I was in middle school when I started to feel like something was "different." I grew up in the religious cult that was the Bill Gothard movement and while disparaging homosexual men was a constant, I had zero concept of any other type of sexuality until late high school when I had my first experience with a girl at age 16. As I look back now at 27, I see so many instances where I had crushes on girls as well as boys, but convinced myself I just wanted to be like them as opposed to with them.

I felt like I was constantly drifting in a sexual purgatory with no access to heaven, but not quite hell either. I knew I wasn't a lesbian since I was attracted to men also, but how could I be half and half? Bisexual was not a term I would hear until I was in my freshman year of college. I was with my then-future boyfriend as I sobbed on a playground after the girl I had been involved with in high school had called me. She told me she had entered into a courtship with someone I grew up with and she "had to tell him about the sin we committed." I was having what I realized later was one of many panic attacks as I told him about what I had done. "Is it possible you could be bisexual?" he gently asked me. A lightbulb turned on and I researched it a little, but after entering into my first real relationship with him six months later it was easy to table for several more years.

Once I moved to the deep south for graduate school, I finally had the freedom to face myself and who I really was. At 25 I entered into my first relationship with a woman. It lasted only eight months, but it taught me so much about myself and the roles that feel most natural to me including realizing that I am on the genderfluid/non-binary scale.

At the age of 25 I accepted a full-time directing position at a Methodist Church on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. They did not ask me my views on politics or homosexuality, so I decided I could operate under “don’t ask, don’t tell.” A separation between my personal life and the church could be done. I had been doing that most of my life anyway. What I didn’t know was that it was killing me and God had been waiting for me to see I could choose myself over a building.

I was challenged to become vulnerable in worship. I loved their children and let them confide in me. Led some services that I am proud of. I went through a breakup, and began to focus on healing inner child wounds from trying to fit in and ignore my true self. Trauma is stored in the body the longer we lie to ourselves and everyone around us. I had seen it manifest in kidney stones, binge eating, starving myself, drinking WAY too much, and self hate in the way I spoke to myself and about myself. The more I began to cultivate this mindfulness, I connected to God in ways that felt natural and I saw evidence of my spirituality in the smallest of ways. The more I welcomed myself and those around me, the more love grew and cast out darkness. My body grew healthier and I began trusting my intuition, knowing that my gut feelings were the truth of what God had been trying to tell me all along.

On February 26th, 2019, the decision was passed in the Methodist Church: Any LGBTQ+ clergy were not allowed and if any same-sex marriages were performed, the pastor who performed the service could lose a years salary. I was heartened by how many Methodists argued against this, but mourned as my choir members shared the news with cheers and joy thanking God for saving the day. Each new post felt like a punch to the gut. These people had taken me in, fed me, worshipped with me and now had no idea they were condemning me to hell. How many of them had told me that God had given me a voice, a purpose? But according to you, God can’t work through someone who has the audacity to love more openly and differently than you. I am a walking abomination and disgusting in your eyes, forget any relationships we built before. Humanity is stripped away every time in order to worship an ideal that is based out of hate and fear. That will never be the Word of God.

The only guilt I felt in that moment was over hiding myself for so long, but not for who I am. Never again for who I am.

I knew it was time to leave and an opportunity came out of the blue that I knew was heaven-sent. Many were saddened and didn’t understand. Even with our differences I loved them, but I knew I couldn’t deny myself anymore. Life and love are not black and white. It is a million muddled colors with shades and fragments that are sometimes different from yours, but have their own beauty.

After becoming permanently unemployed in the music world thanks to COVID, I hope to devote my time writing poems and stories about being an LGBTQIA person living and leading evangelical worship in the Bible Belt.

I’m passionate about using tarot as a tool for deconstruction of Christianity and purity culture particularly in the lives of closeted queer individuals. I want to create an intuitive life coaching career to help those suffering from spiritual trauma who wish to explore other avenues of spirituality. After fighting my calling for a while, I am taking a leap of faith and moving back to Mississippi to build that community there and hopefully obtain another MA in writing. I am out and proud and continuing therapy and allowing myself to be unapologetic about who I was created to become.

My idea of God and finding him in the church pews is a very different one than it was two years ago and that is okay. What I ask for those of you who hold to this traditional ideal is to remember who may be listening among you, that you could be condemning without knowing. We are in front of your face, in your congregation, your local dining establishment, we are your children and your grandchildren. We love you almost as much as we hate ourselves in secret for decades, choosing to abandon the way we were created to please you and keep you comfortable. We will do almost anything in order to not lose you. We love you, conditions aside, because we know the other facets and fragments of you are what matter and make up who you are, not the divide that separates us. Who you choose to love and marry are not our business. All we ask is that you not make our love lives yours in return and love us not on a condition, but with reckless abandon entrusting God to do the rest.

I am also involved in the online ZINE @thehighpriestesscollective so be sure to check that out! I can also be followed on twitter at @Venti_Cat or at my tarot instagram @catwithdacards.