Trust: Magic Is Might (Book 7, Chapter 12)
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Chapter 12, Magic is Might. As August wore on, the square of unkempt grass in the middle of Grimauld Place shriveled in the sun until it was brittle and brown. The inhabitants of Number 12 were never seen by anybody in the surrounding houses, nor was Number 12 itself. I'm Vanessa Zoltan. And I'm Kasper Ter-Kyle. And this is Harry Potter and the Sacred Text.

So Casper, our announcement section. Do you have like a sound effect for me, Casper? Ooh, announcements. What matters? This is your last chance to sign up, everybody. Registration closes July 1st. I'm not sure how many spots are open, but you definitely want to sign up before July 1st because that's when we shut down applications. It's our year of discerning your values, our version of secular divinity school. Find out more at notsorryworks.com.

And then also you can hear ad-free episodes of the podcast if you subscribe on Apple Plus or through our Patreon. And if you subscribe to our Patreon, you get a bonus episode every week. We call it our Every Flavored Bean Conversation.

And our question this week, Caspar, is inspired by the chapter. What's an impulsive decision that you've made that turned out for the best, even if it was just by the skin of your teeth, as the trio find out in this chapter? In this chapter, they're like, let's go to the ministry tomorrow. We have to go tomorrow. And they're like, OK. We're going tomorrow. It kind of works out. Kind of. Caspar, our theme this week is trust. What story do you have for us?

So, Vanessa, you know what I'm like when I'm hosting a dinner party or my birthday or a monthly sing-along. Perfect. Everyone's getting a calendar invite. You're probably going to get instructions on exactly what I want you to bring. There's a clear window of arrival time. Like, everything is perfect.

pretty structured and my leadership style one might say is a little command and control which most of the time i find helpful because it gives people clarity right everyone knows how to be successful everyone knows where they've got to be and when and what's the zoom link and you

you take feedback. You can be like, oh, I can't do that. Right. Exactly. Right. You can say no, and you can say yes. It's just, I like clarity. But I've been leaning into a different way of organizing an event, which I'm very excited about called Solstice in the Park. It's happening in Prospect Park in Brooklyn on June 21st, which is the Midsummer Solstice. Everyone's invited, by the way, if you want to come go to solsticeinthepark.org.

and it's an amazing team of humans that has kind of gathered around this idea everyone's volunteering everyone is super like lovely and creative and i am doing the whole thing on trust like i'm really trying to lean into i'm not even gonna like push you to follow up on like the thing that you said you were gonna do like if you're doing it great and if you're not doing it you don't have

reminders on your calendar? Okay, maybe for one or two tiny, tiny things like when we have to pay for the permit in the park, like kind of essentials. But most of the stuff that people volunteered to do, I've really been like, great. If it happens, it happens. And if it doesn't, it doesn't. And that means

having to accept that, like my wonderful friend who was like, I would love to make this a beautiful brand and I'll build the website and I'll figure out the, you know, aesthetics and the graphic design. I was like, fantastic. And then a month later, she was like, I'm really sorry. I'm moving house and I have two small children and I just can't do it. I was like, fantastic. You know, like just got a roll with the punches and we had to quick

quickly find someone else who could put a basic website together. And it's fine because it's also meant that when I had dinner with my friend Jamie and met his husband, turns out the dude worked for Julie Taymor for a decade, the woman who did The Lion King. And he's an incredible puppet builder and puppeteer. And so he's been leading these incredible workshops for us to make solstice puppets. So it's like trusting in this

different way for me meant that, you know, there was a moment of panic. Like we didn't have a website and I was trying to promote the event and reach out to partners. And so we needed to scramble to get something together. You know, that looks just fine, but not what it would have been if I had been in a kind of command and control situation. But on the other hand, I

trusting that, you know, this fabulous man, Jonathan, could lead us in multiple weekends of making puppets was so much better and bigger than I could have ever commanded and controlled, right? Like, that trust and openness just allowed something to blossom that was way beyond my imagination. And so I'm really curious about trust in this chapter where

Harry makes this big proposal, decision really, like we're going to go to the ministry tomorrow. And it's not that they haven't done planning, right? They've prepared what outfits they're going to need and they've prepared the polyjuice potion and who's going to provide the hair when they walk to work in the morning and all of that. There is a plan. But at the same time, there's a huge amount of trust of like, once we're in the ministry,

We just have to roll with trust. We don't know. We don't know where Umbridge is going to be. We don't know what's going to happen. We don't even know exactly who Runcorn is or what he means to the people walking around the ministry. And so this kind of relationship between command and control and letting go, I think, is so evident when we think about trust. And I'm curious to see how it shows up in this week's chapter. Yeah, trust is a risk.

