In the News: The Washington Post

What transgender people teach us about God, and our humanity

By Sharon Groves, Published: August 19 at 8:59 am

(Jae C. Hong/AP )

“Ultimately, the transgender question is about more than just sex. It’s about what it means to be human.” – Russell D. Moore, On Faith, Aug. 15

There are certainly more egregious quotes from Moore’s recent essay, but to focus on them would miss the larger point – that there is no transgender question. The question is about how people of faith continue to grow in their understanding of our transgender brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, teachers and pastors.  And it’s a growth that, make no mistake, Mr. Moore wants to shut down.

In order to grow, one must leave the ‘love the sinner, hate the sin’ framework behind. Mr. Moore relies on this narrow, tired and, frankly, dangerous argument to denounce transgender experience as sinful.

Now I don’t think Mr. Moore or the Southern Baptist convention lacks caring or compassion. In fact, I work Southern Baptists in our shared efforts to advance lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality in faith communities and beyond. But Moore’s argument is dangerous because it discourages a curiosity about the actual lived experiences of trans people. He’s shutting down any deeper conversation and, in the process, dampening our understanding of how the spark of the divine exists in all of us.

What would happen if rather than depicting transgender people as “fac[ing] a long road of learning what it means to live as God created them to be, as male or female,” we actually took seriously the question of what it means to be human and, more expansively, what it means to live into our full humanity? What if rather than saying that biology is destiny we actually explored the ways in which we all experience our own gender identities and expressions? What if we learned about the lived experiences of our transgender peers?

I remember riding my bike with my brother on a family outing as a child. It was hot and I took off my shirt. My mother’s face turned beet red as she loudly declared, “Little girls do not take their shirts off.” I was 11-years-old.  Just the year before, I ran around impervious to such rules. No one cared. It was then that I learned gender had rules with consequences. I think often of that moment when I think of my transgender friends and colleagues.

My friend and colleague Jay Brown, a transgender man, remembers going to bed each night as a 5-year-old child. He remembers clenching his little hands and praying that he would wake up the boy on the outside that he felt on the inside. He remembers keeping that secret because, even at 5, he knew there’d be consequences.

I would wager to say we all had such moments when our gender identities were defined not by our biology, but by the dictates of our culture – whether or not we are transgender.

The core teachings of Christianity are to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. We cannot love God fully if we don’t do the work of trying to understand who God is for each of us. When we look at the most moving and transformative religious writing – from Augustine to Thomas Merton – there is a sense of openness and curiosity to the experience of God.  We can’t love God if we don’t try to glean how God works in our lives.
Similarly, we can’t really love our neighbors if we cast off all curiosity about who they are and there experience of life in the world. And finally, if we remain uninterested in ourselves – about how we come to know our gender–then we can’t really love the difference that shows up in our neighbors.
The variation of transgender experience has much to teach us.  I was struck that in Moore’s piece he didn’t reference the experience of one transgender person.  He’s missing an enormous diversity both in the experiences of faith and of gender identity and expression.

Experiences like that of Joy Ladin, a  friend who transitioned while she was teaching at an Yeshiva University, or like Rev. David Weekley, a United Methodist minister who became one of the first openly transgender clergy members after coming out to his congregation about his transition decades prior. These experiences of faith and gender are different again from Rev. Megan Rohrer, an openly gay Lutheran pastor, whose own gender non-conformity provides a unique understanding of those on the margins, many of whom are the homeless community she pastors to in San Francisco.

To live our lives with true compassion and caring, we need to move beyond slogans and ask the deeper questions about gender and the diversity of experiences.   But to do that, one must ask the right question and be open to a multitude of answers.

Sharon Groves, Director of the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s Religion and Faith Program.

New Living Lutheran Blog Post: Finding Grace in a New Way

Over the last year I have been working with Amanda Zentz, pastor of Central Lutheran in Portland, Ore., and Dawn Roginski, also a pastor, on a weekly, online Bible study. The project was created with start-up funds from the Domestic Hunger Project to provide weekly opportunities to talk about how the Bible readings each week could inspire people to respond to local poverty.

With 40-60 individuals participating each week, our online Bible study is larger than most congregational gatherings for Bible study that happen regularly at brick-and-mortar churches. Through social media, email and phone conversations, I’ve also been able to provide pastoral support, prayers and collegial support to the community participating in the study.

Last month I got to witness the literal fruits of our Bible study when my grandmother and I took a road trip to Chamberlain, S.D. There we visited Maria, one the most active participants in our online study, and visited the community gardens that Maria lovingly tends with other community members to grow produce for local food pantries and the domestic violence shelter.

Read the rest of the blog post at LivingLutheran.com

In the News: Buzz Feed

See original post and many more photos

The First San Francisco Weddings After The Fall Of Proposition 8

Prop 8 plaintiffs Kris Perry and Sandy Stier were the first same-sex couple to tie the knot at San Francisco’s City Hall on Friday. Then, these happy couples did the same. posted on June 28, 2013 at 11:36pm EDT

Justine Sharrock BuzzFeed Staff 

At 4:45 p.m. today, Kris Perry and Sandy Stier, the Proposition 8 plantiffs, tied the knot at San Francisco’s City Hall. State Attorney General Kamala Harris officiated their wedding. “They have waited and fought for this moment,” Harris said. “Today their wait is finally over.”

