Who are the vulnerable?

Photo by Katie Rainbow ud83cudff3ufe0fu200dud83cudf08 on Pexels.com

This week, the Otago Daily Times has covered a submission made to the Dunedin City Council urging Council to provide separate changing facilities for trans women and that Council staff should direct them to that facility.

The submitter, described as a feminist nurse, was interrupted in her presentation by the Mayor spontaneously rebutting her words in the name of being inclusive.

In a later edition, one transwoman user of the Pool concerned bravely allowed herself to be interviewed and photographed. She talked of the importance of swimming for her. She also admitted to being self conscious when changing in the women’s changing rooms.

The woman who made a submission to the council, in her intention to protect vulnerable girls and women, has, perhaps inadvertently, or maybe also intentionally, made her imagined enemy more vulnerable.

I really am not sure where the impression has come from that some predators deliberately ape female dress and style in order to prey on vulnerable women. There may be men who do that. It seems to be one fear – of trans women – being added to another fear of being preyed upon. More subtlety is needed in our analysis of the world.

Genuine transwomen have usually had a long confusing and lonely road to coming out as trans. They may have lost friends and family along the way as they worked to address their dysphoria (unease with their body and identity). They generally know, if they have been unable to afford to have surgery or if they made their transition after puberty, that they are noticeable as not-quite-female or not-quite-male but something else simply as they walk down the street. Even clothing choices and getting the usual female styling and body maintenance done must be awkward and often embarrassing. Finding a cohort of people who have the same experience or who understand enough for you to be comfortable with them must be almost impossible for some, especially in small towns.

Photo by Anni Roenkae on Pexels.com

Children of course are vulnerable. And even though we haven’t done as good a job as we think we have looking after children in New Zealand over the decades now exposed by the Royal Commission, generally society agrees that children need various protections. That includes protection from unscrupulous adults of any and all sexual orientations and identities. The groundswell of opinion on whether or not children are vulnerable and need care, is more widespread and more of a consensus that that for trans people as yet.

Photo by Ksenia Chernaya on Pexels.com

I don’t think we should have to choose on some kind of vulnerability top ten. All children and all trans people need compassion and care.

Both groups also require us to be nuanced in our thinking. We can defend trans people citing inclusivity as the banner under which we do so. We also need to be prepared to find that among the trans community as among the cis community, there are well intentioned people and those with bent tendencies.

When any minority begins to enter mainstream life more openly and thoroughly, there can be a tendency to idolize them – people are not allowed to criticize because that is to be exclusive. No, it is simply being realistic and wise.

At the same time, the majority needs to make sure they are not sanctifying their own group also. Let us who are white and straight and cis remember many evils have occurred at the hands of people just like us – colonization, abuse, rape, torture, coercion, fraud… we could continue the list. Ghislaine Maxwell is hardly, from exterior appearances, the typical image we might have had of a sex trafficker, but look. Would anyone object to her being in a woman’s changing room alone with a young girl who desperately wants to be a model?

So let’s recognise that whatever group we belong to, black or white or yellow or green; cis or trans, L or G or B, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist or pagan, none of us are perfect. A supporter of Boris Johnson, when recently accused of voting for Boris as leader when he knew he was flawed, replied “We are all flawed. Everyone is flawed.”

I hope that Jesus’ words from the 8th chapter of John’s gospel are ringing in your ears. He spoke thus to the crowd who were avid to stone the anonymous woman caught in adultery.

8 ¹ But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. ² Early in the morning he came to the temple courts again. All the people came to him, and he sat down and began to teach them. ³ The experts in the law and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught committing adultery. They made her stand in front of them ⁴ and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of adultery. ⁵ In the law Moses commanded us to stone to death such women. What then do you say?” ⁶ (Now they were asking this in an attempt to trap him, so that they could bring charges against him.) Jesus bent down and wrote on the ground with his finger. ⁷ When they persisted in asking him, he stood up straight and replied, “Whoever among you is guiltless may be the first to throw a stone at her.” ⁸ Then he bent over again and wrote on the ground.

⁹ Now when they heard this, they began to drift away one at a time, starting with the older ones, until Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him.

Let me point out this doesn’t mean that I think homosexuality or going through a gender transition is a sin! But, we are all too quick to blame and label others, without remembering our own wrong-doing and frailties. Those are the only things we can change.

Certainly let’s hold people accountable when things do go wrong – as long as all people are held accountable, not only the people who unsettle us.

Certainly let’s protect the vulnerable, as long as it is all those who are vulnerable; transwomen and also children; gay men and also wards of the state or boys in church schools.

If you are unsure about this territory of sexual orientation and identity, We’re All Equally Human might help. One reader said recently: “Just to let you know that I learnt a lot from your book, “We’re all Equally Human”. I never did know what all those letters  LGBTQI stood for, let alone all the others you added in Chapter 11.”

And let’s remember the positives when a transition goes well.

