This started out weird!! :) Come join the conversation of how passion and purpose continually change in our lives. Understand how Passion is mostly about us and Purpose is about those around you.
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s narrative with a spiritual thread.
Big shout out and Thank you to our monthly supporters. With your support we can continue to bring and upgrade Splintered Grace Podcast quality and reach.
To learn more or to join our Patreon go to patreon.com/bonnieviolet
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s n
Engage! Rate, Follow, Subscribe & Share
Book ME! - Keynote, Panel, Guest on Show, Officiate Wedding /Memorial in/out of drag.
Collaborate! - Join Team, Guest, Make a Pitch
Sponsor! Patreon, Venmo, PayPal
This started out weird!! :) Come join the conversation of how passion and purpose continually change in our lives. Understand how Passion is mostly about us and Purpose is about those around you.
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s narrative with a spiritual thread.
Big shout out and Thank you to our monthly supporters. With your support we can continue to bring and upgrade Splintered Grace Podcast quality and reach.
To learn more or to join our Patreon go to patreon.com/bonnieviolet
a queer chaplain
Helping to lace one’s n
Engage! Rate, Follow, Subscribe & Share
Book ME! - Keynote, Panel, Guest on Show, Officiate Wedding /Memorial in/out of drag.
Collaborate! - Join Team, Guest, Make a Pitch
Sponsor! Patreon, Venmo, PayPal
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[Music]
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[Music]
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me
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hey everybody yes brett it's wednesday again hey it's tina frank here bonnie violet
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and welcome to splendor grace good morning good morning everybody it's did you say it's wednesday
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did i say it's wednesday i might have said it's wednesday because i never know what day of the week it is
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it's monday it's monday either way we're glad you all are here and can join them i'm bonnieville
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i'm bonnie pilot a transgender uh drag queen spiritual artist chaplain person
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um and i'm glad that you're here wow look i want to see that on your on your title it kind of sort of
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is but then i kind of got lost in what i was saying just then so when we start off like this we can
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only go up right right there you go so i'm tina frank and i'm a
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usually a mature christian um enjoy my life obviously so welcome
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to you guys and thanks for joining us whatever day of the week it is um i think we're about ready to have a
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great conversation on purpose and passion yes definitely and before we get into
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that um how was your weekend what's been going on you wipe your eyes
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oh my goodness i'm laughing those already so hard this is this is awesome good belly laughs good for the soul um
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i had a great weekend uh not much happen which i'm very happy sometimes i just like to hang out
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wander around my house hang out in my yard with my cat and um my honey and just call it good
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and that's kind of what we did this weekend [Music] you're saying you had some beautiful
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weather too oh we do you know i'm in arizona and um although it's a little bit warmer than i'd like
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it was it's really cool in the morning it's cool in the evenings and our afternoons have been hit in the mid to upper 80s
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and they're today they're saying it might even hit 90. so it's perfect nice yeah we had a beautiful weekend
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here in san francisco too we had like um i don't want to say maybe 60s it felt
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it felt like 70s or 80s i think just because it's not what we're used to but like you know everyone got out on the they were
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wearing the shorts and like the daisy dukes and there was like
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i mean there was just legs for days there was legs everywhere that is awesome yeah there's it feels
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like there's a lot more people you know just out and about a little bit more and so it's it's just kind of nice
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to see see more people out and i think the weather definitely kind of you know pushed people out of it a little bit
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absolutely on that note how are you guys doing over there with all your um
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shutdowns and stuff we got our governor lifted all of the mandates off of our state
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and so that has actually got people out and about i think a little more here
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right good morning teresa yes legs in san francisco
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we have been opening up a little bit more and more you can eat like you can eat in the restaurants a
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little bit there's i think it's like maybe 25 or something like that it's
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gonna go to 33 pretty soon um but um but i'm not really
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sure um like the process but it just feels like things are getting a little bit open
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obviously you know people are still wearing masks and they're social completely a lot more people are getting vaccinated
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so i think that's you know people i think that's a lot that we've had i think i'm
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no more people who are vaccinated than not so i feel like that's all headed the right direction so that's amazing praise god
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yeah um theresa is asking if you are related to lisa frank well i will
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right but no not that i'm aware of i am not be so full of uh full of color huh
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wouldn't that be nice i think i definitely didn't get any art talent if i am right right
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awesome so how was your weekend what'd you do anything fun um yeah i mean i had a
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you know i was i was we were talking earlier and i was like it feels like so much has happened between the last time i talked with you
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well it's wednesday oh right it's wednesday already okay
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um but yeah like i got to interview pentecost on wednesday which was really great which again
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feels like a while ago um saturday's regular dance practice stuff we're getting ready to do
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our girl group video shoot soon you're going to post that on our
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facebook page right yeah definitely you know one really cool thing i did
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yesterday which i was really excited about is there is a um it's called queens of the castro
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it's a drag lab they call it but they're doing a residency where um young people
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in the sixth to twelfth grade can sign up to kind of do like a a drag like learn how to do drag
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and so um there's like a mentorship program um and i got accepted to be a mentor and
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so i'll i'll be a mentor through this year-long residency with young people here yeah with young
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people learning about um about drag about history the act is activism
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the culture you know makeup dance performance you know all that sort of
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stuff so it's gonna be really cool it's really cool now how often do you get to interact with these young folks
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so we'll have like uh we have to we have to minimum meet with them twice a month um and then there's these
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workshops that happen every week and so there's like a makeup workshop once a month there's a movement workshop
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once a month and then there's like a group in which all the mentors and all the mentees get together and that's when it's more of like a
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class where we'll learn about like just different like issues like um
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we'll learn how to be like with dif people different than ourselves understand gender understand um
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like just the history of of drag um i think i think it's gonna be really cool yeah sounds like it'll be a
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learning experience for you and everyone that you get to participate with yeah it was
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it was just really cool to meet other the other mentors as well i can't we meet our we meet our they're gonna like match us
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with somebody this week and then we'll we'll meet them this week and then have our first kind of uh group on saturday so if you
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have one minty at a time yeah it's it's ideally going to be set up for there's
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only one mentee but it'll really just kind of depend on um if you're a good fit with someone and then also like if they're
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depending on how many men tours there are versus how many mentees they are because
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they're always um they're gonna be always taking in new new people um throughout the year and so
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it'll be kind of a matching process throughout kind of dependent upon who's participating or
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or not well that sounds like a lot of fun yeah i'm excited about it yeah for sure
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cool cool so you've had a fruitful week yes yes
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well cool it looks like we got a lot of lots of comments
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so where do we start passion and purpose i think these are things that we were
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talking before that both of us are still kind of um developing within ourselves that
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would you say that's the right word developing in ourselves yeah or i mean maybe recalibrating
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oh recalibrate i think it's a better word yeah yeah yeah because i feel like i feel like you and i both have probably
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been very like patchy and passion oriented and purpose oriented yes um and i think i think for me i
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found myself more recently kind of like realizing that i really wasn't
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i wasn't in in my passion i was doing purpose for work i think well i was i
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was doing purposeful work because i was working you know to research and yeah helping you know folks get
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connected to services and stuff and so it definitely wonderful purpose right um
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but i had a really hard time having the passion for it um and i think that's because like um i
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think i heard i listened to a bunch of things on passion and purpose to kind of like prepare for a
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conversation today and one of the common themes was is the idea is that passion is for you
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and purpose is for us or for for for others yeah yeah yeah i i think
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i'd agree with that that's a great assessment of all that i just remember what i forgot to do [Laughter]
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sorry um so yeah i think that's a great assessment and it's funny that you say that uh
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you've been and for as long as i've known you you've always been very intentional and very purposeful
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uh with how you spend your time what you do what kind of things you engage in uh so that's true but it i had never
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realized that you had a moment where you had lost some passion for that and and
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go ahead and i'd like to hear more about what that looks like yeah i think for me i got stuck in the
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mundane of it all like i think i think for me i love to grow
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i love to expand i just think i reached a point where um like i i really feel like i'm at a
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point where i want to and i don't know if it's part of maturing or getting older but i feel
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like i want to pass on what i've learned um onto onto like younger folks but also
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like there's also more for me to learn and more to be challenged by like the work that i've been doing i've been
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doing for over 20 20 years and some of the other and i could do it
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and i could be pretty good at it but i just didn't really i just wasn't
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really excited about it anymore and um it was really frustrating for me
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because i was like this is good work like you um like i felt really
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blessed as like a somebody who grew up where we grew up in the way that we did to be working in the
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one of the best research like facilities on the globe you know and like to find myself there
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doing work like really meaningful work was really great but then also to realize that i wasn't
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enjoying it was really um it was it was disappointing
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um so what was one of the first steps that you took when you realized that you weren't
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passionate about that oh well um i just tried to get honest
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with it with myself about it and to try to kind of like investigate it a little bit more kind of
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get curious as to why um things were the way that they were and it wasn't really
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clear for me that because i was doing work that was so purposeful you know i
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felt like i was dealing with depression i was dealing with lack of motivation i was feeling
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a little isolated and and depressed and this was before shelter in place
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that but so i just was feeling like it was all these other things and work wasn't it couldn't have been
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work like it could have been that i was dissatisfied with work and um it wasn't just work but work was a
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big part of it because it it took me from my ability to to do things that i could be more
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passionate about because i don't think your work always has to be what you're high
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like what you're passioned about or do you and no no i think it makes it
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easier if it is because you can certainly i think you find drive in all of that
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um but yeah that's interesting because i you know i've i also was doing something that i
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loved and i lost my passion for it it wasn't as uh purposeful as yours was
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um and that it but i was self-employed and i had built um and i shouldn't say i my
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husband and i held we had built a position where we could actually employ other people and give them an
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opportunity to have a great livelihood and i was very passionate about that um
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the work that we did uh was was work it wasn't as um driven it was i want to say it wasn't
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purposeful because it was purposeful it was just a different kind of of a of a purpose and it was
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wonderful i loved it we actually thrived in that space for gosh a number of years and then all of a
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sudden it was like i don't enjoy this anymore i don't look forward to it anymore
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i became more like work and for me first i was like it must be
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me i must be doing something must be something i'm just getting lazy bored whatever i was looking at myself what what is it
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about me because it seemed like on the surface that everything was working everything looked fine you know people were still doing what
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they were doing and i kept going and i kept going and i kept going and i just liked it less and less and
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less and less and i could not say well someone was mean to me i couldn't say i had a
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supervisor that didn't like me i couldn't say my clients were ridiculous because they're always ridiculous
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so i just couldn't figure it out but what had happened was i think that i had an innate change i
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think part of it was because i didn't have a challenge anymore and i'm definitely someone who likes to step into a challenge and and to meet
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goals but i think i realized that okay i've been able to build this to this point
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but now i want to define and i want my life to have a meaning just like you were just saying you wanted to have a purpose you want to have something you
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can hand down now you can say you can hand down a company but my kids aren't passionate about that
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they've all got courage of their own they're doing this and that there were not people within the organization that um
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wanted to run it and do you know so i didn't feel like that there was passion but when i look
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back i can see the skill sets that i've learned in that process and i don't know
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if you've done that also working in those organizations dealing with different kinds of people
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understanding different kinds of processes i feel like it's kind of positioned me now for now that things
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have shifted and i'm no longer running the business i have all those skill sets to bring to the table now
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to go on to that next thing which i'm very excited about so would you yeah would you say that was
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some experience for you yeah yeah and i think that's for me is the biggest challenge is being able to
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really like make sure and some of the things i was hearing about um passion someone had mentioned the idea that
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passion is basically what what gives you energy what is it that that you can do that
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gives you energy and that was something that i was really struggling to have and had for a really
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long time and i was able to during shelter and place i was able to kind of like
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start to do some of it like i started to do the dragon spirituality series with glide
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and as as like miserable and unhappy i was to do like my job work
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like whenever i like did the that work i just felt somewhere so much better about it afterwards like
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it felt good afterwards um yeah so so it made me more willing to do it whereas the work i was doing
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before it just i wasn't feeling good afterwards and and the more i looked at it too is i felt
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like i was taking up space that maybe somebody that was more excited to be in it
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could actually maybe even do better than i could do you know and so i think that was
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another kind of like if i want to look at purpose and not just what feels good i can
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i could recognize that i'm actually maybe not even living to my fullest
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potential with my purpose because i'm like in this space that doesn't really like
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sing to me anymore um and there are other folks that i know if they were in that position they could they could sing the way that
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i used to sing at it you know and i just want anymore and um so it's been good to kind of have an
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opportunity to transition i think shelter in place made me
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think about what i was settling for and and why i was settling and like
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why like why not do those things that you've been wanting to do yeah now like what are you waiting for
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when is the when is it gonna really open up you know what i mean
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yeah i totally get it so i had a similar experience and for me i felt like um
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i was trying to continue moving forward even though i wasn't passionate about it didn't enjoy it at all and i wasn't very effective at it
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so things started to shift and so i think you're right being able to step away and allow someone else an
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opportunity i think that kudos i think that's an awesome responsible decision that that you you made for not
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only for you but for that person or the people that are you're receiving services from you yeah so i
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was being a little because i didn't know what to do um i didn't know what my purpose was exactly or actually i shouldn't say that
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i didn't want to admit it um because then i would admit that i had kind of been sidelining it for a while
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um so i felt like this whole process with koben for me it just shut overnight
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boom all right you're done and and i was like oh wait a second what just happened
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and that first moment of oh my gosh now what right i'm grateful it didn't last for
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very long because i'm like okay i can do this but you're like
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and for me the shelter in place has been a process also okay redefining what's important to me
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where am i at at this season of my life because it's different than 10 15 years ago what really at this
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stage in my life am i passionate about you know you've heard about all those horrible things they're incognito people
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losing their lives and losing loved ones and i'm thinking you know what i need to decide
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what's important to me right now and i just start making some decisions about how i want to live the rest of my life
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and i've made some tough but good decisions i'm not everyone has enjoyed those
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decisions but i'm okay about it and so now i'm i'm redefining my
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purpose being based on this new passion that i feel for the life that i have ahead of me
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does that make sense no it totally makes total sense i'm excited about it stevie sing hi
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hey love your podcast thanks for joining us today isaac is
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sending a heart hi isaac vic miss pennycost yes yeah yes love that you're joining us
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isaac um yeah it's i think one of the things it's like passion
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versus uh purpose or does your purpose have to be your passion
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and i don't know i think it's great if your passion could be your purpose and i think
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and your income i guess because we live in this capitalistic world right that we need to have an income
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but i don't necessarily think that passion and the purpose maybe has to happen in the same place
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but i do think it's probably important to have both happening at the same time
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would that make does that make sense yeah yeah yeah i think it makes it easier if it's if it's a singular focus
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um but but yeah i think people can be passionate about things in the middle of their circumstances
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right you know we've all experienced that um so yeah i think there's definitely and i think it was a
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great the way you had defined it before that passion is more about you and purposes more about the people
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around you because i don't know as i get older i want to be more purpose-driven
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i think than and then passion-driven and as i've had this time to think about it and re-regroup and
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figure out kind of what i want to be when i grow up i want to be more purposeful
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so that's something i've always um really envied in you is that you always seem to
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have something purposeful in your life that you are pursuing
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yeah yeah and and i think part of that is you know as i go back and forth this is
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like i um i i do it because it feels good
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um i think i'm still you know like i it doesn't always feel good don't get me wrong but i think
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i like the effect that it has on myself and i don't know i mean there there
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there has been unhealthy like i think you can try so hard to be doing good or like like like for
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instance i was in that job that looked all good it looked like i was there for the purpose
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and i wasn't as much as you know i could have been i guess and so i think those are the things that i have
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to kind of look at because if i'm really honest with you a lot of what drove
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my helping my being of service in community
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especially in the beginning was i needed to um i i didn't feel worthy
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and i felt less than and somehow i had to earn some sort of value or worth in order to
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be more um more equal to people i guess you know and
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um i think i'd always kind of felt that way growing up the way that i did but i know that after
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my hiv diagnosis and getting diagnosed with hiv you know i had i had felt like i was
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still going to excel regardless of what where i came from right and like i was still like i was going to
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get ready to go to school to be an architect and i just everyone told me and i was just going to
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go on and do great and amazing things and then this thing happened where i got hiv and i felt so responsible for it
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and i think in some ways i feel like i still had to make up for it like i first started doing hiv aids work i think and
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telling people about my story and starting alpha then the nonprofit organization was
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really a lot about me trying to validate my existence so that i could
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die and mad and have mattered because doing something with my life had been
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such a big like paramount part of my identity
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and what i was going to do and the idea that i was going to lose it felt like i was failing everyone i felt like i was
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failing god too because i'd always felt that god placed it on my heart to do some pretty rad
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things with my life um and so at first it was really about to try to seek the validation
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and to try to make my life worth as so that i could die even though i had
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totally like messed it up luckily through that process i was afforded grace
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people loved me and i got to a space in which for the most part i don't feel like i
