A Letter to Our Black Siblings, in Solidarity

To our beloved Black siblings, On this day, June 1st, 2020, we write to express our solidarity with you. In the past weeks, we witnessed the murder of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and too many others. We then witnessed the escalating violence that the police have perpetuated in our shared communities, while people gathered and risked their lives to protest the ongoing police brutality with which this nation continues to reckon.

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A Good Man is Hard to Make: A Reflection on Finding My Masculinity through Postcolonial Christology

I am Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian), Japanese, Irish, Swedish, and German. Living in the Bible Belt throughout childhood and adolescence was turbulent and at times hostile for someone mixed-race, queer, and transgender. But the silver lining I found despite my turmoil were the numerous encounters I had with who I believe to be a living and resurrected Jesus. These transcendent experiences were what sustained me through 10 years of teaching and preaching that said while everyone “sins and falls short the glory of God,” people like me were especially sick, broken, something to be prayed away, managed, or erased. I embraced this hermeneutic despite what it cost: my physical safety, mental health, and overall spiritual well-being.

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Unsettling Asian American Theology

Decolonization is not a metaphor, Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang insist. Carelessly calling to decolonize things like schools and other such institutions metaphorizes decolonization. To do so kills the very possibility of decolonization and re-centers whiteness; it is yet another form of settler appropriation. What would it mean then to decolonize something like theology – and Asian American theology at that? I want to suggest that decolonizing Asian American theology requires giving up the search for physical belonging, replacing it with a theology of landlessness, and to be in solidarity with indigenous struggles for sovereignty.

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안녕, 사랑하는 아들 (Annyeong, saranghaneun adeul): The Duality of the Queer APIDA

Forced duality — growing up multiracial Asian American, fresh off the boat from Seoul, now in an all-white environment. My mother moved from Korea, forsaking the comfortable life she worked for, so that I could have the chance of one without someone commenting on my dirty blood. She thought it would be better.

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