God's Gender with Avery Smith--Hosea 11:9

The Bible Bash Podcast

By taking on Hosea 11:9 Avery Smith, host of Blessed Are the Binary Breakers podcast, cracks open a rich discussion with Bible Bash co-hosts, Liam Hooper and Peterson Toscano.

Avery writes: "I interpret God's declaration For I am God and not a man in Hosea 11:9 as, among other things, evidence of Their rejection of being assigned a human gender and the roles implied therein."

Could God be making a declaration of gender? What is Hosea the prophet trying to do and say to the people? And what about God's radical swings from tenderness to threats of violence?

In addition to covering these topics and more, Avery highlights best practices for ministers and places of worship when addressing non-binary people by name and pronoun.

The entire conversation is fresh, insightful, and a lot of fun.

Avery also presents, The Other Text, their poem, Binary Breaker from their book of poetry, the kin-dom in the rubble: a queer Christian's wrestling with God, scripture, and humanity.

Born and raised in Ohio, Avery Smith studied various languages at the University of Alabama. They attended Louisville Seminary and now resides in Atlanta, Georgia, with their wonderful wife and two cats.

You can often find Avery translating Biblical texts and ranting about Hebrew to no one in particular. A firm believer that binaries were made to be broken, Avery is both Catholic and Protestant. They also believe that Divinity thrums through all of Creation and breathes life into every human community, not just Christian ones. This belief led them to start up Blessed Are the Binary Breakers, a multi-faith podcast of transgender stories.

Avery ran an advice blog at queerlychristian on tumblr, and creates work centered around transgender theology and disability theology. Links to all of their work can be found at blessedarethebinarybreakers.com.

Announcing LIVE on-line Bible Bash Event! Dec 15th at 8 pm Eastern We want to close out 2020 with a live, informal and more intimate version of Bible Bash. Please join us for lively bashing, hashing over, and muddling through Bible Bash topics. You will also have opportunities to get involved in the conversations and maybe even meet some former and upcoming guests! Tuesday December 15 at 8:00 PM Eastern Time. Click here to register or visit https://forms.gle/VnzKggAF7Znq8iRF6 In addition to the Zoom interactive presentation, we will also stream the event on our Facebook page. Coming Soon!

In Trans-Forming Proclamation, Liam Hooper tenderly explores gender and the Bible. This book actually defies genre. With rich patches of poetry, memoir, and devotional, Liam weaves together inspiring literary insights with grounded, original, and informed scholarship. Trans-Forming proclamation: A Transgender Theology of Daring Existence is new wine in a new wine skin. It is Inventive, artful, and liberating. Available fall 2020 and published by Otherwise Engaged.

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In each episode of Bible Bash Podcast, Peterson, cisgender gay Bible scholar and co-host, Liam Michael Hooper, a trans Bible scholar, take turns presenting the text. They then discuss. In addition, each episode they present another text, a non-Biblical text of note--religious or secular--that may or may not correspond to the Bible text.

Bible Bash Podcast is a project of Ministries Beyond Welcome.

Our theme song is Playbill by The Jellyrox. It is available on iTunes, Spotify, or through Rock Candy Recordings

To share your questions, comments, requests for passages to be discussed, or suggestions for guests who can talk about texts, email Liam & Peterson: [e-mail]

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Check out other Rock Candy podcasts

• Brown Suga Diaries
• Sacred Tension by Stephen Long
• Bubble&Squeak by Peterson Toscano
• Eleventylife by EleventySeven
• Common Creatives