Clergy with Transgender Children Push Back on Anti-Trans Laws

Kcoyle

I don't think anyone is "telling any child they are in the wrong body," (as Gagnon said above). Let's give children more credit for understanding themselves. Of course they need parental guidance, but children don't come out as trans just for the fun of it. I don't know anything about TikTok or other social media challenges, but kids who seriously come out aren't making it up. They need support just to be who they are--something the rest of us take for granted.

Being trans is not a mental illness, just as being homosexual is not a mental illness. However, gender dysphoria incongruence (when internal gender does not match biological sex) IS a mental illness that can lead to suicide. Some trans children need access to hormones and surgery just to be able to live long enough to reach adulthood. Gender-affirming care is approved by the American Academy of Pediatrics. Anyone working in health care who is up to date on their education should know this.

Laws that force kids to live with gender incongruence until age 18 will result in unnecessary deaths.

TJ

My child was born both male and female. It happens actually more often than people think. Trans people/Intersex people have been around since the beginning of our species. The first documented trans person was back in 7000BC!!! Please 🙏 no matter your belief you should love one another as you would want to be treated. All I am seeing is hate even in this thread.

TJ

My child was born both male and female. It happens actually more often than people think. Trans people/Intersex people have been around since the beginning of our species. The first documented trans person was back in 7000BC!!! Please 🙏 no matter your belief you should love one another as you would want to be treated. All I am seeing is hate even in this thread.

TJ

My child was born both male and female. It happens actually more often than people think. Trans people/Intersex people have been around since the beginning of our species. The first documented trans person was back in 7000BC!!! Please 🙏 no matter your belief you should love one another as you would want to be treated. All I am seeing is hate even in this thread.

TJ

My child was born both male and female. It happens actually more often than people think. Trans people/Intersex people have been around since the beginning of our species. The first documented trans person was back in 7000BC!!! Please 🙏 no matter your belief you should love one another as you would want to be treated. All I am seeing is hate even in this thread.

Dawn Lorraine Pisturino

I have 15 years of experience working in inpatient psychiatric facilities as a registered nurse. If we are to believe in SCIENCE and not emotion, male DNA means MALE and female DNA means FEMALE. There is no dispute about that. Transgenderism is not a physical condition, it is a psychological one. And all of the assertions that there are 150 genders, etc., are mental fantasies, people acting out roles. It's fake. It's not real. Children do not have the mental capacity to make such serious and life-altering decisions as changing their sex with surgery and harmful hormones. And the parents who encourage this sort of thing are NOT protecting their children. And the doctors and hospitals who engage in this sort of thing are just making money off of it. We have to protect our children from harm until they are adults and have the mental capacity to make those decisions themselves.

John Alex Paxson

Sincere love overcomes everything .... beliefs ... cultures ... EVERYTHING!!!!

Asher Page

I am a ordained minister and I am a trans man and my partner is a trans woman. Our pronouns are he/him and she/her. WE ARE NOT BACKING DOWN!!

Asher Page

I am an ordained minister and I am also a trans man and I am not backing down my partner is a trans woman and she is not backing down our pronouns are he/him and she/her and we are not backing down

Daniel Todd Kamm

Oh, sorry, forgot, I am a he / him... too old for anything more politically correct.... Peace tk

Daniel Todd Kamm

Bullies always go for the ones they think they can bully.

So too, politicians and their assorted minions.

I've always wondered about some of those 60's, 70's and 80's TV (no pun intended) programs where some "transvestite" commits a crime (allegedly because that's what Trans People always did back then, while the TV networks were trying to present "Gay" as "Ok" but not really...but yeah, really, and their dish soap sponsors tried too.

Just enough to give production meetings and the coffee breaks some meaning. Toss the queers a little affirmation and "wink," suggestively.

Enter the average "Bubbah."

These same "TV" programs could both titillate and disgust the "Bubbah" during his beer and television viewing time... and give their "honeys" a very rough night ( I believe Romanovsky and Phillips did a song way back in the day ... "ever since that night my need for her was twice as strong...." (my apologies to Ron and Paul respectively).

Those old programs.

I've always wondered whether real crime people, not "Wonder Woman," or some other super cop or detective, would be able to catch the modern day Trans spy or thief or assassin?

Trans, non-binary, whichever whatever people can live in shadow, entering light or retreating to dark at will. Most enter the light after their nascent darkness and stay there, basking in g-d's glory of creation, destruction and re=creation. Blessings.

But most depending on where they are at, could choose, at any time to move from the shadows, to light and dark and back at will.

The "bullies" are now at a certain disadvantage.

On the side: I offer that LGBTQ+/- and et al communities are also at a certain disadvantage: how do you tell a Proud Boy or any of these other types from any other self -respecting queer person in the back room of a gay leather cruise bar?

There are advantages to the bullies way and two or more can play at that.

The bullies have cleared the way nationwide with their narrow interpretation of the second amendment and sloppy access, conceal/carry & self defense laws, to weapons of all types... tsk, tsk.

I just remembered a "Wonder Woman" episode from Season One... she protected her beloved Steve by catching a mortar fired, and throwing it back at the perpetrators....

I love peace, and feeding my cats and the birds and other critters in my yard...and growing green things and food in my garden... and I would never personally support, condone or commit any kind of violence.

Just say no to bullies...

Paece and out

Angela Lewis

As a Christian, I believe God loves us all, and teachers us not to judge, but I'm at a loss to see where this issue is spoken of or agreed with in the Bible, God made man & woman, nowhere is it mentioned that we are to change the nature of his design, we all have free will, which I believe should be exercised as an adult.

Rev. Dr. Father JJ

christfascists talibangelists jesazis dominionists nationalists gopers

all different names for the same thing, people pushing their agenda looking to create a theocracy. and while some/many decry too much government, government overreach while preaching the government that governs least governs best do so while consistently pushing government not just into homes, or bedrooms but now into underwear.

Chris

What it boils down to is this: Whether you agree or not with Trans people, it's none of your damn business who they are or want to be. Your religion does NOT belong in law. Not at a local level, not at a state level, and by Constitution not at a Federal level. Hate all you want, but take your religion and shove it up your sanctimonious ass.

And just in case you're not sure what my point is:

YOUR RELIGION IS NOT AND SHOULD NOT BE MADE INTO LAW!!!

Donald Michael Woodward

It always will amaze me how we put our wants into the word of God. God speaks through the individual and only the individual can be guided by his word. To listen to the voice of another who says their God wants you to obey is stupid. God only speaks to each of us and not to any one individual to be disseminated amongst the masses. So many religions use the idea that God speaks through one person for the masses to listen to and obey. This is just a reason for man's desire to control man. Not too many religions will teach that God speaks to the individual because the preacher then loses control of his flock.

Rev Ned

Garrison Keillor once said, “Lutherans love misery so much that they named a state fire it.”

Diana Lee Tyree

God is the same yesterday, today and forever. He never changes. If Sodom and Gomorrah burned to the ground and never existed again for much less because they didn't have the knowledge or the technology to actually change a gender, these don't either because you can't change DNA what makes them think that God is in agreement with this changing of human anatomy?! Man didn't create man, God did! We are free moral agents, free to choose what we will, but we are not free of the consequences of our choices!

Burgos Johnson

I believe that students should be underto dress in what ever school appropriate manner they want. However, bathrooms have always been a place exclusively for biological females. My friends and I ran for that protection numerous times from the late 1950s onward. Now, in some places a 6'4" bearded man can follow women into the bathroom claiming that "he identifies as a woman". That creates a safety issue. In addition, women's bathrooms are already overcrowded with lines 30-40 people long at sporting and other events because all though both bathrooms have the same number of toilets, women's bathrooms do not have a row of 20+ urinals along the back wall!

When I was 7, I was hit with all of the restrictions placed on biological females. I could only wear dresses to school (I wore shorts underneath) I decided that I would rather be a boy because they had more freedom, little did I know that it would only get more pronounced as I got older. In the current climate, someone would have claimed that I was mis-gendered and might even have begun surgery and hormone therapy. That would have been disastrous, particularly with my family history of cancer. Butchering a child's body and using hormone therapy that they will have to stay on for 50+ YEARS is irresponsible. Menopausal women are advised NOT to use hormone therapy for longer than 10 years due to the estrogen based cancer risks and yet doctors now think it is acceptable to put a child on these therapies for DECADES! Bad Science AND BAD MEDICINE!! Let them dress however, they want but wait to make these drastic surgical and hormonal invasive practices!!

Rev. Dr. Father JJ

“I am a man of faith and I am a Christian, and I believe the Lord gives us free will,” explained MO. state Rep Justin Sparks in a legislative session. “And when you are above the age of 18, you will have free will.”

Well put. Let's not force our belief, or interpretation onto our children. Let them decide once they are 18 years old. So that means that no, absolutely NO religious teachings, exposures, introductions to any religion until the child is 18.

Adults deciding what they think best for their child regardless of what harm may come of it is being called child abuse. Forcing a child into any religious belief can scar them emotionally for life, which can mean lost opportunities, lost friends, lost wages, loss of self.

So the motto should be: Wait then, until 18. At 18 a child can decide if they want anything to do with religion as well as if they are truly transgendered, and they can then decide what's best for them in each case

Paul Wallace

If a Christian is supposed to follow the example of Christ's life while he was living on this earth; then, should they not look into the Bible for guidance? I Peter 2:21 If that's true, let's look at how He handled things in His life. Most everyone is aware of the time that Jesus drove the money changers out of The Temple. But, there is no cover for folk who want to use this as an example. If the story in the Bible is to be believed, Christ was very clear that the people He got rid of were thieves, defrauding poor people who had come to The Temple to worship God. Matthew 21:12,13 So, where can we look to see Christ as being at Christian example? The first part of Like chapter 19 tells the story of Christ having lunch with a tax collector named Zacchaeus. He didn't tell Zacchaeus to stop enriching himself by over taxing people; He told Zacchaeus to believe. And, what should Zacchaeus believe? II Corinthians 5:17 tells us, "Anyone who believes in Christ is a new creation. The is gone. Therefore, Zacchaeus would live differently and no longer take advantage of others. What about the time Christ fed 5000 people with a packed lunch if 5 loves of bread and two fishes. (John 6:1-14) Christ did not means test anyone, he fed them. He even fed the folks who showed up to gather evidence against Home. The point here is, if we live our lives by the golden rule, then the question of how we deal with trans kids is a moot point. I am not responsible for how someone else lives their life. It is my job to treat others with respect and let them find their own way.

Rachael Evans

As someone who is intersex, I live the gender-variant discussion daily, I'd like to share my own thoughts.

First, a Eunuch is not someone who is intersex. A eunuch is a male who has been castrated and who then historically, played a specific role in society such as guarding a hareem. We can trace the existence of Eunuchs back to the Sumerian city of Lagash in the 2nd millennium BCE. The concept has been around so much longer than the New Testament for example.

To be intersex is to be born with a variation in one's sexual and/ or reproductive organs. It's a natural variation that is said, in its various forms, to impact approximately 1.7% of the general populace. Some intersex individuals, such as I, were born with both male and female reproductive organs and an overtly male physique and deep voice. This required medical intervention later in life. However, for most of my life, I hid as a male as it seemed to suit my appearance (but not my gender) because society forced its black or what definitions upon society. Therefore, some intersex individuals are both intersex and Transgender if we wish to use labels. But my DNA is female, I attend women's health clinics, undergo breast scans, and so forth.

The proposed bill in Florida states that a female is medically aligned to give birth and yet, many of us, for various reasons, are not able to carry children. It's a naive definition that ignores all medical science and instead leans on religious dogma and interpretation. Not science.

As to what is therefore transgender. One can be intersex and transgender and therefore, some transgender individuals are also intersex. For individuals such as myself, we underwent a medical diagnosis before being identified as intersex. We have measurable characteristics. For many, many years we did not, it's a recent change in medical science. The same, with time, may yet be true for transgender individuals. If one's reproductive organs can differ, why not one's gender?

If you disagree with intersex, you are disagreeing with all medical variations from what is defined as typical. Do wish the same harm to become disabled children, redheads, those with green or blue eyes, a cleft palate, the left-handed, ill-will because they are different from you?

If you disagree with the idea of medical variation between individuals, I ask you, in your churches, to ask everyone to hold up their right index finger. Then, try and find a matching pair. When you can't do this, reach out to other churches, locally, regionally, nationally, and even internationally. You'll find that fingerprints are our own unique illustration that each of us is born different from one another. We all medically vary in at least one way that is measurable.

If respectfully, there is a god, I will leave that to everyone to decide for themselves, then they have created each of us in a unique, individual way. Surely, if you believe in a deity, is it not possible that only they can be perfectly formed? Or do you believe that you are also perfect?

So, is it time to change one's perspective and maybe consider that we are all wonderfully unique?

JaZe

Leaving 'God' out of the equation would be helpful.

Deborah Jean Howard

It is pretty sad that here in this great nation. That people are afraid for fear something that they think is wrong. Transgender people have been around for eons. Bisexual homosexual heterosexual have been around for years. We live in a melting pot of different nationalities, different beliefs, and different sexual beliefs. As long as you are following the law. Love, one another becoming to one another. It does not matter what race, or what sexual preference the person is. They are still a human being as long as they are not harming children or elderly people. Can’t we all just get along

Linda R Small

Is anyone reading the bible, the answers are in the book!

John Wadsworth

Think about transgender children for a moment at what age does a child really know who or what they want to be or are? Who indoctrinates what the child thinks? There are age limits on many things but somehow now we allow children to make decisions at an age that is way too young. Legal ages for alcohol, driving a car, getting a job. So who really wants the child to change? The system? the child? the parents? Most go to college to be something they want to be and how many end up in that profession? hmmmm.

Steven Ferrell

I personally believe that trans hurt the heart of God as anyone who sins. But God still loves them. I still love them and pray for them daily.

Maggie McD

Why is a person's gender anyone else's business? How I feel and how I present myself to the world is not for you, your faith or any government to manage. Why is it so important for you to inflict your beliefs on others? Keep your faith at home and I'll take care of my family and loved ones. Signed, A cisgendered, happily married for 30 years with two kids consenting adult female.

Janis Carol Sommers

I believe Churches, Synagogues, Mosques, Temples, are buildings where religious membership supports, proportionately the majority membership, will support their clergy.
If, I as clergy, put my personal politics before my congregation in the form of a teaching or sermon, I am leading them to believe in what I think, not the words of G_d, Ye, GOD, Allah, Buddha, or the congregants, themselves, think. I, as clergy, as a Leader, honor the separation of Church and State. Clergy does not Lobby our political leaders in any way.

Matthew Mastrogiovanni

Christianity is a hate group. They claim "Love your neighbor", but they've twisted that to "Love your straight, white, republican neighbor".

Pastor Jody S.

Amen!

And for people that insist on dwelling in the Old Testament, here is another:

"4 For thus says the LORD: To the eunuchs who keep my sabbaths, who choose what pleases me, and who holds fast to my covenant

5 I will give them, in my house and within my walls, a monument and a name,
Better than sons and daughters;
an eternal name, which shall not be cut off, will I give them".

-Isaiah 56:4-

What this means is that if you are anti-trans, you are against God the Father, and God the son.

I'm guessing things won't go well for you at your Final Judgement.

Angela Blackthorne Biggs

Katelynne Shouse, I'm surprised that someone so against bigotry and concerned with tolerance as yourself is unaware that the word "moron" is pejorative and fell from acceptable usage decades ago because of its use as hate speech against intellectually disabled people.

I'm constantly amazed at the level of vitriol in diatribes like this. Why is it that people think anyone who disagrees with them can rightly be subjected to treatment as sub-humans?

Whatever your beliefs; two wrongs don't make a right. Never have, never will.

There's no evidence that proves minors or adults need to chemically or surgically transition in order to be safe or healthy. Some people never do even though they could and that is their choice.

There's no question that adults have a right to make their own choices about their transition status whatever they choose to do.

There is significant evidence that family acceptance and therapeutic intervention can alleviate mental health problems arising from gender dysphoria adequately so that children can safely reach the age of majority, and then make their own decision about when, whether, and how much of a transition they want to make as adults.

There's a significant, legitimate scientific concern that puberty blocking drugs may cause unforeseen, long-term developmental and other health consequences, and even accepting parents, are naturally concerned, and right to expect to have an option to weigh the risk for their children while they are children.

Children are not little adults. They are medically vulnerable in ways that adults are not. They are developmentally incapable of formulating consent in every aspect because they have not developed a pre-frontal cortex rendering them incapable of attaining the level of judgement and foresight they may achieve as adults. That's the reason we require minors to have adult guardians. It's the reason they can't enter contracts or be held responsible, in most cases, for crimes.

We don't actually know what the long term effects of medically transitioning prepubescent children may be.

Unlike adults, treating children with puberty blockers and transition hormones is at this point very much experimental treatment. We know that puberty hormones play a role in brain development and it's possible these drugs could interfere with brain development as well as altering physical development. That is not a risk many parents are willing to take. American law doesn't allow any other form of experimental medical treatment on minors without parental consent. You may not share the concerns of parents but that isn't adequate justification for interference with parental rights, nor does anything excuse your vicious denigration of anyone who disagrees with you in this controversy. We ALL have a duty to respect the dignity of other people, even those who don't see eye to eye with us on important and controversial issues. I very much expect a higher level of discourse on this of all sites, dedicated to respect for all people as human beings. I hope to see more respectful and reasonable discourse here in the future.

Pastor Jim

Wow, such disrespect and BS narratives. Half of you are trying to rewrite history and cram these trendy unsubstantiated ideas into the collective belief system like they existed all along, while the other half don't seem to understand that they are immature theologians just trying to flex their wings and experimental ideologies.

Joe

When Christians don’t like something, they add it to their it’s against my religious beliefs or view. Those same Christians can be seen at school hearings cursing or threatening to kill others whom don’t agree with their agenda.

Douglas Robert Spindler

Man set a blaze by Mormons/LDS church at UC Berkeley as the LDS church tries to coverup the $100 Billion tax fraud.

As one Christin asked what would Jesus do with $100 Billion? Would Jesus take the $100 Billion and feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, provide clothing for the poor and assist the ill? Or would Jesus take the money and buy stocks and real estate to make more money for the LDS church while telling members the money helping those in need around the world.

Colleen McAllister

This is such an emotional and knee-jerk issue. Biblically they did not have the ability to do anything to help those who were born with feelings and emotions that did not match the physical body. We now have ways to help thru hormonal therapy, psychological counseling, and gender reassignment surgery.

The Bible does not address this issue but it did occur. We need to use logic and medical knowledge to help us make decisions. And it is the child and their parents who should have final say. As with abortion lawmakers need to stay out of this one.

Robert J Giammarco

Hmm, lets see, if GOD created man and women, male and female, then WHY all the fuss? If a person wants to change their sex, it should be up to them. AT AN APPROPRIATE AGE. However, parents, teachers, as well as many others PUSHING them in that direction, is wrong, IMHO. How come we hear all these aguments for/against, by so called clergy, etc.. YET, I have YET to see much of the MANY that CHOSE to trangender speaking out so that our children could UNDERSTAND just what is involved? I see NONE of that, because the MSM, as well as those here, seem not WANTING to KNOW exactly what others went through. I guess if your child comes to you and says they want to commit suicide, or blow their brains out, you re going to give them the weapon or pills? Of course not. So WHY can't those who so desperatly want to change the sex of their very YOUNG child, get some facts from those that have done so, and NOW REGRET THEIR DECISION, AND ARE SPEAKING OUT AS TO WHY THEIR PARENTS ALLOWED THEM TO DO SO, ANY DID NOT GUIDE THEM, as we should be doing. Not guiding them into the unknown. GOD would not want that. The evil is spreading, don't be part of it. Think, get true facts. LISTEN to those who have done it, and are having monumental issues in their life.GOD be with us, we all need guidence.

Robert Gagnon

Telling any child they are in the wrong body starts the avalanche of disastrous probabilities. Love who you are as you are. Guidance is what all these children need. Chemical castration and hormones are not the answer. If it were, none of the converted (transitioned) would commit suicide. Children have no clue about the difference of need and want. Apparently todays parents are just as clueless. Anyone can wait until they are an adult to make these life changing decisions. Castration, hormones and surgery only complicate an already disturbed young mind. Treat the issue not the symptoms!

James Riggle-Johnson

Isn’t it up to the parents to choose what is best for their child? On one hand, these legislators say they stand for parental rights, while on the other hand, they take those parental rights away. What they really mean is you have the right to do only what we say is right for your child. It’s also not about religious freedom. It’s about the freedom to abide by their religious beliefs only. Anything else is wrong.

Doctors, parents and their children are not going through transition surgery, they are going on puberty blockers which are reversible. Lawmakers are trying to make people believe that hundreds of thousands of kids are going on these medications each year while the reality is only about 5 – 10 thousand per year. It’s something considered very carefully by physicians, psychologists, parents, and the child. Also, as an adult, you are required to live as the gender you want to transition to for years before the surgery is done. You don’t just make an appointment with a surgeon and head to the operating room. There is a careful evaluation to make sure the person understands what they are about to do.

This is government and religious overreach.

Keith Allen Steele Eash

there are two genders. Male and female. God created them. Natural law affirms it. Subject closed.

Keith Allen Steele Eash

If you have trans kids then you need to send them to a shrink or better yet to a deprograming clinic. They're brainwashed by the local public school system.

Douglas Robert Spindler

This is a hot and heated topics for the Mormons at Brigham Young University. The President of the LDS church, Dallin Oakes claims God contacted him to prevent this from happening. And this is right in the middle of the sex scandal occurring with the LDS church. If you don’t know what Mormon bishops make your girls and women have to do about sex take a look on YouTube, TikTalk and Facebook to hear what their Bishops make them do.

Michael Hunt

Trans rights are human rights! Gender affirming care is shown to be the most effective way to improve the lives and mental health of transgender persons and it's important to start such care before the age of 18 because it becomes more difficult to transition once someone has already gone through puberty.

These bills being passed are intended to deny the existence and validity of the transgender community and it's absolutely appalling that some people have such hate in their hearts against someone who doesn't fit into their narrow worldview.

Katelynne Shouse

Well let's see......one side absolutely refuses to believe modern medical wisdom and wants to inject their Christofascist"beliefs" onto everyone; the other side not only comprehends the Medical and Psychological aspects of the situation but are loving and affirming parents trying to give their children the best possible life. You're a moron if the second group isn't the ones you side with!

arawngraalrd

Gender Affirming might mean making a confusion permanent, but such "care" is often a bit violent and irrevocable for use on Children. Each of us have been glorified in some capacity or other in many previous incarnations, and these capacities may be suitable for current circumstance.