That's the thing, right? Like if you are trusting others, you are making yourself vulnerable to the possibility that they are going to disappoint you. And it's much more likely you'll get a reward if you are willing to take a risk. But it's also possible that you're going to be disappointed. And I think trust is such a beautiful thing when it's earned and it's

It can be soul crushing when it's broken. And one of the things that I'm just thinking about is your friend wasn't able to do what she said she was going to do, but she didn't break your trust, right? That's right. She communicated when she realized she couldn't do it, right? It would have been so much worse to disappear. And actually, that is a helpful reminder for me. Why do I care about this story? The experience of putting together this event is...

is as important to me as the event itself, right? Because the process has been so full of trust and collaboration and like just having to roll with the flow. Oh God, I'm just realizing I'm becoming my mother because she would always tell me to go with the flow because I was such a command and control child. And now here I am being like, guys, go with the flow. I know. We'll cast for something that I can control. Yeah.

Cast for something I have total trust in our ability to do. The 30-second recap. Can you please count me in? Three, two, one, let's go.

So Harry, Ron, and Hermione are constantly staking out the Ministry of Magic creatures, cooking them all sorts of delicious food. And Harry is like, guys, we're going to do this tomorrow. And they're like, what? Oh, my God. And they get a newspaper. And it's Snape is the head of Hogwarts. They're starting to really investigate people who are muggle-born. Things are changing. Stuff has to happen. They have to get the locket from Umbridge. And so they start. They go.

I was just like, la la la. In the newspaper was the sports section and there was the weather report. And I really liked the recipe included in the Daily Prophet. This creature was using it when he made his cauldron cake recipe. Honestly. Right. Will you count me in? Happily, my love. On your mark. Get set. Go.

So they decide that they're going to go to the ministry tomorrow and they prepare everything, put everything in the invisible bag, apparate in pairs. Why don't they do it all three at a time? Don't know. And they land just outside the ministry where they start. First, they stun a woman who's going to work and Hermione transforms into her. Then Reg Catamol is on his way to his wife's trial and they make him puke and he has to go to the hospital. And Harry transforms into Runcorn. They get into the loos, go into the ministry and

And the adventure starts when Reg is told that he has to go fix Yaxley's reigning office. And they see Umbridge in the elevator. A gulp. Gulp. Turns out if you go to the heart of the evil, you're going to meet some evil people. So Casper, I would argue that Hermione is having a hard time trusting in this chapter. And I throw a lot of reasons why. First of all,

frustrated with Harry. He keeps having these visions. This time it is of Voldemort murdering a woman because she won't tell him where Gregorovitch is. And Hermione is like, stop seeing things. And I think that that is that Harry did not build up her trust in trying to learn enough about occlumency. I don't

don't think that she actually thinks that Harry could stop these visions now. I think she's just constantly being reminded like this is something that's untrustworthy about you. You never really tried about this. Then we also see that she's like we are not ready to go to the ministry. We do not have a plan.

And my question for you in both of these is like, what is she not trusting? Or is she just anxious and is like, I can't control this. And so I'm going to take it out in a way that's going to make it sound like I don't trust you. Or is she saying, I don't trust any of us enough to get out of these scrapes. These are big old scrapes. That's really interesting because I feel like at the heart of it is her...

anxiety, like she's a command and control kind of gal, right? I know, I love her. Served her really, really well, right? Her foresight, her research, her preparation, just like always really serves the trio. Yeah.

And with this particular plan of entering the ministry, again, it has served the tree of wealth. They've been observing for a month. They've been there. One of them has been there every day, observing patterns of behavior, understanding who's going to be where at what time. You know, they do have good intel. And I think in some ways, you know, there's never enough information, right? There might never be a moment where she would say, OK, we're ready because she's right. Like there's always unknowns.

I think what's different in the situation in her trust with Harry specifically about this connection with Voldemort is that because of her anxious reaction and frankly, like blaming kind of language every time it happens to Harry, Harry no longer trusts her to tell her that it's happening. And so he lies.

He's saying, I'm going to the loo or I'm going to the bathroom when he feels that connection coming. So like in some ways, Hermione then is right not to trust Harry about those things. And they literally, they find him having like screamed and fallen to the floor again in the bathroom. And they're like, we knew it was happening.

right? Even though you said you were just going to the bathroom. So this non-trusting situation between the two of them, and it really is mostly between Hermione and Harry. Ron is really kind of a third wheel in this conversation as so often. And no, that's not fair. That's not fair to Ron. But like the trust has broken down between them on this specific issue, on this specific action, even though for the rest of their relationship, it's still very high, I think. And I think that it's not even, I,

It is trust, but it's different values. It's like you and I have different understandings of what prepared means.

And therefore you could say you're prepared. And that is not what I would consider prepared. And therefore I trust that you think you're prepared. Right. But that's not what I consider prepared. And that's not like a broken, a broken trust. Everybody's doing their best and everyone is being themselves. And to some extent that is like what makes,

diversity, even in personality type, a gift. Like, Hermione would spend forever packing and Harry's gonna be the guy who's like, "Nope, it's just time to go." Harry's like, "I know how to say Expelliarmus, so let's go." Right, like, we're all set. And like, we need both of those types because otherwise Hermione would just keep studying and, you know, be like, "Oh, I missed one question on the test."

But it's so interesting the things that often make people compatible are the things that they don't trust in one another, right? It's like, you need me. I'm going to be the person who's like, it's good enough. And also, it drives you up the wall that I'm the person that's like, put it down. That's good enough. Sometimes it's almost like you have to tap into a deeper trust.

you know, I mean, Ariana's a perfectionist and I'm not. And so, like, this is a fight that she and I have a lot where I'm like, "Perfect is the enemy of good. This is at a 92%. Like, our effort is better spent elsewhere." And I think overall, I'm so grateful to her 'cause she has pushed me from things being good enough at an 89 to 93, 94. And thank God, 'cause that's embarrassing to walk around with lower standards.

And I have pushed her to be like, it's okay that it's not perfect. We said we would get it out at 10 o'clock today. And like, that's what matters. But in those moments of conflict where it's like, is now the time, even though it's not perfect, I think the instinct is to be reminded that we don't trust each other's instincts on these things. And then you have to sort of like go deeper and then be like, but I trust you that you wouldn't let me embarrass us. But I trust you that like you're pulling this card because...

Yeah. Well, and I think it's interesting, especially in this chapter, because we see Harry's own relationship to this connection with Voldemort. Like, it's changed. Like, because Hermione doesn't trust Harry on this thing, she's missed his changing dynamic with his own experience. Like, at first, he was really scared of this connection, and rightly so, right? It's what tricked him to the Ministry. It's what led to Sirius's death. Right.

What he tells us in this chapter is I'm going to use it. Like, I feel enough trust in what this connection is. I'm not going to be fooled by it. The wand thing gave me specific information. Exactly. Like, I'm getting insights that can serve our mission that actually no one else is able to get. So, like, let's use this information. Right. And it would have benefited...

all three of them if all three of them had access to this information rather than I mean we see elsewhere in the chapter two where Ron's like oh the sanitation workers all wear blue robes and Hermione goes absolutely ballistic she's like how did you not share this information every

Every little piece of info is vital for this mission to work. And so I feel like that lack of trust really impeded some potential collaboration. So I love that illustration that we kind of have to trust each other's instinct, even if it's going against our own. Or at least we have to balance those instincts, right? To find the best solution for us to collaborate successfully. Which interestingly means...

questioning your own self-trust or right being like I also trust myself but I trust them too okay I'm gonna put this part of myself on hold right like it does take a lot of self-trust in a strange way to trust others

That's so relevant here too because Harry is so insistent on we have to do this tomorrow and it comes out of nowhere and it's him totally trusting his gut and not trusting maybe the instincts of Hermione to be like let's prepare let's prepare let's prepare.

