We Cry Out For Justice

Our hearts, prayers, and cries for justice are with the entire Tucson LGBTQ+ community as they mourn the lives of Vincent Anthony Siqueiros (42) and Cameron Davis Capara (33), who were killed outside Venture-N.

Venture-N is a longtime LGBTQ+ gathering space, and we know that bars, clubs, churches, and other community spaces are so much more than places to gather for the queer and trans communities. They offer sanctuary, a sanctuary where people can explore, play, connect, and allow their most authentic selves to be free; a place where someone else’s authenticity sparks something in their own hearts. 

For generations, spaces like Venture-N, have been where we find one another, organize for change, celebrate who we are, and experience the true freedom of belonging.

This shooting is being investigated as a hate crime, and it is particularly painful to see one of our own targeted yet again. People in the LGBTQ+ community have been targeted for far too long. We know this grief differently, deep in our own bones. We deserve places to gather safely. We deserve places to celebrate loudly. We deserve to live openly and without fear of violence because of who we are or where we find community or whom we chose to love. 

At MCCGSL, and as people of faith, we believe that creating spaces of safety, connection, visibility, and joy is essential to creating a better world where everyone can truly belong. I know this is why we do the work we do. I know this is why we gather. It is why we believe so strongly in the power of living as our authentic selves. It is why we are advocates for justice. It is why we will never be silent on matters of injustice. 

Our gathering together matters. Our continuing to organize matters. Our presence matters.

And it is okay to exist in the both/and of this life. We can cry out for justice. We can mourn. We can be angry. We can be mad. And we can still dance. We can still hope. We can still laugh and love. We can still choose joy. We can still believe that fear, violence, and hatred will never have the last say in this world.

May we continue to fiercely protect our sacred spaces, care for one another, and refuse to allow hate to diminish our joy and visibility.

We are each other’s keepers. We are each other’s friends, family, and lovers. We will continue to be a force of love in this world. We will continue to work for justice until tragedies like these are no longer. May it be so.

We send our love and solidarity to Vincent and Cameron’s loved ones, the Tucson LGBTQ+ community, and everyone whose sense of safety has been shaken by this tragedy. Know that your pastoral staff and our wider Saint Louis Community is here for you. 

In the grief and hope of this one wild and precious life,
Pastor Eli

Black Pride

This week, I had planned to write about my experience at Saturday’s Black Pride Expo. As some of you know, it was canceled. No notice and no details; so, I turned to social media to try to solve the mystery. Eventually, Black Pride STL posted an apology and some details. Of course, people reacted, and I started to notice something interesting. Along with the usual gobbledygook put out by people from the safety of their devices, most of the comments were love and support. Folks praised the good of Black Pride STL and uplifted the value of its presence in the community. They asserted the strength of this community as a whole and decried anyone’s attempts to cause trouble or bring harm. Later, the President of Black Pride STL made another post, which stated: 

Moments like these remind us that even in challenging times, there is tremendous strength in coming together, standing beside one another, and choosing community.

As we continue to build upon this spirit of unity, I believe we have an opportunity to create something even more meaningful that elevates our roots in connection, collective support, belonging, and the true spirit of chosen family.

(You can read the entire post here.)

I am reminded of a poster I saw a few weeks ago that read, in part, “The fruit of the Spirit is love.” It got me to thinking. We often try to act in love and to be love and to bear witness to love. These are all good and important parts of living faith. Do we ever consider what we do to generate love? To grow it in the world?

Terrible things happen. We will do out best to respond in ways that help repair any damage. In the meantime, let us work to generate love. And when the terrible comes along, the love will be more keenly felt. That is my prayer for us all.

Pastor Tijuana

A Celebration of the Faith We Sing

I don't know about you, but The Faith We Sing felt especially important to me this season, particularly in the time and place we find ourselves in today. To take a moment, an hour or so in worship each week, to uplift songs of resistance from a broad spectrum of cultures and traditions felt like a gift.

Song has always been a vessel for our people: a vessel that carries stories, brings different voices into the conversation, and reminds us that there are more perspectives than the ones of hatred and violence that too often dominate the headlines. I believe we learned from one another this season. We found hope, righteous anger, and resilience in the words shared by our guests, our musicians, and in the conversations we had after worship.

A quote I often return to is this one:

"During the darkest days of the AIDS crisis we buried our friends in the morning, we protested in the afternoon, and we danced all night, and it was the dance that kept us in the fight because it was the dance we were fighting for." - Dan Savage

We are fighting for our collective freedom, our collective lives, and for justice to roll down like waters across all of creation. May we remember our humanity in the midst of this struggle toward a better and more hopeful world.

It may seem silly to promote a Silent Disco Party in an article like this, but in many ways, the silliness is the point. We must remember what it means to be human to play, to laugh, to have fun, as though our lives depend on it, because in many ways, they do. We will burn out. We will not be able to sustain this work for the long haul if we forget about our bodies, our joy, and our need for rest.

Remember: it is the dance we are fighting for. The freedom to be fully alive. The freedom to let go. Joy is not separate from the resistance, but it is deeply part of it.

Whether you attend the Silent Disco or not, nurture your muscle of joy this weekend. Celebrate for any reason. Celebrate waking up. Celebrate the friends you have. Celebrate the warmth of the sun on your skin. Celebrate because you can. Celebrate the beauty you see around you, no matter how small or how great.

It's worth it. I promise.

With love and joy,
Pastor Eli

LGBTQ+ Faith Alliance In Action

We sent postcards! We joined with the LGBTQ+ Interfaith Alliance and PROMO on Monday, addressing postcards to more than 150 LGBT+ Missourians currently incarcerated in the Missouri Department of Corrections. These folks also receive a monthly newsletter written by LGBTQ+ inmates for LGBTQ+ inmates!

