In the last post, I explained how lonely and afraid I felt in grad school. Afraid I wasn’t worthy of a satisfying relationship and afraid I wasn’t going to be able to take care of myself after graduating. I binge dated as a way to ease the loneliness and find someone to believe in me. … More My Story — Part Seven: Coming Out a Buddhist Christian
Through most of my life I’ve been plagued by loneliness. Few memories of college and my mid-twenties are as vivid for me as lying in bed alone. The physical empty space around my body, the heavy silence, and the internal dread I felt, night after night, wondering how many years might go by before someone … More What Buddhism Taught Me About Loneliness
“If you accept the fluidity of sexual orientation and gender as part of your definition of the sexual human person, then it logically leads us to shift from an act-centered sexual morality to a virtue-centered sexual morality.” … More Virtue, Sexual Ethics, and the Catholic Church
Next week, I’m speaking at the 2018 Christian Feminism Today Gathering about pleasure and virtue. Here are my thoughts/notes for the workshop. You can also check out my notes for my CatalystCon Midwest presentation about a progressive approach to Christian sexual ethics. What is Virtue? Definitions of virtue: Behavior showing high moral standards (Oxford) Conformity … More Can Pleasure be a Virtue?
What would it look like to affirm that vulnerability is, by definition, not safe?
What would it look like to consider all vulnerability as edge play?
This is what it would mean to me. … More Vulnerability as Edge Play
Back in January, a fellow Christian blogger, Chuck McKnight, wrote a post considering whether Jesus could have been intersex. The gist of the argument is that if Jesus were conceived from a virgin woman, he would’ve developed with only XX chromosomes. As McKnight wrote, “When virgin births occur in nature, they usually result in a … More The Power of an Intersex Christ
How a new ethic of justice-love can align with the sexuality of the queer and leather communities and others. … More Mystic Soul and Tom of Finland
Neither faith nor relationships work without a struggle, so why should our most intimate act of connection be forced to be gentle? … More Christian Case for Rough Sex
During sex, with my eyes closed, I trust the feel of their body, the sound of their breath, their moans, the feel of their heat against my skin, the pressure of our mouths pressed together. But our eyes meeting, for whatever reason, feels like asking everything at once:
Do you accept all of me? The girl with the messed up hair and the face that gets too red? The scared girl? The girl full of needs? The girl that likes you and imagines future dates? The girl who wants you to feel cared for? The girl who wants to feel cared for in return? … More On Keeping my Eyes Open
D was asking me how to understand this woman, and what I was thinking was much broader and somewhat bleak: I don’t think we’re ever going to understand and respect everyone else. I don’t think we’re ever going to get rid of all our biases. I’m not saying we shouldn’t try. I’m saying that our respect for each other shouldn’t be based on understanding each other. … More Embracing the “other” without understanding them
Church of the Scarlet Letter 