A Bright Cloud: A Transfiguration Story from India

The reflection for the Feast of the Transfiguration is written by Dwayne Fernandes, Director of Spirituality, New Ways Ministry, and a Bondings 2.0 contributor. 

The liturgical readings for the Feast of the Transfiguration can be found by clicking here.

If you would like to share some of your reflections with other Bondings 2.0 readers, please feel free to post whatever responses you have in the “Comments” section of this post.

As I read today’s gospel of the Transfiguration, it brought vividly to mind an experience I had recently on a trip to my native India. While there, I was blessed to attend an LGBTQ+ gathering at a convent in Mumbai. When Sr. Neeta, a Canossian nun and co-founder of the ministry, said that there were about 120 people in the group my curiosity was provoked, especially when she added that many would be from the kinnar community.

The kinnar is a distinct social and cultural group that defies traditional binary gender norms. The community exists in South Asia, including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. Once held in high esteem for their loyalty to the Hindu gods, with noted positions of power under both Hindu and Muslim rulers in early centuries, their stature in society fell with the British occupation of India and successive policies and laws. Today the kinnars continue to be shunned despite being legally recognized as a third gender in India with an affirmed right to self-identify. 

Without much access to mainstream employment, healthcare, and education, this community is often stricken by poverty and forced to survive by unconventional means, primarily offering blessings, begging and/or sex work. Indian families, historically conservative in terms of gender and sexuality, scarcely want to be identified with a gender-fluid child, leaving kinnar people either abandoned or forced-out of their homes to preserve the dignity of the family.

They are hard to miss on India’s busy streets. Dressed in vibrant saris and striking makeup, kinnars usually weave through crowded intersections offering blessings (and curses) as they beg. While some Indians seek their blessings, others fear their curses. This paradox, regrettably, only contributes to their marginalization and fear in the country. And in a sad irony, while their blessings include fertility, prosperity, and a long life, they themselves remain in poverty, bear no children, and live a life riddled with mockery and violence.

I have always been wary of the kinnar community partly due to the cultural stigma that surrounds them. My guardedness stems from many childhood brushes with them on Mumbai’s trains and thoroughfares. Being forced to hand over money for fear of being hounded or accosted is not very pleasant, especially when faced with an assembly of two or more people. So when I received an invitation to witness a Catholic ministry with them, I knew I would have to confront my past.

I arrived on time, only to realize how fluid the hour actually is in India. But as I waited for participants to gather, I was struck by the animated conversations that burst forth from a makeshift “green room” by the main hall. I saw nondescript, masculine-presenting people enter the room, only to emerge, completely transformed, in glittering saris and glowing personalities.

“They love to dress up,” explained Sr. Neeta. “He is a married man,” she pointed, “but it is only here that he can be his true self and feel safe.” As I came to hear more of the stories, the pain, the joys, and the challenges that met this community, my misunderstandings, like scales, fell from my eyes, and I got to witness the unadulterated person behind the label.

My most humbling moment of the evening was when one of the participants offered me a medley of cut fruit in a banana leaf. They, then, knelt down to touch my feet as a sign of respect. I will never forget this gesture – for here I was, tainted with judgements towards the kinnar community, only to be received, honored, and blessed by one of their own.

In today’s Gospel of the Feast of the Transfiguration, Peter says to Jesus, “Lord, it is good that we are here.” I left that evening of ministry feeling the exact, same emotion. How good it is that God takes us to high mountaintops. Because, past the metaphorical climb (discomfort, fear), what awaits us is nothing but raw revelation of the Reign of God and the whispered comfort of Jesus’ words, “Do not be afraid.” 

Jesus’ transfiguration in the Gospel suggests prodigious potential for change and renewal, much like the kinnar journey – a process of shedding classical expectations of male and female, to embrace an infinitely higher understanding of self. The transfiguration event also comes only after Jesus foretells of his impending suffering and death. With the discrimination, exclusion, economic challenges and prejudices that plague the kinnar community, their road, too, is patented with resilience and strength in the face of heightened adversity.  

Embedded in today’s gospel is an unfamiliar oxymoron – “a bright cloud.” As I reflect on my evening with the kinnar community, I feel “a bright cloud” is precisely what defines them – seemingly opaque, but nonetheless filled with the presence and voice of God.

– Dwayne Fernandes, New Ways Ministry, August 6, 2023