What I know to be true is that our bodies remember the rituals we were brought up with and the words of the liturgy, as spells, that were spoken over us.

I imagine us taking those well worn paths that groove in our neurology and rewriting the text. Rather than reciting words from outside our experience, from an oppressive power structure that wants to keep us small and broken, we will divine our own incantations of truth and declarations of joy that are born from our flesh. Allowing the voice of our erotic knowing a place on the page, and a place in the holy space of community.

This workshop is for you who have been harmed by the church and are looking to connect the tendrils of magic from that tradition with the magic in your body – in a way that is named and claimed by you – defined on YOUR own terms, through the vessel of poetry and being witnessed and held in community.

This gathering is (ir)reverent in the way that we revere our bodies and connection to spirit and subvert the traditions we were raised with as a collective act of healing. 

This gathering invites the spirit of our bodies and desire to be revealed through the word.

The spirit is willing. The flesh is also willing.

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This workshop is for you if: 

• You feel ready to play around with mixing liturgy and the erotic. 

• You still sometimes sing hymns, even though you haven’t been to church in years. 

• You feel like your body has things it wants to say. 

• You understand the power of ritual.

• You want to be more connected to your body and your erotic self. 

• You have done work around your religious trauma. 

• You feel curious and maybe even a little nervous about attending. 
  

Important Details:  

Who: Open to adults of all genders, orientations, and relationship configurations who have the experience of church doctrine negatively affecting their body image, sexuality, and/or gender expression.

Location: Zoom Room with Captions

Date: Sunday, December 1st

Time: 1:00pm - 3:00pm PST

Price: $45

Group is open to 12 participants. 

This 2 hour virtual workshop will include embodiment exercises, an erotic meditation, time to write and invitations to share our writing in a small group setting. 

Examples of liturgical structures will be provided, such as The Lord’s Prayer, Benedictions, Nicene Creed, Call and Response Litanies, etc. for you to use as a structure. If there is a part of liturgy that is significant to you that you would like to work with, please bring it with you. You are also more than welcome to make up your own prayers and offertories to your erotic body.

What Folks Are Saying:

“The Flesh is also Willing is a thoughtfully and artfully created workshop, and a gentle and supportive space. Jess' competence, self-awareness, vulnerability, and experience were evident in how she greeted people, welcomed some of our most vulnerable parts, and was able to give permission for each of us to engage in ways that felt good to us in the moment. There was just enough content - meditations, poems, handouts - to inspire and draw me to engage, and enough space for writing and sharing too - even when I was still feeling vulnerable about some of what I had written. It was wonderful to connect with others who share these experiences by catching glimpses of their stories from what they shared, and to have room for the complex way religious trauma and embodied pleasure are intertwined.”

- Caitlin, Workshop Participant