On July 16, I offered a lay-lead service @theunitariansociety6829, my home congregation. I provided readings and a sermon, and along with members of the band, the music for the service. It was an incredible chance to weave together a spoken message with my songs on the topic of Transformational Queer Joy.
I begin with a reading, followed by my original song Brand New Human, a song about the ways not allowing youth to have models and affirmation stifles them and prevents them from being full human beings in the same ways other forms of oppression prevented, or could have prevented great creators and thinkers from doing things that have been so valued by society.
“You can’t be what you can’t see. You might be a brand new human.” This song is very special to me because it was inspired by the transgender youth I work with professionally who have taught me so much.
I split the sermon into two parts. The first is about my personal journey of coming out and how Queer Joy, gender euphoria and being able to be authentic help me personally to embody my truth and my identity despite minority stress and political backlash.
This section is followed by Yet, Love, a song about the dialectic of queer joy and queer trauma, and the ways they coexist in me. “Oh, oh, we made it out love, yeah we made it out alive, and yet, love, little died, little you died…” We played a scaled down version without backup singers or strings, and while I love those elements, it felt powerful to just allow the simple power of the song to speak for itself.
The second half of the sermon focused on Transformational Queer Joy as a powerful political tool. In this section I speak more about my work a director of QuEAR Candy, a non-profit organization that I started to raise funds for and produce a, intersectional, radically welcoming Pride music festival in my community. Specifically, I focus on a recent fight in my town in which after fighting for pride flags to be prominently displayed on our main street, our Mayor removed several flags in front of a Synagogue at the Rabbi’s request, then removed the rest of the flags. I am incredibly proud of the advocacy and organizing work I was able to do to get the flags returned (albeit briefly). Most powerfully, this was achieved by bringing together members of the intersectional LGBTQ+ and Orthodox Jewish communities in my town with the help of @eshel3113 – Eshel, an organization supporting Orthodox Jewish families with LGBTQ+ members.
QuEAR Candy was able to lead a powerful community action in which members of the community demonstrated that the LGBTQ+ and Orthodox Jewish community overlap, intersect, and along with allies, have the same goals of inclusion and affirmation of all groups. I use this action as an example of how Transformational Queer Joy can be a powerful tool for bringing people into a movement in ways that are not always possible when joy and celebration are left out of movements.
We play Who’s My Enemy early in that section when I discuss how town leadership, and some religious leadership seemed to be hoping these groups would easily come to view each other as enemies. We end with a cover of Allison Russel’s stunning You Are Not Alone. I had the incredible pleasure of singing this song as a duet in the style of @BrandiCarlile and @AllisonRussell at the QuEAR Candy festival this year with the exceptional person and exceptional songwriter @roriekelly. While you’re here, pop on over to Rorie’s channel, they are seriously the best songwriter I know – like Brandi and Allison but willing to play QuEAR Candy!!
For the service, again the band and I simplified and went for a scaled down version with a single vocal. The turnout for the service was great, which was so moving, and it meant so much to be able to sing this song write to the folks in the room, many of whom are long-time friends and supporters, and others who may just need to hear the message that I also used as the QuEAR Candy theme this year “We Have Love.”
I hope you enjoy watching this sampling of highlights from the service. You can watch the full service here on The Unitarian Society’s page https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbIcbcEsyQ4.
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