These stories are under RED headings, GAY, LESBIAN, TRANSGENDER MEN, TRANSGENDER WOMEN, SPIRITUALITY. Scroll down to easily find a story that will speak to your need.
Emily. A Transit of Grace: A Theological Journey with my Transgender Child
I graduated from college in the early 90’s, studying Philosophy and English Literature. I loved creating theories, weaving and finding my way through a paper. I didn’t like the classes that were all about right or wrong answers, black and white, yes or no.
My experience growing up with gender dysphoria is, I am sure, very similar to others of my generation. We did not talk about it, however. We were coerced into clothing that was wrong, had our mannerisms corrected, were dissuaded from engaging in play activities deemed inappropriate for us, etc.
My first recollection of being aware of this incongruence is also my first memory, or fragments of a memory. I was being posed for a photographer in July 1969, so I was not quite two years old. I was wearing a red velvet dress and it felt wrong. I kept looking down at it. When I finally looked up, the photographer got the picture. My mother mentioned many times over the years that I was uncooperative with the activity; I wouldn’t pose with the toy phone the way I was supposed to.
I recently purged my family’s collection of 99% of pictures of me as a child. They depict me in inappropriate clothing with hair accoutrements that I resisted, even though my parents were fairly strict. Contradicting them or showing any disrespect at all was forbidden and this line was not crossed without consequence. However, I could not make myself tolerate the narrow definition of how I was to wear and display my gender, let alone embrace it, as my mother would have much preferred.
When I was seventeen I was outed to my parents as lesbian by a well-meaning family friend. (That wasn’t quite right but it was good enough for twenty-seven years.)
What occurred next was a decade plus of intense family struggle. I moved out due to the conflict while I was still a teen and my mother requested that I not remain in their town, for fear of repercussions to my father’s professional reputation. This was not a problem. I did not like their town and much preferred the larger metropolitan area within close proximity, where I correctly figured I would have better opportunities as an LGBT person. I did, however, lose one job for not conforming to expectations associated with my assigned gender. My parents were furious with me for testing their liberal values. They were certain that I was making choices to annoy them.
When I was nineteen years old and in college, I was in counseling to process all that had happened with my family over my identity as an LGBT person. I was walking back to my dorm when the thought hit me, clear as day, that my problems did not stem from being a lesbian. “Your problem is that you’re transgender.” I stopped walking. I looked at the ground and thought about all I was going through at the time. I had passive suicidal ideation and thought many times about “falling” from heights. I was once pulled back from crossing the street in front of a bus caroming through the intersection. I didn’t want to die as much as I wanted to be free of so much pain. I thought of all this and said out loud to myself, “NO!” I did not believe I could handle the repercussions of a yet more shocking disclosure. I retreated from that thought back into a lesbian identity, where I took refuge with countless other transmen for another twenty-five years. Being a lesbian would have to be good enough, and it would also be bad enough.
I had an intricate symphony of mental somersaults and thought-rearranging I would engage whenever the thought popped up again, as it often did over the decades. When the thought of being transgender percolated all the way to my frontal lobes, I would gently put it back in its cage by convincing myself that treatment would not be accessible to me, that to change one’s sex and name one must be transgender and I couldn’t possibly qualify, that I did not want to be dependent on pharmaceuticals for the rest of my life, that I would lose friends who felt I had betrayed them, etc. We were not using the term “gender nonbinary” at that time, but I did start referring to myself as “gender nebulous”.
In 2009, when I was forty-two, I was working with an elder transman patient. He told me about his transition in the 1960s. He told me that transitioning was the best decision he had ever made, even though doing so in the 1960s was a much more socially isolating process than it is now. I went home and read the paper and a story about Chaz Bono caught my eye. He was in the process of transitioning, having started taking testosterone several months before. This held a certain irony for me, as my mother used to want me to take note of Chastity Bono when she appeared sometimes on his parent’s variety show in the early 1970s. He is slightly younger than I am, and always appeared on the show in long dresses made of chiffon, tulle, and lace. My mother hoped that I would want to emulate the child of literal rock stars. (It didn’t take.)
But what DID take was Chaz’s comment about his decision to transition, which is that it was “the best decision [he had] ever made”. Twice in one day. I got up to brush my teeth and while doing so, I let some thoughts roll around a little in my head, where I would usually engage my retinue of logical gymnastics to convince myself that transition wasn’t for me. I was forty-two years old. I could very easily live another forty-two years and then some. I was very uncomfortable in my body, with my name, with feminine pronouns, and all of it. This had always been the case. My trying to will away my realization that I was transgender when I was nineteen years of age did not work. It just wasn’t going away. I realized that I was in very real danger of going to my grave wondering what it would have been like to have been comfortable in my own skin. I had tried. Hard. For as many years as I was aware I had a gender I hated the one I was given. Not because I hate women in general; I truly do not. I just am not a woman and I decided to no longer continue my unsatisfactory existence in the poor fit I was enduring.
Besides, the amount of alcohol it took to keep myself cajoled into keeping this charade up was increasing and that road never goes anywhere good.
It was another three months until I went to a meeting in my city for transgender men and said my actual name aloud for the first time. I met Sister Luisa Derouen there, as well, and we started a dialogue then that continues to this day. She had been ministering among the transgender community for many years by then. She was instrumental during my transition and remains a dear friend. I have been out as a transman now for ten years, and on testosterone for nine years. I have changed my name and all my documents and have had several surgeries. My appearance is now completely different from how it was before I started.
Also, and very significantly, my mental health is far better than it ever has been. This is undoubtedly the best decision I have ever made. I regret daily not beginning the process of claiming my true identity when I was nineteen and finally realized what all my angst was about.
Since transition, I have been able to find and integrate parts of myself that I could not previously reconcile, since nothing about the way I knew myself made sense. I could not trust any of my self-perceptions, and therefore could not believe what I saw or felt. I have realized lately that before I started transition, I could not even have declared with authority things that I liked, since I knew nothing of myself.
If I could do it all over again, I would have done this so many years ago. It just didn’t go away. But slowly, as I transitioned and underwent my surgeries, the anguish did go away. I no longer hate to see myself in a mirror, no longer hate the sound of my voice. I feel like myself for the first time in my life. I am now fifty-two years of age and I intend to live a long, healthy, and fulfilled life, now that I can.
Colt Meier St. Amand ( he/ they )
Colt Meier St. Amand is a clinical psychologist and Texas’s preeminent researcher on transgender issues. Just 30 years old, Colt was the first researcher in the country to demonstrate the psychological effects of testosterone therapy in trans men over time, and his findings informed the American Psychological Association’s first guidelines for the clinical care of transgender patients. He currently is finishing medical school and plans to work as a family practice psychologist-physician. Colt’s story was originally reported by Francesca Mari and is found at https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/gender-bender/. Reprinted with permission from Texas Monthly, March 2016.
Boy. Girl. Man. Woman. These terms reflect a binary, two options only, view of gender. Our language doesn’t allow for the in-between or outside of. As the trans community has become more visible, it has become clear that gender, like sexuality, exists on a spectrum.
The very first thing that Colt’s parents, Bob and Pam Meier, learned about their only child was which distinct category he fell in. “It’s a girl!” the obstetrician announced as she delivered Colt into the arms of his mother one August day in 1983. And it was on this bit of information that Bob and Pam began hanging their dreams and expectations.
Colt’s understanding of himself would turn out to be considerably different. Like many who are transgender, he felt the devastating disconnect between, as he put it, “the gender others tell you, you are, and the gender you know yourself to be.”
As a child, Colt hated Barbie dolls, long hair, and anything overtly feminine. Because he wriggled out of dresses as soon as his mother had slipped them over his head, Pam got permission from the principal of his Catholic school to fashion him a modified school uniform: overalls made of the same plaid fabric used for the girls’ pleated skirts. Before his first confession, at the age of seven, Colt prayed in his pew: God, please don’t make me a lesbian.
In high school, Colt was a straight-A student, a Eucharistic minister, and a black belt in tae kwon do. He still refused to wear dresses, but to avoid scrutiny, he grew out his hair. Though he had boyfriends, he never wanted to be intimate with them. It wasn’t until the summer after his sophomore year at Rice University that his best friend, a girl in his Catholic youth group, helped him figure out why. Standing in the upstairs hallway of Colt’s parents’ house late one night, the friend leaned in and kissed him. Then she ran down the stairs, afraid of how he might react. He stood in shock for a good minute, his body lit. Then he ran down the stairs to kiss her back.
Colt was ashamed of what this meant because the church had taught him to believe that “homosexuality” is a sin. Yet the love he felt suggested otherwise. More than a year later, when he told his parents about the relationship, they were accepting, though Bob was certain it was a passing phase.
In 2006, several months after Colt graduated with a degree in psychology, he and his partner attended a one-man show at the Rice Student Center. Scott Schofield, an actor on The Bold and the Beautiful, took to the stage to dramatize how he had come out as a lesbian and then later as a trans man. Colt had only ever heard the word “transgender” used as a slur, but looking at Schofield—who was blond, Texan, and transgender—Colt saw himself.
Later that fall, Colt phoned his father, a psychologist, and told him that he’d read the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders—at that time, the fourth edition, known as the DSM-IV—and found that he met every single criterion of what was then called “gender identity disorder.” His dad tried to comfort Colt. Then Colt told his mother. “That makes sense,” she said. “I never had a little girl.”
In the spring of 2007, Colt began six months of therapy in Galveston. He also underwent ten months of counseling in Houston. “It was overkill,” Colt said, “but I wanted to be really sure about transitioning, because the church said that God will always see you as your assigned sex.”
Colt started wearing a “binder,” a nylon-and-spandex vest, to compress his breasts. He attended his first trans support group, and while everyone went around the room introducing themselves, he racked his brain for a masculine name, quickly picking “Colt.” Faculty and students at his graduate school addressed him using male pronouns. He used the men’s restrooms on campus without any issue.
Finally, in October, after Colt’s sixth month of therapy in Galveston, a psychiatrist handed him what people in the trans community call “the letter,” which permitted testosterone therapy, and Colt received his first prescription.
Over the next year, Colt kept an online journal about his transition. After three months, fuzz sprouted on his arms and legs. A small cropping of acne burbled on his face. By six months, his shoulders had begun to broaden and his voice had deepened. Less obvious were the subtle changes to his mood and personality. “When you’re transitioning, it’s like you’re going through puberty.”
Bob and Pam, meanwhile, went to Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) meetings in Houston and attended monthly gatherings at a church in Nederland for Catholic families of LGBT youth. “Knowing you’re not the lone ranger is very helpful,” Bob said.
Though Bob had been slower to accept Colt’s gender identity than Pam, he had eventually thrown himself into researching trans issues and was now educating others through videos he posted to YouTube. Meanwhile, Pam, an OB-GYN, opened her Beaumont office several Saturdays a year to Colt’s trans friends so that they had a safe and respectful place in which to receive gynecological exams.
At his therapist’s recommendation, Colt penned a letter in which he came out as trans. He sent it to members of the community he had grown up in, including his childhood priest.
“This has not been easy for me, as things that are true for me are not mainstream nor are they socially acceptable in many parts of the country,” he wrote. “I am very different, and I did not ask to be.”
His parents sent out their own letter as well. Though a couple of Bob’s fishing buddies maintained that changing genders was a choice, and a self-destructive one at that, the majority of people whom Colt and his parents heard back from were supportive.
“I will try my best to walk with you,” wrote a friend of the family. “We are led by God in this to where He wants us to be.” Another friend sent Bob and Pam an email that said, “Thanks for your willingness to educate others by sharing your experience. I believe God has a plan for all of us and this seems like it may be part of God’s plan for you.”
But the biggest solace came from Colt’s childhood priest. “That is a brave letter by a brave person,” the priest wrote. “I have never particularly paid attention to your gender, but you have and that is entirely what you must focus on.”
Sitting in a pew on Palm Sunday in 2008, Colt listened to the reading from the Book of Mark. In it, Jesus commands two disciples to untether a colt on the outskirts of town so that he may use it to ride into Jerusalem. Colt leaned forward—a colt!—so as not to miss any of the words that followed. “Untie it and bring it,” Jesus instructs. “If anyone should say to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ reply, ‘The Lord has need of it.’” Colt knew then that the name he thought he had chosen for himself had really been chosen for him.
“My work is nowhere near done. We are just getting started.”
Like many, I am a multifaceted person. One facet is photography, which has become a semi-professional hobby. The photos with the most character are taken in the moments of twilight, sunrises, sunsets, or not far from it.
My other facets include being Catholic, an engineer, a musician, an actor, an outdoorsman, a literary critic, a mentor, and an amateur theologian and historian. I am also a transman, also known as a female-to-male transgender. That’s the facet that has tended to be problematic for me and for others. I have always been male, but, when I was young, I was not always seen as such. In fact, there were constant expectations made by those who “knew better” for me to be someone I wasn’t, namely a female. I never met those expectations.
I never knew what was “wrong” with me as I was growing up. I was myself as often as I could be, as soon as I could be. I went by male names in grade school. I felt most alive and validated in every moment that I was seen as a boy and called by the correct pronouns. In those moments, I felt that I was in the light and not invisible. When others would take me for my father’s son, my dad made a point of correcting them, a way of shaming me and trying to make me stop being so boyish. He was a military officer and having a kid like me embarrassed him.
The onset of female puberty was hell and a half. I hated everything that happened, and was despondent. When I was in seventh grade, I searched the library to find what was “wrong” with me. I didn’t find the name for what I was until I went to college and spent a Saturday researching in the library. That’s when I found the word transsexual. While it was great to be able to finally name “it,” I was also terrified. There was so much stigma and pain to anticipate.
There were moments in my later teenage years and early twenties when I was suicidal. There were many dark nights when I despaired for my future, of ever being able to find employment after finishing my electrical engineering degree, of being alone. My identity was trapped in the eyes of my beholders; my reactions dictated in that split second whether they decided if I was male or female. Job interviews were often decided in that split second. Dating wasn’t even a possibility. I was a great friend, but not a romantic prospect.
I started medical intervention at twenty-four, shortly after starting that first job out of college. My first few years of employment were tough. There were no protections and I was the hottest rumor at the company. I had to work harder to make my performance and my other characteristics more visible than the second puberty I was undergoing.
Presently there is no mistaking that I am male, so that facet, which used to be a blinding, disabling part of my daily existence, is now a shadowy part of my history. But I bear the physical scars; anatomical differences compared to a cis-gendered man; the memories of a frustrated youth, of being invisible in my own life; the emotional scars and wounds, some of which lie dangerously close to the surface. I wouldn’t be the man I am without them.
As a Catholic, I am somewhere between a convert and revert. My parents were both raised Catholic, but I didn’t know that until I was almost fifteen. I grew up between my dad’s hostility towards religion and my mom’s exploration of different faith traditions. When I was eight, I was baptized and received my First Communion in the Episcopal Church. However, when I was a sophomore in high school, my parents told me that I was supposed to be Catholic, sent me to Confirmation classes and I was confirmed the following spring and taking the name Patrick.
In college, I drifted back to the Episcopal Church. When I finally went back to the Catholic Church at the age of 30, it was a breeze. I had been confirmed, never married, and I didn’t feel the need to volunteer my past at the re-entrance interview. Subsequent confessions, where I
did mention that I was trans, did not go poorly. While I was consistently the “first one” that each priest knew that they’d spoken to, they were all kind, and sent the message of “go forth and live.” I stayed quietly in the shadows.
I lived what trans folks call a ‘stealth’ existence for years. Eventually, I met Sister Luisa Derouen, a Catholic nun who ministered to the trans community. I started dating a woman who would not let me stay in my shell. In large part because of them I started to expand my horizons, confronting issues over friendships, stealth, intimacy, and my own sexual orientation that I’d left buried.
Having Sister Luisa in my life was a Godsend. Not only did she become my spiritual director, she became a beloved friend. She challenged me to accompany her to a national Catholic gay and lesbian ministry conference. One of the speakers was a Mexican bishop. I have never met a man who so personified Jesus incarnate. He was loving, accepting, and had an uncanny knack for appearing, seemingly out of nowhere, to personally talk with people. Later, I had an opportunity to speak to him. Our conversation was one of the most spiritual I’ve experienced. I felt enveloped by the Church after that weekend.
Two months later, at a Christmas address to the curia, Pope Benedict made comments that slammed the church door in my face, saying that there needed to be an ecology of the human race, and those like me needed to be pruned like weeds from the rainforest. To say I’ve been heartbroken is an understatement.
I once attended a lecture by a rabbi regarding Jewish tradition and gender. The Hebrew language in the Talmud allows for six different genders, including intersex. The rabbi explained that Hebrew thought and language makes allowances for things that are neither one nor the other, such as day and night. This was important in many ways, including defining the parameters of the Sabbath. The language for the other genders that were not fully male or female was akin to the language that defines twilight…not the fullness of day or night, but a beautiful space in between that is both and neither, but distinct, beautiful, and of God.
The photographer in me has seized that concept. I am twilight, I am a sunrise, I am a sunset. I am not a weed to be pruned. I am not “less than.” I am my history; I contain the shadows and the light of what I have seen. I am a physical living embodiment of that moment that allows for striking images, fleeting visions and perspectives that are not possible during the fullness of day or night. I am of God and I have beauty in this world that can only be viewed by those who choose to seek it.
From the time I was a little kid I had always felt hatred toward who I was. I felt like a stranger in my own body. My physical body was that of a girl, but I knew inside my heart and soul that I was a boy. My female anatomy was an obstacle I would have to reconstruct before I could feel complete and “at home” within my body. I have begun my journey to reconstruct my life and physical body to match my inner gender.
