safe home. They love her baby enough to bring him into their family, cherish him. They know that he is their own, and the young girl knows that he will be loved.

Another. A widower, after only four short years of marriage. Left behind, alone, the man he loves gone. Turning to the words of another great widower he finds solace. In the midst of platitudes and condolences, in the midst repeated “it will get better with time”s, he finds an author and, not peace, but understanding.. The words of one man, lost in grief, reaching out through time to another in grief. Together, they can stay alive, make it though their agony.

The nurse. The pastor. The mothers. The writer. The battered woman and the homeless boy. Hold them in your hearts as we turn back to Exodus. Hold them in your hearts, because these are the people about whom the text is written.

Moses calls the people of Israel, the children of G…d, to bring everything they have to offer to the Tabernacle. Our gold and silver, our yarn of the highest quality. He calls us to bring our skill and our talent, to build the Tent of Meeting. There is much to be done. The Tent needs clasps and frames, pillars, bars, poles, curtains. We have to create tables, lamp stands, lights and incense burners. Our carpenters build altars and the seat of judgment. Our weavers create tapestries, coverings, and altar cloths. Moses calls everyone with a willing heart to bring everything we have to create the dwelling place of G…d on earth.

Over 2000 years have passed since the Exodus from Egypt and the building of the Tabernacle. The dwelling place of G…d has changed. What if we imagine a new kind of tent? An Indwelling dwelling place. What if we are the tables, the tent poles, the altar clothes and the incense burners? What if we are not only the skilled craftspeople who build the tabernacle, but also the craftswork that is being built? What if our nurse is a tent peg holding up the dwelling place of G…d? What if our battered woman is echoing in her bruises the colors of the cloth on the altar?

Exodus calls us to build the dwelling place of G…d. We build this dwelling place by embodying the G…d in all that we do. Each of us, in each of our actions, are tent peg in the dwelling place.

What an awful responsibility.

Charity, justice, kindness, compassion. These are the corners of the dwelling place of Adonai. The nurse, the writer, the mothers, the widower – bruised and broken, strong and healing – we embody the Tabernacle. Every relationship we participate in, every action we perform, a chance for us to contribute to the building of this dwelling place, and this means that we are responsible for the ways in which the dwelling place is built. Will we be, as Moses calls for, people with willing hearts who bring what we have to the Tabernacle? Will we be the nurse, the writer, the pastor who feeds? Will we be both builders and tent pegs, embodying the Tabernacle, or will we shut off our hearts and close our eyes to the needs of the world? Will we feed? Will we love? Will we embody G..d and assure that no one wanders through the wilderness alone?

Exodus is a call. A call to justice and kindness. Compassion and mercy. A call to relationship and awareness of the indwelling dwelling place of G…d. We all have strengths and skills. We all have gifts of gold and find yarn. Our words, our soothing hands when someone is in pain. Our willingness to invite just one more person to dinner, to fit one more mouth at the table. We all have strength to hold the tent up. The question in Exodus is: Will we stand up and answer the call?

Speaking out

This week a friend of mine was deeply hurt, while sitting in a house of G…d – a place of worship and safety, a place that should be welcoming and filled with love. Instead of compassion, mercy, and understanding, she received hate speech of the most vitriolic kind. It made me want to cry for her, and it made me horrified that this has happened so much that I can no longer cry about it. Instead, I am angry. Desperately, horrifically angry.

Leviticus 19 tells us that we must love the stranger as if ze was home-born among us.

Deuteronomy tells us that we must remember our alien status in Egypt and love the stranger, as we were also strangers.

The Gospel according to Matthew tells us twice that we should love our neighbors as ourselves.

The Gospels of Mark and Luke repeat this injunction, with Mark going as far as to say that there is no other commandment greater.

Romans, Galatians, James, Philippians, Hebrew and Ephesians all speak to how we are called to love.

Again and again scripture tells us to love. Instead, what the LGBTQ community is often shown is hatred, outright lies, disdain, and venom. We are accused of being child molesters, crimes against nature or possessed by Satan. We are called unnatural, unintended, and not part of Adonai’s Creation. We are accused of destroying families, adopting children so we can “make” them gay, and of perverting the scriptures.

We are accused of these things in our homes, in our churches and synagogues and holy spaces. We are faced with this venom systematically and continually, and in the name of Adonai. We are attacked so often that many of us flee from our religious homes. We are condemned so frequently that we become numb to it, unable to muster the tears that should come with poison, instead shrugging out shoulders and saying, “this is the way the world is”.

