Kashif Andrew Graham and His Deliverance
Episode Transcript
Kashif: [00:00:00] There's been a lot of destruction. There's been a lot of falling away. That's what happened because my whole world was church, church, church, and when I came out, a lot of people sort of scattered. Um, and now I have a new opportunity to build my chosen family and to connect with people and show them me.
Greg: [00:00:28] Hello and welcome to Out Loud. Out Loud is a podcast by and for queer people of faith in the South. Here, we tell our stories of varied religious upbringings, messy coming outs, and the gift of community with one another.
That voice you just heard was Kashif Andrew Graham. My conversation with Kashif ebbs and flows through his experience of coming out to his pentecostal family and friends, as well as institutions here in the south. In what he refers to as his "deliverance years," Kashif has gone from praying that God would change his sexuality to thanking God for being gay. His story is one of moving away from shame and into acceptance, with strong doses of reality that are refreshingly punctuated by laughter.
As a librarian for religion and theology at Vanderbilt University's Divinity Library, Kashif carries a reverence for the written word. He reminded me of that old adage, that you are what you read. And he shares with us the story of how the small but powerful gesture of handing a book to someone at just the right moment has the power to change us at our core. Kashif identifies as a queer Jamaican American, with the gender pronouns he/him/his.
If you want to view the transcript or learn more about the resources mentioned in this episode, head on over to outloudstories.com while you're listening. And while you're there, take a look at our new "Partners" page. We want to make sure churches hear our stories, and that you know about churches that are open and affirming to you attending their services. That's why we're partnering with churches throughout Middle TN and listing them on our site for you to see. If you know of a church that should be on our list, reach out and let us know. Just visit outloudstories.com/partners to learn more.
And now let's hear from Kashif Andrew Graham.
So welcome to the show. Kashif.
Kashif: [00:02:28] Thank you. I'm glad to be here.
Greg: [00:02:30] It's great to have you. Yeah. Um, so I wanna just kind of dive right in. Can you tell me about your faith just growing up?
Kashif: [00:02:39] So, I grew up Church of God Pentecostal. Um, now there's a church of God head office, which that is actually here in the state of Tennessee, in Cleveland, Tennessee.
Um, but the Jamaican church of God is, has all these sort of different flavors, if you will. Um, much more, I think, um, emotive, um, a lot more emphasis on, uh, you know, what you're wearing and all of that. Um, so my, the faith of my childhood was really colorful. It was, um, it was jumping and shouting. It was faith in action.
It was handing out tracts. We were at church all the time. And, um, faith was everything as like teenagers. We fasted when the church was having fasting and prayer. Um, when I say we, I mean my sisters and I. Uh, so faith was, it was real. It wasn't just, um, sort of sequestered into one day, but it was a lifestyle is what we would have said then.
Greg: [00:03:47] Was there like a, a spiritual leader in your family?
Kashif: [00:03:51] Oh my God, Sister Esther, my mother, my mother was the spiritual leader. Lord have mercy. I mean. Oh God, Greg, I can tell you even, I remember being back in Jamaica and my mother, we were in this country church, and I didn't know, I had never seen my mother preach before, but I remember I was sitting in the pew, there were like 10 views, maybe less than that.
Uh, and I look up and there's my mom, my mother with her hair tied in a bun, and she had a robe on and she was preaching something about, uh, being locked in to the plane and taking off. No, turning back. We would hear her, um, in the evenings, praying in the living room, crying out from her belly, “Adam! Where art thou? Adam!” I mean, whatever.
It could be anything. And it's like, you know, how are you going to sit in your room and smoke weed when your mother is praying like that in the living room? You can't do that, but my mother is definitely the spiritual leader. Definitely.
Greg: [00:04:52] Wow. And so what did, um, and what I like, what effect did that have on, on you and like your faith over time? I mean, did that, did that rub off on you?
Kashif: [00:05:03] You know, it's interesting because, um, I remember going through this text now, let's see if I can remember it, but I believe it was The Birth of the Living God and, um, Ana Maria Rizzuto, um, where she talks about the deconstruction of your image of God. And I realized that my mother was the image of God for me.
And so, um, my parents are very conservative. And, um, dealing with, working through my sexuality, there was a point in time where I thought, okay, this is just something I'm struggling with. And if I try hard enough, if I can sort of quote unquote stay pure, stay clean from having what I said then was a homosexual thought, um, I, I could, you know, be free.
And so my mother, of course, very much supported this. Uh, and whenever I felt like whenever something happened, you know, if I, if I didn't quote unquote do particularly well that day, I would feel that God was upset with me, but that God was doing sort of the passive aggressive things that my mother did.
And it's very interesting that I didn't realize that had been the case until I came to seminary and started to unpack all of that, and I thought, Oh my God. Yeah. My mother was, was definitely, um, growing up the image of God for me.
Greg: [00:06:28] So when were you asking questions about your sexuality? Was that when you were living at home and under your mom's roof?
Kashif: [00:06:35] Yeah. Uh, with my parents, I think, so for me, I sort of, um, just because I, I love literature and I'm a librarian and um, but I look at my life as a sort of, uh, three major sections, if you will. This will change in the future, but there are what I call the early years, um, which are up until sort of birth until maybe about, uh, 12 or 13.
And then there's the deliverance years, which is from 14 to 23. And then there's present day, if you will. Um, but the deliverance years, that was, I mark that, that as sort of, uh, um, cut out for me, uh, in the sense that that was the time in which I started to seek healing for my brokenness and seek deliverance.
And so I talk about, you know, I might say at the beginning of the deliverance years, or the height of the deliverance here is, um, which was when I went for a year and a half without masturbating, but for me, and when I realized how unhealthy some of my behaviors were, um, that's when I started to ask about other ways of living cause I was miserable.
And I thought, you know, every summer I'm not going to be able to stare at, I'm not going to be able to continue this business of looking at the ground because I don't want to lust with my eyes. And you know. Um, it was a very, very difficult time, but it was also, my journey had always been very public in the sense that…
Because I come from a community that believes that testifying is how you get your healing, I had to quote unquote, I had to talk about what I was dealing with. And so during testimony service, I said these things out loud. Now, you know, the community that I grew up in, and many Jamaican communities are not only, um, you know, homophobic, but dangerously so, that, you know, in Jamaica you could still be, be killed for being gay.
I mean, it's, it’s, um, not a pretty situation. But I had to, you know, I opened out and shared a lot of things that I was dealing with. Um, and I think that people… I would say that it was good and bad in that it marked me for certain people that I wouldn't be good enough for their daughters because I was, you know, sullied.
Um, or I could never be a real man. Uh, and so, yeah, it was, it was very challenging, but I was asking those questions about my sexuality and from the beginning, from, from, as soon as this sort of thing emerged, um…
Greg: [00:09:21] And you were asking those questions publicly? That was part of the testimony?
Kashif: [00:09:27] Yeah. And it was, it was, and, but the thing is that I think that from the time I was very young that my mother in particular knew, because mothers know, but she proceeded to say, she, she sort of warned me that this would not be okay. That she said, you know, if I should ever discover this, I would roll over in my grave.
Things like that. Um, so from the time I discovered this thing that, you know, my sexuality began to, um, was sort of a sapling and sort of broke ground, it was immediately hit by shame, and I knew, okay, I'm sexual, but in the wrong way. Uh, and, and so, yeah, that, that I lived through that until I came to seminary.
Greg: [00:10:11] Hmm. Would you have identified as being gay or being queer then, or was it just more about behavior and that's what you were, that's what you were admitting?
Kashif: [00:10:24] I couldn't, for me, there was no such thing as a gay Christian and there wasn’t, there was no option. No. So when, when I talk about asking questions, let me just clarify, it was more about a declaration.
I would say it was less of a question and more of a declaration in the sense that I'm healed. I'm delivered from this, you know. Uh, maybe I was asking “does God still love me even though I have same sex attraction,” or I have, um, and I didn't even use that term then. Um, even though I'm having these feelings is what I would say.
Yeah. I mean, the amount of time if I need to get that on a tee shirt, these feelings. Uh, but, but you know, that's, that was probably more of where my questioning was, but I wasn't asking those questions then of whether it was possible to be both queer and Christian. Because for me, the answer was no in those years.
Yeah. So, um, and even, I remember, I'll tell you this, reading, Pursuing Sexual Wholeness, which is Andrew Comiskey’s book, someone actually gave that book to me at church, and she sort of came like by night, so to speak, just very quietly. And, and after Sunday school, it was a little book, and she placed it into my hand and said, “I saw this at a conference and I thought of you.”
And, Oh my gosh, Greg, I read that book and cried. The reason I cried was because it was the first time. Although, you know, Andrew Comiskey is, um, sort of not affirming in the sense that he does not believe that it is possible to be, you know, a sexually active queer Christian.
Um, so let me not say, not affirming and put a label on it, but let me just say that our views don't align anymore. But the way that he talked about this business of grieving, and he says in the book, you know, that he went through a period where he would cry in his pillow because he was grieving sort of the lost masculinity.
And, that is somewhat, it's problematic now, but I understood then… the way that I understood it, was grieving the last years that I had spent, sort of so anxious about every hand movement and gesture and every inflection. Um, and so when I read that, it gave me permission to cry and for the first time I began to cry about my situation.
Um. There were a lot of tears, a lot of tears. But it led me down a journey of continuing to read and seek. And ultimately, when I got to seminary, uh, and I was in the middle of my seminary journey, that's when I started to have, that's when it, it intensified. And I was ripping through books, ripping through and finding, you know, um, because the library that I was working at was unfortunately did practice censorship.
And I couldn't get, they just didn't have certain books. I had to request them by interlibrary loan and I would say that they were for a paper, they were for a paper, they weren't for no paper, but they were for me. Cause I would, I would go home and I read those graciously. Yeah, yeah.
Greg: [00:13:41] Oh my goodness. Wow. Um, yeah. Where I'm really intrigued so far about hearing your story is how similar and different it is to mine in that like in the Catholic church, there is this same kind of testimony, if you will, through the sacrament of confession. You go to the priest, you confess your sins, but it's totally private, so you can go through this whole journey of, “are my attractions misguided?” or whatever, you could go through that whole journey just between you and a priest who can't even talk to you about it afterwards… They are kept, they cannot disclose what happens in the confessional. And so it becomes an extremely personal and shameful journey. Um, and, and yet I feel like we kind of took the same path where it was like at some point you had to kind of just really dig into what you could find.
Like for you it was, it was all of these books that started to open up the answers, even though, you were like publicly, even though you had had confessed this to everyone.
Kashif: [00:14:53] Oh yeah.
Greg: [00:14:53] It's still your journey to kind of find the answer that worked for you.
Kashif: [00:14:56] I wanted it so badly, Greg. I want to be straight so badly.
I wanted to do what was right. I would cry. You know, this is, this story has hope, folks! Don't, don't stop listening. OK? Um, but I would cry by my window in my room in New York, and ask God to make me whole, “Lord make me whole.” And God did make me whole, but, but that's coming. Um, but in the sense that I wanted it so badly.
And so, um, I remember, I remember there was a scripture, uh, something like the angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him and he delivers them. And I was reading it one night before church, and I felt. Like I needed to say, I needed to confess in front of my church. And I was the choir director at the time.
So before the choir would get up and sing, someone would introduce the song and they would say, the song that we're going to sing for you says, “Beulah Land, how I love them,” or something like this. And then the choir would start, um, and they would give a short word of exhortation. But for me, that was my opportunity.
And so in front of. And there was a guest speaker there that day, someone who self-identified as an apostle. Um, and she had a very shock and awe, a very, um, I don't want to use the word wacky, but a very, uh, unusual ministry. And I got up in front of everybody. The choir was standing there and I said, um, I have been healed.
I've been delivered from pornography, masturbation, and homosexuality. And when I tell you, Greg, everybody in the church stood up and people were, it was like an eruption. And I remember the minister, she was wearing purple, she had a purple robe and a purple headdress, and she said, “All y’all should be up here hugging him right now.”
And she closed her Bible and said, he preached my sermon. And everybody from the church. I mean, there were lines of people coming down to hug me and people who went to the altar, and it was for me… Although today, I look at that and I say, I knew what I really wanted was to be able to accept myself and to be able to be happy.
I just wanted to be happy. I recognize the power in telling the truth and the power in speaking. Perhaps my truth wasn't that I had been quote unquote delivered from, but my truth was, this is what I'm dealing with. And I recognize that when I speak, when we speak, when we share our stories, there is a great power in helping people to lead better lives.
[Musical Interlude]
Greg: [00:17:56] What I love, what I'm hearing again and again as you're talking, is that you're starting to grab like what you need from your faith, and there are things that weren't, that haven't worked for you. Right. And instead of, and this has come up in other interviews, too, instead of just disowning the whole thing and being like, “Nope, this church doesn't want me, I'm out,” you've found pieces of it that work.
And, I feel like that is it again and again, kind of the path that so many of us do take. Is that faith still means something to us. These rituals, these practices, this prayer, whatever it is. Like there's something about it that, that is working and it's, and it's our connection to, to the divine.
And, um, I just, yeah, I love that. So with that in mind, I'm curious like what was, what was your, how would you characterize like your prayer life during this “Deliverance” period?
Kashif: [00:18:50] Oh my, that is a, that is a heavy question. Heavy, heavy baby! Well, I would say that prayer for me was about, it was all about confession and asking for help.
Um, I remember reading in, there was a Psalm that had been translated, I can't remember which translation or paraphrase, but it was something like, um, David saying, “I’m wiped out.” And I remember, that stuck with me because I was in the Bronx at the time as an undergrad at Lehman College. Um, and I mean, it was summer and there were all of these hot men wearing just, you know, tank tops.
