Translator: Leonardo Silva
Reviewer: David DeRuwe When I awoke on Friday morning, May 13th, I didn't know a single transgender person. I didn't know the mother or the father, the brother or the sister
of a transgender person. But as that day unfolded, my life changed. I was transformed by an untold number
of transgender persons, their family members and friends, who reached out to me and loved me, even though the Church of Jesus Christ,
which I serve as a pastor, too often has not loved them. Before we go on, I need to acknowledge that the story I have to tell you
is not really my story. It's the story of one
of the most misunderstood, maligned, mistreated
people groups of our time. I stand before you as someone
with five or six kinds of privilege that allow me to be heard today. I am a white, straight,
male, Baptist pastor, middle-aged, from Texas. (Laughter) And because of those things, people will listen to me
who will not, right or wrong, listen to those who have
firsthand stories to tell, but it is those stories
that have changed me. Now, here's the backstory to why
I'm standing here before you today. Since September of last year, our church has been involved
in a detailed study on questions about inclusion
of the LGBT community in the life of the Church. We've been asking whether
there should be any limitations to full membership
and participation in the church based on one's gender identity
or sexual orientation. And I must tell you that this has been the most difficult
and painful conversation I've ever known
in my lifetime in the church. We've lost members, we've lost money, we've lost friends, simply for asking the questions
that we've posed. Along the way, in our study process
with a nineteen-member group, we researched and studied and prayed
and did all sorts of things, and, about five months into that, some members of the study group said, "Look, we have talked
about the 'L' and the 'G' in LGBT, but we really don't know much
about the 'B' and the 'T.' Could we please talk about that?" Well, as it turned out, we had two members of the study group who were well-equipped to help us
with the transgender component of that. One of them is a pediatrician who works in a low-income clinic in Dallas and, coincidentally, has
a number of LGBT patients. The other is a geneticist who recently retired
as a genetic counselor at our children's
medical center in Dallas. And so, together, Dr. Rhonda Walton
and Gayle Brookshire, both of whom are present
here in the room today, they collaborated
to create this presentation, and Dr. Walton presented it to us. I can still see the room, this classroom where we met
on this Sunday afternoon, and the white board where Dr. Walton
wrote out words and drew diagrams to help us understand the difference between gender identity
and sexual orientation, how "T" is really different than "LGB." We learned that gender identity
is about who you are, and sexual orientation
is about who you love, and that these are different things and often unrelated to each other. Dr. Walton helped us understand the increasing body of medical
and scientific research that is teaching us that so much
of gender identity is formed in the womb, in ways that we have not understood, in ways that we cannot see, before a child is ever born. And she talked to us about babies
who were born with ambiguous genitalia, and the difficult decisions
that are made about that, and who makes those decisions. And then, she quoted the Bible to us. She reminded us
that in the book of Genesis, that is sacred to Jews
and Christians alike, we learn, we are taught that all of us, all humans,
are created in the image of God. And then, she said this - She said, "I've got to believe that just because someone
received a different hormone, or a different chromosome, or a different enzyme, does not mean that they received
any lower dose of the image of God." Because she had taught us that these three things - anatomy, chromosomes and brain cells - for most of us, line up
like cherries on a slot machine to give us unconflicted gender identity, but for some people,
they don't line up that way, which might create
a conflicted gender identity or some variation on gender identity that we haven't known
in the past to be normative. Well, I was blown away by what she said. I couldn't stop thinking about it, and I wanted to tell everyone around me. I was out evangelizing on this, and I woke up the next Wednesday
morning with a compunction, just a compelling idea
that I could not shake out of my head, that I needed to write
what I was learning about. Call it a work of the
Holy Spirit, if you will, call it whatever you want, I could not not do this. As a columnist for the national
news service baptistnews.com, I had a platform. It wasn't my week to write, but I sat down that Wednesday
morning and wrote anyway, and in about 45 minutes, these words flowed from my head
