TransEpiscopal

Celebrating Victory, Pursuing Truth

2012-01-20T01:05:00.000-05:00

Speeches in the Senate Reading Room

By the Rev. Dr. Cameron Partridge
cross-posted at Walking with Integrity

On this bright January morning, as the hour of 11am neared,I emerged from Boston’s Park Street T stop, turned left and began walking upthe hill toward the State House. Today(or rather, at this late hour, yesterday) marked the ceremonial signing of the Transgender Equality bill here in Massachusetts. This legislation, first filed in 2007, passed on November 15^th,and officially signed on November 23^rd, adds gender identity andexpression to the state’s existing hate crimes law and the nondiscriminationstatutes in the areas of housing, employment, education and credit. In afitting twist, the week of its official passage was also Transgender AwarenessWeek, a time of educational and community events leading up to the eleventhannual observance of Trans Day of Remembrance on November 20th.

The Senate Reading Room, where today’s signing took place,was packed with observers, a joyful crowd savoring the celebration. Lawmakers were clearly also buoyed, astheir inspiring comments demonstrated. “You have no idea how beautiful you are as you stand here beaming,” saidstate Auditor Suzanne Bump. “Remember that you are powerful,” offered Senator Brian Downing,followed by fellow Senator Sonia Chang Diaz: “it's days like this that remindus why we ran for office... Thank you for reminding us [legislators] of our ownpower, in addition to showing us your power.” Representative Byron Rushing, who joined Representative CarlSciortino in co-sponsoring the bill from its very first days, declared, “thishasn't just been a discussion of gender identity but of the identity ofMassachusetts, and hopefully it will become a discussion of our nationalidentity.”

Representative Rushing, photo from masstpc.org

In his Episcopal Church context, as a longtime member of theDiocese of Massachusetts’ deputation to General Convention– Deputy Rushing inspires us to pose thatquestion of church identity. Faithcommunities can ask, and indeed are asking, what do we stand for as people ofour respective traditions? In theEpiscopal Church we might well ask—and have asked at the 2009 GeneralConvention and various diocesan conventions before it– what does it mean todeclare in our baptismal covenant that we strive for justice and respect thedignity of every human being? In 2009 the Convention passed resolutions puttingThe Episcopal Church on record in support of transgender equality in the civicsphere (D012 and C048), and pledging within our ecclesial life to makeadministrative forms accessible to gender identities beyond male and female andto protect transgender lay employees from discrimination (D090 and D032,respectively). As our collectiveconversation continues, we might allow the varied lives of transgender as wellas intersex people – communities and individuals whose lives are textured notsimply by complex embodiments of gender but also by race, class, sexuality andability-- to deepen our understanding of the human person. How do we interpret and live out themystery of being created in the image and likeness of God?

At the signing this morning, I was reminded of a startlingmoment in the November 15 debate that I watched on my laptop. RepresentativeSciortino was speaking movingly in support of the legislation when he began todescribe the Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR) held at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul the year before. He made apoint of detailing the apology that my bishop, the Right Rev. M.Thomas Shaw, had offered on behalf of Christians who had condemned trans peopleand in the process had “misrepresented God to” us. The apology had been stunning enough in its own right, but tohear it reported, in some sense repeated, on the floor of the House ofRepresentatives, was positively astounding. As I sat there dumbfounded—actually, calling out to mypartner to come see this!-- receiving these words afresh in anunimagined context, I was reminded of a strangely parallel moment at GeneralConvention three years earlier. The Convention had managed to pass D012, the Trans Civil RightsResolution, on the same day that the Massachusetts Judiciary Committee washolding a hearing on its own Trans Equality legislation—an earlier version ofwhat has now finally passed. As a team of trans people and allies worked toward the resolution’s passage in Anaheim, a fellow Episcopalian in Massachusettslearned about it (on his laptop, while waiting to testify in the stultifyingheat) and shared it in the course of his testimonythree thousand miles away. TheEpiscopal Church supports this bill, he was proud to be able to say. It all came full circle.