And perhaps he's been withholding this kind of urgency for a month, right? Like, we don't see that on the page. We know it's happened, that they've done this preparation. I think it's the newspaper. Do you think? That's the instigator. So the news comes that Snape is the headmaster and that the Karos are gonna be there and that these investigations are gonna start happening to ascertain whether or not people are truly pureblood.

And I think that has given him a moment to take stock and be like, we've done enough. Like the stakes are now high enough and things are moving quickly enough. If nothing changed, I think Harry might want three or four more days. Right. Like, I don't think he feels totally ready, but he's like, there's a ticking clock.

And so I think the ticking clock has made him take internal inventory and be like, yeah, no, we're ready enough. We got to go. Yeah.

Yeah. And the sense that, you know, the locket could be anywhere by now. In some ways, actually, the more I think about it, the more credit I'm giving Harry for waiting this long. Yeah. Like, right? He's never spent this long preparing for something. No. It actually shows more of that mutual influence than maybe immediately is evident from the page itself. But what is beautiful, I think, is that Ron and Hermione, once Harry is like,

We've got to do this. They're nervous and they are genuinely scared. Like you really, the fear is real for all three of them, but they, they trust his gut and are like, okay, like we've got to do this and go through the plan in their minds again and again and again, right up to the very last moment. But they execute they to their credit. I think they, they trust Harry just like he's trusted Hermione. Yeah. I can't imagine that moment happening.

of being like, okay, we're probably going to do that in a few weeks. And then be like, tomorrow. Like, that's just like, that's truly a terrifying idea. It kind of feels like someone saying, you know, when you have to jump off with a bungee jump or something, where they're like, okay, we're counting down from three, two, and then they go on two instead of one. You know, they push you off just so your brain doesn't have enough time to catch up with the potential person.

scariness of actually jumping. There's a sort of mind game here. Not that Harry, I think, has like pre-planned to spring this on the rest of the trio, but there is something about a sudden deadline, which means that you can't be perfect, right? Like you just have to accept we've got to get it out by 10 a.m. or we're going to go into the ministry secretly tomorrow at eight. Yeah, there's something clarifying or relieving about it even rather than having it just grow endlessly as like a deadline on your calendar. Yeah.

It reminds me of like health recovery or dealing with diagnoses of like

You know, a friend of mine is going through cancer treatment and there'll be this like, oh, it turns out it's minor. We can pick this back up in three months. Never mind the test isn't what we thought you have to come in tomorrow. Or the other way around of like rush, rush, rush to slow down or right calm before the storm. I feel like we're often in these situations where you're like,

Tomorrow all hell is gonna break loose. There's literally nothing I can do about it until tomorrow though. So I just have to sit. So there's something deeply wise about this to me. I just watched the show that I think is just absolutely fantastic called Dying for Sex with Michelle Williams and Jenny Slate. And like in it, she has a terminal cancer diagnosis and

And like dying is taking a really long time until it's not. And then it's sudden. Right. And I think that that's often if you've sat with someone who is dying, that is how it feels where like it takes forever and then it takes no time at all. And there's just something about the cadence of life that's like that. Right. Like we all know, like summer feels like it's going to go on forever. You're like, I have nine weeks. And then it's like it never happened. Yeah, that's so true.

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Okay, I have a question. Yeah. I have a bold way to say a thing. Ooh. Harry kind of trusts what's going on with him and Voldemort. Yeah. He's like, Voldemort's not lying to me with these visions I have in my head. This is as trusting as Harry has ever been with Lord Voldemort.

What is happening is he gets this image in this chapter. Out of nowhere, Voldemort, he like suddenly can see what Voldemort sees. And he sees Voldemort go to the door of a house and question a woman about Gregorovitch. And the woman say, I don't know who that is. And then he sees green lights. And we think that that's a Nevada cadaver and that this woman has died. And Harry is trusting that like it's the truest reporting in the world. I mean, my only...

