What is spiritual about the struggle for trans liberation? How does it involve all of us? What kind of support and solidarity are required of those who hope to be comrades to trans people? Join us for a discussion about these and many other questions as we talk with Dr. Jehbreal Jackson, Rev. Yunus Coldman, and Rev. Elæ Moss Benedetto about surging transphobic fascism, spiritual and material resistance, and the world-making of transness. The discussion will be moderated by Conor Q. Foley, Director of Community Engagement at the Community Church of New York.
Speaker Bios
Rev. Elæ Moss Benedetto (they/ze) is a trans queer interspiritual minister formed across Catholic, Buddhist, Quaker, earth-medicine, and Jewish mystical traditions. They serve as Spiritual Care & Fellowship Director at Faith in Harm Reduction and an affiliated minister with the International One Spirit network, and currently hold positions in Campus Ministry and as Faculty at Pratt Institute, bringing a background in direct-action organizing, mutual-aid system building, and social-action-oriented art and media to their practice. A third-generation working-class New Yorker with lived experience in sex-work and substance-use communities, Elæ is deeply committed to the ongoing reimagining of widely accessible spiritual care, ritual, and practice for all who have been harmed, stigmatized, or alienated by religion and the state.
Jehbreal Muhammad Jackson (a.k.a Dr. Angel) is an artist, dramaturg, scholar, and organizer. She danced professionally with Dance Theater of Harlem, is a vocalist with Samora Pinderhughes’s Healing Project choir, has served as assistant dramaturg under Julia Reinhard Lupton for UC Irvine’s Shakespeare festival, and as primary dramaturg for Niala Telfar’s “ICON” and Tethered Resident’s evening length work Images. As a published scholar, Jehbreal researches the histories and theories of ballet, ritual dances of the African diaspora, music, and race, and as an organizer, Jehbreal works as a core leader with Qween Jean and her Black Trans Liberation Kitchen, feeding and clothing the Black and Brown trans community of New York every week at Judson Memorial Church.
Born in 1957, the Reverend Yunus Coldman is a BIPOC leader from Buford, South Carolina, who now lives in New York City and plays several trans-spiritual roles simultaneously. He is the Chief Executive Officer of Soulful Touch Services. He is a licensed New York Wedding Officiant. He also offers various ceremonial and spiritual services (counsel, meditation, etc.). Additionally, Reverend Yunus participates in many panel discussions and workshops to express his unique faith experiences and reflect on the intersections of being Black, Transgender, and masculine-identified. Seeking a religious path that would recognize the validity and diversity of multiple spiritual paths, Reverend Yunus Coldman strove to become an ordained Interfaith Minister. He received his ministerial ordination from The New Seminary of Interfaith Studies, Class of 2011.