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need to be validated or affirmed or that i need to earn some sort of value or worth
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in order to be in space with people that i want to be
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you're right but you're right and we all need to come to that realization
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yeah yeah exactly that's an incredible story incredible testimony that's incredible
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well and i i've realized that even like i think even in my last job there was still
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that little bit of oh you're getting you know when i talked about the description
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of where i was working and i think to some degree i almost reached that level where i was like yeah so like
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i'm like this poor like high school graduate who's working at this top ranked you
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know research is like like i showed you all you know and then it was like kind of like i did it and then it was like okay
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now like you don't even you don't even want to be here
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you know and it was kind of like one of those things that i didn't realize what had actually been driving me
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and it was that unworthiness that um less than this
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that uh whatever um you know i've ran away from my potential even though it hasn't looked
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like it i ran away from my potential most of my life because i've been scared
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shitless of it it was just like i'm not worthy i'm not capable and
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i'm coming into realizing that uh that
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and i feel like sometimes what we want to label it on it's like i might be in the position of influence
26:08
and i might be in a position of like whatever at some point but it's not the it's not the celebrity it's not the fame
26:14
it's not the the being known that's just where i was created to be yeah you know and i feel like that's
26:20
where i had to get into a space to where i could realize that i'm just gonna go and be where i'm
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created to be and whether that's in front of a thousand people talking about or that's like
26:32
doing service work on the street or that's i i don't know you know and that's that's all i have to
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do is really try to continue being with me so that i can show up in
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whatever place i'm called to be in without saying no because i'm scared or or
26:51
not putting myself out there because i don't think i'm worthy or whatever yeah
26:58
yeah you're exactly right and i think everything that you just said i think we all struggle with and if
27:04
we're not struggling with it now he's troubled struggled with it in our past and and it's you're right it's it steals
27:10
from us it lies to us and it keeps us from moving and finding that place of peace that place where we can be
27:18
where we can um uh love on people where we can allow people to be who they are i feel
27:24
like we have we struggle with allowing people to be who they are because they're not comfortable with who we are
27:29
yep and and so when we get into that comparison place that's when we are all uncomfortable and
27:35
so rather than us just being uncomfortable i find that we just tend to lash out to other people to
27:41
make ourselves feel uncomfortable you know what i mean so so yeah so yeah wow
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yeah that's something i've really been kind of like trying to understand because i feel like we live in a time in
27:54
which a lot of people feel like they need to tell you yeah how to be
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and how not to be and what it means to be like a good citizen or a good christian or
28:09
a like whatever good human um and there's like this this need to
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to like i don't know it's so it's it's interesting this thing that's
28:22
happening because and one of the things that i've really been struggling with um in some of like the like and maybe
28:28
you can answer this a little bit better but um i was curious about the idea of like
28:33
because i think like jesus in particular a lot of jesus's message was he was criticizing the pharisees he was
28:40
criticizing i guess the christians would that be the correct
28:45
uh no he was criticizing the church
28:50
okay well got you yeah yeah so there's there's there's a difference so go ahead so then
28:58
because i feel like there's a lot of like christians attacking christians as in fart in part of like people attacking people
29:05
instead of like people attacking the church if you will or criticizing the church do you feel like that's what should be
29:13
happening more is that people should be challenging the church
29:18
versus challenging individuals or how does that work well you've got to
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define the church because the word of god says that we are the church so i'm the church you're the
29:29
church we're the church because we're the actual physical expression of who the church is
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the challenge is that the the differentiation is the legalism versus great versus grace and so
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that's what jesus was combating is the legalism of the church versus the grace which is what he died
29:48
for us all to have so when he had a conversation with the pharisee
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it was because he was fulfilling the law that they were trying to live by an
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example was their pharisee one of the pharisees was making a excuse as to why he couldn't
30:04
take care of his elderly parents because he was giving money to the church
30:09
and jesus said no no no no that's not how that works
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you need to take care of your elderly parents and and and still be able to give something to the church
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and and not in lieu of and maybe it's not as much but in in lieu of so what his his
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main thing through the whole new testament was that he wanted to reveal himself to people um as a miracle working god which he is
30:35
in a way where people can come into their own where they can fulfill their purpose and and rest in him so
30:43
the church was not allowing that there were too many rules too many guidelines so jesus came to fulfill the
30:48
law but the church sometimes just wants to uphold the law and and that's where i think there's a
30:54
there's a problem but here's the thing it's not up to you to judge me it's not
30:59
up to me to judge you it's up to us to love one another to be in relationship with one another
31:05
and to give one another room enough to have our own experience with god right because my experience is different
31:12
than your experience because god created us uniquely for this little space in the world that he carved
31:17
out for us already you know he ordered our steps and so if i spend all my time trying to tell you
31:24
what to do how to act what color your hair needs to be and that i don't like your shirt
31:29
then what time am i spending doing the things that god would have me do right so so yeah i'm praying that with
31:37
all the stuff that's happening that people are having a reality check like you and i have or at least taken some time
31:43
to consider where i'm at what i'm doing what's really important and finding that place where they can
31:49
one restore relationships that they've lost especially if they're family relationships and two
31:56
figure out who they are in christ what do we really believe you know what do we really believe i was
32:02
talking to someone the other day and it's like they don't believe in god and that's all right
32:07
but i asked him so what's your life for then what happens next why do you think we
32:13
were we were created or born because for me without that
32:18
understanding of who god is i feel like there's nothing
32:24
i i and i don't want to just exist you know i want to i want to
32:29
i want to live my life i want it to be purposeful i want it to edify the people around me and i want to be able to
32:37
show my kids and my grandkids how to edify those that are around them because to me just like i think you just
32:42
described that's when we're truly fulfilled is when we are when we are serving the people around us
32:49
you know i don't like sitting in my house all by myself i don't like myself sometimes i would much rather be outside with my neighbor
32:56
having some iced tea telling them they look fabulous and i love their garden right right
33:02
it's a huge difference but if i'm out there telling them oh those flowers look stupid you should have put blue ones in i don't know why you put
33:08
that the cat's going to eat that and get sick in your house you know what i'm saying i don't know but so i don't i don't know i i just
33:15
want to i just want to move forward and uh redefine where i'm headed based on the purpose i
33:23
feel that god's put in my heart mm-hmm and landa lakes um stated or legality versus loyalty
33:32
so i think that's like kind of the idea like you can kind of like go by the books so to speak but are you loyal to
33:37
i guess the legalities i guess or the people who are i don't know like you know are the
33:43
people who are um telling you their interpretation or what you know what i mean like and i think
33:48
you've talked about it a lot it's like i think a lot of it is we're called to find out what is
33:53
true for us and what brings us closer to god and what brings me closer might not be what
34:00
brings you closer or you know what i mean but that there is a little bit more like personal nuance
34:06
when it comes to that um absolutely teresa was asking how do you solve a
34:13
problem like maria what's that question i'm not sure what that refers to do you i'm not sure
34:18
either or maybe theresa can clarify we'd love to ask
34:25
speak on it um but yeah i guess how do you um i feel like
34:33
there are a lot and this is i think and i know that this is not the the type of christian
34:39
but i know that you were talking about um or before when you when we first started this podcast you mentioned
34:45
seeing like the people saying like god that hates gay people and you know and
34:51
like and protesting in that way and you're like saying well that's not you know like that's not what you
34:56
believe that's not where you're at how there are a lot of people that are that way though
35:02
yeah and seem to be and maybe it's just because of the work that i'm doing now or the
35:08
where i'm at but i'm hearing and seeing a lot more of that like very bold very kind of literal
35:16
filter yeah like it's not good ways and how i know that that's not the way you are
35:22
um how does that i guess what how do you how does that impact you i guess as
35:28
as somebody who identifies as being a christian it grieves my spirit it makes me really
35:36
it's like we all have representatives of our categories that we live in are
35:44
in this case my identity that are far right or far left and um unfortunately
35:50
people put us all in the same category because of this these extreme circumstances but every time i see those folks on the news
35:58
doing things like that or at funerals of servicemen i think that that group does that as
36:03
well it just grieves my heart that is not what the word of god says
36:08
and this that's a good example of pulling a scripture out of context maybe even a legalistic scripture at a context and
36:16
just trying to make everyone fit in that round hole and that's not what it's meant to be
36:22
that's not what it's meant to be that's like saying we're all created to be preachers
36:27
so every preacher has to look like this dress like this have the same color hair as this wear this suit
36:32
this tie has to look like that it's not like that right right not like that and as long as we continue to do that one
36:39
people are going to rebel as we should um and two these people that are
36:44
actually trying to do it they're missing they're missing the whole purpose for that god created him for
36:51
and and what's sad is it goes down from generation to generation until someone can break out of that mold and it's
36:57
really it's it's heartbreaking for me yeah landa lakes is clarifying um how do
37:04
you solve a problem like maria is a sound of music quote which i'm a bad i'm a i want to say i'm a bad
37:11
queer i don't know that i haven't i haven't watched sound of music which is is like it's a very common
37:19
musical that people are very aware of and rough around long time since i watched it have you have you seen that i have seen it a
37:26
couple of times but it's been a long time and that's when i watched it i'll have to put it on my list of shows to watch
37:31
again or to watch i feel like i might i don't even recall ever watching it but i am a
37:37
horrible like movie recall person i am just not
37:42
good at recall unless i like absolutely like really really love something and watch it over and over i
37:49
just don't fall into the references yeah
37:54
so it's been a while yeah there's a question how does tech support
38:00
drag and trans and how do we how do we do more
38:06
with what we're doing and what could we do more i think for us it's allowed us to i don't know we're in
38:13
two different states it's really allowed us to i think deepen our relationship
38:20
yeah together as well as help us define um who we are as individuals i think
38:26
because our relationship together i think challenges both of us and some of the things that we've just
38:31
taken for granted for sure as isaac says i believe that
38:36
the bolder our voices are the bolder the voices of opposition become
38:42
i've heard you say that to me a lot i think i think it's a different words but i think it's like when you say
38:48
the um i think you use the language like the doubt like the devil or the what is it like you know what i'm trying
38:54
to say you say it yeah i always i always remind myself that i don't battle against flesh and blood but
39:00
spirits and principalities of the air so when when my voice gets stronger in
39:05
love and grace and mercy the the voice of the enemy however he
39:10
might want to use it to say that's not it correct or to drown
39:15
that out it gets louder and louder and louder yeah it seems like the more
39:20
hate the more criticism that comes at you it's probably you know like i think
39:27
that's what isaac is saying it's like the bolder our voice is the more we put it out there
39:32
um i think with clarity and focus the more people want to like chip at it and pick at it there's a
39:39
a wonderful like i think one of the best music videos um came out this weekend
39:46
um which i love but i know a lot of people are gonna freak out about it and i love all the people
39:53
i love all the things i just love that it takes it there you know um little nas um came out with the
40:00
song called montero which is call me by your name and basically he kind of take that he's
40:06
like an openly gay black rapper and he um
40:12
he you know he did that song um old town roll rolltown wrote like the country song
40:18
right so he did this song and um as a black queer artist you know um people are always telling him he's going
40:25
to hell he's you know he's bad for the the children or you know things like
40:30
that and in this particular um like video he basically is like call
40:37
it's and it's very much in the same way like jesus is like what did what did you call me you know like what do you call me and so
40:43
the thing is call me by your name so it's like you call me these things so i'll show you what these things look
40:50
like like i'll be these things and so there's like he's like in the garden of eden in the beginning um he's also he gets
40:58
stoned i don't want to like um but it has like a lot of religious connotations and a
41:04
lot of like um i just feel like a lot of just kind of like okay fine this is who you say i'm this is this is
41:11
who i say like i'm gonna show you this is his response to the negativity that the church is throwing at him
41:17
not necessarily the church but you know how people are about you know so it's kind of his way of um i think
