Prepared to Drown: Deep Dives into an Expansive Faith
A monthly podcast featuring informative and diverse voices exploring contemporary topics ranging from religious deconstruction, anti-racism, and sexuality to holy texts, labour unions, and artificial intelligence.
Prepared to Drown: Deep Dives into an Expansive Faith
Episode 9 - Parting the Binary: Let My Gender Flow
What happens when we free God from the boxes we've built—and in turn, free ourselves? In this deeply moving Pride Month conversation, we journey through the ancient Exodus story reimagined as a framework for gender liberation. The panel explores how "Egypt" represents systems of control that flatten human diversity, while offering a vision of divinity that celebrates authenticity rather than enforcing conformity.
The discussion unfolds against the backdrop of increasing political hostility toward gender diversity, with panelists sharing raw insights about the life-and-death consequences when religious language is weaponized. Ricardo reflects on witnessing systemic erasure of queer identity, Tracy, our guest diaconal minister, shares stories of creating theological sanctuaries for those rejected by their churches, and our other guests, Karen (author) and Lor (Campus Ministry) offer perspectives on finding sacred belonging beyond binary thinking.
The conversation moves from critique to hope as participants share powerful moments of transformation—when people discover that their gender identity isn't something divine love condemns but might actually reflect divine creativity. These testimonies reveal what becomes possible when we embrace a God who refuses categorization, who answers simply "I am" when asked for a name.
Through personal stories, theological reflection, and practical wisdom, this episode creates space for anyone wrestling with religious trauma around gender identity while offering pathways toward healing. As one panelist powerfully reminds us: "If you're questioning the images of God you were handed, that doesn't mean you're losing your faith. It might mean you're finally setting it free."
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Friends, there's a reason that Calgary holds its Pride celebrations at the end of August and not in the month of June, like the rest of the world. It's not because we're trying to be fashionably late. It's because every June, without fail, this province throws a weather tantrum. And so here in the city of Calgary, as we gather tonight to record this podcast, there is a weather advisory. In effect, the rain is already falling and we are in a room full of people who are wondering if we brought the right shoes and coats for liberation tonight. But here we are, gathered anyway, in the basement of a church during Pride Month, to talk about faith and gender and embodiment and what it means to unlearn all of those gods that keep us small. And, as always, we are going to try to do this unfiltered, unedited and recorded live in front of a studio audience. There are no do-overs here, just real conversation about a God who won't be boxed in and a love that keeps breaking open the boundaries. You'll never walk on water if you're not prepared to drown.
Bill:I'm Bill Weaver and this is Prepared to Drown. Let's dive in. Welcome to another episode of Prepared to Drown Deep Dives into an Expanse of Faith. We are here in June in Pride Month in Calgary, alberta, in the basement of McDougal United Church, on the Friday evening before what is apparently going to be a miniature summer snowpocalypse here in southern Alberta, and we are gathered here for our ninth episode, which is entitled Parting the Binary, let my Gender Flow. And so I'm going to jump right into setting the stage for our podcast tonight.
Bill:We have situated the month of pride month of June pride month into the story of the Exodus, which is one of the oldest liberation stories that we have in the Christian tradition. But it isn't a story just about people escaping a bad situation. It's about confronting a system that enslaves and erases and breaks the human spirit in so many ways. And that story, in that story, egypt isn't just a place. It's a symbol of an empire and control and forced conformity. It's where people's bodies were owned and identity was stripped and where autonomy was punished. And the God who shows up in that story is not the God that is typically portrayed in folks speaking about God in circles around affirming ministry of punishment and condemnation and judgment, but rather a God who refuses to play by the empire's rules and a God who doesn't speak in titles and categories and when asked for a name, simply responds with I am Uncontained, unboxed, and that is not the God that Pharaoh or Egypt worships. That's the God who breaks people out of bondage and breaks people out of slavery, and breaks people out of pain and suffering and misery.
Bill:And maybe that's the journey that we are still on as people today, because Egypt in Exodus, pharaoh's Egypt doesn't just live in ancient history. In every age and in every system that tries to own bodies or suppress difference or demand obedience in the name of order or conformity, in the name of social propriety and rightness. Pharaoh's Egypt is a paradigm and a way of consolidating power that flattens people, and it always flattens the marginalized and flattens the vulnerable. It shows up wherever theology is used to restrict rather than release and wherever people are told to conform or be cast out. So wherever God gets reduced to a weapon of control, you are looking at an idol being used by the empire, an idol being used by Pharaoh's Egypt, and so leaving Egypt is what we are trying to do. Every time we choose liberation over dogma, every time we let go of a God that is built to dominate and move toward a God who delights in diversity, in embodiment and in freedom, every time we step away from false gods built in our own image and toward the wild, untamed mystery of God's expansive love. So it is my hope and my prayer that tonight's conversation about gender and theology and God and love and grace is about more than simply theoretical conversations about freedom. I'm hoping that we might start on a journey tonight about finding God again on the other side of the empire, on the other side of the empire on the other side of the sea, and realizing that we are not walking out of Egypt alone. But in order to do that, we got to have some people who know more about it than I do, and so I'm going to introduce your panel tonight.
Bill:We have one of the mainstays on our panel sitting at the far end. Ricardo de Menezes is here. He's a labor organizer and a queer advocate, and someone that I trust to call out the BS in love and grace. Every chance that he gets, he brings fire and clarity and a deep belief that solidarity isn't just possible, it is sacred. And yet somehow he still manages to share my lack of tolerance for performative allyship. So, ricardo, thank you, as always, for being here tonight.
Bill:Next to him is Reverend Tracy Robertson. I've known Tracy for a really long time, and Tracy is a diaconal minister and a longtime colleague whose ministry reminds me that gentleness and justice are not opposites. They're often very much the exact same path. Tracy, in the entire time that I've known her, has brought a deep care and a sharp insight and a grounded kind of hope that keeps people coming back to the table and expanding the table in ways that are humbling to behold and admirable in the face of so much of what we are seeing in the world today. So, tracy, I'm really grateful that you are here tonight. Thank you very much.
Bill:And then, next to Tracy, we have Laura Gunderson. Laura is a student at the University of Calgary, a volunteer at the Queer Center or the Q Center rather, where they've been a part of building affirming spaces for queer and trans students. She brings thoughtful perspective and lived experience and a voice that adds so much to this dialogue, and I'm very grateful that he's agreed to join us this evening. I'm grateful to all of you for being here tonight. My last guest is Karen King, writing under the name KS. King wrote her debut young adult novel, the Cure Book one Contamination. I've got my copy of it sitting right here. She's an award-winning journalist as well a librarian, a youth pastor and now a novelist as well. This book offers a complex and imaginative journey into gender identity and sacred selfhood in the midst of and imaginative journey into gender identity and sacred selfhood in the midst of apocalyptic Calgary, right here in our own backyard in southern Alberta. I'm so glad that she's bringing that voice into this conversation tonight, so thank you for being here. Thank you.
Bill:And so, with that, my hope is that, as we step into this conversation, it's not so much that we're going to arrive at the end of it with some kind of a right answer, because there is no possible way we're going to cover all that ground tonight, but perhaps we can simply demonstrate a way that we can keep on walking and we can keep leaving Egypt together, and if that is the sum total of what we managed to accomplish tonight, then we will have done our task with grace and charity and virtue. So I want to start tonight knowing that I have talked a lot already, but I feel like, based on the events of the last week, I need to ground us a bit more in the moment that we're living in right now, because when we thought about doing this podcast at this time, I don't think we totally mapped out what the world would look like at this time and in this place. Mapped out what the world would look like at this time and in this place. So there are real-world consequences that we are seeing lived out in real time about the images of God that people are protecting and the people that are being erased in the process. So we are recording this podcast tonight in a week where multiple US states south of us just refused to recognize or at least substantially scaled back their recognition and honoring of Juneteenth and actively are seeking the same rollbacks and we're seeing a wave of those rollbacks up here in Alberta as well against 2SLGBTQIA plus rights and dignity and respect and validity.
Bill:So once again we're hearing religious language. I'm hearing religious language. Most of us are probably hearing. It used to justify it, things like God made man and woman, biblical values, natural order, and it reveals something deeper that there's still a dominant image of God being fiercely defended and clung to and, if anything, having walls built up around it, prepared for what I think is going to be a very tragic and misguided fight on the horizon.
Bill:And this is a God who is male and hierarchical and deeply punitive, god who demands sameness and homogeneity in order to be called holy and part of the family. And so part of my hope and my prayer for tonight is that we can have a conversation that rejects that image. But before we go there, it is probably important to at least make sure that we name what it is that we are speaking against for folks who may not fully understand. So my first question to the entire panel. Whoever wants to start is. What kind of image of God is it that is being fiercely protected when people resist the visibility, rights or dignity of queer people in the community?
Tracy:That's already a loaded question, I know.
Bill:I'm not here to talk about the fluffy stuff, Tracy.
