What a Great Circle

Well we just completed this incredible retreat at the ranch and two weeks later we sit in circle and witnessed everyone's process. What a wonderful opportunity we are sharing. So last thursday night we had 20 men attend the heart circle, share and witness life since the retreat. We look forward to those of you with your own ideas of events and processes we can share in community. By all means if you have an idea or an interest let us know so we can incorporate it in the process! Details of the next retreat will soon be posted.

Jerry

Winter Retreat Update/January 24, 2008 Gathering

It is one week following the Winter Retreat at the ranch. My head is still spinning in pure delight at what an awesome experience we shared in the Cedar Forest of Spring City. First of all thanks to Loretta and Brook for working in such a loving and nurturing manner. These two women are part of the magic of these retreats and I want to honor them for those efforts.

As for the retreat itself, the ranch was magical in the new snow layers offered to us. Sean Kaminsky, the director of the show being filmed was present and captured all the magic and growth of the retreat. Surprisingly this was a pure incidental to the overall process, thus allowing for a free flowing event.

In knowing many of the men I truly honor them for their willingness to show up, share, examine and otherwise journey into a new place.

"Nothing determines who we will become so much as those things we choose to ignore." --Sandor McNab

So, overall the retreat continues to sit with me and in my heart as a truly magical and spirit filled weekend, perhaps life altering for the men who participated. Photos will be showing up soon.

ALSO

Thursday January 24, 2008 at 7:30 p.m. we will hold our talking circle at our usual location. (You are welcome to e mail for directions and a address).

This circle is open to the Queer Men looking to share or witness. You are not required to talk. You need not have attended in the past or been to a retreat. I suspect many men from the retreats will have an interest to process more of their journey. Till we meet again!

Jerry

Updates

Well the holidays are behind us and what a wonderful winter season we have. Queer Spirit has also been busy.

1. Fellow Travelers Exhibit is soon to be on its way to another state. It is currently hanging at Cup of Joe's and will be there until I can get my act together and take it down. I imagine sometime this week I will get it retrieved. From what I hear many people from Salt Lake City viewed and pondered this beautiful collection by author Mark Thompson. Please see the Q Salt Lake article on this website. I want to thank the owner of Cup of Joe who generously provided space at her coffee shop for the show. Also, Q Salt Lake provided advertisment free of charge for nearly two months. This was a generous offering from them.

2. Gay Soul Making: Great hit. Mark Thompson and Clyde Hall provided insights and group facilitation offering some thoughts to a group of 20 men. This website offers a detail review of that workshop.

3. Post Holiday PJ Party: 13 men got together between holidays, donning grandma's christmas offerings and together watched The Peaceful Warrior. Great fun and social time for all involved.

4. The Winter Retreat is next weekend (Jan 11-13, 2008) We will be filmed by the Logo station for an upcoming special regarding Queer Spirit. Right now there are 15 guys ready to hit Wind Walker Ranch. Still time to go!

This movement of Queer Spirit has been an absolute joy to watch and observe. More and more men are checking it out and moving with what we offer. We have a yahoo group, Utah Queer Spirit we invite people to join. Will have more to report upon our return.

Jerry

Hey Guys........ Its a post holiday PJ Party.



Tired of the Family Bondage that the Holidays bring?

Need to find a place to dump that Holiday Treat begging to be eaten?

Want to lounge about in those PJ's that grandma got you?


(These two just RSVP'd)


Well here ya go!

John and I thought it would be fun to get together for a relaxed evening of pillows, blankies and PJ's

When: Friday December 28, 2007 at 7:00 p.m.
What to
Bring: Yummy treat to share, PJ's, Blankets, Pillows, everything to be cozy and comfy.
What: Peaceful Warrior Movie and PJ Party

And yes you can bring friends or those interested in Queer Spirit!

Some of you have RSVP'd so no need to do it again, but if your considering attending and have not RSVP this is most helpful.

Call 801 557-9203 for questions.

Gay-The New Straight- I Don't Think So!

“Gay — the new straight” — I don’t think so!

A veteran gay activist gets enspirited to tear into a recent Gregory Rodriguez column.
By Don Kilhefner

December 5, 2007

The title of Gregory Rodriguez's recent L.A. Times column, "Gay — the new straight," certainly caught my attention. Drawing his conclusions from an important new research study done by the Williams Institute at the UCLA Law School, Rodriguez makes many melodramatic, but largely unfounded, claims about gay people. While the rest of you were watching "Desperate Housewives," I sat down and studied UCLA research demographer Gary Gates' report, "Geographic Trends Among Same-Sex Couples In The U.S. Census and the American Community Survey," page by page, statistic by statistic. I recommend it only to the masochists among you.

First Flaw. Rodriguez makes several major generalizations about gay people based solely on one study of same-sex couples. Let's do some simple math.

The number of gay couples on which the study was made was about 800,000. If there were two people in each couple (but you never know with you gay people), about 1.6 million gay people were included in the study. If we estimate that somewhere between 8% and 10% of the 300 million people in the United States are gay, we can estimate a total gay population of about 27 million. (That's settling on 9% — one of the few times I'm in the middle of the road.) Thus gay couples in the study represent about 6% of the gay population.

For research on geographic trends among same-sex couples, that's a great statistical sample. The only problem is that you cannot make sweeping generalizations about gay people and gay identity and gay community based on the study — only geographic trends among same-sex couples. You also can't differentiate between lesbian and gay male couples. Also missing was critically important, stratified demographic information such as the age, race and socioeconomic status of the subjects.

Based on my more than four decades of working in the Los Angeles gay community, I would speculate that the majority of gay men are not in coupled relationships, albeit many are desperately trying either to get into one or out of one. And I would speculate further that those who are in coupled relationships tend to be generally more conventional, bourgeois and conservative — gay assimilationist — than those who are not. Thus, generalizing about the gay community based on undifferentiated and unstratified same-sex couples, as Rodriguez and Gates do, is fraught with gross oversimplification and, in their case, the spinning of a sociopolitical agenda.

Second Flaw. To understand the gay assimilation ideology that Rodriguez is trying to spin, one must understand something about gay history and the struggle between two polarities in the historical development of gay people — gay enspiritment vs. gay assimilation. One can trace this debate back to a dinner Walt Whitman (gay enspiritment) and Ralph Waldo Emerson (gay assimilation) had in Boston prior to the publication of the 1860 edition of "Leaves of Grass." Emerson wanted Whitman to tone down and make more respectable what is usually considered the most famous gay poetry ever written. Whitman refused. Gay enspiritment won the day that time.

Right now we are living in a period where gay assimilation is the dominant ideology of the gay community. It has not always been so. There have been four major periods in our history as gay people here in Los Angeles and nationally:

(1) 1951-53: Radical Beginnings (Enspiritment). Harry Hay and the other politically progressive men who founded the Mattachine Society in Echo Park made a radical statement about homosexuals being a minority group. By organizing a network of secret discussion groups, they called on gay people to work toward creating "a highly ethical homosexual culture" and a "homosexual ethic — disciplined, moral and socially responsible."

(2) 1954-68: Homophile Assimilation. At a fateful 1953 meeting of the Mattachine Society at the old Unitarian Church on Crenshaw Boulevard, conservative homophile assimilationists took over the organization, and the radical founders were largely exiled. The homophile assimilationists emphasized the idea that homosexuals are just like heterosexuals except for what they do in bed (or Griffith Park). Respectability (suits and ties for men and dresses for women) and acceptance by the dominant heterosexual society signaled a major move to the right.

(3) 1969-85: Gay Liberation (Enspiritment). Author Mark Thompson called the year 1969 the "Big Bang" for gay people. Homophile assimilation was over, and a new consciousness emerged among gay people. A second radical, indeed revolutionary, push forward took place — gay self-respect replaced acting respectable. For the first time in American history, a gay community and virtually all of the gay community's institutions were created. Gay oppression was battled openly and fiercely. There was no begging for acceptance.

(4) 1985-present: Gay Assimilation. Except for ACT UP and AIDS activism in general, the gay community again moved right, with gay assimilation supplanting gay liberation. The ideology was that gay people are no different from straight people, as reflected in Rodriguez's Op-Ed. Same-sex marriage became almost the sole item on the assimilationist agenda. The gay assimilation poster boys would be a married gay couple with a home, a child or two and a schedule of PTA meetings and ballet lessons (for the child), a dog, a parrot, a few goldfish and tickets to a fundraising dinner at the Beverly Hilton. Inherent in assimilation ideology is the disappearance of the gay community and gay identity. Gay people would become like hetero tapioca pudding.

