 So good morning to each of you. Welcome to this important webinar focused on trans children, youth and families and our church's ministry with these persons. I'm glad you all are here to share and to learn and I especially want to extend a thank you here at the beginning to Reverend Jeffrey Moore different Heather goddess, who will be our primary presenters and speakers today for their willingness to lend their expertise and experience with us to bless us in our churches ministries. You may or may not know that the, the inspiration and the instigation maybe for putting together this learning opportunity came about at our North Texas annual conference in June. There was a resolution that was resoundingly passed on the last day of annual conference focus on trans youth and families, and I'll read the, the therefore part of the resolution to be a kind of ground for our time together. As it was passed ended by saying therefore be it now resolved that our churches in the North Texas conference will be safe sanctuaries for trans children, youth and their families. And further, while we acknowledge the obligation our clergy have as mandatory reporters, we do not because of our convictions of faith, consider gender affirming care child abuse and thus will not report it as such. That was what resolution stated and in the aftermath of that resolution. There was conversation about the fact that it's one thing to encourage churches to be safe sanctuaries. There's another to equip church leaders with information about how to go about doing that. And so, and that is the real focus of our webinar today, that kind of equipping. So there'll be some presentation, there'll be some opportunity for conversation and questions. As we move along feel free to drop your questions in the chat. And please just norms of zoom etiquette if we can remain right remain muted throughout. And again, there'll be opportunity at different points for dialogue either in small group or to possibly pose a question. Thank you all for being here today. And with that, we offer a prayer and then I will turn it over to the Jeffrey and Heather. Will you pray with me. Oh good and gracious Scott. We give you thanks for the gift of this new day. We give you thanks for the breath of your spirit that enlivens each of us. It means that each and every one of your creatures is sacred in your eyes. God we remember as we gather the ministry of Jesus Christ and the way in which he moved freely and offered himself his presence, his grace freely to all people that especially those who were in his day and time, marginalized, or. Or misunderstood, or left out. God we remember the way that he provided safe sanctuary for all those he encountered. And so God we gather in that spirit in his spirit, and we come with open hearts eager to listen to understand to learn. And we pray that what we gain here will strengthen our ability to offer a powerful witness to who you are in our places of ministry. So bless our time together is in the name of Christ we pray. All right, well, and we are grateful that all of you are here today and that you took the time out of your day to spend with us, learning more and growing your resources for ministry. I'm going to go ahead and share my screen and get us started. You can control the size of your screen if you want to slide it back and forth you want to be able to see more faces things like that you can you can do that. And just kind of outline our time together. We recognize that all of you are on a different part of this journey and you have different amounts of knowledge and so we tried to kind of make this as generic as possible. There will be some language there will be some things that you may not necessarily be familiar with so please feel free to pop in the chat if we use a word or term that you don't know, and we can. We'll try to catch those as they come through but sometimes that happens. But our time together will be what you see on the screen so we'll start talking about myths and statistics will go through some language and why language matters. Some practical considerations and then we will have breakout groups. So we are recording the informational part of this breakout groups will not be recorded and then the conversations after breakout groups where we might share out some of our specific situations in the church will not be recorded so just so you know for confidentiality and protection of our young people, we won't be recording those but we do want this resource to be available so we had to find a compromise. And of course we'll share resources, contact information, and all of that good stuff. As Jeffrey mentioned the beginning, we just want you to put in the chat why you're here, what brought you here today, and you can put where you know what church you're affiliated with. And what the goal is but also just what brings you here today what was it about this webinar that that made you want to attend. And of course, I'll just ask again that you make sure that you're muted and that way there's no competing sounds during the webinar. We'll start out with myths we're just going to talk through it, and we will provide this PDF for you so don't feel like you need to write everything down. Or if I don't read everything on the screen, you'll have access to it I promise. So there are some myths that we just want to kind of go over with you, just to start us out. The first myth is that children are too young to know their gender. So our understanding of gender starts pretty early, and anybody who knows somebody who is gender non conforming or trans or non binary in any way, can think of examples early in where they did not fit in what we would call the gender norm so why do we we know that cisgender, same gendered children who identify with the gender they were assigned at birth, know their gender very early why would we not assume the same about transgender and non binary children. The myth is that a person is only transgender if they declare it at a very young age. As we know gender is socially constructed in a way that gender is put on to us at a very young age and so, especially in some generations, it takes a long time to unpack all of that. So there's a whole bunch of different ways and different times in life that somebody might find, identify and unveil their identity as transgender. There are only two genders. Gender is a spectrum it's not limited to just two possibilities. There's lots of research and information about that we'll share some resources later for you. Many transgender children change their mind about their gender. So not all children who express themselves in gender expansive ways are transgender. The reality is, is that as we all develop our identity, and we all learn how to express our gender as we develop and that takes well into our 20s. So, many children we can just drop transgender from that myth, children change their mind about their gender, they're figuring it out they're learning their identity it's not. It isn't a transitional thing always and we might have time later to talk a little bit about how those changes of mine or D transitioning might happen but that is a could be a whole other webinar. Being transgender and non binary is a sign of mental illness. It's been many many years since that has been the case it's been out of the DSM for a long time as a mental illness. There are a lot of stress factors that might manifest in mental illness but being transgender non binary is not necessarily a sign of mental illness. Transgender and non binary people are doomed to live unhappy lives, of course it is true that transgender and non binary youth are at higher risk, and we'll talk about the statistics a little bit. Just a minute, but the reality is is there no more at risk than anybody else or no more doomed to live unhappy lives than anybody else. They're just no more at risk because of the way that the culture and society puts gender on pushes gender on them and so, of course the last sentence of this is the most significant factor in a gender expansive young persons well being is the support of family and friends and church and church leaders. Transgender and non binary people of all ages can find love create families and live fulfilling lives. Okay, so I get to talk about the fun part. I want to go back to the lap that sentence that Heather highlighted the most significant factor in a gender expansive young persons well being is the support of family. The converse of that is the most significant factor in a gender non conforming child's well being is or lack of well being is the discrimination and ridicule and harm that they experienced out in society. So, we're not I'm not going to read all these statistics to you. We're just going to go through them. I just want to I need to talk louder. Okay, let's try that. There you go. Yes. Okay. I just want to highlight to you how vulnerable this community is. And you will remember from your UM doctor and course that you took that the first general rule is, let's all say it together, do. Right. So as with any vulnerable population. The first goal is to do no harm and this is a very vulnerable population. They are, they exist at the intersectionality of several forms of discrimination and prejudice, and that puts them at high risk for suicide when go on to the next slide. And then there is a discussion. Sleeping, which we know all children need. And next slide. Even access to health care. It's hard to believe that someone would experience discrimination and biases prejudice in the health care system, but in fact they do. And that leads to a higher rate of homelessness, a high rate of police mistreatment and harassment and bullying in school. So, I imagine that a lot of us are here because we want to equip ourselves for those face to face conversations that we may have with the family, or with the youth and how we can support them. I just wanted to take just a minute to step back and talk more broadly about why language matters because your advocacy is going to start, not in the pastor's office, but at the front door, and on your live stream, and in your worship service in your community. Language is incredibly important. We all know it's a powerful tool. And not only affects how you think it shapes your reality. Your reality as an English speaker is shaped differently than the reality of a German speaker. Because of the language that you use. Language allows you to communicate what you think and feel, but to convey your very self right the way that you understand the world and yourself to others thoughtful language shows respect acknowledgement and acceptance. So how you navigate gendered language speaks volumes about the value you place on the identity of others. And non gendered non sexist language communicates that you're listening and listening is one of the most important things for any population that feels unheard. Many of our BIPOC brothers and sisters and siblings have been trying to see I there I just did it and had to correct myself. We've been trying to communicate this to us for years and generations. We do not feel heard. So you must listening is important. It communicates that you care that you value their experience, it demonstrates sensitivity