Campus Ministries run on a shortened liturgical calendar... Most Christian communities get 54 Sundays every year, we get 34. There is a deep sense then that everyone has to count for something. Generally we roll with the calendar at large, only alternating if we get a chance to celebrate a Prayer Book Holy Day. What I realized, however, were that these days were not giving us precise moments to enter into the turmoil, and revelations, of the past two centuries of Christianity, especially as they impact the lives of the students. As a community I recognized we needed to confront these realities within the context of our liturgical life.
I wanted us to engage with subversive theology and movements in the church. I wanted us to recognize the problems of following the status quo and ignoring the smaller voices. Located in the south west we needed to look at the troubled history between indigenous peoples and the Anglican church, so David Pendleton Oakerhater was transferred. No christian community in America can exist, in my mind, and not take the time out to confront the issue of the Church and Race, so Absolam Jones became a Sunday observance. Feminist critique has been a major component of unshackling the church and bringing about fresh movement for the Spirit, Li Tim-Oi is, for us, a Prayer Book Holy Day.
It was at this point that I hit a wall... at this point that I began to feel a little bit of burn... at this point it was asked if my ministry might be "too queer". For a variety of reasons, the infancy of the movement being one, there are not commemorations that readily speak to the recent history of queer theory, queer practice, and queer pastoral realities and the church in the way they do around issues of racism and feminism. Thus I took a step, with a bit of hesitancy and a bit of joy, and decided to take two days noted in my secular universities calendar and make them points of observance in worship.
The first is Coming Out Day. The reality is that every student comes to college with bits and pieces of who they are in the closet. Some of it is stuff they have been struggling with their entire lives, some of it is stuff they had not realized till halfway through their third semester. They need to know that our community is one that embraces honesty and the process of working ourselves out. We know the term, and we talk primarily about it, in regards to LGBTQ+ issues but its a reality that impacts every one of my students. My LGBTQ+ students are simply primary examples and mentors in the practice. The celebration falls on October 11th, which is a perfect point in our year for there to have been enough building of trust but still plenty of space for self revelation. [For our propers, see below.]
The second is Transgender Day of Remembrance. We note it on the Sunday closest to November 20th, the actual date of the commemoration. The reality is that noting sins past does not bring us to reflect on the current acts of horror and violence perpetrated against minorities in our communities today. A basic look at the statistics, which individuals are most likely to be the victim of a deadly hate crime, brings us to an awareness of the situation of transgender women of colour. This is the day that we confront systematic discrimination and the violence it feeds daily in our society, we are simply doing so by bringing a light into the midst of the community that our society would most like to keep hidden. I would strongly prefer that this not be a pressing day for us to commemorate, the caustic reality of our society and the message we as Christians need to make against it make this date a necessity of ministry. [For our propers, see below.]
So there they are, our two made up Holy Days. We are a Sunday evening worshiping community, fully under the auspices of "Order for Eucharist" with a general boon from our Bishop. Nominally the rubrics not only allow but promote our community taking up these days of pastoral concern. There needs to come a day, however, when we small communities are not "making up" commemorations to provide for the queer community the basic level of remembrance and commemoration the church currently provides other Subversive Movements of the Spirit.
Our Liturgical Propers for these days...
Coming Out Day Propers:
Collect: God, who made us for Yourself, to show Your goodness in us:
awaken the life-giving power of your holy nature within us; bring us to a true
and living faith in You, make us hunger and thirst for the birth of Christ’s
spirit in our souls, so that all that is within us, every inward thought and outward
deed, may be turned toward you and your heavenly working in our persons. Amen
Revelation 7:13-17, Psalm 116, Luke 12:2-12
Transgender Day of Remembrance Propers:
Collect: Blessed Creator, who loves creation in all its vast depths
of variety, grant us your vision that we might see the created beauty of each
person and no longer be blinded by sinful notions of gender that lead to the
harm and death of our siblings in the family of Jesus Christ, through the power
of the Holy Spirit, now and forevermore. Amen.
Genesis 32:24-30, Psalm 139:1-5, John 10:11-18
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