There was a point in time when I wouldn't even walk by the gym, the rec center, because I was like, somebody's going to walk out with like bulging muscles and I'm, I'm going to have a thought and I'm not going to be able, you know, I just, I, I, for me shunning the very appearance of evil, but prayer was always, was supplication was, you know, “God help me to make it through this day. Another day. I want to live pure.”
That was what prayer was, and I prayed a lot because I remember I would, I would come home and lay on my bed and say, “I’m wiped out.” And for me, that’s… as I look back now, I can see where things were cracking. Things were falling apart in the sense that, I knew as I was praying that, this was no way to live, that there was better. There was another way.
And I think as I reflect on my life, for anybody to ask me to go back to that, I have to shut them down. I can't even entertain that because life is, we're supposed to live, you know, a life well-supplied and that for me was it was self-hate and it was destructive.
But prayer took the place of continuing to indicate quote unquote, to tell God that I did not want this lifestyle. I didn't want to be this way to remind God at every chance that I wanted to be whole, and I really needed this, but it was, my life had already been sort of planned out in the sense that it was, you know, you grew up through Sunday school in the Pentecostal churches. You get filled with the Holy spirit, then it's time for marriage. But this thing was stopping me from going to the next step and moving on with my life and becoming this PTA dad and living in the suburbs with a station wagon. That was my plan. Totally. Okay. I had the, I had that written in my vision book.
Um, but, but my being gay was stopping me this thing at the time. And so I was praying for that to be removed so that I could go on with my life. So they had, you know, I was at the altar every Sunday. They would have what they called ministry moment, and I would go down and I, at every single chance I got, I would ask people if they said, “is there anything I can pray for you about?”
I shared or asked them to, you know, pray for strength for me. That's what prayer was.
Greg: [00:22:02] So, getting back to kind of what sounded like your coming out journey, um, kind of taking a turn at seminary… What, what was like the books that you were reading then… What was starting to shift then?
Kashif: [00:22:20] So it's interesting. I think the first thing was being away from my family and the community that I had known. Because for the first time I was able to get into my own head and think, “What are my, how do I really feel about things?” I wasn't so enmeshed and I was away and I would get on the back roads and drive to all these, through all these small towns in East Tennessee and face myself.
Um, I think that that's where things started. So I mentioned, uh, The Birth of the Living God (Ana-Maria Rizzuto). Um, I was reading Velvet Rage. Uh, Oh my gosh, there's so many, How to Survive a Summer. Uh, Boy Erased, uh, God and the Gay Christian, of course. So I think reading those things, and I was able to, I did have one faculty member when I was in seminary that no longer works at the seminary.
So that's, don't try anything, y’all, but you know… he, uh, he was very, very supportive. And it's interesting because… So, we were at this restaurant and I was, I wanted to sort of start to come out to him. Um, I wasn't out to myself though, but I, I guess I was, but I wanted to share with him where I was in my journey.
And he had been sort of the nutty professor for me when I took his first, uh, my first semester in seminary, and I took a class with him and I was like, “What on earth is this guy talking about?” Like just, he was saying things that were so new to me, like, what if some, you know, passages or things in the old Testament, are stories, are not factual, but I meant to inspire faith.
And I was like, “What? What? What? What?” I was like losing my mind. Like, this guy is the devil. How was he here at the Pentecostal theological seminary? And you know, he was the one that I went to and we had dinner. And, uh, I was struggling and he said, “You, you want, you have to make this decision.” What he said, “What I'm feeling from you is that you have to make this decision and you want to do the right thing, but you don't know how. And I want to tell you that there are bounds, but the bounds are not nearly as as narrow as we have made them.”
And I remember that thing that opened the world for me. That opened the world for me. I mean, and he, he made himself available. He was the same one that later on in my journey when I was wondering about dating and like trying to say, I don't really know how to do this, especially cause I was in Cleveland.
Okay. It’s, living in Tennessee…
Greg: [00:25:12] I know nothing about Cleveland, Tennessee.
Kashif: [00:25:14] It's kind of slim pickings there. I'm just going to be honest. Okay. Nice people. Nice people. But it's kind of slim pickings. So, you got to go to Chattanooga, if you're looking for, you know…
Greg: [00:25:25] You gotta set that radius really wide…
Kashif: [00:25:30] You do! You gotta go like a hundred miles! That's it! But, but he was the one that I went to with my concerns, and he said to me, um, that “goodness is, is it will find you.” And I thought, wow, that's something that stayed with me. Goodness, will find you. So, you know, I was in the middle of my journey asking these questions…
I should also mention that my, luckily enough, so I had been to a couple of different churches, and the last church that I attended, the pastor was also on faculty at the seminary, and he was the first person that I ever uttered those words to that I ever said, “I am gay and a Christian.” But I started with a question.
So we had, we had a conversation over a number of weeks: “Is it possible to be both queer and Christian?” Now I have to say this, keep listening folks. Um, I was going to gay conversion therapy at that time. I was going to gay conversion therapy and I was in Chattanooga and, uh, I, when he found out, I didn't know what was happening at the time, but we had breakfast and I told him that I was going to see this counselor.
Um, and he didn't really like it. And I was wondering why. Cause I thought you are a Church of God pastor. Like you should be. I mean, he didn't grow up in the Church of God, but like you’re pastoring a Church of God church, you should be, you should be like, yeah, you should be on board. You should be like giving me a ribbon or something. You know?
And he said to me, he was trying to get me to see somebody else. Which I thought was very interesting. And he said, maybe they don't necessarily have to be a person of faith. I didn't know! At the time you're saying this, I'm saying, “What is this guy talking about? He's a pastor, you know?” But he said that to me, and I remember we were there in, in Smalltown, USA. And I'm thinking, this is kind of odd.
So when I, I, but I, that morning also, I was planning to sort of profess to him that I was healed cause I was still, that was the ending of the deliverance years. But I was still there and I said to him and he said, “Well, let's not be too quick to put a label on anything.”
And that kind of threw me into a tailspin because I wanted this to be over. I wanted to move on. I had a young lady that had been waiting on me in New York and I was concerned I was going to lose her even though she wasn't really waiting on me. But… So I wanted that to be over and, uh, he wouldn't let me, which is interesting.
And it was, it ended up being the most helpful thing that he said to me. He started small. There were baby steps.
“Let's not put a label on this.” “Why don't you see somebody else?” Small suggestions. Um, and I did go and see somebody else and she was a, a Southern Belle, uh, that is in the Church of God. And I got in to see her and sat on her couch and I remember she just in the, in the sweetest voice said to me, “Honey, I just want to tell you there is nothing wrong with you.”
And that was, that was deliverance for me. Yeah. That was deliverance. That was a, that was a moment of breaking because in, in, in all my years, at that point, no one had ever said that to me. No one had ever said that to me. Nothing is wrong with you. And I, and I will sort of sort of add as a disclaimer or qualify that, that maybe if, if, if there were one or two people that did, I couldn't hear them, because I had this sort of evangelical “gook” in my ears that I couldn't, you know, I wasn't able to see myself. So, but when she said that, that's when things started to break for me. Yeah.
Greg: [00:29:21] God bless her.
Kashif: [00:29:22] Oh yeah. It is an amazing experience to sit with someone that listens to you and doesn't think that because of your sexuality, you're inherently sinful.
Greg: [00:29:33] Yeah. It's, uh, it's freeing. I mean, it's huge to like, actually to actually have the courage at that stage to, to even admit that “I’m gay,” or I'm even like having these feelings. That is so… It, it takes so much courage to say that to someone.
Kashif: [00:29:52] And then when somebody basically says, I have to tell you as though it's like, I don't know, like they're an insurance agent and they’re reading a clause or something
Greg: [00:30:01] Like your Miranda Rights or something…
Kashif: [00:30:03] Like they, they're Mirandizing you like, hello. You know, they have to tell you that, that you're going to go to hell. And it's just like… And the sad part though, I have to say, is that when I did come out, um, which was on my blog, uh, in 2017, December 2nd, 2017.
Greg: [00:30:21] Which is pretty recent.
Kashif: [00:30:22] Yeah. This has been a journey.
Greg: [00:30:24] You’re about as new on the block as I am.
Kashif: [00:30:26] Yeah. It's amazing. It's just gone so quickly, but yeah. Um, yeah, I, when I came out, there were people who responded in that way that they were like, they felt obligated. And it's interesting because they didn't tell me that right away for some of them… I think I was reflecting on this the other day.
I was trying to go on as though things were sort of. Okay. Or hadn't changed because I thought that they knew, cause towards the end of my journey I was not trying to hide. I stopped sort of self censoring and I let myself be me and I would say things like, “honey,” or whatever, you know, whatever I felt like saying. And it's interesting because then there's some people who are like, someone literally said that to me that he had no idea.
I thought, okay, I know we're in the South, but if somebody's saying to you like “honey,” and like flipping their their wrists, I mean, come on, come on. I was trying to signal to you, you know? Yeah. So it's very interesting though that, that I think that they wanted to, they felt that maybe I was too comfortable with them, and so then those things started to emerge. Slowly.
One person said to me, I'm sorry, I can't, I can't come to your hypothetical wedding, or, I don't know if I could come to your hypothetical wedding. Um, you know, one person felt that she needed to warn me that. You know, when she was in the homosexual lifestyle that it was filled with drugs and this and that.
And I thought, what has happened to critical reasoning? What happened to us being able to delineate and look at our life and say, “this was my sexuality, these are the substances I took…” But I know that, I mean, that's how she has thought about, that's what she thought about her journey. And, and uh, that's up to her.
But it was very interesting that it took time for some of those things to emerge from people that I knew and loved. And that was the hardest.
[Musical Interlude]
Greg: [00:32:38] When you went into seminary, what was kind of your, what was your kind of objective of going into seminary professionally, I guess, and how did that shift by the time you were done?
Kashif: [00:32:51] So that's, this is a great question. Um, I went to seminary because I had a lot of questions and my plan was to go into full time ministry and I was going to be a children's pastor.
And so I was reading all these books about family. And I remember my mother was the one that mentioned it to me that said, you know, “I think you'd make a fabulous children's pastor.” And I thought, “Yeah, okay.” I discovered while I was there, number one, I served at a children's camp in Mentone, Alabama. I mean, that was, it was, it was a travesty.
I was like, I realized, I was like, “I can't stand these kids!” It's not that I don't want kids, I mean one or two kids for me to take care of, that's a different story. But to be a children's pastor and to offer them the care and the attention that they needed, um, in, in such formational years, I wasn't at the place to offer that.
Greg: [00:33:56] Yeah. You gotta be on board for that.
Kashif: [00:33:58] And I just thought I couldn't do it! And not to mention we were at a, at a Bible camp where, um, they apparently, I guess they didn't believe in caffeine or something like this. And so somebody had to go down the mountain, cause I went to the director and I was like, “Excuse me, you're not going to have me here for a whole week with like decaf…” You know, basically serving me like burnt corn husks and not even real coffee.
I was so angry. I take my coffee very seriously. So somebody had to go down the mountain and they had to go to Walmart and got coffee, got regular coffee and it was fine. But I realized that that wasn't my calling. I wonder now how much of that, was the coffee?
Greg: [00:34:35] How much of your life has been determined by coffee?
Kashif: [00:34:37] Seriously, come on. Even the man I will marry is going to be turned on by coffee. Okay. Um, so okay. That was the one thing. The second thing was being in seminary, and again, talking about the deconstruction, I, I've mentioned this book so much, The Birth of the Living God, but it was really the class “Human Growth and Transformation” and talking about the deconstruction of the image of God, I realized, that it had been my mother who in her own disappointments and my father and, and, and, and the men in the community, they were always, that was a large part of… that appeared quite frequently in the rhetoric was, you know, men who abdicated their priesthood in the home and so on and so forth, which was then informed by a larger conversation, conservative conversation about the breakdown of a black family.
So we see where these things sort of seep into the church. And, um, I think that my mother, rather than address those concerns head on, um should have placed pressure on me to say, well, you know, “you'd be a good children's pastor… You need to be a hero for your sisters.” So on and so forth. And I never realized what that was doing to me. That placed a lot of unnecessary weight on me.
And so I was in seminary, and I remember, I remember being outside of the, the dorms, the apartments, and in my car crying on the phone, and it was very late at night. And I said it to her that I never wanted to do this. I never wanted to become a children's pastor. I didn't, I didn't want to do that. That was you and I, I am now looking back sort of in retrospect and reverie. I'm surprised at the clarity that I had. I never, I never really realized that until this moment. Such clarity! But I was, I mean, I, I'm, and I'm also such boldness. Actually. It's because I was in Tennessee that I was able to pick up the phone and say that to my Jamaican mother because she couldn't smack me in the face.
But, you know, I did have clarity in that moment because I was away again and reflecting, looking back on where I had come from. I think that that sort of broke things apart for me that I realized, okay, I am not going to go into children's ministry. I was still thinking of going into some sort of ministry and at that point I thought, well, I really wanted to be a writer.
That's what I, I really wanted to do, but I, it took me a while to sort of make my way there. So, sort of to fast-forward to the end of my seminary journey, uh, May of 2017, actually this was March, that I was on the phone with my mother. And I remember saying to her… I was outside of the library cause I was working in library, timeless outside of the library.
Um, and I was standing in the parking lot and I said, “I’m going to do another masters and I'm going to do a Master of Science and Information Science through the university of Tennessee at Knoxville.” My mother was like, “Are you sure you want to do that?” Because for her, the fact that I did not, I was not pursuing ordination was like I was a failure.
You know? And, and for, for her becoming a librarian was like, what on earth? Like she just, that was not, you know, for her, it came out of left field. Um, although libraries had always been safe places for me throughout school and all of that. Yeah. Um, so my decision was then that I would become a theological librarian and, uh, because I learned about this business of theological librarianship as ministry, that moved me.
It's faith seeking understanding. Totally. You know? Um, and so the person comes to you and you offer them the resource and then you sort of carry them as they wrestle with the text. So I do think that librarians are ubiquitous, should be ubiquitous to the research process, but theological librarians, I think carry the students in a certain way because we understand. I understand that when I slide a book across the table, so to speak, to you, I know the weight because I've been there, because I remember what happened when I was reading all of this and I was in seminary and I thought I was going crazy. And there was a professor that said,… this is the wonderful thing about going to a Pentecostal seminary.
They were sort of always a divine word that somebody could be teaching and they would break out into something in just a second, like they would break out into a 32nd sermon. And so she said, you know, “You feel like you feel faithless. You feel like God is dead, that Christ is dead for you. But I have a word for you.
Stay at the tomb.” Oh! That word could, that could make me shout right now y’all right here in Nashville, Tennessee. I mean, that's what she said. “Stay at the tomb.” And I understood what she was saying. She said, “You feel like your faith is being deconstructed, but I have a word for you. Stay at the tomb.” And um, so that was, that was so important.
And I, I know that that's what students at Vanderbilt Divinity School, at any school for theological education, that they're dealing with that. And as a librarian, I'm aware of like the implications of like, I'm handing this to you, but this may break you. You, you are going to have to wrestle with this.
And so I think of that as ministry. It's dialogue and even as you, like I had a student come to me the other day and I sat back and I said to her, I was like, “What do you really want to ask?” There's something that you are being told that you feel like you should want to ask, but that you don't care about that.
I don't. From what the vibes that I'm getting from you, you don't care about that. There is something that you really want to ask. Go for that. Because then you'll be able to sustain, like you're actually going to be interested in that, you know? But that, that's definitely the work of a librarian. And when it comes to the theological disciplines, I think more so because we are discerners, we are thinkers that we, the word, so to speak, and with a capital, there'll be rolls around in our brains and we think, “What does that mean?” You know? Um, even the other day I was walking in the Belmont-Hillsboro area and this, this scripture, um, came back to me, “to walk in the newness of life” and it just, it, it was rolling around in my brain and I thought to myself.
Wow. We used to, I used to think about that as like becoming a Christian and now, you know, tossing out your weed and your alcohol or whatever, and now I think about that is like my, this is a new sense. About life. Yeah. I have a new perspective. My vision has been, um, has been given to me, has been adjusted so that I can see, I feel like I'm seeing rightly with more clarity than I've ever seen before, and that makes life new.
And so I walk in that newness every day.
Greg: [00:41:36] Yeah. I mean, and I feel like that newness, I feel like I've, I experienced that newness in two different ways. One, basically, like ever since I came out. There has been that newness of just like, this is my identity. Like slowly kind of letting that be a part of my identity and, and seeing the world through the lens of, of being a gay man.
But then there's also this, you know, after the excitement of coming out, kind of wears off and there's the newness to, of just, of being open to something new, happening every day, of constantly staying curious about things, too, that is just so important as we all go on to work our nine to five jobs and have routines that we get settled in to like embrace and be open to the new.
Kashif: [00:42:27] Well then, the newness… There was someone who, um, a therapist who talked about. Second adolescence. Yes. And I thought that that was so powerful. I wrote a poem actually about it that was like, um, it was like learning to breathe again because again, this life is so new in the, in, quite, in fact, because I never, I was never allowed, like having a crush on a guy wasn't okay.
So I never let myself feel the butterflies when I had just a casual crush or when I would see a guy and go, “Wow.”
You know? And now that's okay. And I don't, it's normal. It's healthy! If you are sexual, you know, you might be asexual and have other ways of, you know, but I mean, I, I, so, in many ways there's, this is the newness of life.
This is another adolescence. This is like, and then there's also like the anxiety and the fear that comes in. That's normal of, um, “Will my crush reciprocate?” You know, um, “Will I meet someone?” “Will I get a date to this particular thing?” You know, it's, it's so new and it's, right now I'm navigating all of that.
And there are, sometimes I feel like I'm behind. You know, there are times when I feel like, just because in 2000 it's so new. 2017. There are times when I feel like I meet so many gay men that are so beyond. And that know, all of these words and know how to do this and know this position and that position.
I'm like, you put that where? I'm like, I'm not going to put that there. Look, give me another year maybe. But you know, there's definitely another like this is, this is the newness, and I've just learned to take a deep breath and let myself go at the pace that I'm going because I am building a life that I don't want to run away from.
And that's the most important thing. That's my gauge. And every decision that I make is this in service of the life that I wish to lead of this newness of life. Um, is this in service of that? And is this in service of me building a life that I don't want to run away from a life that I'm proud of and I am.
I am building a life that I'm proud of.
Greg: [00:44:59] How would you characterize your faith and your prayer life now?
Kashif: [00:45:05] That's such a good question. You know, I do something I like to call morning centering. Morning centering could be anything, in the sense that, it could be… I usually will get up and I have, I start to try to be thankful that I'm in a body that I'm awake and I start trying to get there.
I really have to stick away from the devil Instagram in the mornings. I try not to start clicking on things and looking at who, who did like my what and who didn't like this, and it just…
Greg: [00:45:34] You know, it's like a slippery slope…
Kashif: [00:45:35] Because then you start looking through it and you're like. She, she wanted to post that?
Oh, okay, girl. You know, so I, it just gets, you don't want those negative thoughts you all in the morning. But, uh, but, um, I start to, so I go to the kitchen, I have coffee going. With the scent of a coffee in the house, I start to think of, um, what I'm thankful for. I start to whatever thoughts emerge, and that is what prayer looks like to me now.
It could be anything, but it's about something growing. I just sit there and let it grow. You know, something. And it, I feel like that time could take me anywhere. Um, I have presence. That was the thing that came out of that morning centering. I have presence. I matter. When I walk into a room, things change in the sense that there's somebody new in the room.
I have presence. Why? Why is it that for so long, I never, I wasn't thinking about that? I, because I was so focused on not being noticed and you know, just trying to seem as like, not as little a disturbance to the atmosphere as possible. And during my morning centering, it was sort of like an undoing of that.
I have presence. I matter. So that's what prayer is for me. Um, I pray in the car a lot. Um, I drive on the back roads and I, I pray aloud. Um, I like to record videos of myself. And I'm just talking through whatever I need to talk through. And sometimes it's me working out a problem and then it may go into a prayer.
So I'm in the car and I have my video and I have whatever, and I tell myself the truth, how I really feel about something. And usually from there I can like, you know, make a decision that's in service that I'm standing in my truth. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? But that's all prayer. Prayer is all of those things for me. It is. And it can be, I may go into Benton Chapel at the Vanderbilt Divinity School and kneel down in there and pray. I pray anywhere. You know? I really believe in that. So prayer is, is a broad, beautiful thing for me. That is, it's, it's for me and it's for me to be aware of other's needs. Aware of my own needs.
Yeah. I still love to pray, which is, but I'm not begging God to not make me gay anymore. I'm thanking God for making me gay, seriously. That's, that's the new sort of thing.
Greg: [00:48:04] Yeah. Hmm. Is there anything else that you would like to share that we didn't get to?
Kashif: [00:48:11] You know, I think that we are constantly becoming, and we're constantly growing and, as I said before, I think it bears repeating… This business of building a life that you don't want to run away from. Leading and working in service of the highest possible calling. I hope that there, I will continue to connect with people that, um, that are about their business and are getting in touch with what they feel like they're here for what they feel like they're called to do.
And those are the people that I want. You know, in my inner circle. It's, there's been a lot of carnage. There's been a lot of destruction. There's been a lot of falling away. That's what happened because my whole world was church, church, church, and when I came out, a lot of people sort of scattered. Um, and now I have a new opportunity to build my chosen family and to connect with people and show them me.
I love this statement that I wrote when I was in Vancouver, uh, that Keegan, one of the other librarians and I talked about this at length. Um, I was writing my Pride post and she took the picture. That's why we were talking about it. Uh, my life is like a movie. And I said: “Starring Kashif Graham,” in brackets “finally as himself,” and it's the most amazing thing I get to be me.
Yeah. I get to be me. And whenever I get into a situation that I feel like someone is trying to push me back and dim my light, I fight for that. I have learned to fight to be me, to express myself authentically, and I am so excited for the opportunity to just show myself to the world that I don't have to hide anything, I could just be me.
Um, and then when people connect with me, I know it's, they've seen me, you know, that they've seen me. And that's, that's the most important thing to me. So thank you. Thank you for having me here.
Greg: [00:50:18] Thank you so much for being you and for coming on the show.
A special thanks to Kashif for coming on the show. You can find him on instagram @kashifandrewgraham. You'll find that link in the show notes along with other resources mentioned in this episode. I'm your host Greg Thompson. Our editor is Cariad Harmon. And our theme music is by JP Rugierri. We recorded this episode here in Nashville, TN at the We Own This Town studio. And a special thanks this week to Patreon members, Megan Lyons, Luke DuBoer, Lauryn Peacock, and Meg McEllen for their support. Remember, you can become a member and get access to exclusive digital content and merchandise, starting at just $1 a month. Learn more at patreon.com/outloudstories. You can also leave us a one-time donation over on Venmo @outloudstories.
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We'll be back in two weeks with a new episode. In the meantime, remember friends, queer people have faith lives, too. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Thanks for listening.