“Recently I met a trans man whom I had known years ago as a woman. I’d been around when she was beginning her transition. I even created and led a ritual for her to symbolically make the transition with her friends. I realised a little too late that quite a few
of her friends were gob-smacked and not entirely approving! It was all moving too fast for them. It was a slightly awkward day, but I hope the ritual helped a little.”
“When I met him again the other day, I was struck by how ‘happy in his skin’ he is now as a man. He’s lived as trans for some years now. The woman I had known had been prickly and bit reactionary. No wonder, now I know what was going on for her at the time. Now he is self-assured and relaxed, though I’m sure life is still tricky occasionally given general ignorance about such things.” I smile, remembering Alan’s happiness that day…

Susan Jones, We’re All Equally Human, Philip Garside Publishing Ltd, Wellington, 2022, p. 104

And a hymn from Progressing the Journey

For all the saints’ (1)
Hymn for Transgender Day of Remembrance’

Tune: Sine Nomine

1. For all the saints of every age and day,
   who bravely seek to follow Jesus’ way,
   sharing Good News by what they do and say:
   Alleluia! Alleluia!
2. For those who struggle much with who they are,
   listening to feelings which with bodies jar,
   who seek and ask and travel near and far:
   Alleluia! Alleluia!
3. For those who understood, as feelings grew,
   the need to live within a body true,
   and all that’s needed to change and renew:
   Alleluia, Alleluia
4. For Jesus, who exploded people’s view,
   of who were ‘out’ or ‘in’ the chosen few,
   who died for freedom out of love for you:
   Alleluia, Alleluia.
5. And so we meet to celebrate the right,
   to be yourself by day and every night,
   in hope Love’s flame will always burn for right:
   Alleluia! Alleluia! Susan Jones Progressing the Journey 2022

Go well, everyone,

Stay Safe, Be Generous, Practice Compassion

Susan

Orders:jones.rs@xtra.co.nz

Book 2 of Coffeeshop Conversations trilogy

Book 1 of Coffeeshop Conversations trilogy

Progressing the Journey
Inclusive Lyrics and Liturgy

It doesn’t stop because we are tired of it

This has become my saying about the pandemic, but it is also true about other chronic attitudes and atmospheres which pollute society. Even if you offer a free book, people don’t choose to read any more than they already have (which of course might be a lot) about LBGTQI+ matters. Maybe it’s me. By my having been quite activist at Assemblies people might think a book on the topic by me would be a rant. I understand if reading in this area just simply makes you really really mad and angry and you are tired to the bone of feeling that way. Some give the reason that they have many unread books and should not get another one they won’t read. Perhaps I am too precious in thinking this one is different.

So I thought I would post a few samples to whet the appetite: In the first chapter, Charity and I have just talked about the church’s national gathering the following week. Charity is attending; her first time.

I hope Charity’s experiences the next week wouldn’t be too
challenging. Our church could be unconsciously cruel in the way it
conducts debates on what had become known as “the gay issue.”
I look up and see Charity’s girlfriend Katy coming into the hall.
It embarrassed me that people like Katy, who’d exited the church
after an abusive fundamentalist upbringing, should see a so-called
broader church being so draconian in its moral judgments. It
certainly didn’t encourage Katy, and many others, to dip their toes
back into organised church waters any time soon. I sigh inwardly,
then smile at Katy.
“Hi Katy, come to take her away?” I ask.
Katy grins at me from under her heavy straight black fringe. “Oh!
Hi! Yep, she’s been here all afternoon and we have a date with a pizza
and a movie,” she replies.
“Sounds great! Her relief has just arrived, I think,” I say as I see
Tom and his partner Blake approaching the stall. “Take her away and
romance her,” I suggest.
Surprised, Katy gives me a cautious look. She still can’t get used
to a minister approving of gay relationships. It hadn’t been her
experience in the past. “Yeah,” she says, warily.
I smile. Katy would get used to our inclusive attitude here. It would
take time. I hope Charity’s experiences next week, won’t affect Katy’s
and her trust levels too badly, but I wasn’t too sure. Intending to do
the right thing, the church frequently didn’t get it right in the end.

When the conversation gets going later in the coffeeshop after the national gathering, we talk about how people pick up ideas, attitudes or consumer products at different rates of enthusiasm. There’s a graph I’ve found very helpful in explaining this.

Then the ‘aha’ moment happens, like those that happened to me. It becomes impossible to
treat the Other as Other anymore because they’ve become human
to us, become just like us. I remember thinking at that time that gay
ministry students facing rejection by the Church were students just like me.”
“We are!” replies Charity with a wobbly smile. Welling tears turn
her eyes into teal-green pools. “Another iced coffee to celebrate, I
think,” she says and moves towards the counter.
“Make mine an iced chocolate,” I ask.
When she returns, I’ve sketched a graph on the back of the napkin.
Roger’s Adoption Curve