and it's listener oriented, rather than speaker oriented. So we want to move beyond gendered language using words like people person individual human man, humankind humanity rather than mankind. We don't man a booth. We staff of this. For example, interchange with woman and person equally. So here just this is a long list of kind of things where gender bias shows up. I mean, it's, it's deep in our, in our language and you need to think about that go to the next slide, or we invite you to think about it. Again, I just said brothers and sisters a minute ago, and then I corrected myself to siblings. Simple questions like who's your girlfriend or boyfriend. Again, you might think about this in terms of this is a rabbit hole but young couples who may be silently struggling with infertility and you say, when are you going to have children. They may be desperately trying to have children. So questions that we just assume in terms of cultural norms have huge implications and pronouns. This is a particularly important aspect for trans and non binary kids. Here are some other things of the way that gendered language shows up in our, our language. Again, brothers and sisters. Kingdom girls night boys night manly girly. What got brothers and sisters on there twice. Man important. What it's that important. cry like a girl. Man up. But, you know, other things like lame dumb bipolar. Anytime we use that kind of a characteristic or diagnosis as a derogatory or as a label. It reinforces this. This whole structure. I handle scripture by editing it. And so, if I can easily edit out brothers and sisters and just say siblings. Then that's what I do. Often for the sake of poetry, because it's sometimes Paul has a rhythm, dear brothers and sisters in Christ. So I say dear siblings and friends in Christ. Or if you want to keep the familial because friends is a little more distant, dear siblings and family in Christ. See, I've kept the rhythm of the thing, but I have taken the gender out of the language. So now Heather's going to talk about pronouns. Okay, so pronouns is one of those things that can be difficult to navigate. But the question is always like why are they so important and so common responses when we talk about pronouns is it's just too hard. It's unnatural. It's really not that big of a deal and it doesn't make sense grammatically and so we're going to address all of these things. So it's really, it's really not that hard. We easily learn to call newlywed people by their new last name. We use nicknames, all sorts of different ways that we change how we refer to people. And so language also evolves. This is an evolution of language the way that we use pronouns is an evolution of language they as a plural was actually a result of the Oxford movement prior to that it was a singular it was part of the the thou, you know, that. And so they is actually originally a singular. So we're going back to the og. Everything feels now unnatural at first. Everything feels unnatural at first, but when it becomes normalized when it becomes a part of language, a regular use, it becomes much easier. We created language. So we have the power to change it. Go ahead. Think about how unnatural the language of I died and yet I am alive again sounded at the beginning. I mean, right. And yet the found that's the foundation of our faith. We take as the foundation of our faith, a language claim that is unnatural. And so just to go over some of the common pronouns of course we all know she her he him. They then there's is a common use for gender neutral. It's, it can be used in the singular. And it was actually apparently the word of the year in 2015. And so the Z here and her are, yes, are other ways, and they're called neo pronouns. You might not ever hear them. But you might hear them so we wanted to make sure that you saw them so you weren't totally like what is this. It's pronounced like here and it replaces that her hers him his they there in a way of sort of pushing against all normal typical pronouns and offering a neo pronoun and then there are some who prefer for you to just use their name. And they prefer not to use any pronouns at all. And that that probably might be the most difficult for us to get used to and just repeating someone's name because we're, it's drilled into our head not to do that and writing and things like that so key important things for doing pronouns right. If you make a mistake correct yourself and move on don't make a big deal. I actually need to update the slide I'm recognizing but just gently correct others without embarrassing the individual being misgendered so just simply say, Noah, remember, Kai uses they them pronouns, and then just move on. And we do this a lot and in our, in our house and in our, our family and our church so we have to be reminding ourselves often. It becomes more and more natural to go. So question we get often is, should I put my pronouns on my emails or my name tag or anything like that. Absolutely, you should absolutely feel confident and comfortable doing that what that does is that communicates that you want to know other people's pronouns. So if you have on your name tag, your pronouns, then somebody might be willing to one put their own pronouns on their name or let you know, hey by the way I use they them pronouns, and then you just move on you start doing that. And what about introductions, when you have a group of people and you're introducing. It's really easy to just say okay we're going to say our names are pronouns and what our favorite ice cream is and go around everybody does that. It makes it so that it just takes