41:24
it's his way of also like it's it has to do with him there's a lot of really great reactions and stuff but
41:29
and there's probably so much you could take from it but it is kind of him being able to claim his sexuality his identity um and all
41:38
the intersections and not hide it and to put it out there but you know a lot of people say that he's like gonna go to hell and it's evil and
41:45
the devil and so he just kind of went there you know like he lap dances with the devil
41:51
as like a way to be like this is what you say i am like what do you i don't know it's just like i just think it's really powerful
41:58
to kind of like put those things into action in the way that people are saying and really be like is that really
42:04
and if you do think that then i'm going to do it right so to speak it's it's interesting
42:10
i think you have to a lot of people will watch it and like but i was like so in love with it
42:16
in every way every which way one i think just seeing openly like it was beautifully done it was well
42:22
done it was great music it's a great song um but i just feel like he just kind of put it out there for
42:29
um the world to just question and really think about and ponder something so
42:34
and i don't think i can even speak to it as well as but but um have to check it out
42:42
yeah that'd be an interesting conversation for us sometime i'm sure yeah yeah um i know we played
42:49
on here but they don't they always shut us down whenever we play someone else's music yeah when we
42:55
did the reaction video before um but yeah i mean it's def it's definitely like i think it's like if you if because i
43:02
think some people might not be happy about say um some some pop culture music they
43:08
might think that it's too sexualized and it's too like whatever um so i think
43:13
folks who don't like that will also probably not like this um because i think to be honest it's
43:20
pretty much this i think it's kind of within the same vein of things and i think in a lot of the same reasons why other pop artists
43:26
have used sex and they've they've talked about religion i mean if you look at madonna and lady gaga
43:32
you know all of those artists at some point in time have had some sort of critique um on rel i don't know if it's critique
43:40
but religion has impacted their art in some way or another and i think this was just
43:47
he happens to be a black queer artist who's in the mainstream and he's doing the same he's doing the
43:53
same thing um and i just don't think people are used to seeing gay men in particular um hyper
44:00
sexualized and fem and even more fem in a way that i think is really powerful for him to kind of
44:06
just claim that uh for himself you know like to just claim and own that and be in control of it basically um
44:14
versus do you know what i mean yep i know what you mean and i'm thank you for uh for clarifying because
44:20
i i'm going to step back one more just clarification because we were talking a little bit about the church
44:26
and i apologize because i categorized us just as i was saying we shouldn't do but um just because i say i'm a
44:33
christian doesn't mean i'm part of the church there's a lot of people that say that they're christian that really
44:39
have not given their lives to jesus some christians have been raised in the
44:46
church but haven't had an experience with god themselves and so they take that on and so they they won't not experience the grace
44:54
so they only understand the legalism and so then there's caught in the tradition and the rules of
45:00
it and they have a hard time giving grace because they've not experienced it themselves
45:05
and the one more clarification if you don't mind is you're right uh religion has nothing to
45:11
do with the church religion isn't an organization it's an organization the christian church
45:18
is about relationship and so when we try to if i try to walk in religion you know
45:24
that you you would you would ask me what was wrong with me because that's not who i am
45:29
it's it's about relationship but people who have been deceived or just say that
45:35
they're christian because it's the thing to say because i believe in god um they're going to get caught up in a religion
45:40
most people who have had a bad experience at a church it's because it's been a religious experience
45:46
that they've had at the church so just a few clear okay so we can talk about that another time but i just appreciate it because you can
45:52
you kind of touched on all those things and made those clarific made those separations automatically in your conversation i just i appreciate that
45:59
that um i feel like you can understand me better uh than when we first started talking um
46:06
so anyway i'm just just just thank you for that and i just clarifying for the folks out there that might be listening
46:12
so they can understand the conversation that we're having yeah yeah people thinking tina said some bad stuff about
46:18
the church that's not what i was trying to do yeah well i think that's i think that's the
46:23
hard balance because i think even it's like i because i like i want to let people
46:30
have their like have your get your life like have your own
46:35
experience and if you if like your sexuality
46:40
does not have a space for your like for queerness or for like whatever then like keep that for
46:47
yourself don't have that in your world but why do you have to like put that on other people i guess is kind
46:53
of like that whole and then i think when you have to put or you feel like you have to put something on somebody else like
46:59
i just like there's something else going on there and that's something to look at more so than like
47:05
i don't know and that's something i'm really wrestling with to be honest with you is that balance of
47:13
yeah it's it's hard i wrestle with it too and not just on on this issue on lots of
47:20
different issues you know um we're so want people to think the way that we think
47:27
that we can't give people the ability or it's hard for us to give people the ability to make up their own mind
47:33
you know it's and it's i get it i catch myself do it i'm like oh my gosh who cares if you like meatballs or not
47:39
you know just because i love meatballs doesn't mean you have to love meatballs but i find myself trying to explain why
47:44
don't you love meatballs how can you not love meatballs you know whatever or whatever it is and i just think it's something and
47:51
that's just a trivial thing i know but politics is the same education is the same healthcare is the
47:57
same all these things church religion all these things we we want everyone to be like-minded my
48:04
whole purpose although i get it or not purpose idea maybe is even better or understanding
48:11
maybe even better um is to do the best i can to understand the things around me the
48:18
things that i'm putting into my life and allow people the opportunity to build their own
48:24
understanding but willing to share my opinions but not insist
48:29
that because i've shared my opinion that you have to agree with me or that you have to walk in the same opinion that i have right
48:35
and now it's it's hard it's hard and then i'm sure you're experiencing also you
48:40
get people uh from all sects of life that disagree with you or
48:46
think that you should have made that person agree with you and you didn't and so now they've got opinions about
48:52
all that and i'm like oh my goodness it's just so interesting it's just i think the thing is like when you have i
48:58
guess the passion or that like drive to say something you know like i watched
49:03
one of the things i really loved was actually watching reaction videos to this video and um did they have some out there yeah
49:10
there's a lot and i was watching a lot of different reactions and and people didn't necessarily know what
49:15
they were gonna see and i think a lot of people saw things that they never seen before
49:20
and um it also just went a lot of places and so you saw a lot of people's i think just
49:26
natural reaction to some things and there were some there was these two guys that i watched in
49:31
particular that i am assuming they were heterosexual men um they um were definitely very like
49:39
shocked by what they were seeing and they were like and they like were
49:45
like maybe uncomfortable but they weren't rude they weren't offensive they weren't
49:51
like mean or even said it was wrong or they were just like oh okay you know
49:59
like like why can't we like why do we feel like we have to like come at people so hard
50:07
um but then the thing of it is it's just like the things that matter to
50:13
to people is different um and when something matters to you
50:19
i don't know it's just i don't know it's something i'm definitely really trying to meditate on and prey on and um i
50:28
yeah and just i'm actually wanting to find something in the bible even um to kind of support
50:35
on how do we um how do we be better with one another how do we not
50:40
you know push our i don't know yeah there's a lot of good
50:47
stuff in the bible on all that stuff there's a lot of a lot i think a lot of the things that people decide they want
50:53
to have a decision on or disagree on it's not any of their business you're right you're right we have we have opinions
51:00
about stuff i have a friend i just love her um i get to spend a lot of time with with her but and she
51:06
she shares these beautiful stories but she always has an opinion and she knows about what they should do and what they
51:12
shouldn't do and i don't know why they don't do that and i'm just like oh honey it's really nothing to do with you
51:18
so but but the whole conversation is um sharing the story is fine sharing her
51:24
opinion about the story of the fine but not understanding why they're not doing this
51:30
that or the other and if she should tell them that and this and that i'm like oh honey i just need to let that rest
51:35
yeah well i can get caught into it myself too because i either i feel like i've
51:43
come to know or understand that i feel like maybe other people don't and like i can get be like yeah but you
51:48
know you don't you don't see it right or there's there's more to it or yeah it's just like an interesting i
51:54
think kind of um i don't know i think i think it's something that i think i need to
52:00
remember to turn more inward um that's hard and then i think
52:09
choose to have those conversations with people that you can have it with i'd like like you and i when we talked about
52:15
like i think when we talked about race last week in particular it kind of just came up and there was a part of me that
52:20
felt like i needed to tell you something but i didn't really necessarily need to but we could still have that
52:26
conversation and i could share that with you and you could share where you were at and and it was
52:31
it was a good conversation that i think we could have but it might not have been so great in other situations and
52:39
um and it wasn't even really about me trying to tell you that you know this is the right way this is
52:44
the wrong way necessarily you know what i mean like um but i think it can come out that way
52:51
when we're having those conversations with people who are just out there if that makes sense
52:56
right is that right yeah that makes sense i i know i try to um only give my opinion if
53:04
someone asks um i'm really really getting better it's oh it's not been an easy journey because
53:11
i've been one of those people that'll just blurt out whatever it is don't care if you ask or not but here's my opinion
53:17
so i've been really trying to be careful about only sharing when someone asks for my opinion and when i share um
53:24
just let them know this is my opinion this is why i i feel this way and you know if you want
53:30
to talk more about it i'm happy to but if you don't it's fine because i don't want to be the pushy
53:36
so anyway i know when we got off on or got a little beyond passion and
53:42
purpose maybe but yeah you did um charlie brown says just do it be the
53:48
best you can be show your love and keep your glass half full at all times
53:53
great wisdom charlie good to see you yeah you know charlie i do know charlie nice
54:00
charlie's awesome yeah i like the the half full i don't know that i've ever heard that
54:05
before like to keep it half full is that just a more balanced space with
54:10
things maybe charlie you want to clarify a space in which you can take on more and always you found more
54:17
yes i was thinking or grow yeah it feels like a neutral place you know it's not half in like it's not half
54:24
it what half empty or half full or half full yeah so half full it's i guess the
54:29
better side of it yeah yeah i've always thought that i wanted to be overflowing
54:34
but i think that's good as long as you're overflowing with the right kinds of things if you're overflowing with love and
54:41
kindness and mercy and grace and not overflowing with hate and disgust and anger and intolerance
54:48
um those are things we don't want to overflow yeah one yeah like do we need to be over full
54:57
with anything though oh i don't know i i think i like to be over right is that what we give to others i
55:03
don't know i i feel like maybe i understand the half full because i want to have room for
55:08
other people's ideas other people's opinions i i totally get that i totally agree with that i think there are areas
55:15
in my life like i i am a joyful person i want to be overflowing i love it when people say to me i can
55:22
tell when you come in here because the whole room lifts i feel like that's a positive because
55:27
i'm not coming in with anger and frustration and whatnot i'm coming into a space
55:32
i'm trying to edify people trying to help them to i don't know just feel good about the moment you know sometimes we carry in
55:39
lots of baggage into situations you know having a bad day i'm tired i'm
55:45
exhausted i had a fight with someone someone passed away you know who knows and you're you're in this space for
55:51
whatever reason you need to be in this space and i just if i'm in that space i just want to be a lifting
55:57
a lifting it's not going to fix whatever you're dealing with but maybe for the moment you can smile
56:03
or laugh or whatever so on that i mean overflowing kind of yeah i feel that we
56:10
are like running out of time we have like three or four minutes um
56:17
but no problem i'm sorry no not at all not at all um
56:22
we um i just wanted to let folks know though that um tina and i have been invited to be
56:29
guests on a radio show out of chicago um the and it's a show on forgiveness
56:36
so um bob kaiser has a radio show with wghz i'll put all the information in the
56:41
description so if you want to join us and listen in call in during our conversation that
56:47
would be great we'll be going live at noon um central standard time
56:53
that's uh 10 a.m over in the pacific time um time zone um and
56:59
um bob will be interviewing and talking with us about forgiveness and we'll share what our experience has been with each
57:05
other um but and also separately and just i don't know whatever it is bob wants to talk with us about
57:11
there you go um but he's doing a whole series on forgiveness so also if folks are kind of at that space of
57:18
um looking at forgiveness or what curious about forgiveness or on the
57:23
other side of it even he has a really great um series that you'd um love to check out he's had
57:28
therapists and spiritual leaders and he's shared a lot of his own story as well so
57:34
i think it's really powerful and i'm really excited that we get to be a part of the series and so again we'll
57:39
put all that information in the description so that you can check us out this weekend
57:45
um otherwise we will see you next week on monday i'm never gonna monday not wednesday
57:52
it'll be monday we'll call it wednesday but uh it's monday um yes and thank you for um
57:59
watching us either on youtube listening to us on a podcast wherever you listen to a podcast at
58:05
uh splinteredgrace if you'd like to see other episodes or anything like that
58:10
again look in the description if you would like to support our the work of the podcast as
58:16
well as the work of a queer chaplain um feel free to join our patreon in which you can help
58:21
contribute monthly um with a small amount of money like three dollars but it adds up and it's
58:27
super super helpful um in helping us continue to um do the work of the queer chaplain
58:32
and splinter grace podcast i think is that all you know i had to go at some
58:38
point yeah i think that's it all right do you want to um say goodbye and take us out are you
58:44
going to trust me guys thanks for joining us i have a
58:50
wonderful monday and we look forward to having another conversation with you next week
58:56
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59:01
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