Ever since I was able to talk and socialize, I have always been more accepted by the boys in my neighborhood. I would always participate in the neighborhood baseball, basketball, and football games, which I was very good at. I would do anything and everything the boys did without any consideration for fear or danger. These were the happiest times of my life. I would wake up with a smile on my face every morning and be prepared for the day’s activities. During this time I was also dressing like one of the boys. No one suspected anything besides the fact that I was a tomboy. However, I knew there was something more. I was always convinced I was a boy and that I just so happened to be born without the male organs. I tried everything to fit in with the boys; I even tried going to the bathroom like a boy until I eventually gave up trying at age twelve!
Unfortunately, I had to grow up and continue my education in middle school. During this time, classmates began to call me a lesbian. I became convinced that I was a lesbian and that was the end of it. I was made fun of constantly by classmates and people who were supposed to be my friends. The hatred that I felt about being in my body was growing more and more unbearable by the day. I would not want to wake up in the morning. It had gotten so bad that I did not want to wake up at all. I wanted to kill myself so badly. I wished and prayed that someone would just take my life and release my heart from under what felt like a two ton brick. I cried myself to sleep on many occasions. Night was the only time I could let out what I was feeling. I wanted to cry all day long, but I wouldn’t show my emotions to anyone, not even my parents.
The longer I held in my feelings, the more my head would throb. I could feel the blood rushing to my head quickly. My head pounded from all the thoughts going through it. I can honestly say that if I wasn’t too scared to die, I would have killed myself and I would be freed from all the hatred and disgust that I felt toward who I was. It was at this time that my parents began sending me to therapy.
As soon as the therapist and I began talking, I was introduced to a new word: “transgendered.” For me it meant a female who has a brain of a male and believes should have been male. I knew as soon as I heard this, that I was not a lesbian, but rather, transgendered. From that time forward, I spent my life explaining that I was not a lesbian and that it was perfectly normal to like girls because I think, act, and have the brain of a male.
As I expected, people were too rigid and could not open their mind to accept me for who I really was. My parents, however, were very accepting. They agreed with the therapist right away that this was the perfect explanation for who I was. My father was able to let go of his youngest daughter very quickly. On the other hand, my mother took just a little longer to get used to having a son instead of another daughter. My mother did always wish for a boy and now tells me that I am the boy she always wanted. My parents began going to meetings for parents and friends of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people. They are now a very active part of the GLBT community and I could not be more proud of them.
I struggled through high school trying to find a place where I fit in and a place of acceptance. Some people tried to understand who I was, but to others I was still a lesbian. I was constantly explaining to my classmates that it’s not like that and that I would become a boy soon. In fact during the summer of my junior year, I received the okay from the endocrinologist to start taking testosterone and to research surgeons for breast removal. I met with Dr. Johnson, and I was so excited to have this surgery but was disappointed to hear that she would be on maternity leave until September. It was then I believed God had not wanted me to be a happy male. I began to hang my head down low again. A couple days later the surgeon’s office called.
They don’t usually do this, but when they saw my disappointment, they had moved me to the top of the waiting list and scheduled me to see Dr. Stueber who was the “in charge” doctor and did not usually see people like this. My happiness immediately reappeared. Over the summer I underwent breast removal surgery. I went back to senior year as Christopher John Garber who was on testosterone and was now without breasts!
Immediately after graduating from high school, I decided it was about time to get my female organs removed. I made an appointment as soon as summer began. Next thing I knew I was preparing for a complete hysterectomy. I feared that the procedure would hurt, but in reality there was very little pain and the recovery period was only three weeks. I was excited to start a new life in college as a legal male, but there was still one step left to complete. My mother and I went to the birth certificate office in Boston City Hall only to find out that the endocrinologist’s letter stating that I have been living completely as a male and that I underwent breast removal surgery and had received a complete hysterectomy and currently was taking testosterone, and that I fit all the requirements to legally be male, was not on his standard letterhead. My mother and I were so irritated that we went to the doctor’s office right away to get another letter. We then decided to try the birth certificate office at the Bay Side Expo Center only to find out that they would not accept the letter because it did not include the phrase, “Sex reassignment surgery has been completed.” Now we were really mad because the doctor literally wrote everything the phrase said just in a different way. My mother and I were almost in tears; I could feel my heart throbbing again. I ran outside; I felt the need to be alone. My mother refused to leave without talking to the attorney’s boss. He took us into a private room where he apologized profusely and agreed that the letter the surgeon had written for us was fine. The anxiety I was feeling had to be let out and I burst into tears. My sadness rubbed off on my mother because she began to let out a couple of tears also.
The man promised that he was planning on taking it to his lawyer the very next day to get her approval. He replied to us the next day as promised to tell us the letter had been accepted. Two letters from the endocrinologist and four employees later I had finally received the big “male” on my birth certificate. This was the first time I had actually felt closure and happiness for who I have become.
It was finally time to get into college mode. I was excited for once in my life. I was faced with another chance to live my life, but this time would be in the body of the boy I had always felt I was. It was a new beginning as a legal male. No one would know my past and I might actually be able to make some friends. In addition, I would hopefully never have to hear the same, “I am sorry, you are a girl, and I am straight” excuse that I had been getting from girls ever again. I would finally enter the dating world as a straight male and hopefully be given the reciprocated love that I had always wanted for once in my life.
The next hardship I would have to endure was whether I should tell my classmates or not. This is a huge internal struggle for me. On one hand, I feared that if I told people they would not want to have anything to do with me. On the other hand, I might make a lot of friends who I could educate about who I really am. When it comes down to it my heart, soul, and brain are torn between whether I should disclose my secret or bury it inside myself. I really do want to be liked and have a lot of friends. My heart thrives on finally being accepted and liked. At the same time I want people to know what I have gone through in my life to become a male. I am really scared to make this decision and if it doesn’t turn out the way I want it to and people do not accept me, I am fearful for my life. I cannot take anymore disappointment in my life and I am terrified for what may happen if I have to experience this amount of pain again.
Becoming male has given me a whole new perspective on life. I no longer have suicidal thoughts, and I could not be happier. I enjoy waking up each morning knowing that I will not be tortured by my classmates because of my sexuality or my gender. I am now being accepted for the man I have always felt I was! This has been a difficult journey for me, but with the support of my parents and wonderful sister I am getting through it successfully.
C.J. Garber
My music and religion are deeply intertwined within my soul. My life would have no meaning without music and without God, without spirit, without a daily soulful prayer to the Creator.
As a young child I played piano, Mozart symphonies and other classics, with lessons from a young Hungarian refugee woman. She was a conservative Jew, and her deeply ingrained Judaism left a powerful mark upon me. She entered my world from a different continent, country, language, outlook, and life view, forcing me to acknowledge and respect people of profound difference. My own Catholic parents, did not live their religion that way, eventually leaving the Church when I was 6 years old.
There was also another facet of my life that I was certain. That I was female. It was sure to me as a youngster, as sure as my name and my music, and as sure as the profound power of God beating within my heart. All those things were not felt, nor sensed, and certainly never learned. They just were. I was made by God to be female, and to be a musician.
Around the age of four, my mother had to process awkward moments with me often, expressing interest in girls’ clothes and in being pretty. Upon entering kindergarten however, the gender walls rose higher than I could fathom or climb, and I was made to learn that most certainly I was a boy.
Thirty years later, tired as I lay my heavy body down on a large rock in Central Park, tired of a life of denial, of psychotherapy and self-hatred, a life of insecurity, nearly ended several times in an overdose of booze and drugs, I heard, as surely as the sound of a cicada on a summer evening, the voice of God within.
“Do you want to go there?” God asked me, asking if I had the desire, the fortitude, and the determination to make the journey across the gender divide. “Yes, God, I need to go there,” I replied.
In the tumultuous two and a half years that followed, I changed my name, wardrobe, hair, hormonal make-up and way of living. Along the way, I lost friends, lovers, concert dates, and my teaching job. I never wavered however in my newfound determination. It was a journey made not alone but with God, who had asked me to follow the map.
In the midst of everything, I moved to the Bronx in New York, directly across the street from the beautiful St. Philip Neri Catholic Church and school. I began to attend Mass, finding comfort in the rituals and Bible readings, and the welcoming and beautiful voice of the assistant pastor. In time I mustered enough courage for a deeply needed first confession, not knowing how, but doing my best. “You do not need my forgiveness,” Father said, “you have spoken to God and He hears you, and God has forgiven you already, a long time ago.”
I recounted my entire life, of not fitting into the world around me, a gender transition having destroyed my musical career, and my attempted suicides. “But your body, too, is not even yours,” Father said. “It too, is a work of God. Your body is a temple of God, and you must not destroy it.”
The mercy of God, the love of Jesus and Mary, erupted within my heart at Father’s words, I shall never forget. A lifetime of guilt, confusion, self-hatred, cross-dressing, and sexual confusion, suddenly appeared to me. I was human, loved by God, and becoming whole. I had been shown mercy of an order beyond words.
I began to take Catholic classes, and within a year was ready for my First Communion. I wore a beautiful white dress, and had never looked and felt more fully complete, as a person, as a woman, as a follower of Christ and the Catholic faith.
I am a Catholic, perhaps one that our Pope and Bishops do not acknowledge or accept, but it is to the words and teachings of Jesus that I look for guidance, and in so doing identify myself as Catholic. I identify as a woman, and a musician, essential truths, grateful for who I am, and to be of the body and blood of Christ, blessed and loved. In my person and music, may I share and encourage that love in all whom I come to know.
Dani
My Catholic family quit going to Church when I was in early grade school. In high school, some follow Catholic students invited me to their Church, and when I went on a retreat, my spirit was reawakened. I saw the Holy Spirit work at that retreat, I felt the love of God and knew I would always love our God.
Growing in faith and knowledge, I became very active in our Church, married, and raised four children in Catholic schools. I was an acolyte trainer coordinator, bingo worker, folk mass music director, and a Knights of Columbus member. I was even a Grand Knight at one stage.
In 1994 I was involved in an accident that left me with a syrinx in my spine. I was told I would shortly need a walker and a wheel chair by 2000. During that time I went to a healing Mass. In 1996 a follow-up MRI showed the syrinx to have shrunk. My permanent nerve damage was no longer expected to get worse. While doctors had no medical explanation, I do. Faith.
I’ve always had one issue in my mind though. I never understood why I was in a male body, always wanting the female things in life. The churches I attended taught that being LGBT was a sin. I therefore expressed my female nature in private, at home, and then went to confession.
At one point, I was approached about applying for the diaconate program. I knew however, that this part of me was not accepted, and it stopped me from being closer to our Lord, something I would have loved.
As time would go on, I was fighting myself to be something I was told was a sin. Thirty Eight years into our marriage, I opened up to my wife, a born and raised Polish Catholic with a deep faith. While our marriage got really shaky, the one thing we agreed on was that I needed to see a mental health specialist. I thought I could solve everyone else’s problems by ending my life.
My psychiatrist and psychologist shared that my inner feelings were not unusual and that others have the same feelings. With my wife’s ok, I started anti-depressants, and then HRT, and immediately felt better and happier. My wife and I agreed to reevaluate in 6 months. After 2 months however, she stated that she could see the positive effects. She said she took her marriage vows very seriously and would stay with me, but was concerned that my soul may be damned.
I, too, shared her concern. I had felt this way since I was eight years old, but was unsure why. I just knew that it was not a sin or perversion. I had been told that being transgender is a mental disorder. I came to the realization that God made me this way and, if I was born this way, understood that everyone who is LGBT is born this way as well. I read up on conversion therapy camps and was upset about what society and my Church had taught about the LGBT community. I saw a priest chastise a mother for supporting her gay child. I did not see acts of love toward the outcast of our society.
Continuing my quest, I first found Dignity, which was accepting and allowed me to worship our God as my true self. My first “Prayer of the Faithful” was for our brethren to learn to accept us for who we are. I was in tears, again feeling God’s love in my heart. I felt a need to live and carry forth Jesus’ message.
Eventually I did find a priest who let me know my soul is not damned for being transgender. I now attend this church where I am openly accepted. My wife and I are still together, and I truly thank God for putting this loving person in my life.
I currently run a support group for transgender people and am very active in an accepting church. My heart is filled with love, working to communicate with priests and others, doing Jesus’ work. Prayers for all, and please pray for me.
God Bless.
Miriam: Stories of Faith and Transition
I am a Catholic Christian, 61 years old, transgender male-to-female, divorced by my wife who also succeeded in procuring an annulment. My ex-wife and 4 children now live a distance away.
As a child, we were a nominally Catholic Christian household, my parents and 5 siblings recited some memorized prayers daily when we were very little. After second grade, CCD life disappeared for me and my family’s religious sense faded away.
I was a social misfit, and recluse. My father and brother generally tried to “beat the female out of me.” I was bullied and saw school counselors. I began to have vivid fantasies of developing as a girl, even trying out for cheerleader in grades 7 and 8. I didn’t fit in with either boys or girls. In grade 12 I felt I should receive Confirmation and attended classes at the other church in town.
I also decided that I wanted to be a priest and the diocesan vocations director arranged for me to study at a seminary. Not seeing any theological conflict, I also attended a Presbyterian missionary conference.
While attending seminary, I was immersed in good Benedictine Catholic Christian culture, and began praying a daily rosary. I left after three years however, feeling I was on the wrong track. While finishing my BA in Psychology I sought some professional counseling for my sexual identity struggles.
I went back to school, studying for a teacher’s license, and met my bride, now ex. We were both practicing Catholic Christians, had common visions for family life and were engaged within a year. My transgender feelings however, were stronger and more frequent than ever.
I began teaching at a small rural Catholic school, but felt I taught horribly. Later working as a medical social worker, I collapsed in chronic fatigue, never fully recovering. Meanwhile my transgender tendencies often poked their head out, subconsciously testing for reaction.
Our first two children were home births. As they grew, we home schooled and then adopted two children from Russia. As years went on, my wife became the bread winner and I did most of the child rearing. We grew in Catholic Christian fervor and developed a ministry in apologetics, later becoming a book and gift shop. I buried my transgender self.
As young adults, our children began to leave, and our marriage became more distant emotionally and physically, ending in divorce and then annulment a year later. Shortly after the divorce I had my ears pierced and began HRT. While my ex was initially furious, we now communicate, however very little more than necessary. I continue to communicate well with my two adult daughters, a little with my youngest son, however not at all with my two other sons. I also had Gender Confirming Surgery after prayerful, rigorous, analytic discernment and prayers from many people.
I still hold my marital vows as I understood them. I am a leper among Catholic Christians in general. As Simon Peter said to our Lord Jesus, at the end of John 6 however, I have come to believe that Jesus is the Christ, and to whom else could he go? Jesus has one Church and so I can never leave. I have some fellowship with other Catholic Christians, and I attend a parish where I am allowed to sing in the choir. I’ve been suspended from my Knights of Columbus membership, after 30 years.
I am extremely lonely. There is much treasure for me to share from my life, my God-given life. I pray I give well in this life and the next.
Christine: My story (she/her)
I have been very blessed and fortunate.
For as long as I could remember, since about the age of 3 or 4, I felt different. As a child, I would go to bed every night praying I would wake up a girl (a story commonly echoed by many transgender people). Growing up in the 60s and 70s meant the technology to easily “connect” to others had not yet been invented. I felt alone.
I enjoyed both boy and girl games and toys. Through my adolescent and teen years, I played sports, and privately wore mom’s clothes when alone. As a teen, my only exposure to the transgender world was hearing about tennis player Rene Richard’s sex change. I could only dream.
My college and early professional life mixed in dating, trying to fit into the traditional male role, trying to convince myself that my female longings did not really exist. Eventually I fell in love and married. Our marriage lasted 29 years. We have two beautiful children, a daughter and son.
My wife knew I cross-dressed for the last 15-20 years of our marriage. I’m in sales and travel often across the US, and while she was “okay with it,” it was something we stopped discussing over time as our relationship spiraled downward. Our marriage dissolved, I feel, not for trans reasons, but for the same reasons many other couples end. Ours was broken. Certainly, my frequent travel did not help.
Once we separated I needed to figure out where “I” was going. I attended a number of regional transgender conferences, and support groups both near me and across the US.
After two years of research, I still didn’t know where I was going, but knew I needed professional help to get there. I my mind it was “I can’t. I would lose my family, my friends, and my job.” After a year of therapy, it became, “I can’t not do this.”
I was also concerned about my faith. As Polish Catholics in Northeastern PA, my parents were very faithful to the Church. We attended Sunday and Holy Day masses, and other church activities as a family, and I often accompanied my father to special evening services. My wife, children, and I followed a similar path.
One late Saturday afternoon, I felt it was time to speak to a priest, at confession. I obviously knew what our Church taught with respect to being gay. At that point however, the Church was still silent regarding transgender folk. The Church was still figuring us out. I also knew that only my “outside” was changing. Everything else, my heart, my mind, my soul, and my faith remained unchanged.
I first said my confession to our associate pastor, then said. “Father, now I have something a little more challenging to discuss.” The conversation immediately reverted to sex. I said, “Excuse me, Father, this has nothing at all to do with sex, this has to do with who I am. You can throw me out if you want,” I said, “but if you do, I’m coming back. This Is My Church.” “No, no,” Father said, “we’re not going to do that.” After a little more discussion, he said, “Let’s together say a prayer to our Blessed Mother to help guide you on your journey.” I was crying as I left confession.
About a month later, I returned to confession again, this time to our Monsignor, whose first words were “God loves everyone.” I cried again.
It took my children, then 26 and 14, about a year to accept. Telling Mom however, was the most difficult. At 88, she did not understand what being transgender meant. One of her first questions to me was, “Did you talk to the priest?”
My employer and my customers have been wonderful and accepting. In 2016, I had gender confirming surgery. My children understood. Life began anew.
Even though I had attended the same church with my family for about 24 of our 29 years of marriage, we were a somewhat non-descript family, attending mass, educating our children, but not actively involved in Church community life. A couple of things changed that.