We keep our mouths shut, worn out from the constant fight against hate, unable to enter the battle one more time. We find ourselves saying over and over again that the people who hate us “just don’t understand” and that they “need love and grace too”.

They do. I am not arguing against that. However, I find myself at a point where complacency is no longer an option. I find myself at a point where keeping my mouth shut is no longer an option. I am tired. I am tired of sucking it all in, and moving on with my life.

It is time that we stood up, took up the shields and swords of battle, and refuse to be silent anymore. It is time that we fight for the pronouns we want. It is time that we go public about the hate mail we receive, and it is time that we bring it into our churches, our synagogues, and our houses of faith.

The houses of G…d are holy places. They are places where the will of G…d should reign. Instead, they become places where hate speech is covered up, where we are told to “stay in dialogue and remember that” the person spewing venom at us “is in need of grace too”. The holy places are being corrupted by pastors who refuse to speak out against hatred, instead claiming, “everyone is entitled to a diverse interpretation of the scriptures”.

I agree that everyone is entitled to hir own interpretation of scripture. Read it however you want to. However, as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. said “the right to swing my fist ends where the other [person’s] nose begins.” Hate speech is hate speech and it must be removed from our holy places. A person, fully entitled to their own interpretation, is not entitled to spew that venomous interpretation in our places of worship. It is time that pastors, priests, imams, and rabbis stood up and cared more about removing the poison from our lives than they do about membership, money, and positions.

Scripture calls us to love. It calls us to care for all people. It does not, however, call us to bring scorpions into our beds. Sometimes love is hard. Sometimes love is sharp and painful. And sometimes, love means taking care of ourselves, loving ourselves enough that we are willing to speak.

It is time that we, the Queer community, bring to light the hatred being brought to us under the guise of “spiritual healing” and “Christian love”. It is time that we stop allowing people to use the excuse of wanting to “save us” as a cover for their condemnation of our lives. It is time that we temper the call we receive to have grace and understanding for those who hate us with a steely resolve to bring that hatred to light, instead of sucking in the poison and hoping it doesn’t kill us.

Gay Marriage and the "Judeo-Christian" Myth

This was written by my friend Greg Griffey; I found it both powerful and important, and wanted to share.

Gay Marriage and the "Judeo-Christian" Myth

Ask a sampling of U.S. citizens if gay marriage should be legalized and you will likely get a diversity of opinions. Some are supportive, others not. Some make arguments in between, suggesting for example that every couple should receive a civil union under law regardless of gender pairing and the sacred connotations of “marriage” should be left to religious communities. It is rare, however, at least among the people I call my colleagues and friends, to ask such a question without getting into a discussion about biblical notions of sexuality. “God says it’s a sin.” “I’m not judging gay people but I don’t support their lifestyle.” “I love the sinner but hate the sin.” “God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah because of homosexuality.” “God’s ideal is one man and one woman. Besides, gay couples can’t procreate.”

In the context of gay civil rights in the United States, these kinds of religious arguments suppose the myth of the “Judeo-Christian nation.” “Our nation was founded on ‘In God We Trust,’” some argue. The term “Judeo-Christian” in reference to the United States is a misnomer, however, given the fact that in our nation’s history Catholics, Jews and others were excluded from naturalizing as U.S. citizens or at least held with great suspicion on the basis of their Jewish and Christian identifications. Perhaps it would be more accurate to argue that the U.S. was (and in many ways still is) a nation of very European Protestant paradigms and privileges (with forms of deism in founding documents), but never some homogeneous “Judeo-Christian” state.

It’s one thing to oppose gay marriage on the basis of one’s religious beliefs; it’s quite another to drag isolated biblical passages into a conversation about gay civil rights under the United States Constitution. If we are going to appeal to selected biblical passages and the "Judeo-Christian" myth when discussing civil rights and law, then we could make it illegal to eat shrimp and pork; to wear a garment with different types of cloth; women could be the legal property of their husbands; men could have multiple wives; and slaves could be forced to obey their masters. Yet many of those who oppose gay civil rights on biblical or "Judeo-Christian" grounds would not likely support the legalization of slavery, polygamy, or the criminalization of people who consume pork or shrimp. (Although some would probably support slavery on biblical grounds, as their forebears did before emancipation.)

Religious-based discrimination enshrined into the laws of the United States ignores the religiously pluralistic landscape of our nation. People of faith have every right to add or forbear their blessings on same-sex marriage. However, while I am no Constitutional scholar, it seems to me to enshrine discrimination into the laws of our pluralistic democracy based on appeals to biblical passages is both unethical and unconstitutional. "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion."