Guess is that his trust comes from the fact that Voldemort is showing Confusion or Voldemort is showing Weakness in a way right Voldemort doesn't understand what happened with the ones either. That's why he's chasing Gregorovitch That's why he's like in Albania. He's trying to understand what has happened and unlike the kind of image

of Sirius needing to be rescued or, you know, just like the kind of temptations of something that would speak immediately to Harry's activating energy. He feels like he's seeing information that couldn't possibly be a trap, right? Like, because he too is confused by that. And so it makes sense to him that Voldemort's confused by it. There's a sort of,

We are the special two connection, which it's both about the literal like information being shared, but it's also about the questions that they both have this mystery that they're both inside of that neither of them has an answer for.

Now, the one thing that I'm curious about is that Harry doesn't wonder, like, is Voldemort able to see things that Harry's thinking, right? Like, that seems to not be a question. But then at the same time, maybe Harry isn't having these extreme emotions or extreme experiences in the same way that Voldemort has. Oh, I'm just having a thought. Is the fact that Harry never uses the killing curse...

one of the reasons why Voldemort's never able to get into Harry's brain in these scenes. Oh, never feeling as big of a feeling, at least. Yes. Yes, Harry can always feel... I love that. Harry is like, I don't ever feel so big. Yeah.

Right. Right. Like there's something. Is it a certain cruelty? Is it a satisfaction? Is it like whatever we're seeing with Voldemort? That's what's giving Harry access. Well, this glee, right, that Voldemort has before he finds out that this woman can't help him and then, you know, kills her just in this awful way. But that's an interesting. So it seems like a one way relationship in terms of information being shared. Yeah. I'm just thinking.

thinking right like it is just a strange bedfellows moment right like a friend of mine who was an anti-nuclear activist talks about a moment in which he was protesting with greenpeace outside of a nuclear plant and an oil company was also protesting and they were like well we can trust each other on this one thing wow we both don't want this nuclear plant to be built

And as soon as this one project is over... We're back. Right? But actually, we have exactly the same motive here. And then interpersonally, some of the people really liked each other. And it was like, well, we have the same goal and we like each other. And then it's over. And so these... I mean, I know I've talked about it before, but these strange bedfellow moments where you're like,

Are we on the same side right now? Sure. It's strange because you're like, I am going to trust you on this. You and I are the only two people who really understand what our wands did. I can't trust Hermione's read on this. She wasn't there. Only you and I were there, Voldy.

It's so interesting. You're focusing on Voldemort is making me see another discrepancy of how they approach trust because Voldemort asks this woman, like, where is Grigorovitch? And she's like, I don't know him. I don't know where he is. And like, clearly she might have known him, but then genuinely doesn't know where he is, it seems. And Voldemort's response is to kill her.

Harry and Hermione and Ron need to access the ministry. And so they use the polygist potion to imitate three real people. But they don't even stun all three, let alone kill them. Right. Like, I mean, whatever the ethics of taking someone's identity and making them horribly sick and miss their wife's trial in front of the Death Eaters. Like, this is... They don't know that they're doing that, but... Yeah. They're not choosing to do that. Bad. But...

It's not killing these people, right? And I think partly what Voldemort is doing is, sure, like, he's covering his tracks so that this person wouldn't be able to say, like, it was Voldemort who was here and all that kind of stuff. But this is not about trust. This is about, like, utility. Like, this woman can't serve his power, so done.

And the trio just have much more trust of like, it's not worth killing someone to get where they want to go. I don't know, even the way they're treating these kind of tertiary characters, I think reveals how trustful they feel of the world around them, which is interesting. Right. The last place that I want to talk about is Creature.

So Creature, the trio is behaving as if they totally trust Creature in this chapter. Creature is fully on board. He has been given Master Regulus's locket and he's feeling really good about himself and they're nice to him. And so he is cooking them incredible food and Ron is so happy. Amazing food. French onion soup. Stew.

Tasty puddings. You have options. It's like, do you want this soup or that soup? Yeah. And the trio is really trusting him. They're talking about plans right in front of him. My question is, are they trusting him because he is now on their side? Are they trusting him because they have bought him and they know that he now feels loyal? Or because Harry owns him and has shushed him? Or is it relational?

