Created Male *AND* Female: An Open Letter TO “Religious” Leaders
December
19, 2017
Dear
“Religious” Leaders:
I
have seen your letter of December 15, 2017 promulgated at the United States
Conference of Catholic Bishops website, at http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/marriage/promotion-and-defense-of-marriage/created-male-and-female.cfm
You
begin your letter by claiming a commitment to marriage as the foundation of
society, but only if that marriage is a “union of one man and one woman.” The emphasis on heterosexual unions is rooted
in six biblical references Gen, 2:24, Mt. 19:5-6, Mark 10:8, 1 Cor. 6:16 and
Eph. 5:31 to becoming “one flesh.” But what about your rejection of those of a
same-sex attraction whose commitment of love and fidelity move them to becoming
“one soul?” We see this in one passage, 1 Sam. 18:1-3.
1 And it came to pass, when he had made an end
of speaking to Saul, the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and
Jonathan loved him as his own soul. 2 And Saul took him
that day, and would not let him return to his father's house. 3 And
David and Jonathan made a covenant, for be loved him as his own soul.
You
claim that the one man, one woman marriage is a “natural marriage,” but that is
a heterosexist notion, Becoming “one soul” is just as natural for gay and
lesbian couples, as becoming “one flesh” is for straight couples. And doing otherwise is the unnatural. Your promotion of opposite-sex marriage and
denigration of same-sex marriage is the first evidence of your animosity
against people who are created by God to be different.
You
who are the scribes and Pharisees f the modern era do not heed the lesson of
Mt. 7, and in this letter, show yourselves to be like the foolish man that
build his house upon the sand (Mt.7:26).
Beginning
in error, you compound the error by attacking transgender and intersex people,
who are created by God to be different.
In your letter, you cite the words Gen. 1:27 but fail to understand their significance of the conjunction “and” in the context. After you share the idea that human beings were created “male and female” in the image and likeness of God, you proceed in the rest of your letter to separate that creation solely into beings that are “male *or* female” – and there is a difference. You assume that sex is naturally “male or female” though that is not true, either biblically, culturally, or scientifically.
In your letter, you cite the words Gen. 1:27 but fail to understand their significance of the conjunction “and” in the context. After you share the idea that human beings were created “male and female” in the image and likeness of God, you proceed in the rest of your letter to separate that creation solely into beings that are “male *or* female” – and there is a difference. You assume that sex is naturally “male or female” though that is not true, either biblically, culturally, or scientifically.
In
Mt. 19, Jesus acknowledges more than two sexes – while he starts in verses 4
through 6, he refers to the “one flesh” concept that is the foundation of
heterosexual marriage. But 1n verses 11
and 12, Jesus points out that this message is not intended for all, but only to
“they to whom it is given” (meaning in context, those who are heterosexual and
cissexual). But then, in recognition of
the teachings found in Isaiah 56, Jesus points out that “male and female” is
not merely “male or female” but also includes people referred to as “eunuchs.”
12 For there are eunuchs, who were born so from
their mother's womb: and there are eunuchs, who were made so by men: and there
are eunuchs, who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. He
that can take, let him take it.
Transgender
and intersex people are created by God as transgender and intersex people. The science
shows that we are “born so from our mother’s womb” and some of us seek gender
confirming surgeries so that we can fit into binary socio-cultural expectations
that we be “male or female” even though we were created different.
Indeed,
the reality of gender cannot be separated from one’s sex, but those whose
genital tracts are shaped differently, or whose brains followed one gender path
while their genital tracts developed differently, or those whose bodies develop
entirely along one line but, aside from a complete androgen insensitivity gene
expression, might have turned out developing entirely along the other
path. Binary sex, arbitrarily dividing “male
and female” solely into “male *or* female” is a cissexist concept that is an
affront to the diversity of God’s creation, and to the very concept of a
respect for the inherent worth and dignity of every person to which you scribes
and Pharisees pay only lip service.
Sexual
difference within the variability of being “male and female” is in reality more
complicated than seen through the overly
simplistic heterosexist cissexist lens of seeing people as naturally “male OR
female” – and as you write “sexual difference is not an accident or a flaw—it
is a gift from God that helps draw us closer to each other and to God.” So, then, why do you reject the inherent
dignity and worth of transgender and intersex people who God cleaved
differently out of that inchoate “male and female” creation?
