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A Challenge to society and to the churchesLittle did I know how enriching would be the encounter when I went to meet with a group of transgender persons a while ago at the offices of Gender Dynamix, Saartjie Baartman Centre in Manenberg, Cape Town. Their openness, humanity and faith moved and inspired me.
What follows is simply an attempt to convey something of their experience – in their own words. The quotations in this article come both from the group I engaged with, and also from the book they gave me and signed: “trans – Transgender Life Stories from South Africa” by Ruth Morgan, Charl Marais, Joy Rosemary Wellbeloved; Jacana Media, 2009.
The reality of the transgender experienceThe reality of the transgender experience is now increasingly recognised and respected in the medical world, and by those relating to transgender persons.
“My mom once took me to the doctor, who told her, ‘Your son is a female trapped in a male’s body’. It was like a light bulb moment as everything just fell into place.” (Note 1)
“I discovered the only option for me was to change my body to fit what I knew was in my mind.”
“Unless you personally have the experience, I don’t think you can fully appreciate what it’s like…I think it is like the whole transgender issue; unless you are involved in some personal way… it remains an abstract academic exercise…”
“I felt like this body was alien to me and to what I was feeling inside.”
“they (trans persons) can’t cope with life being what they are not, and not being what they are.”
“I told myself, ‘This is how things are and this is who I am, therefore I have made peace with what I really am.”
The awareness of being different starts very earlyWhat is remarkable is how very early in life transgender persons sense that they are different: “I was about six or seven when I realised that I did not fit in and I didn’t really feel like other boys.”
“I was in grade 3 when I first realised that I was different.”
“All my life I knew that I was – call it ‘different’.”
“The first time I noticed, or felt different to other kids, was at the very young age of five. I could never accept the fact that I was a girl.”
It is important to understand that in talking about transgender persons, we are not talking about people with ambiguous or mixed genital organs. Trans people are born with a typical biological make up. But very early they sense a kind of inner contradiction. Their gender-sense of being, for example, a boy, is out of sync with their biological make up.
The eventual decision to undergo surgeryGiven this often over-powering sense of ‘being in the wrong body’, many trans people undergo hormone treatment and/or surgery involving various degrees of alteration and change. And so after surgery many share their experience in this way:
“I just became more comfortable in who I am. And when you are happy in your skin you do better. And I am a creative person so I felt more creative.”
“Oh. This is what it feels like to be normal.”
“I felt in myself I was far more of a person. I could concentrate better.”
“I lost the hopeless me; I lost the victim and in the process I gained focus, I gained somebody I respect a lot.”
“I just became more comfortable in who I am.”
“The results made me feel whole for the first time in my life.”
For many, their faith is what has kept them going“I am a very strong believer….and my faith is something nobody will ever be able to take away from me. I’ve made peace with God, and I think God has made peace with me too. I see myself as a child of God, …and that He created me in His image……I am also not an afterthought……God is not going to love me less.”
And a word of encouragement to fellow trans persons: “Don’t lose hope. You were meant to be in this world and to make something of your life because God created you to be on this earth. Just be sure to find your inner soul.”
“I am grateful for my family... (who) ... taught me to never move away from the Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth, no matter what.”
The tragedy of the Church’s rejection and ignoranceAll too often their experience of the Church is one of rejection. The churches have been culpably unaware of the reality of their experience, making little attempt to listen and understand.
“I didn’t feel comfortable at church. I didn’t feel accepted. I felt I am not right for the church, and she (my mother) would say, ‘forget about people. Your relationship with God is just between you and God.”
“Think of me as a person” – a message to the Church and Society“Don’t think of me as a trans man, don’t even look at me as a man; think of me as a person first and foremost.”
“If you can treat everyone simply as a person first and then as anything else….I think we we’ll have a far better world to live in.”
“People are scared of what they don’t know and making it more commonplace also makes it okay.”
“I’m transgender and I am happy where I am, and I’ve found peace within me…”
“I don’t understand individuals who don’t respect others’ rights because this is God’s will at the end of it all. God is the only one who has the right to judge.”
The longing for negative attitudes to change“My hope for the future is that I’d like people to accept trans people more readily than they do. Not sneer at them, or laugh at them.”
“Just because people are different doesn’t make them bad or wrong. It just makes them different…. there’s a place for everyone if we just take the time to listen to their particular stories. All people have instrinsic worth.”
A Message from mothers“…as time went on I realised she was different……..I got to understand that it wasn’t a choice. ….I told my family…to accept her as she is.”
“I accept my child as she is because God created her as she is.”
“My message to other mothers like me would be, please, please just let your children be who they are, you shouldn’t let your children live the life that is not theirs.”
“My mother…is supportive of me, because she knows that I am a man, she truly understands.”
Some reflecting further with the ChurchThe reality of the trans person’s experience is a challenge to the Church to examine its way of handling these issues of gender and human sexuality. The degree to which the churches have failed to lovingly embrace trans persons is surely a judgement on the Church. The churches need to be asking themselves the very simple but fundamental faith-question: Is this the way Jesus would treat such people? Is this the way Jesus wants us as churches to be treating them? Is this the message we want to convey? If not, then what?
The well-known Catholic moral theologian, Enda McDonagh, in his book “Vulnerable to the Holy”,in a thought-provoking chapter on the diversity of human sexuality, shares this offering which we would do well to ponder: “By revealing the mystery of human sexuality in another form, it could play a redemptive, healing role in society…”
Is not the Holy Spirit saying something important to us, as we listen, perhaps for the first time, to the words and witness of these trans persons, as well as through the message from these mothers?
Compiled by Bishop David Russell
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