Tracy:All right, all right, well, I'll start, since I chimed in right away Well, I'll start, since I chimed in right away A lot of the image that that I grew up with. I'm 56. And so the image that I grew up with was very much a narrow image of God, this man on a throne and so far removed from me that, of course, I would fear him because he's so far away from me. And as I started my spiritual journey, like, seriously, my first prayer that I ever wanted to be answered, that I prayed for probably three years straight, was I wanted to be able to look at a group of people, wherever I happened to be, and see the divine in every one of them. I wanted to see what God sees.
Tracy:And that happened to me on the train. As I was still I was not a minister yet I was going downtown to work and I got on the train and all of a sudden it was like holy, can we swear on this? Holy shit? Like I can see, I can see things like I can see it was. It was just, it was amazing, it was an amazing, and I sat there in like this awe of every single person around me. Some people were chatting in different languages. Some people were upset that they couldn't drive to work. They were on the train and you could tell that they were mad and I'm like you're missing all this wondrous stuff that I see. Anyways, it was like the most amazing thing.
Tracy:And then it hit me that if this is what this was, my prayer answered, and if this was what God sees, then the God that I grew up with was not the right image for me, and so that God came like down, based on the way I was raised and became a part of me and became a part of every single person I could see, and so, um, so, the God that, the God that I don't recognize, that people use to uh, harm and and justify, hate and justify, um, all those negative things, judgment and all those things, is not the God that I, that I know, but that's the God of patriarchy, that's the God of control, power and control. It's a God that I think it is. It comes down to power and control for me, in that image of when you want to harm somebody in God's name, that's using God's name and being. It's not swearing, it's not saying oh my God, it's not saying God, damn it, it's not doing all those things. It is using the love of God, this unconditional being of divine divinity, and justifying harm. The minute you harm someone, it's not of God.
Tracy:Anyways, I talked more about what I think God is, and then, yeah, you still got there, it's good, okay, thanks, we round around.
Ricardo:I can say that image you grew up with, because I grew up Catholic and in my mind or maybe the Catholic church teaches this or not, I don't know but in my mind God was, yeah, on the throne, but at the same time, watching everything that you did, and it was never like, hey, you just like did a really good thing. God was watching you. It was like, oh, you were bad. God saw that right. So the punitive God that you talked about, and when we talk about what you say, people that use that punitive and that patriarchal God for a God of punishment and hate. I don't, I'm not trans and I don't go through the trans experience like some people do, but I've stressed to find a trans person that was raised non-religious, and so they have that same experience that a lot of people had when it comes to religion when they were young. You know God's watching you. God will beat you down, whatever you're gonna go to hell. But people who are rejected by religion um, and myself included in many ways, when I came out, uh, the catholic church and the catholic priest wasn't very nice to me, but not as horrible as they could be to other, and they are to others. They still yearn for that love and that community, and that's all they want in many ways is just a community to love them or to be. Just leave them alone right at the end of the day, let them be who they are and that's, that's the kind of God that I see, in the sense that everybody was, if, if we are all created in his image, then that, that queer person, that non-binary person, that trans person, the black person, everybody is. Just let them be who they are and be free.
Ricardo:And in my experience, especially over the past couple of years when I've been experiencing and traveling through my more non-binary side, I noticed that in clothing choices and in expression of gender is the way that society battles the most. In gender expression, when a person who has a beard, like myself, and is big and whatever, puts a skirt on, you get the most stares. And that's how I feel the effect of a binary world and very much a world that was driven by religion in that sense, right, like the binary, you have to remember this. Like in many of the Southeast Asian and Pacific Asian nations, third, genders are very common the Fava fina of samoa, uh, and in thailand, and and uh, all of those specifically, there was always a third gender or always an additional gender than the two, until christianity and colonialization came through right and forced these binaries upon them to the point where the third genders were repressed and uh and tortured and forced into the sex trades in order to survive.
Ricardo:And this is all part of that process. The same thing happened here in residential schools, with two-spirit individuals who were forced into the binaries or in many ways tortured as well. And you know the United Church of Canada had a hand in that process of residential schools as well, and you know the United Church of Canada had a hand in that process of residential schools as well. And they're still the only church that I know of that's made such an apology that they can't say it enough. But that's the God that I think needs to exist more, just the one that lets people be but also undoes all of that damage of forcing people so far apart in their genders that they can't even find a connection anymore, right or fluidity.
Karen:Yes, I totally agree with you, because when I grew up Anglican in Newfoundland in a very traditional, almost high Anglican church and that is almost borderline Catholic, almost high Anglican church and that is almost borderline Catholic and the version of God that we grew up with was not only on the throne but almost like Santa Claus, had this big beard, white hair and had a good list and a bad list and do not get on the bad list and so there was always somebody watching you and taking notes and so you know you had to kneel down. Make sure it hurt when you said your prayers, make sure it hurt when you when you. We saw them lose contact with that relationship with God. We saw them lose contact with that relationship with God. We saw them lose contact with that relationship with their parents. Some of them were kicked out because they came out as being trans and a couple ended up on our door and for us, the acceptance was basically knowing that God is a God of love and that was the basic. We went back and said, okay, what's the basic information that we know to be true? If God is a God of love, he loves everybody, and if God is a God of acceptance, he accepts everybody.
Karen:And I think a lot of us out here who are having struggles and conflict and trying to rationalize and figure out what being non-binary means in a Christian environment. Instead of saying God created us in his image or their image, we intentionally, we purposely, give God our attributes, give God our identity and say put God in a box. God is not a human, god is not a man, god is not a woman, god is not a gender. God is God. And I think we've fallen away from that.
Karen:We keep giving God our misconceptions of what God should be, whether that is Santa Claus, whether that is an authoritative figure that follows us everywhere and takes notes to make sure that we go to the right place or that we repent and turn around, or even judge us. What we wear and you mentioned about clothing and I had this conversation with our son when he came out For me it's why is it that women can wear pants, skirts, suits, ties? I went through the 80s and 90s wearing my dad's tie wrapped around my neck and his dress, shirts with leggings and you know, I'm sorry Neon socks?
Bill:I'd like to apologize to the 80s, but you know it was.
Karen:You know, yes, we got strange looks from our parents and uncles and aunts and stuff like that, from our parents and uncles and aunts and stuff like that. But if my brother would have donned a skirt, except a kilt Now, a kilt is a different thing, but an actual skirt or a dress, oh my goodness he would have been not only shunned but close to stoned, to death. I would say, and that is a shame that you know, we we accept in certain ways and we don't in others, and it's so.
Lor:Is that disparity that is rubbing us raw and like when you're saying the god that we're protecting or that people who are oppressing people are protecting and that they're using to defend, like all these legislation changes and stuff, I'm thinking like this is the god. That is that, yeah, that is the power and it's not the love. And this is the god. That is like supporting, uh, just what you want, you know, and what people um, specifically, I guess people empower, want and they it's not like shaking them up I know, I feel like god shakes me up, you know. Like when you're talking about, like public transit, spiritual moments, like, yeah, yeah, I've had several of those, but just like humanity, and like seeing humanity from god's perspective and just like how amazing and how diverse and like incredible it is, and then just thinking, oh, we're gonna condense god to this little tiny god that agrees with all my decisions, revisions and hates all these people Like no.
Bill:Yeah, I remember when I was younger we watched reruns of the Simpsons.
Bill:I'm not as young as or as old as everybody sitting here at this table. I'm younger than you, are you, maybe it's possible but we watched reruns of the Simpsons. I remember really clearly, still to this day, one episode episode, that um, that really jarred me um when I was, when I was younger, um, and I can't even remember what, what the interaction was about. But there's a. There's a scene where Marge and Homer are fighting about church, um, and and Marge says to Homer um, don't make me choose between my family and my God, because you just can't win. And in that moment I remember feeling like a really really terrible churchgoer and and and I like for for years and years and years. You'd see it on the reruns, it would play itself out and I would constantly be thinking about this, like, why would I, why wouldn't I choose God over um? You know everything else in my life, right, this is, this is sort of what the, the church kind of um at least, was trying to instill in me, um, unsuccessfully for a real, although I guess they played the long game um, but, uh, um, but but realistically, like I. I can remember when I. I can remember the first time I was able to watch and go actually like. I disagree with you, marge, um, and, and if your God can't handle some of this stuff, then you need a better God, um, rather than a better family, rather than a better community, rather than um. So, um, like, like it's, it's. I'm. I'm fascinated at how much it was ingrained just into Wednesday night primetime television, right, this idea of what religion kind of called us to do and be and believe, and that the pinnacle of it all was this idea that there was a God who had rules, and the rules might change from arbiter to arbiter of what those rules were, but at the end of the day, that's almost.
