This episode is about allyship, and how true support of marginalized communities is never without cost. Our guest, Mary Nichols, is a former minister who was defrocked for her support of the LGBTQIA community—which includes her husband and her son. Cynthia met Mary through Twitter in the summer of 2021 when she was going through arduous interviews with the credentials board of her church who’d decided—despite the fact that Mary’s family was always upfront about their unique situation—that Mary was no longer fit to serve her church community. Here’s the story of how a self-proclaimed good church girl ended up on the dangerous side of the most divisive issue in Christianity and the exorbitant cost she paid for loving the people who mattered most.
Intersexion: A Story of Faith, Identity, and Authenticity
A deeply human story about choosing between social acceptance or health, fear or authentic friendship.
What happens when a teenage girl hits puberty, drops a testicle, grows a penis, develops breasts, gets a period and tells no one? What if years later this person finally confides in an insecure ally who has her own secret: a life-changing promotion with a catch—her signature on a document labeling sexual minorities as “repugnant” and “offensive”?
Intersexion is a life-giving true story that plays out at the tense and tenuous intersection of identity and religion. Cynthia, an adjunct professor with a trunk full of ungraded papers and snack wrappers, has been an LGBTQIA+ ally for years—in convenient ways. She enjoys the company of her queer friends—but her support isn’t risky; it hasn’t cost her anything. Until she meets Dani. The youngest child in a conservative evangelical family, Dani knows that playing the role of dutiful daughter is safer than jeopardizing faith and family with a norm-defying body that seems an affront to both. Born visibly female, yet desperate to be seen as the boy he truly is, Dani relies on prayer and magical thinking, until his life depends on one thing: the truth. A middle ground was no longer an option for either of them.
Told in both Dani’s and Cynthia’s voices, Intersexion is a harrowing, hopeful exploration of the cost of coming out—as an intersex minority, ally of a minority, or asker of difficult questions—and what it means to come into one’s own. It’s a book for anyone craving a more authentic life, and a story about the intersections we find ourselves in by no choice of our own.
To contact Cynthia Davis: cynthiavaccadavis.com
For more information or to read an excerpt from Intersexion: https://lakedrivebooks.com/intersexion/
Available through Amazon: click here