A Transgender Spiritual Retreat

I'm off for a few days of renewal and self-reflection to Hot Springs, North Carolina.

It's been an incredibly busy summer, not the quiet one I hoped for.

Kindred Spirits is "a global network based in the Southern Appalachians near Asheville, North Carolina since 1993." They put on a spiritual retreat every year where people get together to think about and be in the presence of the "spirit of transgender."

A friend told me about it, and it sounded awesome. So we're driving down together.

"Each of our four days together, we share in daily sacred circles. Our Laurel River hike culminates in a ritual swim-frolic. Special teaching sessions will be offered by some of our veteran attendees, often including various intuitive and shamanic sorts of work. Our ceremonies climax on an ancient Cherokee bald mountaintop with a 360-degree vista. This retreat can be a life-changing experience for you, connecting with your trans-spiritual family, as well as launching you further along your own spiritual path. You are encouraged to bring your own unique visions and expertise to share within this powerful gathering of your own kindred spirits."

Whoa, right? I hear the cell service is hit or miss, and I'm not sure about the internet. Here's some more about the retreat.

There are people from various spiritual and religious backgrounds, shamanic traditions, Native American cultures, Buddhists, Druids, and me with my bagels-and-lox Judaism, but also a long background in Biblical and Talmudic (even some Kabbalistic) studies.

I talked to Holly Boswell, the founder of the group. I asked her about the issues of cultural appropriation that concerned me, and she assured me that the retreat does not attempt to appropriate other cultures' spiritual practices.

Here's a little snippet from an article by Ms. Boswell, entitled "The Spirit of Transgender":

What brings us to this place we call "transgender" -- this way of being that needs to redefine, transform, and recreate itself in a world that insists we must conform to our genitals? Perhaps there was an itch in the groin. Most assuredly, there was an ache in the heart. And let's not discount all the mental anguish.

Researchers are investigating causative factors such as chromosomes, unique hormonal configurations, and of course psycho-social influences.... but I ask you: what do you believe it is that made you transgendered? Was it the itch, the ache, the anguish... or was it also something else? -- something most people can't define, something called "spirit".

This "body-heart-mind-spirit" pattern is an age-old, universal construct. Most of us spend a lot of our lives in the "body-mind" mode. Some of us manage to also be in "heart space". But how many actually visit the dimension of "spirit" -- even a few times, much less regularly? I have observed, however, that many transgendered people not only visit this dimension -- out of necessity -- but are often coming from this place.

I'm really looking forward to this.

"When I Was A Little Boy, I Prayed To God"

Several years ago, my synagogue asked me to write something about being transgender and Jewish.

I grew up very, very devoutly religious, and I felt terrible about my feelings inside. It hurt me every day. Can you see it in that little face?

The piece has been published in our prayer book, Siddur B'chol L'vav'cha (which means "With All Your Heart," a reference to the injunction in Deuteronomy 6:5 to love God with all your heart).

I thought you might find it interesting.

Growing up very religious, and believing very deeply, I thought a lot about God.

This prayer is about how I felt about being trans, and my relationship with God, as a young person in my pre-teen and early teen years, and how that resolved as I grew older.

"When I was a little boy, I prayed to God.

I prayed God would make me a girl because I knew I wasn't really a boy, not inside. I didn't want to keep pretending to be a boy because it was hard to pretend all the time. I knew I couldn't go on forever pretending like that. It made me very tired and sad. I wondered why God would want me to be tired and sad every day.

But I tried hard not to disappoint God.

One morning, after praying like this for many years, I woke up and God had changed me.

God changed my tiredness into courage. God gave me the courage to tell the truth. God gave me the courage to tell people that I wasn't a boy, even though it made some people laugh and some people get mad.

God's courage has made me happy. God's courage has taught me to love myself. God's courage lets my outside be like my inside. God's courage gives me the gift of honesty. God is Truth.

I thank God for giving me the courage to tell the truth. I thank God for giving me the courage to be me.

Thank you God, for creating the whole infinitely complex universe and for creating the infinitely complex me."

This is also available on the Jeff Herman Virtual Resource Center of Hebrew Union College.