First, an email to the diocese began an 18-month conversation about where the diocese stood on LGBT issues. Monsignor and I also had numerous discussions about starting an LGBT Prayer Group/Ministry in our parish. After a few more months of diocesan uncertainty, Monsignor said, “Let’s just do it.” It’s been almost two years now. Our group, although small, continues to meet monthly in our Parish Center. Our Bishop is very aware of our group.
Second, about a year later, Monsignor pulled me aside after mass and asked me to become a Eucharistic Minister. More tears.
Through my involvement in our parish Ministry, I’ve become associated with other ministries and groups in Philadelphia, throughout New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York City. I have received calls, emails, and social media messages from other transgender Catholics, most of whom struggle with Church acceptance, some who wrestle with Church teaching, some who have left the Church, and one who unfortunately had been physically removed from her church.
I have been blessed to have met with Father Jim Martin numerous times, and was invited (along with 17 gay and lesbian Catholics, supportive clergy, and parents) to dinner with Cardinal Joseph Tobin at his residence in Newark. It was an amazing evening.
Again, I have been truly blessed and have so much to be thankful for. There is much more work to do.
Libby: On Being Transsexual, An Unexpected Spiritual Journey
I grew up in a tough, lower middle class, blue collar neighborhood. I went to an all boys’ public elementary school (and CCD classes) until 6th grade and then transferred to Catholic schools for the 7th through 12th grades. I had very good parents, even from a spiritual standpoint. My childhood was fairly uneventful and pleasant although I always felt something wasn’t right. I can remember having these “feelings” or thoughts as early as age four or five or sooner. It’s all very vague and unclear now (I’m 67 at this writing). I did not have the vocabulary then to really understand what was happening. Gender related information was scarce. Internet didn’t exist and I was very young and dare I say…innocent.
The feelings seemed to be concerned mostly with a desire to experience things from a girl’s perspective…to “feel like a girl” and later wishing I could be physically female and live as a girl and woman. I worried that I might be gay. I instinctively resisted these thoughts and feelings, given my background. I tried to compensate, suppress and hide these feelings.
My feminine feelings became more and more pronounced, with more clarity, well before puberty--possibly as early as age seven or eight. In my teen years—or even earlier—I became more and more detached and distant; less sociable and more isolated. I entered puberty struggling with these conflicting feelings--great anxiety, fear and a draining experience of depression. A great sadness enveloped me, moving well beyond personal hardship or life difficulties. The sadness reflected what seemed to be my hopeless situation, with no satisfactory resolution on the horizon. I felt trapped, as if I were in prison with no prospect for release. Intuitively I knew what was causing my distress, but I could not find the words to verbalize these feelings and dared not try to talk to anyone. Who could I really trust with my secret, where could I dare to go for help back in the 50s and 60s? At that point, transgender people that were often viewed as a danger to society, and commonly ostracized and even institutionalized.
I heard the term “transsexual” for the first time before puberty began for me. At that early point I became very afraid, resisting the whole idea that I might be a transsexual. Even if my worst fears were true and I was indeed a transsexual, I had neither the support nor the financial resources to take any action. I saw no possibility other than making the best of what I was physically; a male. I tried to counter my feelings by being as masculine as possible. I thought perhaps this experience was just a phase, a fad I was going through. If I just ignored the feelings, hid them, denied them, perhaps this experience would just go away. This was my secret, and as with most secrets, these thoughts festered and hurt me in many ways.
My gender conflicts were not only making me very sick and unhappy but also slowly causing me to drift away from the Catholic Church and God. There was no grievance or malice, I just couldn’t participate any more. I suspected that members of these communities would condemn me if I shared such personal information about myself. The conflict and turmoil boiling inside me revealed how far I was drifting from the Church, but more importantly from God.
Finally I felt I had nothing to lose: the time had arrived for me to resolve my gender identity issues. I started taking female hormones shortly before my 59th birthday. Eventually I got in contact with a Catholic sister, Sister Luisa Derouen. We corresponded first by email and later by weekly phone calls and finally met in person at a transgender event in a hotel. Her message was that God loved us…loved me! She insisted that we could have a relationship with God without adhering to a clerical rule book. She looked at me and said, “Libby, don’t you know that God loves you?” I couldn’t answer, probably because I didn’t feel loved by anyone. But in that moment I felt something I never before experienced. I sensed love from her. I could see it in her eyes! I began to cry uncontrollably, right in the middle of the afternoon crowd in the hotel lobby.
I identify as Catholic, even though I am not presently a practicing Catholic. I had always hoped that someday, somehow I could reconcile with the Church. But I had seen my transition as a further impediment. Also, I’ve been attending a Unitarian Universalist Church where I have been accepted and have made many friends. How do I give this up to return to a Church whose hierarchy includes many who do not accept me? I worried especially about the rules of the Church that I was not following. I had spoken to a Catholic priest about this and his response was “God is not that petty!”
Sister Luisa reminded me of the Catholic Church’s understanding of the primacy of conscience. I had lost connection with this conviction. The Church should emphasize this important principle. Catholics would then be encouraged to take more personal responsibility for their spiritual lives. I think the crux of my conflict in reconciling with the Catholic Church is that I fear submitting to the Church’s authority because I fear they won’t respect me and I will slip back into mechanically following the “rules,” which would likely then be followed by guilt.
I no longer feel I’m spiritually dead. I believe in and love God more than ever. I’m grateful to God for the many gifts given me, including my gender identity. I have an active prayer life and spend time with God every day. I try to do good works as the opportunities arise. My faith has remained strong and constant now for many years. I do not know if I will ever reconcile with the Church, but I am open to this.
I view the existence of transgender people as evidence of God’s creativity and love. I believe we are part of God’s creative genius and exist to complete God’s plan. I believe God not only epitomizes love, but wants to include us, all of us, in God’s love. I probably did not consciously believe this when Sister Luisa spoke to me in that hotel lobby many years ago.
But that is no longer true, thanks to her and many other friends. My belief and faith in God and my inner spirituality is stronger and I believe healthier than at any time in my life. I never suspected my transition would be so focused on my relationship with God. It has indeed been an unexpected spiritual journey!
Finding Irene
I am a practicing Catholic, a frequent confessor and daily Mass attendee. I begin each morning in quiet prayer, seeking direction from the Holy Spirit to live out my mission in life. I attended grade school with Dominican sisters, and high school and college with Jesuit priests and brothers. I’ve been married for twenty-three years. I own a very successful business. I love to travel and have been known to become a little upset when Notre Dame loses a football game.
I also am a closeted transgender woman. My years of silent suffering have dramatically impacted my health and wellbeing: consuming of my free time, tormenting my inner thoughts, frightening me, and causing serious illness. Physically, I can no longer hold it inside and I must do something about it!
Gender dysphoria has been with me all my life. As a child, my family was aghast when they saw me wearing my sister’s pink skirt and asked if I was a homesexual. I quickly went to my bedroom, slit the sides of my hips with a razor blade, and returned to my family with a crazy story of how I fell in the rose bush and needed the skirt to keep pressure on my hips to relieve the pain. There were other incidents growing up when my siblings and friends caught me but no one ever said a word about it.
As an adult, I convinced myself that I could keep the dysphoria a secret and offer my suffering to God. Maybe this was my cross to bear in life? I thought it would be better for me to suffer than cause pain to those people the Lord had placed in my life: my wife, my family, co-workers, and friends. After all, Jesus showed us the ultimate gift of sacrifice by giving his life for our sins. After years of suffering in silence, one day I spent several hours quietly praying in my local church. I knew that I could no longer ignore my gender dysphoria. I heard a voice tell me to go out and find Irene. It’s okay! I then felt freer to embrace my true self who is Irene. Thank God!
I began experiencing unusual extreme pain in my chest wall and the left side of my body. After numerous medical tests and doctor visits, doctors could not determine the cause for my pain. I started wondering if my suppressed gender dysphoria was causing the chest pain. I planned to take my gender dysphoria to the grave, and it was becoming a real possibility. But most interestingly, when I had time to be Irene my symptoms disappeared.
I prayed to God for direction for what I should do. I was not willing to compromise my faith. Previously, I met with a priest to confess my transgender condition. He said two very powerful things to me. First, he asked me if I was comfortable in my own skin. I responded with a “yes.” Second, he said “God doesn’t make mistakes!” I should not be ashamed or afraid of my gender dysphoria. God made me this way for a reason. This was so freeing for me! It was time to play the hand that God dealt me, and it was okay!
After a great deal of prayer and consideration and help from a therapist, I began hormone therapy. Physically, I am much better: my health has improved and my symptoms have subsided. Emotionally, I am struggling with how I will tell my wife and everyone else. I believe my path is to transition and to present as the female that I am. I believe it’s the only way forward, even though I do not know where the path will lead. I keep reminding myself to be not afraid and trust in God!
In August of 2018 I reached out to Sister Luisa Derouen, a Catholic sister who has been ministering among the transgender community for 20 years. Her spiritual guidance continues to be most helpful to me. My greatest fear was that I could destroy my marriage by telling my wife who I really am. However, I’ve tried to endure the suffering of gender dysphoria on my own for decades and my body can no longer sustain it.
