Meet the TransQueer Latinx theologian James Talarico said continues to inspire me

Texas Democratic Senate hopeful James Talarico once lavished praise on a self-described “TransQueer, Latinx” activist theologian as a major source of inspiration for his left-wing philosophy.“When you started following me on Twitter, I couldn’t contain my inner fan boy, because I read your book last year and it continues to inspire me and y’all’s work continues to inspire me,” the state lawmaker told Roberto Henderson-Espinoza during a March 2021 podcast appearance.“I told you I was a boring, straight, cis white man, and I added ‘Presbyterian’ to spice it up,” Talarico added.“My imagination is also just limited by my own background and identity.”“My whiteness, my masculinity, all those things limit my imagination about what’s possible,” he went on.

“And that’s where … your book helps me do that.”Henderson-Espinoza, a PhD scholar, uses He/They pronouns and self-describes as Mestizaje (mixed race), autistic, non-binary, transgender, and Latinx.The book Talarico referred to was Henderson-Espinoza’s “Activist Theology,” published in 2019, which lays out a brand of progressive religious values aimed at fighting “interlocking supremacies.”The two began interacting in February 2021 after Talarico followed Henderson-Espinoza on X and described himself as “a BIG fan.”Since winning the Democratic nod for Senate, Talarico has faced a deluge of attacks from Republicans accusing him of being too woke for Texas.GOP critics have pointed to Talarico’s past remarks, including from 2021, when he explained that “In my faith, God is non-binary,” argued that the Bible is fine with abortion, and suggested that there are six biological sexes.Talarico’s past affinity for Henderson-Espinoza seemingly provides some clues about where he was getting some of those ideas.In 2018, Henderson-Espinoza penned a paper calling for “transing religion as one approach to methodologically dismantle the logic of the norm that grounds the...