Conservative Pastor Speaks About "The Transgender Question"

[Carolyn Marie]

I debated with myself whether to place this here or in the Religion Forum. I think it will get more attention here. My only comment is that Mr. Moore seems to think its all about the surgery. I wonder if he has ever spoken to a transperson?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-faith/wp/2013/08/15/conservative-christianity-and-the-transgender-question/

Carolyn Marie

[Guest KimberlyF]

He seems to have covered the gauntlet.

"and they can't be eradicated by a change of clothes or chemical tinkering or a surgeon's knife, much less by an arbitrary announcement in the high school gym."

The one line keying on surgery seems to work more for dramatic effect.

"But we believe we can no more surgically alter our gospel than we can surgically alter our gender."

I do like a few comments...

"But this also means that we will love and be patient with those who feel alienated from their created identities."

"All we can do is say what we believe as Christians: that all of us are sinners, and that none of us are freaks."

I'm fine with disagreeing with people who don't preach hate.

[VickySGV]

In Robert Helnlein's story Glory Road, the Empress of 20 universes goes in regularly for "imprinting" of the entire mental lives of her predecessors in office for the last hundred or so generations to help her make wise current and relevant decisions in regard to her governing her empire. She reportedly gets all the bad the prior emperors / empresses experienced along with the good, etc.

My daydream for this person is that we could invent a machine that could take our experiences and imprint them on people of this type. Give the guy the "wisdom" of 20 or 30 real life TG people's experience. We are nearing the technology level for it. The sooner the better.

[Carolyn Marie]

.I'm fine with disagreeing with people who don't preach hate.

Amen to that, Kim. I do agree that his comments were more restrained and tolerant than many I've read.

HUGS

Carolyn Marie

[Guest alexiaannalise]

I really disagree with him its not that we are defying god its the fact we were assigned the wrong gender in the womb i wish ppl would really learn this i deal with this enough with my ex gf that its not right well to me being a female feels right and good and i love who i am actually becoming and its awesome

*kisses*

Alexia Annalise

[Guest -guest-]

I'm surprised that the concept of a disconnect between the mental (gender identity) and the physical (sex) doesn't come more easily to Christians.

Don't they generally believe that our bodies are only transitory and our souls define who we are?

[Guest sophia.gentry58]

Carolyn, I got a slightly different take from the article. First, I would have love to have had the capability of responding to Mr. Moore directly. In fact I will attempt to locate his local church address and send him a letter. Secondly, to me, Mr. Moore seemed to be saying that regardless of what attempts we make or how far we go in changing or altering our appearance it is wrong in the eyes of God and therefore a grave sin worthy of hell fire.

I did like however many of the threads as a response to Mr. Moore's short sightedness.

Two (there are more) things are obvious to me with respect to Mr. Moore and many like him (I was one of those people before spending a year in Iraq) one; he is not willing to accept the fact that because the bible that was developed especially during the King James era was seriously bastardized, it brings into question whether Christianity can claim legitimacy in the area of biblical inerrancy. Secondly, and most importantly, 99.999% percent of the world's population incessantly majors on the minor. What I mean by that with regard to this topic is that most of us (including us trans men and women) spend way too much time concentrating on this flesh of ours, very little attention to our minds, and little to no attention on the eternal existence of our true selves, the spirit of our humanity. For those who do not accept the premise that we even have a spirit is perfectly understandable why they wouldn't have a clue about such things, but I find it ironic that Christians in particular but you can throw in the Jews and Muslims as well who each claim to understand all things spiritual and each believing that they have the eternal edict for controlling our lives are so carnal, so superficial that you'd be hard-pressed to gain any insight into true spirituality.

Some hold the view that the body that we all have is a mere shell that allows us to experience life in this plane of existence. Albeit, a magnificent shell to be sure, but a shell nonetheless. There are many others who believe that this shell of ours is a holy temple because of the eternal spirit within, however whether we are mere shells or a holy temple we are beings that are sovereign over our own body, not to destroy but to creatively express life via the body without limitations. Thus, all who have a problem with me transitioning are simply basing their views with a primitive draconian mindset.

Sophia

[Guest Always Good]

The gospel can't be surgically altered? Is he forgetting about Constantine's little operations?

[VickySGV]

The gospel can't be surgically altered? Is he forgetting about Constantine's little operations?

The Council Of Nicea did not completely arrive at the common canon of items in the Bible, and even today, the Roman Catholic Bible, the Orthodox Christian Bible and the Protestant church canons are significantly different, and have different doctrines of what can constitute final authority on belief of the users of that Bible. Constantine was the moral equivalent of Dr. Frankenstein as far as the Bible went, since there were countless other documents offered, but unused. A wonderful kettle of stew.

[Guest LizMarie]

This article is an attempt to dress up bigotry in religious guise and give it excuse for existing. I've seen quite enough of this already, regardless of how politely he formulates his words. There have been very religious formulations for all sorts of bigotry in the past as well.

The "conservative Christian" is a human being who has deliberately decided that science is meaningless to them, even though their entire lives exploit the cumulative power of the scientific revolution all around them. Science repeatedly tells us that what we are, as trans folk, is an inherent biological truth and that his entire premise, that we are created purely and perfectly male and female, is absurdly wrong.

Further, this "God does not make mistakes" perspective is destroyed by the Gospels themselves. Examine John 9:1-3 where a man was blind from birth not because of any sin but solely to become a means of glorifying God. That right there puts to the lie that mistakes must be a sign of sin and that God only creates us perfectly every time. I've often thought about Carolyn or Genee serving with their churches and how their positions and outreach to those in need within the trans community wouldn't even exist in the form that it is today if they were not trans themselves to begin with.

As far as surgical alteration of our genitals goes, Jesus himself simply didn't seem to care. In Matthew 19:12 Jesus himself states: "For there are eunuchs who were born that way, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others—and there are those who choose to live like eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it."

In short, this author cherry picks his verses to fit his preconceptions, then stamps those preconceived biases as divinely ordained and asserts that this is how it is, science be damned.

Not so long ago the Dalai Lama said "If scientific analysis were conclusively to demonstrate certain claims in Buddhism to be false, then we must accept the findings of science and abandon those claims.” This same ought to be applied to Christianity, and conservative Christianity's refusal to accept this is prima facie evidence that it is, at its heart, an anti-intellectual wish to restore the dark ages. This denial of science is intrinsic to the system of falsehoods perpetuated by "conservative Christianity" to keep its followers in bondage to it. In many respects, conservative Christianity bears the hallmarks of a cult, denying reality itself and using brainwashing techniques to ensure that its followers remain obedient to its interpretation of reality.

Frank Schaeffer, the son of the late Christian apologist Francis Schaeffer, has written extensively about his escape from this mental prison that conservative Christianity constructs. The blog "Permission To Live" is another place where someone who has escaped the mental traps of conservative Christianity has written extensively. I highly recommend reading both Frank Schaeffer's website and the "Permission to Live" blog, if you feel trapped by the inherent contradictions of conservative Christianity and want to find your way past such into a larger and more meaningful world. I have a close friend who grew up in that and she says, in her mid-40s, that she doesn't even understand how she lived and believed as she did when she was younger.

In short, polite formulations do not excuse bigotry, and just because it is polite doesn't mean I will respect it. I will no more respect a bigot towards trans folk than I will respect a bigot towards people of color.