Queerology: A Podcast on Belief and Being

Queerology is back for a couple of special episodes about Matthias' new book Holy Runaways: Rediscovering Faith After Being Burned by Religion. In this episode, Matthias shares about where he's been the last year, introduces the book, and reads you a sneak peak.

If you preorder Holy Runaways before October 3, you'll get free access to the Healing From Spiritual Abuse seminar Matthias co-taught earlier this year. Just ema...

For Maddie Zahm, there's nothing more powerful than writing songs that scare her. On her debut EP You Might Not Like Her, the Boise-bred singer/songwriter intimately documents the massive upheaval she's experienced over the last year: a life-changing journey that includes leaving the stifling church community where she long served as a worship leader, moving to Los Angeles and coming out as queer.

With equal parts raw vulner...

Shannon TL Kearns is a transgender man who believes in the transformative power of story. As an ordained priest, a playwright, a theologian, and a writer all of his work revolves around making meaning through story. He's the co-founder of QueerTheology.com and the podcast Queer Theology and his new book “In The Margins: A Transgender Man’s Journey with Scripture” released last week

Shannon is a recipient of the Playwrights’ Cent...

Mace Mooney is a psychotherapist in training and a leader with Affirming Youth Ministries (AYM), a nonprofit dedicated to ministering to LGBTQIA+ youth and those that love them in the name of radical inclusion, authenticity, and God’s expansive love. They’re the cohost of the podcast, No Small Thing which invites folks to live less certain and more curious lives. Today, we're chatting about their work with AYM and what we can l...

Dianna Anderson is a nonbinary, queer writer based in Minneapolis, MN. They are the author of several books, including Damaged Goods: New Perspectives on Christian Purity and Problematic: How Toxic Callout Culture is Destroying Feminism.

Dianna’s newest book, In Transit: Being Non-Binary In A World of Dichotomies, is out today! It’s an exploration of what it means to be non-binary in a world that genders everything, down to the very...

Lucy Dacus is an acclaimed singer-songwriter and author from Richmond, VA. She has released three studio albums including 2021’s highly lauded Home Video, which earned rave reviews from global outlets such as Variety,The Guardian, NPR, Rolling Stone and many more. In 2018, Dacus created the collaborative supergroup boygenius with close friends Julien Baker and Phoebe Bridgers. Their debut EP was one of the most talked about release...

Edafe Okporo is a global gay rights activist, the founder of Refuge America, and one of the country’s most visible voices on the issue of displacement, leading an organization with a vision to “strengthen the US as a place of welcome for LGBTQ displaced people.” He was born in Warri, Nigeria, and migrated to the United States in 2016 as an asylum seeker and is now a refugee of the United States. Edafe is among the inaugural winners...

Rachel Kurtz is a Minneapolis-based singer/songwriter who has been touring and singing for almost 20 years. Her powerhouse voice and heartfelt performances have been electrifying crowds in Atlanta’s Georgia Dome, New Orleans’ Superdome, Texas’ Alamo Dome, and hundreds of other concert venues from coast to coast. Recently, she came out as queer and released her new single “Gay Kids” a love song to every queer kid out there, from a q...

Matthew Paul Turner is a New York Times bestselling author of multiple books, including his Children’s books — When God Made You and When I Pray For You. His newest children’s book, I Am God’s Dream released last week.

Matthew’s writing career started nearly 20 years ago, and he has published a book every year. Called “one of Christianity’s fresh voices” by Publisher’s Weekly, Matthew’s other notable works include Our Great Big Amer...

Bridget Eileen Rivera is a sociologist completing her Ph.D. at the City University of New York Graduate Center. She’s the author of “Heavy Burdens: Seven Ways LGBTQ+ Christians Experience Harm in the Church.”

Today she chats with Matthias about the ways LGBTQ+ people are harmed in the church, especially in regards to forced celibacy. She explains how she uses her choice to be celibate to undermine traditional arguments and carve a p...

Jo Luehmann is a Colombian-born and raised pastor who moved to the US to get her master's degree in ministry and theology. After 10 years working inside churches, she found in personal and systemic ways how harmful and abusive the evangelical church can be. Jo quit her job and committed to finding a faith that wasn’t abusive.

Alongside her partner, she started the Living Room a non-profit reclaiming faith and Christianity as spi...

Brenda Marie Davies is an author, podcaster and YouTuber. Her channel God Is Grey—a guide to becoming an inquisitive, fearless, SEX POSITIVE, free thinking Christian in the modern world —has over 135,000 subscribers.

Her debut book, On Her Knees: Memoir of a Prayerful Jezebel, chronicles Brenda’s spiritual journey over the course of a decade in LA, through marriage, divorce, unlikely friendship, and sexual exploration. Told with raw...

This episode first aired Sep 10, 2019. Rev. Dr. Yvette Flunder (she, her), a San Francisco native, has served her call through prophetic action and ministry for justice for over thirty years. This call to “blend proclamation, worship, service and advocacy on behalf of those most marginalized in church and in society” led to the founding of the City of Refuge United Church of Christ in 1991. In 2003, Rev. Dr. Flunder was consecrated...

Jamie Lee Finch is a sexuality and embodiment coach, speaker, poet, and author of "You Are Your Own: A Reckoning with the Religious Trauma of Evangelical Christianity".

She's coached over 400 people in the past 5 years and sees her role in her work as that of a conflict mediator between human beings and their bodies.

She's just released her very first online course called "Your Body is a Person" that walks you...

Samson Turinawe is the Executive Director of Universal Love Alliance (ULA), a Ugandan humanitarian, educator and human rights defender. He believes that "every human being should be respected simply for being who they are, a part of Life's creation." Tolerance, inclusiveness, love, compassion, dialogue and reconciliation are all central themes in his work.

Through his teaching and activism, Samson is working for a new ge...

Emily Regenstreif has supportive parents. The best thing that they could do and ever did was to listen and then wanting to learn and know more by asking questions.

Emily grew up queer in Portland, Oregon, in a Jewish faith community. She had a lovely and lucky experience — very different from the traumatic backgrounds of others who grew up queer in faith communities. That’s not Emily’s story.

Emily is a 31-year-old receptionist who s...

Julie Rodgers is a writer, speaker, and leader in the movement working for full inclusion for LGBTQ people in Christian communities. She played a significant role in shutting down Exodus International, the largest conversion therapy organization in the world, and she was also the first openly gay person to be hired by an evangelical Christian college. She is featured in Pray Away (2020), a documentary about the movement to pray the...

How are you celebrating national Queer Youth of Faith (QYF) Day on June 30, 2021?

On this episode of Queerology, a panel celebrates the life, creativity, and gifts of queer youth of faith.

The panel includes Ameera, a trans-Svengolie American Muslim; Taline, a bisexual Armenian Christian; Daniel, a gay Jew; and Sebastian, a trans-Christian.

Happy QYF Day!

Topics Discussed:

• QYF Panel: How each identifies and how faith formed their id...

Melissa Weisz and Pelayo Alvarez are hosts of the Forbidden Apple Podcast, which creates space for LGBTQ+ people to reclaim their spirituality—whatever that means to them.

Melissa is a former Orthodox Jew. Although she came out as queer, Melissa adores her family and the Hasidic Jewish community in which she was raised. As an actor, producer, and writer, Melissa aims to uplift the voices of marginalized people and communities.

Pelayo...