Furthermore, if marriage is as sacred as Christians claim, then why are we so quick to hand over its definition to a secular state? Why do ministers of the Gospel of Jesus Christ willingly become agents of the state, rendering the things of God unto Caesar by signing marriage licenses for the state? Why do we not instead forfeit our privileged state-agent status by putting "marriage" where it belongs: in sacred spaces and communities of faith rather than in the hands of secular government? Perhaps because we would rather live with the myth of a “Judeo-Christian" nation and all the real and supposed privileges that come with religious establishmentarianism when the established religion is our own.

Radio Interview on Family Realities

I was asked to do an interview on Family Realities, a radio program out of Emory and Henry College. The focus was on Queer ways of doing love.

Here it is. Enjoy.

Sexual Love Without Gender -- Radio Interview

Queer the Census

We must stand up and be counted!

The census tells the story of who we are as a nation, and that includes LGBT people — but only when we participate, and only when we're fully counted. Thanks to the collection of unmarried partner data, a more complete picture of who we are has emerged. For example, we know that:

• Same-sex couples live in 99% of all US Counties.
• LGBT parents live in 97% of all US Counties.
• Black and Latino same-sex couples are raising children at almost the same rates as their heterosexual peers, but on lower incomes ($10,000/yr less).

Still, there is no question on the 2010 census that asks individuals if they are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender — and LGBT questions are not included in almost all other major federal surveys.

It's a big problem. The census, which counts everyone living in the United States every ten years, provides the data that is used to determine funding and policy priorities at the national and state level.

Being counted isn’t just a numbers game, but a question of whether the LGBT community gets access to the resources that support our health, economic well-being, safety and families. The LGBT community must be visible--and that means participating in the census, but it also means being counted fully.

That's why the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, together with CREDO Action, has launched Queer the Census. We must ensure that LGBT people are accurately counted in the next census — and we need your help to make it happen. Here's how:

Queer the Census!

Morning Prayer

I wake up in the morning. Before I have gotten out of bed, before I turn on the lights, or pet the dogs, I pray.

Modeh ani lifanecha melech chai vikayam, she-he-chezarta bee nishmatee b'chemla, raba emunatecha.

I offer thanks to You, living and eternal Ruler, for You have restored my soul within me; Your faithfulness is great.

It is traditional. In the Hebrew, it is masculine in language. It is filled with the gender-biases and patriarchal language that I seek to avoid in my day-to-day life.

But it is my prayer. It is a prayer of my people. It is glory and honor and joy in the return of the gift of my soul from its night wanderings. I love the language of the tradition, and I hold it dear to my heart.

Then I fast forward. I shower, dry my hair, attempt to choose clothes. I set everything out to get dressed. And I pray.

Baruch Ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech Ha’Olam Ha’Mavir L’Ovrim

Baruch Ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech Ha’Olam sh’asani b’tzelmo

Baruch Ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech Ha’Olam Sh’hechianu, v’kimanu, v’higiyanu, la’zman hazeh

Blessed are You, Eternal One, our God, Ruler of Time and Space, the Transforming One to those who transform/transition/cross over.

Blessed are You, Eternal One, our God Ruler of Time and Space who has made me in God’s image.

Blessed are You, Eternal One, our God Ruler of Time and Space who has kept us alive and sustained us and helped us to arrive at this moment.

Baruch Ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech Ha’Olam B’shem mitzvat tzitzit v’mitzvat hityatzrut

Blessed are you, Eternal One, our G-d, Ruler of time and Space for the sake of the mitzvah of ritual fringes and the mitzvah of self-formation.

It is new. It is inclusive of all forms of gender. It is filled with the language and politics and belief in a G-d who is more than just one or the other that I desperately need to cling to.

It is a blessing written for those transitioning genders, for those seeking new ways of gendering, and for the wearing of a chest-binder[1]. It is new.

But it is my prayer. It is a prayer of my people. It is glory and honor and joy in the sanctity of transformation and beauty.

It is the beginning of the daily ritual of transforming the geography of my body.

I put on my binder.

It is painful. It is constrictive. It becomes harder to breathe.

It is joyful. It is honest. It becomes easier to move in the world.

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[1] These blessings were written by Rabbi Elliot Kukla and Ari Lev Fornari, 2007 and may be found at http://www.transtorah.org/