LISA SALAZAR — BLOG

Based on a 2014 survey, this essay revisits what trans lives reveal about inner life and spiritual endurance at a time of renewed religious hostility. Image of light streaming in, finally. In the fall of 2014, I set out to ask a deceptively simple question: what does spirituality actually look like in the lives of transgender people? At the time, public conversations about transgender lives were only beginning to edge into mainstream awareness. The language we now use so easily, especially the word  non-binary , had not yet entered common circulation. Most people in my community described themselves as trans men, trans women, gender-queer, or gender-fluid, using the language that was available to them then. If this same survey were conducted today, many of those same participants might well describe themselves differently. The map of language has changed. The terrain of human experience beneath it has not. I was not trying to make a theological argument or defend any religious inst...

Photo: The glowing screen of my laptop displaying the Facebook post that inspired this essay. A reminder that existence is not an argument. It is lived. On how a quiet truth can unsettle those who haven’t yet faced their own. The post was about the Williams Institute’s recently updated data showing that approximately 2.8 million Americans identify as transgender. The post was gentle in its simplicity. It did not petition, persuade, or defend. It only acknowledged that trans people are here, and have always been here, woven into the ordinary life of the nation.

“No one should lose their child so that someone else can feel more comfortable in their fear.” What might be coming down the tracks as we look toward the dawning of a new day?