Transgender Identities & Spiritual Traditions in Asia & the Pacific: Lessons for LGBT/Queer APIs by Pauline Park presentation at the Pacific School of Religion Chapel Berkeley 2 April 2013  I’d like to begin by thanking Jess Delegencia of the API Roundtable for inviting me to speak here at the Pacific School of Religion; I am [...]

Transfeminism Speaking My Truth to Power by Pauline Park Is there a ‘trans feminism’? And if so, what is it? Given that feminism itself is such a charged subject and transgender identity is a contested domain, that question is a productive one even if one not easy to answer. It was in graduate school (1988-94) [...]

Klee’s “Insula Dulcamara” (1938) Paul Klee on intuition in art According to Paul Klee, the technique of the brush stroke is a great deal, but the crucial factor in painting is intuition. “We construct and construct,” Klee wrote in a Bauhaus prospectus, “and yet intuition is still a good thing. A considerable amount can be [...]

Saami shaman working (1674) Reclaiming Our Spiritual Legacy as Transgendered People By Pauline Park 18 June 2000 I was asked to speak on spirituality and the transgender community. It seems to me that the connection is an intimate one, far closer than we may realize. For we as transgendered and gender-variant people lie at the [...]

Henry David Thoreau might well have been thinking of Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist when he wrote that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” While Thoreau’s “Walden” long predates Annie Proulx’s “Brokeback Mountain” short story and the Ang Lee film based on it, the transcendentalist philosopher’s magnum opus remains as relevant [...]

Isfahan: Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque First North American LGBTQ Muslim Conference Held in New York By Pauline Park Lesbian & Gay New York (LGNY) 3 June 1999 Think “Islam and homosexuality.” The mind immediately conjures up images of a gay man in Iran being stoned to death by an angry mob while an imam fulminates against the abomination of men [...]

Patrick Cheng‘s mother reads a statement in Chinese in support of her son and the LGBT/queer API community at the QAPI press conference in Chinatown on Jan. 30.  At left: lead organizers Irene Tung & Aries Liao. NYAGRA statement on the participation of LGBT/queer APIs in the 2010 Chinese lunar new year parade in Chinatown [...]

One of my favorite places on earth: Frying Pan Creek in Mt. Rainier National Park… Awhile back, a friend of mine suggested I do ’25 Things’ on Facebook, but I was a little reluctant to do that application on Facebook (too much like a chain letter), so I’m doing it my own way, here on [...]

On Friday, November 20, Iowa will commemorate the first Transgender Day of Remembrance in the history of the state. I am honored to have been invited to speak at a number of events that have been organized as part of that commemoration. On Wednesday, November 18, there will be a welcoming reception at The Center, followed [...]

Dan Halloran performing a pagan ritual; but are the other heathens registered Republican…? William James wrote of “The Varieties of Religious Experience” in 1902, long before the movement now known as ‘neo-paganism’ came into its own. While I am not aware of any survey data on the matter, I suspect that most people, if asked, would [...]