I notice she’s dried her tears, though she still looks a bit fragile.
I think some brain work might help to move our focus from the
emotional to the cognitive for a while. Not that emotionality was
wrong, but we can seldom get the logical part of our brain to work
if we are in its archaic, generally emotional, sector. Charity looks
curiously at my hastily drawn graph.
“Have you seen the Roger’s Adoption Curve? It’s another way of
looking at ‘ingroup’ activity,” I ask.
“A bell curve, seen those before,” replies Charity.
“Yes, that’s the shape. This one is about how readily people take up
or adopt new ideas. We could draw lots of graphs for different ideas
and you might be at a slightly different place on each one. Today, let’s
let this curve represent how church people adopt the idea of same sex-
attracted people being accepted for ordination as ministers or
elders.”
“Firstly, there are the Innovators, a ridiculously small percentage
of the population. In this case they might be gay themselves, or
liberally minded heterosexuals or people who have gay children or
siblings. Whatever, they know gays are not dangerous subversives!
This might include a gay person who applied for the ministry. They
know it could be dodgy. They are convinced however of their call
and their right to be a minister in the Church if suitable in other
ways. In other areas of life, these might be the inventors of a new
product like the mobile phone.”
Charity nods and I move my pen to the Early Adopters’ section.
“The ministry students who were rainbow people in the first sector
probably managed to get to training because they met some Early
Adopters along the way. Maybe it was their family, their minister, or
a lesbian lecturer at uni. Early Adopters see the new thing happening
and like it. They are still a small percentage of the whole population.
They know the new thing is unusual, but they like unusual. They like
being first when a new thing is happening. In the world of mobile
phones, Early Adopters will line up half the night to buy the new
model at midnight when they go on sale.”
Charity grins and proudly taps her new cell phone. Katy, her
girlfriend, had lined up to buy it for her the previous week. Charity
had been over the moon, not just about the cool features on the cell
phone, but about what that act showed about how much Katy cared
for her.
“Notice the percentages in these sections. Add them together and
you get 16%. A new product does not reach mass market status if
only this small number of the population have bought it. A company
needs to influence the next group as well to get real entrée into the
mass market.” I move my pen to the Early Majority section of the
graph.
“These Early Majority people aren’t as keen on a new event,
product, or idea as the previous two groups. But they watch the
first two groups as they engage with the new product, or idea or
behaviour. They keep an eye on how it’s going. If there are few or no
teething troubles, they will buy the product. This gets the product
into mass market status.

I noticed on the news recently that it was claimed having more than 5% of the population buying EV vehicles meant the idea of EVs was ‘over the tipping point’ i.e. was reaching mass market status. I think they are jumping the gun a little, or perhaps LBGTQI+ is more complex.

Watch David Tomlinson mention We’re All Equally Human on The Holy Shed You Tube channel. https://www.facebook.com/philipgarsidepublishing.

The rest of the Holy Shed session is worth watching too. Dave says some important stuff on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxq3y0-ByeA&t=12s

I will post some more another day – but that might give you an idea of how Book 2 of the coffeeshop conversation trilogy goes.

We’re All Equally Human is in Scorpio Books Christchurch!

In the meantime, stay warm/cool (whichever hemisphere you are in), stay safe and stay well – all quite tricky things these days!

Susan

Orders: jones.rs@xtra.co.nz

Where did June go?

Hello friends and followers

I am shocked that the last post on this site was 24 May – June hasn’t quite gone yet, (today is the 28th), but almost.

I see in my calendar at the end of May a few things I didn’t get to, so there must have been a flurry of activity not booked in to happen, and yet, which did happen.

In June a few things were on. A church job which I had thought was put to bed flared up again and needed more time and thought and travel. Then I was investigating a subtly confusing motion at the 2022 Special Assembly which seemed to be about having dialogue on the issues of gays in church leadership and same sex marriage but which has turned out to be a discussion around how can we NOT change our mind if we don’t want to and still live together in the same church without anyone losing their property!

We might have been discussing this for 30 years, but only on the floor of Assembly mostly (except for 1995/6) where the length of speaking time has been progressively trimmed back to a paltry 3-5 minutes.

If you have been an intelligent person and bought and read We’re All Equally Human, you will realise that in these kinds of circumstances, liberals and conservatives ‘talk past each other’. Even when they are using the same words like justice and authority, they mean different ways of dealing in those values.

Our current Moderator, Hamish Galloway, has been working behind the scenes to get a dialogue together but I have just found out that the dialogue is not about the substantive issue but about an idea of restructuring the church so there is an ‘inclusive synod’. This is a route dictated by a conservative lobby group, not a route chosen by the whole GA, though they did vote for the motion of a dialogue group. (It begs the question of what the other part of the church will be called – ‘continuing church’ or ‘exclusive synod’?)

Dialoguing when one group chooses the grounds of engagement doesn’t seem like any kind of mediation I’ve heard of. Despite 30 years of debate at successive GAs, the whole debate which should include biblical interpretation, ethical codes, understanding of identity, and a whole lot of other things, has never been held. I have tried to set out some of the background factors, people’s orientation to the whole subject and different ways of arguing in WAEH.

I’ve recently watched a documentary on Dilworth School (a private scholarship school here in Auckland NZ) where they think over 150 boys over years have been abused by paedophilic staff including a couple of chaplains, I really wonder how the mainstream church can feel it still has the right to dictate to a minority sexual orientation about the speck of sawdust in their eye. The plank in the church’s eye has been massively obvious over the three decades of this debate. I would excuse the conservative group in the PCANZ if I thought they lived blameless lives, but there are more than one examples of infidelity within that group that I know of and others will know of more. ‘Throwing stones’ and ‘glasshouses’ comes to mind as an appropriate epithet.

