It’s been exactly 8 years since “The Brave Thing.” That’s what we call it in my family.
The Brave Thing was a day of trauma and triumph, when I defended myself and my family in a courtroom in Clearwater. I summoned up courage and calm while an attorney hurled horrific innuendos and false accusations at me to break apart my family, because we are two dads, and one of us is trans. (Psssst, it’s me!)
I endured extreme emotional abuse that day, the culmination of a many years’ long ordeal. Ultimately, after The Brave Thing, my husband and I won the right to keep our kids.
While our trauma was playing out in a courtroom, the nation was facing a different trauma. On the very same day as my experience of The Brave Thing, Donald Trump was elected for the first time.
My family’s situation is complicated, but aren’t all families complicated? I will skip over the details, because they aren’t all mine to share. We have wonderful kids, who are now finding their way into adulthood, and I hope someday our kids will discover the words they need to share what they endured in their young lives. But today, in the aftermath of a second Trump victory, I want us to think about the many opportunities for bravery everyone will soon face.
As a reader of Watermark, you’re likely an LGBTQ+ person or a dedicated ally. If you are a Trump supporter, you may have already stopped reading this. I do hope you’ll read on, whether you are celebrating Trump’s election or mourning it.
In the coming four years, and beyond, our whole community will be called to use courage we don’t even yet know we have. The impending attacks will impact those queer folks who voted for him, just as they will impact those of us who voted against him. The fallout will hit us all.
As a pastor, some people expect me to always bring hope and uplifting words. While I would rather be a hope-bearer, I am called to be a truth-teller, even when the truth is difficult. The truth is that things are going to get worse before they get better. Sometimes the hope we need can only be found after we have wholeheartedly faced our most difficult truths.
The painful reality about our current era is not only the impending Trump presidency but also a cultural shift that has been happening for some time. Kindness has been rebranded as weakness, compassion is seen as a disadvantage, empathy is labeled as “woke” and for some inexplicable reason, wokeness is presented as a bad thing. Cruelty seems to be the current path to success.
So where is the good news? Where is the hope? It’s in the knowledge that we can change this cultural reality. When we work together as a community, we find that we are brave enough to make change happen.
We must pull together, so that the issues that impact one of us matter to all of us. We must develop systems for supporting one another, in ways that we have never seen before. What would it look like to live shaped by kindness, compassion and empathy? To do so, we need a fundamental shift toward solidarity.
Leaning into this call for solidarity means accepting the reality that all battles for equality are inherently LGBTQ+ battles. It means that white folks must be willing to care about racial equity, as if our lives are also in jeopardy. It means fighting for the protection of marriage equality and queer families, whether or not you are married, and whether or not you have kids.
It means caring deeply about reproductive justice and abortion access, even if you don’t have the kind of body that can be pregnant and whether or not you engage in the kind of sex that could result in a pregnancy. It also means that people who are not transgender absolutely must care about the struggles ahead for trans people, as if it were their own bodies are on the line.
We have an incoming president who has spent months running ads filled with hatred, vitriol and fearmongering about trans people. If our community takes the brave step of living into solidarity, those attacks are no longer against just trans people, they are attacks against everyone in our community.
When we lean into the call of solidarity, all types of bodily autonomy, freedom, and liberation are recognized as LGBTQ+ issues, even if they do not directly impact your body, your freedom, or your liberation.
I want us to fight each danger ahead as if it impacts each of us directly, because, in reality, it does. Racial equity, abortion access, trans rights, marriage equality and the protection of LGBTQ+ families are among many issues that are now under attack. We can divide ourselves up and address our own issues alone, or we can become an unstoppable force of bravery, together.
The day that I endured The Brave Thing in that courtroom was profoundly traumatic — and worth it. It saved my family. I only survived it because of the solidarity of the people around me.
I know the power of beloved community. Let’s be that community to one another and inspire the brave acts that will save us all.
Rev. Jakob Hero-Shaw is the Senior Pastor of the Metropolitan Community Church of Tampa, MCCTampa.com. He is a proud husband and father in a family that was legalized through marriage equality and adoption. His words reflect his own views and are not an official statement of MCC Tampa.
Watermark reached out to LGBTQ+ and ally voices across Florida who asserted the community is “Not Helpless. Not Alone.” Read more here.