I am sure I am not alone. I am praying for everyone struggling with gender dysphoria, and praying for understanding from fellow Catholics and all people.
I believe that it is okay to be transgender and Catholic. Jesus’ life on earth centered on caring for the poor and marginalized. No one was and is outside his compassion. As he said, “It is mercy I desire, not sacrifice.”
God bless all who read this. Lord, please guide us. Jesus, I trust in you!
Melissa's story: God loves me just the way I am
My story began a little over forty-seven years ago. I was born into a Catholic family in Albany, New York. My sense of heritage was quickly developed because of an extremely close relationship with my Irish-American maternal grandfather. Unfortunately, he passed away when I was only nine years old. He was critical in my early childhood development because of the volatile relationship that often existed at home between my parents. My grandfather seemed to be the one person that I could always rely on, who loved me without reservation, and would be there when I needed him. I loved him so very much, and wanted to be just like him when I grew up.
He was an almost legendary figure in the family, combining a strong Irish personality with an unparalleled athleticism and an unshakeable faith in God. After he passed away, I frequently felt alone. This became increasingly problematic, since even before he passed away, I had already begun to develop a sense that not everything was right with me.
At about age five I began to develop a sense of my gender, and it was completely at odds with the little boy that I had so far become. I wasn’t initially concerned, however, as I thought it was possible that every other boy felt exactly this same way. While I hadn’t told anyone, by age nine when my grandfather died, I knew differently. My third grade teacher had already told our class about Christine Jorgensen, the first well known transsexual.
At the time of my grandfather’s death I was quite sure of three things: First, my sense of gender did not match the boy that I was increasingly becoming; second, this mismatch was generally considered odd or worse by others, and seemingly was experienced by only a few; and third, I knew what it took to be a man, because a simply wonderful man, my grandfather and role model, had just died. He was considered by everyone to be a man’s man, and in the wake of his death, I never wanted anything more than to be just like him. I missed him so much. I decided that I would honor my grandfather while avoiding the embarrassment of being a transsexual, by being just like him. Unfortunately, my depth of knowledge of my grandfather was very limited because I was still a child at the time of his death, and after his death no one in the family ever spoke much of him in front of the older grandchildren in order to spare us the pain. My understanding of this man was not in any way nuanced or sophisticated, which proved to be very limiting in developing a more complete male persona during adolescence and adulthood.
My difficulty in developing a more mature male persona was unimportant in the end, as my sense of gender dysphoria increased in both intensity and frequency steadily throughout these years. I am very confident that these would have continued to overwhelm me, and prevent me from ever successfully becoming a male. While I eventually became accomplished in several things male, it never did come very easy to me because it all felt so unnatural and uncomfortable. Essentially, everything I did was learned by mimicry. This confidence is additionally reinforced by recent scientific research, which has indicated that the transsexual condition is acquired before birth and can be readily seen in the differences in certain brain structures that are associated with the endocrine system. This segues very well with the conclusion drawn by the vast majority of mental health professionals who work extensively with transsexual clients and strongly believe that it cannot be eliminated through psychotherapy.
In many ways, the part of my grandfather that I most wanted to emulate was his strong faith in God. I desperately wanted to be reunited with him someday in the afterlife and I knew I would have to be a good Catholic to get there. His faith always seemed to give him a sense of peace and unflappability that other people simply didn’t possess. I’ve always found the Catholic Church to be so filled with imagery, whether in it’s painting or sculpture, or it’s scripture. The Catholic religion itself seems to have many more icons than any other monotheistic religion. I suspect it’s probably because of its long rich history, and its large membership. Trying to grow up as a good Catholic with this increasingly developing and expanding transsexual nature along for the ride, soon became impossible because it clashed so much with the imagery. I would always listen intently to scripture at Sunday Mass, and would hear about the many images, both good and bad, i.e., the story of the sheep and the goats.
I soon came to believe that being transsexual was morally wrong because it seemed to conflict with the laws of God and nature. Another problem about being transsexual is that it seemed to be so much more than I, or anyone else for that matter, should or could ever hope to handle; and God wouldn’t do that to anyone, right? Why would God want to make someone transsexual, anyway? As I got a little older I began to equate being transsexual with being homosexual. It was just something that happened to some unfortunate people, but they could stop it, couldn’t they? Wasn’t it just a lifestyle choice? Weren’t they living an evil life? Weren’t they sinning?
The intensity of my transsexual feelings definitely got stronger and more difficult to overcome as I got older largely because of the changes brought about by adolescence and puberty. As my body began to change, it got further and further away from where I wanted it, and more importantly, where I felt it needed to be. To compound matters, the body I wanted and felt like belonged to me, was becoming increasingly visible in the girls my own age. As I got older, the changes that took place in my body were most unwelcome, which seemed to be completely contrary to the experience of the other boys my age who welcomed and even relished these changes as they occurred. I felt more and more distant from the other boys my age, even though I was becoming a man, just like them.
My feelings of being transsexual often overwhelmed me. No matter what I did, I couldn’t stop or get rid of this growing sensation. My thoughts were constantly centered on it, with the implication that everything was just horribly wrong with me. These transsexual thoughts were almost an automatic thought process. Little nor nothing could trigger it. If my mind wasn’t otherwise focused or occupied, it seemed to almost naturally gravitate to these thoughts. I never had any rest from them, and peace in my life was a completely foreign notion. In many ways, this soon became almost as much a part of me as eating, drinking, sleeping, and breathing. It was me and I couldn’t control it, despite my believing that it was morally wrong and against the basic tenets of my Catholic faith, which I wanted to uphold so desperately.
I would hear about the peace of God every Saturday in CCD and Sunday in Mass, but it seemed to be completely elusive and something that I would never find. I never had even one moment’s rest from myself. My feelings about myself quickly progressed from frustration to anger, to self-hatred, to worthlessness, to my possibly being a sinner who was doomed to spend eternity in hell. My life wasn’t worth living, and I couldn’t stand myself any longer. Thoughts of suicide, which I also knew to be morally wrong, began to grow. I honestly wasn’t sure whether it was morally better to live with these feelings, or whether it would just be better to be dead. Despite all this, I still tried to love God as much as possible. I hadn’t lost all hope just yet. However, I didn’t realize how impossible this was to do, loving God and hating myself. Since I knew it was important to love God as much as I loved myself, I thought it might be okay if I simply loved him so much more.
A major event occurred in my Catholic life at about thirteen, when I went to a Saturday afternoon confession. In the confessional, a visiting priest indicated that he was determined to help the children and youth of the parish make better confessions. He would do this by taking the initiative and asking a series of questions from which we were simply to answer yes or no. While I initially thought this was odd, I went along. However, I soon became increasingly uncomfortable. The questioning seemed to get more and more strange. After a few moments, I had already been asked about whether I had ever had sex, or even had ever masturbated. I became very fearful of the direction that the questioning was apparently heading. Before I knew it, he asked me the big question, whether I was homosexual, or had any experience with any other sexually deviant practices. While he didn’t specifically mention being transsexual among those sexually deviant practices, I felt that I could not answer no to him without lying. I did not know what to do. After a minor pause, which was probably unnoticeable, I lied. When I left the confessional I felt horrible. I had lied to a priest. This was significant enough, but even more so, and what truly made it a seminal event for me was that by asking about these unnamed sexually deviant practices, the implication was very clear. I was sinning against God.
This was so very troublesome because I had always left myself a little wiggle room since I never truly knew, nor truly wanted to know, whether being transsexual itself was a sin. I now had incontrovertible proof in the form of this confession that I was sinning against God, and I strongly suspected it was a very big sin, especially because the priest seemed so earnest about the confession. I couldn’t even take comfort in the fact that I didn’t really do anything to pursue my transsexuality. I had only occasionally read some book or magazine articles to get more information to better understand it. Hopefully, I would be able to get it under control, or even better, get rid of it. However, I believed that this was a sin because of my constant thoughts about it, and not because of my actions, per se.
Once I became absolutely convinced of the seriousness of my situation, I started to become ashamed and completely despondent. Over the next few years I lost all hope for anything positive to come of my life, and I started to change for the worse. While I never lost faith in God, it became very hard to love him any longer. In reality, I became very fearful of God. The other major cost during this period was my relationship with my grandfather, which up until this period I was able to keep alive within me. Now it started to die. I knew he could not be proud of or love his grandson any longer. During this period, I really needed to talk with a professional psychologist about being transsexual, and perhaps more importantly, with a priest or other religious, because my faith had been completely shaken, and was on the verge of collapse. I became completely distant in every relationship of my life. The nature of the relationship didn’t matter.
While I really needed considerable professional help, I was trapped because my transsexual secret still seemed to be something I couldn’t share with anyone. At this time, I thought that with all the changes that were occurring to me, it would be obvious to many people around me, but in hindsight, I think I was mistaken. I’m sure that any people who noticed these changes occur simply attributed them to the volatility of passing through puberty. I suppose at this time especially, I was crying out for someone to talk to, someone to help me address these issues. Unfortunately, to be a transsexual means to be quiet, ashamed, alone, and oftentimes, completely desperate. Without a doubt, what I most needed was a priest or other religious to tell me convincingly that God loves me just the way I am.