through my fingers into the laptop, and created a column that was titled "Seven Things I'm Learning
About Transgender Persons," having no idea what
those words would unleash. Well, it was published two days later,
on Friday, May 13th, and it went live on that website
at 5 a.m. Eastern time. When I awoke at 6:30
Central time, that morning, I knew something unusual was going on because I picked up
my cell phone to look at it, and I had Facebook messages
and emails and voice mails from people about that column that I didn't even know
had been published yet. And that was the portent
of the way the day was to go. The column has now been read
by more than a million people, and it has gone truly viral. My wife and I spent a good part
of that day at the kitchen table, watching social media, with the shares and the likes
and the comments, and they were moving so fast
we couldn't even keep up with it. It was like watching an electric
meter spin on a hot summer day in Texas. (Laughter) Well, over the next two weeks, I spent every free moment I had responding to more than
450 people who wrote to me, or called me. I talked to them on the phone,
I exchanged messages in all sorts of ways. I learned the stories
of transgender persons, their family members,
their friends and others. Ninety-five percent
of the comments were positive. Yes, there were a few cranky people. There were a few who wrote
to tell me that I was the tool of Satan, or that I clearly did not
understand medical science as it was written in the 1950s. (Laughter) But the vast majority
were incredibly supportive, and most moving of all to me
were transgender persons who wrote to say, "I read that you don't know
any transgender persons; I'd like to be your transgender friend." And so, out of that, we moved from online communication
to face-to-face communication. I began meeting for breakfast,
and lunch, and dinner, and coffee, with new friends who were transgender, and I heard their stories. They were shocked that a Baptist pastor
would sit down and listen to them, and I - I was shamed to hear
their stories of repression, and persecution, and rejection, and to understand how difficult it is
even to use a public restroom in peace. Almost every transgender person
that I've met has told me that, from their earliest awareness, from the time they were four,
five or six years old, they knew something
was different about them. They knew the anatomy
they presented on the outside did not match who they were on the inside,
but they didn't know what to do with it. They had no vocabulary for it,
they had no role models for this, they had no one to talk to, and often they just stuffed it back in,
and tried to keep on going. Sometimes, they turned
to strict religious observance to try to "get rid" of this. And none of that worked. Most of the time, when they finally
came to the realization of what they actually had known all along, they found a sense of peace, they said, but they almost always lost family, co-workers, and always friends, who abandoned them. There are a number of stories
I could share with you that have been written to me. I've chosen just a few today. The first is from
a trans woman in California. She said, "As you said, most of us
do not want to be in the spotlight. You will hear folks talk
about gay pride and gay power, but never transgender pride or power. We just want to be
productive members of society and live the life God designed for us. Transitioning to our correct gender is the only way to find peace
within ourselves. Some of us spend a lifetime
in unfathomable suffering because of self-loathing
for being different, because of family abuse and rejection,
and lack of resources. Transgender people
have a 40% suicide rate as compared to the national average
of around 3 to 8%." The next is from a trans woman who wrote to tell me about her history of attempting
to find peace in the Catholic Church, in the Mormon Church, in the Navy, and then to tell me
about her 12 suicide attempts. "You don't know what reading
your opinion piece did within me. Lately, I've been reading
article after article of the attacks against LGBT people, especially those of us
who are transgender. I read almost every day
of another murdered trans woman. Then, today I read your post, and in shines this ray of hope
from my screen. It shows me that there are
true Christians out there. Your words brought tears to my eyes, with the hopes that maybe, just maybe, God is still with me. He's here, but I can't yet enter a church with Him." One of the most difficult things to hear
in these communications has been the number of transgender persons
and their family members who are people of deep and abiding faith, but have been rejected, expelled, kicked out of churches
and other communities of faith, simply because they
or someone they love is transgender, and the church does not know
what to do with it. The most frequent question I was asked
in all of my communications is this: "Does God still love me?" A few weeks ago, I received an email
from a trans woman and her wife, who live in the Dallas area. They wrote to say, "We've heard that your church is a place that is welcoming the marginalized
members of society like us, and that if we showed up, you would welcome us and you
wouldn't escort us from the sanctuary. Is that true? Is it really safe for us to come there?" Well, I couldn't move fast enough
to write her back and say, "Yes! Yes, yes! Please come!" And they did; they came the next Sunday. And my wife and I met them, and we were able to have lunch
with them after church. For about an hour and a half,
we listened to their story, and I was astonished to discover that this trans woman and I
had been in seminary together, in the same place, at the same time. We don't think we knew each other, but we had felt the same call to ministry, gone to the same place for training, and yet, 30 years later, our lives had taken
vastly different paths, and we had been brought back together
by these words that had been published. A few days later, I received
a thank-you note in the mail, a beautiful thank-you card, and it said, "Thank you so much
for receiving us. We have looked for four years for a church
that would welcome us like you did." One of the reasons that I have received a hearing
with the transgender community is because I was willing to listen. I wanted to meet people
who were different than me. You may be wondering if I've undergone some sort of dramatic
conversion through all of this, maybe from hatred to love, and the truth is that's not really it. But I think the conversion
I've undergone is more significant because it is a transformation
from indifference to compassion. Before May 13th, I didn't know
any transgender persons. It's not that I hated anyone
or didn't like anyone. I just didn't know these people! I didn't know these people
who were different than me, but so much like me, as well. And I believe this is the condition
of most of America today. We are guilty of the sin
of willful ignorance and the sin of silence. Let's face it: I am one of the least likely spokespersons
for the transgender community. (Laughter) And yet, one of the things
I've learned through this is that often we don't get
to choose our causes; they choose us. And in this moment, because of what I have heard and learned, it's time for me to speak up, and to help others understand. It's the letters from parents that have moved me
really the most, though; parents just like you and me, who love their kids
and want the best for them and want them to succeed
and want them to be loved by other people, but yet, they've been dealt a hand
they don't know how to play, and they feel so alone. There's one mom named Emily
who wrote me in such a way that she encapsulates so much
of what I've heard from others. I want to share this with you. She said, "I'm the mother of two children: an absolutely brilliant and amazing son
who turned 11 today, and a sweet, funny
and smart eight-year-old girl who is transgender. Your blog post gives me hope. Since we have allowed our daughter
to socially transition, we have lost almost all our family. The three relationships that remain
are extremely strained. My father-in-law
doesn't speak directly to me. My mother-in-law says
that I let Claire's 'issues' rule my life. Neither use her name. For a time, Claire was 'this one.' They focus on the pain this causes them. They're hurting, they're sad,
they mourn the loss of their grandson. But they've never looked at any
of the resources I've given them. They've never gone to a PFLAG meeting,
they've never talked to others, anything! My husband's aunts said this is the result
of the darkness of the world and Satan's influence on us." She says, "I've always known
that my daughter was different. When she was three, she made her first set of boobies
out of slices of salami." (Laughter) "She'd make comments about growing up, when she gets to be a girl
and having long, pretty red hair; comments about when she grows up
and gets to be a mommy. She put on her first dress
when she was six years old, and I literally saw the tension
drain from her shoulders, and I saw the joy in her face. A little over two months later, she looked at me,
right in the face, and said, 'My boy life is over,
and it's my girl life now. Call me Claire.' This winter, she suffered her first bout
of suicidal ideation. My eight-year-old wanted to die." And then, this brave mom
taught me this lesson. She said, "A loving God did not
put my daughter on this earth as an example of how not to be,
or of how we should not parent. She was put on this earth
to show the wonder of this creation; this little girl who looks
just like I did at her age, this little girl who giggles
and it's infectious, this little girl who hid because she was
afraid we would throw her away, but eventually was brave enough
to tell us that she's a girl, and her name is Claire." Thank you. (Applause)
