For The Love With Jen Hatmaker Podcast For the Love Podcast

This powerful episode in our Queer Futures series features an enlightening conversation about power structures with Jen and renowned author Roxane Gay and co-writer Megan Pillow. The women explore not only the concept of individual power, but how we can engage in community empowerment. Together, they delve into how marginalized communities, particularly LGBTQ+ individuals, can claim their power and challenge existing power structures to create a more inclusive and just society.
Discussion includes: 

Claiming Individual Power: How women, LGBTQ+ individuals, and others can assert their power in personal and professional spaces.

Challenging Power Structures: The importance of calling out abuses of power and questioning the status quo

Empowerment Through Solidarity: The role of community and collective action in amplifying individual voices and driving social progress.

Re-examining Power Dynamics: How rethinking traditional notions of gender, race, and power can lead to more equitable outcomes.

Focusing on the Margins: The significance of centering marginalized voices and experiences in conversations about power and progress.

Roxane and Megan discuss practical steps that anyone can take to empower others around them. We’re encouraged to ask ourselves critical questions about our own relationships to power and to question the power sources that infringe on the rights of others and use our individual power to disrupt them. Every small act of resistance contributes to a larger movement for justice.
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Thought-Provoking Quotes:
“Power doesn't affect all of us equally and some people are able to wield power or are given power, and others have power wielded against them. There are all kinds of factors that contribute to the why of that.” - Dr. Roxane Gay
“When you see an abuse of power, call it out and identify it. Oftentimes power works because nobody questions it and nobody challenges it.” - Dr. Roxane Gay
"We have to use voting as one tool [to enact change], but we have to figure out other ways to be involved in our communities and to enact other forms of power, not just rely on voting as the singular tool that we use to try to enact change.” - Dr. Roxane Gay
“The queer future is complicated. I think the queer future is much better than the queer past, and we are really enjoying a lot of freedom. But it's not enough and until all of us are free, none of us are free.” - Dr. Roxane Gay
Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
Bad Feminist by Dr. Roxane Gay - https://roxanegay.com/books/bad-feminist/
Difficult Women by Dr. Roxane Gay - https://roxanegay.com/books/difficult-women/
Hunger by Dr. Roxane Gay - https://roxanegay.com/books/hunger/
All of Roxane’s Books - https://roxanegay.com/books/
Do The Work: A Guide to Understanding Power and Creating Change by Dr.Roxane Gay and Dr. Megan Pillow - https://bit.ly/45nxhvd
The Power Book: What is it, Who Has it, and Why? by Dr. Roxane Gay - https://bit.ly/3VBRYAl
Obergefell v. Hodges (2015 Supreme Court case making same-sex marriages legal in the U.S.) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obergefell_v._Hodges
Guest’s Links:
Roxane’s Website - https://roxanegay.com/
Roxane’s Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/roxanegay74  
Roxane’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/roxanegay74
The Audacity (Roxane and Megan’s Stubstack Blog) - https://audacity.substack.com/
Megan’s Website - https://www.meganpillow.com/
Megan’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/megpillow
Megan’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/megpillow77/
Craftwork (Megan’s Substack Blog) - https://craftwork.substack.com/
Connect with Jen!
Jen’s website - https://jenhatmaker.com/
Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/
Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker
The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media, presented by Audacy. 
Four Eyes Media:

In this special bonus episode of the For the Love Podcast, Jen sits down with her literary hero — beloved author and teacher, Anne Lamott, whose candid, humorous writing has inspired millions to embrace their imperfect selves.
Anne and Jen explore the hard-won wisdom distilled across Anne's 45-year career and 20 books - from finding radical self-love after a lifetime of shame, to surrendering to life's ordinary miracles during periods of existential crisis. With refreshing irreverence, Anne shares her lessons on unearthing your deepest, truest voice and faith that new paths are waiting, even when the way forward feels hopelessly obscured.
Jen and Anne discuss

The importance of radical self-love, letting go of shame, and being your own priority before trying to please or gain approval from others

Having faith that there is a "shape" or path waiting for you, even if you can't see it yet, by surrendering and doing the work of self-examination

