Love Letters

[00:00:00] Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I am your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex. And this series is part of a Soulforce podcast channel where we're trying to get at deep conversations about queer and feminist theology, decolonial, faith, gender justice, and most importantly, sacred resistance and spiritual healing.

I am reflecting on this time of year because one, it's my birthday season and two, because this year marks the 10th anniversary of ordained ministry for me, both as Reverend Sex and Reverend Alba Onofrio. And I wanna share a little bit today about what that ministry is, because it's a very, um, non-conventional ministry.

[00:01:23]Over the past 10 years, I've served as a Spiritual Strategist and Executive Director for Soulforce, but I've also done a lot of sexual liberation and healing work through the Sexual Liberation Collective as Reverend Sex. I think one of the things that's most interesting to me is, I come from a people in the mountains of Western North Carolina who are deeply distrustful and suspicious of institutions in general, and I think that comes from us being very isolated in the rural parts of Western North Carolina.

But the culture is you don't trust institutions, you don't trust folks you can't look in the eye and shake their hands. And I think that totally carried over to my ministry as well. One, because as a queer feminist, first generation Latine, Appalachian, mama, non-monogamous, femme, radical queer, uh, no one really wanted to ordain me in a traditional sense because I don't paint within the boxes.

[00:02:32] I don't color within the lines and when I say radical inclusion, I actually do mean everyone. And that's kind of anti-institutional and its nature. But the other side of it is that my primary community of faith are activists and human rights defenders, LGBTQIA+ people who are fighting for dignity and their own equality, and the lives and communities of our people. So I really do fit better in an organization that's working toward ending weaponized religion and healing spiritual violence than I do in an institutional church setting. We're gonna have a gathering to kind of commemorate these 10 years, but I want to share a little bit more about what it was like for me to be ordained by a group of people who weren't just interfaith, but some of them just exist on a spectrum of spirituality, practice, and politics that are just not really seen in most of our churches. I was ordained by a group of radical queers in Durham, North Carolina, which is my political and heart home. And it was made up of folks who practice earth-based religions, indigenous spiritualities, African-based spiritualities, as well as folks who are Presbyterian and American Baptist and Catholic and Pentecostal and, and, and an intersection of queer and trans folks of elders of babies and youth of folks who would call their spiritual journey a religion and others who wouldn't. But what we had in common and why I was ordained specifically to this community was because we shared a belief that the weaponization of Christianity particularly in order to cover white supremacy, imperialism, capitalism, and colonizing forces around the world is a problem.

[00:04:57]It's something that attacks our people, not just from the outside, but once it gets into our spirits, we literally perpetuate that violence and harm against our own spirits and often against our own bodies. That was the group of activists and community who saw the inspiration when I got called to ministry.

And even if they didn't understand it, and even if they don't mess with Christianity, they were a yes to the work of trying to understand how Christianity got in bed with systems of power and domination and how we defend our community and our people from that harm. So 10 years ago we got together in a Quaker friends meeting sanctuary.

We had rituals that came from adaptations of mujerista, Latina feminist theologians and biblicists, and some of the rituals that they had done back in the day 30, 40 years ago. When they were doing communion, for example, the Catholic women didn't believe in having communion that wasn't presided over by a priest. But of course, because women can't be priests, they wouldn't have been able to have communion unless there was a male priest present and because they wanted to be a Latina woman space only, they adapted the communion ceremony and ritual to be a celebration of the promise of a land flowing with milk and honey rather than centered on, uh, the traditional communion with the body and blood of Christ. I really love that and use that, um, communion ritual because I think there's enough blood and enough brokenness to last us millennia into the future, particularly as folks who come from marginalized communities who are constantly being broken on the altar of capitalism and white supremacy and imperialism and capitalism.

[00:07:09] We don't need to know any more than we already do about bloodiness and brokenness and how unworthy we are because we are told all day every day from so many sources how unworthy we are. Rather the work of ministry and healing is to do the opposite, to remind us who we are as children of an immensely wildly creative and loving God who makes us promises toward what is possible when we add our hand to the plow, when we add our voices to the resistance. When we add our time, our labor, our energy, and most importantly, our creativity and our love to creating that world that we believe is possible and know is possible. We also did a ritual of ordination that was connected with, um, the traditional laying on of hands. So there was lots of folks there who, they themselves were ordained Christian ministers from various traditions, one of them being the co-founder of Teología Sin Vergüenza, Reverend Dr. Lis Valle-Ruiz, who is uh, Presbyterian, and she was the presiding minister over that ceremony and ritual and did a beautiful anointing based on the the woman who anoints Jesus' feet as a framework for what the journey is that lies ahead for understanding, touch and erotic and connection and care for the body as deeply intertwined with the work that I was called to do and the work that the divine calls all of us to do.

So through that, there was a laying on of hands. Anointing with oil and an ordination that involved a committee of accountability in a different sense, because in denominations, folks would have a whole group of people that were in the hierarchy that would assess them. And would be the accountability, should there be any misconduct.

[00:09:16] And so we recreated that in community so that it was clear that if it's something in my ministry caused harm, that these were the people designated to go to, to mediate that. Um, and also my own vows toward my community and toward God around what I would be doing, um, for my call to ministry around defending our community and working on spiritual healing.

The last piece of that ceremony that I wanna bring to the front is the reworking of the Our Father prayer. So instead of our father who art in heaven, I rewrote the prayer to be something that felt more aligned with what God felt like to me, and particularly for those of us who do not have a good image of what a father figure looks like or who doesn't wanna understand God in this Zeus Heavenly Father, angry God, judge King, warrior kind of way, and the prayer goes like this. Our mother who dwells among us, hallowed be thy names, thy love shall reign and peace remain on earth as it is in heaven, and give to us now your holy power to fight for our liberation as we resist those who seek our domination and lead us not into desperation. But deliver us to the new creation for life, has the power and yours, the glory and ours, the freedom forever and ever.

Amen.

[00:11:03]From this ordination 10 years ago, I went on to be installed into interfaith community in Asheville, North Carolina called Jubilee Community that was truly interfaith and really lived into that experimental co-creation, um, based in a, a creation spirituality that really takes its, um, direction from the different seasons and the different ways of nature that helps us understand the divine, which I personally love because even Paul in Romans tells us that if we don't know God, it's our own fault because literally God is all around us in creation.

So basically shame on us if we don't know anything about God, and I really appreciate that because I at least learn a lot more about God through the natural world, through the incredible complexity of our brains and our bodies through the wild mystery of the depths of the ocean and the incomprehensible expansiveness of the cosmos.

So I really loved learning about what does it mean about the divine, about God when there are so many places in science, in the world, in creation, both spiritually and scientifically, I would probably would put those things as interchangeable that we can learn about God. That helps us understand how deeply we are actually a part of and intertwined with all of creation.

[00:12:35] Um, so that was part has been part of my ministry, but the main work has been through the Sexual Liberation Collective and Soulforce. And some of these rituals that we did 10 years ago are things that make their way into really amazing creative theological experiments that we do for spiritual healing and reclamation work. Like we have a thing called Culto Cuir or Church of the Queerly Beloved. And in that ritual, in that celebration, in that church service, we say this prayer to our mother. We do a trans baptism, we do a reimagined communion with that same ritual of milk and honey. With a promise of wholeness and authenticity and life abundant for all of creation, we do a reverse altar call where queer and trans clergy and mental health providers stand at the altar and offer a symbolic apology to our community to say the things that you were taught about your impurity, the things that you were taught about being sinful and who you are and how God created you. That was not your burden to bear. That was not your sin, but rather that was the sin of institutions who contorted the Bible, the text under the guise of love and care and spiritual direction and counseling. Or mental health services to tell you that you were wrong or you were bad, or you were unlovable, or you were unworthy of God.

[00:14:17] But rather, we wanna take that back and say, that was actually institutional sin. That was the culpability of those people with limited understanding. Or with intentional malice to cause harm to our communities, and we will take that load back in a symbolic gesture. Of course, trauma and religious, um, hurt takes a lot longer to heal, but it is symbolic representation for people who gain power or authority through these institutions to say, we would like to symbolically take that load off that way that you were taught was wrong and rather embrace and say we apologize on behalf of those institutions. So those things, those little seeds of creativity that came from a community of activists, queer and trans folks, figuring out a way to make sacred the ordination of somebody who was not all alike.

We don't all have the same theology. We have aligned politics, but not even the same politics. How do we make sacred? How do we witness? How do we hold this call that while not allowed within institutional denominations, is nevertheless deeply from a faith place of call of connection with the divine of purpose and duty toward our people in our community.

So that time is really special to me because it helped me expand what was possible and start working that theological imagination and that creativity to be in community with what I believe and who I believe, but also a deep cultural humility to say there's so much I don't know, and there's so much we can't be arrogant about because we are all in the process of learning.

[00:16:19] We're all trying to figure out our path toward what we've been taught. And how to separate of that, what is good and healing and life giving, and what of that has been co-opted or stolen for our own harm and for the demise of others. So as I'm in this season of reflecting a decade in, I'm thinking more and more about how we do more of that these days.

How we spend more time and energy, particularly those of us in communities of faith with a faith tradition that we practice. How do we get deep into what we are believing and then apply that into the real world right now? Doing that, sifting and sorting between what is healing and helpful, what is harmful and needs to get left behind, and how do we move toward a creativity and kind of tandem movement with others of different faiths, of different spiritualities and practices so that we can reclaim some of the moral high ground and truth that should be always that of religion. But somehow over the course of time and through a lot of very intensive resource investment and theological ideas and development on the extreme right we have somehow lost that position of saying, we know what is right, fundamentally right and fundamentally wrong, and we move from that place as people of faith. Of people of conscience toward the struggle for what is good and what is whole and what is righteous, even if we come to that from a diversity of perspectives and analysis and strategies on how we solve it.

[00:18:03]So I welcome you to celebrate. In this time with us as we take every win we can get. And so being in this work for a decade, specifically in this theological work feels like a win. Feels like something that while it feels sometimes a little, um, a I don't know, inappropriate to be celebrating when so many things are so hard.

It also feels really important to remember that there has always been people to resist. As long as forces of domination have existed, there have been folks who have been resisting as long as humanity has existed. L-G-B-T-Q-I-A people have existed as long as homo sapiens have existed migration has been part of how we move through the world, and diversity has been part of our planet since long before humans ever set foot here, um, in this current form.

So I am taking a moment to, to celebrate that both life just as it existing and me having the privilege to have another day and another year to do this work in community, to be alive, to share love and life and possibility, and hope, and also to celebrate that there are so many possibilities and so many of us, so many cosmos and worlds inside each of us that could possibly create the path toward our future liberation toward a new creation. If we can intertwine and weave together those creativities and those thoughts, those ideas, those experiments, those failures, those successes, it just feels like so much more is possible. So this is your reminder that you are not alone, that we are in it together.

[00:20:04] And I just wanna thank you for spending some of your time today with me in Love Letters from Reverend Sex. Make sure you check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza which is a queer space for feminist and Christian folks navigating the intersections of sexuality, identity, family, faith, Latinidad, and we connect with theologians, elders, everyday saints and activists to try to decolonize our faith and work for the liberation that we know we all deserve. Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcast and make sure to visit soul force.org or find us on social media at soul force org to find more of our resources and how to build more life affirming theologies and spiritualities for those at the margins of faith. [00:21:26]

[00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel, and it's a place for deep, liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial, theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be [00:01:00] able to recognize your face or your name. But I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

Hi, beloved. This is Reverend Sex, AKA Reverend Alba Onofrio, and you found me today sitting outside in the fresh air, outside my home, listening to the traffic going by on this busy day and writing this love letter specifically to those who feel consumed by fear right now. I am [00:02:00] thinking of how often the Bible says to fear or not.

It's one of the most prolific phrases in all of the text, and I know that some people right now are thinking, wake up. Where are you right now? Look at the world around you. Look at what we're living. There's so much to be afraid of and uh, I am sitting with that and feeling it deeply. It is whew, so true that there is so much to be afraid of.

I think the part that I wanna talk about specifically is when that fear is not from the dominant powers and principalities that surround us, that have death dealing policies and strategies of secret police and systemic oppression and domination, but rather when that fear comes from the inside out, when it's God that we are afraid of.

[00:03:00] Fear is something that humans react to most strongly. It's one of the primary tactics of all sources of power from all generations that we have in written and known memory, and that fear is something primal. It keeps us alive, it keeps us from walking into danger many times. But what does it mean that the Bible says "fear not" more than 300 times?

Depending on the translation, it could be anywhere from 200 to 350, but there is a consistent rhythm in both testaments about fearing not and not being afraid. And yet we spend so much of our lives sitting in fear and moving out of fear. So much of our theology, if we come out of many Christian denominations is based in fear.[00:04:00]

I think when I first accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior when I was six years old, that that wasn't a true falling in love with God. It was a fear of hell, and I think so many of us had that. First encounter with Christianity and salvation being connected to the fear of hell or fear of being abandoned or left out, and that's how we come to God so often is through this sense of fear.

Fear of punishment, fear of hell, fire and brimstone. And I think it's a really important thing that we come to terms with, that we deal with, that we process. Because while it is a primal drive to help us and keep us alive, as we mature in our faith, we can't stay stuck there because it inhibits so much more from us and our spirituality to be able to mature and [00:05:00] grow and actually fall in love with the divine in all the ways that that is possible.

So I'm thinking about today, um, someone said. In a recent meeting that there was a move in this moment. So much of the chaos came from this idea of keeping us in a trauma response of fight, flight, freeze, or fawn, and that some of us could stay there for years at a time, and that really struck me because I've been really frustrated with folks since this new administration has come into power and feeling like people are stuck in the awe of, I can't believe this is happening.

Or at some point there's gonna be someone who's gonna come in and save us or stand up for this, stand up for what's right. So at some point people are going to fix it. And some [00:06:00] people being external and over there, whether that's in Washington DC or in the church or through some divine sweeping in like rapture. And I would like to spend next time talking about rapture in more detail because I think it's a foundational building block for so many of us. Around control, through fear that happens externally through white Christian supremacy and how we're raised in that theology. But there's this psychology idea that if we are stuck in that trauma response of fight, flight, freeze, or fawn for too long, then we get stuck there.

And the whole system kind of shuts down. Uh, the example that's often used is the animals who play dead. Uh, when it's something feels too big or too overwhelming to deal with, when the threat is too great, we just shut the [00:07:00] whole system down. Our nervous system just shut us down, and that's when we feel overstimulated for too long.

And what that can do is lead to us not being able to feel at all. It leads to dissociation, to apathy, to not letting the hard in or the heavy in or the scary in, but also not letting the good in. And that is the thing that I'm seeing. So much right now in our community is that for some of us, we have a fight mode and it is fully activated and we are moving through with such anger and such ire that we kind of burn up everything even from the inside.

And that's not sustainable. Some of us are in flight mode, but. Most of us can't just up and leave where we are or where we come from, especially when the threat comes all the way [00:08:00] inside our bodies. Some of us have a fawn response, which is this kind of acquiescing to trying to get ahead of the game by complying with things that are harmful or unjust, just so that we can survive and get by.

And then there's this other one of freeze, which is we are completely overwhelmed by all this stuff going on, and we don't know where to start because we're supposed to be in the streets protesting this and boycotting that and doing this on social media and being a good person. And yet there's the same issues that we have always had.

It's a very surreal moment where it feels like everything should be different because everything is different, and yet there are all these things. Paying the bills and getting groceries, and making dinner and keeping bedtime. So there's all of this around, but the idea that if we stay in that response [00:09:00] we are immobilized, we aren't able to move anything forward and that stuckness, when it sits in our body, we can be completely consumed by dread and fear and overwhelm. And so for an anecdote for that, at least for me, I'm thinking about how do I hold onto and clinging to the promise, clinging to the mandate of fearing not. Especially when we come out of theologies of fear, and I think that's part of the work that we really have to do as people of faith is understanding who is the God that we are serving or believing in, and how was that different from the God that we were taught when we were children? What kind of God can we believe in?

That is not one who is wrathful and angry and jealous and mean, and [00:10:00] sometimes arbitrary, but rather centering on who is God that is the creator of life, the being that is with us. In our own breath every second of the day. And I will tell you that when I was growing up, I was told that God was with me all the time and Jesus was with me all the time.

And I used to feel like I had Jesus on my shoulder watching me, I mean all the time from when I was in the bathroom to when I was taking tests. And that kept me from a lot of really, um, unhealthy behaviors. I told the truth I was a very goodie two shoes because I was taught that even if I wasn't caught by an authority figure that God was still watching.

And if God was watching, then I was in trouble with God, even if no one else knew because me and God were enough. And I carry that until [00:11:00] now. Around me and God being enough. So when people are saying harmful things about me and my community, when people are believing things about the world, that for me just feels heartbreaking.

Me knowing the truth and God knowing the truth has to be enough. Me and God make a majority that is, um, what I say to myself sometimes when it feels overwhelming, the quantity of evil that it seems like is moving through the world at this time. But if God is with me all the time, not to get me into trouble, but rather because God suffers with those who suffer. God is with us in our most joyful moments and in our most devastating depths of our soul, nights of uncertainty and and fear, then God is that constant that lives in us, but we have to decolonize that God that is [00:12:00] in us to not sit in a God that is someone who hurts us or hates us or tries to confine us to tiny boxes, or tries to keep us in order and in rigidity because there's rules that are so tight that we will die or that we will be abandoned if we don't follow them.

So I'm just all the time trying to ask myself over and over again, who is the God that I serve? Who is the God that made me? Who is the God that knows me? Who is the God that is with me all the time? And what is that God like? Because if that God is a God who propels genocide for no reason, if that is a God who sends people to hell just because they don't say a certain prayer, then that is no God of mine, and that is no God to serve. [00:13:00] And it honestly doesn't resonate with the God that I know in my soul, who has honestly kept me alive time and time again, even when everything else said that I should not be alive. So thinking about decolonizing God and who God is.

Part of that is figuring out what is the God that we fall in love with, not the God that we are told we have to obey or else we will be abandoned or we will be hated. I think it's really important for us in this time to try to do this work of we feel fear, and that is valid because there is so much to be afraid of.

For some of us, seemingly from all sides, but when I'm starting to feel that fear, I try to take it from an [00:14:00] abstract cloud ambiguous thing into really specific concrete things. What am I actually afraid of in this moment? Maybe I am afraid that the government will send secret police to take away someone that I love.

