Transsexual Rights and the Gospel

In a post a couple of weeks ago, I noted that New York City is going to allow individuals to change the gender designation on their birth certificates and quoted Joann Prinzivalli of the New York Transgender Rights Organization, who hailed the "move away from American culture’s misguided fixation on genitals as the basis for one’s gender identity," a fixation that is "based on an arbitrary distinction that says there are two and only two sexes."  By email, Ms. Prinzivalli has offered a lengthy response to my post.  Here is an excerpt:

When I refer to sex assignment at birth, I refer to the common practice of using genital shape as the guideline - and for over 99% of babies, this works as an accurate assignment. For the visibly intersexed (those having genital ambiguity), the sociocultural imperative drives doctors to perform genital mutilation to make them conform to one or the other of the official assignments. For those who are not visibly intersexed, such as transsexuals, who have some brain structures that develop in a way that closely matches the development in persons of the sex opposite their initial assignment, that initial assignment is incorrect.

Additionally, some who are intersexed do not identify with either of the binary assignments. Our society insists that there are two and only two sexes, and while that is true for the large majority, there is a small minority for whom there is a diversity - and that is not merely in gender identity, but in sex assignment as well.

I would appreciate the opportunity to respond to your blog with these comments, as well as the following more theological exegesis, which was my homily for the service at last year's International Transgender Day of Remembrance. Looking at your rather impressive list of professional writings, I would think you might find my disagreement with the Magisterium somewhat interesting. I is entirely too bad that the Vatican relied on he terribly warped views of Dr. Paul McHugh of Johns Hopkins for the "science" behind its sub secretum Y2K document on transsexuals in the Church.

. . . . What the Pope and the Christianists refuse to understand, is that the punishment of Sodom was meted out to those who do not accept strangers, and who hate people be-cause they are different. The real "sodomites" are the people who have a rabid hatred of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people, because we are different, because we are strangers, because we are eunuchs.

But God loves us.

There is a further message in the Gospel for those who preach bigotry and hate, and who want to deny human dignity and fair treatment to those of us who are different because we are LGBT. The message of Mathew Chapter 25:31-46 is a warning to the intolerant.  When the time comes for Judgment, they will be found wanting.  Whatsoever they have done to the least of God’s children, they do to God.

Those who insult and hate us, and shoot us in the back of the head, or bludgeon and stab us until we are unrecognizable and dump our bodies in a shallow grave, are not the only ones who will number among the goats.

Those whose intolerance in the name of Christ leads them to deny to the members of the LGBT community basic human rights and dignity will fare just as poorly on the Day of Judgment. Like the men of Sodom, their inhospitable and suspicious bigotry is an affront to God as well as to those who are the victims of their persecution.

These same Christianists, the real sodomites, also often wrap themselves up in the flag and claim that their concept of Christianity is also patriotic and American. The nation that supposedly guarantees its inhabitants the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, has a history of treating people with injustice. The treatment of slaves, of women, and of LGBT people, has all the same earmarks. You will know them by their works.

My prayer for them is this: May God forgive them, if they know not what they do. But they do know what they do, and they believe they are justified, and that is so much sadder, because they are more likely to die unrepentant.

And so I pray for them, that they may become open to the knowledge and understanding they need, the strength and courage to change their ways and see the truth, and, inspired by Holy Wisdom, that they no longer be so hard of heart, and that they know peace and love.