"The Indelible Mark of the Priesthood"

Monday, July 7, 2025

Happy Monday, my friends! This is one of the Monday Moments in which I’m writing, in part, about something which is still in the future as I write but will be in the past when you read about it. I’m preparing for my trip to Atlanta, GA, for the 2025 Holy Convocation of The Fellowship of Affirming Ministries (TFAM). Not only is this my first time attending Convocation, but during Convocation this year I will be ordained in TFAM with nearly 50 other Queer and allied leaders from around the world. Some of these folks have never been ordained, commissioned, rostered, etc. in any church or denomination. Some, like me, hold ordination in our respective local congregations, but not in any regional, national, or international organizations. And some hold ordination in well-established denominations which are either not affirming of LGBTQIA+ people or in which they struggle to find the resources and community with TFAM offers particularly to our Queer Siblings of Color. Many TFAM clergy hold ordination and privilege of call of in more than one denomination, organization, or congregation.

I’ve written on my journey to ordination beginning in the Roman Catholic Church previously. Catholics often talk about the “indelible mark of the priesthood” which is the idea that when a man is ordained a priest something about him changes and remains changed forever. Even if he leaves the priesthood, gets married, and has children, he remains forever marked as a priest. While perhaps not embracing this “mark” as a theological or ontological construct, my clergy friends in other traditions and denominations talk about how ordination or joining the official clerical class of their tradition does change something about them in ways that they have trouble identifying.

While being ordained by Blue Ocean Faith Columbus last year was a special and powerful moment, nothing about it seemed to change who I was. Yes, it confirmed my role as pastor and my public ministry, but my work and the tangible quality of my ministry didn’t change. A year later I still don’t feel like anything has changed which makes it difficult for me to understand the change my clergy friends sense in themselves at ordination. A possible explanation is that my theology of ministry strongly embraces the pastoral and ministerial call that every Christian has as a child of God and an integral member of the beloved community. Yet, as soon as I name that theology I hear several of my Episcopal priest friends in my head shouting that they too would understand their theologies of ministry in very similar terms (to say nothing of my clergy friends in other traditions more typically associated with the priesthood of all believers).

How do you understand ordination? Does something change when a person is ordained?

Let us pray: God, bless all those you have called to serve your church as ordained clergy. Grant us the grace to serve your people with humility and empower us to speak kindly to our congregations and prophetically to the powers and principalities of our world. Enable us to have positive impacts on the people you put into our paths. We ask this in the name of our model in ministry, our only advocate, and our liberator, Jesus. Amen.

Blessings on your weeks, my friends! Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben +

No Hierarchy in the Kin-dom

Sunday, July 6, 2025

Gwendolyn Glover DeRosa (she/her)

Director of Student Ministries, King Avenue UMC (Columbus, OH)

Queer Christian

Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” When he had placed his hands on them, he went on from there.

(Matthew 19:13-15 NIV)

What are some of your hobbies? The kinds of things you do just for fun, just for yourself? As someone who works in ministry and whose free time is spent in LGBTQIA+ advocacy, I was neglecting my self-care and mental health for years. So, I made a really specific goal to do something just for myself and so I joined a group of non- church, non-ministry friends for a Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) campaign last year. If you don’t know what DnD is, you are not alone. I always thought I  would not like DnD because I am not a game person.

Even though I’m a big nerd, it’s actually difficult for me to understand the complicated rules of games and I’m just not competitive at all.

I didn’t realize that DnD is a group storytelling game. And I love stories! I identify most of all as a storyteller.

In a DnD campaign, all of the players are on a quest together. No one player is better or more important than the other players. Everyone is equal in the game.

Everyone is needed. Everyone matters.

One of the first campaigns I played in was a story about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. I played a Queer female knight named Sir Brigid. I was so excited to play this game because I’ve always loved the legends of King Arthur and the Round Table.

Do you know why the table was round?

It’s because there was no hierarchy in Camelot. Everyone had an equal and valued place at the table.

This was the kind of kingdom (or kin-dom) that Jesus talked about to everyone. But when people heard about this kingdom, they were confused. Everything about this kingdom was turned inside out and upside down. The last shall be first, and the first shall be last? What did that really mean? Who was in charge? Who was prioritized? What held the power in this kind of kingdom?

People seem to quite naturally make hierarchies in society. They categorize people and put

them kind of on a ladder, where the most powerful are at the top and the least powerful are at the bottom. They say that rich people are more important than poor people. They say that adults are more important than children. They say that being faster, smarter, popular…whatever…makes a person matter more in society.