Bill:The question right now is who gets to tell you what God thinks? Because it used to be that it was the clergy. I would say that even right now, that's not the case anymore, and especially in so much of what we see around the hatred and the violence and the fear and just all of it, all of the clawbacks and rollbacks on everything related to diversity and equity and inclusion, certainly as it relates to the 2SLGBTQIA plus community is it's the random stranger on the street corner who gets to tell you what God thinks, and if you don't like it, you're wrong. The street corner who gets to tell you what God thinks, and if you don't like it, you're wrong. And we've reached that point where there is no underlying truth anymore to any of it all. It's just everybody's armchair, theologian kind of opinion on things, and that's a really, really horrifying place to be when you really think about it, because, um, like you end up with you end up with an entire community filled with diverse opinions about something that really, at the core of it all is is kind of none of your business, yeah, um, and certainly not something that you should be exerting any agency over, because you would be pissed off if someone ever came into your house and did it to you. Yeah, right, you would be pissed off if someone ever came into your house and did it to you, right? Woe to all the straight white people that they decide that. You know the heterosexuals are wrong and God, actually you know like it won't be fun at all for anyone.
Bill:So you hinted at this, Lauren, I want to like pull at it a bit more because, like both you and Tracy have talked about kind of this, like these awe-inspiring moments where we're, you know, seeing humanity through kind of what we would imagine, at least the eyes of a more expansive and loving God the human moment, the human experience. So what do we actually? Well, let's play it either way. What are we losing when we let people limit that or, if you would rather, be way more positive than I am on a daily basis? What do we gain by actually casting a wider view and casting a wider understanding of an ungendered, unbiased, unjudgmental, uncondemning God? What do we gain by actually doing that and dropping the? Because you've actually done some work around this and some conversations around this at university, right?
Lor:Yeah, I mean, what I've heard from people the most and what I guess I've seen in my own life the most is like, when you get this like moments of like bigger view of God, it's Well I guess it's such a big concept now I'm losing my words it's like you can see how people and how creation is just like reflected in that and how it's a lot more of it than you can like conceptualize. You know, and we can see like the beauty in, like in my own experience of being non-binary, like there is a lot in that. That's like how do I shape that identity? How do I like kind of build on, like what I was given and like God is like this, like ultimate creativity. I, I don't know.
Tracy:Yeah we're all like these works of art that are works in progress Kind of yeah.
Lor:And then, like with talking with people about their experiences of like how they've opened their imagination of God and how that's like affected their relationship with God or their relationship with spirituality or like a lot of those big kinds of relationships and feelings and identity things it's a lot of. I can see myself reflected, I can feel that connection. I can see the connection of like this is like a valued part of me and this is like a valued part of me, like that is valued by God and yeah, that has brought people a lot closer to like other people, to God, to just interactions with the world in like a positive, valued kind of way. Valued kind of way instead of like this is something that is shameful or this is something that is imperfect or deviant, but it's expansive, it's encompassed in like this godliness, holiness, yeah.
Ricardo:Let's not forget, I mean, that the beauty and creativity and the diversity of the world existed. I mean before white people ruined everything.
Bill:Sorry, when are you ever sorry?
Tracy:Sorry, not sorry. Yeah, I'm not sorry.
Ricardo:Yeah, the cultures and the traditions and the different aspects and the different perspectives of God existed throughout the world, yeah, and God existed in the climate, and God as a God of love and one that would provide the sun and the rain for the crops and provide good fortune and goodwill for villages to have more children and raise a large family and all those sorts of things. And then I don't know maybe the ministers and the crowd here in the group can talk to me about it what did it all of a sudden be like? No, no, no, that's not enough, right, we're also a God that tells you how to dress and how to act and how to look and how to pray and all those kinds of things to you. And so it's when we get to that point and we're at a crossroads in society now, especially with God and the beauty of humanity, where people are.
Ricardo:I mean, people have stood on soapboxes preaching what they thought about the Bible and about God for centuries, and now they're off the soapbox and they're in your face, and then now they've gone from in your face to ripping down the walls around you, right? So I mean, an example is they removed the name Harvey Milk off the boat, and a certain people said that it was specifically done on Pride Month for that reason, if you understand Right. So like they could have chosen any other time of the year. No, no, we waited for Pride Month to rip Harvey Milk's name off the boat, right? And so this is where we're at now. We're at a crossroads where, like we, either defend diversity and the dignity of humanity or we fall back into the traps of of um, a really harmful time for a lot of people well and at the same time, like I would say, also a crossroads, where I hope we're also realizing just how tenuous all of the progress actually is.
Bill:Right, like to be able to wantonly wait and flaunt that there are powers in the world that can stomp all over this stuff whenever they bloody well feel like it right. And so what, then, is going to be our response to that right? What does resilience look like in the face of that? What does solidarity and allyship look like in the face of that? Really right, because thoughts and prayers are great.
Tracy:We could actually do something.
Bill:I'm vocationally required to believe in the power of prayer.
Ricardo:It's a bona fide occupational requirement.
Tracy:There's a vow in there somewhere.
Bill:Thoughts and prayers are kind of what they bank on being the limit of your work on the subject right in response.
Bill:So again, pray, absolutely, don't make it the only thing in your toolbox. So, yeah, I mean, like this does feel like a crossroads time and I'm not naive enough to believe that it's the first time ever that it's been a crossroads time, right, but certainly we're in the midst of one, and I don't even need to look south of the border and Joanne's not here to like really make us lean into it right now anyway. But realistically, we can look right here in Calgary, in Southern Alberta, in Alberta, and see that, yeah, like it's happening in real time all around us and thoughts and prayers are running out of runway on the issue.
Tracy:Well, it almost becomes comical. That phrase, right, thoughts and prayers becomes comical, right, like, I think, a lot of people. On June 1st, you know, you put something on Facebook happy, pride, all those kinds of things and my youngest had a post that said we can't just say love is love anymore, like now. We're in a time where we have to say let's save some lives, right, because lives are literally in danger, right, and we're letting it happen. I had somebody once tell me that she was talking to a room full of clergy who from affirming churches and and was being very real with us, and so we were saying what can we do? And she said I don't understand how you can allow a group of people to take the scripture that you love and use it against somebody in in such a harmful way. It's weaponized.
Lor:It's weaponized.
Tracy:And it always has been. But we can't be these quiet allies anymore. We can't just be this. Oh, I didn't know there was affirming churches. Well, why not? We need to be shouting this from the mountaintops. I started talking about going back to binary and non-binary. There's no such thing as binary Like let's just admit that right from the get-go those things that are listed in the Bible man and woman, free and slave, greek and Jew no.
Bill:Gentile and Jew.
Tracy:Yeah, Jew and Gentile, all those kinds of things, right, but those are like what we always say. We use those things as the ends of a spectrum, right? Male and female and everything in between, Greek or Jew and Gentile, and everything in between Rich and poor, everybody in between. Like that's what it's meant to be, those lists in the Bible. It's not meant to be the binary Like it's meant to be. Let's just encompass from. It's not meant to be the binary Like it's meant to be, let's just encompass from here to here and everything else. Right.
Tracy:And so the sense of binary is really, when we come down to it, there's more sides to an argument, even than just two. Right, there's no binary in these things, right, Anyway. And so I also think that this feeds into talking about diversity and understanding God in a deeper level. Doing interfaith work and learning about other faiths is huge in terms of opening your heart up to who God really is right. Like you cannot tell me and I can say this with some confidence the Christians like did some damage, Like did a lot of damage, saying I am the truth, that's only Jesus. And it's like, come on, Like that's not what's meant. Like you cannot tell me that only christianity, which is the cause of a lot of wars and conflicts, is the only right way.
Bill:it's the right way for some of us well, and even even in that scripture passage, like proof texting obviously is a huge issue, right? Because jesus goes on to say there are other sheep and other flocks right exactly, yeah, and they, but they still respond to my voice, right?
Bill:so, um, so, certainly this is one problem. I don't want to lose sight of one thing, because you did ask a question, ricardo, that I actually want to try to take a stab at answering and I'm trusting that, uh, that tracy will will help me out with this one because you said when did uh, when did it all start to go wrong? Maybe the ministers could try to explain to you when it was that we suddenly decided that it wasn't enough. We had to start saying that God was also a God of rules and what to wear and how to worship and all that kind of stuff. So what brought me back to it was actually something that Tracy had said about this idea of the binary and everything in between.
Bill:Right, no-transcript, because even in the Trinity we find so many places where God breaks free of the breaks free of the triune understanding of God, right, that even beyond those three is God. So, no matter what it is we try to do throughout history, it's our best failed attempt and it will always be based on our context. It will always be just inherently based on our context. So, on the one hand, we shouldn't expect anything but the prosperity gospel from the wealthy right. You would hope for a little more grace in it. But the essence of the prosperity gospel makes sense to come from the wealthy right, just like liberation theology should come from the margins right. Nobody would believe liberation theology coming from rich white people.
Bill:It wouldn't look like or sound like liberation theology to emerge from them, but even at its crux, what we learn over time is that even the best of it is still our best failed attempt. Because even beyond the best we can muster in our time exists God. Because even beyond the best we can muster in our time exists God Every time. Whatever box, the most expansive box you can put God in, god is still waiting on the other side of the walls of that box, right? So it doesn't seem, but we haven't made it to a point yet where we can grasp there is no box, right? I don't want to sound like the Matrix, but realistically, like that's kind of where it's at, if we can't
Lor:define our relationship with God.