Third Flaw. A third major flaw in Rodriguez's gay assimilationist spin is his use of a conventional immigration-minority group historiography to interpret developments in the evolution of gay people. It goes like this. They (fill in the blank) came to the United States, the Great Melting Pot, and after two generations they were absorbed into the mainstream (except for Africans who came involuntarily and were enslaved).

I would suggest Rodriguez pay attention to Albert Einstein when he said "the significant problems of our day cannot be solved with the same consciousness that created them." A consciousness from that of our hetero oppressors is needed to understand the present evolution of gay people. Our so-called gay identity, whether negative or positive, is largely hetero-male derived and defined.

A new way of understanding gay people is that being "gay" and being "heterosexual" are radically different — like yin and yang — two separate and different parts of the whole, the human species. As gay people, our function in human evolution is different from the evolutionary function of heterosexuals (reproductive survival). Not only is being gay important and substantial, it has a significant evolutionary and social purpose and provides gay people with innate purpose that guides our behavior, our lives and our many contributions to society.

For a long time, gays have been trying to minimizetheir differences from heteros as an act of survival. But now, for the first time, the forward-moving force of history compels gay people to maximize their differences from straights as an act of love to ourselves and to them — the emergence of a new gay consciousness. In deep and profound ways none of us has "come out" yet.

Don Kilhefner, PhD, is a Jungian psychologist in West Hollywood. He is a founder of Los Angeles' Gay and Lesbian Center, Van Ness Recovery House and numerous other seminal institutions in the gay community including (with Harry Hay) the Radical Faeries, an international gay spirituality and consciousness movement. With Roberto Blain, he writes a column for Frontiers, Southern California's largest gay newspaper, titled Edging Out: Exploring the Frontiers of Gay Consciousness.

I Thoughts this was Interesting

"Going Our Own Way"

by Jesse Monteagudo

In "A Separate People Whose Time Has Come," the late Harry Hay —
founder of the Mattachine Society and the Radical Fairies — wrote
about the special roles that Lesbians and Gay men, bisexuals and
transgendered people, play in society: We are "messengers and
interceders, shamans of both genders, priestesses and priests,
imagemakers and prophets, mimes and rhapsodies, poets and
playwrights, healers and nurturers, teachers and preachers, tinkers
and tinkerers, searchers and researches." Since Hay wrote those words
other queer authors, mystics and philosophers have echoed his words
and his belief that homosexuality is more than just sexual
orientation.

Gay, Lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people are special people,
and not just because our affectional or sexual orientation or our
gender identity is different from the majority's. We are special
because we play special roles in society. Since we are not limited by
strict categories of gender or sex, we often lead the way, leaving
others to follow. According to Judy Grahn, author of Another Mother
Tongue, "Society uses all Gay people who participate in Gay culture,
for special purposes. We are closely watched to see what constitutes
the limit of a thing — too far out, too much, too low, too bad, too
outrageous, too soft, too dangerous, too rough, too cultured, too
aggressive, too sexual." If we could go back in time and examine the
first woman or the first man who ever tried to do something new -
from world-shaking philosophies to styles of fashion — It's very
likely that she or he was Lesbian or Gay, even if that person never
expressed his or her sexuality.

One of the ways GLBT people lead the way is in the field of religion
and spirituality. This we do in spite of, and sometimes because of,
opposition in the part of the religious establishments. In many
cultures, sex and gender-variant people serve as priests, witches,
shamans and sages. And while traditional Judaism, Christianity and
Islam condemn homosexual acts, and often restrict the roles of women
to those of wife, mother, nurse, teacher or servant, they could not
keep many of our ancestors from expressing themselves in their own
unique ways. Many of our ancestors, in the days before GLBT-affirming
churches, synagogues and temples, became mystics, both as a way to
express their own unique talents and because mysticism involves a
personal relationship with God that does not require an intermediary.
Judaism, Islam and Christianity offer many examples of gender-variant
mystics, women and men, who by expressing their own spiritual
yearnings paved the way for others.