None of us are perfect and I don’t expect conservatives to be any more perfect than more liberally minded people, but each side needs to be careful about calling out the other from an imagined moral high ground. None of us are on that high ground. Isn’t that the whole point of the often preached atonement theory? We all have baggage that needs forgiveness and redemption. It is part of the human condition to be less than perfect all the time. The trouble is that when one side demonises the other, the demonised people are subjected to far more scrutiny than the side which is treating them with disdain.

I was in a Zoom meeting today discussing a ministry situation and the only elder in the group stated from her considerable experience of the church and of ministers that ministers generally lacked the skill of self-criticism. I thanked her on behalf of the ministers in the group! She’s right, though. Partly, I think, because we want to do a good job and because we don’t want to think we might have let people down and we feel there is a reputation we must uphold, ministers can be the worst at owning their baggage.

If we might also feel we have the power and might of an Almighty God behind us, we may then feel we have all the more reason to stand our ground. That can lead to overworking, lack of listening, a paucity of much needed apologies and an increasing isolation from the opinions of those who are experiencing our leadership. Because they are experiencing it, they in fact might be very very well qualified to offer critical feedback!

I am torn that this ground breaking opportunity for dialogue away from the floor of a combative Assembly debate has come up when I have just retired. NOT that I think I could solve the problem. I can quite see my absence from this dialogue might help it to go better, in facT!! A new generation has a completely different take on things. I just hope that if We’re All Equally Human can get out and around the church and country that some of what I’ve learned reflecting on the debate might help others to be confident within it.

So, if anyone of you want copies for a discussion group or to give away to others, I can cut deals! Do email on jones.rs@xtra.co.nz to see what we can do together. While the book is gay positive, I have tried to lay out postively, and with compassionate grace, the ways I have experienced conservative concerns on the matter – both from my own background as a child and teenager and youth leader in the Baptist church and from experiences within the debate since 1991. If it doesn’t change conservative minds it might give allies some information they didn’t know before.

So maybe that is where June went – I have been talking with others, emailing, and speaking on the phone and in Zoom meetings to try and understand this process and ‘dialogue’ myself.

Fortunately for my mental health, at the end of June, David Tomlinson did another Holy Shed on LGBTQ+ issues, this time on the biblical passages. At 33minutes he mentions WAEH. Here’s the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxq3y0-ByeA&t=2158s. Cool, eh!

I have a flier for the three books which have come out, (2 from the trilogy and the one with lyrics and liturgy) so if you want a flier to send to a friend, just, again, email and I can send it to you. NZ buyers help me most by buying from me, but all three books are available online in the usual places.

Well, friends, good to make contact again and however you appeal to the power which is higher than all of us – prayer, meditation, concentrated thought – please surround the process going on in the PCANZ at the moment with love and especially focus on 5 October when the first dialogue will happen. This is an important moment, let’s hope it will be a kairos one.

Grace and peace to you all

Susan

Just email jones.rs@xtra.co.nz

Phobia-day

Last week contained “International Day against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia”

Unite’s website https://www.unitetheunion.org/ says this about the day:

Unite is proud to recognise International Day against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia on 17 May. Known as IDAHOBIT for short, this date was chosen as it commemorates the date of the decision to remove homosexuality from classification as a mental illness by the World Health Organisation in 1990. [only 30 years ago!] The main purpose of IDAHOBIT is to raise awareness of ongoing discrimination, violence and persecution of LGBT+ people across the world.

Research by Stonewall, the national LGBT charity found that one in five LGBT people have experienced a hate crime because of their sexual orientation in the past year and over half of trans people have been subjected to a hate crime due to their gender identity.

It’s always been a bit of a mystery to me why other people’s choices are the business of someone else. Even in the straight world, people often not related to you and with whom you are not well acquainted seem to think it is OK to comment on you being single, or married or divorced, and whether or not you have children. I can see that being confronted with a homosexually-orientated man or woman, a transgendered person or someone who identifies as bisexual might be actually confronting, if it hadn’t happened to you before, but why would it be your business to dispute that person’s choice?

It might be different if the person concerned ‘got in your face’ over it, but even then surely the situation is a discussion/debate/argument, not one where your personal opinion about their individual choices is the point.

I personally hate the thought of people talking about me when I am not there, but I realize I do that too, and it is human nature for us to discuss each other with our friendship groups. I might not agree with everyone’s choices, but unless they materially affect me in my life – why should I think I’m entitled to express an opinion or force that opinion on them?

The International Day this month mixes two different groups which are clustered under the LGBTQ+ umbrella. Homophobia and biphobia relate to people who make a different choice from the straight variety of sexual orientation. The difference for them from the majority is who they choose as sexual partners – mostly a fairly private activity.

Transphobia relates more to sexual identity – how the person feels and presents themselves to the world. This can be more confronting for straight friends and family as it messes with accustomed perceptions and interpretations of bodies. It is still usual for collections of visual clues to go together – female clothing in the majority goes with ‘feminine’ features and build, for example, and there is plenty of male clothing which gives out macho or masculine vibes. Based on this we have been taught explicitly and explicitly different ways of identifying who is a girl or boy or woman or man.

If we consider a continuum or people, we might group at the middle, men and women who dress in ways the majority would be familiar with and expect. To one side, the ‘female’ side, we might group women who affect a more ‘masculine’ style – fewer frills, perhaps, darker colours, more often wearing trousers than skirts etc. We will still recognise this group of females as women fairly easily. Then moving on we find men dressing as women, maybe transitioning through hormonal and surgical treatment into being trans-women. This taxes the ability to instantly recognise the sex of a person and so renders us more uncomfortable, surprised or unsettled.

