10.2.23 - Matthew 18:6
We've all excluded people because of a difference we didn't understand. What's one way you can commit to being curious about inclusion today?
If any of you cause one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,[a] it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea.
This scripture was texted to me not too long ago from someone that could not reconcile my trans being with her own beliefs.
My presence as an adult trans person made her leap to the refrain used to invoke fear against trans people: trans children are made by the visibility of trans adults.
The trans child part of me read that text along with the current forty-five year old part of me. I felt rage she had the audacity to harm me with scripture. I felt sadness and wondered at the harm she causes to children outside of the binary today.
As those feelings of sadness were held, something soothing emerged within me.
I re-read the scripture and knew that the compassionate, protective heart that said these words was including my trans childhood in them. What she had named as sinful in her text I renamed as sacred and blessed.
I knew children outside of the binary are to be protected, celebrated, and nurtured into fullness of life and being.
We've all excluded people because of a difference we didn't understand. What's one way you can commit to being curious about inclusion today?
--Dax Frankiln-Hicks