Bill:We're in just as much trouble, right, If we can't say God loves us and others. We're in just as much trouble. We have to define God in order for us to be in relationship with God. But it will always be our worst or our best failed attempt. We will never get it right. Where it goes wrong is when hubris kind of sets in and you go. I know it better than anybody else. That's where it starts to go wrong. So even in the idea of the male and female and everything in between, even beyond that, is.
Bill:God right, even beyond everything in between? Is everything outside of that spectrum right? And that's the earth-shattering, mind-blowing kind of reality as you go is that it's not even about the ends of the polarity, because there are no ends. But how do we relate to that as people? That's the struggle, right, we relate to that as people, that's the struggle right. We're uncomfortable in that space, and rightfully so in some ways, because the vastness of God is not the vastness of humanity. It can't be. We are finite, we are mortal. We're all but humble sinners.
Bill:That's my attempt at it. Anything to add, Tracy, that would make it any easier on anybody.
Tracy:No, no, you did a wonderful, lovely job there.
Bill:Does that at least let white people off the hook a bit, ricardo?
Tracy:Yes, Well, I think also I'm bringing it back a little bit to the Trinity right the Holy like we kind of get a handle on God, we have a handle on Jesus. The Holy Spirit is a wild card, right. The Holy Spirit gets us uncomfortable.
Bill:Also the feminine person in the Trinity, Exactly Also the feminine, which is also a wild card right. The Holy Spirit gets us uncomfortable.
Tracy:Also the feminine person in the Trinity. Exactly Also the feminine, which is also a wild card. You never know what you get. But I think that's part of that uncomfortability. Is that a word?
Bill:Sure, we've made it one here tonight.
Tracy:All right Is that we don't like uncomfortable, we don't like unexpected, we don't. You know, we like when things are planned, and that's also with those in power. People like the mess they, they like to control the message, right. And so if you believe what I believe, then you're a safe person. I know what you're going to say, I know what you're going to, what you think. But if you don't believe the same as me, oh, oh, I don't know what I we're all gonna do with that, because you know I have other things to worry about than to worry about what your message is and what you, your belief, is like.
Bill:if you believe the same as me, then I can, you know, control other people, and yeah, so it's, it's yeah, and yet at the same time, when you begin to experience those god moments we've heard it already here tonight the liking being shaken up, liking being unsettled, at least right. So there's good comfort and bad comfort, or good discomfort and bad discomfort in the middle of it all, right. So anyone want to try to quantify what that looks like?
Tracy:Well, you know I sorry I'm talking a lot, I'm going to let other people talk.
Tracy:But I started in our PowerPoints and things at church, I started putting other pronouns or other names rather than just the male mostly male or Lord.
Tracy:You know, we male or Lord and I'll put that in brackets. So I won't change a hymn, but I'll put in brackets an alternative word, and so I always say to folks at the beginning of the service who haven't been to my church you'll see words in brackets, you can sing and you can say whatever you're comfortable with. But I would encourage you to say the words in brackets and see how it feels, See if it opens your image of Lord in a different way, or of God in a different way, or of he in a different way, and see how that feels and you're in a safe place and you can be uncomfortable. But you might be surprised that it might open you up to something that is actually something positive and something oh, I hadn't thought of she in that sense or in that verse. It sounds different, right. So I think that could be a positive way of making uncomfortability good, Exciting. Yeah, making uncomfortability good, exciting.
Tracy:Yeah, yeah because I'm like you, laura, like I get excited about the differences, like the things that are unexpected.
Karen:Yeah, I get excited about those kinds of things and I think there's generations of people out there who do not have the social and uh debate of natures that a lot of our parents even grew up with. Um, you know, we had debate clubs, we had uh in classes, and a lot of schools still do. But now, with the advent of social media and the internet what what people have started doing and they started doing this years ago they gravitate towards other people who feel and think the way they do. Rather than challenge themselves, rather than go out and find someone to have a debate with, they would rather be in a little chat group and then with someone who feels the exact same way, has the exact same opinion, and that chat group expands and expands and all of a sudden, you basically have a cult and now you're going to start doing something and you're going to start spreading that cult message and you're going to start implementing that message within society and impacting society within society and impacting society, rather than have an educated discussion and be open to honest opinions. That may or may not change yours, but at least you'll be given the opportunity to say okay, if I feel this way, why do I feel this way and if this person is saying something that refutes that, that makes a lot of sense.
Karen:But I think a lot of people have lost that ability to actually think that somebody else who's refuting their information and their opinions to give them enough openness to accept that what you're getting instead is combative. You're getting, if you don't agree with me, well, blah, blah, blah, screw you, I'll never talk to you again. You're unfriended, you're blah, blah, blah. And it goes into this combative, threatening nature. And you see it in politics, you see it in society. I mean, I wrote my book on extremism.
Karen:I wrote it 10 years ago when I started seeing these things popping up in our society, these things popping up in our churches, these things popping up in our industry, in our province in Alberta specifically, and at the time it was just a small little seed. And when I started writing the premise for it, based on real-world trends that I was seeing in my journalism career, a lot of people who read the first drafts oh, this is too out there. You know, it's too extreme. Do you really think this is going to happen? It is happening. You know there are lots of things that I mentioned now that scared people when they read the book, and it should.
Karen:Extremism is here. It started years ago. It's not something that sprouted up overnight. It didn't sprout up in the States. It didn't sprout up in Canada in a little tiny seed overnight. It sprouted from years and years and years of not accepting other people, not accepting other people, not accepting other opinions and not being open and honest with other people in those discussions saying we get defensive, like you said, right, you get defensive, there's conflict, instead of saying, oh, you know, can you tell me more about why you think that?
Tracy:or why you say that and and and? I don't ever have to agree with that person, but I'm not going to want them dead, you know. I will get to a point of understanding where they're coming from. Right and so this, right and so this. Again, I'm I'm giving props to my youngest, ev hi Ev, to say that this curiosity like they are brilliant, anyways, curiosity, I think, is the is one of the keys to being able to be in, like, living in peace with one another. And I think back to your original when did this happen? Like, how did this? And I think it started with like, people stopped being curious, right, stopped being curious and decided we're right, you're wrong, decided that the good news was only about Jesus. And no, it wasn't. The good news is about love, it's not about you know. And we just become combative.
Karen:Yeah, and I think, as soon as we say we have it, we know god we know what exactly that's when we're in trouble.
Ricardo:Yeah, you know, and it's it's hard too, because we also live in a time right now where people want to erase the unknown and the uncomfortable and they want to uh um, not just not talk about it like what you used to do.
Ricardo:I was happy at a time when you know, when I came out it was still the early 2000s, late 90s, and it was a very uncomfortable and a very awkward and a very weird situation for everyone in my family and friends group because, like, as I was telling our three guests, like we didn't even have sexual orientation in the human rights code yet in Alberta, right, Let alone marriage and all this stuff. And now we live in a world where, you know, we supposedly have these rights enshrined in law, right but we're actively seeing it rolled back because we're living in an age now where they don't want to just leave us alone or keep quiet about it or not acknowledge, they want to erase it and erase us off the face of the planet.
Bill:Yeah, and in the face of that, even enshrined in law is not safe enough and not safe enough.
Ricardo:And, like yesterday, we had a pride. Like we do our birthdays, like the month of birthdays, we do them on a day at the office and we also, like, sort of had a pride celebration. So I went to the cupcake store and got, you know, my boss got these big plethora of rainbow cupcakes and everyone celebrated their birthdays and I gave a little. He gave a little speech about like pride and how the first pride protest was at Stonewall Hotel in New York in 1969 when the police raided and somebody said well, you know, did that ever happen in Canada? And not many people know that in Calgary.
Ricardo:The police raided the gay bar in Calgary in December of 2002. Yep Raided, arrested, hauled everyone to jail at the gay bar in Calgary and I was just 19 years old or 20 years old when that happened and I was like what the hell is going on? Right, like I'm in this community, I'm out, there's no going back, right and so it took the Calgary police 21 years to issue an apology to our community in Calgary, to say we made a mistake and we shouldn't have done that. Right and so. But we're getting to a point now where, like you know, let's put the governments aside and the crazy governments aside, even corporations are backing off now and saying you know, we don't want anything to do with this. Now, right, we will protect you if someone discriminates against you, because the law requires us to, but it's no longer going to be something that we're going to talk about.
Ricardo:And it's just it's erasing us and it's not just putting us back in the closet, because not talking about us is one thing that's almost like leaving us alone but not talking about us while there's radical, extreme, hurtful and violent people in power is a death sentence for a lot of our community.
Ricardo:What I also am very concerned about is that the a lot of people in the 2SLGBTQIA community, especially gays and lesbians, are becoming apathetic to what's going on because they feel that we have we're safe. In Canada, I know a lot of gay people that, like, they go to all the parties, they drink their faces off, but all of like the social justice events, all the the marches and the things that are going on, no one shows up anymore for these things, and it's scary for me because it's one of those situations where you know there was a quote that I saw on Instagram where you know they came for the Indigenous, but I wasn't Indigenous, so I didn't care. They came for the Jews, but I wasn't a Jew, they didn't care. And then finally they came for me, right, but by then it was too late.
Ricardo:Nobody left right. So that's. The problem is that right now, we're in a situation in a world where they want to erase and suppress and repress Like it's a scary time in a lot of ways. And over what? Really? Let's put it into context Over what right A person wearing a dress right or somebody who looks different and acts different than you, right? We're literally doing these, passing these laws and shaping the minds of children and humanity, which prevents people from getting jobs. Like 80 to 90 to 100%, 100% of the trans people that I know just want to work, pay their bills, buy some groceries.
Bill:Playing about the cost of groceries right along the way.
Ricardo:Yeah, maybe get a good drunk once in a while, go on a vacation, that's all they want, right?
Karen:And actually have a life. I mean, the fear of a lot of trans kids these days is that they won't have a life. They don't deserve a life. They don't know where to go.
Karen:I work in a school and we have a GSA. I'm a librarian at a school and when four books were put on the ban list and all of them were LGBTQ+, we had one of those books in our learning commons. It was age appropriate. It was pulled. It was just at the start of Pride Month. So what could I do? I made a huge Pride display. I brought out my LGBTQ books, made a big display, had my rainbow hearts, had all my bookmarks with all you know save a life, You're welcome here. I had, you know, all kinds of display things for kids to come in and see and all the Canadian books on nonfiction and fiction books where there were non-binary characters and people in Canadian history, famous people in sports, you know who are non-binary and LGBTQ+. The number of kids that came in, grabbed a bookmark and started putting them in other books in the Learning Commons, Just so that other kids reading other books, whether they be LGBTQ+ or not, would have something to flip through and find a positive message. They went throughout my learning commons and it was, you know, a very powerful moment to see these kids come in, and it's a safe space for them. But in the same token, though, in discussing with the GSA club members at our school, I asked them before the podcast here tonight, in talking with the students, what kinds of things are stressing them out these days. These days and the teacher I spoke with said everything they are so frustrated, they're so scared, they are so unsure of where they belong, and if they belong, because society keeps telling them they don't, when can they go? We can have safe spaces in our schools, we can create a safe space in our families, in our homes, in our churches, but outside of that, where can they go If everything is being clawed back, in the employment industry, in education, if you see it, in society, if the clawing back is starting to happen? I am fearful for their lives, Because when all of this stuff started coming out, this negativity, this very vile hatred towards LGBTQ, especially trans, one message that kept going through Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, was a meme that said you know, can we get back to the day when they just killed themselves?
Karen:That showed up in my feed, that showed up on the Twitter world Because I'm an LGBTQ plus author. It showed up in my feed and I can just imagine how many kids saw that, how many young people saw that, how many people who are afraid to even disclose to their parents, to their families, to their close loved ones, to their church, to their mentors. How many people saw that and what that did to their psyche, what that did to their faith, what that did to their mental health. Because it shocked me and I think of my son and what he struggled with. He had those suicidal thoughts but he had us to help him. If you don't have that support network to help you through those minefields that are out there now, where do you go? Because I am so scared for the kids in Alberta right now.
Bill:I really am so it used to be I know Ricardo is giving me the subtle hint to look at time as well. We are reaching the point for intermission, but I do want to say really quickly, before we move into the intermission, that one of the things that you used to be able to I think at least count on is that, even when all of the other supports or structures or systems that were in the world were failing you I was taught as a child, I was taught as a teenager you can always count on God, you can always turn to God, and I think part of what we jeopardize the most in all of this is when you take away that bastion of hope, that one bastion of hope that isn't reliant on human institutions or the best of humanity to make it happen, the best of humanity to make it happen. So we have spent the first part here talking about where we are at and some of the things, the implications, the very serious implications of this conversation and what happens when we co-opt God and kind of box God into a model that tells people that they either conform or don't belong, or ought not to live, or are somehow judged and condemned for that fact. So when we come back from our intermission again, vocational hazard. I'd like to look at the brighter side, if we could for a little bit, so that we're not all leaving here feeling distraught.
Bill:But I don't want to make light of the reality that certainly I anticipate every single person sitting here on this panel tonight has experienced some degree of the implications of this rhetoric up until this point. I know that, certainly in the church. It is no secret to folks who have been around to know that I and one of my daughters have had to go through this, including the thoughts of suicide, and that even in her advocacy for her friends that are in the 2SLGBTQIA community experienced great violence and an absence of support from the structures that were supposed to have safe places A school that did not have a GSA and has pathologically refused to start one up and certainly felt very alone and was only held actually by the friends that she was, you know, supporting herself in the middle of it all and obviously her family that deeply loved her. But I think what has shifted, if I can be so bold as to say it, what has shifted now is I don't think people truly understand the consequences of their actions or the consequences of their words anymore.
Bill:You gave the example and I'm not critiquing the example because I agree with it, but you gave the example of just because I disagree with somebody doesn't mean that I would want them dead, and I think what we have actually reached is the point now where people don't realize that disagreement is okay. How you choose to disagree can actually lead to somebody's death, and it used to go without saying that you knew there was a way to disagree. Well, yeah, violent would be the wrong word, but certainly the most volatile disagreements, even on issues of politics or certainly issues around human rights, there was always at least the understanding that at the core of it all, human dignity must still remain as a part of the discourse right, and maybe I'm romanticizing it, but it certainly wasn't like it is now today.
Bill:right, we do live now in a day and age where, yes, silence is complicity, and you're not just complicit in not changing things.
Bill:In a lot of cases you're complicit with the narrative that actually leads to people losing their lives certainly losing their livelihoods, but more often than not also losing their lives or being at greater risk of having that happen. So when we come back, let's imagine a different world for a little bit, if we can. I know that might be hard for us to do, but for now we're going to take an intermission and we will be back to start off the second half of our discussion. Here and before the break we were talking about what happens when our image of God is too small, and so now I'm hoping that we can turn the question and look a little bit more at what becomes possible in our faith and in our relationships and in our own embodiment and our communities when we let the image of God actually grow and expand and become more than a simple binary image and, in all honesty, a patriarchal, male, punitive kind of image of God.
Bill:because leaving Egypt is not just about what we're leaving behind, it's also what we're moving toward. So it's about claiming our freedom and it's about telling new stories, stories that haven't necessarily dominated our literature, our airwaves, and refusing to let the empire or the pharaoh of our day define our worth. And so that's actually going to get me to start with you on this one, karen, because that's exactly ha ha, look at this. That's exactly what your protagonist, julia, is facing in your book. She claims her truth and I'm trying not to give away too much because I don't want to spoil it and then everyone will go hey, I don't need to buy the book.
Bill:But there is a moment in the Cure where Julia is standing in front of a mirror and she's got a pair of scissors in her hand and she's talking almost with a voice in her head at the same time. And she's just come off of a conflict with her parents and they have said we just really wish that we could understand what you are going through. And Julia is talking to herself and the mirror and saying if you want to understand what I'm going through, then you need to face reality. And then the voice in her head says you needed to face reality. And then the voice in her head says you needed to face reality, julia. And she takes the scissors and she takes that liberating step towards becoming visible and cuts her hair and looks in the mirror afterwards and says well, hello there.
Bill:I think the description is actually her. What was the word? Her hair is not destroyed, but I think it's her chopped hair or whatever. Looks at her image in the mirror with this clearly amateur cut in the mirror kind of haircut and says, well, hello there, nice to finally meet you.
Karen:Yes.
Bill:And so when I was reading this, I was very aware that, for me at least, this was not sort of a coming-of-age moment. It was actually more of a really kind of sacred and embodied moment of refusing to let somebody else define who she is. And certainly not the first and definitely not the last in the story. Either right, but my question to you is going to be a little bit different than that, Because I want to know and this is going to be a.
Bill:I'm trusting that, as a journalist, you've had to answer our questions and not just ask them. Uh, as you were writing, julia, yes, uh, as you imagine, someone claiming their identity, uh, in defiance of the binary expectations of her day, our day, um, did that process shift anything in you?
Karen:Of course it did. I don't think I could have possibly have written the book without me growing with Julia and going through that growth process from Julia to Jules, from Julia to Jules. Jules was based ever so slightly on our son and about his transitioning. He had a difficult time, the same as Julia did, but we noticed in his transitioning that the conversation that he always had in his head did not match the conversation we were having with him and there were times when we would discuss something, and I think it's part of being a teenager as well.