But God’s kin-dom is the opposite. The most vulnerable folks are kept safe. The quiet voices are listened to. The poor are prioritized. The gentle and humble, the small, the slow, these are the ones that lead us when we are living into the kin-dom of God.

Let’s pray: Hi, God! Thank you for the gift of storytelling. Stories, like the ones that Jesus told, show us what it’s like to be part of your kin-dom. Help us to dismantle systems of hierarchy in our daily lives. And may we make space for the marginalized in our lives every day, for that is where you will be found. Amen.

Reflection

I wonder what this kind of kin-dom might look like to you.

I wonder how we might prioritize the people society puts at the bottom of the ladder.

I wonder how we can make space for those voices today.

Action:

Learn about, get involved with, and support community care organizations locally. Here

are a few in Central Ohio that I recommend:

•       Heer to Serve https://heer2serve.org

•       Star House https://www.starhouse.us

•       Stonewall Columbus https://stonewallcolumbus.org

•       TransOhio https://www.transohio.org

Nervous for Someone Else's Courage

Monday, June 30, 2025

Happy Monday and Happy Pride, my friends! Today is the last day of Pride Month and at approximately 12am (midnight) tomorrow many of the companies which did support Pride will quietly change their logos and ads back to their regular colors and displays. Yet, the LGBTQIA+ community will continue living our truths even as we face an onslaught of hate and laws targeted against us and our flourishing.

On June 20 and 21, the Old State Saloon and its owner, Mark Fitzpatrick, held the so called “Heterosexual Awesomeness Festival” (also known as and reported by some as the “Hetero Awesome Fest”) across the street from the state capitol in Boise, ID. The event, which drew approximately 50 people and tons of negative publicity, began with claims that LGBTQIA+ people prey on children and ended with Fitzpatrick fighting a singer and at least one person rejoicing that Boise had so few Black residents. Promoted using the standard troupe of queerphobic ideas—including that Pride Month excludes heterosexual people—the event was a mix of white Christian nationalism, white supremacy, and heteronormative idealism. But in all that hate, one singer, Daniel Hamrick, took to the stage, identifying himself as a US Army Ranger, and playing his original song “Boy” about a Transgender boy who is forced into “feminine” activities when he really wants to be rough and tumble with the other boys. Hamrick’s song was cut short when he was physically assaulted by Fitzpatrick and removed from the stage.

I knew that “Heterosexual Awesomeness Festival” was a flop, but I didn’t know about Hamrick’s song or the ensuing fight until a friend sent me the video. As I watched Hamrick introduce himself, put on his Ranger beret to cheers from the crowd, and begin to sing, I got very nervous. I knew that someone had attacked Hamrick and I was nervous for him, even though I wasn’t there and the event was over by the time I watched his performance.

Something about speaking truth in that way and in that space made me panic. Perhaps it was my Midwestern politeness which forces me to not make a scene—that would be mean even to these horrid people—or perhaps it was my aversion to pain knowing that the type of people who would organize something called the “Heterosexual Awesomeness Festival” would not resolve their differences with their words. Whatever it was, I had to turn off the video more than once and finally had to come back to it later to avoid having a panic attack myself.

I’d like to think that in the moment I could muster the courage to speak truth to power and privilege whether like Hamrick’s song or something closer to my own life like Bishop Mariann Budde’s sermon calling President Trump to compassion for immigrants and LGBTQIA+ youth. But then I catch myself questioning if I should wear a “Trans Rights are Human Rights” shirt in certain public places or my “Queer Pastor” shirt when I know I’ll be around nonaffirming clergy. My allyship and activism should not have such basic limits no matter whether I decide to wear the shirt, preach the sermon, or disrupt the event.

Where do you find yourself questioning your allyship or activism? When have you wondered if you could be a better ally or activist?

Let us pray: God, you empower us to speak out against injustice, to hold our leaders accountable, to document the false promises of empire, and to announce liberty to all those held in the bounds of marginalization and oppression. Yet, sometimes we question ourselves and our commitment to the work of allyship and activism. Grant us grace, God, and help us find grace from our friends and colleagues when we struggle to see the impact in the work we do. Cast away the shadow of imposter syndrome and help us rest restoratively and as an act of resistance. We ask this through Jesus, our liberator. Amen.

Blessings on your weeks, my friends! Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben +

Note - It is the practice of many Anglican/Episcopal and some other clergy to include a cross (“+”) before or after their names to indicate a blessing. Traditionally, bishops place the cross before their names and priests place the cross after their names. Though I like the tradition, I associate it with Anglicanism and did not adopt it when I was ordained. However, I’ve learned that some TFAM clergy use the cross in this way and have begun using it when I sign emails and letters.