Incarcerated Trans folks are under attack by the Director of the MO Department of Corrections, as ordered by the Missouri General Assembly under budget bill nine which aims to completely erase hormone therapy replacement budgeting for trans folk incarcerated in the MDOC. In actuality budgeting to supply hormone therapy for those who need it in prison costs about 10,000 dollars a year. Since denying trans folk the care that they need is unconstitutional, there will be a lawsuit and will cost the state millions of dollars. As we know the actual numbers, this is not about saving money, this is about the continual targeting of trans folk. I recognize and continue to grieve that the Missouri General Assembly has consistently pointed its finger at transgender people.

Despite what others do and the state says, we want these 150+ folks who are incarcerated to know we care, are advocating for change, and they have not been abandoned! It gives us hope and energy working with others who are also advocating for change.

Don't forget, Hebrews 13:3 calls us to remember those in prison, as if we were in prison with them.

Fireflies

My first time ever seeing a firefly was just last year. I still remember it vividly. I was standing outside Pastor Lauren's house when a flash of light darted through the air. Then another. And another. It felt like pure magic.

We live in a world where bugs light up?!?! There is something about that simple truth that fills me with awe.

This past evening, after leaving church, I decided to head to Tower Grove Park. Someone had told me that one of the best places to see fireflies was near the native plant gardens in Tower Grove Park. I wandered through the park for about an hour, watching what must have been a hundred fireflies blinking among the flowers and trees. Standing there, surrounded by wildflowers and dancing lights, I found tears welling up in my eyes.

The world is so incredibly beautiful. And I also know it is deeply painful.

So many people I love are hurting. People are suffering, losing benefits or access to the care they need. Families and individuals are struggling simply to make ends meet. My prayers have been filled with heartache these days, and I know there is no way for any one of us to fill every gap or heal every wound. Yet even in the midst of all that, I cannot deny what I witnessed and what I witness everyday. The world is beautiful, too.

Love still reaches into every corner of creation. Blessings and gratitude remain abundant if we are willing to notice them. Wonder has not disappeared. Beauty has not given up on us. And I still believe that love is the most powerful force in this world.

So I want to invite you into a simple practice. What makes you stop in your tracks? What fills your eyes with tears because what you're seeing feels almost too beautiful to be real? Where does your heart remember that life is, despite everything, astonishing? It is important that we know where those places are. It is important that we make time for them. Because part of bending the arc of the world toward justice is refusing to let despair have the final word. It is relishing in joy. It is believing in love. It is slowing down long enough to notice the beauty that has been surrounding us all along.

Be amazed by this strange, beautiful, delightfully ridiculous world we inhabit. After all, we live in a world where tiny bugs light up the paths beneath our feet. How cool!

With Love and Wonder,
Pastor Eli

Happy Pride!!

HAPPY PRIDE BELOVEDS

This Pride, I hope you embrace the tenderest parts of yourself, the parts that need nurturance, patience, and compassion. The parts that make you most human, most holy, most you. I hope you know how loved you are in this world. How much you matter. How your presence, exactly as you are, makes this world more beautiful and more whole.

You are God’s light in this world, radiant, needed, and beloved. The world needs your voice. It needs your story. It needs your authenticity. It needs you. May we remember that the bravest thing we can do, is be ourselves.

In Love and Solidarity,
Pastor Eli

"The Bravest Thing We Can Do" by Rev. Sarah (Are) Speed.

"Trust your belovedness.

Let it be a protest,

an act of resistance,

a song of celebration.

Trust your belovedness in a world

that is rarely satisfied.

Wear it like a badge of honor.

Speak it as confidently as your last name.

Tattoo it to your heart.

When outside forces

chip away at your sense of self,

when life asks you

to hand over the keys,

remember the water.

Remember creation.

Remember how it was good,

so very good.

Let that truth hum through your veins.

Sing it so loud

that it drowns out the weariness of the world,

for the bravest thing we can ever do

is trust that we belong here."

Lekh Lekha

Lekh Lekha

Genesis 12:1 (NRSV) "Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you."

Lekh Lekha, in Hebrew, can be understood as go walk with yourself; to go walk with you; to go to and towards yourself. This was Abraham's command from God at the beginning of the journey he was about to embark on. God calls him not only to leave behind what is familiar, but to move toward the person he is becoming.

Let God's call to Abraham remind us that we, too, are called to live more freely, more fully, and more truthfully. That is a worthy journey. You are unique, beloved, and created with purpose. Not everyone will understand your path, and not everyone needs to. Some people may never fully comprehend the work God is doing within you.

Perhaps Lekh Lekha is an invitation to become our own companion on the journey, a reminder to walk toward ourselves with honesty, openness, and courage. It is a call to trust that transformation is possible, even when we cannot yet see where the path will lead.

May you remember that each time you show up as your authentic self, even when it feels difficult or frightening, you are doing brave and holy work. Loving ourselves fully is sacred work. It is transformative work. It is the work of becoming who God created us to be. You are not a disruption. You are a revelation.

I pray that each of us may experience both the ordinary and extraordinary power of walking toward ourselves. May we learn to recognize the goodness that already resides within us and within our bodies.

May you be able to look in the mirror, wherever you are on your journey, and see your own goodness, your own belovedness.

May you know that you can walk toward yourself again and again. May you trust that you are never finished growing, never finished becoming, and never beyond discovering something new about the person God lovingly created you to be.

With So Much Love,
Pastor Eli