Birth Pangs of Liberation: A Homily for Trans Day of Remembrance

First UMC of Pittsburgh | Mark 13:1-8; 1 Samuel 1:9-18

As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” Then Jesus asked him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”

When he was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, “Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?” Then Jesus began to say to them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. Many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come. For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. This is but the beginning of the birth pangs.

I. The Temple and Today

"Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!" The disciples marvel at the temple's permanence, these seemingly unshakeable structures of religious and political power. But Jesus sees something different. "Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down." He sees the possibility of transformation where others see only unchangeable structures.

As we gather for Trans Day of Remembrance, these words take on new urgency. We face the likely return to power of an administration that promises something far more dangerous than before - a marriage of chaos and calculation. What was scattered authoritarianism in Trump's first term now has a blueprint through Project 2025, a detailed plan for systematic oppression ready to be implemented from day one. This isn't just rhetoric - it's a calculated strategy to make trans existence impossible through coordinated federal policy.

Yet it's precisely in moments like these - when the structures of death seem most permanent - that we must remember how the Spirit moves in history. Let me share with you another story of resistance from today’s reading from the prophets:

After they had eaten and drunk at Shiloh, Hannah rose and presented herself before the Lord. Now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the doorpost of the temple of the Lord. She was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord, and wept bitterly. She made this vow: ‘O Lord of hosts, if only you will look on the misery of your servant, and remember me, and not forget your servant, but will give to your servant a male child, then I will set him before you as a nazirite until the day of his death. He shall drink neither wine nor intoxicants, and no razor shall touch his head.’

As she continued praying before the Lord, Eli observed her mouth. Hannah was praying silently; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard; therefore Eli thought she was drunk. So Eli said to her, ‘How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Put away your wine.’ But Hannah answered, ‘No, my lord, I am a woman deeply troubled; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman, for I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation all this time.’ Then Eli answered, ‘Go in peace; the God of Israel grant the petition you have made to him.’ And she said, ‘Let your servant find favor in your sight.’ Then the woman went to her quarters, ate and drank with her husband, and her countenance was sad no longer.

II. Hannah's Lament

Hannah's pain wasn't just personal - it emerged from living under patriarchal structures that defined her worth solely through reproduction and submission.

When she pours out her soul before God, she is dismissed by Eli the priest as drunk, deviant, a spectacle. "How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself?" he demands.

How familiar this feels to trans people who are told our authentic expressions of self are mere performance, our pain mere spectacle, our desires mere confusion. Like Hannah, we are often treated as "worthless" when we speak truth about our experiences. The religious authorities of our day, like Eli, are quick to dismiss and pathologize our deep knowing of ourselves.

III. Remembering Our Dead

This is why we gather today - not just to mourn our dead, though we must name and honor them. We gather to pour out our souls, to speak truth about the structures of violence that continue to take trans lives. We gather to lament the hundreds of trans siblings killed this year globally, disproportionately Black and Brown trans women. We say their names, knowing each one was beloved, each one carried divine breath, each one's authenticity was a gift to the world.

Yet Jesus reminds us that when structures of death seem most secure - when nation rises against nation, when calculated plans for our erasure are being drafted in think tanks and federal offices - "This is but the beginning of the birth pangs." Birth pangs signal that something new is emerging. Through the pain, transformation becomes possible.

IV. A Personal Revelation

But I tell you, as someone who encountered Jesus' queer truth in an unexpected place - while rage-posting on Facebook of all things - that following our deepest longing for authenticity and wholeness is holy work. I had written a reflection about the queerness of Jesus, drawing on ancient rabbinical writings about Adam's gender complexity, medieval mystics' erotic language about Christ, exploring how the risen Jesus transcends binary gender altogether. When people pushed back, I found myself getting intensely angry. In that moment of defending Jesus' queerness, I couldn't tell where my defense of Jesus ended and my own emerging truth began. The Spirit revealed my own queerness through that holy anger, that divine frustration.

This is how the Spirit often moves - not just in sanctuaries or solemn moments, but in unexpected spaces, even in our rage against systems that try to constrain divine possibility. As Dorothee Soelle reminds us, mysticism is deeply democratic - available to all, showing up in our daily encounters, our arguments, our moments of holy disruption.

