Loss and Chronic Pain

Earlier this week, on August 2, 2022, my cat Frodo was euthanized. Similar to our other cat Snowflake – who died on May 8, 2020 – he had blood work done which showed he was starting to have kidney failure. He had lived a good long life, and we didn’t want things to get worse for him like they had for Snowflake, so we made the decision to have him euthanized that day.

Snowflake lived to be 14 and Frodo lived to be 16. It’s typical for strictly indoor cats to live to be about 13-16, so I’m thankful they both lived a full life. I’m glad for the time I had them, and as painful as the end was with both of them, I’d do it all over again if given the choice.

Frodo was a trooper and survived many times I wasn’t confident that he would. I know that no amount of time with a beloved pet (or any loved one, human or animal, for that matter) will ever feel like “enough” time, and the end will always hurt in a way words fail to describe.

Summer is always the worst time of year for me for a number of reasons. It seems like every year, there are grief/trauma anniversaries and often there are new incidents that come up that are painful. There’s a lot I don’t feel ready to talk about at this point, that I may or may not talk about one day, but 2020 and 2022 summers have been pretty brutal. 2021 was thankfully not that bad for me, and 2022 hasn’t been as hard as the summer (or really the whole year) of 2020, but it’s still often felt like hell.

Although Frodo’s death wasn’t completely unexpected, it still obviously hurts badly. I’m also still grieving that my church is shutting down. In late November/December 2019, I started listening to Collective Church sermons. Rob Carmack’s words were so healing for me. There was no pressure to fully agree with a set of doctrines; there was no coercion to giving time, energy, or money when you felt stretched thin; as a neurodivergent, disabled, and chronically ill person, I finally had found a church where there was no expectation that I would end up being healed. There was no pressure to “just have faith” or “just pray more” to be healed – I could simply be me. The church valued inclusion; not in a “it’s fine that you’re here” way, but in a “you belong here” way. I had found a church that truly valued things like anti-racism, LGBTQ+ affirmation, egalitarianism, accessibility, helping people living in poverty with no strings attached, etc.

When I first began listening to sermons, I was very wounded from experiences within churches and told myself I could stop listening if I needed to. I wasn’t going to force myself to stay if I was triggered.

In January, when Rob stepped down as pastor, I felt crushed. Many guest sermons had been deeply hurtful and triggering; very few gave me the sense of solace that Rob’s did. I’m grateful for the leadership Megan and Courtney provided over the following few months as co-pastors, and appreciated the sermons I was able to listen to. I have still considered this church my church through all of this, but I didn’t listen to sermons often.

I don’t know if or when I’ll have another church. I expected this to be my forever church. What I do know is that I will not force myself to find another church, because tending to my trauma and grief and pain matters more than church attendance. And loving Jesus doesn’t require being part of a church. I have some in mind I know I can check out if and when I feel ready, but I’m still grieving and I’m not ready to call another church my church yet. What I do know is that if & when I ever do find another church, it needs to be one that is unapologetically anti-racist, accessible, egalitarian, and LGBTQ+ affirming. I’m angry that churches that are indifferent about these things, or opposed to them, continue to thrive while a church that was passionate about social justice is coming to a close.

Similarly, I think I’ll always consider Frodo and Snowflake my cats. Having had at least one cat for 16 years now, it’s so strange and heartbreaking to not be a cat owner at all anymore. I definitely want more cats in the future, but I don’t feel ready for that yet. And I’m not sure if or when I will feel ready, or when it would be practical to have a new pet.

In the midst of all of this – processing my cats’ deaths (and I’m referring to both, because Frodo’s death has certainly brought up some emotions about Snowflake’s death, especially considering they both experienced kidney failure), continuing to process religious trauma, job searching, finishing up my summer class and preparing for my fall classes – I’m also still dealing with chronic pain. For the last 2-2.5 months, my symptoms in general have been worse. Over the last two weeks in particular, my migraines have been worse. I didn’t cry as much with Frodo’s death as I did with Snowflake’s, and I’ve been distracting myself a lot, mainly because I know crying always brings on a hell of a migraine for me.

And I gotta say, I hate this shit. I hate that I have to choose between feeling the feelings about my cat’s death and pain management. Grieving as someone with chronic pain is a unique hell because of the fact that I have to make this choice. I just want to be able to cry about my cat, fully let myself miss him, without getting a migraine. Migraines triggered by emotions like this are often much harder to get rid of – and I have already been experiencing a lot of pain that my medications aren’t working well (or at all) for. So let me just say that you should check on your grieving friends, and check on your disabled/chronically ill friends – and also, especially check on those experiencing both. It’s horrible and I wouldn’t wish this hell on anyone. I don’t want to, and shouldn’t have to, suppress my emotions or distract from them in order to manage my pain, but this is just the reality I’m dealing with. I absolutely hate it and no one deserves this.

This week has been a hard one, to say the least. I’ve been watching Smosh and Mythical/Rhett and Link videos to laugh, and I’ve been watching Koramora and froggycrossing videos for Animal Crossing content to relax to. There are plenty of other YouTube videos I’ve watched lately as well, but these channels in particular have been comforting during a very difficult time. I’ve been sleeping with a pillow and a blanket on my bed that Frodo loved, and tried to not focus much on their deaths so as to avoid crying (which as I mentioned earlier, is a major migraine trigger for me, and always produces migraines that are extra difficult to treat.)

Some words I have often reflected on during various periods of grieving (from https://verse.press/poem/blessing-for-the-brokenhearted-6973785118333689337):

“There is no remedy for love but to love more.” -Henry David Thoreau

“Let us agree for now that we will not say the breaking makes us stronger or that it is better to have this pain than to have done without this love. Let us promise we will not tell ourselves time will heal the wound, when every day our waking opens it anew. Perhaps for now it can be enough to simply marvel at the mystery of how a heart so broken can go on beating, as if it were made for precisely this – as if it knows the only cure for love is more of it, as if it sees the heart’s sole remedy for breaking is to love still, as if it trusts that its own persistent pulse is the rhythm of a blessing we cannot begin to fathom but will save us nonetheless.” -Jan Richardson, “Blessing for the Brokenhearted”

grief & joy are intertwined

The title pretty much says what I’ve been thinking (and feeling) a lot lately: that grief and joy are very much intertwined.

I recently got a new kitten. She’s all black and so, of course, I named her after the black cat in Animal Crossing named Kiki. She’s brought so much joy already (and also a bit of a learning curve since I got her at about 6 weeks old – she’s now around 8 weeks – and my previous cats I got when they were about 3 months, or 12 weeks, old. Plus, it’s just been a long time since I’ve had a kitten of any age. I’m still very much used to adult cats and so getting such a young kitten has meant learning and re-learning a lot of what it takes to care for a cat this young).

And yet, I simultaneously feel grief too: Snowflake died at age 14 in May of 2020 and Frodo died at age 16 in August of 2022. I grew up with them. I spent the vast majority of my life with them. Several moves, transitioning from elementary to middle school to high school to college, getting my first two jobs, through the unpredictability that comes along with being disabled & chronically ill, etc. – they were there for a significant chunk of my life.

I can’t help but wonder how they’d react to Kiki if they were still here. (They’d probably get tired of her antics very quickly, to be honest.) When I see her do some of the same things they did, I feel joy and grief simultaneously: joy at witnessing these feline quirks again, and grief knowing the two cats I grew up with – who I saw doing these quirks so often – are gone.

For both of them, I absolutely believe that euthanasia was the right choice. It was one of the most painful choices I’ve ever had to make, but sometimes the right thing to do is the hardest thing to do. And saying goodbye to a beloved pet in any way (letting them go on their time or choosing to euthanize them) is one of the hardest things we as humans ever do.

It’s been wonderful to have a happy, healthy, playful, sweet kitten again. I’m very much in love and so grateful to have her.

But it’s brought up some unexpected grief, some fresh tears, that I honestly didn’t see coming.

I’ve been wanting to get a cat again for awhile. I knew that Frodo & Snowflake could never be replaced, but having spent nearly all of my life with at least one cat (including another older cat my parents had taken in from my dad’s mom before they even got married and that died around the time I was 6 years old), it was painful to not have any cat at home.

Months after Frodo’s death, I kept having the urge to come out to the living room to see him – and kept reminding myself, over and over, that he’d never again be there for me to greet him.

I miss Frodo and Snowflake dearly. I will always love them deeply. I truly believe I wouldn’t be all of who I am today if I hadn’t grown up with them. They were such special and beloved cats, and I’m immensely thankful for all of the time I had with each of them. They are truly irreplaceable.

The bond I’m forming with Kiki is different. She’s a different cat, so the bond is different. And I still very much love her deeply. Buying her food and toys brings me so much joy. She’s a sweetheart, very playful, very snuggly, super affectionate and loving. I love her so much and I’m grateful beyond words to have her.

I still miss Frodo and Snowflake even more than I realized I did…and yet, if they were still alive, I likely wouldn’t have been able to take Kiki in.

The grief of missing Frodo and Snowflake is so intertwined with the joy of adding Kiki to my life.

I love them, and I love her.

I am experiencing the grief of those two losses all over again as everyday I’m reminded even more that they’re no longer with us now that we have a different cat…and also, everyday, I’m experiencing the joy of a new pet all over again. Kiki is here now, and already it’s hard to imagine life without her. Spending time with her is one of my favorite parts of each day.

I’m sad & happy. I’m grieving & grateful. I’m sorrowful & joyful. All of these feelings can coexist.

If you’re in a place where you’re holding multiple feelings & experiences together at once: welcome to the club. You aren’t alone. It is okay. I hope you feel loved through it all.

And if you only have the capacity for one emotion or experience right now: that is okay too. May you feel loved through it all, too.

Death & life are intertwined; thus, grief & joy are intertwined. One is not bad or wrong while the other is good or right – they’re emotions, experiences; they just are. They are valid and so normal for us humans to live with.

For any loss(es) you may be grieving right now, I do sincerely hope you also have (or soon will have) something to bring you joy, hope, gratitude.

“healthy” isn’t the same for everyone

Trigger warning for talking about weight loss/gain.

In the fall of 2017, when I was 19 years old, I lost a lot of weight. I was on a medication for chronic migraine that was working well at first, but did come with a lot of side effects — including weight loss.

I didn’t mind the weight loss. At my lowest adult weight, I was about 10-15 pounds away from what is considered “normal” or “healthy” for my age, height, and sex. And I got lots of compliments on the weight loss, too.

But that wasn’t the full story.

That semester, I was often bedridden. I failed all of my classes that semester. I had a really hard time getting up even just to eat or go to the bathroom (I had a friend who would walk over to my dorm sometimes and walk with me to the cafeteria because he wanted to make sure I was eating something, even if it wasn’t a lot). I had awful brain fog, my memory sucked, and eventually the medication was no longer helping at all – meaning I ended up dealing with not only the side effects, but also the terrible migraine pain I’ve become so accustomed to throughout my life.

And yet, even when people knew how sick I was and knew why I’d lost weight, they still complimented me.

Now, as an almost-25-year-old, my body at its healthiest tends to be in the 200-230 pounds weight range. Is it ideal? Not really; I wouldn’t mind losing weight if I could do so in a healthy way.

But when I am staying fed, hydrated, and rested, when I’m moving my body around a lot, I tend to stay in that range. When I am at my overall healthiest, I also weigh more.

I’m learning that’s okay. I’m learning to love and care for myself as I am, not as some idealized future thin version of myself that may or may not ever come to be. This life is too short to waste time trying to make myself fit into the boxes of diet culture and fatphobia. And if I do lose weight, I don’t want sickness to be the reason I lose weight.

I want to be healthy. And right now, with my medications and routines and day-to-day life, I am (relatively) healthy. My pain is mostly well-managed.

I’m still disabled and chronically ill. I don’t anticipate that changing. And I can take pride in my identity as a disabled person because disability isn’t inherently negative.

But I feel so much better than I did in the fall of 2017. I weigh more, and because of that I may seem less healthy; but the reality is, I do *feel* significantly better. My body seems to be content, happy, healthy at a higher weight, and that is okay.

So when people open up about weight gain or loss, please remember this: not all weight gain is bad, not all weight loss is good. Both can be healthy or unhealthy; they can both be extreme or mundane. They can both impact a person’s health, positively or negatively.

Believe people about their own bodies and lived experiences.

This is my body and my experience: that I tend to lose weight when I am sicker and weigh more when I am healthier. And I don’t want to punish or harm my body for simply existing and doing its best to keep me alive.

church talk & vulnerability

I haven’t listened to a sermon in months.

My younger self – from even just a few years ago – would be flabbergasted by this. I was in church for years. I loved church; I threw my whole self into it. The music, the scriptures, the sermons: all of it brought me so much comfort, joy, hope, peace.

Now, any time I think of listening to a sermon, I feel myself flinch. I brace for the worst.

My previous church shut down earlier this year. I had fully intended for that to be my forever church. I felt safe there. I felt loved. I never even went in person (due to distance, the pandemic, not driving for health reasons, etc.) but it felt like home.

