From a journal entry on March 8, 2008:
for our next assignment in our preaching class, my exegesis section has to do an artistic presentation (because we’re in a special exegesis for the arts section) and i was totally at a loss on what to do because i don’t really like the passage that we’re assigned (it’s the “doubting thomas” passage in John 20). but i’ve been thinking a lot about queer bodies (because basically i’m a science experiment right now) and want to tie that thread throughout my projects if i can. i was thinking about how thomas was saying that he wouldn’t believe that jesus had been resurrected until he could see the wounds for himself and touch them, and i started to think about how for trans people there is that same element as people ask, “so have you had surgery yet?” “what do your genitals look like?” “can i see?” and it’s that same idea: until i see what you look like without your clothes on, i won’t believe you to be who you say you are. so i want to do some kind of artistic presentation of that. and i think i want to culminate the presentation by giving myself my T shot in front of the group. i’m still not sure how it’s all going to work out, but that’s the initial idea. i think it might be really powerful.
This was the moment when my relationship to Scripture, theology, and God changed. This is the watershed moment that I point back to and say, “This moment sent me on a new trajectory.” It was this experience of reading myself into the Thomas passage that has shaped almost all of the work I have done in the past three years around theology. This was the impetus for the writing of the Trans* Passion Narrative, it’s been the impetus for much of the preaching and teaching I’ve done, and it’s also radically shifted the way I view my personal relationship with Scripture.
I’ve written before about how in my evangelical days my spiritual life had been based mostly on emotion and in my early coming out and seminary days it had been based mostly on intellect. Working on this artistic project in seminary was the beginning of bringing back together the emotional and the intellectual.
For the final project I ended up making four large canvases with photos of myself during transition, photos of my shot supplies, wearing my binder (and the crease it left in my skin from being so tight), my prosthetic, and articles and phrases about gender. I displayed the canvasses in a cross form and in the center I had a video of me giving myself my shot that played while people took in the photos. I prefaced the presentation with a short reflection on the invasiveness of the questions and the gentle rebuke of Jesus. And then I invited them to come and see.
It was an intensely personal project; I revealed a lot of myself through those photos, but it was also honest to the text. I began to see that I could reclaim Scripture as a living, breathing thing. I could see my story and my experience reflected in the Sacred story. It has made all of the difference.
I’m flabbergasted at the notion of anyone asking to see your genitals or even asking “what they look like.” How incredibly rude and insensitive.
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