Affirming Quakers is not a revenge project because revenge would shape the entire project around those who hurt us. And we are tired of things being about them.
Affirming Quakers was born in a moment of storm swirling around a joyful center: the wedding of Madi and Hannah, photographed by Marcus and officiated by me. They wed on a clear October afternoon, in front of over 100 members of their chosen family, at a beautiful outdoor venue overlooking a field that lay fallow.
Although this wedding took place outside of any Quaker structures—I am not a recorded Quaker minister, the guest list was not primarily Quaker people, and the field was not Quaker land—there were many who took issue. A common drumbeat: "How dare she come into our backyard and perform this wedding?"
"Our backyard." As if all of Kansas belonged to them. As if the Browns were not married a few miles from the place where five generations of Hannah's family have also lived.
But therein lies the problem: nonaffirming people make the LGBTQ+ conversation about themselves. If you listen closely, their arguments against queer inclusion are all about their comfort, their theology, their traditions. The only thing there is theirs.
And so, Affirming Quakers was born, but that was the first and last time that our project has had anything to do with those who hurt us. Their their-ness showed us the extent of our unbelonging, so we left to build a house of our own. We do not exist for them, but neither do we exist against them. We exist for our beloved community.
Now, for some confessions.
I confess it has been tempting to use our growing platform to exact revenge. We would like to tell our side of the story, to divulge the details of closed-door meetings that leaders so obviously worked to keep silent. When a bewildering rumor clearly midwifed by secrecy stumbles into our sphere, the temptation to correct it—it would be so easy!—rises once again.
I confess that revenge is a tempting tool. Revenge fire burns hot and fast, and it does its damage well. But what is left when its fire cools, leaving us with a creation in the very shape that we sought to avoid?
For my part, I confess that I still mourn my crumbled and crumbling network. I know that the narrative is being steered by others and wonder if providing the correct details might have steadied a structure I was so sure would hold. I wonder if the silence of friends—far more painful than the aggression of enemies—could be remedied if I just told them what happened.
Of course the answer is no, and we are done using truth as a bowl to beg for crumbs.
But mostly, I confess my worry for my teammates. I worry and worry and worry. I worry that this vote against revenge exacts too heavy a cost upon them, because these self-imposed limitations mean that they hesitate to tell full stories of their own. The power of a shared story is one of the earliest tools that the queer community used to heal. I worry that in swallowing the details, we poison ourselves.
In guarding against revenge, have we boomeranged into the age-old trap of prioritizing their comfort over our own thriving? I confess I don't know. I just don't know.
But today, we choose against revenge. We choose to build. We choose love and light and spirit and dancing and rest and weddings and dogs and theater and books and new wineskins. We love our new house and all those who found their way to it. We love one another, and we trust a long process.
We belong.
We are loved.
We are not alone.
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