SEMINARIANS’ PODCAST SHARES STORIES AND RECLAIMS SPACE FOR INTERRACIAL IDENTITIES It is hard to imagine seminarians finding time to produce, edit, and promote a podcast in between classes, jobs, studying, and field education, but that’s just what Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary Master of Divinity Students Jordan Aspiras and Sarah DeHaan have been doing since July 2020 with their podcast, Mixed Kids Ministry. The idea for Mixed Kids Ministry began in their first semester of seminary when Aspiras, an interracial Filipina, and DeHaan, a biracial Latiné, were looking for a space where they could be their whole selves and struggling to find it. This missing space led to them founding Mixed Kids Ministry - a place for reclaiming the grey space in theology and the church for those with interracial identities through open conversation and storytelling.
Sarah/SD: I’m Sarah, I also go by SD, and I am a biracial Latiné. I’m a third-year master of divinity (MDiv) student here at Garrett-Evangelical. I graduated from Western Michigan University with my bachelor of science in family studies. Following my studies, I hope to pursue a call to palliative/end-of-life chaplaincy and Death Doula Certification while continuing to study the intersection of death and culture. Mixed Kids Ministry is more than just a podcast, so can you tell us about what Mixed Kids Ministry is and how it got started?
Before we dive into Mixed Kids Ministry, tell us a little about yourselves:
Jordan: We met in our first year here at GarrettEvangelical and pretty early on started having conversations about how theological approaches didn’t quite fit for our lives. I am an interracial woman; my dad is Filipino, and my mom is white, but I was raised in a community heavily influenced by Chicano/Mexican American life and identity. Because of this upbringing, my relationship to my ethnic/racial identity has always been somewhat confusing. A lot of people assumed I was adopted when they saw me with my mom - even teachers and other parents. Teachers would say, “Oh it all makes sense now,” upon seeing my dad. But this is all important to the formation of Mixed Kids Ministry because we weren’t reading or seeing stories like ours reflected in theology and theological discourse.
Jordan: I am Jordan, and I am interracial, raised in San José, California. I’m in my third year of my MDiv, and I graduated from Baylor University in 2019. I am interested in hospital chaplaincy, particularly with intensive care units and abrupt/ traumatic end-of-life care. I am also interested in exploring what it looks like to have chaplains as a part of medical schools, specifically working with residents, fellows, and medical students when they rotate off and onto the ICU.
SD: Mixed Kids Ministry was born in the first semester of our time here at seminary. We quickly realized that there were stories missing from theological education and the church, stories containing those who live and exist in the grey space of the binary, in this space in between. At the heart of it, Mixed Kids Ministry blossomed through our mutual experiences of being multiracial and has been nourished and sustained through the continual building of this community.
Over the past year, Aspiras and DeHaan have launched a website, completed two seasons of the Mixed Kids Ministry podcast, created merch, and more - all while still being full-time students. We were thrilled to get the chance to interview Aspiras and DeHaan and let them share more about themselves and their work with Mixed Kids Ministry.
10 AWARE MAGAZINE | SPRING 2022