I don’t know if, or when, I’ll go to church again. After so many past churches leaving me feeling wounded and traumatized, then the safest & most loving church I’d ever been in shutting down, it’s left me feeling awful.

I know that any church I become involved in needs to: be LGBTQ+ affirming; be anti-racist; actively care for the poor; welcome immigrants and refugees; be accessible; and in as many ways as possible with the resources it has, actively & tangibly care for marginalized & oppressed & vulnerable people as much as it can.

I’ve had a church in mind for awhile that I think would fit the bill. But I have yet to listen to a sermon from there.

Listening to any sermon – even from my previous church – hurts so deeply right now, on a level I can’t explain.

It almost feels like having gone through several break-ups with less-than-great relationships, then finally finding a perfect fit for me and watching it/them die. (I’ve been single my whole life so maybe this is a bad analogy but it’s the best one I can think of.)

How do you recover from that? How do you heal from that? Do the grief and trauma ever go away?

I don’t know the answers to these. (And they’re mostly rhetorical questions, so don’t feel like you need to provide answers to them either.)

In all of this, whether or not I ever set foot in a church again: I believe with all my heart that God is good and loving. I believe God is safe. I believe God cares for our trauma and pain and grief. I don’t believe God would want me in a church that would damage me further. And I believe God meets me where I am.

So, will I ever be back in a church again?

I can honestly say I hope so, and I think I will be eventually, but it’s clear to me that it will still take some time. Now is not the right time for me. And that’s okay.

And it’s also okay if I’m never ready, if I never am part of a church again.

I’m grateful that 3 years ago, in November/December of 2019, I found Collective Church in Roanoke, TX and started listening to their sermons online. A lot of healing happened. A lot of life was given. Every sermon ended with “Grace and peace be with you” (from the pastor) “and also with you” (from the congregation). And that was a balm for my soul – grace and peace. It was simple, calm, comforting. It was what I needed at the time.

And while the pastor stepping down and later on, the church shutting down, has been absolutely devastating to me, I don’t regret the sermons I listened to and the relationships I gained. As was often said in this church, “you can’t have a resurrection until you have a death.”

For me, I don’t know what resurrection will look like. I have hope that eventually, my metaphorical Sunday will come.

But for now, I’m in the middle of Friday/Saturday. With grief, trauma, pain, loss all affecting me deeply.

I still have joy. I still have hope. My life certainly isn’t all bad or horrible – and I don’t want it to seem that way.

But I also don’t see Sunday coming any time soon.

And so I grieve, and God grieves with me. I ache, and God aches with me. I yearn for the love, connection, hope, joy, life, peace, grace, comfort, etc. that Collective Church brought to me – and God is in the yearning with me.

I believe God suffers and struggles with us. God isn’t impatient with our tears or our fears, but lovingly sits with us, holding us, not saying “it’s okay” to stop our emotions but gently reminding us that the Divine is with us no matter what. That all our emotions are allowed and welcomed and acknowledged.

KJ Ramsey has written, “Sadness is the soul’s way of saying ‘this mattered’.”

This church mattered. The sermons and the songs and the scriptures and the relationships which were so healing and life-giving to me – they all mattered.

So as I sit here with tears in my eyes on a Saturday night, knowing I won’t be listening to a sermon tomorrow – just like I haven’t listened to any sermons in months – I remember that my sadness shows that all of this mattered.

And not only that, but that I matter.

God is with me where I am at, and so I continue going forward each day, each hour, each moment – and I remind myself that finding a good, safe, loving church home isn’t a guarantee. But that God being with me is a guarantee. God is with those who mourn, those who weep, those who are longing, those who are alone, those who are hurting, those who are betrayed, those who are lost, those who are scared – God is on the margins with the vulnerable. And so in this time when I am vulnerable, I am reminded God is here.

Especially as we approach Christmas and remember that Joseph, Mary, and Jesus were vulnerable – I am reminded that Jesus’ earthly parents were vulnerable. I am reminded that even the Son of God was vulnerable.

So maybe, just maybe, it’s okay if I’m vulnerable too.

Human Overboard: My Thoughts

James and the Shame (Rhett McLaughlin) recently released a country music album titled “Human Overboard”, with 11 songs that share different aspects of his personal deconstruction story. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVkdI7gZ0gU This is a link to an episode of their (Rhett and Link’s) podcast, Ear Biscuits, in which Rhett and Link discuss the album. I’ve written a previous article* about the first song, “Believe Me”, but since the album’s release I have been listening to many of the songs repeatedly. (Note: I’ll be writing about 10 of the 11 songs on the album; “Kill A Man” is the one I would’ve liked Rhett to elaborate on more, and it’s the one I feel least sure of to really write much about here. I like it being included in the album but it’s not one I feel equipped to write about here so this blog post will focus on the other 10 songs which are more straightforward to me.)

*https://briannathehugger.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=1360&action=edit If you’re interested in that article, here is the link for it

1. Family/Relationships The first songs I want to write about are “Sorry” (written to his parents), “Creek and Back” (written to his kids), and “Where We’re Going” (written to his wife). All of these are very emotional songs, and I think show the complexity of changes or transitions (of any kind – with faith or otherwise) within relationships. As someone who is still Christian but has deconstructed (and is still deconstructing), there is so much I’m either uncertain of or flat out completely disagree with now. I’m sure that for some people, if they knew all of my deepest thoughts and feelings and opinions, they would believe I’m going to hell, that I’m not truly a Christian and maybe that I never truly was. I tend to be pretty open about my beliefs, but there are some things I only talk about with very trusted and non-judgmental people because the reality of what some people may think or say is too painful for me to be totally honest with them. I’m not saying I lie about my beliefs with these people – but I’m careful with how much I disclose. Not everyone needs to know everything, and I’m learning that’s okay.
2. Personal Processing “Believe Me”, “Only Thing”, “Give A Damn”, “Flash Of Rationality”, and “Old Letters” are relatable for me. While some things aren’t really in my nature (like the line from Flash of Rationality about putting a lot of books in my cart but not finishing if I think I’ve got the gist – I’m not much of a reader, but when I do read, I like to finish the whole book), the main theme of these songs – about wanting people to trust and believe my lived experiences, about openly saying there’s so much I don’t know and can’t know, about caring so much and giving a damn so much (sometimes wishing I didn’t), about thinking I know the nature of God & about certainty I used to have that I sometimes now still crave – is deeply relatable and personal for me. I love what Rhett put into words in these particular songs.
3. To The Church The last two songs I want to write about are “In Vain” and “Fruit”. I love the whole album and it’s incredibly difficult to choose a favorite song, but these are definitely up there as two of my favorites. In the podcast episode in which Rhett talked about each of the songs on the album, one thing he mentioned when talking about these two songs was the conservative evangelical Christian support of Donald Trump. This is something that has frustrated me for so long. I’ve said before that if Jesus were alive in the flesh on earth today and spoke up against Trump, there would undoubtedly be people who claim to be Christians who would still side with Trump. There is not a doubt in my mind that that would happen. I have frustrations with the left and with moderates too, but with the political & religious right – and ESPECIALLY with Trump supporters – I feel a lot of anger. I feel betrayed that so many people who taught me to care for “the least of these”, to love marginalized & vulnerable & oppressed people, now have full-blown support of Donald Trump. So many people who instilled in me the value of following Jesus at all costs no matter what, have decided they’d rather make Trump their god and judge me for doing exactly what they taught me to do – follow Jesus. Trump and Jesus are undeniably antithetical to one another, and I am unapologetically choosing Jesus. I choose love: loving LGBTQ+ people, loving people living in poverty, loving BIPOC, loving non-Christians, loving foreigners & orphans & widows, loving disabled & chronically ill & neurodivergent people; loving everyone who the church shuns, because I believe love is the most important thing. I used to feel like I needed all sorts of disclaimers and caveats to fully love people fundamentally different from me. Now? I can simply love them, freely and without explanation. I don’t need to justify loving people as they are. I can simply love them. And while deconstruction (and reconstruction) has involved a lot of grief and trauma, the freedom to love fully and freely has been one of the most beautiful parts of my life. I am grateful beyond what words can truly convey for this gift of being able to love people with reckless abandon. I don’t need to explain why I love people; I can just love them, full stop.

And I feel like this album, “Human Overboard”, really represents all of that for me. There is so much complexity and nuance to one’s faith journey; but for me, I believe my guide has always been love, and I’m realizing that as my faith has shifted and continues to shift, love is still my guide. It is the one thing I can continually come back to. It is intrinsic to me, and I don’t take that for granted.

Thank you, Rhett, sincerely, for this piece of art & humanity you’ve shared with the world. It is beautiful and moving and so deeply meaningful for myself and countless other people. I’m grateful for you and proud of you. I appreciate who you are. Thank you for not just what you do, but simply for being who you are.

Why I Am In Favor Of Debt Forgiveness

Lately, with Joe Biden’s $10,000 debt forgiveness plan, I’ve seen a lot of people discussing the issue. People’s experiences and perspectives lead them to their conclusions – some people feel it would be better going towards medical debt rather than educational debt, for example. I think that’s a fair and valid point. I also know a lot of people are not happy with the amount. Many people are deeply in debt and $10,000 is barely scratching the surface of their debt. I think it’s understandable why someone in that situation would be frustrated.

The thing that I don’t understand is this: when Christians say that debt forgiveness is “not biblical” and “not Christlike”. I have four major reasons why I completely disagree with that argument.

First: in the Bible, many people were community-oriented. That’s not to say selfish people didn’t exist in the Bible, because they absolutely did – but for a lot of people, the mentality was very much focused on the best interest of the group, the community, the culture; not what they could get out of it for themselves, but what would be best for everyone. I see this the same way: I certainly hope I benefit from this personally, but whether I do or not, this is going to help people. Something good doesn’t have to happen to me for it to be a good thing. It can simply be a good thing because it benefits people, regardless of whether or not I’m one of the ones who benefits from it.

Second: debt forgiveness happens a lot in the Bible. It’s not painted as a cautionary tale, either – of course there are plenty of things that could arguably be considered technically “biblical” because they happen in the Bible, but aren’t meant to be prescriptive. But debt forgiveness is consistently seen as a good thing. Additionally, a lot of people will say things like, “Well, the debt forgiveness in the Bible is metaphorical, not literal” – but in fact, much of the debt forgiveness in the Bible IS literal.

Third: in the Lord’s Prayer, *the* prayer that Jesus taught people to pray – debt forgiveness is included in that prayer.

Fourth: if your theology includes the belief* that Jesus died on the cross for your sins because you could not pay the price? Then literally the entire premise, the foundation, of your theology is debt forgiveness.

People can absolutely have discussions on debt forgiveness. People can have varying perspectives and opinions. I don’t think we all should think the same way about everything. There are plenty of valid points people can bring up in conversations about debt forgiveness.

All I’m saying is this: if you say that debt forgiveness is “not biblical” or “not Christlike”, you are objectively wrong. I am not one to say “the Bible is clear” because honestly, that phrase is used in very manipulative and controlling ways. In my opinion it contributes to a lot more harm than good. It’s often used to push an agenda, and a lot of times people aren’t really looking at the context of scriptures or the original languages – rather they approach it from a modern-day perspective. However, this is one instance in which I genuinely think the phrasing applies. I feel like the Bible is pretty clear that debt forgiveness is a good thing.

From purely a theological perspective, it does not make sense to oppose debt forgiveness by arguing that it’s unbiblical or unChristlike. Because debt forgiveness is, quite frankly, very biblical and very Christlike.

*Note – there are different theological perspectives on why Jesus died. The viewpoint mentioned here is PSA, or penal substitutionary atonement (also known as satisfaction theory). Throughout different times and places in history, and still today, not all Christians hold to PSA theology. Other atonement theories include Christus Victor (or ransom theory) and moral influence view. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christus_Victor This wikipedia entry explains some of each theory (and further googling can certainly give even more information, if you’re interested.)

James and the Shame “Believe Me” – My Thoughts

Lyrics: “I think you want an answer I’m not prepared to give, ’cause the one I gave you said that that ain’t it. Must be something that I want – fame and fortune, or at least a little jaunt. It may seem too cut and dried, but I just found some things I could not brush aside. Now if you’ll oblige: I don’t think it’s true. I’m not asking you to agree, I’m just asking you to believe me. You say my heart was never true, that might say more about you. I know it shouldn’t matter if you take my word when I say I didn’t leave ’cause I was hurt. But there goes my pride, with its refrain that I be seen as justified. Likely nothing I could say, and I’m not sure you would care for me to explain. Sure, you can pray, but I don’t think it’s true. I’m not asking you to agree, I’m just asking you to believe me. You say my heart was never true, that might say more about you.”

I’m a huge fan of Rhett and Link. I actually just got caught up on a couple months’ worth of content of Good Mythical Morning/Good Mythical More and Ear Biscuits due to school and health things taking up a lot of my time & energy during that time. (I’m still busy with school, and still navigating health things, but I’m glad to be caught up on their content which brings me so much joy in my day-to-day life.)

As much as I love what they do as a duo, I was honestly really excited for Rhett’s solo project to come out, too. So many fans, myself included, love their comedy music but have been asking for serious music for quite some time too. And while that likely isn’t something they would ever necessarily create *as a duo*, I think either of them individually doing something like this is beautiful. I may do another article for some/all of the other songs once the full album releases, but I wanted to write about “Believe Me” now because it’s been on repeat for me (despite not being a country music fan personally.)

Although Rhett and Link are no longer Christians and I still am a Christian, I relate a lot to their stories. I’m immensely grateful they’ve told them and I think this processing of Rhett’s deconstruction through music will be beautiful and healing for a lot of people.

I don’t know if I’d ever come out with an album like Rhett has, but I have written a couple of things in a similar vein as this. I haven’t done anything musically with them, I might one day; but it was cathartic and healing and life-giving to write out something which helped me process trauma, grief, and anger, as well as hope, about some things I’ve been through. (As of right now, I’ve only shared these poems/maybe-future-songs with one person.) I’ve been drawn to music and poetry for as long as I can remember, and I think they can be excellent vehicles of processing things (both positive and negative) in our lives.

With that said, for me personally, one of the biggest costs of deconstruction has been music. Countless songs that I used to love and feel so connected to God with are now only reminders of trauma, of pain, of theology that tries to silence hurt or doubts instead of sitting with them. I have a handful of songs I can hold on to, and I’m slowly growing that number over time, but I don’t listen to music in general as much as I used to. And I don’t listen to anywhere near as many songs as I used to. I’m fine with this, because I know that my healing and my spiritual journey are my own and whatever helps or hurts my process is real and valid to me. It’s best for me to accept this as my reality for now, rather than trying to fight or suppress these very real feelings and experiences just to try and be like I was growing up.

You know, in all honesty, that’s true of my deconstruction in general. I can’t just fight or suppress what I have in the past or am currently undeniably feeling/experiencing just to be like I used to be – I have grown and learned, and with growing and learning comes painful realizations that some things aren’t what I always thought they were.

I am, and always have been, very much a lyrics person before a music person – I didn’t care much growing up how “good” or “bad” the music itself was. The lyrics were often very emotionally charged, and that’s what took me to that place of feeling so connected to God. Now, not only can I better assess how “good” or “bad” the music is (I use quotes because music taste is very subjective, though some musicians are objectively more talented than others – I think music can be judged both subjectively and objectively, though in this case I’m more talking about the objective rather than subjective assessing of music), but I also know there are beliefs I cannot run back to. And a lot of these beliefs are very present in the music I loved so much growing up.

I think this desire to be believed and respected is something I very much relate to. There are so many topics – LGBTQ+ identities/relationships, abortion, politics, climate change, racism, etc. – that I had certain views on growing up*. That LGBTQ+ identities/relationships are sinful; that abortion is murder and there’s never any justification of the act or nuance on the topic; that you should always vote conservative because conservatives are the ones who will enact the will of God with their political power/influence; that climate change isn’t real; that racism is something we solved long ago. Learning new information – not being brainwashed into believing leftwing propaganda, but learning actual, undeniable facts – was what made me realize on these (and many other topics) that I couldn’t reconcile the truth with the faith I’d been given growing up. (In fact, in many cases, I would say what I was handed growing up was propaganda and brainwashing – not that people were always ill-intentioned, in fact I believe many of them were and are well-intentioned – but the information was presented from a biased perspective, not one of seeking out objective truths which may at times mean rejecting beliefs you have held for some time.)

Like I mentioned earlier, I am still a Christian. I have no doubt there are people who’d call me a heretic, or as the song says, say that “my heart was never true”, but what I would at least ask people to understand, respect, and believe, is this: I have loved Jesus my whole life. I still do. And I still try to live my life by Jesus’ example of love. You don’t have to agree with my beliefs or conclusions (I’m sure the future me will disagree with the present me on some of these and/or other things), but as Rhett asked in his song, I’m asking you to believe me. I’m asking you to trust that I am indeed learning and growing and trying to process the information I gain as helpfully and accurately as I can. I’m trying to seek out the truth. I do all of this knowing I’ve been wrong in the past, and knowing I’ll almost assuredly be wrong again. But I am certainly trying to learn what is true (and not just what Christians say is true, but what is actually, undeniably true, even when it doesn’t line up with what a lot of Christians say/think/believe), and I am trying to embody the teachings of Jesus. I’ve been wrong before and I’m sure I’ll be wrong again, but please know, I am trying my best to live out Jesus’ love and to always seek out the truth.

And to Rhett, if you ever happen to read this: thank you from the bottom of my heart for this song. It means so much to so many people, and I believe the album as a whole will be healing and life-giving to a lot of people (myself included). I am grateful for you and so proud of you. This music is a gift – and even beyond that: your story, and who you are, is a gift to this world, too.

*About the topics I mentioned earlier, here’s where I stand now: 1) I am unapologetically LGBTQ+ affirming. 2) Abortion does grieve me, but I believe it ought to be legal for a number of reasons; I believe that autonomy and choice are crucial, and there are many, many reasons people may have abortions. I do not believe in hating, judging, or condemning anyone for having an abortion for any reason (including what people traditionally think of as abortion, as well as treatments for ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, etc. which are legally and medically considered abortions). 3) I have never voted Republican, and thanks to Trump’s presidency, I probably never will. I have issues with some of the views of moderates and leftists as well, but I do lean most towards being a leftist personally, and my trust in conservatives as a whole is pretty much gone. (I know there are some good ones, but there are too few good ones and too many bad ones for me to justify supporting Republicans at all at this point.) 4) Because of what I have seen/heard from scientists who know what they’re talking about, I absolutely believe climate change is real, and that we should do what we can to care for the earth (which is, you know, something that is actually addressed in Genesis, so you’d think that more Christians would be better at actually caring for the earth considering the Bible says to do so.) 5) Racism was real in the past, and racism is still real in the present. It was problematic in the past, and it is problematic now. The U.S. has an ugly past and present of being racist (not to mention being oppressive and evil in other ways too), and by no means has this country ended racism. Also, something doesn’t have to be overtly or intentionally racist to be racist. Racism is racism – no matter how overt or subtle, intentional or unintentional, racism is racism is racism. And though it’s a problem on an individual level, it’s a problem on a systemic level too, and it is long past time we acknowledge that and work on changing these things.

Why I Want Abortion To Be Legal

Growing up, I was very much pro-life. I was raised in conservative evangelical Christianity: this is pretty much just a given when you’re in that camp. It’s assumed you hold the pro-life stance. And while people have varying degrees to which they agree with the stance (some may make exceptions for rape/incest for example), it is very common for pro-lifers to be adamantly against all abortions, no matter the circumstances. I cannot tell you the number of stories I’ve heard from people who were walking into a Planned Parenthood (or other abortion clinic, but usually this is the one mentioned) and a large group of pro-life people screamed at them, calling them murderers and telling them they were going to hell. A not insignificant number of people weren’t even going in for abortions but for other things offered by Planned Parenthood. I remember one such story came from a woman who was going in for a cancer screening, because she couldn’t afford one from traditional doctors. These people did not care about why she was going in – or the fact that she herself was/is a mother; and not only that, but her elementary-age daughter had died in a school shooting a few years prior.

Imagine holding that grief & trauma, going somewhere to receive medical care – but the place you’re going has a stigma that a lot of people latch on to and target. These so-called “pro-life” people had no interest in hearing her story or showing compassion to her situation.

Here’s the thing: I didn’t wake up one day and decide I didn’t care about the sanctity of life and that I was now 100% okay with abortion. It wasn’t a thoughtless, careless choice.

I love kids. (Every job I’ve had so far has been in childcare). I would love to be an aunt and maybe even a mom one day. Kids are great. Sure, they can be tiring and overwhelming at times – but they are fun, they are kind, they are often smarter and wiser than we give them credit for. They’re cool.

This isn’t only about children, though. I’ve also realized the last several years that if I truly am pro-life, that means caring about and advocating for anyone who is marginalized, oppressed, or disadvantaged in some way: women, poor people, disabled/chronically ill people, BIPOC, non-Christians, abuse victims, immigrants & refugees, LGBTQIA+ people, and more. It’s not enough to say I care about the unborn but excuse racism, ableism, misogyny, xenophobia, Islamophobia, antisemitism, queer-misia, etc.

I also want to say that while I personally at this point don’t align 100% with either the pro-choice or pro-life side of things, right now, I am much more grieved by the pro-life side. It honestly seems like that group is utterly devoid of empathy or understanding for people who receive abortions – and I don’t say this lightly.

I say it because I lived it. I say it because I used to be so fully pro-life, so proud that I believed something that was (supposedly) fool-proof and absolutely correct in every situation.

I say it because I can’t sit by and let these beliefs be stated as facts, without saying anything, just quietly letting conversations happen. Sometimes it is right to be quiet – and other times, it is right to speak up.

I know a major reason I’ve had this shift is because I have taken time to shut up and actually LISTEN to people on the pro-choice side. It’s hard to not act on the instincts of defending what you think is correct.

But the reality is, none of us have the full picture. And sometimes, we’re so focused on parading what we believe to be true that we miss important pieces of the puzzle from others who we don’t see eye to eye with.

As much as is possible, I want babies in wombs to have a chance at life outside the womb. I want abortion rates to decrease. I want abortion to be unnecessary.

I don’t believe making abortion illegal will accomplish those goals. I believe that for everyone impacted by abortion, it being made illegal will actually be worse in the long run. Also, legal or illegal, abortion is going to continue regardless.

It also seems incredibly hypocritical for the same people who apparently care so much about the lives of babies in wombs, to not care about police brutality towards people of color, or to oppose universal healthcare, or to be against stricter gun laws, or to be in favor of outing LGBTQIA+ people and against resources that offer suicide prevention to these people. Decreasing police brutality, enacting universal healthcare, having stricter gun laws, offering suicide prevention & safety/respect towards LGBTQIA+ people would all save lives – but it really seems like, because these issues aren’t about “the unborn”, their lives apparently don’t matter to the pro-life crowd. And this completely breaks my heart.

Additionally: if someone has an ectopic pregnancy, or has a miscarriage and needs a D&C? Those procedures are legally considered abortions. So if you are in favor of abortion being illegal, you’re in favor of those procedures being illegal. Even if you personally categorize them as different, the fact of the matter is, legally they are still also abortions.

So let me be clear: I don’t love abortion. I hope I never need one. I want abortion rates to decrease. And at the same time, I want abortions to be safe. I want to prioritize the lives of pregnant people – and I’m intentionally using ‘people’ here for a few reasons: 1) when a child is pregnant, the pregnant person is not a woman, because women are not children; 2) LGBTQIA+ people who can become pregnant don’t all identify as women; 3) not every woman can become pregnant or wants to become pregnant; and 4) though people can and do debate about when life begins (at conception or any point in the womb vs at birth), one thing is undeniable: the person who is pregnant is absolutely, undoubtedly, without question A PERSON.

If, like me, you’ve been taught for years that the pro-life side is always absolutely right no matter what and there’s no need to question it or argue about it, please know there is always room for doubts, for questions, for changing one’s mind, for repentance from harmful views. Even if you feel like you will disappoint family or friends or Christians in general, their feelings do not matter more than people’s lives and stories. If you’re like me, and you’ve hesitated to have a mindset shift in this regard (or others) due to fear, know that fear’s job is to keep us safe but sometimes rather than providing safety from bad things, it holds us back from good things. Moving away from this point of view that I thought was loving showed me that theological, personal, and political convictions that are more liberal/leftist/progressive in nature can lead to even deeper love, compassion, and connection with others. I am filled with so much more love and grace and compassion and understanding now than I was when I was a conservative and an evangelical. I support the legality of abortion BECAUSE I care about life and justice and safety and health. I am not okay with shaming people who’ve had or considered having abortions because they have their own reasons, their own circumstances, their own thought process. If someone is in an abusive situation and can’t leave, and doesn’t want to subject a child to that – who am I to judge? If someone has health risks that would make pregnancy and/or childbirth dangerous – who am I to judge? If someone is unable to financially support a child and/or doesn’t want their kid to experience the trauma that so frequently comes with adoption/foster care – who am I to judge? If someone is sexually abused and the fetus is a reminder of that abuse – who am I to judge? Or for literally any other reason: who am I to judge?

Another thing I keep thinking about lately is that during Trump’s presidency, he incited a lot of anti-Asian hate because the pandemic started in Asia. His administration was also very vehemently anti-mask and anti-vax. And now during Biden’s presidency, this administration has been treating the pandemic as if it is over or nearly over when we continue to experience spikes and new variants. In my opinion, neither of these is pro-life. Inciting hatred or violence is not pro-life. Pretending a dangerous virus is no longer a threat when it actually is is not pro-life. I understand why a lot of people feel frustrated, disappointed in, and let down by both the right and the left at this point. It isn’t right, and our leadership ought to have done/be doing better.

All of this is to say that in terms of whether I am pro-life or pro-choice…well, it’s complicated. I can see validity in both sides and I can see problems in both sides. But I know that based on the research (data, facts, statistics, etc.) AND listening to people’s stories, I am moving further and further away from the pro-life perspective. Of course I still value life. I still believe life is precious and a gift (and I’m grateful that I can even see it this way – prior to March 2016, my anxiety and depression were untreated. Now, a little over 6 years later, being on medication has allowed me to see that life has not only awful things, but beautiful things to offer us as well. I see not only life in general as a gift, but also my life specifically as a gift, and I’m in awe that I can even type that out because pre-medication & therapy I wouldn’t have been able to genuinely believe that). I also know that abortion absolutely can be life-saving and necessary healthcare, and I’m not here to judge or shame people for receiving an abortion. Sometimes it’s needed but not wanted; sometimes it’s wanted but not needed; sometimes it’s both, sometimes it’s neither – but whatever the circumstances, pregnant people have the right to make their own decisions about their own bodies, and I’m not in favor of taking away their rights.

More Thoughts on Easter & Resurrection

I know we’re past Easter 2022, but the following words from J.S. Park about Easter and resurrection keep coming to mind for me:

“For so many of us,

there is simply no resurrection.

It can be painful to see in Scripture how the sick were healed and the dead were raised—

all while so many of my patients remain still under sheets, their families deciding when to disconnect the machines.

Sometimes it doesn’t work out.

Sometimes there is no closure.

Only tension, unresolved.

Only prayers unheard.

Only a stone unrolled.

I have prayed hard for miracles. I have seen families weep on their knees or shake their loved ones begging them to wake up. I have said before: I have never seen a miracle. Not in seven years. I have seen the cruelty of a seemingly indifferent and haphazard universe. Babies born to die. Abusive husbands walk free. The cancer wins. The transplant fails. At a deathbed, the family does not always unite, but fights. Death does not always bring people together. At times it reveals trauma hidden for too long.

In these rooms, I am in no mood to believe “He is risen.” I wonder too often if God listens.

I wish I could tell you that pain has meaning or it makes us better or there is some sort of victory in the end. A note of hope. But it doesn’t always go that way. I really wish it did.

I can only say I have found no closure—

only those who remain closest

when the tomb will not open.

I try to believe the rumor that Sunday is coming. But Fridays are long. Fridays can last a lifetime.

There, I have found Mary near and present,

Salome here with spices,

Joseph with his linens,

Nicodemus with his aloe.

They found me.

Nothing fixed. Nothing resolved. Nothing made alive. Only those close who stayed alongside. I know I am lucky. So many still alone, I can only hope we each find people to call home. I am grateful you are here, in this long eclipse, when Sunday is far. This storm may not pass. I hope you will stay too.”

When I was still an evangelical and a conservative, these words would have really shaken me. Believing in a literal, physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus – and always having hope & joy because “Sunday is coming” and “He is risen” – was such a core part of not only my faith, but really my whole identity.

Yet now, on the eve of my 24th birthday, these words feel comforting, validating. I feel solidarity and empathy from these words.

I shared in my last post about a tweet I see which encouraged discussion on how people’s lives would (or wouldn’t) change if Jesus’ resurrection could definitively be proven false. I’d definitely recommend looking that up if you haven’t seen it. I think so many people had really thought-provoking answers, both those who said a lot would change and those who said that there would be little to no changes.

For me, as a disabled, chronically ill, and neurodivergent person, I’ve rarely seen miracles.

It isn’t that I believe miracles never have happened or never do happen. It isn’t that I think they’re impossible or close myself off to all possibilities of miracles.

But they seem random, inconsistent, driven by cruelty and not love. In the worst case scenarios, people endure awful things that no one should ever have to go through, but no miracles happen; in the best case scenarios, people endure awful things but experience a miracle that stops or reverses what happened, but they still carry the trauma of what happened as well as the knowledge of what could have been. Either way, miracles don’t seem to be truly rooted in love.

I believe God is love. Above all else, I fully believe that loving myself, loving others, and loving God are all intertwined and all important. I certainly fail and am not always good at it, but I really do try to live my life with love as my motivation for what I say and do (as well as what I don’t say or do).

I’m not sure I believe in an all-powerful God, though. To me, there is no way I can fathom an all-good, endlessly-loving deity who is also all-powerful when so many terrible things continue to happen. The attacks in Ukraine, anti-LGBTQIA+ legislature, the ongoing pandemic, etc. For me, prayer has mostly become a means of me lamenting to God about these horrible things – not so much praying for miracles, but simply expressing my grief and aching over these tragedies.

As such, I found J.S. Park’s words comforting. Sometimes, there is no resurrection. Sometimes, there is no hope or redemption or celebration or joy. Sometimes, there are no silver linings or bright sides.

And in the midst of all of that which too often feels lacking – there are still people who will stay, who will not flinch or run away from people’s pain, who will empathize as I believe God empathizes.

It’s certainly not always easy or convenient to have this theology. But this – the practice of staying, of waiting, of compassionately sitting with hurting people while our Fridays and Saturdays feel endless, and Sunday feels like it will never come – this feels far more real and true to the experiences of myself and many other people. It certainly isn’t anywhere near as joyful or triumphant as the theology that proudly and quickly proclaims “He is risen” and “Sunday is coming”. But sometimes, like in the movie Inside Out, what we need isn’t to cheer up or think positively but to sit with people in their & our pain. Sometimes what we need is simply to validate the awful things we go through and not to rush into resurrection.

It’s not easy, but it is holy, sacred, good work to just sit with those who so desperately long for miracles, for joy, for hope, for celebration that may not ever arrive. It is good to empathize. It is good to be kind and gentle with ourselves and with others as we so deeply want to see Sunday and joy and resurrection and hope come, but understand that it may not come for a long while – or that it may not ever come at all.

I pray that we would find each other, that we would tenderly hold one another, that we would see ourselves and others with compassion, that we would not rush anyone – including our own beloved selves – into resurrection when it feels so far away or maybe even nonexistent and impossible. I pray that we would not run away from pain (our own or that of others), but that we would learn and continue learning to sit with each other while we ache and grieve, and that this sitting with wouldn’t be conditional.

Resurrection: Literal or Metaphorical (or both)?