Know
this, that the gender dysphoria experienced by transgender and some intersex
people is not a discomfort with one’s actual sex, but rather a discomfort with
the arbitrarily-defined cultural binary sex to which one was incorrectly
assigned in the first place.
If
it is your responsibility to “respond … with compassion, mercy and honesty”
then why do you persecute us?
Children
are not told that they can “change their sex.”
However, some children assert, correctly, at an early age, that they
really do not belong grouped together with the sex they were assigned at birth –
that is not their inherent sex, despite external genital evidence.
It
does these children who are different great harm to suppress their natures as gender-different. Other children should be taught to respect
the worth and dignity of those relatively few who are gender-different, just as
Jesus did. Unlike you who wish to stifle
the natural diversity of God’s creation, I call upon parents and our medical
institutions to not harm these children. (And that includes stopping the
barbarity of infant genital mutilation still sometimes practiced on intersex
infants.) I agree that “The state itself has a compelling interest, therefore,
in maintaining policies that uphold the scientific fact of human biology and supporting
the social institutions and norms that surround it,” but those words do not
mean what you advocate them to mean.
In
your letter you create a “straw man” that makes it seem that transgender and
intersex people operate under the notion “that a man can be or become a woman
or vice versa” rather than recognizing that it is possible for a transgender person
to have been created by God having a brain and genital tract that do not match
up in a cisgender manner. So instead,
you would rather condemn transgender children to suffer “ridicule,
marginalization, and other forms of retaliation” so that you can preserve your
cissexist blindness in the face of biblical truth and scientific developments about
the natural world.
Your
call for policies to uphold a person’s sexual identity is good, but for your
limitation to the diversity of “male and female” to be cleaved solely into a
cissexual male *or* female. The privacy,
safety, worth and dignity of transgender and intersex people is as relevant and
important to all is the dignity of cisgender people – and yet in your blindness
you do not see Truth. If you truly believe in “authentic support” for those who
God created to be different, you will rescind and reject your letter.
Sincerely,
s/
Joann Prinzivalli
Serva
Servarum Deae
This open letter is intended in particular for the following modern
scribes and Pharisees who signed the December 15, 2017 letter:
Most Rev. Joseph C. Bambera
Bishop of Scranton
Chairman, USCCB Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs
The Most Rev. Dr. Foley Beach
Archbishop and Primate
Anglican Church in North America
The Rev. John F. Bradosky
Bishop
North American Lutheran Church
Most Rev. Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.
Archbishop of Philadelphia
Chairman, USCCB Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth
Most Rev. James D. Conley
Bishop of Lincoln
Chairman USCCB Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage
The Rt. Rev. John A. M. Guernsey
Bishop, Diocese of the Mid-Atlantic
Anglican Church in North America
Rev. Dr. Matthew Harrison
President
Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod
Imam Faizal Khan
Founder and Leader
Islamic Society of the Washington Area
Most Rev. Joseph E. Kurtz
Archbishop of Louisville
Chairman USCCB Committee for Religious Liberty
Melchisedek
Archbishop of Pittsburgh
Orthodox Church in America
The Rt. Rev. Eric V. Menees
Bishop, San Joaquin
Anglican Church in North America
Rev. Eugene F. Rivers, III
Founder and Director
Seymour Institute for Black Church and Policy Studies
Church of God in Christ
Rev. Dr. Gregory P. Seltz, PhD
Executive Director
The Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty
The Rev. Paull Spring
Bishop Emeritus
The North American Lutheran Church
Rev. Tony Suarez
Executive Vice President
National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference
Very Rev. Nathanael Symeonides
Ecumenical Officer
Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America
The Rev. Dr. L. Roy Taylor
Stated Clerk, General Assembly
Presbyterian Church in America
Andrew Walker
Director of Policy Studies
Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission
The Rev. Dr. David Wendel
Assistant to the Bishop for Ministry and Ecumenism
The North American Lutheran Church
Paul Winter
Elder
Bruderhof