the, the spotlight off of the person who might have a pronoun that either doesn't seem to match with how they present or how they've been known or what they're, you know, or is it they them pronoun usage and you know, we will know that otherwise so if you take the initiative of making that a safe space for them to be able to share that then they will step into that space. Okay. I want to pause here and answer a question that's come up in the chat that I didn't see from Kerry. Is it harmful to use brothers and sisters language in our literature. I guess I might ask the question, flip the question around and say, as a woman, is it harmful to refer to God as he the answer might be. No, as long as images are balanced. But if all I hear is God is he every time God is mentioned for my entire life as a woman. It becomes harmful. Good. So, brothers and sisters language doesn't need to be harmful as long as it's balanced in a constellation of language. The more I would suggest to you that the more we could get towards non gendered language for God, the better we're doing. So the more we can get towards non gendered language and liturgy. The better we're doing. In the meantime, there's a spectrum. And so often I will say at the beginning of my service. The language in the service that is abrasive or isolating to you. For that we apologize. We hope we've done the best to do with our language to make it as inclusive as possible and we hope that during the course of the service you will hear language, which also feels welcoming and affirming. I can't catch everything. Right. But I'm, I'm, I'm hoping in the course of the service to create a wide spectrum that welcomes and affirms everyone at some point, because of course there are people who identify as brother or sister. This is not a course. I mean this is not a webinar on definitely of course, this is not a webinar on the theology or biblical interpretation of gender if people are interested in that we would be happy to provide one of those. Just some things to think about in terms of number of genders and the Bible. You might think about and then let's have a discussion about people who like penguins and where penguins were created in the in the story of Genesis, or you might consider why after God creates day and night. And then it says, and there was evening and there was morning. Like where did those fit in. Okay. So some practical considerations. First of all, this is being transgender or non binaries, not a matter of taking on an identity. This is a matter of revealing their true identity. And here I do want to share a short scripture passage from the sixth chapter of Mark. Jesus went to his hometown accompanied by his disciples. When the Sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue and many who heard him were amazed. Where did this man get these things they asked, what's this wisdom that's been given him. What are these remarkable miracles he's performing. Is this the carpenter. Isn't this Mary's son and the brother of James John Judas and Simon aren't his sisters here with us, and they took a fence at him. Jesus said to them a prophet is not without honor except in his hometown among his relatives and in his own home. Jesus identity in the culture was a carpenter. It wasn't his identity, it wasn't his, it wasn't his vocation it wasn't his job it was his identity. We have a hard time, maybe connecting with this because we have become so promiscuous in our vocations and jobs in current culture, but I would encourage you to go back, take a field trip to Kentucky or West Virginia, and ask people why, knowing that they are going into a mine full of coal dust that will shorten their lives that they're still coal miners in 2022. And they will tell you, it's because it's their identity. They know nothing else. Their father was their grandfather was their great great grandfather was this is who they are. Jesus was a carpenter in the culture in, in appearing as the son of God, he did not take on a new identity. He rather revealed his true identity. So expressing emotions and asking for support doesn't equal weakness. Hopefully that's self apparent to most of us. Young people are often dismissed by adults. This is in a lot of situations. And, you know, wanting to be seen as a child of God in your true identity isn't a problem. Again, go back to the sixth chapter of Mark and the rest of the gospel and see what's going on there with Jesus. As we've already seen with some of the statistics, the risk of ignoring or not believing a student who's coming out is far outweighs any concerns about whether they might be seeking attention or whatever. Ignoring them is not going to make it go away. And you, please, please, if there's anything else you hear today, believe what your LGBTQ students tell you about themselves as they express and explore their identity. Remember even Jesus explored his identity. Look at Luke. And he grew in wisdom and stature. Right. Jesus grew into his identity as the fullness of what it means to be the Christ. This is not your place for someone to educate you. I mean, your interaction with your trans youth and families is not your place to educate yourself about trans people. Just as your interactions with your BIPOC siblings is not your place to educate yourself about racism. That's your job to do here in this kind of environment. I know their story. Please do not question it. Listen, listen, listen, and affirm this is their story. Believe me, even the youngest of youth and children who have come forward with whatever story they have. They have journeyed long and hard with this. It's not just