This revelation wasn't about rejecting what I knew of God, but discovering a deeper truth that had always been there - in sacred texts, in mystical traditions, in my own body. Like Hannah's lament becoming prophecy, my anger became a gateway to transformation…a path to revelation. The Spirit often works this way, hovering over our pain, finding resonance with our pain, joining our anger against oppression, opening doorways for liberation.

V. Birth Pangs and Becoming

For too long, Christianity has preached a gospel of self-denial disconnected from fulfillment, teaching that sacrifice alone is virtuous. But even Jesus took up the cross "for the joy set before him." His solidarity with the oppressed wasn't mere duty - it was bound up with his own liberation.

When Jesus warns his disciples about the temple's destruction, he isn't just predicting doom. He's pointing to the Spirit's subversive work. The same Spirit that hovered over creation's chaos, that stirred in Hannah's lament, that animated Jesus' ministry among the oppressed, moves now in our resistance to fascism's rigid order. This is why Jesus tells his disciples not to be alarmed - not because the threat isn't real, but because the Spirit's power to subvert empire is more real still. As recklessly hopeful as that is, it is our hope. Our confession of faith. Our declaration of divine defiance.

The Spirit moves in places of pain - not because suffering is sacred, but because people are sacred. She moves where structures seem most permanent to reveal their fragility. She moves in our deepest wounds to reveal our unshakeable dignity. She isn't a caged bird to be kept under a sheet at the church altar. She is wild, unfettered, dangerous to every death-dealing structure. Wherever the Spirit moves, the Spirit subverts.

Consider how trans existence itself participates in this subversive movement. Project 2025 may have their blueprints for oppression, but they cannot blueprint the Spirit's work. Our bodies and lives testify that gender is more fluid than fixed, more liberating than limiting when freed from rigid binaries. We demonstrate that authenticity and joy matters more than conformity, that transformation is more life-giving than mere tradition, that longing for fullness is holier than mere obedience.

VI. Call to Action

But birth pangs are not meant to be endured alone. The rising tide of fascism demands collective resistance. Jesus didn't just predict the temple's fall - he gathered a community committed to manifesting God's liberating love. Hannah's song wasn't just personal vindication - it was a vision of systemic transformation where the hungry are filled and the powerless raised up.

The forces of death are never idle. They work through detailed policy blueprints, through coordinated legislation, through religious doctrine that turns the liberating Gospel into a tool of conformity. They work by isolating us, by making us believe the structures of oppression are permanent, by convincing us that our deepest desires for wholeness are somehow contrary to divine will.

This is what fascism and religious fundamentalism fear most - not just our refusal to conform, but the joy and power we find in authenticity. They fear how we create chosen family when biological family rejects us. They fear how we reimagine gender beyond binaries. They fear how we demonstrate that transformation is possible, that no structure of oppression is permanent.

For allies and accomplices in this room, this means moving beyond performative support to concrete solidarity. With coordinated oppression on the horizon, we need coordinated resistance. It means recognizing that trans liberation is bound up with your own liberation from rigid gender norms and systems of domination. It means using your privilege to create sanctuary, to fund mutual aid, to fight anti-trans legislation, to celebrate gender diversity in all its forms.

VII. Closing Vision

Listen - the Spirit of Liberation dances in the space between us, subverting alienation and oppression, opening possibilities where none would otherwise seem possible. The same breath that moved over the waters of creation moves through every trans person claiming their truth. The same power that will tumble the stones of empire flows through communities of resistance and care.

This is not wishful thinking. It is defiant hope grounded in the Spirit's subversive movement through history. From Hannah's lament becoming prophecy, to Jesus predicting the temple's fall, to trans communities creating beauty and possibility in the face of calculated erasure - the Spirit continues to birth new life where empire declares death.

So yes, we weep today. We name our dead. We pour out our souls before God like Hannah. But we also join her prophetic song, her vision of a world turned upside down where the mighty are brought down and the lowly lifted up. We claim Jesus' promise that no stone of oppression will remain unturned. We trust the Spirit moving in our places of pain, birthing something new through us.

May we have courage to persist in truth-telling like Hannah. Wisdom to perceive transformation like Jesus. And trust in the Spirit who subverts death, who breaks every chain, who makes a way where there seems no way. For the Spirit moves among us and in the spaces between us, calling us to nothing less than the liberation of every living thing.

Amen.

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Here’s the video of the homily: