Some days we can glimpse why we were put on this earth.  Yesterday was one such moving moment for me, as I led a short rite for a soul friend preparing for gender affirmation surgery.  We made no extra special great fuss about this.  Nor should we have to, for such signs of grace for LGBTI+ people are really very natural, if our world would but allow itself to  know it.  Yet it was profoundly significant in the journeys we are making at this time.  For today's sea-change of understanding gender and sexuality not only brings healing and hope to specific individuals.  It also offers vital hope and healing to tired aspects of our society, not least to religious groups and their members.   In a profound sense it is thus sacramental: helping to reveal what has been hidden, opening up and helping to sustain fresh pathways of life and transformation.  Our short rite yesterday was like that.  It publicly honoured deep movements of life and spiritual wrestling which have not only been unacknowledged and unsupported, but often tragically dismissed and disastrously resisted.  It also proclaimed that new life for all of us is to be found in the tender solidarity of us all, in the mystery of God's extraordinary and abundant grace and diversity.    Our 'transgender' rite was just a small part of our usual Milton Anglicans Sunday parish eucharist.  As such however, it was no 'hole in the wall' secret ceremony,  but a truly grounded and open affirmation both of a remarkable sacred particular person and of our growing sense of what it means to re-create community and 'church' today.  It felt like a renewing movement of spirit for our community, certainly for my own sense of priesthood, and a re-presentation of what it means to be differently ordered bodies together in the body of Christ.  It also made us wonder why such things are not expected in the life of all spiritual communities...

It was a delight to share with Transfaith co-author The Revd Chris Dowd in a podcast conversation with the Anglican Dean of Brisbane, Peter Catt, and producer Dom Fay on the subject of transgender identity and faith.  This can be accessed from the On the Way - Transgender Identity and Faith link here.  Our hope is that this is a further contribution to shedding light and enabling an increasingly warm welcome to gender diverse people, our gifts and insights.

“On the Way” itself is a series of recorded conversations (podcasts) exploring the deeper mysteries of faith, meaning, and beauty that people from all over the world are able to listen to on smartphone or computer. These invite others who are also “on the way” into conversation; seeking a transformative spirituality and inclusive faith that speaks to real issues of today.  Together in dialogue and storytelling the aim is to discover meaning and articulate a Christianity that expresses the liberating and life-giving message of the Gospel in our time.  It sits so beautifully with the journey I and so many others are making

Links to the other published podcasts, and further information about this Cathedral project may be found here.