What can the Natural World Teach Us about Ourselves? with Cai Quirk

10/18/22 • 20 min

The Seed: Conversations for Radical Hope

Cai Quirk frames their art and their work expanding gender narratives as a collaboration between themself, the natural world, and Spirit. Despite the continued erasure of queer stories, Cai reminds us that the natural world keeps these stories of the “fluidity and diversity of ourselves...for us to be able to relearn.” In their conversation with Dwight, Cai invites us into those processes of collaboration, expansion, and relearning.

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Cai Quirk (they/them or ey/em) is a lifelong Quaker with passions for Witness, personal discernment, and diverse methods of spiritual deepening. With a gender that transcends binaries, Cai is practiced at deeply questioning societal expectations and norms and in shifting towards roots of individual and group integrity. Spiritual deepening, Witness, and integrity are expanded in Cai’s writing, photography, and music practices. Cai’s upcoming book of photography and stories, Transcendence: Queer Restoryation, connects themes of spirituality, mythology, and gender diversity, nature and storytelling.

Learn more about Cai’s work here: https://caiquirk.com/

Preorder Cai’s upcoming book, Transcendence: Queer Restoryation , here.

Listen to Cai’s First Monday lecture, “Myths of Gender,” here.

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The Seed asks guests to share a quote or text that has been transformational for them. Cai shared the following quote from Winona LaDuke:

“When we start our stories at the moment of harm, we get limited, we lose imagination. What were our stories before the harm? We can reimagine our pasts, imagine the pieces, the stories that weren’t handed down.”

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Find the transcript for this episode here.

The transcript for this episode is available on https://pendlehillseed.buzzsprout.com/
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The Seed is a project of Pendle Hill, a Quaker center open to all for Spirit-led learning, retreat, and community. We’re located in Wallingford, Pennsylvania, on the traditional territory of the Lenni-Lenape people.
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Online Quaker Worship with Dwight: Dwight will attend the Pendle Hill online Quaker worship on the last Friday of the month from 8:30 to 9:10 AM (Eastern Time). Visit Pendle Hill Online Worship for details.

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. & Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund.

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Learn more about Cai’s work here: https://caiquirk.com/

Preorder Cai’s upcoming book, Transcendence: Queer Restoryation , here.

Listen to Cai’s First Monday lecture, “Myths of Gender,” here.

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The Seed asks guests to share a quote or text that has been transformational for them. Cai shared the following quote from Winona LaDuke:

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Find the transcript for this episode here.

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. & Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund.

Previous Episode

How Do We Heal Amidst the Unspeakable? with Rev. Rhetta Morgan

Dwight sits down with Rev. Rhetta Morgan to discuss the power and purpose of heartbreak, the magic of sitting with grief, and the connection between healing self/others/world. What does it mean to heal and hope in the midst of the unspeakable? “I want to invite people to go in the direction of the illogical,” Rev. Rhetta says. “It is illogical to be hopeful when everything around you is falling apart. I want you to do it anyway. I want you to go in that direction of the transcendent.” This conversation digs into the complexity, beauty, pain, and alchemy of radical hope and its power in the chaos and crises of our current moment.
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Reverend Rhetta Morgan is a singing healer, spiritual activist, and interfaith minister who has been gathering tools for healing and inspiration for over 40 years. She is a valued teacher at Pendle Hill, offering workshops and lectures on topics including faithfulness and action, grief and healing, and nonviolent action. Through her gifts of prayer, poetry, facilitation, and sermonizing she cultivates hope and nurtures connection in her community as a pathway back to belonging and wholeness.
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You can learn more about Rev. Rhetta’s work on her website, https://reverendrhetta.com/

Listen to Rev. Rhetta’s First Monday Lecture, "Into the Night: Holiness of Darkness," here.
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Find the transcript for this episode here.

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. & Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund.

Next Episode

Love, Power, Justice: How Do We Make Our Activism Effective and Spiritually-Grounded? with Eileen Flanagan

How can we practice courage? How do we build our “fear toolbox” and find our roles in social change work? In this episode, Eileen breaks down concrete steps for discernment around these questions. Her work as an environmental activist and spiritual writer has long focused on building effective movements that are grounded in love and harness people’s power. Here, she and Dwight break down the turning points and learnings over her career that have transformed her thinking about the relationships between love, power and justice, and about the illusion of separation.
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Eileen Flanagan has served as both clerk and campaign director of Earth Quaker Action Team, which uses nonviolent direct action to pressure corporations contributing to climate change. She has also been a Pendle Hill Resident Teacher, a university lecturer on racism, and Trainings Coordinator for Choose Democracy, which trained 10,000 people in nonviolent strategies to prevent a coup in the lead up to the 2020 election. Her online courses on effective and spiritually grounded activism have engaged people around the world. The award-winning author of three books, she tells the story of her leading to work on climate justice inRenewable: One Woman’s Search for Simplicity, Faithfulness, and Hope.
Read more about Eileen's work at eileenflanagan.com.

Listen to Eileen’s November 2020 First Monday Lecture, “What Happens Wednesday? Preparing Ourselves for the Work Ahead” here.

Register for Eileen’s upcoming Pendle Hill workshop, Making Our Activism More Effective through Nonviolent Direct Action, here.

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The Seed asks guests to share a quote or text that has been transformational for them. Eileen shared the following quote from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s speech “Where Do We Go From Here?”:

“What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and that love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best ... is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power, correcting everything that stands against love.”
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Find the transcript for this epis

This project is made possible by the generous support of the Thomas H. & Mary Williams Shoemaker Fund.

The Seed: Conversations for Radical Hope - What can the Natural World Teach Us about Ourselves? with Cai Quirk

Transcript

Cai Quirk 0:09

There have been so many queer stories erased throughout time and through oppression. And one of the things that I was realizing recently is just how much the natural world holds some of these stories for us.

Dwight Dunston 0:27

Welcome, everyone, to The Seed: Conversations for Radical Hope, a Pendle Hill podcast where Quakers and other seekers come together to explore visions of the world that is growing up through the cracks