Many years passed and making contact with anyone about being transsexual still seemed absolutely impossible. In fact, the biggest single step that I have taken on my journey of transition, which I began a few years ago after I thought I was going to kill myself, was to make that first contact. In my case, it was a call to a caring, compassionate, understanding and knowledgeable psychologist. This was only the first step. A later step, certainly of equal importance, was when my psychologist introduced me to a sister who told me convincingly of how much God loves me.
My life now has meaning. I have been reconciled to my grandfather, and know that he is in fact proud of me. Most of all, I am again a good Catholic, completely in love with God. I am most definitely a Catholic where it counts most, in my heart. I believe without a doubt and without hesitation, and completely in the Apostles Creed. While I might diverge with the theological beliefs of some, I have complete confidence that I am abiding by God’s will for me on what has been an extremely difficult and, at times, tortuous journey.
Today, I have much more mundane concerns about my faith that I’m sure are reflective of many other Catholics. Sometimes my sense of God is so alive within me that it seems to burn, and other times it seems to weaken and grow cold. I can feel so good when it is fervent, and so bad when it is weak. I wish it could be strong and steady all the time. I truly love God, and only want to do his will. While I’m not always sure exactly what that is, I still want to do it, and I pray for his guidance. I firmly believe that his will, in part, is for me to resolve my transsexual dilemma and finally find a little peace and rest in my life.
Dawn's story: A spiritual Catch-22
I remember Fr. O’Reilly standing behind his large desk, pushing himself upright on fingers splayed out on the green blotter, imposing even without the stark, black cassock. He seemed to be so very tall, as most grown men are to a five year old. “Why are you here?” he asked in a not unkind voice. “I disobeyed Mother Superior,” I mumbled, quickly averting my eyes to the floor. “Yes, but why?” he pressed. “I wanted to play with the girls.” I said. “But you are not a girl,” he said, “and you should be thankful God chose to make you a boy. It is much better to be a boy and you should do as Mother Superior says and play with the boys.” “I don’t want to play with the boys. They make fun of me and I don’t like their games,” I cried. “You must play with the other boys. That is how you will learn to be the man God wants you to be.” “No, I will not be a man!”
“It is sinful to not do what God wants us to do. God made you a boy and you must be a boy. You must put away these sinful thoughts and pray that God gives you the strength to obey his will for you. If you don’t, you will go to Hell.” He moved out from behind the desk and walked toward me, exposing the wooden paddle he often used to reinforce his commands. “I’m going to help you remember this lesson, help you understand the pain of disobeying God’s will.”
That day in 1951 I learned that being different was dangerous. That day I learned the feelings I had of being a girl were wrong and not according to God’s will for me. I learned the way I felt was unnatural, that the feelings I had not asked for nor cultivated, the feelings that were just there inside me, were evil, something to be ashamed of and thus hidden away. That day I began to construct the façade that allowed me to hide in plain sight for over fifty years.
I am a cradle Catholic, second boy of parents who converted as adults. My mother was extremely devout and saw to it that her children went to Catholic school. She believed in and loved the Catholic Church and taught her sons to love it, too. And I did love the Church. I trusted that if I did as Fr. O’Reilly had demanded I would be happy being a boy. I began to pray the rosary each night asking Mary to help me feel happy that I was born a boy. But still in my heart, I really hoped I would wake up a girl. But all the prayer did not help. I failed at being the boy I was supposed to be. The other children, boys and girls, sensed I was different, called me “sissy” and shunned me. I became a loner, a small wisp of a boy inhabiting the margins of the playground. I succeeded at the only thing I could. I made good grades.
My parents were very focused on my older brother who was born with severe asthma and had barely survived rheumatic fever and polio. My mother knew our faith had saved him. As long as I brought home good report cards and no bad notes from the sisters, they were happy with me and didn’t noticed that I was always alone. My effort to plaster over the ache in my heart worked until my brother was diagnosed with bone cancer.
Dean had just turned fourteen and I was eleven. Mother and I said the rosary together each night, asking Mary to intervene, but Dean did not get better. His leg had to be amputated, but mother urged me to continue to pray for him, and I did. My parents began to spend every available moment at the hospital with him. Being such a good, quiet child, I was allowed to stay home alone after school. One afternoon I happened to see an article in the newspaper about Christine Jorgensen, the first well-known transsexual. Doctors had turned a man into a woman. All my stifled dreams and wishes came rushing back. If God let doctors operate on a man and make him into a woman, how could it be a sin for me to want to be a girl? For the first time, despite Fr. O’Reilly’s warning of God’s wrath, I crossdressed in my mother’s clothes. And it felt good. I looked in the mirror and finally liked the person I saw. That night I prayed for God to let my brother live and to let me find a way to be a girl.
But neither prayer was answered. One day, after I had again worn my mother’s clothes, she came home and told me Dean had died. Suddenly, I knew Father had been right. I knew God had taken my brother as punishment for my grave sin. At confession the next day, the priest told me that my sin had not caused my brother’s death, but that it would lead to my damnation if I did not live as the boy God made me.
I tried. Though I had been a wimpy boy who never played sports, I decided to become one who did. I discovered that God had given me a body that responded well to exercise. I found a neighbor who was a gifted athlete in many sports, particularly football, the sport a real boy must play. I soon impressed him with my desire to learn from him.
A year later, I began high school and earned a starting position on the junior varsity football team. Suddenly, I became part of the in-crowd, a jock, and a desirable date for all the right girls. By the time I graduated, I had earned letters in football, track, and tennis, was elected to numerous leadership positions, was voted a senior favorite and won a congressional appointment to the US Air Force Academy, which was all-male at that time. There I excelled again, playing football, soccer, rugby, as well as earning academic honors. I was doing all the things a cadet was supposed to do. And I did them far better than most. I became engaged to my high school sweetheart and we planned to marry in the Cadet Chapel graduation day. I should have been happy, but I wasn’t.
All that time, I prayed for God to hear the pain in my heart, the ache that would not go away. Daily Mass and Communion did not seem to help. No matter how hard I tried, a moment’s lapse in concentration and a small voice that seemed to come from my soul would tell me I was not really happy. I assumed I had not yet made up for my sins, that I had not yet become the man God wanted me to be. I prayed that marrying my soul mate would be the answer. But again my prayers were not answered. The morning after our wedding, I awoke to the familiar ache. Two months later, as I began flight training, having achieved the dreams of so many young men, I plunged into depression and made my first attempt at suicide. After I was released from the base hospital, I went to Mass often, hoping that receiving communion would help.
But it did not. God did not seem to care that I was hurting, even as I earned my Air Force wings, a most manly accomplishment. I began to feel nothing at Mass. I had done everything a boy and man are supposed to do and still the ache was in my heart. I was becoming angry with God and the Church.
I left the Air Force and began a new career as an engineer. My wife sensed my unhappiness and hoped that a child would strengthen our marriage. I became a father and worked hard to be a good one. I think I was, though I would not let my wife have our daughter baptized in the Catholic Church. I was too angry with a church and a God that would reward my long struggle to be a man with such unhappiness in my soul.
I began to run away from life. I put in long hours at work and rapidly rose through the company ranks. I provided well for my family. Though I was falling away from the Church, I continued to pray to Mary, asking her, a woman, to intervene. A callus built up on my soul, but nothing would stop the ache. Finally, I no longer went to Church because it became like sixty minutes of institutionalized pain, each time slowly reopening the wound on my soul only to pour in religious salt.
Gradually I fell into depression, spiraling ever downward. After thirty years of marriage, I finally told my wife why I was so sad in spite of all her efforts and all my successes. She quickly withdrew from me and I descended further into depression. The engineering firm I had worked so hard to build began to struggle since I could not maintain the level of effort it had come to depend upon. I was unable to prevent our purchase by a larger firm which also foundered. I lost all the investment I had made in my company. Then I lost my job and soon after, our financial stability. A year later, after several suicide attempts by both my wife and me, our marriage ended.
I was alone and lost. I had nowhere to turn except back to the Church. I returned to Mass and prayed for healing. And once again the Church let me down. I found a priest in my small town and told him I was a transsexual and I needed to feel that God would understand I must live as a woman if I am to live at all. He blandly told me that I had been born a man, would always be a man in God’s eyes, and that I should just look between my legs and I would know that. He told me I must not act on my feelings, that altering my body or living as a woman would be sinful, that I should work harder at being a good Catholic, at attending Mass, at prayer, asking for strength to follow God’s will. The words of Fr. O’Reilly all over again. My fifty years of trying to follow them was still not enough to satisfy the Church.
A few days later, I was in the mental ward of the VA hospital in New Orleans. I felt rejected by God; unable to be the man he wanted me to be. I was in a spiritual Catch-22, a Catholic double bind: I could not continue to live as a man and my Church would condemn me to Hell if I tried to live as a woman. I wanted to die, to stop the pain, but that too was a mortal sin. It seemed no matter what I did, I would be forever in pain.
It was at that point that Sister Monica entered my life. A friend tried to persuade me for many months before I finally agreed to meet her. Somehow my heart overcame my fear of once again being hurt by a member of the Catholic clergy.
I will never forget that night when her ministry began to impact me. I wrote in my journal the next day: “Since I left you Saturday morning, I have had such a feeling of joy and hope for the future. You touched something in me, perhaps finding a small ember of faith in the Church still glowing after all those years.
With Sister Monica’s help, I began to believe that I could come back to the Church as Dawn, and subsequently I attended Mass with her at her church in New Orleans East. The pastor and the congregation accepted me and welcomed me to their fold. That day I began to feel welcome in God’s house. Coming to terms with my Catholic faith at last freed me to move forward with my transition. Instead of waking each morning regretting that God did not take me during the night, I am anxious to get up and face the day, for being alive is now a miracle instead of a curse. I like what I see in the mirror, a fifty plus woman who will at last be able to enjoy her true spirit. My friends tell me they can see the difference in my face and hear the happiness in my voice.
But being a transsexual and trying to practice my Catholic faith is not easy. The church fathers continue to parrot Fr. O’Reilly’s words. Though intellectually, I now know that the men in Rome are not the entire Church, their words can still hurt me/
I am a transsexual, yet I am many things. I am a sissy, a crybaby, the butt of jokes and fodder for the Catholic school bullies. I am a high school jock, a college football player, an intramural boxer and rugby player. I am a warrior, an Air Force Academy graduate, a Vietnam veteran, a GIB, the guy in the back of an F4 Phantom “Goose” flying behind Tom Cruise. I am a professional engineer registered in six states. I am a businessperson, executive vice president of a large engineering company that provided livelihoods for over a thousand people. I am a leader, active in my community and profession, serving in chambers of commerce, charities and professional associations. I am a teacher, instructing future teachers how to use computers and the Internet to improve their classrooms. I have a doctorate in Instructional Design and Development, which clarifies how the way we think influences the way we learn on the web.
I am a transsexual, sixty-five years old, yet just a few years into my new life as a woman. I am also a cradle Catholic, raised in the Church according to the Baltimore Catechism, missing Latin and not understanding Vatican II. I am a husband, wed in the Catholic Church to my high school sweetheart and married for almost thirty-four years. I am the father of one child, a now thirty-five year old daughter who is not a cradle Catholic because I would not let her be baptized as an infant. I am a fallen-away Catholic, though I am still desperately trying to find a spiritual home within the Church. I am all of these things at once. But for the Catholic Church, the only thing that has mattered all my life and all that still matters is that I am a transsexual.
Can I choose not to be a transsexual? Let me answer this way. Friends who are not Catholic often ask me why I want to be part of a Church that does not value me for who I am, a Church that declares me, like they do gay people, to be something disordered, an abomination. The answer is that I can be no other. From my earliest memories I have known the Catholic Church as the Church. I cannot change my faith and I cannot change my being transsexual. I have always been a Catholic and I have always been a transsexual. I can only choose to die trying to live a lie, or to live the way that makes my soul sing.
Could I have chosen not to have surgery? I feel strongly that I had to have this surgery if I was to have a body that is one with my soul. Though the Church considers this surgery “superficial”, changing nothing, for me it is life giving. At long last I see a body that truly reflects the person I am. If I am blessed to find another soul mate, that person will see me the way I want them to see me. I am, at least in the state’s eyes, for at least some of society’s legal necessities, a woman. Two not inconsequential examples: I can at last be able to go to the bathroom without breaking the law and my hormone prescriptions are covered by insurance. Still the Church considers this “choice” sinful, disfiguring the body God made for me.
I still pray that someday the Church fathers will open their hearts and truly welcome my trans brothers and sisters and me home, home to the fullness of our wonderful Catholic faith.
Dawn Elizabeth Wright
SPIRITUALITY
Welcome to the (potluck) banquet
A woman whose fear has kept her away from a community where she could acknowledge her own goodness finds support , friendship, and affirmation when she reaches out to Deb. Although she never made it to the potluck, she found a friend who loved and respected her for who she was.
My husband and I are part of the Diocesan Catholic Ministry with Gay and Lesbian Persons monthly potluck host team, and we are members of the Parent Support Group team as well. I sent our bishop a note, along with this tribute to a friend, saying I know he hears our group should not be seen or heard, but by being “out”’ we can help bring peace to those who need us. In answering me, he reminded me, that although she had not made it to a potluck supper, she had indeed been "welcomed to the great banquet."
My friend died this week. I had not known her long, but her life touched mine, and I will miss her. She reached out to me in September, beginning the phone conversation in the same way a few others had: “What do you people do at those potlucks, and who comes?” I never know how the conversation will go after that ... but in her case, it was the beginning of a friendship.
My friend was a retired Catholic school teacher with chronic health problems. I had gone to school with her younger sister. She had taught my younger brother. We connected quickly. She worried at first that I would recognize her name, and then later appreciated the fact that we had so much in common.
She was finally coming to terms with the fact that she was lesbian. She told me she had kept the bulletin announcement with my name and phone number in it for four months before she got the courage to call. She told me on the first call that she had not shared with anyone her "secret." That she had not spoken it aloud, until she called me.
We visited on the phone for an hour the first call, then again about two weeks later for another hour. She came out to one of her sisters between calls, and was so grateful that her sister had been kind and loving and told her this was not a big issue and that she should have shared earlier ... and that she was loved.
In the beginning, I invited her to our monthly ministry potluck. She told me she was afraid that coming out to a crowd was more than she could deal with. I told her she would be fine, as the potluck includes family and friends, supportive parishioners. No one would make any assumptions from her being there. She said she would try, but lost her courage.
The next few months her health issues were worse, and it was not until February that we got together for lunch and a three hour visit. She shared with me her story, and her fear that Who She Was would take her straight to hell. This was not a woman who had been away from church. She was a religious order auxiliary, and had a committed prayer life and strong faith. She was concerned because a few months before we met, she felt love for the first time, and it was for another woman. Nothing had happened, she knew her love interest had not felt the same way, nothing had happened, and yet she feared for her soul.
I spent a lot of the time we had together reminding her that she was as God made her, that she was loved, and that the Father cared for her. We spoke every few weeks, sometimes just for a quick reminder that it was "potluck" week, sometimes for more "soul sharing" conversations. She never made it to a potluck supper; her health and her wariness just didn’t allow it. But she never gave up, telling me each time, "I will try; I really want to come."
I left a message for her on Tuesday that the potluck was a week late because of Easter. She didn’t call back, but that was not uncommon when her health was at its worst. I found her obituary on Sunday and hoped that she died in peace, knowing the Father loves her. He does; I just hope she felt it.
Deb Word
A mother's experience
A daughter comes out in college and starts her mother and father on a path of understanding.
Twelve years ago my daughter Gretchen invited me to come to Purdue University for dinner to celebrate my birthday. She was taking summer classes and working at Whirlpool so she remained on campus. The next semester she would begin her senior year.
Following dinner she gave me my gift, a book titled Straight Parents; Gay Children. I couldn’t believe my eyes. After an uncomfortable period of silence, I asked her if she were trying to tell me something. As she nodded, I asked her if she were sure to which she responded, “Mom, are you sure you’re heterosexual?” Since I had never questioned my sexuality, I was certain she had and now understood what had been puzzling her for some time.
I hugged her, told her that I loved her and it didn’t change my feelin
gs for her. The only thing different was I had more information about her now. She asked me to prepare her dad because she wanted to talk to him soon. She wanted to talk to her brothers individually.
When our children “come out of the closet,” we as parents go in. For several years I remained silent on the subject but did read a number of books to try to understand and accept. I was dealing with the death of a dream I had of my daughter marrying some day.
Late in October seven years ago, my husband and I traveled to Boulder Creek, California to have an early Christmas visit with our daughter, since she would not have enough vacation days at her place of employment to be able to come home. I selected a simple cross with Chanel set diamonds on a gold chain for Gretchen’s gift. She said she really appreciated the thought and the gift but that she could not accept the cross because it was not about who she was any more. My eyes filled with tears; I could hardly speak. I could see the disappointment in my husband’s eyes. Feeling rejected by our church, Gretchen felt her only recourse was to leave the church.
This was the beginning of a journey by my husband and me to learn as much as we could about homosexuality. My husband saw an announcement in the newspaper of a meeting being held where clergy from local churches were invited to speak on their particular denomination’s vision of gays in their church. During the Q&A period of the meeting, my husband asked, “When you don’t use the pulpit to preach against homophobia, aren’t you contributing to it?”
Those attending immediately applauded bringing my husband to tears. The panel of clergy agreed that they were remiss and, yes maybe they were part of the problem.
Like many other conscientious and concerned Catholics, we feel called to be voices that question and challenge.
When members of faith communities gather and sing the song, “All Are Welcome,” do we really mean that? Does the church not understand the need to have a ministry that includes all people regardless of their sexual orientation? My husband and I pray and work towards the day when all are welcomed as full and equal members in the sacramental, spiritual and social life of our Church and local communities.
Rita Wagner