When the news hit that San Francisco officiants were going to start wedding same-sex couples, some people dropped everything and ran to City Hall. Jessica Becker and Jacqueline Bralostozky ran out of the house, discussing on the way there in the car whether they really wanted to do this or not. They realized after they got married that they had left their apartment door open. Some were in town visiting for pride — like Randy and Kurt Andrews, from Palm Springs, who serendipitously were celebrating their seven-year anniversary today.

Over the course of the evening, dozens of same-sex couples joined them. Officiants, including city supervisors, read vows to couples in the city hall’s main lobby under the rotunda. Each time a couple said “I do,” a cheer would ring out. Cameras were constantly flashing.

One straight couple brought cupcakes for newlyweds. Another guy brought flowers for brides and grooms, knowing people in their rush wouldn’t have bouquets. Two volunteer pastors came in case there was need for more officiants to join the judges and city supervisors.

There was not nearly the same frenzied excitement as in 2008 when San Francisco wed same-sex couples in an almost gueriilla fashion before the passage of Proposition 8 in November of that year. It also wasn’t like the first time, in 2004, when then-Mayor Gavin Newsom began marrying same-sex couples in ceremonies that were eventually found to be invalid.

There isn’t the same fear this time around that this could end at any moment. People have a chance to plan a ceremony. Some even rushed down, got their license, and then decided to wait for a full ceremony. Others, however, didn’t want to wait one more day.

Here are scenes of love, happiness, and celebration from San Francisco’s City Hall on Friday.

In the News: The Guardian

Obama applauds Supreme Court's Doma and Prop 8 rulings – live updates
link to the original article

Eoin Reynolds reports for the Guardian from San Francisco, where religious leaders held a press conference to celebrate the day's news. A small crowd gathered San Francisco's Grace Cathedral, Eoin reports:

Reverend Roland Stringfellow said that many church leaders believe gay marriage is an affront to their religious freedom, but he and many others do not agree.

"Many clergy of a variety of faiths believe it is our religious freedom to welcome anyone who wishes to live in the light of life and truth," he said. "Today we open our doors to all couples who want to be joined in love."

Reverend Charles Lewis, a Lutheran minister with the Society of St Francis, has been working with the gay community in San Francisco since the 1960s. At that time the struggle was to prevent police harassment and violence towards gay people.

"It has taken us 50 years to get to marriage equality," he said, "but we must remain vigilant. What we have won today has been won by law and it can be taken away by law."

His colleague Megan Rohrer is the first transgender Lutheran minister, having been ordained in [2006]. She hailed the day as a victory but warned there is much more to do.

"There are still 37 states where it is not legal for gay and lesbian couples to get married," Rohrer said. "There are still some rights that are denied to transgender individuals. In some states the courts have denied the right of transgender people to marry at all because they do not recognise their gender."
Representatives of the Jewish community also turned out in support of gay marriage.
Rabbi Doug Kahn, the executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council, said: "The organized Jewish community overwhelmingly supports gay marriage equality out of an abiding commitment to civil rights in our society and therefore applauds today's Supreme Court decisions as a major step forward."

In the News: San Francisco Bay Gaurdian

Did the Hayes Valley Farm occupation help or hurt the cause of liberating urban space?

06.24.13 - 12:16 pm | Erin Dage |  Article Originally Posted at the San Francisco Bay Gaurdian

Activists who occupied the former Hayes Valley Farm site held the space and posted this sign before being evicted by police.

 

Did the recent activist occupation of a temporary urban farming plot help “liberate the land,” as they claimed, or might it actually make property owners less likely to allow community-based temporary uses on land awaiting development? And did the farmers of this once-fallow land inadvertently provide a new toehold to challenge a proposed housing project?

Promptly after Hayes Valley Farm ended its three-year stint to make way for long-planned housing that would be built on the lot, a group of activists (many from Occupy San Francisco) calling itself Liberate the Land took residency for nearly two weeks, renaming it Gezi Gardens in solidarity with protesters at Gezi Square in Turkey. At 2am on June 13, Gezi Gardens was raided by police and the activists ejected.
The rise and fall of Gezi Gardens has had some people within the San Francisco urban agriculture community questioning whether or not the occupation was helpful in promoting the cause for more green space in the city. For some involved in the urban agriculture community, the end of Hayes Valley Farm reflects a not-so-distant future for other green spaces in the community.

Pastor Megan Rohrer is executive director of Welcome: A Communal Response to Poverty and project coordinator for The Free Farm, a community garden on St. Paulus Lutheran Church’s land on Gough and Eddy Street. That plot, temporarily turned into green space with permission from the landlord, St. Paulus Lutheran Church, is scheduled to end its three-year stint in December to make way for housing construction, much like Hayes Valley Farm.