The wisdom that comes with age in realizing how little you know

The way small, mundane acts can be profound expressions of love and service to buoy you during dark periods

For anyone who has ever felt cracked by life's circumstances, Anne's perspective provides a roadmap back to wholeness.
Thought-Provoking Quotes:
“[I've been] giving myself deeper and deeper permission to use my own voice and to stop trying to get people to like or respect me or to think I'm more educated than I am--which I'm not at all educated--and to just get kind of cleaner in my own being so that I could write the deepest I could go in my own truest voice and just get that day's work done one day at a time. It's like nautilus for the soul. To keep writing your truth with your own weird, quirky, way of expressing yourself and being affirmed that people seem to like it and to keep going.” - Anne Lamott
"What love manifests is making more mistakes. Knowing as a writer, that a pile of papers and notes and index cards is a fertile field, and you don't need to know what you're going to do with them. They know what you're going to do with them. The material knows what you're going to do with it, and it's going to get back to you as it trusts more and more that you're a reliable narrator." - Anne Lamott
“We do some deep dive into the obstacles to radical self-love and to just surrendering to the path of goodness or God or the holiness. The first thing God says to Moses is 'take off your shoes. Feel the earth beneath your feet. This is holy ground.' And that is what God has for you, starting right now. Take off your shoes and wiggle your toes in the earth. Look up. Breathe in. And when you are restored from what you've been through, all this nautilus for your soul you've been doing, you're going to step forward into that shape.” - Anne Lamott
Resources Mentioned in this Bonus Episode: 
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life - https://bit.ly/3K1JZGg
Somehow: Thoughts on Love by Anne Lamott - https://bit.ly/3ytWzeK
The American Way of Death by Jessica Mitford - https://bit.ly/3JZCP5s
Hard Laughter: A Novel by Anne Lamott - https://bit.ly/4bFcO7b
Five Rules of Being a Grown-Up (Article by CJ Green) - https://bit.ly/4bXbmxl
8 Best Anne Lamott Books -https://bit.ly/3yoWbyj

Guest Links:
Twitter - https://twitter.com/annelamott/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/AnneLamott/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/annelamott/
Penguin Random House - https://sites.prh.com/annelamott

Connect with Jen!
Jen’s website - http://jenhatmaker.com/
Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/
Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker
The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media, presented by Audacy. 
Four Eyes Media: https://www.iiiimedia.com/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

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Jen Hatmaker revisits one of the most impactful and downloaded episodes from her "For the Love" podcast's 7-year history. In this powerful encore, she has a candid conversation with acclaimed writer and speaker Jonathan Merritt who publicly comes out as gay for the first time during their interview.
Jen and Jonathan reflect on their intertwined journeys - she as an ally leaving the evangelical world, he as a prominent faith voice reckoning with his sexuality. Brace yourself for an emotional, insightful look at the joy and pain of Jonathan's coming out experience. This is one powerhouse episode you won't want to miss again (or for the first time!).
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Thought-Provoking Quotes:
“I had a choice. I could either leave the idea of being loved in that way and loving in that way behind and to get belonging and acceptance, or I could choose to be rejected by the people that I was given as a family and a faith community and I could go off on my own way and try to find love. And that's a tough decision.” – Jonathan Merritt 
“I'd grown up hearing this, ‘we hate the sin, we love the sinner.’ And yet, everywhere I looked was all this sin-hate. And there was no marking of loving these people.” – Jonathan Merritt
“The number one reason that someone changes their views on homosexuality or same-sex marriage is how they answer the question, ‘Do you have a close family member or friend who is gay?’” – Jonathan Merritt
“I live in an Episcopal seminary. You feel hundreds of years of prayers that have been prayed here by good people. People who joined the Civil Rights Movement. And people who were marching after the Stonewall Riots. And people who did it because they loved Jesus and not in spite of that fact.” – Jonathan Merritt
"American evangelicalism is predicated on the existence of an enemy to fight, and that keeps people coming to church. It's the need to be against, right? And people revel in that, that's the selling point." – Jonathan Merritt
Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
Love is the Game Changer of Our Faith: Bishop Michael Curry - https://bit.ly/3BQ2FUl
How to Create a Politics of Love: Lisa Sharon Harper - https://bit.ly/3IdV3gW
Jen Hatmaker: Trump, Black Lives Matter, Gay Marriage & More - Jonathan Merritt - https://bit.ly/3IhrUS0
Christian Rock Star Comes Out as Gay in Letter to the World - Jonathan Merritt - https://bit.ly/3siB9Ms
Eugene Peterson on Changing His Mind About Same-Sex Issues and Marriage - Jonathan Merritt - https://bit.ly/3LXWlyX
Leading Evangelical Ethicist is now Pro-LGBT (David Gushee) - Jonathan Merritt - https://bit.ly/3LVOTUV
A Faith of Our Own: Following Jesus Beyond the Culture Wars - Jonathan Merritt - https://bit.ly/3Vvj8J6
Dr. Michael Lindsay - Sociologist & Author - https://www.taylor.edu/about/president-profile
James Martin - Jesuit Priest - https://www.instagram.com/jamesmartinsj/
My Guncle and Me by Jonathan Merritt - https://www.amazon.com/My-Guncle-Me-Jonathan-Merritt/dp/0762485612
Guest’s Links:
Website - https://www.jonathanmerritt.com 
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jonathan_merritt/ 
Twitter - https://twitter.com/JonathanMerritt
Connect with Jen!
Jen’s website - https://jenhatmaker.com/
Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/
Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker
The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media, presented by Audacy. 
Four Eyes Media: https://www.iiiimedia.com/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jen and award-winning author, Kelly Barnhill, discuss the powerful themes and inspirations behind her genre-defying book "When Women Were Dragons." Sparked by her outrage during the Kavanaugh hearings, Barnhill created a bold metaphor where women transform into dragons to escape societal oppression.
In this conversation, she delves into her controversial ending that ultimately represents the multitude of paths to female empowerment. Barnhill also examines the dangerous historical pattern of silencing trauma and marginalized voices, from the 1918 flu to violent racial tensions.
Jen and Kelly discuss:

“When Women Were Dragons’" exploration of women transforming into dragons as a metaphor for rebelling against oppression and societal constraints.

The ending and how it represents there are multiple valid paths for women's empowerment - some transformative, others finding power in conventional roles.

Highlights about the historical pattern of silencing traumatic events and oppression of marginalized groups.

Portrayals of womanhood as expansive and defying rigid societal definitions of what a woman is or can be.

Novel Summary:
"When Women Were Dragons" by Kelly Barnhill is a feminist fantasy novel that explores themes of female empowerment, societal repression, and transformation. Set in an alternate 1950s America, the story revolves around a mysterious event known as the "Mass Dragoning of 1955," where a significant number of women across the country inexplicably turn into dragons and fly away, leaving behind their human lives.
The protagonist, Alex Green, navigates life in the aftermath of this event. She grows up in a society that tries to suppress and erase the memory of the dragonings, facing the stigma and secrecy surrounding the topic. Alex's journey involves uncovering family secrets, particularly those related to her aunt Marla, who was one of the women who transformed. As Alex learns more about her aunt's life and the circumstances of the dragonings, she begins to understand the broader implications of the event and its connection to women's liberation and agency.
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Guest’s Links:
Kelly’s Website - https://kellybarnhill.wordpress.com/
Kelly’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/insufferable_blabbermouth/
Kelly’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/kellybarnhill
Books & Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill - https://bit.ly/3Vd01m3
The Book of Dragons: An Anthology - https://bit.ly/4bO3ldN
Kavanaugh Hearing - https://supreme.justia.com/justices/brett-m-kavanaugh/
1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic - https://bit.ly/3ysjfvX
The Book of Love: A Novel by Kelly Link - https://bit.ly/4btgQzN
Nettle & Bone - https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250824776/nettlebone
Connect with Jen!
Jen’s website - http://jenhatmaker.com/ 
Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/ 
Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker?sub_confirmation=1

The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media, presented by Audacy. 
Four Eyes Media: https://www.iiiimedia.com/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week’s top episode from the archives is our number one most listened to episode. In a profoundly moving encore episode, Jen Hatmaker shares the story of interviewing her daughter, Sydney, as Sydney shared her emotional coming out story. This raw conversation follows Sydney as she vulnerably shares her journey of accepting herself as gay while still holding onto her faith–and we’re very excited to share this again during Pride Month as part of our Queer Futures series.