Okay. If that is a thing that I'm focusing on right now, rather than just being overwhelmed by all of the things to fear, picking a thing that feels on top right now and then making a plan for that one thing, okay? If that's the thing I'm most scared of, what can I do in this moment that helps address that fear?

Maybe something I can do is create a plan. A, an escape plan for my loved ones. Maybe I can commit to myself that when this moment happens, I will do this thing. I will say these things to the cops. I will [00:15:00] have a go-bag ready if I need to do this thing. If I need to go visit this person, I can serve my community through delivering groceries or attending community meetings. I can write letters, I can speak up any of those things, and it doesn't have to be all of the things that we do all of the time, but we can pick a thing so that the fear doesn't get overwhelming. I will focus on this one thing and I will do this thing with my whole heart, with my whole chest, I will practice being brave. I will practice doing what I know is right. I will practice giving myself a pep talk. When I feel scared about a thing and I wanna run away, I will work on that one thing. My granny used to always say that we. Hope for the best, but we plan for the worst, and that is one of my strategies in life.

How do we prepare for the worst hope for the best? Do everything we possibly can in [00:16:00] our own power to whatever extent that's possible each day, and then give the rest to God. That doesn't mean that we do nothing and give it all to God. It means that we understand that we are in community with God all of the time.

In every moment, in every place, and that God is on the side of those who suffer and those who struggle for life because God is life and God wants us to have a full life. So my hope for us, for each of us is that we may be able to do the internal work, the brave internal work of figuring out where it is that our fear comes from.

And any time that that fear comes from God comes from this concept of what Christianity has told us God is like, or God hates or God wants from us, that we have to sacrifice our own lives, our own selves on the altar of [00:17:00] this religion that we do the work, the gentle, hard deep work of extracting that image of God and replacing that image of God with a divine who made us in our wholeness, in our authenticity, who loves us and wants us every day to be more and more ourselves, not to the harm of others, but in relationship with all of divinity, all of creation, all of the world, so that we can make our own selves, a safe haven and a home because it is the place that we can most control. So my prayer today is going to be specifically for those of us who are feeling overwhelmed by fear in this moment. Will you pray with me?

God of peace, source of life. You tell us that we need not fear because you are [00:18:00] with us. Isaiah reminds us that you are with us. All of the prophets remind us you are with us and therefore we should not fear. Help us remember that those prophets were being told that because they were almost always in times of dire straits.

Of war, of oppression, of difficulty. Let their reminder to themselves be a reminder to us. Help us face the things that we fear. Name them, make them concrete, make them real in the sense of something that is addressable, something that is workable, something that is contestable. Let us never believe that you should be the source of fear.

Not you. Not you. Oh God, help [00:19:00] us not get stuck in the overwhelm of fear and the apathy and the disassociation. Let us feel, break our hearts again and again, that they may be soft enough that they never break, but rather flex into our deepest connectivity. With all that you have put into the world, to the creative strategies of resistance, of love of care, help us root into the ancestral knowledge that is ours for those who have resisted empire for as long as it has existed, including our ancestor Jesus.

Help us remember that you are always with us. Help us face what's coming with courage. Help us train our souls and our hearts in the way of you that we may be your actors on earth. That brings about new creation. [00:20:00] Help us not to just fall into narratives of escape or that some of us are better than others, but rather that you are in each and every living thing and therefore we have a plethora of siblings and knowings and medicine and healing at our disposable. At our disposal every day that we get to be in relationship with that we get to care for that care for us. Help us tap into the divine channeling of love and possibility and hope that overwhelms the sense of fear. That helps us face that together. Help us to know that we are never alone and that you and us together make the majority.

Make what's possible. Help us to know heaven on earth. Help us to cherish and relish the moments of joy, of [00:21:00] pleasure, of love, that they may sustain us in other moments when we are feeling low and alone. Protect and hold each of your beloved children. All of us here and all of our communities, that we may all turn our faces toward the horizon of life and love and authenticity and wholeness forever and ever.

Amen.

Thank you for spending a little of your time with me today. In Love Letters with Reverend Sex, AKA Me, Reverend Alba Onofrio. I'm the Executive Director and Spiritual Strategist for Soulforce. You'll find us on social media @soulforceorg or @ReverendSex and make sure to like and subscribe in all the things. And maybe you know [00:22:00] someone who needs to hear this episode or this prayer.

If someone has come to your mind during this time, take that to heart and send it their way. Remember that we are the ones we have been waiting for and we are God's hands and hearts and send buttons. Also, if you need free theological resources, you can find that on our website at soulforce.org. Or check us out on our weekly podcast of Teología Sin Vergüenza a faithful podcast at the intersections of Queer trans feminist theology from Latin America and its diaspora where we talk about, um decolonizing our religion and healing from spiritual violence through interviews with faith leaders, activists, theologians, and elders. And we want you, so do all of the things that you know to do from here, and we'll talk again next week.[00:23:00]

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me. And love letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce. Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist Christian Latine folks, navigating faith and family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome. Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of [00:24:00] faith.

[00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast channel, and it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be [00:01:00] able to recognize your face or your name. But I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now, in this moment, I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

Hi, beloved. This is Reverend Sex AKA Alba Onofrio, and you found me, uh, at a quiet moment at the end of the day with a cup of chocolate, um, writing you this love letter. Specifically. This love letter is in continuation of our conversation around fear and the theologies of [00:02:00] fear that we come from. And I'm still on the conversation many moons ago now about rapture and rapture theology.

So I want to spend a little bit of time sitting with, talking about, hopefully healing a little bit of our theology. For those of us who was, who were raised on the idea of rapture. And I know it's been a while, and for many it was this moment of, um, making fun of or laughing at all the different things that people were putting out on social media about the rapture. People selling their homes or their possessions, which honestly, I never quite understood.

If you're gonna be raptured what you could do with money, why you would sell it, and not just give it away. But, um, I saw a funny video of folks in LA standing on a bridge at midnight [00:03:00] with their trumpets and white, uh, ghost-like sheets over their whole bodies. And, you know, there was just so much about folks unlocking their phones so that whoever came next could see it.

Or leaving Bibles with instructions about what to do after they had been raptured, even Christians who were contacting queer, uh, pet sitters to take care of their pets because obviously we are not going to heaven and we are not gonna be raptured. And those were lighthearted and jovial for the most part.

I definitely giggled here and there, but the other side. It feels like underneath that there are wounds and tender spots that last for an entire lifetime. Under that, around the time that that was going around social media, I would use it as an icebreaker in some of my [00:04:00] meetings and not a single Queer person that I talk to on multiple continents.

There wasn't a single person who didn't have some sort of story connected with the rapture. Even folks who were more distant from it saw it as this strange thing that was happening to some of their friends. But for those of us who were raised in rapture theology, it was kind of a core part of our upbringing and childhood and our nightmares and fears.

I remember I was raised by my granny and she was definitely the most good and holy person that I knew, and she was a stay at home retired grandmother at that time, and whenever I would come home from school or wherever, and she wasn't in the house, after I looked for her, and she wasn't where I expected her to be, the first thought that always came to mind my entire childhood, [00:05:00] adolescence and teenagehood was: oh my God, the rapture has happened and I've been left behind.

And I got to hear, recently through these icebreakers, so many people's stories of waking up in the middle of the night and their parents not being where they thought they were and being worried that they had been left behind, or, you know, seeing an empty room where it wasn't expected, and that being the first thought.

It's a core part of the lives of those of us who grew up in the late nineties and early two thousands, particularly because of the New York Times Bestselling left behind series that was books and movies. We watched it in our church group, uh, church youth group. And so, if that is true, and that was part of your upbringing as well, or your young adulthood, I encourage you to take a moment with me just to revisit what is the theology behind that [00:06:00] and is there any of that still lurking in our spirit?

You know, it's not an accident that children's movies almost always start, or have as part of the central plot, a parent or parents who die or who are lost, or who become unsafe. And that orientation gets the immediate buy-in, the emotional buy-in, and, kind of trauma response, of young people and children, and that's not unintentional. It gets the investment that then carries the rest of the movie. And if you are somebody, like me, who raised a young child not wanting to instill those narratives of abandonment and fear, there was really very few movies that you could watch that didn't fit into those categories of a parent who was either causing the harm or who had died or [00:07:00] disappeared. So I wanna re respond to this in a Christian context. I want us to talk about it in trying to decolonize our theology because it's really, uh, nefarious in all of its ways. I was, um, listening to a psychologist recently, CJ Johnson, who was saying that, you know, rapture narratives are extermination fantasies. It's this idea of purging the world of people that we disagree with or that doesn't see the world like we do, and that it happens in times of collective uncertainty and dread, like times of war or pandemics or financial uncertainty. And we are certainly living that right now.

And it just struck me how much it gets to this idea of a get, get out of jail free card. Like, we who are on the right side, the righteous, will ha- have the ability to just escape, will [00:08:00] just be lifted up without having to do the work of cleanup, without having to dig ourselves out of this hellscape that we, as the human species have created for ourselves in this earth through generations of domination and war and harm.

And I think that's something that we have to work on as people of faith trying to decolonize our religion is not leaning into this hope of escape, of just being able to wash our hands of it and leave it all behind. And I think that shows up in lots of ways, not just rapture theology. But the question of who deserves to be wiped out, who deserves to just be left behind, is a really serious question for those of us who take our religion seriously.

I think it's important to go back all the way back to when we are [00:09:00] taught that there are some people who are destined to go to heaven. If you had a predestination theology, um, or this idea that some of us are less than others of us, uh, that we deserve less life, less rights, uh, less wholeness. It's this built in idea in our theology that God loves us all, but that some of us will say yes to Jesus and some of us won't. And those of us who don't are destined for suffering and extermination and eternal damnation, and eternal suffering. From the hell fire to purgatory, fill in the blank. It's just this idea that we are already in this hierarchy of who deserves life, who deserves heaven, and I think that goes to a [00:10:00] really intense psychological hellscape that many of us were brought up in.

On the one side, we are taught that we are responsible for the salvation of others, which is why we are propelled into missionizing and evangelizing. It's kind of this arrogance of savior complex, that we have the answers and we are right and we are required by God to send that information out into the world.

It, it gets taught as it's benevolent to save others, but the arrogance, I mean. It's just profound. As I get older, I realize how little I know, and that has me approaching many things in my life with so much more humility. And when people ask me what happens after we die, the honest answer is, I don't know.[00:11:00]

I don't have the answer. What I do know is that hell is a created concept by humans. It's not authentic to the biblical text that this idea that there is eternal suffering doesn't make sense to me because, what does that say about God? That God would send people to eternal suffering and returning back to this trauma that so many of us were given as young people, when we were told we had to evangelize on the bus, uh.

Not just at church, but everywhere in the world, at the grocery store, on the street corner, when we meet somebody, when we're out with our materials or tracts. It was this idea that I remember so clearly being taught that, I was going to heaven as a saved Christian, and that from Heaven we would be able to see into Hell and that there would be people there that we had [00:12:00] met, that we knew that didn't accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, and that those people would be burning.

In a lake of eternal fire and that they would be screaming in agony and torment and crying out and asking for a single drop of water. And that from my perch on heaven as part of the saved who had been reconciled to God, that I wouldn't even be able to give them a drop of water and that they would look up at me and say.

Why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you save me? You had the power to save me, and you didn't. And therefore, I will spend eternity in Hell. As an adult and as a mother, and as a pastor when I think about what that put into the psyche of me and other young people who were given that image, I just am flabbergasted that that should ever come out of the [00:13:00] mouth of a person of faith or out of the pulpit or an institutional church. Because what in the world kind of heaven would it be if we had to live that nightmare of seeing others in torment and suffering constantly, but without any power or ability to do anything about it? That actually feels a lot about how I'm feeling these days, that there's so much evil in the world and there's so much harm and there's so much suffering.

And some days I feel like one single person with very little power to do anything about it. And that is where faith comes in for me. I am reminded that whatever it is that I can do is mine to do and I do everything that I can each day. Both in my actions and in my thoughts and in my prayers and in my work, and the rest I give to God.

And God holds that with me in the bigness of it, in the [00:14:00] overwhelm of it. And that helps me really figure out and stick to what is mine to do. And I try to do the pieces that are mine really well. And with my whole heart and with my whole chest, and that's wow how we navigate this current kind of hellscape.

That for me feels like the image of what I was told was hell, not in the physical sense, but in the psychological sense, in the spiritual sense. It is remembering that I am not helpless and I am not powerless. Though I am a single soul, I am in community with all of creation with God. With creator, with the ancestors, with knowledge that abounds and medicine that abounds and possibility that abounds. And it is my work to cling to that which gives life and that which gives hope, and to do my own work in the [00:15:00] world and trust that others are doing theirs and that together we are part of that call to evangelizing the world, not by telling anyone how awful, sinful, terrible they are, or threatening them with hell or a God of punishment and damnation, but rather living into a reality that says, because I believe that there is a different way that is possible, because I believe that the divine struggles alongside all of life, because I know that I am part of this interconnected web of life and resistance and hope and possibility that I continue on and I do the work that is mine to do. Which of course can only be discerned from the inside out, from prayer, from reflection, from what makes your heart come alive, from what makes you wanna get up in the morning, to do the things in the world for the people that you love, for the people extended beyond that.

And that's how our communities work. And that is [00:16:00] why religion, particularly fundamentalist, fundamentalist Christianity, is so insular. Because for example, when I was a child, we were at church every time the doors opened, many times a week, and I went to a tiny church school and therefore everybody around me had the same theology. So I believed that everyone in my life was going to heaven. And therefore I also needed to be saved so that I would go to heaven to be with my family and friends. And so when I was taught that we weren't supposed to be unequally yoked or I wasn't supposed to be friends with other people who were different unless I was evangelizing to them, and even then I should keep them at a distance less, they influenced me and I go down the slippery slope.

That is a really important strategy because by keeping us insulated in communities, we then believe I have to conform and be like everybody else in this community or [00:17:00] else I will be left behind and not just in the sense of rapture, but I will be left out. I will not. Be welcomed in this church community or in this family.

I have to conform to what I'm told is the expectations of my gender or my life trajectory, or who I'm in community with, or else I will be abandoned and alone, just like the Disney characters at the beginning of movies who spend the trajectory of a couple hours trying to recover that which was lost, or trying to create new community out of isolation.

And so, once we truly open our hearts and our minds to others outside of the insulated world of Christianity that we come from. At least in my world as a Southern Baptist, even the Methodists were going to, hell forget about the Catholics and then once you get beyond Christianity, it was just [00:18:00] absolute no to anyone being with us in heaven.

So, of course, you know, conveniently, heaven looked a lot like everybody and everything that I was surrounded with, very monochromatic and very mono. Just monolithic in every sense, from race to class, to theology, to place of origin. And when we really start, at least for me, when I start making friends with, true friends, not a deception in order to convince somebody or convert them to what I believe, but rather with humility and curiosity to see other people in my community, in the extended world, other systems of belief and thought and culture and food, and appreciate those for what they are, then the question of:

Do these people, these good people, these other communities of faith, [00:19:00] these other very moral and upright, righteous humans who may not identify with Christianity or my version of Christianity, would God send them to hell? That becomes an un, you, you can't, I couldn't reckon with this.

Would God send them to Hell? The answer felt like it was clearly, no. But I was taught that is what is going to happen. They're going to hell unless they change to our way of being. And certainly that is what's been told to me and my community over and over again in the queer and trans community, is that if you don't change, if you don't convert, if you don't renounce your sinful ways and be exactly like us, then you are going to hell.

The conclusion for me is, that isn't a God that I wanna be connected with. And for me that didn't mean losing my faith or my God or my Christianity. [00:20:00] It meant decolonizing my religion to try to sift out that God that had been given to me, that was given to me only for the purpose of controlling me and my behavior, my body, controlling what I did with my time, my resources, my body.

And trying to reconnect with an abundant God who creates wildly lavishly, gaudy colors and textures and flavors and landscapes, and trying to expand my heart and my mind to understand some of what is said in the text, which feels like now so loving, so expansive. My favorite chapter of the Bible is Psalms 1:39, and it could be used as a text of terror because it says, where can I go to escape your spirit?

Where can I go to get away from God? It could, it says. I could [00:21:00] go to the highest mountain or the deepest hell, and there you would be. And that feels a lot like the God that I was taught as a child, which is no matter where you are, God is watching you. That can be understood as a surveillance kind of God.

But now from this position, it feels so much more like a God of love who is alongside me in all of my moments. Whether it is pleasure, joy, happiness, sorrow, struggle. That God is with me and right alongside me, not to convict me or judge me, or cond- condemn me to eternal suffering, but rather to be in it with me to the depths of my soul.

And that feels really, really soothing and empowering in this moment where so much feels like it's beyond my control. So, when I think about the Left Behind series, I'm thinking maybe we [00:22:00] should revisit that. Maybe we should read it together and go through the theology little by little. Maybe that would help heal some of the parts of me and us on the inside who still react to that word rapture, who still have seeds of that kind of judgmental predetermination, dispen-, dispensationalism.

Kind of theology that's in our, in our beings, in our spirits, that thrust us into complicity with fear and terror for both us and our neighbors who are different than us. I'm gonna close us out with a prayer, and I hope that you will join me again next time as we go through Love Letters with Reverend Sex. Holy one, [00:23:00] God of creation, of life, of love, of struggle, of healing, of wholeness. Help us to find our home in you no matter where we are. Heal that part of us that has been scared to be left behind. Come into us and help us find community in you. Knowing that you'll never leave us nor forsake us, that you are with us to the ends of the earth and beyond.

Help us understand that you would never be whole without us. That your gift of your light in each and every one of our souls means that you are not whole. Until each and every one of us are reconciled to you. Help us to do the work of being [00:24:00] worthy, to be reconciled to that which is wholly good and wholly connected and wholly alive.

Help us fall in love with you in us. That we may be the love of our own lives that we may never feel alone. Help us survive the hell that is this world of our own human creation, help us to be heaven on earth and create heaven on earth for ourselves and for others. We know that you are not the God. Of judgment, condemnation, and fear.

We trust that you have not created a system in which some of us are destined to die and suffer eternally while others are meant to sit in glory. [00:25:00] Help us to face this moment with courage. Help us to know that you fight alongside us and that there are things worse than death and some of us are living them in this very moment.

Cover us and protect us in our communities as we move through our days trying to be your actors on earth. Help us tap into the ancestral knowledge and wisdom, the medicine of creation, the knowing of history, the love of the divine. Help us feel it coursing through our veins, help it to be that which motivates us, not through anger, not through fear, but through love, eternal.

That which has transcended generations since the dawn of time, help us to trust that you are alongside us [00:26:00] in the struggles for justice, for love, for equality, for doing that which is right in the world. Help us. Help the world. Help us be humble. And creative. Help us live in solidarity to the best of our ability.

Forgive us for the moments where we fall short and where we grow tired and weary. Be our source of strength, our guiding light help us to face the horizon toward the new creation that you call us to be. Help us to find each other. Help us to love you, which is loving us, which is loving the world, which is loving creation. In all of the holy and precious names we have come to call you in the quietest moments of sorrow and in the loudest moments of triumph we pray. Amen.[00:27:00]

Thank you for spending a little bit of your time with me, Reverend Sex in this segment of Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm Reverend Alba Onofrio AKA Reverend Sex. And make sure that you come back. Like us, subscribe, share, send it to someone who might need to hear this episode. We trust that you know who those people are and that you know that you are God's hands and heart and feet and send buttons.

If you need theological resources, you can find it on our website @soulforce.org or check out our weekly podcast of Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a faithful podcast at the intersections of queer, trans, feminist theology from Latin America and its diaspora. We talk to all kinds of folks who are theologically trained about decolonizing our religion and healing from spiritual violence.

You can find us on social media @Soulforceorg, @teosinverguenza, in Spanish, and [00:28:00] @Reverend_Sex. We'll see you next week.

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and love letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex. The ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce. Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for queer and feminist Christian Latine folks, navigating faith and family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens, while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome. Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soul force.org to [00:29:00] find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. [00:01:00] I may not be able to recognize your face or your name. But I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

Tonight, you have found me deep in the night, in the witching hour here in my office, where all is quiet. I'm Reverend Sex, and this is my love letter specifically to those of us who we're told that Halloween or Samhain or Día de los Muertos was the devil's holiday. [00:02:00] For the church kids who had a fall festival or a trunk and a treat, for those of us who were denied access to our ancestors, or who are ashamed of our forefathers, or who don't really know where we come from because of white Christian supremacy and all that it's stolen from us in the name of Christian morality.

I wanna talk to you while the veil is still thin and the moon is still full and the ancestors still feel very close. For most of us in Western societies, death is something that we fear and therefore we outsource to nursing homes and funeral parlors and cemeteries. Somewhere over there. Many of us have never witnessed death or birth firsthand, certainly not as part of a regular [00:03:00] cycle of our lives and culture. We have no clue how to be useful or comfortable in those very sacred, limited liminal spaces. And, um, I worked for hospice in rural Tennessee during my seminary placement, and I was really honored to be able to accompany people as they or a loved one transitioned. There are endless interesting stories of miracles and healing and struggle and difficulty.

But one of my main takeaways was that for many, many people in that community, in addition to the sadness that comes with the grief of losing a loved one, it was also a time for families of great guilt and of exploitation, [00:04:00] specifically because of this outsourcing of death. People having no community or culture around taking care of a body at home or hand digging a grave, and instead everyone pays a funeral home and has to figure out what to do often at the very last moments before or after a transition, and I just saw so many people in this very poor and working class community of previous, uh, DuPont factory workers. I saw so many elders and middle class, lower middle class, and, um, working poor folks at the end of life, feeling like they had to choose between paying their rent or [00:05:00] paying for medicine and paying the final funeral expenses for their spouse or their loved one.

And in this situation, in most states, if you give uh, somebody over to the state for state burial, then you have no access to where that person is buried. There's no notification of when it's gonna happen. There's almost never a ritual or people at the grave site. It's kind of this world of, of, you know, the unknown mass grave site that is held by the state for the indigent.

So you can guess that most often people chose to pay for the funeral expenses rather than paying for things like rent. Sometimes this became very complicated [00:06:00] when elders were choosing between their own lifesaving medicine and being able to pay for the cremation or funeral of their spouse, often spouses of decades and lifetimes.

And I felt like my blood would boil almost every time we had this experience as I was serving one of these families. Because I never understood why the church of all places shouldn't be a place that we talk about death. Because unlike almost everywhere else, when we, when we talk about death in church, we believe that death is not the end of the journey.

It just feels like it would be an incredible ministry. So I'm putting that out there for whoever is connected to church spaces or if you know about this kind of ministry, I would love to hear about it and help spread the word. But this work of [00:07:00] talking about final wishes and arrangements, doing wills and helping people learn about alternative options to the funeral industrial complex that makes a lot of money off of folks in their time of grief. Um, and instead of maybe going out into a different part of the world and doing mission trips, maybe we could start by ministering to our own elderly, um, and folks who need support in, in this final, final arrangements and, and living wills and what we desire for our bodies and our spirits and rituals around that.

I think we could alleviate so much guilt that I just saw in family after family if we were willing to talk about death and especially from a position of, while it is sad, and it is [00:08:00] heartbreaking, so many times people are left behind that are grieving this loved one, but. As people who believe in an afterlife, how healing would it be to be able to talk about death in the context of eternal life and possibility of being with those we love again at some point, um, in our own future.

So even though many of us were taught that our people are in heaven, very few of us were taught to talk to the dead. Much less anything that sounds like a prayer to them, because ancestor veneration equals idolatry. It's just this idea that if we are invoking our ancestors in any way that it's a kind of witchcraft, even the Catholics who do a better job of honoring the dead than most other [00:09:00] Christian denominations, there's still a formal process of becoming a saint or authorized as somebody who can be an intermediary or an intercessory for our prayers.

We, at least where I come from, we're taught to keep it very broad in this phrase of "cloud of witnesses". Um. And my guess, or maybe a little bit more than a guess, is that this too is about power and control as we try to heal from white Christian supremacy and the ideologies of white Christian supremacy and colonized religion that have been embedded in our culture and in so many of us.

We need to recognize where religion and Christianity in particular has been co-opted to cause harm and to control us rather than to help us be more [00:10:00] alive, to flourish, to be more whole in who we are. And I think this comes directly from, I don't know if this is true for you, but in my experience, this invoking of ancestors, particularly those who disobeyed systems of power or who forged a new path and made a way where there seemed to be no way, or who overcame unbeatable odds, they give us strength and their stories give us power and insight. Even the quote unquote "bad ones" teach us lessons about how we wanna be and show up differently in the world. They help us remain committed to our own part in making sure that the arc of history bends in the right direction towards justice. So when we forget our history, when we silence the places and the people that we [00:11:00] come from. We're fragile, I think of a tree without roots, with shallow roots or, or roots that have been pulled up. We're easily toppled whether our ancestors challenge or inspire us, whether they're cultural ancestors or familial ancestors, blood or chosen, whether we know a lot or a little, whether our ancestors are in the land or in the sky or just running through our DNA in every one of our cells. Our dead are still very much alive, and their legacies require our attention.

I feel like they are impacting us every day, whether we're mindful of them or not. Whether it's generational traumas or cycles of violence, strategies of survival, legacies of healing, and embodied knowing are all [00:12:00] undeniably at play every day in all of our lives. Even if we don't build altars to our dead or believe in ghosts or even the afterlife. So I truly believe that until we deal with some of the original sins of this nation and of colonization and the role of religion, particularly Christianity, in that work, in those systems and those empires, we'll never be able to heal both individually or as a people. And we certainly never will be able to live into this unified society that we at least claim to aspire to. And, at the same time, I wanna honor that it's not always fun or easy to do ancestor work.

I, um, moved back to the Appalachian Mountains where I am from, where I grew up, and I [00:13:00] felt really clear, from spirit, that I had to do some work to be able to live at peace on this land that my white ancestors had come from for many, many, many generations. And I really didn't have any idea what I was doing.

I felt very led by intuition and I was trying to do my best to live in harmony with the land. Um, I live in a little cabin that doesn't have heat except through firewood or air conditioning. Water comes directly from the ground. It's a very rural and rustic kind of lived experience that for me was, about trying to simplify my life and live as close to the land as I possibly could and have the lightest footprint on the earth I, I can, [00:14:00] as part of my spiritual practice.

But I felt very called to learn more, as much as I could, about my ancestors from that place. And just tend to those relationships, even though I knew very little about them. And over the course of many years and research, um, I began visiting grave sites. My, um, father's family, are coal miners.

And so, I visited the very rural counties and places where they were from and began doing grave cleanings and grave site visitations and, and just kind of honoring that history and trying to learn more about who they were, where they were, what their lives might have been like.

And one time when I was doing this work. [00:15:00] I came across the family graveyard of my great great grandparents and their many children, and one headstone had been kind of toppled and had moss and dirt on it. So my very young daughter and I spent a long time cleaning the gravestone and digging it a little bit out of the mud and trying to get it turned over, at least facing up where we could see the name.

And when we did that. When I finally turned it over, I almost couldn't breathe. Um, the headstone that I had spent this time tending and cleaning and their siblings buried all around them that I was learning about in this tiny coal mine county in rural southwest Virginia, [00:16:00] the headstone said Robert E. Lee and then the family name Osborne.

And as the only Brown descendant of these very white coal miners. Um, I didn't know what to do with that, to be quite honest. Because what it said to me was that at some point in the 1800s there was my great, great grandparents, who were very poor Appalachian coal miners, who had admired Robert E. Lee enough to name one of their children the entire thing. Robert E. Lee. Then the family surname. So that's something I've been sitting with and thinking about and working on, and [00:17:00] honoring that even in my Brown body that never passed for white growing up in Appalachia, where I'm from, that is still part of the legacy that I carry in my body that I need to contend with.

That and other ancestors that are not fun to think about or don't make me wanna spend time honoring their memory. I have what I would consider a good for nothing father who has passed, lots of lost stories of ancestors because of the color of their skin, or the people of their origin or, second wives of grown ass men who were married as kind of a throwaway in their youth to take care of that grown man's child or children. Lots of abuse and addiction and tragedy, and a whole lot of blank spaces that I [00:18:00] can't find information and just don't know who goes there or what the stories or lives were, especially having, um, an immigrant mother from another country that has less than perfect record keeping, particularly for folks who didn't have money. So if it's hard to do this ancestor work. Know that you're not alone. Not all of our ancestors are going to be these amazing, perfect, idealistic, um, figureheads that are just honored and revered by everyone.

Some of us may not have much access to any of our ancestors. It was helpful for me to know that there are almost a million ancestors, direct ancestors in each one of our bloodlines [00:19:00] since colonization about 500 years ago. And if you think back even more ancestors before that, tens of thousands of years before that, we all have human ancestors.

And in those millions of ancestors that we have some connection to through our DNA, through our embodied knowledge, there are amazing kindred and there are really challenging and troubling past. So many of us have both the colonizer and the colonized in our bodies, the slavers and the enslaved, the refugees, and the colonizing forces of war.

And I hope that that's a hopeful thing. I hope that that feels in our spirits, [00:20:00] like, oh, it's so vast. It's so much more vast and encompassing than just the couple of people that you can name, or I can name in my legacy or my direct genealogy. It is also helpful to remember that the land is also an ancestor and rebuilding relationship to land wherever you are, through plants, through gardening, through paying attention, through prayer, environmental justice.

For care for the water that always remembers, through animal siblings, cousins, and family, through pets and other four-legged beloveds that have gone before us. Even elements like the air and fire that have been around for as long as the universe and cosmos have existed, that all [00:21:00] of those can be ancestors.

For me, the moon and the stars have been a really steady place to build relationship because they are also part of God's creation and they have seen so much of life and so much of death, and even our bodies are made of the stuff that was there at the beginning of this planet and before. And I find that really comforting.

And the last is that it's always possible to build relationship with writers and artists and music and historical and cultural figures. And for me as a Christian, last, but certainly not least, is our ancestor Jesus, who has an entire legacy around him and who he was and what he has to teach us and what the stories are surrounding him.

Regardless of what you know or don't know about the historical Jesus or what we can prove or not about his [00:22:00] divinity, it's helpful for me to think of Jesus in this way because as all beings human and mythological historical where we get just a little snippet, um, and archetypal, it helps us. At least it helps me to pull from the lessons both good and bad of who we could be and who I could be in the example and legacy of who has been before. So I think this love letter is just to say that being Christian does not take any of this away from us. If God is the creator of all and we carry the divine in us, which I believe with all of my heart and soul, then the potential for the relationship to ancestors has God all up in it. God is timeless.

[00:23:00] God is before, during, after, in the future, in the past, in the right now, in this very moment. And that means for me that God has things to tell us and teach us and show us in every possible way that we're open to. So healing in plant medicine and learning about the gifts that are available to us through the flora that exists in our world, the medicine of love and community.

The joy and embodied healing that we can get from music and sex and knowledge. And yes, through the history, and the ancestors, and the spiritual connections of who came before is all there for us if we want to tend and grow those sources of power, of knowledge, of connection. It's not witchcraft or Christianity, we don't have to choose.

We [00:24:00] are healing and learning and growing, and when we honor where and who we come from, we open more paths to God, for God to show us more, to co conspire, for our collective healing, for our individual healing, for us to be able to root down into the reality and truth of interconnectedness, to fortify our strength and our resistance in this moment, and also to do that arc bending work for the future so that one day we can become a good ancestor.

I believe that Halloween or Samhain or Día de los Muertos is one of the most sacred and high Holy Holidays because it creates a time and a space that gets toward that liminality of life and death and the sacredness of that [00:25:00] transition. And it being a transition, not the end. Or if it is an end, it is also a beginning.

But it is that movement through time into timelessness, and it offers us, if we're willing to decolonize our faith, and spend some time in the hard, as well as in the good, it creates space for us to imagine a world in which we are so deeply loved and so deeply connected, and so incredibly powerful that we have the potential to help heal the past and help create the future differently. So if you're feeling a little bit helpless or if you're feeling a little bit left out of the Halloween celebrations, I invite you to pull out some of your craft supplies. Build yourself an altar with the flowers or the flora of the season, [00:26:00] to light a candle, get a bowl of water, say a prayer to God on behalf of those who were harmed by religion, by colonizing religion, those who were made stronger by the testimony or the gospel, and just spend a little bit of time whenever you can, opening more pathways to the divine so that we can maximize our impact, maximize our healing, maximize our love and our fullness. Will you pray with me as we close out this Samhain, Día de los Muertos, Halloween love letter?

Holy one. Holy one who moves [00:27:00] through and throughout time and space, past and future, help us now in the present. To remove all of those burdens of labels that tell us that we are bad, that tell us that we are not worthy of your love. Make us believe that it is only through cutting off pieces of our own story, of our own history, of our own being, that we can be close to you.

Reveal to us what you know we should know, reveal in the quiet moments, the connection to who we have been and who we can be. Make a different future possible. Hold us, especially those of [00:28:00] us who are working so hard to decolonize our spirits, to reclaim our faith and our spiritual practices. Help us feel solid in the work of remembering and help us re-member.

The places that make us strong, the places that help us heal, both past and present and future. Go with us on these journeys of history of ancestor work. Help us honor those that we claim as ours, those that challenge us to be better. Challenge us to be the good ancestors that we want for ourselves. Help us be our own good ancestors.

Guide us in your ways. Keep us from evil. [00:29:00] Hold us in the spiritual danger of liminal space that we may not be lost to despair, that we may not be hidden under piles of shame. But rather that we may feel the incredible connected power of being rooted down into you, into the core of the earth and out into the vast expanse of the cosmos.

May we always know that we are yours and that there is no other way to be than in community with you and with each other. In all of the holy and precious names we have come to call you in the quiet still moments and the witching hours. Amen.

If this love letter resonates with you, we wanna hear your story. You can find me on social media @soulforceorg or [00:30:00] @Reverend_Sex and at soulforce.org website and reverendsex.com. Make sure to like and subscribe and all the things, but most importantly, if someone you know or love comes to mind during this time together, that might be the tap of the divine asking you to pass along this message of love for the healing of someone else's heart.

May this love letter be good news, of great joy for all the people, and may we come together again next week for more Love Letters with Reverend Sex. Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce. Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and [00:31:00] feminist Christian Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome. Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be [00:01:00] able to recognize your face or your name. But I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

Tonight, you have found me in the quiet just a little bit after the loud, terrible karaoke down the road has died down and I am alone spending some time thinking about you. [00:02:00] This Love Letter with Reverend Sex is specifically for those of us who have experienced conversion therapy or reparative therapy as it's called, though it is truly no kind of therapy.

If you need to hear this for the first time or for the thousandth time, or someone you love has had this experience and so you need to hear it on their behalf or alongside them, then this letter is for you. SOGIE change efforts. Are literally everything and they're all around us. Um, maybe you're not familiar with that human rights lingo, but SOGIE stands for sexual orientation and gender identity and expression. And this idea of [00:03:00] wanting to fix us or change us because of our sexual orientation or gender identity is literally all around us all the time. We are constantly being policed by society. By church communities, by our families, by our own minds many times, certainly by beauty standards or gender expectations.

So it's kind of hard sometimes to tell when we have been a victim of, or a survivor of conversion "therapy", quote unquote, or reparative "therapy" because it is constant, the force that is trying to get us to conform to a very heteronormative reality and expectation for our lives. But these SOGIE change efforts have been [00:04:00] named more in that vein with when it is an intentional effort, particularly coming from a place of power to change either our gender identity or expression or a sexual orientation

And even when it's well-meaning, it still can have devastating effects and does have devastating effects for our community every day, not just in the global south, but also in our own country here in the US. And as the Supreme Court has more thoughts about this and weighs in on whether or not it should be allowed for a therapist and psychologist to encourage and support LGBT people who believe that we are broken or sinful or bad.

Whether it should be allowed that [00:05:00] medical professionals and mental health professionals that know from all of the research and all of the data and all of the consequences that have been shown and published time again, whether they should be allowed to, because of their religious beliefs, and most often Christian beliefs, whether they should be allowed to guide and encourage and shepherd those of us who feel like something must be wrong because of the messages that we get, whether or not they should be allowed to do that. Or whether they have an ethical responsibility to use the science that we have access to, and the experts in the social sciences field, in the medical field, that say that there is actually nothing wrong with us, and that it isn't something that needs to be changed or converted or repaired.

So it [00:06:00] feels like it's very much on top, especially as our trans siblings have been specifically targeted and our trans serving organizations, um, are trying to be connected to domestic terrorism and violent extremism. So I wanna go into a little bit about. What is the theology that allows these kinds of ideas to take root?

That there is something bad or something wrong with us that needs to be converted or that needs to be repaired. Especially because so much of these kinds of therapies and pseudoscience is perpetuated and encouraged and is benefited by church communities and faith communities, and done by Christian pastors and Christian leaders and Christian psychologists, the [00:07:00] Christian being the important modifier there because it is because of these supposed religious beliefs that we are told these things.

So, as someone who is not a social scientist, but rather a pastor and an activist, theologian, I feel like it's important to spend a little bit of time thinking about what is all of this change about and where does this come from in our theology? I believe a lot of it has to do with the concept of original sin.

This idea that we are born bad, we are born into sin, and therefore, from the very first breath that we take on this earth, we need to change something. It's a little bit humorous now at this age, decades later, to remember my very young self, um, my 6-year-old self who [00:08:00] said the prayer of confession, um, that affirmed that I was a sinner who deserved hell, and only through the grace and blood of Jesus Christ was I saved.

When I think back now, I can't remember a time in my entire life growing up that I wasn't a church kid and just living in church, going to church schools. So when I think about that 6-year-old and all the sins that I would've committed by six, that I should be in this posture of groveling on the ground in repentance, talking about how I deserved hell.

It makes me chuckle a little bit on the surface, and then under that it's heavy and it's painful to believe, to remember that time where I believed so clearly and was reaffirmed in so many places around me that as a [00:09:00] young child who grew up in the church. Pretty much with continuous supervision, so there was a little, little space and time for me to get into much kind of trouble.

For me to believe that my flesh, my body was weak and suspect, and that I required a deep constitutional change in my very being, that I needed to be saved from my own awfulness, from my own sin, from my own evil. That change was required, that conversion was required. That another being, Jesus, that his suffering on the cross, that his blood, that his sacrifice was required because I had violated in such a foundational and fundamental way the honor, the love, that God had given me that [00:10:00] I deserved at six years old and seven and eight, and all the way through, that I deserved hell, eternal damnation, and I deserved to suffer. Basically, the concept that I needed to be saved from myself. Because I myself was not trustworthy to know what was good or bad, to do what was good, to understand what was ethical. Which wasn't something, and isn't something that comes naturally to most of us as children. We mostly understand that when we hit another child and they cry that we've caused harm, and we often have the experience where you see a child hit another child and the one who got hit starts crying. And the one who did the hitting immediately starts crying in response and often cries more than the, than the child who was hit.

I think that's a perfect example of [00:11:00] how we are wired as social creatures, how observation and wanting to be in community and wanting to give and receive care and love and respect are wired into our human nature for the most part. But to have that be called into question and condemned as our flesh is dirty, is evil, is suspect and suspicious that we needed to be saved from our very selves.

I think that's foundational to understanding why it makes such logical sense within that framework of conversion that we need to doubt and have suspicion around our own desires for our own bodies, for our own gender expressions, for our own relationships, and for our own love. And I think I wanna [00:12:00] just share my favorite chapter, which I talk about almost every time.

Um, the 139th Psalm contradicts that very thing. It talks again and again about God being with us no matter where we are in the highest highs and the lowest lows. The inside and the outside, that God doesn't stop at just making us and then withdrawing, but rather knows us from the very beginning, all the way through continuously.

And then the chapter kind of crescendos at this idea that we are fabulously and wonderfully made. It says fearfully and wonderfully made, but it's the kind of fearfully that's not about being scared of something or intimidated by something. It's the fearfully and the like, awe and wonder and respect and just like [00:13:00] overwhelming, incredible, humbling nature of how incredibly beautifully, wonderfully we are made.

And so, I think about how different things would be if we, rather than embracing the idea of original sin, leaned into this 139th Psalm framework of original blessing. If we leaned into this idea that the spark of God is in us, literally inspires us. The breath of God enlivens us. That that is the Imago Dei.

That is the image of God that we are given. I think it's really beautiful. This theology called Creation Spirituality. Which really centers this understanding of God through nature of understanding creator through [00:14:00] creation. And they have this concept that's pulled from a lot of other Christian mystics and other folks about original blessing. And you know, I do not care for Paul. I'm generally ready to get rid of him. Um, in all things theological, but in Romans one, Paul talks about God's nature. And how God can clearly be seen and understood by what God has created. And Paul is using this to say, you know, we are without excuse. You have no reason to not understand God even if you don't know the Bible, even if you don't know theology, even if you've never been witnessed to, because God is everywhere all the time in all of creation.

And even though I don't agree with Paul about almost anything, Romans one is the chapter that holds, [00:15:00] um, one of the clobber passages. And if you don't know what clobber passages are, they are, there are these 7 to 10 Bible verses throughout the Bible that are used against LGBT people in particular to condemn us and to call us terrible names, and, and justify incredible spiritual violence and physical violence. And so when we get to about verse 24, 25, that's what's used against our community. And so I appreciate going just a couple of verses back to verse 20 to talk about this part that Paul says right before that, which is, look at God in creation and you can tell so much about God.

So there's no reason not to know God. So since this is the same exact chapter is used against us, I feel like it's only appropriate to use that same chapter for verses earlier to talk about the opposite. [00:16:00] Which is, God's nature and how we can understand the way God is through creation.

So I wanna take a minute to talk about that. I am from Western North Carolina in Appalachia and I love the mountains. Um, the oldest mountains on the planet and some of the plant life. Let's just take one. Not flora and fauna and fungi. Let's just take plants and within plants, let's just take flowers and let's think about what we have to understand about God through the flowers.

I'm just gonna run through a couple of my personal favorites. I think about these tiny little flowers that come out in spring called Bluets. And they're so detailed. They're just as tiny as half a fingernail. Teeny, teeny tiny. And they [00:17:00] kind of cover the ground sprinkled throughout the mountains, and they have a very bright little center with a kind of white.

Next layer out and little blue tips and they show up. They're super delicate, super soft, and very detailed, even though they're tiny. And then on the other side, we have something like the magnolia that comes from the magnolia trees throughout the south, and they have these waxy, thick, white petals that are very creamy and large monochromatic. But they're as big as your head sometimes and they grow on these trees. They cannot be missed. And they exude a beautiful, very intense smell. Then you have something like the kudzu flower. Which for many plants, they use flowers as a way that they get pollinated so [00:18:00] they can propagate into other plants. But kudzu's flower isn't what gets used because they don't really propagate through seeds.

They propagate through rhizomes that happen under the ground, through the root system. So these really beautiful clusters of purpley pink flowers that smell like Smucker's grape jam. That come out of these incredible growing vines that can grow up to a foot a day in the heat of the southern US summer. And smell like grape jelly.

To something like the trumpet flower that has an intoxicating smell of these huge dangling flowers that go up on the tips and are this lovely white cream to orange color. Or poinsettias that [00:19:00] we get during the winter that require both cold and dark. We often cover them with brown paper bags so that they can then emerge as these beautiful red flowers.

Um. Right about now in this season, or the tiny little crocuses that come out of the ground while there's still snow on the ground in January. Or the sweet pea that grows like a weed and has this very intense fuchsia color. But if you pick it and put it in water, all of the color drains out within a day, and it's this kind of white colorless color. Or the mimosa tree that grows throughout the south that has these bunchy, pink, little, um, they look like face powder brushes. And they smell so sweet and they grow on these trees. And each one of the little stamens has this pink [00:20:00] color and a white center, and you can rub it on your face and it'll tickle just like you would a blush brush or something like that. And then you have something like a dandelion, which is considered a weed, but literally every part of the flower and the root system and the leaves are medicine.

Really incredible medicine, and they act like concrete and cement are the most fluffy tended gar- garter- garden bed. So it's like they can grow anywhere and they are so good for us and they're so healthy and they're so bright yellow and just give so much life. And yet they're often considered a weed and something to be, um, eradicated.

So, that's just a tiny handful. I mean, a teeny tiny handful of the flowers that I grew up with in my granny's garden, in our neighborhood, in our community, that were beautiful and lovely, but also so common that they were [00:21:00] overlooked, and many of them considered invasive weeds. That's not even touching on the endless variety of roses or orchids or flowering vegetables or grasses or aquatic plants.

You know, I could go on and on. I love this stuff, so I will stop there. But all that is just there to say, what does this tell us about God? This very short reflection of a few plants and flowers that grow in a very specific place, in one community, in this one state, on this continent, on this particular planet.

Where does this show us that gender expansive people fit in. Non-binary people, trans people, effeminate men, masculine women, whatever those things mean. Where do they fit in? To me, it says we fit in just fine. In fact, we [00:22:00] make all of the sense in the world when we put ourselves in the panorama of creation in terms of plants or animals or flowers or foods or fungi, right?

We belong so perfectly. We are so incredibly normal that even in our glory, in our beauty, we are every day. We are common. Because it is our variety that makes us part of this wild, incredibly creative creation. So, going back to this idea that Christianity is built on this need for change, and because this idea that we are naturally sinful, then conversion or change means something good.

It means that conversion therapy is [00:23:00] good because it turns us away from who we naturally are. Which is what this idea of original sin and needing salvation is based on that we have to turn away from who we are, naturally. How we are in our innate being. But what if we flip that around? What if we are precious and blessed.

What if it's actually the world that needs to change? What if our change is less like converting from Queer to straight or trans to cis? What if our change is more like a maturing. A more, um, unfurling. A blooming into our fullness, into our most authentic selves, into our most extravagant, beautiful, whole version.[00:24:00]

What if the blessing is in the particularities. What if who we are in our most creative sense in every way, not just gender and sexual orientation, but all of the things that make us specifically who we are, all of our joys, all of our pleasures, all of our ways of engaging in a world, in a way that is loving to God and to ourselves and to others.

What if that is who we are called to change into, to lean further into. And the conversion work, rather than being inward for ourselves and our authentic beings is actually change work in the world for systems of power and domination.

Will you pray with me?[00:25:00]

Beloved Creator, how glorious are your works? I know them well. They live inside me. Inside each of us. Help us to hold on to the vastness of you, to the mystery, the awe, and the wonder, rather than painting you small and static and rigid, because of our own fears and insecurities. Remove the horse blinders that are forced upon us to make our world small and to make our bodies controllable.

We understand that we are kept on a path of straight and narrow, but [00:26:00] accompany us as we discern the paths that lead to you. Help us to recognize the signposts that tell us that we are being led like the workhorses to our own demise. Keep our minds free. Help us remember that you made us. To be free, like the wild stallions on the plains.

May we return again and again to you? Help us to feel the closeness of you, the flourishing in our unfurling of our most audacious and flamboyant expressions of truth. Help us to turn to [00:27:00] inspiration. To creation, for knowing more about you. For what you have created as explanation for who you are and reflection on who you want us to be.

Help us to notice you everywhere all the time. In the flowers, in the trees, in the seeds, in all of creation, help us honor it and care for it and love it as precious representations of you, and help us love and hold each other as precious representations of your vastly expansive creative nature. For all of these gifts that you have bestowed upon us for every bit of knowing and love and blessing that you have so freely given, [00:28:00] we offer you gratitude and praise.

Amen.

If this love letter spoke to your heart. We'd love to hear how it resonated with you. If you wanna tell us your story, you can find us on social media @Soulforceorg or find me @Reverend_Sex or on our websites at soulforce.org or reverendsex.com. Please like and subscribe and give stars and all those other things that help us get the word out.

But most importantly, if you know someone who came to mind as you were listening to this, please take that as a sign that maybe you should forward this to them. That this message may be a love line, a love letter for the healing of someone's heart. I hope that this has been good news for you [00:29:00] and that you'll join us again next week.

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce. Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist Christian, Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome. Leave [00:30:00] us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be able [00:01:00] to recognize your face or your name, but I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

So we've been hanging out for a while now. You know me as Reverend Sex, and it seems like a good time for you to learn a little bit more about the gospel that I preach, which of course is called the Gospel of the erotic.

You found me tonight in my office at home, in the quiet of the night as the house has gone to bed and settled down [00:02:00] and quiet with my faithful cat who loves to accompany me at all hours. We are both nocturnal creatures. And this love letter is specifically for those who need to hear a different kind of good news, a gospel that feels like something embodied and real and practical in this moment.

So this is Reverend Sex, and you're about to hear about the gospel of the erotic. So the gospel should be good news for all the people, and this one comes from Our Lord comma Audre. And that phrase, Our Lorde comma Audre, comes from a beloved who I deeply respect and admire, Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs, who is a Queer Black feminist poet, oracle scholar, spiritual way maker, and healer.

I often return to her work. It makes me feel hopeful and like a [00:03:00] different world is possible and real and just at the edge of our fingertips. So I definitely recommend you pick up her work whenever possible. She is the biographer for Audre Lorde and her newest book is called Survival is a Promise, which is all about Audre Lord's life.

And I love her use of Our Lorde comma Audre because we don't need any more Lords or masters, and maybe it's nitpicky, but it reorients my soul to this idea of king of kings, Lord of lords, master, these kind of patriarchal terms that always point to systems of power in which those with wealth or privilege of some sort, have way more than everybody else and exploit the bodies and the labor and the knowledge and the land of those who have less. So I am a pretty intense stickler about that kind of [00:04:00] language within Christianity and using this term Our Lorde comma Audre, for me, not only gives me a little chuckle, but it helps me reorient toward a black feminist future that feels like everything is more doable or at least more livable in that pursuit.

So back to the good news, the gospel of the erotic. It sounds sexual, and I am a co-founder of the Sexual Liberation and I do love the sex work and the theology of sex. Um, but I wanna talk about how Audre Lorde explains the erotic. She has this one speech in particular, it's called Uses of the Erotic : the Erotic As Power.

She gives this speech in 1978, at a conference about the history of women. And the entire thing is like eight pages, double spaced, maybe. You can also like search it on YouTube and [00:05:00] hear her voice giving this speech. It's very short, but it totally changed my life and reoriented me within theology and has made me an incredibly committed evangelist and missionary on behalf of the Gospel of the erotic. So I really wanna tell you a little bit more about it.

She talks about the erotic as this life force, this like creative energy. I would go so far to say from a theological perspective that it's actually the Imago Dei that which makes us most like creator.

She calls it a source of power for change and a resource that's deep within each of us. And when we listen to it, we get this sense of satisfaction. We can recognize it when it happens because it's this very deep and intense kind of yes in our bones. [00:06:00] It also works the other way when there's a very deep and intense no. But it's this question for me that feels like, how do I know this to be true in my bones, like bone deep? And especially now that so many veils have fallen away and you really can't defer. We really can't defer our morality to anyone, certainly not to institutions. Those are always suspect, but even our elected officials and leaders.

Faith communities and law enforcement all feel like they are being pulled and compliant to things that are truly evil and centered in death. And so for me, it feels like it's time. To really recognize that we may have differences of belief, and that's totally fine, [00:07:00] but we all have to take responsibility for the logical ends of the things that we say we believe.

Sometimes that's really hard. I know, because people will say, well, if the Bible can support this and the opposite of this, this and that, if it can support abortion and being against abortion. If it can support slavery and being against slavery. If it can support the death penalty and abolition. Like, if it can support all these things that are literally contrary and two opposing sides, how do you decide what to believe?

And for me, that's simple. It's about having an ethic that goes alongside it. And I use what I call the ethics of life.

If the logical end to your theology, your belief system is one that causes suffering and death for our planet and for all of the creatures in it, including human beings and especially [00:08:00] those most marginalized among us as creation. Then, that's a death dealing theology and it's not good even if it says so right there in the Bible.

And on the other side, if we follow theology or belief systems that lead to more people being able to survive, to live, to creation to be able to thrive, then that life giving belief, in its logical conclusion, if you walk it all the way out and apply it to everyone else and all of creation, then I would call that a good theology or a good way of believing.

And you'll hear me talk about the ethics of life often because sometimes I think it can be confusing. How should we decide between good things or what is the lesser evil?

Another part of that is the erotic. It's this other place of deep knowing and a resource [00:09:00] for us to use and trying to decide between this thing or that thing, or this way, or that way, or maybe many ways, many paths. So, that deep "yes", that bone "yes." I feel like those of us who are LGBTQIA+ people, we often have a leg up in this.

We often have an advantage because almost all of us have had an encounter, a moment with ourselves or with another, where the overwhelming "Yes" in our bodies and in our bones, something that felt like attraction maybe, or that felt like seeing ourselves mirror in another, or in a community. That Yes, is so powerful that many of us are able to, maybe not get rid of entirely, but at least shake free from the bondage of having to fit in these boxes of what it means to be a good person or a good Christian. Because the [00:10:00] draw and pull to our people and those we are attracted to and love is so strong that we're willing to take the risk to try something.

That feels like it might be us, that it might be a better fit. And I feel like that's such a gift that I have as somebody who's experienced that, because it was really one of the first cracks in the system of Christianity that I was taught that helps me begin to be able to at least question, if not deconstruct, but it was the beginning point.

It was the "oh, how can this be so bad when every part of my spirit and body say yes?" So, the erotic helps us exercise that muscle. That deep, deep, deep, yes. And it helps us make decisions based on internal desire, not what others will think of us, or not what the pastor says. Audre Lorde says that in order for [00:11:00] systems of power, any system of power to main con, maintain control over us, that that system has to silence and vilify and suppress and deny the erotic.

Again, the erotic being this life force, this core being in the center of our spirit and our bones. That shift for us right and wrong, help us feel danger, help us feel secure. This is the primary work in Christianity. I see it over and over again that we are taught to not only ignore our bodies and our intuition, but to distrust our bodies, to ignore our creativity, or to funnel it in these very small channels for an appropriate purpose that is given to us.

Intuition and imagination. In terms of how we think about [00:12:00] God or what we know about what we desire for our own lives and bodies and pleasure and desire is completely vilified. We are taught that our power comes from obedience and submission, whether rather than what. Audre Lorde teaches us, which is the exact opposite. That it is that deep erotic, what I would call the Imago Dei that bone-deep yes or no, that is so close to creation and creator because it is there that we feel the interconnectedness of being part of something bigger than ourselves. And not just a part of a community, but part of an entire species, part of an entire planet that's part of an entire cosmos.

All of which I would say is held by creator in loving admiration, support, interdependence. [00:13:00] So when we see the body as sinful or deceptive, or even demon possessed, as many of us have been told about our sexual orientation, then we give away so much power. We fit into what is considered good, or we try to.

And we have internalized what it means to be a good Christian and in order to be that good Christian, we have tried to kill the erotic. We've tried to disconnect from our bodies and often our minds that part of us that asks questions when things don't quite make sense or when the theology we're given doesn't square. Or, when it feels like there's hypocrisy all around us in the church where people say they believe a particular thing, but then live in a different way.

All of that, [00:14:00] all of that distrust of our own power, of our own knowledge, of our own guiding life force. All of that vilification and trying to squish it down and make it be quiet, all of that makes us so much easier to be controlled. One through fear of not getting it right or not doing it right, or not being a good Christian.

But then it has a like reinforcement mechanism of shame because when we don't live up to those imposed expectations and goals. When the threshold of good and being a good Christian is impossible, not only because of perfection, which is unattainable, but also because it's a total setup. When we can't live up to that, then, we have to try to hide it and cover it through shame. Or, we have to [00:15:00] confess and come clean and humble ourselves and submit ourselves to the judgment of the community and of our leaders and our families in order to regain belonging and kind of wipe our conscience clean, if you must. Um, that helps us try to reenter.

I think often about this concept of a Proverbs 31 woman, which is a total lie, right? It's this picture of a woman who not only does all of the housework and takes care of her children and takes care of her extended household.

But she also has time to create things with her hands and is brilliant businesswoman and makes money and does all these things while her husband sits at the city gate. And that's lauded in so many of our communities as the ideal woman. And while I am all for entrepreneurship and for people being self-sustaining, there is this [00:16:00] sacrificial nature of how women and caregivers are supposed to behave, that literally sacrifices our entire life, alter creativity and energy, um, on this altar of capitalism or with this ideal of being a good mother or wife or a family person. And that can happen to all of us, not just straight or cis women. But it is this impossible expectation that builds into a system of control that punishes us for not living up to the impossible and makes us very easy to manipulate.

Because we either fear we won't be able to meet it, or we have shame or guilt that we didn't do it and we can't share how hard it is or what we failed at. And therefore we need to hide and we worry that we might be found out. Or, we do accomplish [00:17:00] it by, to all extents, um, and purposes on the external, but we have nothing left for ourselves.

We just become a shell of a person or a servant to all of those that we love. So what is the good news? The good news is that the erotic is in each of us. It's not just sexual. That is a different episode, and I do have a ton to say about sex and pleasure in the body and sexual desire. That's a different conversation that I do wanna have, but this erotic is about this very alive, vibrating life source.

This internal compass that is not driven by trauma or by fear, or by guilt, or by shame, or by duty, but by desire, by pleasure. Our Lorde comma Audre teaches us that when we listen to the erotic we get this deep [00:18:00] satisfaction. Whether it is in sex, or writing a poem, or creating something from scratch. And once we know that bone-deep kind of yes, and the satisfaction of letting it guide us in many ways.

For the, whether it's from a big yes, like our career path or embracing our gender or sexual orientation to little things like how we spend our 30 minutes of free time in the afternoon before the kids get home. The more that we listen and respond and hone our, our listening to the sound of our internal small voice that's deep, deep, deep inside.

And for some of us buried very deep and under a lot of layers of shame and guilt and fear, the more that we develop that muscle. The less acceptable everything else becomes. We're not willing to just exist [00:19:00] anymore or to be beholden to other people's vision of who we should be or what should make us happy, or how we should spend our lives.

We become indomitable. Our spirits become strong and steadfast and true. Our hearts and our minds become ungovernable and disobedient to the powers and principalities that seek to control us. We become shameless. Agential. Full of potent erotic will from the source of life and the source of love and the maker of all creation. And there are few things more dangerous to a system of domination than a people without shame. And that is indeed good news of great joy for all the people. So welcome to the Gospel of the Erotic. I'm Reverend Sex. Will [00:20:00] you pray with me?

Creator of life, source of all that is and was and will be. Thank you. Thank you for that small still voice. Thank you for keeping it alive. Even when everything around us has trained us to silence it. Thank you for making us in your image in the ability and the power that is able to create.

Let us be makers of things, creators of things, harbinger of life. Help us to be what you know we can be. What you have made us to be. Help us each be brave enough that we are willing [00:21:00] to go digging, go mining for the erotic, wherever it is buried deep inside our souls. Make her strong, make her loud, make her undeniable in all of our beings.

And whenever we get that undeniable, yes, may we each be surrounded by community who love us and accept us for exactly who we are and who encourage us to be our full and brightest selves. Help us to heal our own bodies and spirits. Through the weaving work of mending. Mending our bodies back into our souls and our souls back into our bodies, our hearts and our minds tethered to each other as a system of checks and balances.

Let all of this amazing, integral [00:22:00] knowledge move together as one. Help us heal the traumas and understand our patterns so that we can recognize when the voices that are telling us what to do, we can recognize are those from you? Or, are those in response to what we've been taught and what we've been told?

Are they trauma responses or are they freedom calling us? Be with us. Be with our community, especially in these times where it feels like there is so little leadership that we can depend on. Let us depend on you. Let us depend on your gospel of the erotic. Of all that is true. Of all that is right in all that is good.

In all of the names that all of your children call you, we pray. Amen.

I [00:23:00] am grateful for your time today and I would love to know more about the kinds of things that you would like me to talk about in the future. We have so many topics and so many things to over go over and to go through, and we're just about to wrap up season one, and that means that we're planning for season two. So, if you have questions that you'd like for me to answer as Reverend Sex, or if there's somebody's story that you wanna share, please reach out to us. You can find us on social media @Soulforceorg or @Reverend_Sex. And you can find out more about us alongside free theological resources at soulforce.org and Reverendsex.com. Make sure you like and subscribe and do all the things that you know how to do at podcast. Leave us a comment, let us know if this episode resonated with you. But most [00:24:00] importantly, if you have someone you love who came to mind during this time together tonight, maybe this is a nudge for you to send the episode over.

Maybe this is Divine, asking you to be one of God's angels, a messenger of love, and send this episode over for the healing of someone else's heart. May this be good news of great joy for you and for all of our people, and until we talk again, this is Love Letters with Reverend Sex.

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce.

Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist [00:25:00] Christian, Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome.

Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be able [00:01:00] to recognize your face or your name, but I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

You found me today in my home finding a moment of focus amidst the busyness of home life and work and family coming in from out of town and thinking about end of year festivities. Maybe we'll do a holiday series next year if you want. I have a how the white Christian supremacy stole almost everything for holidays, so if you're interested in that, [00:02:00] let me know.

Anyway. This love letter is for folks who have forgotten how to pray or who maybe feel like God doesn't wanna hear from us anymore. I think it's really important this time of year when so many of us have family festivities and need a little bit more spiritual fortitude, that we have space to have our own practices that help us ground and center.

And I really believe that prayer can be one of those. I know that some of us have been told that God doesn't wanna hear from us until we repent or change or some other kind of thing, but I do wanna say, I really believe God does want to hear from you and from me all the time. And let me tell you why. So God, being creator. In the Christian tradition, we have this concept called the Imago Dei, which is [00:03:00] basically that we were made in the image of the God of God, in the image of the divine. And lots of people have different opinions about what exactly is the Imago Dei. Is it that we have a soul and other creatures don't?

Is it that we have the ability to create? Or what is it exactly that is this Imago Dei? This "made in the image of the divine." And I think, I'm gonna give you my opinion since you asked, uh, that it's not just that we're made like God, but I believe that there is a piece of God in each of us. Like truly God has gifted us a spark of the divine.

And that's how we have all of these narratives around God longing for us and us longing for God. It's this wholeness that we're looking for and that God is looking for. Because if God has put a little piece [00:04:00] of God's self into each of us, then it is really longing for part of us when we are longing for God and for each other.

There's this fancy word called "panentheism" which is this idea in theology that God is in all beings and also beyond all of that. So not just God is a sum of all of the cosmos and creation, but rather God is in everything and God is beyond that. So there's a new $10 vocabulary word for you if you're interested. And that's the kind of theology I believe in. I really do feel like God is with us, but also God is in us. And that God suffers as we suffer in real time, not just through Christ who suffered and died on the cross under Pontius Pilate, as our creeds tell us.

But no, God feels in real time with us right [00:05:00] now in the good, in the bad, in the hard, in the easeful, in the joy and the silly. So, if that's true, if you'll take this journey with me, what does that mean? Well, for me it means God already knows. It's okay. God already knows about whatever the things are that are going on for you or true for you, or fearful for you or frustrating for you.

We don't pray to give God information. We pray for us actually. And, Dr. Nancy Bedford says that prayer is one of the greatest resources that we have in these times. And if you haven't listened to her episode of Teología Sin Vergüenza yet, I think it's episode two of this season, and it is so jam packed with brilliance and wisdom and strategy and just knowledge of all flavors and sorts. So definitely go back and [00:06:00] listen to that if you haven't. But she says that prayer helps us to focus and discern what is our work in this time and what do we do with our precious lifeblood in this time. And I couldn't agree with her more. And I would say that prayer also helps us build that channel to God. That spark of the divine that was placed in you and in me at our inspiration or at our breathing in the breath of life when we joined this plane of existence and said yes to the challenges and beauties of being alive at this time, that connection to God and every living thing that is part of creation is there.

Whether we nourish it or not, whether we acknowledge it or not, it's still there. It's still this very alive oneness that exists, and I [00:07:00] don't wanna sound too new agey, but it really, for me feels like the interdependence of this planet is not just about food systems and water and weather and the environment. It is spiritual in nature. I talk a lot more about this in Love Letters that's about the Gospel of the Erotic. So if you want to listen to more information about how that connection piece works, I suggest you listen to that episode. Okay, so I said this episode was about prayer. And those who have forgotten to pray, how to pray or feel like God may not wanna hear from you.

So you might be asking at this point, okay, what does all of this connecting and interdependence have to do with forgetting how to pray? Well, a lot actually. When we're young in our faith, it is normal for someone to give us prayers that we memorize, or a kind of call and response. If you did that in [00:08:00] children's church where they would say a line and then you would repeat it to God and then they would say a line and you repeat it to God. As we got older in our faith, whether that's age older or just a time in our, our church life or in our spiritual practice within Christianity, maybe you were given a formula.

Like, we start prayer with a dear God or holy one, or, father, or some other word for God. And then we give God gratitude for all of the blessings in the world and for creation. And then we say our prayers for others on behalf of others. And then finally we can ask for God, uh, for ourselves, our own petitions. And all of that is good. That's beautiful ways of praying.

Those are really helpful tools. I also love Catholic prayer practices because the church has so, so, so, so many beautiful prayers that you can [00:09:00] really focus on the meaning and the intention behind the words rather than trying to find the right words or sound elegant or eloquent for God. I know that trips a lot of folks up, so I appreciate there being practices and just endless quantities of prayers for almost every topic that you can pull from.

We at Soulforce are actually working on a prayer project right now, specifically to support the rites of passage and the lives of queer and trans people that often don't have prayers that folks can say or memorize to go along with those important moments in life. So we will be bringing that to you soon. But you know, often when I ask queer and trans people who are coming to me for advice or for, um, a time to think about Christianity and God and healing, I ask many people if they pray, and a lot of our people say no. [00:10:00] So if prayer is this really helpful practice, why don't we do more of it, or why don't more of us do it?

Well, many of us have been taught that it is not for us. That church is not for us, that the Bible is not for us. That praise and worship music is not for us, that God is not for us. That prayer is not for us. So. That makes total sense. And just as all of those other things are a lie from hell, ie from white Christian supremacy, so is that part about prayer.

But I totally understand why people wouldn't want to talk to God. Particularly this God who supposedly hates us or judges us for being ourselves. Or, pray using the formulas and the postures or the pre-written words of a faith that has failed us. So what do we do [00:11:00] with that?

Well, the good news is that the divine is in everything and in everyone. Panentheism, if you remember our vocabulary word. So anything and everything can be part of our prayer life as we rebuild this connection. It could be something as simple as talking to God like you would a friend. You don't even have to use the word God or Father.

You don't even have to give God your undivided attention. Maybe talk to God while you're in the shower. Or maybe while you're coloring or knitting or driving. Obviously do not close your eyes while you're driving. You don't have to give God your undivided attention. You can be doing other things and focusing that time as a focused energy in that connection. And building that connection, listening and telling, [00:12:00] even without words. It can be a presence, it can be an emotion. It's just about the intention and the focus of doing it for that purpose.

Sometimes God doesn't even need words. Sometimes we don't even need words. I would say probably God never needs words, but we more often need words. If the names for God are triggering, like Father, and God, and Jehovah, and all these other words, give God a nickname. If you're an English speaker, maybe you wanna call God Jesus, or Sky Daddy 403, or Queen Bee, or Queen Mother. Whatever it is. The point is the relationship. So, whatever feels most welcoming and makes you want to do that connecting work, that healing work, that building work, then choose a nickname that invokes that. I know people talk a lot about respect and reverence, but I do not. I think God is stronger than that, already knows us and [00:13:00] loves us and appreciates our gratitude, always, but doesn't need us to be all holier than thou and our skirts down to our ankles, on our knees, with our eyes closed and our heads bowed.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it. Those practices, that's for us to get us in the right head and heart space to build that channel of the erotic, of the connection with God. And, so if that feels harmful, or violent, or triggering to your past, then those practices don't need to be your practices.

It's not this very rigid formal way, that you have to put on the right costumary, and fix your language to be able to come before God. If God is in us and works through us and around us, then God is there and can hear you whether you're cursing or frustrated. Or joyful, or silly, or [00:14:00] pleasure. Like whatever mode you're in, that is where you meet God.

I'm also gonna say something a little controversial, or maybe a lot controversial, but this connects back to our episode about our ancestors and how they've been robbed from us. I believe particularly those who have crossed over and are connected deeply in soul and spirit form with the divine and with the whole oneness that I've been talking about here and talk about in the erotic and talk about with the ancestors that the people that I love and who have loved me are with God and in God. So, sometimes when I'm having a really hard time, I think about who the person is that I would go to in that moment to have that conversation if they were still on this side. So for example, my granny who raised me, I remember what she sounds like and what it feels like to be held in her arms.

I remember the kind of advice. [00:15:00] That she would give, or even her southern accent. And so, if I am needing that most soft, unconditional love, welcoming me home to do laundry at three o'clock in the morning when I'm gonna be there for five hours and turn right back around and go to school the next morning. Like, that kind of energy who will make me steak eggs at midnight, even though she's been asleep for five hours. Like if that's what I need in that moment when I'm praying, I will often pull her image and her smell and her feel into my prayer world and even use her name as the name of God, because that is the form of God that I'm channeling in that moment.

That's who I need to hear from in that moment. Not the one who is, you know, nipping at my heels trying to make me be a more disciplined person to get my goals accomplished, right? So I believe that the ancestors work in that same way and they're intimately connected and one with [00:16:00] God. So if there's somebody on the other side that feels like someone you could talk to, I encourage you to use their name. To use their feel to call into your body, into your spirit, what they were like or how they might sound if they were talking back to you rather than this, um, more ethereal, or this more judgmental God.

Okay. Enough with the controversial stuff, although maybe all of this is controversial. Anyway, for those who do not do well for being submissive or being told what to do or how to do what we do, or for those of us and/or those of us who are healing from spiritual violence, the point of prayer is just connection. It's literally in a spiritual form, but a spiritual digging the mud and silt out of the channel that connects us to the erotic to God, to creation. That thing that [00:17:00] was utterly impenetrable when we were born.

We came into the world with that spark of divine in us that wasn't just like in the image of God, but rather was a piece of God and therefore was directly connected to God. I've heard a lot of folks in my culture and in my family talk about how babies don't know the language yet because they're still speaking the language of the angels, or they're still talking with God. It takes them a while to fully, you know, come down to this plane because they have been in communion with the divine before they got here. And I love that idea.

So you can literally do this prayer practice with anything, and this is the advice I give most often when someone is struggling with prayer. I say this. Or, I ask this, how would you allow God to talk to you? How will you listen? Like, what is your commitment to listening? And [00:18:00] that can literally be anything.

It can be songs on the radio if you still listen to the radio. It can be billboards or t-shirts or your favorite TV show. I once had someone ask for advice. I asked them this question and they told me that they would listen to their niece. If God gave them messages that came through their niece, they would listen because she was too young and pure to have alternative ulterior motives.

That's amazing. That's truly perfect. Because the point is to give God a channel and commit to listening when God uses that channel, trusting that God will use that channel. God will talk to you through any mode of communication that you will engage and connect with God about. I, I know this to be true. I know this to be true, so just pick a thing, but you have to commit to that thing.

So [00:19:00] something like, God, if you talk to me through messages on my favorite Detective True Crime podcast, I will listen. That may be a silly example. Literally anything. I mean that literally anything, I think that God can move and channel through anything as long as we are willing to honestly commit to listening and saying, okay, that's a message from God. Rather than all the things we do to explain it away, that it was coincidence that wasn't really for me, that isn't applicable.

We work really hard not to listen sometimes, especially when we're hurting. So whatever that thing is, we need to commit that when we hear the message, we will actually listen to that. One suggestion, if you feel stumped on this, is the natural world. That's a great starting place. Maybe like your garden, or walking in the forest. When you walk your dog.

Whatever you're doing, if you're doing those activities with an [00:20:00] open heart and a spirit that is looking for God in that, and you have that intention, I believe God can use those channels and use those methods, those ways of communication. You know. If some of us prefer telephone over text, then we have to call our grandmothers who prefer telephone over text.

If we have folks who do not wanna talk on the phone and we prefer email so they can think about a thing and discern about it and then write back, we do that. That's part of how we accommodate each other in society and in social networks. And I think the same thing is true with God. God is willing to accommodate us with what feels like channels that we've- are open to listening and receiving as well as giving. And we just have to put that intention, and trust and believe that if we give that to God and we get messages back that those are actually for us.

I do wanna give a couple of words of warning. One, if you hear [00:21:00] judgment, interrogate a little bit more whether that is the voice of God or whether you are repeating messages that you've been given about what you think God would say in that situation.

Because we are always decolonizing religion and detoxifying our connection with our bodies and the divine. So that may come up from time to time. But it's important to try to disassociate what you think God is gonna say or what you anticipate God is gonna say, particularly if God is in the voice of the judgmental, fiery, condemning version. Versus connecting with God in different ways, which is why I suggest trying a different modality that you haven't done before because it doesn't have so much built in expectation about how that process or how that relationship is gonna go. It might be something that you wanna journal about when that comes up, or talk to your therapist about, or other friends who are [00:22:00] working on the decolonizing work. If you have those messages, that is exactly what you're expecting God to say, not because the answer makes you better, more whole, more authentic, live a more abundant life. But because it comes from a mode of religion that has caused you harm, that's when you start asking those questions. About where is this message coming from? Whose voice is that? What am I expecting to hear? And is this just repeating those patterns that I've been told before?

Okay. One other thing, which is that silence is okay. Someone I love asked God if something that they were doing in their life was okay and they didn't hear anything. They expected to hear very loud judgment and a very loud no. And it was startling and disorienting when there wasn't anything back. There wasn't a yes. There wasn't a no, there wasn't a, maybe it was just silence. [00:23:00] And so I wanna remind you that silence is okay. Don't project what silence means to God. Rather, maybe focus on your feelings, and that will give you a lot of information. Like sit with the knowledge, start from this place:

sit with the knowledge and belief that you are loved beyond measure that your queerness or transness or sexuality or difference is a blessing and not a curse, even if the world doesn't see it that way, that you're not being a- you're not being tested. God isn't trying to discern your heart or isn't giving you a cross to bear. And sit in that knowing, in that truth.

Repeat it as many times as you need. Write it down. Look at it. But sit in that truth and that reality, and then feel what comes through. When you're anticipating God giving you answers and it's [00:24:00] coming from a violent, judgmental, warrior king God versus one of your ancestors who loved you more than life itself, or this image of creation that is expansive beyond measure.

Then that's when we have to start shifting away from the words. Maybe words aren't the thing that you need in that moment. Maybe what that silence is doing is helping you sit with what are the feelings that you're having about that question to begin with? And maybe what is needed in that moment is for you find out what you're feeling and how to process those feelings. Rather than God coming in, as we're often taught, to just give you the right answer, give you discipline, give you rules, and then send you on your way. I feel like that's such a gift and so much trust that God has given us for us to be able to discern sometimes our own answers when we can find them within ourselves, trusting that we're connected to God and to others in [00:25:00] creation.

So just remember the connection is the point. Building out that channel, the connection is there whether we use it or not. And especially in these times, we can use all the tools, all the fortitude and all the spiritual power that we can muster. So if you haven't tried prayer in a while or if you think God doesn't want to hear you, I encourage you to revisit those thi, those thoughts, those feelings, and give it a try.

Try something silly and see where God shows up. You might be surprised.

Will you pray with me? Hmm.

Creator of all of all silliness of all fun, of all, pleasure of all healing, of all joy. [00:26:00] Be with us in the unconventional prayer life. Help us muck out that channel that has been filled with other people's lies about us. Help us dig out and dig out from under the shame or the guilt that keeps us from connecting with you.

Help us roll up our sleeves. Get that snow shovel. Use our bare hands if we need to. But help us know that you are there and you're not fragile or tender. You don't need the most eloquent verse in iambic pentameter. You don't need our pure speech, free of our colloquial phrases, of our curse words, of our frustration, of our anger, of our tears.

Be with us in the right now. In the tiny moments of [00:27:00] life, help us see and hear, and feel and taste that you are there. Whether we reach for you or not. Help us be brave enough to reach for you. Help us trust that you will show up when we give you the channel to connect. Help us know that silence is not being ignored, is not being condemned, is not being forsaken, but rather silence is a gift and a space for us to be in our own truth and our own questions and our own fears.

Help us to know that you hold that container. Give us paths to joy. Give us paths to spiritual power. Give us paths to ourself that is connection with you, with love, with divine power, with [00:28:00] connectedness, with the whole cosmos and beyond. Help us to see you in everything, everywhere. In every one, in every moment.

Help us not be overwhelmed by the floodgates opening. When we can acknowledge your presence all around us. Help us rather be swallowed in the great big hug that feels like the caring and nurturing of our souls. Help us move through the world, help our people be strong. Help our connection be fierce. Help all of us find our way to you. And may everything that we have been taught that is not of you, may that voice be silenced. May we expunge and expel every bit of the lies and hate and [00:29:00] fear mongering and hurt that has been given to us in your name. May it be cast out and may it be filled with all that we know that you want for us, for our love, for our joy, for our abundance, for our people, for our freedom.

Be with us. Be with all of our people. We need you now. Know. That you are ours and we are yours, and we are each other's. And we are who we have been waiting for because we are in you and from you, and from all those who have made it possible to be exactly where we are today. Amen. And goodbye. And we'll talk to you soon and we can't wait to see you again.

Amen. And amen.

If this [00:30:00] love letter resonates with you. We wanna hear your story, we'll wanna hear your feedback, and you can find me and us on social media @Soulforceorg, or @Reverend_Sex or at soulforce.org and reverendsex.com. Make sure to like and subscribe and the thumbs up and all those things, but most importantly, if this love letter has touched you and someone came to mind while you were listening to it, take that maybe as one of those messages from the divine and pass this love letter along to others who might need this healing. You might be exactly who they need to heal their heart in this moment. And may all of this be good news of great joy for our people. And until we talk again, cuídate.

Thank you for [00:31:00] spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce.

Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist Christian, Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome.

Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of [00:32:00] faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in [00:01:00] person. I may not be able to recognize your face or your name, but I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

You have found me tonight feeling a little tired and a little slow of mind as I finish up a week of writing to try to finish up this book and tonight I am writing this love letter to all of those who could use a little bit more hope in your [00:02:00] life. Or maybe for those who are sacred timekeepers and want to be thinking about advent season.

You know, I feel like one of the things that is most taken away from us when we leave church spaces is this sacred time that's tracked all throughout the year, through the different liturgical seasons or through the different events that are happening at our churches or communities of faith. That, for me at least, really helped me mark time.

I really understood my year through what was happening at church and what was going on in our community. There was always sacred timekeeping that was happening for us, either in the rhythm of every week for Sunday service or Wednesday night choir practice, or annually, like Mother's Day luncheon or sunrise service at Easter.

I have [00:03:00] only really felt the depth of that loss since leaving those spaces. So I love it whenever it's possible for me and my family to incorporate more of the ritual time periods in our lives, whether it's through rites of passage, some of which we create. Or whether it's through reclaiming or reconsidering different Christian traditions that we can give new meaning.

So in that spirit, I think I'm gonna do the next few episodes that we have on Advent. And I never celebrated Advent growing up because we were in an evangelical church, and so we really just focused on Jesus and the birth of Jesus and Christmas. As I've gotten older and gone through Divinity School and been in community with so many other Christians, the season of Advent feels so appropriate, especially [00:04:00] in the time of year where we are being encouraged to buy lots of things and spend lots of money and do lots of decorations.

I love Christmas and I love the lights, and I love the sounds. I love the same Christmas carols being played over and over and over again, and some of them make me cry every time I hear them, if I'm paying close enough attention to them, even if I'm in a store. So I am a huge Christmas fan. Even though I am anti-consumerism and anti-capitalism.

And so what that means is we have to find other ways of finding meaning in this particular time period that's so, so, so focused on consumerism and comparing ourselves to each other and finances. And for me, advent is one of the ways that I can do that and that I've learned to do that with my family. So if you haven't had any experience with the season of Advent, it's the few [00:05:00] weeks leading up to Christmas and each week has its own theme, and oftentimes you'll light a candle on Sundays, either at your community of faith or in your home.

Um, a different color for different meanings throughout this four week season before we arrive at Christmas, and it's really meant as a time of preparation, of preparing our hearts for the light of the world who was supposed to be what the birth of Jesus represents on the 25th of December. Well, we know many of us that Jesus was not born in December.

Um, and a lot of the experiences of colonization and syncretism that made it so that we celebrate Christmas at this time of year when so many cultures have some sort of festivities that celebrate, uh, light. And reminding ourselves in the deepest parts of winter where it's coldest [00:06:00] and darkest, that the light will come back in the next season of fertility and coming through with plants and creatures coming out of hibernation.

That that is coming. It is on the horizon and we can use that reminder more than ever at this particular time of the year. So, in that spirit of advent, I have often wanted to write an advent devotional. I don't get very far because I get really frustrated with the themes. Someday, maybe we'll come up with different themes that feel more activist centered, but I'm gonna try this time, this year to to make some sense of the themes that we are given.

So the first week of Advent is centered on the theme of hope. And hope is something that's complicated for a lot of people. In fact, I would say hopelessness is one of the biggest epidemics that our community is facing [00:07:00] right now, and our country in general. So when I talk about hope, I wanna be really clear.

I wanna talk about hope not in this passive way that's like, we sit still, and we pray to God maybe, and we just hope that things are better. As in, we passively sit still and imagine a different outcome than what is the reality in front of us. But we don't really do anything about it. And for others, I hear people badmouthing hope as this kind of eternal optimism that has no grounding or basis in reality.

It's none of those things for me and. I think there's this concept that I'd like to share with you that feels really connected to Hope. There's this literary plot device called deus ex [00:08:00] machina. And I remember being so frustrated as a young person when I read books, or even watched movies, or TV shows where there's this God figure who swoops in at the end and fixes everything and resolves all the loose ends, and then everybody just kind of floats off into the sunset. And I do love a happy ending, and I do love things being resolved. It is equally frustrating when things are just left floating in the air or left, uh, with ends unfinished when I am reading something or watching something.

But, this idea that there is this God figure that will just take care of it, I feel like is a little bit of what our society has been going through for the past year, where we keep thinking that somebody's gonna do something about this. Whatever this is, whether it's the violation of someone's rights or whole [00:09:00] communities of rights, whether it's terrorism against our own population, whether it's not abiding by the law, whether it's hateful comments, conversations, and then that blowing up into entire political systems that are suddenly against things like science or specific communities or voting. So there's this idea, I think that Christianity really perpetuates, that, in the end, God will just handle it. I talk a little bit about that in our Love Letters episode about rapture, but I think it's true across the board. We have this sense that God is just going to swoop in and either hit somebody with a lightning bolt or make everything right, or that right always wins. I can still remember my first election when one candidate won the [00:10:00] popular vote and yet the other candidate won vote, uh, the other candidate won the presidency. And it was the first time that I realized that everything doesn't turn out like a Disney Princess movie at the end.

There's no such thing as the right will always win. The right as in the correct side, not the right as in the conservative wing of politics, but that was a really hard awakening for me as a teenager. And I think a lot of Christians and folks who are coming out of Christianity sit with that. What does it mean if there isn't this predestined end to all of suffering or harm that's caused, that ends in positive, perfect resolution that includes justice and healing and everything coming into fruition and conclusion in a nice, tight package. [00:11:00] That's the idea of deus ex machina. This idea that God or some authority figure will swoop in and save us, and I think many of us are coming to the conclusion this year, hopefully, are finding our way there, that there isn't somebody who's gonna come in and do it for us, that we are gonna have to do it ourselves. That it is our responsibility, individually and collectively, to resist evil forces in the world and to commit ourselves to the work of making a different future possible, both for ourselves and for others.

Uh, there's this very funny, but cool, quote going around on social media these days that's actually from a few years ago, like more than three. And somebody named Matthew at Crow's Fault has this great quote about hope that I wanna share with you because I [00:12:00] think it is the most aligned to what I believe hope is, or what hope feels like in my body.

They say this, "People speak of hope as if it's this delicate, ephemeral thing made of whispers and spider's webs. It's not. Hope has dirt on her face, blood on her knuckles, the grit of the cobblestones in her hair, and just spat out a tooth as she rises for another go." Hmm, that's a whole world word. Amen to that.

So I wanted to talk about hope as this extension of believing in ourselves. Not so much as a matter of faith in some outside external forces or in this Pollyanna idea of the good, the greater good, that exists somewhere outside of us, but rather, [00:13:00] hope is a commitment. It's the idea that you know that the world is going to be better, because as long as there's breath in your body then you will be in the mix of working toward that different world, that different reality. I think hopelessness is so dangerous. It means that you don't have the will to continue on. You don't have the will to struggle for something better, to try something new or different. It means you've given up and that hopelessness is the intent of all of the harm and chaos that's happening on so many fronts right now.

It is to wrench our bodies of the will to continue on, to keep trying. One of the things that is most impactful for me about our LGBTQIA+ [00:14:00] community is that we are a people who refuse to give up. We are a people who, generation after generation, after generation, after generation, no matter how hard the circumstances, or how hostile the context, or the environment, our people have continued to exist and they've continued in some form or fashion to be themselves.

Even if they aren't able to be the most rowdy, out there, booty short wearing queer or trans person, we've always existed. And there's a comfort in knowing that we have yet to be extinguished, generation after generation, no matter how hard they've tried. I feel like I could probably say similar things about women who have been labeled as witches or earth-based healers.

I could say [00:15:00] the same thing about immigrants and our struggle and fight to believe in a better future, and then to work toward that. It feels a little bit like prayer to me. They say, first you pray with your heart and then you pray with your body, meaning. We pray and we ask God for things. We ask God to support our endeavors or to help others in their process, but most of us know we don't end our prayer by just saying amen and letting God handle it without any help along the way.

We understand that that putting of our intention and our will and our heart and our spirit toward an outcome includes our actual labor and work and creativity and effort toward that end that we're praying for. I feel like the same thing is true with hope. We [00:16:00] commit to a different outcome than what is anticipated because of the hostility and the systems of power that exist and are creating havoc right now.

Hope is like a muscle that we work and we commit to, not because we're delicate and passive and have to just hope, just expect someone else to swoop in and take care of it, but rather it is a dogged commitment to a different outcome because we are unwilling to accept a reality in which we no longer exist, or a reality in which our people are not free or not whole or not healed, in which a world is not possible. It is a commitment day after day in the little and in the big ways, wherever we can affect change, to pull ourselves up bloody as we may be, grit in our [00:17:00] teeth and in our spirits, that as long as we are agents of the divine, as long as the divine gives us breath, that we will commit to what we already know to be true, which is that our people are incredibly beautiful and wonderful and good, and deserve all that is possible when we win.

A friend of mine, Sam Ames, says this wonderful thing. Sam says, "We don't follow hope. Hope follows us." That does my heart so good. These moments, these times where I'm tired. When the world feels heavy and big and hard, to imagine us as a people. And us as a people, being many kinds of people, and many groups of people. But, [00:18:00] us as a people, being the example of what hope does, what hope and actions looks like, what creativity comes to play when we commit ourselves to the truth that we know about our communities.

So for this first week of Advent, I want to wish you a day, a month, a life, a season filled with hope. With a kind of hope that falls down or gets pushed down and then gets back up. Will you pray with me?

Mm. Holy one. You inspire in us and conspire with us. [00:19:00] You give us breath and beating hearts. Circulating blood that helps us be in this world. We ask for every breath and every drop of blood to be imbibed with hope. Which is to say we pray for fortification in our commitments to our community, to who we are and who we know you to be.

Help us double down on hope. Give us the tools and the community to keep sacred time. To mark our lives through the work of your desire of the community to be [00:20:00] whole and strong and abundant and wildly and creatively ourselves. May we not be lost to desperation and hopelessness. May we be strong in the face of despair.

Circle us now in this time of advent as we prepare our hearts to be reminded yet again of the light of the world coming into the world, being in the world, and of the world and embodied in human flesh. Help us remember our commitments. To what it means to be enfleshed in this time, in this moment, and to care about the bodies and the beings and the spirits of others as we care for ourselves.

Which means, help us to be reminded of who we are, what we are worthy of. Help [00:21:00] us to hope with our bodies and not just our minds. Help us not to discard hope as a tool of oppression as an eternal, optimistic fantasy, but rather help us center into the truth and into the commitment that we are yours and of our communities, and of this place and this planet. And therefore we will, we will, we will do better. And help us be better and help your creation be more possible as long as you bless us with breath.

In your holy and precious names we pray, amen.

If something that we talked about in this podcast today [00:22:00] resonated with you, let us know. Send us a message on our social media channels @Reverend_Sex or @soulforceorg. Find us online at soulforce.org or at reverendsex.com. Most importantly, if someone was laid on your heart as you listened to this episode, if there is someone that you love who might need to hear this message of hope this holiday season, pass it along.

Help them know that you believe in them and you believe in us, and that hope is not an ephemeral light fantasy, but rather a deep, bone deep, soul deep commitment to what is true. Thank you again for spending a little bit of time with your Reverend [00:23:00] Sex and in our Love Letters. Until next week.

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce.

Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist Christian, Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome.

Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian [00:24:00] supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be able [00:01:00] to recognize your face or your name, but I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

Oh, sacred timekeepers. Welcome to the second week of Advent when our theme this week is peace. I am writing this love letter from my home in the quiet of the night when everything is still, and I [00:02:00] am just settling down from a long day, but very joyful to be with you tonight. And, so this love letter is again for the sacred timekeepers who are reconnecting with some of the older traditions of Christianity like Advent and trying to find a new, more decolonized perspective, or at least a new way of approaching some of the themes and ways of believing that we've been taught our whole lives.

Oh, it feels like there is no peace to be had anywhere in our country and most places in the world these days. So, I'm not particularly gonna send this love out letter out to those who need more peace, but rather invite those who are interested in a conversation about what peace means, uh, into a prayerful [00:03:00] reflective time tonight. You know, I get asked a lot to do either sermons around Advent or devotionals, or other kinds of writings around this time of the year because we are always looking for more content in the world, uh, particularly in justice centered communities. And I generally have said no in the past as much as I possibly could.

And the main reason why I've said no is because of this very week. This week that is supposed to be about peace. And I've remember growing up feeling like peace had more to do with this quiet candlelit, maybe vesper service, but this idea of a quiet reverential sanctuary where there is an absence of chaos and noise and running around.

It's [00:04:00] very still and quiet, and in my mind, very boring as a child. And I just remember hearing like Jesus is the prince of peace and the story of Jesus on the water with the storm saying, peace be still. So I honestly haven't had a very high opinion of peace from even the time I was a child, but now I'm much more of a no justice, no peace kind of person, if you know what I mean.

For those of us who are agitators and provocateurs, and folks who spend a lot of our lives trying to call attention to things that are going on in the world and in our communities, the idea of being peaceful for some of us, that means non-violence.

For a [00:05:00] lot of us, it's used against us as a weapon that we should be peaceful, meaning we should be obedient and we should be proper, and we should go about things the right way, with the proper amount of respect and deference to those in power. So whenever I'm asked to write something about peace, I often think in my mind, no justice, no peace. And considering in this particular moment we are living so far away from any concept of justice, it feels like peace is impossible. Yeah, peace feels like a hard word. I am thinking about um, blessed are the peacemakers. And I do believe that blessings on those who work for peace, particularly in places where war is such a [00:06:00] central lived experience.

I'm thinking about Gaza, I'm thinking about Sudan. I'm thinking about so many places in the world. And may the peace maker peacemakers be blessed always and forever. Always, always and forever. But I'm thinking of peace in this moment in a different kind of way. Peace is often defined as the absence of something. Like the absence of conflict or violence, um, an experience of life without challenge. And I really have come to terms with an idea of peace that can fit within my theology and in my world that is less about the absence of something, but rather centers closer to conversations around integrity. I am thinking about how peace for me is the feeling of [00:07:00] falling into bed at night after having worked all day long to make the world a better place and to make life more possible, both for my own loved ones and community, and also for those that I have never met and never will meet.

Peace is a grace that comes from doing the best that I possibly can. It means at the end of the day or at the end of a task, I'm able to say that I have done the very best that I could do. And at the same time, it has another piece, which is I can trust others that they are doing their very best. And, that I can trust God in God's infinite potential to change the world.

I can sit with myself and say, this is enough for right now. It means I can rest for a moment [00:08:00] and start all over again tomorrow. It means that I can maybe offer moments of peace to my comrades and others on this journey by saying, let me take this one and you rest. Let me keep the night watch. And you recover so that you can show up the next day.

It isn't something that comes from being in a militarized police state that technically isn't at war. It isn't something that comes from class privilege of being able to live in a gated community and have big doors with big locks that keep us safe from all of those outside. I don't think that those gates and those locks are what God intended when God talks about bringing peace to the [00:09:00] land, or when Jesus says that he leaves us with peace.

I think it can be so helpless feeling after exhausting days of feeling like it's futile, the work that we're doing. Whether it's exhausting conversations about racism or about why trans people are not asking for anything special when trans folks just want to live in the world in their own lives and in their own bodies in alignment with who they know themselves to be. I know it may feel hopeless in conversations about the Bible and sexuality or about Israel and Palestine and the occupation in Gaza. I know sometimes I worry that I'm not enough. That [00:10:00] I have this ridiculous feeling in my mind that I am somehow the savior or responsible for others' salvation, either in the physical embodied sense or in a spiritual sense. I think many of us faith leaders feel that mantle as if it is ours alone, and that can be very isolating. But I know almost all of us have these moments where it feels like we should be able to do the exact right thing or say the exact right thing in order to make the change in the world that we desire, both in our own lives and in the lives of people we love, and also in the world at large, and it just feels defeating and exhausting day after day when the change that we desire doesn't come about. I will be honest with you that we are nowhere near done [00:11:00] and we will not be done in our lifetimes, but there is a peace that exists.

There is a possibility not just for the privileged and the rich who can separate themselves from the world. Or from Christians who can meditate so deeply and intensely and unite in the mysticism of God, that they can escape their own bodies to be in the celestial realm for a little while. No, I'm not talking about that kind of peace.

I'm talking about a kind of peace that isn't about the lack of something or the absence of something that doesn't center, um, nothing to do, or everything being complete with a nice tidy bow on top. I'm not talking about that kind of peace. I'm talking about a form of existing deep in our integrity, and that [00:12:00] is where a place of rest and peace can come from for every one of us.

When I say I can rest at the end of the day because I have done the very best that I can, I mean, some days the best that one can do may mean that you make it through the day alive and come up again the next morning. It may mean that you got out of bed today and that was the absolute best you could do, and that counts.

That counts as resistance against systems that seek our death and despair. That counts as being your full self, even when your full self doesn't measure up to whatever the idea is that you've created for yourself. It is about a relationship both to one's own self and what we know to be true about the best that we can do. It is about [00:13:00] compassion for our own realities, our own experiences of trauma, of what's happening in our bodies and in society, and ev any given moment.

And it's also about trust for others and compassion to others. Trusting that as you live your fullest, brightest life within the circumstances and constraints of the reality that we're living in, you doing that day after day and whatever that looks like for you and only you know what is the best that you could do that day, that gives others permission and inspiration to do the same. So I trust myself to do the best I can to commit to that. I trust others to do the best that they can and their commitment to that.

And we trust that me doing my best every single day, and others doing their best every single day with the work that is each of ours to [00:14:00] do, that there is a grace that comes from the divine. There is a help, an aid, and a comfort that comes from God who can do so much with those two things. Peace for me is about not getting in our own way, not working ourselves into oblivion and exhaustion. Not killing ourselves for the cause, but also not holding back in what is possible that we can accomplish.

It's a very hard balance to strike, and it requires a ton of self work and self knowledge. It requires an interdependence with where we are and where others are in the world. And feeling that connectedness through the divine, through creation and living fully into that, it means being really clear about what we can do, what we can't do, what we're here to do, and what we are not here to do.

What is our assignment, and doing that the best that we can. [00:15:00] And so I can sit with the idea of peace. I can embrace it. I can even celebrate it. It doesn't mean a world free from tragedy. It doesn't mean that everything is resolved. It doesn't mean that there is a lack of a challenge of work still to be done of devastating consequences and injustice all around us.

Because if we wait for that kind of peace, none of us will ever see it in this lifetime. We can numb out, we can medicate. We can try to escape. But living in true peace, living in harmony with our internal beings, with our souls, with creation, and with the divine alongside each other is a process of deep self-work and self-healing and self-knowing and self-compassion. And then we start with the [00:16:00] innermost circle of ourselves and expand that understanding, that compassion, that effort, that trust out to our community, to the wider world, to all of creation and of course to the divine that holds it all together.

So I just wanted you to think with me for a little while. When someone wishes you, the peace of God or peace go with you, or in moments of extreme distress, thinking about peace be still and calming the waters. My prayer is that you have an additional understanding of peace, not just as the absence of something, but rather as the reflection of a way of being and a disciplined spiritual practice of living into who we say we are and what we say we believe.

Will you pray with me?[00:17:00]

God of peace let us know you even amidst the chaos. Help us to understand peace in its most internal form. Help us hear the call and the mandate for the self work that is required to feel settled in our souls, knowing what our lane is, knowing what our assignment is. Doing the very best we can and acknowledging for ourselves that this is the best that I can do.

May we lay it on the altar of liberation. May we hold it as a mustard seed of change. May we feel the consequences of our actions in the best possible ways, knowing that we are peacemakers whenever we create that sense of interdependence, trust [00:18:00] and love. Move through our days and our nights. Move through our waking and our sleeping.

Guide us and be with us and hold us. May we never feel alone. May we know the peace that comes through you by doing the best that we can, and then handing it off to a bigger source, to a greater mover. To the divine mycelium who move through all of creation and connect all things that can make all things possible, bring us peace. Bring the nations together.

May the guns be hammered into plows. May the harm that is done through bombing, through starvation. Through separation of families, may that cease. [00:19:00] May all of those things that cause us harm and pain to our planet, to our bodies, to our communities, may all of that be still. May we know the peace that is the absence of violence and war and harm, and may we, we also know the peace that comes deep within. In this season of advent, surround us with the hope of anticipation, with a knowledge of who we are in you, with a possibility of what can happen when we all align in our purpose.

May it be strong, may it be bright. May it be worthy of the divinity that each of us are endowed with. May we go in peace and lay down in peace and rise again in peace.

[00:20:00] In every holy and precious name we have ever been taught to call you, amen.

If you know somebody who needs to hear a little bit more about an adjustment of what peace means, if you know someone who needs a reminder to trust themselves and trust each other and trust the divine to fill in the gaps, won't you share this episode with them? Just take a minute to be the angel of peace, the messenger of the divine in this moment.

Let us know your experiences with peace. Do you agree with me on this newer definition, or not? Would you prefer to stick to the traditional one? As we start to bring this season of Love Letters with Reverend Sex to a close, we would also love to hear from you.

We would love it if there are questions that you would like for me to [00:21:00] engage, if there are topics that you would like for me to uncover, rediscover, process out loud, think about, meditate on in community. Please let us know. You can reach me @Reverend_sex on Instagram and all social media. You can also find us @Soulforceorg, or you can write us directly at hello@soulforce.org. Also, please like and subscribe, and all of the other things that you know how to do. Or just leave us a comment here, wherever you're listening to this podcast episode. Thank you for your space, for your spirit, for your time. May we go in peace.

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend [00:22:00] Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce.

Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist Christian, Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome.

Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of [00:23:00] faith.

Axis Mundi: [00:00:00] Axis Mundi.

Reverend Sex (Rev. Alba Onofrio): Hi, beloved. Welcome to Love Letters with Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Sex, and I wanted to introduce myself to you. This series is a part of the Soulforce Podcast Channel. And it's a place for deep liberating conversations about being Queer and Latine, decolonial theology, faith, gender justice, and above all, sacred resistance and healing.

I wanna tell you a little bit about me because I think about you all the time. We may not have met yet in person. I may not be able [00:01:00] to recognize your face or your name, but I think about you all the time. I think about our people, especially now in this moment. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect, especially now amidst the chaos and confusion amidst the hurt and overwhelm.

I believe it's possible. I believe that that is the way we move from here to where we are going, and I can't wait to have more conversations with you.

Hello, sacred timekeepers. You have found me in a time of celebration. This week we are celebrating the 90th birthday of the matriarch of our family. And so it is a great time of celebration and joy that she has made it so many years of love and life on this planet. [00:02:00] It feels like it fits in perfectly with this week's theme of joy.

If you have been listening along to Love Letters, you know that we are on week three of the season of Advent where we are supposed to celebrate joy. And if you have ever seen advent wreaths with the candles, if you had them in your church growing up, or if you've seen them around town, or maybe on your own family's table, this is the week of pink candle. Which is centered around this idea of joy around how the shepherds felt when they heard the good news of Jesus' arrival.

I wanna come at this in a different way. Because I want us to talk a little bit more about joy from a perspective that is specifically resisting white Christian Supremacy. So one of the [00:03:00] most foundational ideas that has been instilled in us, since we are very young, of white Christian Supremacy, is this idea of binaries. Mutually exclusive opposites. We're taught it from the time we are born, with our little kid games. We're taught that the opposite of white is black. We're taught that the opposite of fat is thin. The opposite of tall is short, and we have these opposite games.

And a question for me is always, thinking about trying to work through a different way of seeing the world is, why isn't the opposite of white rainbow? For example. Like a prism that absorbs or reflects light? Why isn't it being devoid of color on one side and then all of the colors of the rainbow on the other side, for example?

That's just one of the many, many, many ways we're taught to think about the world. [00:04:00] So the same thing is true around things like sexuality. Someone is either gay or someone is straight, and therefore those of us who are not within a gender binary or bisexual, pansexual, polysexual, all of these many other forms of sexual expression and gender expression are very confusing. Because we blur those lines.

Just like we're taught that there is chaos on one side and order on the other, we're also taught that there is good on one side and bad on the other. So in that way, white Christian Supremacy gets into us all day, every day for our entire lives, just by focusing on one of those two without even having to name the other.

So for example, when people say, I am a good American citizen, they are immediately playing on the idea that we will already know that if they are good and good fits in with [00:05:00] American, good fits in with citizen, good fits in with Christian, et cetera, et cetera, that we will already know that there is an opposite. Which is, not those things. So bad would be non-citizen, non-Christian, non-American, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So those binaries are at play all the time. And what happens when those of us who don't fit neatly into two opposite and opposing categories show up in the world? Well, we cause a lot of turmoil and chaos because we're taught everything should go in the good bucket or in the bad bucket.

And so those of us who complicate that narrative are seen as evil or bad because we make things quote unquote confusing. What would happen if we actually just got rid of the binaries entirely and recognize them for what they are, which is a strategy of white Christian Supremacy. So all of that is a very roundabout way [00:06:00] to say:

In this week where we are supposed to be joyful, many of us don't feel joy as our primary experience of this moment. There is so much grief and heartache, and fear and suffering. In the world and in our own internal lives, even. Maybe for the time of the year that it is for circumstances within our own lives, our own families, or just the state of the world around us in general, that it feels like we have to be completely in that mode of whatever those feelings are, such as grief or anger, and there is no space for joy. That feeling, that idea that we can only be one and not the other. So, if we are grieving the loss of someone that we love, or if we're furious about the current political condition or the genocides happening around the [00:07:00] world, or wars, et cetera, that we can never have a moment of joy.

And so, one of the things I wanna do in our time today is just name that idea for what it is. This binary logic as a strategy and tool of white Christian Supremacy and remind us what we already know to be true, which is that we can hold cosmos and worlds of truths within us. And that isn't bad. So even if you're outraged and frustrated and on the front lines.

Or very inwardly focused and grieving and hurting in this moment. That doesn't mean that there aren't also moments of joy and laughter. Those things can exist at the same time. It doesn't mean that you are less down for the cause or that you are betraying someone that you're grieving. What is actually true is that we hold within us many worlds and many truths and many realities.

[00:08:00] So I invite you in this time to think about, when we're feeling guilty about having moments of joy, whether it's through silly things like scrolling social media, or a funny thing that our favorite animal friend does in front of us at home. Whenever we have those moments of joy, not to take them in as moments of guilt, but rather to know that we, by having moments of joy, even within the moments of despair or grief or heaviness, that those are not contradictory. But rather those are part of the full embodied lived experience of being human and not something we need to have guilt for. But rather we can hold that as part of our resistance to the ideologies of white Christian Supremacy that tell us that we must live in this binary thinking of one or the other.

So now that we've gotten that binary thinking squared away with [00:09:00] giving ourselves permission to have many feelings at once and not have to be stuck in just one way of being and thinking perpetually in order to be our full selves, I'd like to switch to what I really wanna talk about this week. And that is Mary.

I could literally do an entire series on Mary, the mother of Jesus. I love her. I am super Marianistic in my beliefs, particularly around Guadalupe. And this past week was Guadalupe's feast day and I could just do a whole series. If that's something that you're interested in, leave us a message, send us a note.

We'd love to hear about that, and I can work on that particular area because it is something I love. You know, some people feel like Mary has been used as the tool of submission for women to put us in our place and tell us who we should be for so many generations that she [00:10:00] just cannot be redeemed. We have to kinda expel her and start over again with different myth figures and different, um, religious entities that can help us live into a more liberated way of being.

I can honor that that is a very logical, reasonable position, but that is not my position. I'm quite the opposite. I think her power over many, many generations is the reason why we should recover her, because there is so much to say about her.

So I am gonna take the time this week talking about joy, not in the kind of like, yay, yay celebration, momentary flickers of happiness that come up, but in a deep commitment to a future that winds up being the source of joy that is profound in its impact in her life and in the world in general. So let's talk a little bit about her.[00:11:00]

Mary is called the Theotokos or the God bearer. And that feels so deep in my spirit because she is the bearer of God in this, in this story, in this narrative of how Jesus comes to be in the world. But I think about how much our theology, our liberation theologies, and what we've talked about before in this series around the Imago Dei and being made in the image of the divine, how much actually all of us are Theotokos. All of us bear the resemblance of God, the being of God, the spark of the divine that is in us.

And so, when I think about her, I think about her as such an example, uh, of who we can be and how we can live into the world. Now, to say that as a queer feminist Christian pastor, that can be controversial, right?

Because I just told you all the ways that she's used to tell us that we should be [00:12:00] quiet and long suffering and sacrificial. But rather this week we're gonna talk about who was Mary? And maybe I'll start backwards. So, the Virgin of Guadalupe is the narrative of an Indigenous woman who appears on this hill here in Mexico City, just outside Tepeyac. And she comes and appears on this mountain, or this hill, that had been the home place of a famous, very important, very central goddess of the Meshika culture before colonization happened. Guadalupe comes in 1531. Which is just a little over a decade from when Hernán Cortés invaded Mexico and started massacring people.

So some of the things I wanna lift up, it's a beautiful [00:13:00] story, you should totally look it up. Every year on her feast day in December, millions upon millions upon millions, tens of millions of pilgrims come to the city to offer her devotion and gratitude and to ask her for help and support in different things going on in their own lives and in their families lives.

But what I wanna focus on is she is the apparition of Mother Mary, but she is in Indigenous. clothing. And she is an Indigenous woman and she's speaking to an Indigenous man. And what feels so important about this story to me is that she's showing up at this very particular time. This is not the long suffering, sweet, delicate flower that we're often given as this image of Mary, especially when we have her with her European phenotypes from, you know, medieval paintings coming out of the [00:14:00] colonizing countries in Europe. Or when we have even the Guadalupe with her eyes cast downward with her hands kind of folded. No, this is an apparition of an Indigenous woman. Coming on the mountain of one of the most powerful female goddesses of the pantheon, of the Meshika people and culture of that time.

And she's coming when her people are being slaughtered. And I'm talking about millions upon millions upon millions of humans. Up to 90% of the entire population has been murdered in a decade. So this is time of incredible misery and hurt and painfulness, where Indigenous folks in this new colonized world have no standing. And she is there to make a declaration, not only about her own power and her own ability to be there and [00:15:00] support her people, but also about the worthiness of, particularly at this moment, Indigenous people on this continent saying they are also children of the divine. They are also God's children and are worthy of full and equal, um, being and living in the world.

So, I love that image of her on this continent because oftentimes so much of what we read in the Bible feels so far away, but this particular tradition coming out of a Catholic tradition, even for me as an evangelical, feels so close because it's so much closer to where I am from and where I grew up.

So I love Guadalupe in that way. It's been almost 500 years since she has appeared on this continent for the first time, and her power is just as great as it was. More and more so I would say over time. So it's a really powerful image to look at her not as a submissive, um, passive [00:16:00] feminine like sub. So we can look at her not as like a supporting actress under the main role of some other figure, but rather as the protagonist of this story.

And it goes back to what I think of when I think of Mary, the mother of Jesus. She is not this sweet little delicate princess that so often she's painted to be in portraits and in the conceptualization of her from a patriarchal position. No. She is someone who was birthed and grew up in a resistance community.

She would have been under the Roman Empire at the time. She would've been part of a legacy of women who, and a whole [00:17:00] community, who were fighting to get out from under the repression of an entire empire of the Roman state. So when I think of her and her 'yes', the, the, the part of scripture that comes closest to mind is in Luke one.

We have this song called the Mag- Magnificat, which means my soul magnifies the Lord. It's the Canticle of Mary. It's one of the most ancient Christian hymns that we have, and it gives us a great idea of who she is. And a lot of times we'll talk about this as she's singing joyfully as she receives the news that she will be pregnant, she will have a son, his name will be Jesus.

This is when the angel comes to her and after she's done asking her questions and kind of giving him the rundown of like, how is this actually gonna work? 'Cause this doesn't make any sense, et cetera, et cetera. She sings this song called The [00:18:00] Magnificat, and it's in Luke chapter one. This is such an important part of our story for this, this week talking about joy.

Because it is the place where she is talking about what her joy is about. It's not this narrative that's given to girls of, like, oh, you're gonna be a mommy and it's gonna be great. There are a lot of us who wanted nothing more than to have children, and that is a huge part of our lives and our joy.

But this isn't what this song is about. It isn't where she goes to. It isn't a naive kind of, um, celebration of what's gonna be easy. Because nothing for her is easy and she knows it from this very moment. She knows that she will be seen as possibly having committed adultery. She knows that she's gonna have to go through the [00:19:00] pain of childbirth.

She will have seen it by this age. She will know that she may be a single mother. She knows that she's supposed to have a life and this is going to vastly derail that life into something else. This is a song where she's not yet aware, but she can only imagine.

With the history of how the Jewish people had been squashed by the Roman Empire time and time again, though they continued to rebel against the empire and refused to be colonized and refused to be subjugated with their culture, their practices, their faith for generations and generations. And yet she comes from a people who still resist. Even her name, Mary. We get that from the Greek. But, her name would've been the same as Miriam as in the sister of Moses who was powerful and rebellious, and a leader who [00:20:00] loved her people who was also known for singing and dancing.

This is the song of somebody who has endured suffering and who will continue to endure suffering. I mean, she will have to flee for the life of her child. She will have to run away to a different country where she doesn't know the language or the culture. She will have to flee in the night because of a narcissistic, ego-driven, maniacal ruler has decided to deploy the military in their own kingdom to disappear, baby boys. To slaughter them and their innocence because he is so tender that he's scared about there being some kind of ruler that has prophesied that was gonna come in and overthrow him.

[00:21:00] She will have to watch her firstborn son seemingly lose his mind when he is not a carpenter and doesn't follow, follow in his father's footsteps where their entire reputation goes to hell, where he's arrested and humiliated and publicly tortured and dehumanized, and then murdered publicly by the state under capital punishment for doing what? Doing nothing more than defying the powers that be and daring to declare that all of us are created equal in the image of God, that all of us have access to the Creator.

She was part of all of that. She comes from an anti-imperialist group of people who have been resisting, who have been freedom fighters for generations long before her and many generations after her. So she is coming to this canticle, this magnificat, this soul magnifying the Lord, in a way [00:22:00] that is saying not: I'm just gonna sit back and live the high life now I will be called the goddess of heaven and I have to do nothing else, but just celebrate that I was chosen among all women to be this wonderful Theotokos.

No, she is saying 'yes' with her whole being to stepping into a legacy and a promise that her people would not be quelled, that her traditions, her culture, her religion, would not be thwarted by systems of power that seek to kill and dehumanize anyone or anything that dares to defy them. No, she's coming to the magnificat saying: This is a moment that will be remembered and I will be remembered in history. Not for the princess sitting on my pillow, not doing anything, but rather for being part of the legacy of resistance.

She talks about in this magnificat, starting at verse 47 [00:23:00] in in Luke 1, talking about my soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God. This is a sense of her saying. Oh, this is the beginning of something. This is a continuation of something, and this is a new day. A new way of moving through the world. She talks about how God will bring the powerful down from their thrones and lift up those who are lowly. Who will fill those who are hungry with good things, and the rich people who have been hoarding, all of the resources will be sent away empty.

It's about God's mercy coming to the aid of those in need about those who struggle. And she even ends it by saying, this is part of what God's help is going to look like because of God's promises that were made to ancestors generations back. So when I think of her and I think of Guadalupe, I [00:24:00] think about promises of the divine to be with us, to be here in our midst not to do everything for us. Not that there won't be misery and sorrow and grief and trouble. But rather, oh, I can sit in the joy of knowing that I am stepping fully into a promise and I am help helping to actualize that promise in real life, in real time. In my lifetime right now.

And I don't know about you, but for me, that is a promise of great joy that makes me feel a satisfaction and a purpose and a connection and a commitment that I don't know that I would always call it joy. Sometimes it feels very scary. But it is something that feels so deep in my bones that gives me hope and gives me possibility. Helps me fuel for another day.

So I hope this week as you're [00:25:00] celebrating this season of Advent, if you are, and you're thinking about joy and you're holding the many feelings that we can feel at once, both good feelings and bad feelings, joys and sorrows, hope and despair, that you will also remember this canticle of Mary, this Magnificat where her soul is magnifying the Lord ahead of time and making its commitment yet again to step into a legacy of ancestral resistance that has outlived so many generations of freedom fighters and lovers, and mothers and caretakers and resistors.

May that be part of our prayer and our legacy this week and forever. Will you pray with me?[00:26:00] Oh, Emmanuel. God with us, God in us. God arounding us. Be with us here in this season of Advent. Sit with us in the joy alongside the tragedy. Sit with us in the satisfaction of being part of a long legacy of resistance to evil. Center us and ground us in Mary's Magnificat. Help us to find those moments where we can say, my soul magnifies you, oh God.

My spirit rejoices in your promises. Help us remember the way of mercy, of compassion. Help us be part of the processes. Help us be part of the [00:27:00] resistance. Help us be part of the hope. Help us be part of the peace. Help us do what we have been called to do as followers of a creator who wants abundant life for all, who creates us in the divine image.

Not just some of us, but all of us. Help us in this moment of division. In this moment of hate and anger. Of cancellation culture and being estranged from our neighbors. Help us remember the promises to be that which helps fill the hungry with good things. Helps us equal the playing field for those who have so much more access. And privilege. And resources. And others.[00:28:00]

Come to our aid. Help us to accept your work in the world, not as a heavy burden, but as a purpose driven commitment to what we have already been called to. May we be in the line of our ancestors who receive the promise that there would be a day where the lion and the lamb can cohabitate. Where there is war no more.

Help us sit in the joy of all of the small things that come together to make that world possible. May we be one in each other and in the vast kindom of creation where all are welcome and all are included, where all our wounds are healed and where we do not continue to hurt each other with our own [00:29:00] wounds.

Help us be a part of your solutions. Help your solutions be a part of who we are. And may we forever live into the hope and love and promise of knowing that you are who you are and you always will be with us amongst the people. Alongside us in our joy and in our grief, in all of the moments, big and small. We praise your name and glorify what is to come.

Amen.

If this episode of Love Letters with Reverend Sex touched your heart let us know. We'd love to hear your stories. What resonated? What were you taught about Advent or about this season of learning to celebrate joy within Christianity? What have you learned since leaving Christianity or on the [00:30:00] outside?

What brings you joy this season? Please let us know in the comments or reach out to us on social media @teosinverguenza @soulforceorg or @Reverend_Sex. We are grateful for your time and energy being with us. If there is someone who came to mind while you were listening, we encourage you to send this their way.

Maybe there's a little bit of joy that they need to have in this season, and this gives them permission or space to think about that in a different way. We are almost at the end of this season of Love Letters with Reverend Sex. So if there are topics that you would like for us to talk about next season, please make sure to be in touch.

We're working on that now. And while we'll miss you for a little while, we'll be back soon. As soon as the new year starts, by the end of January, we'll be back on the air. So thank you again, and you are listening to Love Letters with Reverend Sex.[00:31:00]

Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and Love Letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, also known as Reverend Sex, the ED and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce.

Make sure you also check out our Monday show, Teología Sin Vergüenza, which is a space for Queer and feminist Christian, Latine folks navigating faith in family, sexuality and identity, where we talk to theologians, elders, and everyday saints about decolonizing our faith and working on social justice issues from a very informed political lens while shamelessly, theologically centered in our faith. You are welcome.

Leave us a review and comment on Apple Podcasts and make sure to visit soulforce.org to find more resources on fighting white Christian Supremacy and building life affirming communities for all those at the margins of [00:32:00] faith.

Rev. Alba Onofrio

[00:18] Oh beloved, hi. Welcome to the second season of Love Letters with me, Reverend Sex. I've been thinking about you so much recently. All the time, really. We may not have met in person, I may not be able to recognize your face or your name yet, but I can feel you here with me, in my spirit and in my bones. I've been praying for us. I pray for our people, now more than ever. I'm obsessed with how we find each other, how we connect and heal, especially now, amidst the violent chaos and spiritual overwhelm in these hard and painful days, sins generations deep now surfacing.

[01:06] This series is part of the Shameless Theology Podcast channel brought to you by Soulforce. And Love Letters is a spirit space to laugh and grieve, to unlearn the bad theology we've been taught and most importantly, a place for us to gather for just a few minutes each week to find each other and remember who we really are. I believe in our sacred resistance and I believe in us. These are my love letters to you and all of us who need them.

[01:39] Welcome. I'm so glad you're here. On the ocean side in a very small island here in the more than 7,000 island archipelago called the Philippines. And I am reflecting on the work that we've been able to do while we've been here and I'm just feeling honored and blessed to sit with that. I often come to the ocean because she is the only body big enough that I feel like can help regulate all of the emotional turbulence and turmoil that I often carry in my body from spending so much time with our people who carry such heavy burdens of resistance and love, but also discrimination and harm.

[02:29] So you find me reflective tonight and I'm sending this love letter out to all of us who need a reminder to choose love over fear when the days get heavy and the emotions get chaotic and turbulent. This past week I had the honor and pleasure of doing a question and answer session with an amazing LGBTQ youth advocacy group in Manila they're called Pantai and that means equality in Tagalog. And we got the regular questions that I always get, which is like, what does the Bible say about queer people?

[03:14] And what is true about Sodom and Gomorrah? Can we talk about that? Is there a theology within Christianity that ever accepts us? Why is God so punitive? And if I choose to believe in a God who is loving and accepts me as I am, isn't that just me making God into my own image and isn't that idolatry? And what do I do when I've spent my life in a very particular religious setting and I don't want to believe those things anymore, but they are completely ingrained in how I see myself and how I see the world?

[03:55] All of those are amazing questions. And if you would like for me to go over any of those answers of my take on those questions, then drop us a note, either an email or on social media and let me know and it will get added to the queue. So we went through lots of those questions and there was beautiful musicians who were expressing their experiences of queerness and coming out and love in the closet through music and performance. And then there was this raw moment where a mother of queer young people got really honest and emotional and through tears, she asked and reflected.

[04:44] You know, it's like one of those questions where it isn't quite a question. It's more of an expression of hurt or emotion, but it comes out in a way that's like, can we talk about this? And I was so grateful for it. And through her tears, she asked the really simple question of, why aren't there more of us? Why do people continue to choose hate over love? Why is it so hard to get people on our side? And why does it feel like religion is always the reason on the other side?

[05:21] It was an honest question. It felt like it came straight from her heart as the mother of people who are queer, who she loves in a community of people that she loves, but feels like is often on the outside. So I thought I would bring that here to our love letter and share a little bit about what I told them. I believe that it's not hate that they're choosing, but rather it's fear. I feel like most of us progressive folks have heard all about the cheap tactic of creating a common enemy like queer and trans people or feminism or immigrants or poor people in order to try to get folks to align, to align on your side a strategy of division and hate

[06:15] that we are currently just seeing all around us on full display. Fear of immigrants taking our jobs, which leads to hate through xenophobia, or women having autonomy over our bodies, which leads to hate in the form of misogyny, or fear around our own sexuality and gender that leads to transphobia and we talk about that a lot, how the right creates enemies through othering people, groups of people and labeling them as dangerous. I talk about it a lot, actually, in my book under the idea of spiritual terrorism.

[06:57] But what we don't talk about enough, I think, is how religion and Christianity in particular fit into that whole strategy of divide and create common enemies through fear of somebody stealing your jobs or ruining families or having the power to say yes or no about what happens to them. And I think in particular, all of this fits into religion in a particular way because of white Christian supremacy. Because the Bible could be used to talk about how we should love our neighbor and how we should welcome the immigrant.

[07:45] There are hundreds of references of how we should care for those who are most vulnerable, or how we should be on the side of equality for all and the leadership abilities of women. So it's not like there isn't a choice in the matter or that there isn't a case to be made for inclusion and justice from a biblical standpoint. So one of the things that I want to talk about is how we choose one side over the other, how we choose the messages of division and fear over those of love and inclusion.

[08:26] And one of the things I talk about often that I will continue to talk about because it's of great concern to me is about our teachings around love and particularly on our beliefs about love in relationship to fear. Even though the Bible uses the phrase fear not or don't be afraid dozens and dozens of times throughout the Bible, the Old and the New Testaments, we still learn that people of faith should quote-unquote fear God. Many know this to be a mistranslation.

[09:04] The word in terms of fear is actually respect. We should respect God. But we get this understanding from church and from religion that love and fear can go together in our relationship with God, with this Heavenly Father, with this figure that is supposed to be our divine parent. And then we believe that about God, this God that is supposed to be our closest love relationship and our example of the most perfect love. That gets projected on what we believe about human love.

[09:45] So, consequently, all kinds of physical, emotional, and spiritual violence gets normalized in this process. We learn that it's okay to be scared of someone that we're in a relationship with, even someone who's supposed to love me. And even if they have a lot more power than I do, this certainly rings true in many parent-child relationship. I feel like I see this often on social media and other places where we think that we're supposed to be scared of our parents, or our parents make us feel like we are at their mercy, even when we're grown, whether it's through cultural expectations or through actual physical power or financial power.

[10:41] But there's this idea that it's okay for us as parents, on the other side, to enforce what we want from our children through the fear of violence or the fear of rejection. We are sold this image in interpersonal relationships in general and in love relationships and romantic relationships in particular, that we have this image of God as a punitive, jealous, and rigid divinity who gets angry. And we conflate and are taught to conflate love and respect with fear. And that model then repeats itself in human relationships, not surprisingly.

[11:28] I feel like so many people come to Christianity not because they fall in love with God, the Christian God, or even the Christian teachings, but because they are scared of hell and they're scared of God and they're trying to avoid punishment. This is certainly true, I would say, for most children who make the decision to become a Christian and through conversion tactics around calling us sinners and saying that we deserve hell for all of eternity. And then that fear and trying to avoid punishment by the powers that be then gets repeated again and again in society.

[12:08] We're trying to avoid the wrath of those with power, whether it's our bosses at work or our government officials, the police, or religious leaders. In church, we tell people to listen rather than talk. Kids in Sunday school are chastised for asking too many questions. Doubts and concerns about the Bible and religious authority are labeled as rebellious or failures of faith or signs of a poor spiritual life. And so in this way, we quickly learn that obedience is the price we pay for belonging and compliance is the currency of safety.

[12:52] Then that gets mapped out onto the rest of our lives. It's easier not to question the authorities. It's easier to keep my head down and not resist the system. And it's okay for us to be scared of our law enforcement, of our elected officials, of our leaders, that it's normal to live in fear, in fear of punishment and consequences of being who we are. And practically speaking, it's just pragmatic for us to try to avoid all that. Fear is such a controlling force in all of our lives and all of our societies.

[13:40] One of the things that makes me love our LGBTQIA plus people so, so much that we as a people choose love over fear time and time and time again. In so many ways, it's easier to just go along rather than to resist, to let the tide carry us rather than to go against the flow. We have an entire community to comply with the current mandates around gender and sexuality. Even though fear is justified, it's so real and so strong, we as a people choose love and life, even though sometimes it really does feel like we're not sure we can actually survive it.

[14:33] But I came out because the desire to belong for who I truly am, to find my own people, and that desire to be in community, that for me was greater than my fear of all the bad things that could happen to me once I was out. And to me, that's a miracle. So many of us are isolated and yet we have a similar experience, that something deep, let's call it the spark of the divine or the Imago Dei, there's just something there that's so strong that it overpowers the fear.

[15:20] Our longing for authenticity and for love and for each other and for life, this force, it becomes more powerful than the fear of judgment or even of violence and rejection. We live in a society where it's so much easier to go along, to get along, and the threats of violence are constant for those who don't conform. It is incredibly brave and beautiful to choose love over fear day after day after day. And that's what our people do. It's like what Jesus taught us.

[16:07] Some things are difficult, particularly love and our own truth. I believe that Jesus knew full well that his message of equality and love could get him killed by the state. He had the opportunity to retract his claims, to take back his teachings in order to save his own life, and he didn't. He knew they wouldn't let him get away with love and power and empire. They gave him the opportunity to recant, to take back all of that stuff he said so that he could go on and have a nice, normal, comfortable life.

[16:54] And he said no. He resisted the hegemonic powers and principalities. I'm sure he was scared. I mean, how could he not be? But he chose love and it cost him greatly, and for us, choosing love over fear always comes with consequences. But it is my deep hope that when we are brave and choose love, that we can feel the lineage of Jesus and that kinship, that it is strong, that it is alive in us. And I wish for us that all of our love may be reciprocated back to us, so that we can also do the math of the cost-benefit analysis and conclude the same thing that he did, which is that love is always worth it in the end.

[17:52] Will you pray with me? Beloved one, the one who casts out fear, the one who teaches us to love, help us understand your love more clearly. Help us reject the notion that fear can ever be conflated with love and respect. Help us to understand your words. Help us to understand your actions. Help us to see the divine in each other. Give us fortitude and strength for the journey ahead. May we always be so brave in your example that we always choose love over fear.

[18:49] Cover us and protect us in our fight for freedom and equality. Protect those who are most exposed and most vulnerable. Give strength and courage to those who step out from the conflation of obedience as faith. May we be fortified and persevere. May we be recognized in community. May we receive the benefit of love and belonging, not in exchange for compliance and obedience, but rather in exchange for our own true selves, for the vulnerability of showing the world who we are. Bless this community and keep us always.

[19:42] In your holy and precious name we pray. Amen. Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me and love letters from Reverend Sex. I'm your host, Reverend Alba Onofrio, aka Reverend Sex, and I'm the Executive Director and Spiritual Strategist here at Soulforce, the org that sponsors this podcast. I want to make sure you also know about our Monday show called Shameless Theology, where we talk to queer, trans, and feminist theologians, faith activists, and Christian clergy from a Latina lens.

[20:21] We talk about things like religion, family, sexuality, identity, and home. It's a space where we shamelessly tell the truth to both decolonize our own faith and also amplify the voices of sexual violence, religious phenomena that defile the faith. So check out our weekly conversations on Shameless Theology podcast and download our new book on our website at soulforce.org. I hope you've enjoyed this episode of Love Letters from Reverend Sex. If someone you love came to mind during this episode, consider forwarding it as a love letter of your own.

[21:01] Until next time, may your heart be ablaze with love and be fiercely loved. We'll talk again soon.