Karen:You have all these dialogues in your head that you think somebody's thinking about you or what they're really thinking, what they really want to say and what they mean when they say what they say. I had those conversations in my head when I was a teenager. I had those conversations in my head when I was a teenager and nine chances out of ten they were wrong, because my perspective and my perception was so skewed with my own identity and what I was going through that I was changing everything in my head so that, because I couldn't figure out the muddled part part. Now, when I created Jules, it's one of those characters where it's a book about extremism. Yes, so Jules goes through extreme reactions, but I also wanted the dialogue to be there in Jules's head and the reader knowing what Jules was going through, which is why there is a dialogue. Jules talks to themselves a lot and the voice that starts off with Julia is not the voice that ends up with Jules, and there's a journey there as Julia transitions to Jules. That voice who starts off mean and very vindictive and hateful and very conflicted and nitpicky and very sarcastic, and that comes out in Julia's behavior with her family, with her friends and all this anger they have.
Karen:As Julia transitions and becomes Jules, though, they find a place where they can belong, they find their own identity and accept who they actually are and then realize, well, the world's not going to come to an end because of me. It'll become because of everything else that's coming around. But my parents are accepting of me, my family is Okay, well, that's a safe space. My brother is accepting of me Well, that's a safe space which opens up a little bit, a little bit, a little bit more, so that by the time the book ends, jules' inner dialogue is so affirmative and is so comforting and not quite confident yet, but it's a voice that surpasses your inner psyche, the inner dialogue and actually Jules gets a glimpse of God talking to Jules and accepting and caring and loving who Jules is.
Karen:And when Jules looks at that mirror for the first time and cuts the hair and sees who they are just a little glimpse of who they actually are it's a big load off. It's like I don't have to disguise myself anymore. I don't have to disguise myself anymore. I don't have to hide, I don't have to transform myself to fit an image that society says I have to fit into a box that society wants to put me in. So I wanted the readers to journey with Jules and I hope you felt that when you read it.
Bill:I actually wrote here that for me, one of the things that gave me great hope in reading this book and I mean, you know the audience probably doesn't know, but my 12-year-old is now actually reading the book and my 15-year-old is called Dibs afterwards, right, so in a lot of cases I was joking with the panel before we started because they're all going like Dad, why are you reading a young adult book? But I wrote that for me, the thing that brought sort of a lot of hope out of the characters that you built in this book is that there's a reflection here that there can be queerness and divinity that exist on the page but also in the world right.
Bill:That we can actually get to a place where queerness and the divine are not separate things at all but are in fact one and the same.
Bill:So that certainly would be my endorsement for reading the book.
Bill:But certainly there was great hope in that, and again, for my kids to be interested and engaged in it as well is one of the places that gives me great hope.
Bill:I think that if we start to find ways to change the stories that are dominant in our narrative, if we get away from the Simpsons rerun ingrained kind of understandings of where God fits into the picture of things and what our relationship with God actually is when it comes to questions around, your God tells me that I can't be like this then we probably need a better God, as opposed to don't make me choose between God and you because you can't win, right, there's never that kind of at least in my experience, no, there's never that kind of a choice being put before us, right?
Bill:God never forces us to choose between God and dignity, right? And so, yeah, I mean, like certainly every page, you feel the anger at the beginning. You gave away more than I was going to, so I don't feel bad, and you do get to journey through the entire transition and all of both kind of the courage and the heartbreak and everything that kind of goes with it, right? So again, like for me personally, thank you for writing the book because again, my kids are loving it so far and it's a different kind of narrative than we typically hear.
Bill:Yeah, it's a different kind of narrative than we typically hear and the characters are front and center as opposed to sideline punchline supporting cast characters.
Karen:And I try to make them as real as possible. Jules is a compilation of a bunch of different teenagers that our son has befriended and even other trans kids in our church. When Jules, just after our son, came out as trans and it's funny, these kids find their tribe. Whether you try and push them one way or another, they find their tribe. Whether you try and push them one way or another, they find their tribe. And when our son came out as trans, it wasn't like we stood up in church and said our son is trans. He just slowly came in and changed a little bit each time and all of a sudden there were other teenagers who noticed and said Okay, I see the difference. Maybe I can sit and have a chat with you later. And mom and dad came over. Maybe I can talk to you about some things which led to other conversations and friendships and to tell you you know Jules does do a transformation.
Karen:But you know I had this conversation with my son two weeks ago and he knew I wrote the book. He knew he was an inspiration for the Jules character, but he hadn't read it yet and he got a copy for Christmas and he's been sitting on a shelf and he's been working hard and everything. And he decided to pick it up and start reading it about a month ago. And he called me a couple weeks ago and he said mom, I love your voice, does Jewel? He was only a couple of chapters in and he said does Jules change? Does Jules grow? Because I've grown, haven't I? And I said, oh, my God, you have grown so much. I'm so proud of who you've become. You have embraced who you are to the 10th degree.
Karen:He went through this stage in middle school, high school, and lost all confidence in himself. But as soon as he embraced who he really was, who God made him to be, he thrived. He got on this path. He wanted to work himself through university. He did, convocated with excellence on the dean's list every single year in university, has a dual degree, like in a science degree, and he's doing his master's in the fall and he has a wonderful, beautiful partner and I see so much hope for him and he gives so much hope. He gives so much back and he is. He is talking about, you know, whenever, whenever there's something in our lives that we're struggling with. He said, mom, I'm going to pray for you and to have that come back at you after throwing it out there so many times. That is a mother's dream.
Ricardo:I want to say that I believe your son embraced who he was and is thriving because of a safe space and a mother like you.
Karen:Oh, thank you.
Ricardo:And you are truly special for providing that for your child when so many children don't get it, because I truly believe that when trans kids survive, trans adults thrive and they live. But they need that safe space to be themselves and embrace and explore who they are, because otherwise they're just perpetually thrown into a box. So don't discredit yourself for what you've done and provided for your child too.
Karen:Thank you so much.
Ricardo:And it's important as a society that we just love and accept people for who they are and how they come.
Ricardo:I mean, even until today, most people will have that reservation of insecurity when they don't see part of themselves.
Ricardo:Everybody wants to see part of themselves in everybody and wants to see similarities, to see part of themselves in everybody and wants to see similarities, and and similarities is a source of comfort for most people, in order to provide um that connection for conversation and and for um and for friendship or or anything.
Ricardo:And um you know, as a union organizer, I always tell my staff that um you know, you you'll only develop more activists if you stop talking to the people that look and sound like you, and you'll only find the true issue in the workplace and the true challenge that people are facing when you're doing that organizing, facing when you're doing that organizing, even if it's existing unionized workplaces or new ones, if you go to somebody that you would have no comfort or no pre-existing sort of urge to speak to and just sit down and talk with them and understand who they are. And that's where the real beauty of humanity is, when we explore the unknown and we are curious, like we said in the last half, right, when we are curious and when we are, when we just break down all the barriers and just have a conversation with somebody at a human level, right.
Karen:Thank you, and I mean I don't do this alone. I know I don't do this alone. I have a wonderful husband who's also an Anglican priest and who has been such an amazing mentor for both our kids, and we have a God who's loving and kind and answers prayers and is there when they need them and even when they don't think they do. But I wanted this book to be about hope, even despite all the chaos.
Bill:There's hope in the middle of it.
Bill:The world is still kind of yeah well, the world's still going to half half a priest and a librarian.
Ricardo:There must be no shortage of bookshelf space in your house.
Karen:That's another story. Things work out for.
Bill:Jules, not for a lot of other people. Laughter, laughter laughter, laughter.
Bill:Things work out for Jules, not for a lot of other people.
Bill:Story about a bus driver named Raj. Oh God, I wanted to move on because this is an example. Tracy, I'm coming to you actually because you have ministered in a variety of different kind of contexts and ways, right. So you've done the progressive congregation kind of ministry. You're at St Thomas United now, and certainly even in progressive conversations McDougal, red Deer Lake, st Thomas, everywhere there are still we are still doing the work, I think, of trying to unlearn harmful theologies, right, like you described the idea of you know like we put the words up but we put the words in brackets, right? Or, in my case, we tend to do a lot of the.
Bill:You can say the Lord's Prayer in whatever language and tradition brings you closest to the comfort of God, knowing that for some people it is just as difficult to take away the language they have said for 50 years as it is to encourage them to consider what the implications behind that language might be right. Lordship in and of itself is not a bad thing. How it has been misused would be the bad thing. So, from the pastoral perspective, for me it's always about whatever wording works, as long as it's not an expectation that everybody uses the same words.
Bill:But you've also chaplained at a young offender center, and many of the people you would have worked with there because I did a practicum there a number of years ago would have been on the receiving end of some of the most rigid and punishing religious messaging imaginable, not just because of their context, but again, certainly even a number of the folks when I was there doing my practicum were wrestling with a very. It was very clear and they would disclose I'm gay, but it is not safe to be gay here, just in general right. So I'm curious. I'm going to invite you at least to start. What begins to heal for people, whether it be in worship or in their own self-care or in their relationships with others, when you start to hear a different voice, other than that of the God that is oppressive and empirical and patriarchal, one that actually invites them to come out of Egypt and to move towards freedom and true, authentic freedom? What heals for communities and for people and for relationships, when you start to walk down that road?