I recently saw a tweet asking Christians if or how their lives/faith would change if the resurrection of Jesus could be definitively proven as false. Reading through the responses was interesting as it presented many different people’s perspectives and experiences and why they chose to see resurrection as literal or metaphorical (or some of both). [Note that as I talk about this tweet as well as the responses, I’ll be paraphrasing just to make writing this a bit easier – but the link to the original tweet, if you’re interested in reading it and the responses to it, is here https://twitter.com/preston_shipp/status/1507715710239313923?s=20&t=Nkzu511kZo3rhQQ6v_fCWg%5D

A lot of the responses (including my own) essentially boiled down to this: whether or not there was indeed a literal physical resurrection of Jesus would not change much, because listening to, learning from, and following someone committed to love, empathy, grace, peace, hope, etc. is beautiful and shapes the way we live our lives. Whether Jesus’ resurrection was literal or metaphorical, to many of us, is not really the point – the point is living in a way that embodies the radical compassion and love that we can see based on what we know of Jesus.

One response continues to stick in my mind, though. It was this: “As a Black man in America, I’d lose all hope. The fact that there’s a Brown skinned Jewish Man who was brutally oppressed, murdered by the State & police of His day, & yet, beat all that by physically rising again gives me a certain hope for this life & the next.” (link here to this specific response: https://twitter.com/LamontEnglish89/status/1507814597566234629?s=20&t=Nkzu511kZo3rhQQ6v_fCWg)

Ultimately, none of us can absolutely say with 100% certainty that Jesus did or did not literally physically rise from the dead. But how we understand and process this concept of resurrection – be it literal, metaphorical, or some mix of both – can say a lot about how we live out our faith.

Something I often think of is the saying “you can’t have a resurrection until you have a death.” For me, one example is that in high school, I took two years of French. Although I had the same teacher both years, it was like a completely different person. The first year, French was my favorite class and one of my best classes. The second year, while I still maintained straight A’s in French, I felt completely lost in the subject. That year – my junior year of high school – was difficult for a number of reasons; not only was the subject material in all of my classes pretty demanding, but my migraines had recently gone from episodic (happening a couple times a year) to chronic. I was experiencing intense pain and fatigue on a constant basis. My teacher knew all of this, yet had no grace for me whatsoever. There were times she wouldn’t let me ask questions even when I was absolutely clueless on what to do. She was verbally abusive to me nearly every single day. She killed my confidence and love of learning languages, and I couldn’t do anything except sit through the class and endure it.

At the time, my anxiety was heightened and everyday during French class, I felt like I was living in a state of the fight/flight/freeze/fawn responses – mostly going with freeze. I felt like it was my fault, and that if I just tried harder, I could change how my teacher treated me. I know better now – I understand that it wasn’t my fault, and she was completely in the wrong on this. Several years later, I’ve been able to start learning American Sign Language (I’m hoping to one day become an ASL Interpreter), and from time to time will brush up on French using Duolingo. While I’m mostly feeling better and safer with learning languages at this point in time, for a long time just the thought of learning a new language or practicing one I already had some knowledge of (like Latin or French) was extremely triggering. It would send me back to those days of sitting through French class, being abused pretty much every single day, and not having any choice but to sit through it and try to not make it any worse. To this day I still have occasional flashbacks and nightmares (though overall this, and other aspects of mental health, are much better for me thanks to my meds and skills I’ve learned from therapy a few years ago).

I absolutely would have rather never had this metaphorical death. I don’t think I’m made better or stronger for having endured abuse and now am finding ways to love learning languages again. So often people are praised for resilience, when in reality we should be gracious and tender, compassionately caring for ourselves and those around us especially when it comes to trauma. This metaphorical resurrection – of regaining my footing and rediscovering what made me love learning languages in the first place, before this abuse happened – has been beautiful and I am so grateful for it. But nothing erases or negates the trauma I experienced all those years ago in a high school French class. None of this makes how she treated me okay or acceptable. I didn’t need to go through it to become better or stronger or braver or more resilient.

Similarly, the concept of Jesus’ resurrection – whether literal or metaphorical – feels very nuanced and complicated for me.

I love the actions and teachings of Jesus. I love that he preached and embodied grace, peace, hope, empathy, love, compassion – I love that I have this example from my faith to follow so that I can learn different ways that I can preach and embody these things myself. I love the idea of a literal resurrection – that even death itself will always lose to love. I believe in a God who is Love, and I think that resurrection, whether metaphorical or literal or both, is a good analogy here; that God – that love – may not always seem triumphant in every moment, but will ultimately win in the end.

For me, this is what my faith and theology are rooted in. Regardless of whether Jesus’ resurrection was literal or not, it really wouldn’t change much for me. I don’t need it to be literally true in order to have a moral compass, or to love and serve others, or to do good deeds. What is most important for me is aiming to live my life in such a way that love is truly at the core of my being, my motivation for what I do, how I do it, why I do it. If Jesus’ resurrection could definitively be proven as either true or false? It would honestly make very little, if any, difference for me.

And by no means am I wanting to say that everyone has to have this same view. Like the response I quoted above – “As a Black man in America, I’d lose all hope. The fact that there’s a Brown skinned Jewish Man who was brutally oppressed, murdered by the State & police of His day, & yet, beat all that by physically rising again gives me a certain hope for this life & the next” – I think a literal resurrection does absolutely have importance and great meaning/value for many people. We all have our own different backgrounds, experiences, perspectives, and there’s nothing wrong with either belief.

So as people contemplate Good Friday, Easter Sunday, and the concept of Jesus’ resurrection this weekend, I hope they/we remember that all of this means different things to different people. If you don’t or can’t believe in a literal resurrection but still feel compelled by the person and message of Jesus? That’s okay. If a metaphorical resurrection alone isn’t enough and you need to believe in a literal resurrection? That’s okay too. And if you don’t land firmly in either camp – maybe aspects of both literal and metaphorical resurrection resonate with you, or you just aren’t sure what makes the most sense to you – that’s also okay. It isn’t wrong to have doubts or questions, and it isn’t wrong to believe in the hope that comes with something miraculous that defies death. It’s okay to be wherever you are at in your faith journey.

I think it’s worth considering this topic from different angles. I truly do love and appreciate Jesus and the way he lived his life. I’m grateful for his example and personally tend to lean towards believing in a literal, physical, bodily resurrection. But whether this belief is accurate or inaccurate, I know that what’s most important to me are the values I see exemplified in the words and actions of Jesus – love, grace, peace, hope, empathy, compassion, etc. These are things I firmly believe in and don’t ever want to compromise on. These values will always be good, meaningful, & important to me no matter what the literal truth of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection happens to be.

If this question isn’t something you’ve thought about, I’d encourage you to consider it. It’s a thought-provoking exercise and I think that no matter where you personally land on the topic, it’s good to assess how your particular beliefs on the matter change or don’t change the way you live your life.