We could construct the same kind of continuum on the other side of the main group – after the macho ‘cowboy’ look, there are men who act in more feminine ways, wear a frill or two, perhaps more ‘feminine’ colours, less macho outfits. It’s not so usual because the overwhelming expectation of society – both men and women is for men to fit a fairly narrow range of types. These men are easily recognisable as men, but further down the spectrum we find women who adopt all male attire and through hormonal and perhaps surgical techniques, become trans men.

Note that, interestingly enough, my impression is that less fuss is made about trans men than trans women – I’m thinking because the male is a higher status in our society and it is a ‘step up’ to become a man while it is a corresponding ‘step down’ to become a woman – (for some people, not everyone thinks that if they have brought their reactions to conscious thought.)

As always, these types of phobias are, at base, like other phobias which we develop. They result from a majority group (in particular) meeting a group they have not met much before and being not quite sure how to react, or meeting a group which they have been taught to fear because of their ‘difference’.

More of us in the group doesn’t necessarily mean better. I remember a group of four or five 14 year old girls at a school where I was teaching. In that cruel, vindictive way teenage girls can sometimes adopt when in a group, they banded together to make a particular young male mathematics teacher’s life hell. He was a bit arrogant, but he didn’t deserve them. I remember meeting them roaming the corridors at lunchtime when they were meant o be outside and feeling afraid of them too, though I was the teacher and they were the students.

But we assume that if there are a lot of us, then we are automatically right, or entitled, or better, superior and probably too more intelligent. Uhuh! Ain’t necessarily so.

I found writing We’re All Equally Human fascinating because it exposed to me a few of my own biases. One reader told me they had found out where they had biases too and were surprised – because they were unconsciously held.

I was brought up short myself when writing WAEH when I found the original Greek or Hebrew words we have taken to mean same-sex or homosexual describe actual behaviors very different from the long term mutual gay relationships we would expect in Christian leaders. They in fact describe sexual violence ( in the First Testament passages) and child abuse with adultery on the side (in the second Testament passages). Of course that kind of behaviour is forbidden, but it doesn’t mean what we have been told it means. This is not homosexuality as we know it today. Why have people not done this investigation before, we could ask!!! And, if conservative Christians are shown this mistranslation and misinterpretation would this make the difference? Or is there now a vicious cycle where the mistranslated word has generated homophobia and then the misinterpreted Bible is used as a reason for that exclusion. Then this so called ‘righteous’ exclusion and homophobia are conflated, so that even if the original translation is null and void, people do not change their minds, as unknowingly they have become motivated by homophobia rather than by Bible-loyalty – right?

I was very surprised when someone I met in the gym ( not a regular church goer since his youth) who has now read both books 1 and 2 in the trilogy, said that he was ‘mortified’ reading that chapter about mis-translations and interpretations. ‘Mortified’ was the very word he used. He went to a Presbyterian Sunday school and to youth group within the Presbyterian church because they had girls in the group. He’s not really experienced Presbyterian full on church as an adult. Yet obviously he had taken on board the church’s anti- feeling about gays. Perhaps he’d picked up an uneasiness about gays from the society at large, but felt it was justified because the church agreed. So he was mortified that he had taken that ‘biblical’ view. I was worried that the church had such an influence on the general population. It’s OK to have influence when it is a good one – but spreading homophobia? Ewww. I realized thinking this through that I too have thought that in being pro-gay in the church debates, I was somehow doing something vaguely wrong or dangerous. My mind has completely changed on that – now my view is that it is the church which is doing something which is actually dangerously wrong.

Especially when, doing my book research, I found that gay young people who go to church are more at risk of poor mental health and suicide than gay young people who do not go to church, I found myself becoming braver in my stance. Tony Campolo (famous evangelical speaker in the US) is right when he says that the church is doing something very wrong to produce this result and should stop it immediately.

Gay relationships are not necessarily abusive (though just like straight ones, they can be), but when I think of the millions of children abused by heterosexual paedophilic leaders in different sectors of the church which has been reported in recent enquiries I really wonder how the church can have the confidence – arrogance? – to continue to stigmatise and demonise same sex couples.

As a result of this phobia over many years being held in the church, church people are consequently ill educated on the terms and categories and protocols common in rainbow communities. So we blunder around, like colonially minded incomers blunder around with respect to indigenous understandings and language. I tried in We’re All Equally Human to put in as much information as the format would allow.

I’ll never forget a trans woman telling me that the sign outside St Andrews on The Terrace was ‘wrong’. This sign was the pride and joy of the congregation and had been put up in 1881, welcoming people of every race, creed…. and sexual orientation. She rightly pointed out that sexual identity was not included. I asked around the congregation about their understanding of trans issues, to find that they were only just a little knowledgeable about orientation issues and variations. The whole sexual identity area was a relatively unknown country. Yet the same church was known as activist in the same-sex arena.