Tracy:Wow, I think I don't want to make it as simplistic as your soul starts to heal, but I think that's part of it. When I get a phone call from somebody who is ready to kill themselves because their church has told them that they're an abomination and the world would be better without them, and I talk to them for two hours on the phone and I get them through the night. They have nothing to do with St Thomas, they just call us because we have the rainbow and we might be a safe place to talk about God and get them through. And then two years later, I see them at Pride Parade and they come up to me I've never met this person. They Years later, I see them at Pride Parade and they come up to me I've never met this person. They recognize me for some reason and say you got me. I'm here today because of that two-hour conversation. And so then I tell those stories to the congregation in sermons and messages and things and people.
Tracy:There's a certain sense of pride from the congregation. Um, when, when their leader is out there, right, doing, doing the things, um, of course, there are some congregants that are like, you know, don't be political. Well, it's not political it, but it's not. But there's a certain sense of pride, and so I think. And then congregants come up to me and say I wish I could do what you do, you know, and I'm so glad that you do it on our behalf, kind of thing. And I said we're all doing it in our own way, we're all doing it. And so the minute you're able to go up to somebody in a grocery store and say, nice skirt, that looks great on you, you know, and those, it's a small thing for those of us that have privilege of being able to say those things out loud and not worrying about the consequences of that, but it's huge, for it can be huge for the recipient of that. So I think what begins to heal is, well, first of all, relationships. But I think our souls begin to heal, like, like, I think, I think people who are affirmed in who they are and how, I say God made them to be, and and give them that confidence that, yes, god made you this way and God is journeying with you in this, and so am I and so is the church.
Tracy:There's, there's a buildup of, of, of the, of the, the, the faith that has, you know, a lot of a lot of folks grew up with the faith, right, and they miss it when they're ousted from their church communities. Right, they miss that foundation. And so when they find a church that says they're affirming, they'll check it out first and feel the waters and see if it's actually safe and if they're actually preaching or living out what they preach. But as soon as they find that they become involved in the church community, they start to trust other people on other committees, they start to volunteer and they start telling their community outside the church about it and that just heals the entire church.
Tracy:Like our church, the Christian church has been so damaged by the harm that we've done in the past and it's our responsibility today, as affirming Christian leaders today, to fix that. And so it's the same idea as reconciliation. Right, I wasn't there, I didn't run a residential school right, we can use those excuses. Right, it wasn't me, no, but we represent that, right. And so I think it's still our responsibility and I think, as uncomfortable as that makes some people feel there is still that uncomfortableness moves them towards just that soul healing, that spirit healing. Yeah, I don't know if I explained that.
Bill:So, laura, what about you? What do you think? What, uh, what opens up for us and how we relate to ourselves and to each other when we start to, um well, hold god's identity a little more loosely than it has been in the past?
Lor:well, when you were speaking, tracy, about like I guess people coming into community and finding that belonging and finding that they can be accepted as themselves I know I don't see the full like journey as much like sometimes they'll be like I volunteer at the Q Center on campus and sometimes they'll be like high schoolers that are touring campus and they'll stop by and like I've talked with some of them and like just like there will be tears sometimes you wow, I'll be able to find this kind of community here. Like things are opening up to me, you know, so that kind of healing, like yeah, it's very, very cool to see. And then also when embracing God, I don't know, I got to have some really cool conversations this year through like campus ministry. We had a lot of discussion programs on a lot of really cool topics like God and like gender and things like that, and just to hear people's stories of how they like connect with God differently and how they connect with community differently and how they view themselves differently because of like these more open images of God, like there's one person I was talking with who, like specifically did not feel a connection to God, you know, left spirituality, I guess, behind a bit because of the like male image of God and like I can't see myself in this.
Lor:I can't see a lot of people that I know in this, like what does this have for me? And then finding that like wow, what if I look at God in like a more feminine way? What if I look at God in like a gender expansive way or all these different things? Then there's like that level of connection and there's that I can see myself in the divine and just like a lot of that echoed in the personal connection and the reflection yeah I think there's a lot of simple things we can do to like visibly accepting.
Karen:Um, I mean, I wear my cross, I'm uh, at school, but I you wear a pride t-shirt or uh or something. Or just make a comment and say give a compliment, um, just because you're a nice person, like, I think we've lost that kindness to people, that kindness If you see someone that you think is struggling a little, give a compliment, give a kind word, a smile. You know, open a door. It doesn't take much to change someone's day and you know little actions make big ripples.
Ricardo:It's interesting that probably one of the most simple ways to not just show allyship but leadership towards the 2SLGBTQIA community is just expressing your pronouns in one way shape or form. Wearing a button or a sticker, putting a sticker or a button on your name tag. If you have one or every name tag that you have.
Ricardo:Or even doing systemic change like if you're in a capacity to organize events or conferences to ensure that pronouns are something that everybody has to choose, or not go by any if they don't want to. Some people prefer to go just on their first name basis, and so I want to just read something really quick. It's not terribly long at all. It's what we put in every single one of our conference programs and it just says increasingly, many of us are expressing their gender identities and expressions in ways that are new to some of us. Inclusion and equity is our union's way. For that reason, we want to take a moment to explain the importance of acknowledging everyone's proper pronouns and take some time to introduce ourselves to each other with those pronouns, and that's what I mean. Right, you don't have to say hi, I'm Ricardo. Why go by he? They pronouns. Every single time that gets kind of like it's a lot. Have to say hi, I'm Ricardo. Why go by he?
Tracy:they pronouns every single time. That gets kind of like it's a lot.
Ricardo:But even if you wear a button, somebody who's in the closet or questioning knows that you're almost a safe person to say it. So we go on to say some of us prefer she, her or he, him, while others prefer more neutral pronouns like they, them. Many folks, especially in the 2SLGBTQ plus community, identify as non-binary or gender fluid, someone who doesn't identify as exclusively male or female in the context that we know today and as union leaders, it is essential that we acknowledge and respect this by using their proper pronouns all the time. Nothing is more impersonal than the way people refer to us by our names and our pronouns. Accurately using a person's chosen name and chosen pronoun is a part of. There may be a lot of learning that we have to do, but small little symbols of we're trying goes a lot further than you need to fit in. Yeah.
Ricardo:Right, and that's where we all have to start right. And in a world where maybe you are just as offended by what's going on in the political and the social discourse in the world right now, but you don't know where to start and you don't know how to even begin to express even some sort of solidarity with the communities that are being targeted, you can at least say you're trying rather than keeping quiet right.
Ricardo:Stuff like you know, pronoun pins, or even stuff like wearing a small rainbow on your jacket, or even just like educating yourself. That's what I was just going to say, reading something.
Lor:Here's a very very.
Bill:I don't think. I don't think I'm oversharing if I am, you'll call me to task for it later but the prime example would be we actually had an email or a text interchange, right? A couple of weeks ago where I was like this is probably the stupidest question I could ask, and I mean, I've known you for a while, right, but I was writing a description for this episode and I was like okay, so am I using queer, am I using non-binary?
Bill:What's the actual like? What would you prefer I use? And then I sat and I waited Because you were like-.
Ricardo:I was in the US. I was in the US and I turned my data off because I could charge $14 a day.
Bill:And I go through this process in my head, like did I ask an offensive question? Did I not do it right? Did I miss the one that actually mattered? Right, like this whole thing. And then finally, sorry, I just got this now because I've been down in the us and didn't have a signal, or whatever right so um, but it's just. It's just like I think the effort matters more than anything else right um more than like it's.
Bill:It's okay to not know, um, but it's not okay to pretend you don't know, right. And it's certainly not okay to then make the assumption or go for the categorical, you know, just normative, whatever. Right? So in an ideal world? So what I keep telling my kids is ask them their pronouns, because if they argue with you about it or get ridiculous about it, you know they're not a safe person to talk about anything else with. That is the simplest of the simple right. If they're going to get hung up on that, don't start talking to them about anything else, because if they can't just say he, him or she, her or they, them or whatever, without a running discourse to go with it, they're not going to be a safe place to talk about anything deeper or certainly much more vulnerable in a safe way, right? So the effort truly matters, right, more than anything else, if you can just acknowledge that you don't know everything.
Ricardo:We can all see why book bans are so horrifically damaging to children. And I mean, I think we all agree on two things, a that no, three things. The easiest one is there are some books that probably shouldn't be out there, yeah, yeah, I agree. Someone that was in power between 1930 and 1945, maybe his book shouldn't be in chapters too much, right, but there is a.
Bill:Who are you talking about?
Ricardo:There and he was burning books, remember.
Bill:Right Book back. There is when you limit people's learning by ban burning books. Remember Book back.