In Medieval Iran, the mystics of the Muslim Sufi tradition were often
Gay or bisexual men. For many Sufi masters, the path to the love of
God often went through the love of a beloved disciple, the
shahid. "God is Beauty," said the Qur'an; and for many Sufis that
beauty was most exquisitely expressed in the beauty of a young man.
In the case of Rumi, the greatest of the Sufi poets, his love for
another man was literally earth-shaking. For many years, Rufi shared
his life with his Beloved Friend, Shams al-Din. When Shams
mysteriously disappeared — probably murdered — Rumi mourned his
Friend in his own unique way. He put on mourning robes, a white shirt
open at the chest, a honey-colored fez, and sandals, and for forty
days danced a dance of lamentation and love in the garden where Shams
was apparently killed. From Rumi's experience came a new and lasting
religious order, the "whirling dervishes."

Our Jewish ancestors, who lived for most of the last two millennia as
minorities in Christian or Muslim lands, were not as free as the
Sufis to express themselves so freely. Yet gender and sexual variance
managed to come through at certain points of Jewish history. For
example, the authors of the Cabala, the great book of Jewish
mysticism, wrote at great length about the Adam Kadmon, the
androgynous primordial human, and about the Shekinah, the female
aspect of the Divine. And in Medieval Spain, at a time when Jews,
Christians and Muslims lived in harmony under the Moors, Gay or
bisexual Jewish poets like Moses Ibn Ezra, Solomon Ibn Gabirol and
Jehudah ha-Levi wrote poems that bridged the secular and the sacred.

Within European Christianity, the mystic tradition was often
expressed by members of various monastic orders. The Christian
monastic tradition attracted many men and women who had no intention
of getting married but who welcomed the opportunity to live in same-
sex communities where they were able to express or sublimate their
sexual or affectional orientation through prayer, song, religious
work and community service. Saint Aelred, abbot of the Cistercian
convent of Rievaulx in northern England in the middle of the twelfth
century, was obviously Gay, though probably celibate. To St. Aelred,
spiritual friendship, which Aelred called "true friendship," is "a
gift of God's grace." Though we don't know anything about St.
Aelred's sex life, if any, we are told that he cultivated "spiritual
friendships" with many of the young monks under his rule.

Many of the Christian mystics were nuns who, because of their gender,
were kept out of leadership positions in the Church. One of the great
nun mystics was Hildegard of Bingen, a 11th century abbess who was
also a poet, a prophet, a playwright, a composer and a scientist
whose writings indicate her love for other women. In 17th century
Mexico, another talented nun, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, wrote
volumes of mystic poetry from her cell in the convent of San Jerònimo
while at the same time conducting a series of passionate friendships
with other women, including the wife of the Viceroy.

Today's Lesbians and Gay men, bisexuals and transgendered people,
follow in the footsteps of these and other great mystics and poets
and saints. Many of us left the religious institutions that we grew
up in and gone our way, finding our own paths and expressing our own
gifts. And, by doing so, we inspire others to do the same. We are,
indeed, "a separate people whose time has come."

Jesse Monteagudo is a writer and activist who lives in South Florida.
Reach him at jessemonteagudo@aol.com.

November Activity!

SPIRITUALITY VS. REALITY
Is There A Difference?

"Too often we get captivated by the busyness and hecticness
of daily living that we forget to reference our deeper, intuitive selves...""
– Christian de la Huerta

What is our unique vision of spirituality?
And how does it manifest in a gay/queer context?



Workshop Focusing on Gay Spirituality

Gay spirituality will be the focus of a workshop guided by art therapist Dean Pappas. Participants will create three-dimensional self-portraits using modeling clay which will serve as a jumping-off point for a discussion of each person’s spiritual vision and worldview.



All materials will be supplied and a small fee to cover expenses will be requested. Additional money above and beyond the requested fee may be donated to the QueerSpirit.org scholarship fund designed to assist those in need to attend upcoming retreats.

Dress is informal. It will be unlikely that the modeling clay will get on any clothing, but if you have concerns about damaging clothing, please wear something that you might consider as "work clothes".

Please bring a drink or treat to share.