The Free Farm’s land will sprout a housing project with all low-income housing units, whereas the project being built on the Hayes Valley Farm site will have 40 low-income units out of 180 total condos. Regardless, the possibility of a similar situation to what happened with Hayes Valley Farm has Rhorer on edge.

“I have a nervous feeling that what happened with Hayes Valley Farm may happen with my garden. I just want everything to end smoothly and peacefully,” Rohrer said. “I respect what the Occupy folks are doing in bringing awareness, but feel that what they did was a little disingenuous. Since the start of Hayes Valley Farm, there was an understanding that condos would be built over it. It was going to happen eventually.”
Longtime San Francisco activist Diamond Dave Whitaker was one of the people that occupied Gezi Gardens. He’s not sure if the occupation will be prove helpful to the urban agriculture movement in San Francisco.

“I’m not sure. What I do know is that Gezi Gardens was one of the few wild spaces left here,” Whitaker said. “Not everything has to be done within the law. Time will tell if what happened there helped urban agriculture here.”

Katy Broker-Bullick, a site steward at the 18th and Rhode Island community garden, told us the occupation of Gezi Gardens served to spark a dialogue about green spaces in San Francisco.

“I appreciate what the Occupiers are doing at Hayes Valley Farm in so much as it draws attention to innovative, community-based green spaces in San Francisco, and serves to foster a balanced, open discussion of the function and importance of such sites for community connection and innovation in urban spaces,” Broker-Bullick said.

Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-SF) is also weighing in on the discussion of urban green spaces in the city. Although he does not have a stance on the occupation of Gezi Gardens, he has made strides in trying to make urban agriculture more accessible with San Francisco’s Urban Agriculture Incentive Zones Act, Assembly Bill 551. It calls for property owners to sign a contract that would zone their land strictly for agriculture for 10 years in exchange for decreased property taxes.

Ting doesn’t necessarily support those who occupied Gezi Gardens, but said this: “What I do believe is that we should be doing what we can to keep green spaces in San Francisco.”

Some groups in the city may respect what the Liberate the Lands attempts at occupying Gezi Gardens, but the politically active Hayes Valley Neighborhood Association wasn’t one of them.

On June 7, nearly a week before the raid of Gezi Gardens, HVNA President William Bulkley penned a letter to Mayor Ed Lee, pleading to end the occupation of that land: “The HVNA board of directors feels that the current situation on Parcels O and P places a health and safety risk to both the participants and our neighbors. We respectfully request that, as mayor, you direct your staff to take appropriate action in a swift and timely fashion.”

Yet Rohrer also said Occupy activists are a much-needed part of San Francisco’s urban agriculture community. “It’s because of the hard work from people who have been connected to Occupy that spaces, like the Free Farm, are running,”  Rohrer said. “We have a lot of Occupy folk who volunteer that put their hearts and souls into the soil.”

There are efforts to halt building on Gezi Gardens, though many of the people who had occupied the lot have “scattered to the wind,” Whitaker said.

Mona Lisa Wallace, an attorney working with Liberate the Land, is attempting to halt construction based on the grounds that an accurate environmental impact report was not done because the land was found to be exempt from a more current report. Wallace said the last report was done five years ago when Parcels O and P were classified as “disturbed land.” Since then, plants and wildlife have flourished on Hayes Valley Farm.

She said an appeal to the exemption from a current environmental impact report will be filed at the the Board of Supervisor’s office on Friday. “Over the years a habitat has been created for hummingbirds, bees, crows, and quail,” Wallace said. “The exemption from the environmental impact report does not free them from being in compliance with federal and state law.”

New Living Lutheran Post: The Mary Experience

The awkwardness of puberty is such a universally awkward experience that it is one of the first stories in the Bible. As they come of age, Adam and Eve’s self perception changes, they begin to rebel and Eve begins to experience the aches and pains that will soon give her the ability to have a child. If Adam and Eve’s story sets the stage, Cain, Abel, Rebekah, Isaac, Daniel, Esther, David, Michal and Solomon’s stories show some of the many ways teenagers explore, bend and shatter the lines between child and adulthood.

Yet, it is Mary’s story that most reminds me of the bravely awkward teenagers of today. Most scholars believe that Mary was a teen when she was told that she was pregnant, and some wonder (without resolution) if Luke’s description (1:35) of Mary being “overshadowed” is a code word for violence. While politics, science and faith may have different ideas about how Jesus was conceived, it remains a miraculous event that the Messiah is born to bring light to even the deepest, darkest shadows.

Read the rest at LivingLutheran.com

New Living Lutheran Post: For the Children of God

Two hours before the members of St. Francis Lutheran Church in San Francisco prayed for their own daily bread, they fed 140 adults and 16 children a casserole, green beans, fruit and dessert. Each week, members and volunteers from the neighborhood sort through excess food donated by Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s. Some of the food is made into a meal, while the rest is shared with food programs hosted by other Lutheran groups or given away as pantry items.

“Keep eating, it’s the only meal we’re going to be able to have today,” a mother told her oldest of four children under 8 that early Sunday morning. The mother was right; food programs in San Francisco are closed on Sunday afternoons and evenings so the volunteers can go to church. There were no other options for free food that day.

Read the rest at Living Lutheran.