Ricardo:When you limit people's learning by banning books, you limit anyone's ability to even try, right? And the third thing, when it comes to people saying, well, we have to protect the children from, we have librarians for a reason, university educated people that say maybe kids shouldn't read this, okay, and we're not going to put this here, but when they can understand what it is, it's available at a library, a public one, right? Like there are people that are smarter than the governments who are banning books, who are making those conscious decisions for children but also saying that kids need to learn about all aspects of life. And this is is why we have to try. And you know, when the government of Alberta, they're pushing that bar as far as they can.
Ricardo:And when they talked about book bans, my heart sank because I had my coworkers. I don't know, I shouldn't say that, but yeah, I did. Well, you know, he came out as bi eventually, but he told me first or very early on and I didn't know, like how safe the surrounding, like I knew my co-worker was safe because we talked about it all the time. I just didn't know how. So I like wrapped a book about, like exploring bisexuality and I slid it in his backpack when he came and I was like there's something in your backpack.
Ricardo:If you're not safe at home, you know, open it up when you're in the washroom or whatever and he was all happy. But I thought to myself like if that book could just be there in the library for them to like, explore and learn in a safe place? Libraries should be safe spaces and this is what I'm saying like, um, I was super happy with McDougal when we opened up the whole 2SLGBT section in the library and bought a whole bunch of books and put them in there. Like I don't know how busy our library is of Jen's like crazy stamping cards, I don't know, but we have to try, yeah, and that library does exist.
Bill:Yeah, absolutely Right.
Tracy:I always taught my kid that whatever books get banned are the ones you should read, just saying as long as they're age appropriate.
Karen:I mean, I think there's still a banning out right.
Bill:Probably means you should read it, maybe not at the age of eight.
Tracy:Not right now. Yeah, exactly that's right, but yeah.
Karen:I mean there are inappropriate materials depending on the age and maturity of children, and I work at a junior high, so it's a grade 6 to 9. So we have to have books for grade 6 students who maybe read at a grade 5 level. We also have books for grade 9 students who read at a grade 10 level. So years ago when I started, I put dots on my books with the suggested reading levels on them. Now that's not a suggested reading level that I come up with, that's from library services. You know United Library Services. These are expert people who actually go through the books and determine what the reading level is for these books.
Karen:My concern about the government's ban is that you have a partisan government who is influenced by lobby groups determining which books are being banned rather than having a conversation with the Canadian Library Association, with the Alberta Library Association, and having a conversation. What books are appropriate do you deem appropriate in this list? Why? Why not? And then decide which books, if which books can be pulled, and when that conversation didn't happen, when you don't turn to the experts in what books are appropriate for which students, you are missing it so clearly, the mark, so clearly, of what education is all about. I mean, you are limiting education and that is a slippery slope, as we found in the 1930s, 40s.
Bill:And probably now in the 2020s. Yeah.
Bill:So I'm sensitive to time. I want to wrap this up. We do something here. Last thought, sort of down the table. I'm going to question this one, though, or I'm going to add a question to this one. So if you could rewrite one line, either in the social discourse of our day right now or in the church's theological messaging about God as it relates to your identity, your gender, who you are, rewrite If you could rewrite one line currently social discourse, church discourse what would you write in its place, and why?
Ricardo:And I'm going to start with Ricardo, because I haven't asked many tough questions tonight- I'm not sure that I would rewrite anything, but I'd certainly add more gay people in the Bible and while they probably do exist, I was going to say do you think they're not there now?
Bill:No, they probably do exist.
Ricardo:They may have tried to be rewritten out or written out through different subsequent versions of the Bible. I know for a fact that throughout history there were times when openly queer people were actually quite well accepted and you know, discourse changed and people were persecuted for whatever fashionable persecution at the time was, whatever fashionable persecution at the time was. But if we had in the Bible like an actual, like story of a queer couple that ended up happy and God loved them and had children you know what I'm saying Then that would change the whole course of history. Because whoever picked out the words out of the Bible to attack certain groups of individuals caused a lot of historical and tragic drama throughout our entire time. And I think to myself how much different the world would be if Christianity had maintained the book of love rather than dominance and conversion. Right Tracy.
Tracy:Yeah, I would echo that. It is unfortunate that there was a mistranslation of the Bible in 1946, and that got globbed onto by a lot of extreme Christian groups, and so I kind of wish that that hadn't happened. But it was a United Church minister that called them to tasks to tell them that was a mistranslation. So that's kind of nice for us. United Church people. Remind anybody that says that, especially Christians who are on a mission to convert people to Christianity. I would remind them that the first people that were told about Jesus's birth were shepherds, the lowest of the low in society, and the second were magi from faraway lands, essentially scientists, who were led to the birth of Jesus or to the childhood home of Jesus and not to be converted, to come as they were, come as who they are and just bask in. This is the being that I have sent to to teach people about love and acceptance, and they left without being converted. They left another way, and so that's one thing that I would just yeah for me.
Lor:I guess I look back on my own kind of like putting together of queerness and Christianity in like what I believed in, like who I was, and the kind of fundamental turning point for me was like finding this foundation of like safety and security and like beloved status, rather than having this like internal debate of like, oh, if I am queer, well, I knew I was queer. If God truly thinks that like queerness is a sin, then like am I like inherently less loved or like that kind of fearful theological and not also not theological only, but like political discourse on people's like status in the church and their status as just like human people with dignity and humanity, just to give it all the foundation of safety and belovedness and yeah.
Karen:And I think I would encourage people to lean into the true identity of beloved child of God. There's no gender in that, there's no binary in that. There's no other than beloved child of God. And I think if people what I'm seeing is if people who are attacking the non-binary and the 2SLGBTQ2S plus community, the queer community, hold up a mirror to the Pharisees and see how different you are or how the same, because Jesus came to preach love and acceptance to the marginalized, to those on the brink of society, to those who were not accepted. And if Jesus preached love and acceptance to all the people that were cast out of the mainstream society and everyone else, the Pharisees and everyone else was throwing laws at them this, that and the other thing. This is why you can't do it then how much more are you like the Pharisees to those oppositions than you are like Jesus? Which side are you on of that mirror? I want to be on the side of Jesus.
Bill:All right. In the Exodus story the people don't just walk out of Egypt it's not out of Egypt into the promised land. They wander and they wrestle and they forget and they remember and they complain a lot on the way. I'm reminded that anytime you try to leave empire, anytime you try to leave dynamics or structures of power and control, it isn't a one-and-done kind of an event. It actually ends up being much more of a practice, and dare I say even a spiritual practice in a lot of ways. Sometimes the hardest part isn't crossing the Red Sea of our day, it's letting go of the gods that kept you small, or the pharaohs that kept you small, or the powers that kept you small. So if by chance.
Bill:Something tonight stirred something in you. If you're questioning the images of God that you were handed, that doesn't mean that you're losing your faith. It might mean that you're finally setting it free. To our panelists tonight, to Ricardo and Tracy and Laura and Karen, I want to say thank you. Thank you for a robust conversation and for your witness and your wisdom and your willingness to actually walk this path out loud and with a great deal of vulnerability. I'm really grateful for all your voices here tonight and very thankful. And to those of you who are listening whether you're listening or online or part of our live audience here today again, thank you for listening and for being here, either in person or online, to hear. But I want to say the following plainly, because I always get the last word To those of you who were raised to believe that God hates you, that your gender or your body or your love makes you unworthy that was a lie.
Bill:Yes, you are not broken. Or your love makes you unworthy. That was a lie. Yep, yes, you are not broken. You are beloved, always have been and always will be.
Bill:To those of you who are raised to believe that God hates others and you are trying to learn a different way. Keep going different way. Keep going Because unlearning Egypt is holy, sacred work. And to those of you who wake up every day and fight for the dignity of others in classrooms and boardrooms and libraries, and picket lines and pulpits, thank you. Thank you for all of the work and know that you are not alone.
Bill:And to anyone who is still wandering in the wilderness, unsure if there is a promised land on the other side of all of this undoing there is. They're honest to God and truly, as the story is not finished yet and you are still a part of the story and always will be. So, it is my hope and my prayer that, as we leave here tonight, we will keep walking the road and we will keep unlearning Pharaoh and making room for the God who says I am who I am, and maybe we can continue to leave Egypt together. So until next time this has been prepared to to drown, thank you, and take care of yourselves and each other. And happy, pride, happy pride.
Bill:Thank you, happy pride that's it for this episode. But just because the mic turns off doesn't mean the work does. If something you heard tonight hit close to home or cracked open an old image of God, don't push it away. Sit with it and let it move you, because this isn't just about belief. It's about survival and belonging and dignity and reclaiming the sacred from those who've tried to gatekeep it. You can find more at PreparedToDrowncom, with full episodes and blog posts behind the scenes, extras and ways to connect. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and if you want to help fuel these conversations, we'd love to have you on our Patreon. Until next time, keep walking, keep unlearning and keep leaving Egypt. We weren't made for closets or for cages. We were made to be free, and the only way that we do that is together. I'm Bill Weaver. This has been Prepared to Drown and happy Pride.