I bribe someone. I don't then trust them. I'm like, they're gone as soon as they get a better bribe. But that is not how they're behaving. They are just like, Creature can be trusted with our lives. Yeah, it's so interesting because they're talking about the plans out in open, right? Like if Creature wanted to go and tell Narcissa or Bellatrix about the plans, he would have all the information he needed. Right. Like if they commanded him to. Like he can't because he's a house elf.

And Harry has forbidden him. But he has found ways to be sneaky around that before. Exactly. Like, Creature is a smart guy. I feel like, honestly, I think the food is the right place to point to. Because it's not what Creature is doing. It's how he's doing it that has built trust. I mean, you see it, especially with Ron, that he's like, huh, this food is really improved. Yeah.

this must be an indication of like the quality of our relationship, right? Like it's not just doing something grudgingly, like it's doing it with enthusiasm. And you see it in the way Creature is talking. You see it in the way, you know, the house looks different, right? The copper pots are shining. Like there is a pride in Creature in the space that he's living in, in a different way. And I mean, yeah,

the politics of this were always complicated, but like this desire to serve or like this desire to be the best, the most, you know, wonderful house elf that he can be and to make the home the most welcoming and comfortable place for the trio. So I think that's what builds trust for the trio. But the other way around is,

is interesting to question because we point to the locket as the moment when things change. But of course, as creatures behavior change, that certainly Ron and Harry's

Right.

Well, Vanessa, let's turn to our sacred practice for this week. We're going to continue with our Havruta practice, of course, Jewish practice of text study in which we engage around a specific question anchored in the text and offer up a solution and invite the other to offer an alternative solution and hopefully find some truth in the middle between our different answers. I believe in us. So here's the question I have for you.

We see in this chapter a lot of comments

by other employees at the ministry about the frustrations of how they have to get to the office, for example. So we see another worker talking to who they think is Reg, but of course it's Ron in disguise, talking about using the public toilets as a way into the ministry and saying, oh, what a pain in the bum forcing us all to get to work this way. And he's saying that out loud in the presence of a bunch of other people. To me, this suggests that

that rather than a complete command and control kind of overlords, you know, the Death Eaters are running everything, that there's actually a fair amount of trust amongst the existing workers that nobody likes these new overlords, that they don't want them to stay. It's not an active resistance, although we do see moments like Making It Rain and Yaxley's Office of people interrupting the day-to-day office life under Death Eater rules.

you know, reign. So it's got a passive quality to it, but it is out loud, right? It's not yet secretive in little notes or, I don't know, invisible notes being passed from one office to another. It's out loud. It's in public. And so I guess what I want to argue is that the ministry is a contested space. It's not yet completely taken over. And I'm wondering if you agree with that. And if so, why? And if not, why? Yeah.

I love this point. I love this point in that I think it speaks to me of something that I think is true, which is that you can't totally take over a place. You can't squash the internal flame of every person you want to oppress. Total oppression, total controls, total sublimation is fake, right? Like you never know whatever that flame is inside of someone. That doesn't mean that

You can't materially take everything away from anyone. And, you know, Virginia Woolf's mother, Julia Duckworth Stephen, who was a social worker in the late 19th century, she served in London, said there's no lack of creativity when it comes to people torturing one another, right? Like something along those lines that like.

we as humanity truly have figured out all of the ways to degrade one another. And I always think of that as like heartbreakingly true and that Julia Duckworth Stevens was out there doing her best to make that better, right? And she was somebody who dealt with a lot of heartache, including her first husband dying and being terrified of being, you know, living in destitution and poverty as a single mother and

And so, yeah, I think that that's absolutely true. And the reason that the Stasi was something like 50% of, you know, East Germany is because you can't control everybody. And so in order to try to control everybody, you have to be totally paranoid all the time because you're like, someone is going to be resisting me all the time. Yeah.

Yeah, it's making me think of the ways in which that kind of resistance is so pivotal to the story. We're going to see it with Narcissa. Of course, we see it with Snape from the very beginning. But just that like...

the inability for complete evil to ever really capture anyone is striking it's my favorite piece of media is an interview that john stewart did with marco rubio i mean at least 15 years ago now marco rubio was on the daily show to talk about immigration reform and he was like i'm on here because john this is something that you and i actually agree on and john stewart was like

Why is it that conservatives are always liberal on the one issue that speaks to them? You care about immigration because your parents are Cuban immigrants. Dick Cheney cares about gay rights because he has a gay daughter. Like, all of you have one issue. You want us to be progressive on the thing that impacts you. What lack of imagination do you have that you want to dominate everyone who isn't like you, but you see the humanity here? And I think that

Like, everyone has their thing, right? Where it's like, I mean, the reason that Voldemort is the embodiment of evil is because he doesn't seem to have an exception. Yeah. But everybody under him does. It's like, but not my son, but not Lily's son, but not Lily, but not, right? Like, everybody else has one little spark inside of them. Yeah. It also makes me think about how, you know, these small acts of resistance...

No one is necessarily thinking that it's going to stop the machine. I can't remember where I read this and I really need to find it. But the point was being made in this piece that I read that what you're doing when you're interrupting in these significant but small ways is it's not necessarily to end this regime, but it's to keep the hope alive of what is to come after. Absolutely. Because every regime ends, right? Oceans rise, empires fall. And so like, yes, our first task obviously is to shut...

shut it down as soon as we can. And at the same time, also to keep the hope alive of what might be built afterwards and very practically to keep the skills and the relationships and the resources that we'll need in that time. And so, I don't know, I found that giving me hope in moments where I felt kind of

or despairing. And I think the fact that these workers are talking in this way so openly is invigorating, I hope, for the rest of the people there, even if it is putting them at some risk. And just let everybody know

overhear them and be a little more scared and like spend a little more, right? Like the people in charge, let them feel a little less secure that they're totally in control, right? Let it reign in their office. I mean, the question that I have back for you is like, is it enough, right? Yeah. Like, shouldn't they be locking Umbridge in her office and not coming to work, like organizing a mass

And, you know, my answer to that is like, it's never enough. And we need all the things and we need all of us. Right. Like making it rain in Yaxley's office is going to make it harder for Yaxley to do work that day. And it's going to be like and organizing can be really hard. And like we should all do everything we can. We should all do everything we can. I guess maybe actually I think that they all should be doing a little bit more and that I should probably be doing more.

But if everyone good left, I guess my answer is like, everyone should be doing more. Everybody should be doing the most. And we all need grace because it's an imperfect world. And therefore there's an imperfect solution. Like the only...

way to stop an empire rising is through more violence. It's just so complicated. So yes, they should all be doing more and I don't judge them for not doing more. I think the other thing I'm taking away and we see this so clearly in the attack on people who are from muggle-born families is just the strategy in which fascism

hacks away at solidarity and casts a scapegoat and chooses an enemy for everyone else to kind of edge away from or lie about or in some way to break down the bonds of solidarity that would make resistance so much stronger. I think this chapter is an invitation for us not to fall for that, right? Whether it's the framing of people who are undocumented as like illegal or to frame queer people as bad

and wrong, right? And you see each different fascist government taking a different approach. In Italy, it's all about gay parents, right? That's the target. That's the social ire. Here, it's about immigrants. In the UK, it's about trans people. And it's just...

Like the way in which a narrative is constructed that makes people the other and the way in which people are being impacted by all of these rules get broken apart. And that's the kind of trust we need to be building going back to our central theme for this chapter is like, don't let us be divided by the powerful people whose interests it serves for us to be weakened. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I'm not sure if that brought us to concrete answers in this, but it feels, I feel energized and clarified about like, yeah, the need to do more. Do more and more grace and joy. Yeah. I'll do all the more things. Yes, please.

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For the ones who get it done.

This week's voicemail is from Connie. Hi, my name is Connie and I've been an avid listener of Harry Potter and the Sacred Text since 2016. If Harry Potter defined my teens, Harry Potter and the Sacred Text has been a guiding voice of my 20s. Having a structured time each day to dive into deeper thoughts and reflections about the text gave me a framework to do the same for my own life. One of the most impactful episodes was on the theme of resentment.

At the time, I was working as an analyst for an agency, and agency life is very fast and comes with big personalities. And I resented what felt like constantly being nitpicked at. Listening to that episode, Vanessa shared a story about her resentment towards her boss when she was an assistant. Later, she shared an insight that kind of rocked my world. I think she said that resentment can build if there is a perceived power difference, but that power difference may not actually be there. For me, a light bulb went off, and from then on,

I chose to see the nitpicking as constructive feedback and proactively adjusted to what I've learned to be uncontrollable changes. This really shifted how I engage with other people, and I wouldn't have learned that if it wasn't for Harry Potter and the Sacred Text.

Now that I'm turning 30 and you guys are coming to a close, or at least this podcast is coming to a close, it really feels like another chapter has begun. So I just wanted to say thank you so much, truly, for everything you, your team, your sponsors have provided me. I am so excited for the future of Not Sorry Productions, and I'm so grateful to be part of this community.

Thank you so much, Connie, for being with us. And we're also really excited for where Not Sorry is going to go. And just really grateful to have people as part of our community. It's now time for us to remember members of our community who have been loved and lost. And this week, we remember Gabriel Andrews, who was nine, who was a friend, a son, and a sweet soul. Pat Ewing, 77, who loved her kids, Words, and Brooklyn.

Coach Joe Townsend, who was 52, who was a baseball and girls bowling coach, a mentor, father and friend. And Ruby Briggs, who was 76 and a beloved mother.

Vanessa, it's time for us to offer our blessings as well. Who would you like to bless in this episode? I want to bless that woman who is murdered by Voldemort. I think that there are just people who are being impacted in this country by the cruelty of Trump's policies. And it isn't arbitrary insofar as it's across power lines. But

It also is arbitrary. Like one person gets hurt and another person doesn't. And this is just a woman who has done nothing wrong and randomly gets attacked because of one person's political motivations. So I just want to offer a blessing for her.

What about you, Casper? Yeah, I want to bless Reg Catamol. And I mean, maybe secondarily Reg's wife too. Like, in the same way that you're pointing to the kind of the victims of this system, you know, Reg is the victim of the trio's plan. He's more importantly, a victim of the kind of fascist state that has arrested slash is interviewing his wife because, you know, she's

assumed to be muggle born or associated with, with the muggle world in some way. But the fact that he can't be there to hold her hand, to accompany her in this terrifying moment, he's letting her down. He feels completely torn, uh,

apart by the fact that he's now puking uncontrollably and has to go to the hospital so i i just want to yeah bless anyone who feels like they can't be where they know they should be maybe because of health reasons but probably just because of life in one way or another yeah just a blessing for all of us who are struggling to show up for the people we love in the way that we want to

So blessing for Reg. Well, next week, we'll continue with book seven. And sometimes it is a heavy book. So thanks for sticking with us as we read this one. We're going to be reading chapter 13, The Muggle-Born Registration Commission. And we'll be reading it through the theme of ritual.

Just a few reminders before we give our thanks and close. You can always find ad-free episodes of Harry Potter and the Sacred Text on Apple Podcasts and find out about our latest programming on NotSorryWorks.com. This was Not Sorry Production. We're a feminist production company and we're grateful to be sponsored by the Fetzer Institute.

Our executive producer is some person called Vanessa Zolton. We're edited and produced by AJ Ramos. I've heard great things about her. Our music is by Ivan Paisal and Nick Boll, and we're distributed by ACAST. Thanks to our fabulous Minerva's Book Club members. We want to say thank you to Averill, Amanda C., Amanda S., Amber, Amy, Ashley, Danny, Emile, Esther, Gregoire, Casey, Kelsey, Kriti, Kyle, Marina, Nadia, and Sita.

Thanks to Connie for this week's voicemail, Ariana Nettleman, Julia Argy, Nikki Zolton, Courtney Brown, Matt Potts, Anissa Ahmed, Danny Langley, and of course, our friend and mentor, Stephanie Pulsar. We'll be back with you next week. Thanks, everyone. Bye. You guys, I can breathe again. Let's start recording. Breathe. Hey, Kristen, how's it trackin'? With Carvana Value Tracker. What else? Oh, it's trackin'.

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