something that they dreamt up and, you know, came out. Implying, wondering, questioning if this is a phase, communicate you don't trust them, that queerness is chosen, and that they'll grow out of it. I would please implore you to avoid the language of choice or decision or lifestyle. This is about identity, not a decision. Okay, so one of the most common questions we get is, well, can I still have gendered activities? And like boys versus girls, skit nights or small groups based on gender, or girls spa night or boys camping trip or things like that. You know, we're not here to say, no, you can't do that. But what we hope is that in having this conversation, you'll recognize that sometimes those things can be harmful and can cause harm, as Jeffrey was talking about earlier, earlier with the general rules. So whenever you think of an activity or a conversation that needs to be gendered, you need to ask yourself a few questions. Why do I think this? Why does this conversation need to be gendered? Does it really need to be gendered or is it just what we've always done? And then the last question, which I think is one of the most important, is would everyone benefit from this information? A lot of times when I teach wonderfully made, people will ask, and I don't know if this is true for you too, Cheryl, but I think that people will ask, can we do like a boys group and a girls group? And I always have to have this conversation with them is everyone benefits from this information. It is just as important for males assigned at birth to hear about what it means to be female, and to go through the things that female bodies go through, as it is for female bodies to hear what male bodies go through. And so if you cannot gender something, everyone benefit from this information. Boys also like pedicures. So pedicures are for everyone. Yes. So David put in the chat that youth retreats and camp sleeping arrangements are either a boy or girls cabin. And these are issues that we are currently talking about. I know at least we have had conversations at midwinter retreats and such in the past where we've had non binary students that have attended of how we do that. There are camping ministries in the United Methodist Church that offer gender neutral cabins or gender inclusive cabins and those are policies that churches need to be thinking about. When we're having a retreat, how do we do this? We had a planning retreat. Last weekend and everyone was in the same room. Or not last week, I guess it was a couple weekends ago now, but everyone was in the same room. And, you know, we were, we had not, we didn't have a sea of lava, but you know they sort of self selected where they were going to sleep but they were supervised so it was, it was fine. So you have to figure out what is best for your particular group in that particular situation. You want to make sure that you create physical spiritual and emotional room for young people to be themselves as fully as possible when they are in your space. You want to help families of LGBTQ youth through their teenagers coming out process and all of the ebbs and flows of that. You want to make sure that you listen to parents concerns and questions about what the new identity means. Parents go through a grieving process. You are going to be their pastor through that experience. They grieve all sorts of things. And in many ways it is, it can be like a death and so you would approach that in the same way you would approach any other grieving process. And of course throughout the entire thing, as we've said several times just encourage them to love and support their child, even if it means shielding the children, the teen from some relational fallout that might come, which may include family members. So, having those real conversations with parents is important because there are going to be family members who are not, who don't respond well. And they really respond when a child or student comes out. So recognize the courage that it takes to come out. Make sure that you celebrate that with them. Celebrate the moment. Don't editorialize don't say I always knew I always had a suspicion. Don't say that. Don't make it about you. Right. This is about them realize that this is just one step this is a step in a journey that is, is a journey, everyone, if everyone takes it some level right like we all figure out who we are we all figure out how we're going to express ourselves as humans as sexual beings. And so this is just a step in a journey that that all humans go through in some way. Unfortunately, it's it's a step that is, it's made a big deal in our culture, and make sure that you establish expectations of confidentiality, they know that you're not going to tell anybody that they don't want to know like if they come to you and say, please don't tell my parents please don't tell my dad please don't tell my mom, you know, please don't my grandparents. And, and, and doing that so. There's a so there's a question about talking about restroom facilities bathrooms. If you have a way to make a restroom a gender neutral restroom. That's great. You should definitely do that. We have a single stall restroom. That's even better. And but it's, it is always great to be able to make a bathroom space. A safe space for students and at some of the camps that we the Jeffrey and I have worked at we have restrooms that we make single stall restrooms they actually have two stalls but they have locks on the door. So during the week when we're at camp, we make them single stall and anyone can use them. So that that's really the easiest way but I think that in our churches