Jen reintroduces the episode reflecting on what’s changed since this conversation and how it’s affected her community. Three years later, this episode remains an incredible force, sparking deep discussions around LGBTQ+ issues and Christianity in our community. Jen recalls the immense reach and impact this episode evoked - from mending broken family relationships to causing church leaders to reevaluate their approach. As Jen reflects on Sydney’s growth, it’s a beautiful reminder that embracing authenticity allows people to flourish.
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Thought-Provoking Quotes:
“I was just scared, and alone. And I wanted to have it all. I wanted to have my family, and God, and my future. And I didn't think I'd be able to have it all.” -Sydney Hatmaker
“It doesn't matter how loving you are, or what emphasis on Scripture you come with. That's not enough if you're not fully accepting them as children of God.” -Sydney Hatmaker
“Your allyship can't be about you, and it can't be performative, and it has to be for everybody. And it has to be about love.” -Sydney Hatmaker
Connect with Jen!
Jen’s website - https://jenhatmaker.com/
Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/
Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker?sub_confirmation=1
The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media, presented by Audacy. 
Four Eyes Media: https://www.iiiimedia.com/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this emotionally charged last episode in our For the Love of the Matriarchy series, Jen shares an intimate and profound conversation with Christine Blasey Ford, who came into the public eye when she testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on September 27th, 2018, while it was considering the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court; describing an alleged sexual assault by the Supreme Court nominee that took place at a high school party in the 80s. Christine, with brave vulnerability, opens up about her harrowing experience in the aftermath of her testimony and the tsunami of public scrutiny she faced. Through her story, we're reminded of the incredible power of women when we come together, support one another, and find our collective voice against injustices. This episode is not just a dialogue; it's a clarion call to all women to connect, share, and empower each other in a world that often seeks to silence us.
Christine shares with Jen:

the moment she heard that Brett Kavanaugh was on a short list of Supreme Court justice nominees and the immediate reaction that she needed those in power to know the truth

the emotional toll the aftermath of the experience took on Christine and her family, and the safety measures they had to employ because of constant death threats

why she decided to write a book, One Way Back, to tell the story now, citing what she learned through the experience and what she knows now about the many other women in history who have also spoken their truth about sexual harassment and assault

the incredible amount of support she received from women and sexual assault survivors in the form of letters, which carried her through some of the most difficult moments


Jen and Christine's conversation underscores a crucial message: when women connect, we're not just powerful together; we're unstoppable.
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Thought-Provoking Quotes:
“It took many years to feel that I was ready to say something and to break the silence. I had been silent for so long. I was feeling a little bit guilty even, for having so much focus and learning about the contributions of so many other women in so many different venues who have spoken up against sexual harassment and sexual assault. And I just thought, 'Wow, I need to share all the things that I didn't know beforehand. Maybe I could share them and maybe it will help someone.'" - Christine Blasey Ford
“The system can often work in ways that make [women] feel divided and makes us feel negatively towards each other. But when we actually connect, we're really powerful together.” - Christine Blasey Ford
Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
Christine’s Senate Judiciary Committee Testimony - https://bit.ly/3UzlYeof 
One Way Back: A Memoir by Christine Blasey Ford - https://bit.ly/4dHlk7C
Washington Post Article featuring Christine Blasey Ford - https://bit.ly/4bjFNh3
Guest’s Links:
Christine’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/christine_talkinout/
Christine’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/fordchristine66
Connect with Jen!
Jen’s website - https://jenhatmaker.com/
Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/
Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker
Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker
The For the Love Podcast is a production of Four Eyes Media, presented by Audacy. 
Four Eyes Media: https://www.iiiimedia.com/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices