Religious Leaders Debate Transgender Issues: Catholic, Protestant and Muslim Perspectives
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Unsplash photo by Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona.
(OPINION) News about transgender issues tends to deal with women’s athletic competitions and shelters, pronouns, girls’ locker rooms, public school sex education, competing rights claims — with parents on both sides of the dates — and resulting political and legal disputes.
There’s been less coverage of medical morality, especially concerning underaged youths, and hardly any about how various religious groups understand gender and why.
Journalists should take notice when four vigorous arguments on the religious aspect appear in the space of just six days, as follows.
March 20: The leaders of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops authorized publication of an important but little-reported transgender policy. It declares that Catholic health care agencies “must not” perform or help develop chemical or surgical procedures to transform a person’s bodily characteristics into those of the opposite sex.
The stated reasons are theological and moral. Key quotes: “We did not create human nature; it is a gift from a loving Creator,” so human dignity requires “genuine respect for this created order.” Sexual differentiation is a reality “willed by God” and a “fundamental aspect of existence as a human being.”
Therefore, surgical and chemical techniques to switch a patient’s sexual characteristics or puberty blockers to halt youths’ natural development “are not morally justified.” To the bishops, such interventions are “injurious to the true flourishing of the human person” and violate doctors’ basic moral maxim to “do no harm.”
March 23: Franciscan Father Daniel P. Horan of St. Mary’s College in Indiana denounced the bishops’ statement as “a disaster” and “theologically irresponsible” in a National Catholic Reporter article. Given the complexity of the issues and ongoing research, he wants the hierarchy to practice “intellectual humility” and shun such “absolute moral claims.” Horan accused the bishops of “gross ignorance” on what medicine and science tell us about “gender-affirming care,” charging that they “are not interested in understanding even the basic facts and reality.”
This attack is particularly noteworthy because the bishops cite beliefs from the Second Vatican Council, the Catechism and decrees not only from popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI but Pope Francis, who is often praised by liberals for flexibility on some LGBTQ+ issues.
March 18: In a New York Times opinion piece, Rabbi Elliot Kukla, who identifies as transgender and nonbinary, advocated “gender-affirming hormone therapy” in hopes of lowering the suicide rate among transgender teens. He argued that biblical Adam was androgynous and ancient Jewish tradition recognized “four genders beyond male or female.” To Kukla, “trans liberation is a gift to everyone because it expands the categories for what it means to be human.”
March 22: Rabbi Kukla’s article drew a fierce National Review rebuttal from Yeshiva University’s Tal Fortgang. He called Kukla’s thinking “shockingly shoddy” and said the rabbi spurns Orthodox Judaism in a manner popularized by “Jew-haters.” The four supposed extra categories in the ancient Talmud, he said, were not genders but rare anomalies of genital malformations or castrated men.
Protestants also have intense disagreements, regarding which see this 2022 Guy rundown — “Variations on old questions: What do U.S. churches believe on transgender issues?” Another Guy item proposed “Gender Identity and Faith” (InterVarsity Press) by clinical psychologists Mark Yarhouse and Julia Sandusky as 2022’s “book of the year” because they treat the complexities from actual cases, including religious clients. See: “Under-covered story in tense times: Counseling with transgender Christian believers.”
For Islam, here’s a draft transgenderism fatwa posted last June by the Fiqh Council of North America.
Then there is this, from a strategic location in journalism: a highly significant dispute over newsroom standards raised by transgender coverage in The New York Times. Here are a few of the many online articles about all this.
Cultural conservatives argue that the Times promotes the transgender cause, typified by this piece — “The New York Trans” — in the current issue of Commentary magazine.
Yet on Feb. 15 the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation filed an angry protest against the paper’s coverage, endorsed by 1,200 Times contributors and others, which targeted three staff writers. GLAAD then posted updates on the ongoing debate Feb. 16 and 24.
In response, Times management declared that such attacks on colleagues and participation in advocacy group campaigns violate journalistic ethics (click here for New York Post coverage).
The local NewsGuild President Susan DeCarava quickly assailed the Times policy. And then 82 Times reporters — including byline stars and religion writers Elizabeth Dias and Ruth Graham — bemoaned their union’s view of journalism, asserting, “We are journalists, not activists. That line should be clear” (Rod Dreher commentary and basic documents).
Richard Ostling is a former religion reporter for The Associated Press and a former correspondent for TIME Magazine. He’s also worked in broadcast TV and radio journalism covering religion and received a lifetime achievement award from Religion News Association. This piece first appeared at GetReligion.org.