Toxic Masculinity & Punching Nazi’s

Content Note: mention of nazi’s, toxic masculinity, gender stereotypes, mass incarceration, forgiveness

As I scroll through my news feed over the past week I am disturbed by the drastic increase in violent messages. My Facebook page slants leftward and thus every third post is some variant on the “punch a nazi” meme, which has been disconcerting in ways that do not feel healthy or helpful. So I’d like to unpack this, in my usual public way of scattering seeds of ideas that I hope will prompt further exploration among those that read them.

First of all, I feel I need to add a disclaimer. I’m a white, temporarily able-bodied person, who has recently been granted an immense amount of class privilege. I’m also autistic, queer, transgender, and a trauma survivor. In this reflection I am speaking only for myself and the questions that I am experiencing. I do not condemn anyone for acting in self-defense, nor is this an attempt to dictate a set of norms that everyone must follow. I’m asking these questions because I believe it is healthy for all communities to explore the benefits and consequences of their methods, even as they are firmly in agreement about their goals.

For the record, I firmly stand against any ideology that dehumanizes, others, or calls for the genocide of humans because of their race, class, ability, gender, sexuality, religion, or any other aspect of identity. I abhor the ideologies of eugenics, the violence of the American system of mass incarceration, and the intricacies of systemic discrimination that are interwoven in every aspect of our lives.

That said, as I was thinking through the prevalence of the “punch a nazi” meme, I couldn’t help but wonder if there is a connection between the call for violence with toxic masculinity. Toxic masculinity, as I’ve seen it described, is the way in which those who are perceived to be male are encouraged to use violence to solve their problems, to hide (or deny) their emotions, and to remain in control whatever the cost. This concept is also interwoven with a societal valuation of masculinity being more useful than femininity. As one of the ways that toxic masculinity reinforces these expectations is shaming, the parallel grows even more haunting to me with every “if you aren’t punching nazi’s you’re on the wrong side of history” post I read.

As I write this, I am mindful of the ways in which the skills our society calls feminine, those of connection and bridging, empathy and love, have been misused and twisted. The very concepts of ‘love’, ‘respect’, and ‘tolerance’ are still being used as weapons to coerce and force people to ‘forgive’, or rather to appear to have forgiven, those who are still actively causing them harm. With this in mind, I still wonder what it would look like to value radical feminine skills alongside the violent response the punch a nazi meme involves. Empathy that demands accountability. Bridges back to the community that require those who have caused harm to acknowledge the destruction they have caused. Educators who know the value of what they teach, and yet still stick with that one person who doesn’t quiet get it. And they do so not from a place of coercion or desperation, but because they are adequately resourced, valued, and supported and thus can choose to do this necessary and valuable work.

Perhaps I have a higher valuation for this connection based activism because of how it has changed my life. The place I come from taught me many racist ideas (along with ableism, sexism, heterosexism, cisnormativity, and many, many others), most of which I am still actively unlearning. All I can say is that the person I am today depended heavily on people with the later skills, who met me where I was, showed me the harm I caused, and loved me even as I make the repeated mistakes necessary to unlearn a destructive habit.

With this in mind, I believe it is very possible to be firmly against nazi ideology and not be able or willing to use physical violence. For me, I hesitate because I’m always aware that because of my sensory needs and gender the American penal system would be a terrible fit for me. Thus for me to punch a nazi would be to commit an egregious act of self-destruction. This does not mean that I desire passive resistance, in which the martyrs pile up to no good end. I’d simply ask that between the bleeding and fighting we reflect on what skills we want to see flourish when the time of violence truly does come to an end. What are we doing to protect and care for our empathetic dreamers, our reconcilers, and our healers, who are excluded from our communities when violence is offered as the only acceptable option? How are we celebrating the unique gifts that everyone can bring to the struggle for justice? What types of responses are needed now, and which do we hope to see needed in the future?

The Invisible Rejection: People of Agender & Non-Binary Gender Identities after the Primates Decision

                My Facebook & Twitter pages have been full of news lately discussing the decisions reached during the Primates' meeting.  Not being an expert in Anglican polity I’m not going to even attempt to wade into the mess of who has authority over whom, and what these decisions mean. I’ll even freely admit I lack a historical context for what is going on, though you better believe Anglican history will be high on my to-do list when I get to seminary.

