the individual revealed in her video that she was a transfeminist, a historian of queer identities in modern Britain and also an evangelical Christian. Jesse was taken aback. Jesse was born in a very conservative and religious country, and born in a Catholic household. Facing intense pressure to fit a certain role their whole life, Jesse chose to denounce their faith – for why should they have to theologically justify their own existence? Everywhere they went, things seem to be split into strict binaries. Religion does not welcome queers, and queers should not be religious.
Listening to the transfeminist historian, Rebecca, Jesse was introduced to a completely different perspective of spiritual thought. Jesse learned the broader contexts and more complicated histories behind concepts she was raised to believe as the undeniable truth. Rebecca spoke of the importance of binaries – which seem to represent the ills of Jesse’s life – to modern societies, and hence why people seem so desperate to hold onto seemingly rigid forms of gender. In the video, Rebecca laughed – she acknowledged that she knew people would find the combination of her identities a little odd, that people might find her optimism strange. But Rebecca pointed out that throughout history, she had not been the first one saying this.
Religions have been re-interpreted and also misinterpreted – they are a product of time, history and institutions. Rebecca believed that other queer folks like her, and also Christians, can work together to find inclusive and kinder readings of their faith. When Jesse finished the video, she smiled – it was a breath of fresh air to the queerphobic vitriol she was raised with. Jesse opened her messaging app, and muted the group chat.
Over the next few days, she would have a lot of reflecting to do. Maybe she and her peers can too, like Rebecca, reconcile faith and identity, and take that first step to bettering the experience of being religious and questioning your identities.
This story was submitted as part of the Oxford Pilot Phase of the Gen Z Role Models Project.
“the individual revealed in her video” (S125) © 2026 by The Gen Z Role Models Project is licensed under CC BY 4.0
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