if, if, if you have a restroom that can be designated as a family restroom or an all gender restroom, that's great. There are places where you can order signs that will say all gender. You have different, you know, little people on them. If you're not ready to have this conversation, you need to get ready because you're going to have it and push yourself to get into this uncomfortable territory, because it's really important as in what we do as clergy as lay people in the church who are journeying along people, along with people. It is our job to be in uncomfortable territory. And so we just need to be ready to do that. Remember that this is not about you and your understanding in your education. This is about the person's identity and figuring out how to live and thrive and flourish as a created being of God. If you're, if you really feel that you're not confident about having the conversation, just remember to always respond with affirmation, acceptance and an expression of God's love. God loves you. Exactly as you are God loves you. You are a culture creator, you get to create the culture at your church, your staff along at your leadership. They, you all have a part to play and how the culture is created the church, the games that are played curriculum that's used the jokes that are made and laughed at the way you talk about God language you use. And even the kinds of events you plan and you all have a spidey sense about the culture at your church turn that is turned up to 111215 for folks who have been traditionally pushed to the margins of the church. And so listen to them. Listen to the queer people in your church listen to your queer friends and do an audit of your physical space. I have a family restroom and Jessica talked about having that once the family restroom was created with a single soul. It was really a way of communicating that love and and acceptance. And make sure that you're looking at what messages are being communicated art posters bulletin board signage and this is the same work we do when it comes to racism and diversity and inclusion right so this is all it's all intersectional is homogenous are we seeing only cisgender heteronormative families and then of course make small changes first you don't have to do anything crazy. You don't have to build a new bathroom. Little steps are okay. Okay, so we're going to go into breakout groups I'm just going to. We've got breakout groups set up we've got some people who to lead the breakout groups. And so these questions I have them on a document that I'm actually going to drop in the chat so you all can open them if you want to use them for a guide because I know they won't be in the chat once you get into your break room. There are other questions for discussion so we're going to break into groups and give you an opportunity to talk about specific things that you have going on in your congregation questions that you have, or things like that. And so you can use these questions here, or in the next slide to kind of guide your conversation if you don't know what else to talk about. And then, Jeffrey, do you have anything to add. I would just add these are. There's someone in your group who has been invited to help facilitate the conversation. That certainly doesn't mean that they're experts we're all on a journey. We're all learning and humility about this topic is one of the best qualifications. This is a place also if you have contextualized questions, you know what if or I have this or whatever. This would be a place to bring those up because we can't obviously address all those in the large group so we'll spend 15 minutes, maybe 15 minutes and break up groups and come back at 1130. Very very good. I'm going to manually finish setting these up so just give me a minute or two and we'll all find our way in those groups. So Andy while you're finishing that I'll go ahead and just kind of walk through some of these questions. So you might think about how gendered language how you how gendered language is used in your congregation, or someplace that you'd like to change it. If you had to grade your church and their use of gendered language is always interesting to sort of see. And then just think about a couple places that you might want to start to change that language. So you can use these. Of course this work is intersectional right like I said, a couple minutes ago, you might ask a question of how many queer folk are in lay leadership in our church, how many queer clergy are, you know, ever come to the church or exposed or is our congregation exposed to. You can ask some of these questions and talk about ways that you might see a possibility of increasing a congregation's exposure and and start to shift the culture and in your congregation. I'm trying to find a link for you. I'm trying to remember who we ordered ours from at a long but and to be clear. The word queer is a word that the community has reclaimed in our generation that when we grew up queer was derogatory. It's a broad umbrella term to. It's often used as a broad umbrella term to read to refer to basically kind of the entire alphabet soup. So it's not derogatory when we say queer people, we're talking about L G B T q which can also mean queer questioning. And it looks like our groups are ready so let's go. Here we go. Okay, are we all back. Okay, we want to have some time for some open q amp a but I also want to honor that people may to move on. And so we want to share some resources with you quickly and so I'm going to share my screen. I have a new web page that's on the conference website, you can go to just go to ntcumc.org. And in the search put trans, and it will, this will be the first thing that pops up, or you can go bookmark this address. Here are some links directly to our website, which have some more detailed information. This was a seminar that we did earlier this fall, I mean spring, I don't know what time of year it is. The governor and the AG were hot and heavy about criminalizing gender affirming care. I do want to say, even though it seems like this has gone quiet. It's not gone away. They're busy campaigning right now, for sure. But, and they're going to come back to this. This is some good information about how to get started in terms of protecting your children how to build a safe folder. It explains what a safe folder is, and then some resources. There's lots of good information on there for what to do in terms of a CPS investigation, how to respond when CPS shows up, etc, etc. And to be clear, I think I said this on the conference floor, the trauma to a family that has nothing to do with whether it's legal or criminal. CPS can embed an open investigation on any complaint they receive, and that's where the trauma comes to a family is at the point of investigation, not at the point of trial. So, if I call CPS and I say, hey, I think the person living at the bishops address is looking at child pornography. They can open an investigation based on that, and they can start asking the bishops neighbors, hey, have you seen anything, right, and now the cat's out of the bag, even though the accusation was totally false. But to be clear, it's totally false. And it has no grounds in reality, and it's not legal, but they can open an investigation. So you can see how that happens. Then here are some resources that I think would be directly helpful to you. I mean, like basic nuts and bolts tools that I call from the P flag website. There's a lot of these parents and families of lesbian and gay, it's a, it's an organization that was started in the 70s, it's much broader now. There's a p flag chapter at North Haven that North Haven hosts, we're getting ready to launch another p flag chapter for the Eastern excerpts and suburbs at St Stephen. And I think Grace Avenue is talking about launching one for the northern counties. So P flag has a huge amount of resources on the website, but these are some ones that I think would be immediately helpful to you. And then here are two other documents. These are PDFs talking about suicide and LGBTQ populations and from another great website straight for equality, a PDF on trans ally materials. So all available to you on the conference website. Two resources that I think every pastor should have every person who works in a church every if you have conversations with young people. These resources you should have, and it's welcoming and affirming. And it is a guide to supporting and working with LGBTQ Christian youth. This is edited by Lee think I will make sure that we send a link to this to all of you. It has an accompanying youth book that's queerfully and wonderfully made. It's a great there was a great resources but this one is especially good for a lot of these questions that you have and things that we talked about today, it'll be repeated in this. The first for parents that I really love is gender identity guide for parents. And again, it's compassionate advice to help your child be their most authentic self. It just sort of helps kind of walk through this journey. And there are others so we'll make sure that we send those to you I know that Mary Ann posted a document. And then there was another oh in flesh Jessica talked about in fleshed as a great resource you can Google and fleshed liturgy resource inclusive language it'll it'll but I'll pull all those links and make sure that they get sent out in the email with the pdf of the great. And then of course Jeffrey and I are both resources. And if you need help having these conversations. If you want somebody else to come in and have the conversation and facilitate the conversation, so that you don't have to be the person. Sometimes that's easier. And we are absolutely willing to do that and we'll put our emails in the chat as well. And so we can go into the Q&A if there are questions if you want to ask a question, it might be good. Maybe to drop them in the chat. Or you can, there's a lot of people that's why I'm just concerned about like everybody on muting and asking questions at once because I know everyone's going to ask questions. While you're doing that. I let me add, I use in fleshed as a graph as a reference and a resource often. It's also important to note that they come from a Calvinist background, not a Wesleyan background. So as you grab things from there. Please be theologically aware of what's happening liturgically, and that you may need to adjust some language to be more Wesleyan than Calvinist. There are email addresses, unless of course you're a closet Calvinist, then we need to have another conversation. theology humor. Always. Any questions. Wow, this is the most successful webinar I've ever let. Well, I appreciate all of your time and willingness to step into this conversation. Yes, and it is very important for youth ministers and pastors to not be silent. Again, if you have questions, you may email us you can reach out to us in whatever way. So yeah, Laura to your point be aware of what's going on in your community, which your school board is doing, and be ready to speak out, and, and step into that space in that uncomfortable space that we talked about. Thank you all it was wonderful. I look forward to seeing you again in another context or another conversation.