                Rather than delving into a quagmire I am unqualified to explain, I’d like to speak about a troubling linguistic trend that has taken root among those renouncing the primates decision. I feel like a broken record, a conscript for the language police, for going back to this. Yet apparently it still needs to be said. If you’re posting about your support for “our LGBT brothers and sisters” you are actively participating in the erasure of our siblings with many genders and no gender.

                Indeed, I find these responses, in all orders of ministry, to be far more painful than sanctions from a distant body. It is hurts because I am overwhelmed by the expectation that we are done working for equality. As “The Episcopal Church Welcomes You” floods my feed, and I find myself shaking my head at the complacency which surrounds those posts.  

Do the people rushing in to proclaim their welcome consider how unwelcoming it is to see terminology that silences your experience?  Your existence? Are they aware that in our 1979 Book of Common Prayer there is a Eucharistic prayer that specifically excludes everyone who is not a son or daughter from the “everlasting heritage of God”? Have they considered how painful it is to be caught up in the movements of the Easter vigil, hungry for a sign of grace, only to hear that you are not a part of the celebration because of your (a)gender? Do they know how tiring it is to repeat for the umpteenth time ‘my pronouns are they/them’, and receive a grammar lecture in response to your invitation?

                In this rush of people running in to proclaim their support for gay marriage in the Episcopal Church, I instead find myself inundated by reminders that I’m not supposed to exist. With every Episcopalian who declares how open we are to our “LGBT brothers and sisters”, I’m told that the pain of discrimination I’m experiencing within the Episcopal Church is irrelevant. All of this leaves me feeling like a pawn in a larger game, a token of equality who is supposed to blend into the rainbow crowds hissing at the primate’s decision.

                But I don’t blend in. I long to participate in a catholic church where my welcome is based not on geography or my skills as an educator/activist, but on Christ’s presence in every human being. I also cannot passively accept the Episcopal Church’s characterization of ourselves as a bastion of inclusion while we remain reluctant to engage with the cissexism, heteronormativity, racism, classism and ableism that abound within our institutional church.

Indeed, as I watch this ecclesiastical drama unfold, I find myself pulling away, in pain and confusion. For even the language of these debates contributes to the erasure, the enforced invisibility, of my people. Yet, much as I long to, I cannot remove myself completely. For it was in the Episcopal Church that I first heard the gospel, the place where  I was first told that my existence was not a sin, that community in which I learned that God could and does love me for who I am, who I’ve been and who I will become.

 So rather than retreat completely, I offer to my church this meager cry of pain. I give you this mess of words that hold a seed of the longing within me. I offer you these reflections, as I offer to God this prayer, remembering that in all things, in all times, and in all places, we are called to abide with one another in love.  Love for ourselves and our neighbor, for those we agree with, and those we cannot understand, love for those who are hurting and for those who rejoice. 

Creator God, I pray for your church. For the heirs of your dominion who hear from the right and the left that they are deformed, unworthy, invisible. We ask you to be with all who doubt their strength to endure another round of rejection, that your Word may enfold and shield them from the countless mortal words of ignorance and fear. We pray for those who struggle to find your constancy in a tumultuous world. For all of us who have inherited a legacy of oppression from all sides, and stare at a quagmire that defies peaceful resolution by our own strength. May all of us come to know your truth in our lives. Open our ears when it is time to listen, and guide our tongues when it is time to speak. Above all gracious God, be with us in our times of division, that we may never fail to see how you are making us one.   

Onward to Galilee: The Mission Field Within Us

My biggest struggle with the Episcopal Church’s newfound focus on evangelism is that is starts from an assumption that we have the answers. As we grow ever bolder in telling each other to “go forth” and “be the Jesus movement” I wonder why we assume Jesus is starting in our churches. Perhaps my unique situation has left me doing evangelism backwards, but at this moment I’m learning the Gospel in the world, and weeping as cries of Jesus in my friends go unheard in the church.

                It is in my work, listening to survivors of intimate partner violence take steps to reach safety, often fighting stigma, isolation and their faith communities along the way, that I see resurrection being lived. At the boisterous table of a local college, full of people who’ve found themselves rejected by the local churches (including the Episcopal Church); I join in a sacramental meal with others who are hungry for a life that transcends the limits of this world. Instead of a home, my community is a scattered group of friends, of many different beliefs and unbelief. It is they who hold me as I cry under the weight of discrimination. It is these people, many of whom have left organized religion years ago who tell me that God didn’t make a mistake in me. And it is in those moments that I can feel the Gospel come to life. For it is in these places of the world, the “mission fields” that church is gearing up to save, that I’m actually at home.

                It is hard to admit this, especially in a church that values the appearance of being well put together. When we speak of the challenges of going into the world, I don’t ever see conversations about people like me who are more comfortable eating at soup kitchens than the hotels we schedule our conventions.  Indeed, the more I learn about oppression and bias in the world, the less welcome I am on Sunday morning. The more comfortable I get in naming my discomfort when we blame mass shootings on “the crazies” instead of engaging in our own role in perpetuating a culture of violence, the more I’ve been told to be quiet. As I get more forceful in demanding that I be treated as the person God made me, the more I am told to tolerate erasure for the sake of relationship. When I bring up an aspect of oppression that we engage in, by active participation or silently complicity, I am asked to not be disruptive. I watch in pain as the marginalized people I keep lifting up, my dying friends, are so often reduced to a ‘controversial new issue’ that we aren’t ready to engage with.

I’ve fallen silent online because I don’t know how to blog about faith when I’m desperately hungry for a sacramental vitality that feel so distant. For example, as I sat with the pain of General Convention and my rising alienation from my home parish, I needed to change my rule of life. On those pages I had written “I will attend the Eucharist at least weekly” because I was inspired by the richness of life I experienced when daily Mass was a part of my routine.  After this summer that statement became restricting. After much painful discernment I’ve found it to be sinful to expect myself to endure dehumanizing otherness simply to participate in the rites of the church. That line has since been expanded to read in full:

The sacraments, those set rituals and spaces where heaven and earth are joined with the full communion of saints bearing witness, are for me also the epicenter of invitation and exclusion. Caught between the eternal invitation of Love and the time-bound exclusion of language, those moments of life can also thrust me back into the shadows. Thus in the this next phase of my Christian growth I commit to participation in the sacraments when doing so will not cut me off from Christ’s loving presence. In times when I am unable to worship with my siblings I will allocate time for intercessory prayer, that we all may be one as You and the Father are one.

Throughout this transition, from star Episcopal young adult on the ordination fast-track, to one fed by the presence of Jesus in the world while ministering to a church that denies him daily, I’ve never lost my love of ritual and liturgy. Each time I come to a service where I can dare to hope that it will be inclusive, tears burst forth, as I drink in the worship as a starving person might water in the desert. In the absence of those places, I’ve spent so many nights crying myself to sleep longing for a church home that sees me, and loves me for all that I am. I’m desperate for a faith community that takes my awareness of inequality along my comfort in the forbidden places as the gifts that they are, instead of as a threat to stability. Indeed, I’m dying for lack of a place where I can enter the celebration of the Eucharist without being told that my name is unimportant, and my pronouns are too complicated.  All of this is happening while I am still an active member of a church that shapes its advertisements around ‘welcome’ and constantly tells me how good I have it here.

                Because of this pain, when this prompt first came out, I was going to skip it. How could I go to Galilee, when I can barely bring myself to endure the dehumanization and separation that is so often asked of me within our Episcopal Church? How could I write about evangelism, when I’m currently learning more about the Gospel from the people who’ve left, then the ones who expect me to stay?

                It was in these questions that I began to see how it is that I can be growing into my ministry and away from the body that first sent me to it in the same moment. My Galilee is not the mission fields of the world, but the Episcopal Church. Instead of the childhood salvation plan I once forced on to others, I am called to bring the Gospel back into my own worshiping community by testifying to the places where fear and pride are keeping us from the death that could, through the power of Jesus, bring us back to life. I feel like an alien on Sunday morning, because I’ve met the living God in the faces of the oppressed and broken.

So as we speak of going forth, I offer this reflection. When we think about evangelism are we doing our own work to be sure we are ready for them. When we issue the invitation, are we asking ourselves the hard questions? When we go into the world do we expect those we meet to conform to our expectations? Or do we dare to offer the unthinkable Gospel of mutual transformation in the name of Jesus Christ?

Healing Waters: Resurrection at General Convention

                Resurrection is such a joyous word. It calls forth life where there once was death and is traditionally greeted with resounding alleluias. This direct link between resurrection and glee has made it difficult for me to wade into the waves of resurrection I had the opportunity to experience at the 78^th General Convention of the Episcopal Church. I’ve been off-line for the past couple of weeks as the “look at all the cool stuff we did” posts grated at my raw spirit while I struggled to find meaning in the intensity of an event that simultaneously took major steps to proclaim the gospel while still revealing how many gaps there are in living that gospel out within our walls.

                Long before I boarded my flight to Salt Lake City, I had already recognized that much of my ministry would be rooted in presence. As someone who hears that people like them* don’t exist on a daily basis (avg. 15-19 times a day at #GC78) I understood that a large part of my work would involve simply being there as myself. I knew this work would be challenging, but was entirely unprepared for what happened.

                I was present at every worship service offered by General Convention. Yet even as I was in awe at how many different cultures were celebrated and named within that space, I struggled to stay. From the opening worship service to the closing there was not a single official Eucharist that didn’t imply that people like me* don’t exist. Added to this, before that first service I had been told by two armed security guards and an official from the church that the direct action for justice I had learned in the Episcopal Service Corps and campus ministry would lead to me being exiled from the convention if I dared to try anything like it again.

                Hands shaking, I cried out for something, anything to help me stay present. I stumbled across a piece of paper and a pen. Weeping I struggled to find words that would help me stay. In the music video for the Canticle of the Turning, which is a paraphrase of the Magnificat, there is a picture of a building which has the phrase “Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes” spray painted on its side. So, trembling,  I told the truth and created a sign that read “I am not a son or a daughter but I am still, now and always, A Child of God, beloved, made worthy and a part of the everlasting heritage”**.  Adapting a carabineer clip to serve as a pin I fastened it to my back. As I did so I trusted that the God who called me to serve in such a painful place could turn that flimsy piece of paper into a mighty shield through faith in the same God that made those words true.

                Barely a few moments after I had taken up my paper shield of faith, I was approached by an older woman who asked to read it. When she had finished she reached for it, to take it from me, saying “I don’t believe that’s appropriate”. I had to grab her hand, and tears poured down my face as I said “no, I need this”. This was an unfortunate adaptation, for what was in my heart was “no, WE need this”.

                I wrote that tweet as struggled with the congratulatory nature of Presiding Bishop Katherine’s sermon on prophetic voices that centered on the amazing prophetic work the Episcopal Church is doing, and yet was silent on the need for prophets to call us out on the injustices within our institution.
                In that moment and at many others throughout the week I was brought face to face with the years of shame I had internalized about crying. From the myth “boys don’t cry” to being exiled from my IEP meetings for tears I have spent my entire life hearing that to cry is to be weak, an inconvenience or at the very least unprofessional. But at convention that shame was broken down as I learned that my presence, tears and all, could be transformed into a powerful witness. 

               Those people who simply stayed with me, holding my grief as though it was their own helped me reach a place where I could remember the truth I stated above. Even as I wept I knew that no immediate action could change the hurt I felt. I was not, am not, looking for a quick fix. What I sought, and what I found in many different ways were people who were brave enough to stay present even without having the answers. Simply knowing that I wasn’t expected to carry all of this alone made it possible keep going. 
             

                This is resurrection. We didn’t solve all of the gender discrimination issues within our church, but I was thanked by a young trans man who could see himself in my testimony on C037. We certainly didn’t fix racism, but in faith we heard the voices of six young people from widely different places who boldly shared their experiences of race in the Episcopal Church. While we still might be surrounded by a “decline narrative” we took huge steps in reshaping how we view and fund evangelism.

               When I think about the resurrection I found at convention it feels very different from that which is portrayed as “normative”. I’m not giddy with joy, or running out to tell people how I had an amazing time. Instead I’ve found myself in stillness and prayer, reflecting on the gritty work of resurrection. To be resurrected and to proclaim resurrection in that space I cried a lot. I wept and shouted, I hid and returned. The resurrection I experienced at General Convention didn’t come all at once, and certainly wasn’t a pleasant experience.

               Despite the pain and hurt, and the rawness that lingers, it was worthwhile. For I’ve found that what defines resurrection isn’t comfort but transformation.  Resurrection isn’t just Easter day, but it is the oblation, the holy offering of oneself, to God’s purpose each and every day. To live a resurrected life means staying present when common sense has long sense been reduced to folly and reason is completely unreasonable. Resurrection was at General Convention, in tears and laughter, joy and pain. I left a different person that I arrived, transformed by the people I met and able to trust that my presence led to transformation in others.

                This is resurrection, and while I’m not yet ready to say I’m looking forward to it, I’ll certainly be there to do this all over again in 2018.

*People whose genders are both, neither, a blend of, or without reference to masculinity and femininity

**”part of the everlasting heritage” was a direct reference to Eucharistic prayer B which was the form for that morning and includes the exclusive phrase “everlasting heritage of your sons and daughters” (BCP pg. 369)