Dearest Soulforce family,


With over 350 anti-LGBTQI bills introduced in the US just this year, and majority specifically targeting trans people, to say our hearts are heavy would be a gross understatement.

In such a short amount of time we have seen white Christian Supremacy hard at work with “we just want girls sports to be fair” shifting to “we just want to protect minors” and now escalating to “let’s arrest doctors and force adults to detransition”.

There’s no “trans debate”. There are simply trans people deserving of LIFE and being denied that fundamental right. Not only are our trans siblings deserving of every human right that cisgender people are afforded but they should be able to enjoy them. This means we do not just need law reform but cultural change.

In the midst of all of this, we want to make sure you have some community-centered tools that help you shelter your heart.

So many of our team rely on music as a safe space to process and be held in our feelings so we have created this Spotify playlist of the songs that are helping us hold on to hope and we want to remind all of our trans siblings, it’s always darkest before dawn.

With hearts ablaze and spirits unyielding,
Assata de la Cruz, Director of Community Outreach
Cine Club Sinvergüenza

We are always looking for ways to gather our community and heal the wounds of Spiritual Violence together, and this time we are doing it through movies! Throughout March, our Spanish-speaking team has been hosting a series of online meetings in which we watch the documentary "Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed" together with people from different countries in Latin America and discuss our own experiences of Spiritual Violence within religious spaces.
Creating Change 2023

Our team traveled to San Francisco to attend the Task Force's Creating Change Conference alongside thousands of wonderful LGBTQIA+ activists from all over the US. We participated in an Interfaith Service, hosted a workshop on Spiritual Healing for QTPOC People of Faith and a caucus for Latinx survivors of Spiritual Violence. Also, our Executive Director, Rev Alba Onofrio, opened the Faith Institute with a powerful presentation about white Christian Supremacy and the work we are doing to sabotage it!
Spirits Unyielding/ Espíritus Inquebrantables Blog

We released a monthly bilingual blog that will be centering the voices of activists and survivors as they share their experiences combating Spiritual Violence in their specific contexts. You can click here to read Argentinian trans activist Amado Flora's text about how religion is weaponized against LGBTQIA+ people in their country, or here to read Costa Rican researcher Nelise Wielewski's insightful reflections on how an overemphasized view of sacrifice in theological discourse normalizes power imbalances, sustains oppression and presents suffering as a form of "purification".
SpiritualiTEA

Our first episode of SpiritualiTEA debuted this month! Our Director of Community Outreach, Assata, sat down with our Board Chair, CC, to spill the tea on how they have both been impacted by Spiritual Violence as Black Women and how they are navigating their healing journey. You can watch the replay of the conversation on our Instagram.
Institute on Spiritual Violence, Healing & Social Change

Director of the Institute on Spiritual Violence, Healing & Social Change, Karina Vargas Espinoza, recently facilitated workshops for students from 3 US-based universities participating in study abroad experiences in Costa Rica. The presentations and discussions focused on the ongoing threats to human rights in Costa Rica and the United States and how the Religious Right manipulates religious teachings to justify their acts of oppression.
Religious Exemption Accountability Project

In September of 2022, Abilene Christian University’s Student Government passed a resolution to remove harmful policy language from the student handbook which negatively targets LGBTQIA+ students.

In a major blow to LGBTQIA+ students, Abilene’s Board of Trustees and Senior Leadership Team ignored and overruled the student government by refusing to allow the policy language change to go through.

Sign this petition demanding that the Board of Trustees and Senior Leadership Team follow the lead of their student government by removing harmful language which singles out and targets LGBTQIA+ students, faculty, and employees.
Let's Party! 

Loving and celebrating each other is best done in community. That’s why when it comes to celebrating Soulforce’s 25th anniversary, we’re hosting house parties! The fun has already begun! To get us started, Board Member Rhina Ramos hosted a House Party on February 15 as Soulforce geared up for Creating Change! She invited community members from her area to her home to dine, drink, donate, and celebrate Soulforce!

We are so proud that Soulforce has been on the front lines of resistance to religion-based violence for 25 years. To keep fortifying this work, the Board of Directors is organizing a series of house parties where our beloved community will celebrate, share the work of Soulforce, and practice community-centered fundraising. And we need your help to host one in your community! You get to choose what kind of party you have, your party's fundraising goal, and when you want it to happen. Soulforce Board Members are available to support/guide you along the way in planning your party and making it happen! Follow this link for more information and to sign up to host! 
Partner Spotlight

SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective was formed in 1997 by 16 organizations of women of color from four mini-communities (Native American, African American, Latina, and Asian American) who recognized the right and responsibility to represent themselves and their communities, and the equally compelling need to advance the perspectives and needs of women of color. In continuing with this mission, SisterSong gathered on what would have been the 50th year anniversary of the Roe v Wade decision with 39 other organizations to envision a new future for reproductive justice.

You can read and sign the statement created by the collective as well as share the toolkit within your own networks.
Resistance & Resilience

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the federal government forced American Indian children to leave their homes and tribes to attend boarding schools which all too often resulted in permanently severing the connection between the children and their families and their tribes. We detailed this in our blog Operation Assimilation: How The Catholic Church Stole Turtle Island.

Finally, in 1978, Congress enacted the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) in response to the unwarranted removal of American Indian children from their families and tribal communities in alarming numbers.

But now ICWA is being challenged in the Supreme Court and if overturned, white Christian Supremacy will be successful in destroying what many experts call the “standard of child welfare law” as well as the entire legal basis for tribal sovereignty.  

At the heart of all LGBTQI struggles for justice is bodily autonomy and personal sovereignty. What happened to Native children with the Federal Indian Boarding School was the original US conversion therapy and will continue if ICWA is overturned. You can dive deeper into what’s at stake in this recent Teen Vogue article then sign this petition. There are also many other resources and ways to be involved in this struggle through Protect ICWA.  
Coming Up Next

  • Our next episode of SpiritualiTEA will take place on April 9th at 6:30PM CT. Assata will be joined by Annie Buell to discuss “Expansive Spirituality After Church Hurt.” Join us on Instagram!

  • We’ll be at Pride Fest in Mobile, AL on April 15th! If you’re local, come say hi and grab some free swag! If you’re not in the area, you can join us virtually in our Instagram and Facebook stories!