At the recent Special Assembly of the PCANZ a motion was carried about a dialogue on ‘inclusivity divisions’ in the church. From the reported debate it looks like for some this is just ‘how can we leave the church with our property intact’ – or maybe ‘how could we bribe the ‘other side’ to leave if we say they can take their property with them’? Whatever they discuss, maybe it will lead to some positive developments, but it will depend how rabid the phobias are and whether both rationality and compassion will intertwine in the discussion.

In this climate it would seem that We’re All Equally Human could be a good resource!! Great timing! Groups could read it. Individuals could gift it to more conservative friends. If people had bought a copy before the end of April 2022, the reduced pricing in place then could still apply. If anyone wants to order 5 books or more for discussion purposes, a lower price could be negotiated. The aim of the book is to present recent findings and to help both those who are ‘anti’ and ‘pro’ to be more knowledgeable in their conversations.

Email me (see below) and ask for costs with postage for the numbers you want. In this possibly more conciliatory climate let’s at least allow ourselves to get more educated, to become more able to have a conversation which goes beyond two people merely disagreeing without educating each other further.

My personal trainer described Wherever you are, you are on the Journey (book 1 in the trilogy)… as being as ‘smooth as a mochaccino’ to read. We’re All Equally Human, he said last week, for him is like a Long Black – deeper and darker but still a good cup of coffee! Get yourself a ‘Long Black’ too.

Grace and Peace and an end to all phobias

Susan

Orders: Email jones.rs@xtra.co.nz

We’re All Equally Human – all over the world!

My publisher has just sent me the online opportunities to buy We’re All equally Human.

If I can still mention that buying a print book from me is the most valuable kind of sale for the author, but if you are not in New Zealand it obviously makes sense to save those horrendous shipping costs.

If you want a print copy from me and need the content in your hands faster than ‘after Easter’ if you place an order with me I will email you the final script so you have it before the book arrives. Just let me know when you order.

Online opportunities to buy:

eBooks

PGPL: https://pgpl.co.nz/ebooks/were-all-equally-human-ebooks/

Payhip: https://payhip.com/b/3UdWc

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1140739

Amazon eBook: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09X59664N

Kobo eBook: https://www.kobo.com/nz/en/ebook/we-re-all-equally-human

Print

PGPL:  https://pgpl.co.nz/print-books/were-all-equally-human-print/

Amazon.com Print: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09WXG2WF5

Amazon UK Print: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09WXG2WF5

I refer you to a recent blog of mine When to speak up and when not. Like a viral pandemic which does not go away just because we are tired of it, then injustices do not simply melt into the sun if no one does anything about it.

I long for a day when our interaction with the rainbow community is as seamless as it appears in the video presentation from the GA meeting last year, given by Rev Dr Theresa Cho https://vimeo.com/showcase/8596507?page=2

Hope to hear from you. If you buy from another source, do let me know how you found the book. If anyone wants to use it as a study resource for a group contact me about special pricing. jones.rs@xtra.co.nz

In our Lenten journey, we are approaching Jerusalem just prior to Passion Week journey. Jesus weeps over Jerusalem’s hard heart. May he not weep over ours.

Brought to Tears

The journey to Jerusalem is never easy,
not any easier now,
with this dread feeling
that it was all for the last time.
Those moments when it seemed
you walked in slow motion,
all sound muted;
looking at and seeing the faces,
but not hearing their words
your own mind racing
“Listen!” you wanted to shout, “Listen now!
Take heed of what I say! Now! I won’t be back, you know!”
When you saw the city
the beloved temple gleaming in the setting sun
suddenly it was all too much, and the tears came.
So many times, Jerusalem had been told the good news.
So many times, it had not listened,
its sophisticated multicultural society
believing it was too knowledgeable to need to look inside
and see what was needed – what was the ‘one thing necessary’.
It was too much to bear without tears filling your eyes,
dropping one by one on the dusty path
one by one down the steep hillside,
bouncing off shiny olive leaves,
hissing into steam on sun scorched ground.

(c) Susan Jones Progressing the Journey p. 135

Grace and Peace to you all

Susan

We’re All Equally Human – available for pre-order

Hello! We’re All Equally Human, Book 2 of the coffeeshop conversations trilogy is following along behind her sister Wherever you are you are on the Journey. Pre orders are now being taken for this book which will be available in print form after Easter.

Book 2, Coffeeshop Conversations Trilogy

Meet Charity; young, lesbian, Christian, in a happy relationship with Katy and disturbed by her church’s attitude to LGBTQI people after taking part in its national conference.
Through regular conversations in the local café with her supportive minister, Charity shares her experiences, and gains new insights and confidence about her identity and role in her local church. She learns that interpretations and translations of so-called anti-homosexual key Bible texts are recent, wrong and don’t cover loving committed adult same sex relationships.
Importantly, after studying research on how people adopt new ideas with her minister, Charity learns that people can change their mind and their attitudes, but that this happens at different paces for different people.
This non-fiction novel also includes:
• a glossary of terms associated with LGBTQI topics
• a liturgy – Recapturing the Flame
• a list of rainbow resources for LGBTQI people and their families
• four reflections preached by the author
• a ‘coming out’ poem, and
• a Baby Thanksgiving and Naming
You’re invited to join Charity on her journey of discovery.

I’m pleased to launch pre-orders for  We’re All Equally Human, Book 2 of the Coffeeshop Conversations trilogy. Equally Human aims to empathise with and educate both gay and straight, inside and outside organised religion.  It is intended to resource the church in its ongoing discussions about members of the rainbow community.

The importance of us all recognising each other as equally human whatever our orientation is re-affirmed here. This debate has been present in New Zealand mainstream churches since the 1970s and has raged since 1991.  Public debates do not allow time and space for considered laying out of the relevant points nor exploration of underlying forces greater than all of us. It has been a privilege to have time to investigate and write on this topic.  You can help spread this resource to others not yet entirely convinced.  Yvonne Wilkie makes these comments:

Like a mighty tortoise crawls the Church of God, brothers we are treading where we’ve always trod.” This re-imaging of a line in the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers stuck an immediate chord. Underlying my reluctance to write a comment about Susan Jones’ We are all Equally Human, Charity’s journey raised buried emotions I had thought long dealt with. Journeying alongside Charity I was reminded once again that the cliched “coming out” is a life-long journey; it is one that we never grow out of.  As Charity discovers each unexpected, if not surprising, response to her spiritual journey of self-recognition, her coffee conversations reveal rich insightful explanations. They move across cultural, historical, sociological, and importantly, biblical and theological pathways offering empathetic reassurance.  I found myself saying yes and yes and finally Hallelujah!  Susan Jones’ We are all Equally Human removes the tension that surrounds religious debates on sexuality. It points to the significance that being “equally human” is also a life-long journey. Yvonne Wilkie, former Archivist, author in the history of women in Religion.

Prof. Peter Lineham said this:

The Rev Dr Susan Jones does great service to young people pondering their relationship with the church in two books written and one to come, all “conversations in a coffee shop.” The delight of these books is that serious, significant concepts are clothed in flesh and inscribed on table napkins (when a pen can be found).  This delightful style, reminds me of the ancient model of the dialogue used from Plato’s time.  These participants are, however, much more interesting and livelier than a Plato dialogue or fictional discussion. Their developing stories and wisdom are derived from life experience. Hope in Wherever you are you are on the Journey and Charity in We are All Equally Human have their personal ups and downs, while Susan writes about herself, her reading, her coffee and changing perspectives with disarming yet instructive frankness.

Wherever you are explores Hope’s journey of in considering pastoral ministry, developing her own very inclusive and progressive faith journey. Charity in We are all Equally Human, is a young lesbian with a delightful choice of dress and a hard coming out story.  This style works exceptionally well as a light but serious way to explore issues, for these books certainly do explore deep issues, introducing readers to a wide range of concepts (explained by diagrams on the serviettes) and very significant writers.

Fortunate, indeed, the young people who sought and received very sensitive and professional counsel from Susan Jones, and fortunate we are to have books like this, allowing us to explore, ponder, to agree or disagree.

I am especially thrilled by We are all Equally Human. A stream of peoplecome to talk to me and I point them to books. This one is so locked into Aotearoa, its stories, and church life, that it will be so useful.  I will be recommending it widely to those on the journey of relating faith and sexuality.

On  my own journey of coming out, and that of my friends, we have all struggled with theological and biblical issues – probably most writing essays on the subject, revising them as the journey continues.  Susan’s book gives tools for proceeding on that journey of theological and biblical reflection.  Her words reminded me so helpfully that this journey of reflection is one we all need to travel, hopefully with wise and thoughtful people alongside, just as Susan was with Charity.

Take advantage of Susan’s personal offer during April:

1 copy $25, ($29 posted);

2 copies each $24;

3 copies, each $23

in recognition those copies might be given away to further spread the conversation.  (4+copies $22.50 ea)

Postage: P & P $4 for 1-3 copies, $7 for 4+ copies during April.

Rural delivery add on an extra $4.30 NZ Post charge

(Or, buy one to read before ordering more to give away or sell on)

Books available a week or so after Easter.

From 1 May

P & P for 1-3 books $5.60.  All copies $25.

On receipt of emailed orders with a shipping address, Susan will send costs & banking  details.  

(BTW: She benefits most by you ordering your copies from her email address: jones.rs@xtra.co.nz )

Looking forward to hearing from you,

May you all have a lively and happy Easter.

It is after all the season of new birth, just as this book is being birthed into the world!

Susan

jones.rs@xtra.co.nz

www.jonessmblog.wordpress.com

When to speak up and when not

The question of voice is a fraught thing. When raised in fundamentalist settings, one’s voice is thoroughly proscribed. You are to give voice only to the acceptable, the ‘right’ and the ‘true’ (as defined by that setting).

It takes a while to realise some are allowed their voice just because of who they are, while others are rendered voiceless in many subtle ways just because of who they are. It also takes a while to work out that some groups aren’t speaking up in your particular bubble because they were never allowed in.

It takes even longer to train oneself, as one of the more ignored groups in the public spaces of your bubble, to speak up, to know about points of order and rights of reply and your right to ask for secret ballots. To work out when logic is needed and when personal experience might carry the day.

Some women, but mainly male allies, clamoured, over decades, for women to be included in the priestly class. In the New Zealand Presbyterian church women owe a big debt to Rev Ian Fraser, who deliberately planned and carried through a strategy to both educate and convince the church. Why did men do this? Well, women weren’t there! Because they were not elders or ministers, they just weren’t present as voting members of successive General Assemblies. You can’t vote for yourself if you do not have a vote!

Women became a group which the New Zealand Presbyterian institution finally admitted to the heart opf the bubble, women elders in 1955 and women ministers in 1965. Women therefore are due the same respect as male ministers. That sometimes happens but, read the Burning Bush follow up report, sometimes not. https://www.presbyterian.org.nz/about-us/research-resources/research-papers/women-of-the-burning-bush-still-burning-25-years-on How ever good or bad it is to be a woman minister in today’s PCANZ, they are now in the ordained ministries of elderhood and clergy because people spoke up and continued to speak up, actually from as far back as 1924! If you take that as the start of this debate in the church, it took 41 years.

Gay and lesbian Presbyterians, if they are in a committed relationship, still cannot be officially ordained as elders or ministers in the PCANZ. Like women before them, this officially excludes them from Presbyterian General Assemblies as voting members because only elders and ministers can be commissioners. This means that this issue will only be progressed if straight allies speak up and continue to speak up.

There’s an old story about Jesus being asked after his death what plans and structures he had left on earth to carry on his work. HIs hypothetical answer was, of course, his followers. There were no supernatural structures or blessed constitutions or massive institutional frameworks or confessions of faith or Moderators to manage the continuation of his work. Just a bunch of shell shocked, frightened followers facing the opprobrium of the Jewish religious establishment and the might of the Roman Empire. Where would we be now if they had failed to speak up and to continue to speak up – an activity then which could be fatally terminal? The sentimental part of this story is the conclusion that Christ had no hands but ours, no feet but ours, no voice but ours.

So when I heard the other day “we’ve decided not to talk about it” on LGBTQI issues, I went home and pondered whether that was indeed the mature, wise move it had been made to sound, or not. I’m not proud that it stopped me saying at the time, “Well, I’ve just written a book on the subject”, but it did. I colluded with the conspiracy of silence in the moment. But, when I got home and reflected on the conversation, I wondered what voices do excluded groups in our church have but the voices of those included in the sacred bubble? No hands but ours, no feet but ours, no voice but ours.

We could learn from history. Ian Fraser saw that GA debates weren’t getting anywhere and so proposed education and a survey throughout the church. He continued to speak but in a different way. We’re All Equally Human is a similar but different approach. If we do nothing?

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” It’s a quote routinely attributed to Edmund Burke. But it turns out falsely so. Apparently, he never uttered these words. At best, the essence of the quote can be traced back to the utilitarian philosopher John Stuart Mill, who delivered an 1867 inaugural address at the University of St. Andrews and stated: “Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.” https://www.openculture.com/2016/03/edmund-burkeon-in-action.html

This quote refers to men both in the generic sense of humankind, but also because in 1867 men were the principal actors in the public arena. Today’s men may not realize it, because it has always been true for them and is the backdrop of their lives, but men are listened to more than women in our church. So, this quote is correct in its gender references. “Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing”

(BTW: I found it interesting at a funeral I attended recently that when the MC ‘forgot’ the next item on the programme (twice) the next item was a woman reading poetry.)

At this stage in our church I would not be surprised that there would be nothing that appealed to a queer Christian in being accepted as a minister in the PCANZ. We may in fact be working for a change in principle which will not be taken up by anyone for some time, if at all. But our polity at the moment is wrong on this issue. Allowing homophobia to continue as one of our guiding principles is very wrong, just as prior to 1965, sexism was the wrong beacon to follow then.

I heard again the other day about Mike Riddell’s persistence in protesting against wrong. We were reminded about the time he stripped to his boxer shorts in an Auckland City Council meeting when protesting about homelessness in the city. In the Baptist church where he ministered for 7 years, they now have this on their website:

Gay and Christian group

The Gay and Christian Discussion Group is an informal gay affirming discussion group that meets monthly to discuss issues that directly affect our faith, how we feel and what we can do for other Gay Christians. We DO NOT believe that being gay disqualifies anyone from living a full and faithful Christian life.

Our aim is to provide a safe forum for Christians who happen to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender to openly discuss their thoughts, hopes, and fears in a supportive and constructive environment without fear of instant condemnation.
The group is open to people from all denominations, and any who are interested in finding out more about being gay and Christian. We are not limited to Ponsonby Baptist members.

http://www.ponsonbybaptist.org.nz/gay-and-christian-information.html

I don’t think there would be anything which needed fixing that Mike would not talk about any more. That might leave the rest of us and others uncomfortable but that was less important than righting the wrong.

An important footnote: This does not mean jumping in without reference to the needs and desires of the gay community in this matter; deciding we know best, as straight Christians. Had the person said to me, “The gay friends I have in the church have asked us not to talk about this”, then that would have been different. That kind of conversation needs to come first so we are working with people and not at them.

Keep on speaking up, people!

Susan

(Not so sad right now, more mad!)

We’re Equally Human, hopefully going to the printers Monday 4 April, in your hands therefore in about 3 weeks from then? DV and CP. (a prize for whoever works out what that means).

Orders: jones.rs@xtra.co.nz Pricing to be confirmed. Watch this space. Pre orders will open when the book goes to the printers.

Information: www.jonessmblog.wordpress.com