A Future Seen from Christmas Past

Redefining faith from a community perspective.

Faith is a difficult thing to discuss in the trans community. The US is an intensely Christian nation, with even those who do not self-identify as such observing the customs, the beliefs, the holidays of Christianity due either to their upbringing specifically, or the broad miasma of social influence the religion has on our society generally. Every trans person in this country bears the burden of this reality, some more directly and traumatically then others.

Being raised in an atheistic Unitarian Universalist household, I was fortunate enough to escape many of the most crushing pressures Christianity exerts on us as kids. My experience of religion was defined not by dogma or scripture, not by rules enforced from above, but by a sense of community, support, and broad acceptance. This is not how most of my loved ones grew up.

It’s hard not to talk about faith and the enduring ever-presence of Christianity in this country as we wrap up the first week of December. It feels like every store is playing carols, every street has decorations, and every public plaza has a tree, strung thick with shining lights of every color. Every piece of evergreen decor seems to serve as a purposeful reminder of holidays long past, a communal grasp at nostalgia that feels more desperate as the years go on, or as I grow older. I’m really not sure which. But those intentional draws back to childhood present, for many trans folks, a less then flattering image of the past, of childhoods born up under the same oppressive force that now presents itself each year as nothing more then whimsical tradition and fantastical displays of lights, coupled with depictions of the birth of Jesus Christ on a lawn on every block, or in little cardboard boxes lining the shelves of every store. The same oppressive force that kept them in the closet. That got them bullied. That not only taught them how to hate themselves, but which taught their parents how to hate them too. Their parents, their neighbors, their friends, and everyone else in their original communities.

Just as this time of year brings a sense of trauma and defiance to so many in our community, so too do discussions of faith. In a society where Faith means spirituality, spirituality means religion, and religion means Christianity, it’s not hard to understand why. But faith need not mean something quite so linearly defined. Faith is, in many ways, just another word for trust, as is belief, and in that sense, faith is and always will be vital to us as both a movement and community. Faith in each other, individually, is how we form connections, how we form our networks, how we reach out to others and accept them in and stand beside them through the difficulties we face. Faith in our community is how we move mountains, how we campaign for legislation, how we fight back against oppression.

What is harder to find, and even harder to cling to, is faith in our allies. One month ago, this country accepted, by wide margins, the formation of a fully anti-trans government. From the white house, the congress, and the supreme court, the people of the United States either voted, or stood en masse apathetic, for our worsening oppression. It is hard to have faith in our allies right now. The conservative party promised a future where transgender children would be pushed more to suicide then to treatment, a future where transgender adults would have their care restricted or denied, a future where trans people of all stripes would be denied basic public dignities and perhaps even banned effectively from public life, and millions of people purportedly on our side failed to show up to the polls to raise a hand against these people and vote no. It is hard to have faith in our allies right now. But still, in the face of all of this, there are people, organizations, collectives of individuals who do not directly suffer under our oppression but whom stand against it out of principle, or out of love for us, and who will continue to fight along side us, even if they may be fewer then we need at present, even if the fight they embark on is simply to bring more like themselves into the fray. It is hard to have faith in our allies right now, but we must, because the alternative of isolationism does not protect the next generation of us.

If we are to survive, if those of us who have not yet discovered themselves and joined our community are to survive, then we must fight for a better future, and to fight for it, we must envision it. We must have faith that it can be built. Have faith that we can build it. Have faith in each other, and in those who help us lay the bricks of this foundation, that we are all working to construct the same communal home. To have faith in an envisioned future is to trust that we will stand a chance of getting there, and to trust that we, as individuals, are not alone in our visions.

I have written many snippets of imagined futures. Of quiet moments, pleasurable gatherings, of sun drenched kitchens warmed by the hearts of a dozen people like myself all working and eating in commune with each other. These are fractions of envisioned futures, they are resultants of the goals we set, but they are not enough. In my introduction to this blog, as well as in many other places, I have said I will include short stories here from time to time, and this is why. We must be able to imagine for ourselves a better future, a goal that we can work towards, not merely defined by rights and regulations written down in rulings and amendments, but in our daily lives, in the way we move within the world and find and help and love each other. We must imagine life as it might be, as lives worth fighting for.

I will strive to write my visions down, as best I can, for others then to see and share in, but more then this, I hope that you will do the same. I hope you hold in your head some article of future life, or can learn one day to do so, and then have faith that it can be achieved in some near way through our collective work. There is a value that cannot be put to words in fighting for the same shared dream.

So, as the Christmas season closes in, and reminders of that past grow ever more persistent, take the chance to find your faith in something new. In something of your own creation. Take the opportunity to see a future for yourself and for the ones you love that is not only free of this poor pained nostalgia, but which you may hope to see some day, so far down the road though it may be. Have faith in something new, in your vision, in yourself, and in us, your community, who stands here at your side. Let’s try and make it there together.