Also on my mind today were the words (viewable here as blurry video),offered by Bishop Shaw at this year’s TDOR. Speaking at theend of the program, he welcomed us to the Cathedral and then offered a word ofgratitude that felt almost like a meditation: “because of your honesty, becauseof your integrity, because of the way you so pursue the truth of your identity,you tell me about the nature of God, because that is how I think God is. And so I thank all of you not only forthe way that you enlighten my understanding of God but how much you preach tothe rest of the world about courage, and about bravery, and about truth andabout perseverance of identity. Weowe all of you a huge debt of gratitude. Thank you.”

I got the sense people were both honored and stunned by hiswords, working to digest and contemplate them— I know I was. His comments about perseverancein pursuit of the truth of identity—language I had not heard him use before—reminded me of words from the Gospel of John that I first really took in at amiddle school summer Bible camp: “you shall know the truth and the truth shallmake you free” (Jn 8:32).

From this chair, at the end of this day, looking out at the striking vista of falling snow, it strikes me how the process of knowing the truth and beingfreed by it is both lifelong and communal—by turns grueling and wondrous, andinextricably relational, even as it is distinctive to each person.

Governor Deval Patrick signs the bill, photo from masstpc.org

An important truth about the MA trans equality law is thatit is far from perfect: it does not include protections in publicaccommodations—access to public gender segregated spaces. Everyone was resolved to come back and getthat done. And as I think abouthow far we have come, how much more free we are than we were just a few shortmonths ago, I know that what we need more than anything else is the will, the support, the conviction to keep pursuing the truth.

CP

In Massachusetts, An Unfolding Dream

2011-11-15T19:18:00.000-05:00

It's been a tense, exciting day in the Boston area as thelegislation known as the "Transgender Equal Rights Bill" makes itsway out of the Judiciary Committee for the first time in six years. The bill is heading to the legislaturewith a vote expected tonight or tomorrow as the winter recess approaches.

Yesterday the BostonGlobe and BostonHerald reported on the impending vote, and thismorning both papers reported on dueling press conferences in whichthe bill's opponents called the vote a "distraction" from economicissues. When one suchrepresentative argued, "The goals of the advocates is to have thislitigated in the courts,” he was confronted by Ken and Marcia Garber. The Garbers' transgender son was, asthe Globe explained,"bullied and discriminated against before he lost hislife to a drug overdoes at the age of 20." When the representative"said he did not have time to answer their question because he was late toa meeting," the Garbers, faithful members of Dignity Boston,"challenged Lombardo’s contention that the transgender bill is a distractionfrom bills that would protect the state’s economic future, [saying] 'Some ofthese people will never have a future if they don’t do something' to pass thelegislation."

The trans community had strong victories late last Springwith Connecticut and Nevada added to the ranks of the now fifteen states and 132counties and cities with nondiscriminationand hate crimes protections.

This drama happens to be unfolding during Massachusetts'"TransgenderAwareness Week," in which a number of colleges, universities andother community spaces are holding trans-themed events. The culmination of the week is thetwelfth annual observance of the Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR). Though international in scope, the TDORmovement was sparked by a death here in Allston, about a mile away from where Iwrite. Rocker Rita Hesterwas murdered on November 28, 1998 almost three years to the day after the lossof Chanelle Pickett on November 20, 1995. A growing number of Episcopal (and other) congregations have beenhosting TDOR events in solidarity with trans communities, even as theobservances themselves usually avoid the languages, music or imagery ofspecific (or at least any one) religious traditions. Indeed, in his TDOR welcome at a packed Cathedral Church of St.Paul last November, Bishop M. Thomas Shaw offered an apology to thegathered community for the ways in which Christian communities in particularhave failed to welcome trans people and have, as he put it,"misrepresented God" to us. I posted a piece about that TDOR here.

This Sunday the Boston TDOR will take place once again atthe Cathedral Church of St. Paul.

Today Bishop Shaw reiterated his support, that of theEpiscopal Diocese of Massachusetts (as of its 2008 Convention), and that of TheEpiscopal Church (as of the 2009 General Convention) for the legislation. His statement reads,

"Hopeful that after six years the transgender equalrights bill will come to the Massachusetts Legislature for a vote this week, Icontinue to urge lawmakers to support it. Now is the time to carry civil liberty for all people another stepforward by safeguarding the equality and honoring the human dignity oftransgender people. Passing thebill this week will serve as a powerful sign of hope, particularly as TransgenderDay of Remembrance is being observed at our Cathedral Church of St. Paul inBoston this Sunday. I pray thatMassachusetts will open this new door this week so that we might step throughit together toward social justice for all."

The full text of the statement is available on the Diomasswebsite, here.

As it so happens, Sunday is also one of the major examplesof what I call "hinge days" in the liturgical year, those days in theChristian calendar that form us with peculiar intensity as we move from oneliturgical season to the next. November 20th marks the last Sunday after Pentecost, otherwise known asthe Feast of Christ the King or the Reign (or perhaps, as Verna Dozier mightput it, the Dream) of Christ. Sunday's gospel text from Matthew 25 issues the ultimatechallenge of justice from the Son of Humanity, enthroned in eschatalogicalsplendor: will we feed the hungry,clothe the naked, give drink to the thirsty, welcome the stranger, visit theimprisoned? As we "do it untothe least of these," we "do it unto" Christ, we are remindedwith unsettling specificity.

As the battle over this legislation heats up, I find myselfseeking to be present to it as a holy time and space, as an invitation to be,as Bishop Shaw often puts it, opened. It strikes me that this openness is not simply a static state of welcomeand inclusion, but an ongoing process of being opened, transformed byGod, ushered into new ways of being in the world, into a new time andspace that Christians name as the reign or dream of God. That notion ofopenness is unsettling and challenging indeed, but hopeful and promising beyondour wildest imaginings. May it be—mayit become – so.

Chaz on Becoming

2011-05-13T15:31:00.001-04:00

In a banner week in which the governor of Hawaii signed a workplace nondiscrimination bill into law, and in which the legislature in Nevada is debating a similar measure, the biggest transgender-related news is coming from Chaz Bono. That’s because the documentary about his transition, Becoming Chaz, premiered Tuesday night on the Oprah Winfrey Network, and Chaz has been everywhere this week promoting it.

The few reviews I’ve read have found their way into the film via people other than Chaz. His partner Jennifer has been a fascinating figure for some, and Cher has for others. I haven’t read any reflections on his siblings, but they would be bridge figures for still other viewers of the film like, say, my sister. It makes sense—if you’re not trans (and even if you are), you might have a hard time relating to Chaz, but you could more easily imagine yourself in the position of those who have a relationship with him.

But as a transman myself, Chaz was the one on which I knew I would be primarily focused. Because he’s the son of celebrities, having grown up under completely different circumstances than did I or anyone I know, I honestly wasn’t sure how well I would relate. More than that, I was concerned that because of its celebrity connections, this film had the potential to feed into the mass media’s sensationalistic appetites. Given all that, I was fascinated how little this film actually does falls into that trap, and how Chaz and Jenny come across as remarkably down to earth and authentic, very human amid a fair bit of drama. Chaz is very clearly and simply himself, take it or leave it. So too is Jennifer. The two of them have been through a lot both individually and as a couple, and they’re remarkably honest about that.

I was intrigued — and oddly relieved — to hear that there nevertheless were aspects of the film that stretched their own comfort zones when they saw it after the fact. In the interview with Rosie O’Donnell after the Oprah channel premier, Chaz talked about the difficulty at first of seeing an argument that unfolded over kitchen preparations for Jenny’s graduation party. But then as he watched it again, he came to see the argument as a real portrayal of where he and Jenny were at that moment. That comment to O’Donnell conveyed a revealing sense of perspective, a sense that Chaz knows he was in a different space then and will be in a still different one down the road. Comments like those suggest to me that he takes his “becoming” very seriously, and in a much broader and deeper sense than transition alone.

Chaz has been through some seriously choppy life waters, and while he doesn’t put it this way, his remarks about previous eras of his life suggest that he has had to make a practice of seeking perspective. He has had to make a practice of accepting himself for who he is. When he said at one point that he didn’t want to lose anyone because of his decision to transition but knew that he had to make the decision regardless, I thought, yeah, I know what you’re talking about. You don’t get to a place like that, you don’t arrive at such a crossroad, without having done a ton of work-- discernment.

I also appreciated how Chaz did not present himself as speaking for every transman, let alone every trans person. In one scene, as he spoke at what I believe was a Transgender Day of Remembrance event in West Hollywood, I was impressed with the way he got up and described himself as a newcomer to the community, not presuming to speak for others, and acknowledging that tons of organizing and community building had preceded his arrival on the scene, in many ways making that arrival possible.

That said, there were some assertions in the film with which I disagreed. The misleading graphic listing the side-effects of testosterone failed to distinguish those that affect transmen alone (e.g. the need to monitor liver function) from those that all nontrans men have to watch (e.g. cholesterol). I wasn't crazy about the film's repeated use of “breast removal” language; as a result, many reviewers are now using it in a way that can subtly reinforce the judgment that this surgery is merely a form of “amputation” (or, worse, “mutilation"). Simply sticking to the term “chest reconstruction” would have been more straight forward. Chaz also made a few universalizing comments about the relational effects of testosterone, saying things about his insights into male/female difference that reminded me of remarks I once heard on the infamous testosterone episode of This American Life. All I could think was, Stop! Don’t go there! Trans folks don’t know any more about what “really” differentiates the sexes, where “really” means “biologically,” than anyone else. What I think we do have a chance to see at particularly close range is how gender gets culturally organized, how intricately, concretely, differentially, intersectionally each of us is woven into an ever-shifting socio-cultural fabric.

There is so much more to say about this powerful film—more than I have time to write here. But the final thread I find myself pondering is that of narratives—with what stories we narrate our origins, the origins of our self-awareness, the origins of our decisions. Again and again, we were shown images of Chaz as a child on TV with Sonny and Cher, images that had the effect of asking the viewer to consider the narrative s/he supplied for that child. It makes me wonder, what narratives do we assume or project onto one another? How do we shift those narratives when our expectations are subverted? But that then raises the larger question, how do we narrate change without assuming the process moves in a straight line? There is something crucial about what it is to be human that is captured by Chaz’s process of becoming. Not only does it raise the question of how sexual difference fits into—indeed might change — one’s conception of the human person. It also asks us all, trans and non-trans, to consider how the process of becoming itself, how transformation, grounds and indeed defines our humanity.

CP

Easter People in a Good Friday World

2011-05-01T00:31:00.003-04:00

Cross-posted from the Walking with Integrity Blog:

Retired Bishop Barbara C. Harris has a saying that we are “an Easter people in a Good Friday world.” That’s what I find myself pondering as I think of the current state of affairs for trans people in the U.S. right now. If we are an Easter people—an Easter body—we are, as tomorrow’s passage from John 20 so strikingly depicts it, a risen body marked by wounds that remain open.

The U.S. trans community got some good news this week when the Department of Labor announced it has added "gender identity" to its equal employment statement. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force's press release on the addition can be found here.

We also got some good news two weeks ago when the state legislature of Hawaii sent legislation to Governor Neil Abercrombi that would protect trans people in the area of employment. On Monday, April 18th, Hawaii’s House of Representatives passed Bill #546 which, as the Star Advertiser explained, “would bar employers from discriminating on the basis of gender expression, bringing Hawaii's labor law in line with similar protections in the areas of housing and public accommodations.” The governor is widely expected to sign this legislation.

That Hawaii already protects trans people from discrimination in several areas, particularly access to public accommodations, is also significant. In other states, public accommodations access is being hotly debated, with opponents of equal access often caustically terming such legislation “bathroom bills.” The specter these opponents raise in such debates is of vulnerable women and children being open to attack in women’s restrooms—if not by trans people, then by people posing as trans. With such fear tactics, they seek either to prevent the passage of laws that would safeguard trans access to public accommodations, or they seek to repeal legislation already on the books.

The state of Maine is currently considering just such a repeal, as shown by Integrity Maine member Ben Garren’s recent testimony against that repeal effort.

As of Monday, Texas became the home of another repeal effort, this one attempting to prevent trans people from marrying. As Bay Windows reported earlier this week, “The legislation…. would prohibit county and district clerks from using a court order recognizing a sex change as documentation to get married, effectively requiring the state to recognize a 1999 state appeals court decision that said in cases of marriage, gender is assigned at birth and sticks with a person throughout their life even if they have a sex change.” In addition to preventing future marriages, this legislation may well undermine the legal standing of existing ones—my own, for instance, if I lived in Texas.

Meanwhile on April 11th in Maryland, the Gender-Identity Discrimination Act (House Bill 235—which addressed employment but left out public accommodations) was effectively killed for the current legislative year when it was narrowly voted back to the state’s Judiciary Proceedings Committee. As the Baltimore Sun reported, “While the bill was being debated on the House floor, one delegate alluded to Cpl. Klinger, a comic-relief character from the TV show "M*A*S*H" known for wearing women's clothes while trying to get a psychiatric discharge from the Army. The delegate wanted to know if his colleagues wanted Klinger leading a day care center.”

On April 18th, one week after the bill was killed, a young transwoman named Chrissy Lee Polis was attacked by young non-trans women as she tried to enter a bathroom in a Baltimore MacDonald’s. The story of the beating, including a video taken by a MacDonald’s employee -- in which Polis can be heard asking “what bathroom am I supposed to use?!” -- went viral in the days that followed (youtube has now removed it). This story has been covered everywhere, from this call to action by Chris Paige of TransFaith online to an NPR story yesterday and a Washington Post piece earlier this week. A Baltimore Sun story from earlier today considers whether perhaps this horrifying event may be a moment we look back upon as a turning point.

As TransEpiscopal co-founder Donna Cartwright put it in a letter to the editor of the New York Times today, “Defiance of rigid cultural gender expectations still makes many people uncomfortable, and all too often we pay the price for others’ discomfort.” Nevertheless, she continues, “we can create new cultural space by being who we are, without apology.”

When I think about the process of creating that “new cultural of space,” I can’t help but be reminded of the mystical theology of Julian of Norwich, whose feast day falls on May 8th. I think of her vision of the body of Christ, its side mystically opened to all as to Thomas in the upper room—opened in a strangely infinite capacity as a place of refuge, a body of transformation, a passage of rebirth.

An Easter people in a Good Friday world indeed.

-Rev. Dr. Cameron Partridge is a Lecturer and Interim Episcopal Chaplain at Harvard University

Trans Faith Action Week Launches

2011-04-05T14:01:00.007-04:00

Cross-posted from the Walking With Integrity blog:

Yesterday I participated in a press conference at the Massachusetts State House in which religious leaders called for the passage of "An Act Relative to Transgender Equal Rights," a bill that would add "gender identity and expression" to existing nondiscrimination legislation in Massachusetts. For the past three years this bill has failed to make it out of committee, despite a great deal of support in the legislature and from the governor. The main speakers at the press conference were the Right Reverend M. Thomas Shaw, SSJE, the Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts; Sean Delmore, an openly transgender man who is the Assistant Minister at College Avenue United Methodist Church (Somerville) and a member of Cambridge Welcoming Ministries, and a candidate for the diaconate in the United Methodist Church; and Rabbi Joseph Berman of Temple B’nai Israel in Revere, MA. The press conference was part of a weeklong effort, dubbed by the Interfaith Coalition for Transgender Equality and the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition as "Transgender Faith Action Week," a week in which congregations from various religious traditions are calling for transgender equality.

An article by Lisa Wangsness about yesterday's press conference was on the front page of the Metro Section in this morning's Boston Globe, and is pasted below (the above photo by David L. Ryan was taken from it). This article comes on the heels of last week's Guardian article by Becky Garrison, which featured interviews with a number of transgender clergy in the United States and the United Kingdom. In the UK, as Rev. Dr. Christina Beardsley has explained in a series of blog posts for Changing Attitude, the week of March 21st featured seven short video interviews by 4thought.tv on Channel 4 (unfortunately not available for viewing outside the UK) at the intersection of transgender and religious identities. Garrison's article pointed back toward the UK video series and forward toward Trans Faith Action Week, here in Massachusetts.

CP

Here is today's Globe story:

Religious leaders revive bid to pass transgender bill

Bishop M. Thomas Shaw of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts and several other clergy yesterday called on Massachusetts lawmakers to pass transgender-rights legislation and asked religious communities to throw their support behind the bill.

Shaw said that virtually all transgender people have experienced discrimination or harassment and about one-quarter have been fired from their jobs.

“Supporting this legislation, and supporting transgender people in the life of the church and in secular society really has to do with the living out of my baptismal covenant,’’ he said.

The bill would prohibit discrimination in Massachusetts against transgender people in employment, housing, public accommodations, education, and credit, and would expand the hate- crimes statute. Thirteen states and more than 130 cities nationwide have passed similar legislation.

A majority of lawmakers in both the House and Senate cosponsored the bill last year, but it never came up for a vote. Representative Carl M. Sciortino Jr. of Medford, a lead sponsor, said the political climate changed dramatically after Scott Brown won the special election for US Senate in January 2010.

“The level of willingness to take up controversial votes diminished after that,’’ Sciortino said.

The issue became particularly charged a year ago, when Republican gubernatorial nominee Charles Baker derided the legislation as “the bathroom bill,’’ a term opponents use to reflect their belief that it would give sex offenders greater access to children in public bathrooms by effectively making the facilities unisex. Supporters of the bill say that is not true: People would still have to use bathrooms that match the gender they present.

Kris Mineau of the Massachusetts Family Institute, which opposes the bill, said yesterday that his organization remains concerned about “the privacy, safety, and modesty of all citizens.’’ He said there is no need to broaden the state’s nondiscrimination and hate-crimes statutes.

He noted that the number of sponsors had declined markedly this year — from 81 to 52 in the House and from 23 to 16 in the Senate, according to the website of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition.

Gunner Scott, the coalition’s executive director, said 35 former cosponsors either did not run again or were not reelected. Supporters of the legislation are talking to freshmen and hope to find additional support, he said, adding that the bill still has more cosponsors than about 95 percent of other bills.

Governor Deval Patrick also backs the legislation and this winter issued an executive order protecting transgender state employees from discrimination.

Representative Byron Rushing, another lead sponsor, said religious groups supporting gay rights showed their political strength in 2007 when they helped defeat a proposed ban on gay marriage. “I think what religious groups offer is their theological perspective on justice . . . but it’s also very important that we hear from those denominations that have begun to end discrimination against transgender people within their own denomination,’’ he said.

Other religious groups, including the Massachusetts Conference of Catholic Bishops, fought against the gay marriage bill in 2007. The bishops also opposed the transgender legislation last year.

About 135 clergy are publicly supporting the bill this year, according to the Interfaith Coalition for Transgender Equality. The coalition this week is asking congregations to work for its passage. Appearing with Shaw yesterday were the Rev. Cameron Partridge, a transgender man who is interim Episcopal chaplain at Harvard; Rabbi Joseph Berman of Temple B’nai Israel in Revere; and Sean Delmore, a transgender man who is assistant minister at the College Avenue United Methodist Church in Somerville.

Shaw acknowledged that it might be tougher to rally as large a coalition for transgender rights as for gay marriage, if only because relatively few heterosexual people know someone who is transgender.

Getting to know transgender people personally, he said, has “taken me deeper into my own faith life and proved to me once again that unless everyone has equality . . . nobody is really free.’’

And here is last week's Guardian story:

Trans clergy are finally gaining greater acceptance
As we approach Transgender Faith Action Week, progress can be seen in attitudes to trans people within the church

Becky Garrison
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 30 March 2011 18.04 BST

Last week, the Rev Dr Christina Beardsley, vice-chair of Changing Attitude, a network of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and heterosexual members of the Church of England, was one of the voices featured on 4Thought.tv's week of short films featuring trans people and faith.

While the US Episcopal church developed a maverick reputation within the Anglican communion for blessing same sex marriages and ordaining gay and lesbian clergy, the House of Bishops of the General Synod of the Church of England's report Some Issues in Human Sexuality, issued in 2003, contained a chapter titled "Transsexualism". Currently, one can find about a half dozen trans clergy in the UK and US. These numbers are imprecise, as some clergy do not wish to go public beyond the scope of their individual parish or diocese – a concern that's understandable given that the trans community seldom receives even the legal protections afforded gays and lesbians .

Beardsley, who was ordained for 23 years prior to her transition in 2001, observes that "some within the Church of England feel the issue of trans clergy has been settled" by citing such cases as the Rev Carol Stone and the Rev Sarah Jones. However, she says: "Not all trans clergy have been supported by their bishop, as these two priests were, and some have been excluded from full-time ministry because of Church of England opt-outs from UK equality legislation."

During the 2008 Lambeth conference, a decennial gathering of Anglican bishops, Beardsley organised a panel titled "Listening to Trans People". While only four bishops attended this gathering, it represented the highest number of bishops to participate in an Inclusive Network to date. Also, this panel helped consolidate Changing Attitude's networking with Sibyls, a UK-based Christian spirituality group for trans people, and the US-based online community TransEpsicopal.

The Rev Dr Cameron Partridge, interim Episcopal chaplain and lecturer at Harvard University, served on this panel as the sole US representative. He transitioned in 2002 during his ordination process and has been an instrumental player in guiding the passage of four resolutions supporting trans rights during the US Episcopal church's 2009 general convention.

The Rev Vicki Gray, a Vietnam vet before her transition, and currently a deacon with an emphasis on ministry to the homeless, noted that their goals at general convention were to assert that we exist as flesh-and-blood human beings, to demonstrate that we are here in the church as decent and devout followers of Jesus Christ, and to begin the process of education and dialogue that will lead to full inclusion in the life of the church, not only of the transgendered but of other sexual minorities such as the inter-sexed (known to some as hermaphrodites).

Following the murder of trans rocker Rita Hester in Allston, Massachusetts, in 1998, a vigil held in her honour became the impetus behind the International Transgender Day of Remembrance, an annual event held on 20 November. Even though this day to reflect and remember those who have been killed by anti-transgender hatred or prejudice is not a religious service, in 2010 memorial services were held for the first time at Episcopal cathedrals in Boston and Sacramento.

The Rev Christopher Fike, vicar of Christ Episcopal Church in Sommerville, Massachusetts, who transitioned in 2003 after having served in a fairly high-profile position as a female cleric, believes that moving this memorial to the cathedral signifies that the church views this as a justice issue. He says: "The more we normalise people who are outside the typical in their gender expression, the more room there is for that range of expression. We no longer have to hide our real identity from the church."

The Rt Rev M Thomas Shaw, SSJE, Bishop of Massachusetts, admits that ordaining and providing pastoral oversight to trans clergy proved to be a life-changing experience for him. Initially, he struggled with the idea and the reality of having trans clergy until he saw they were doing the same ministry as everyone else.

From 3-10 April, Transgender Faith Action Week will be held in the Boston area in the hope of bringing forth faith leaders from different traditions to increase awareness of the trans community in religious circles. Partridge, one of the organisers, says: "We call upon the church to consider carefully its vision of theological anthropology, its theological vision of the human person. How does gender factor into our conception of the human?" After all, in Genesis 1:26, God created ha-adam, a nonsexual term that means "human being". Then, after he created humanity, she declared that it all was "very good".

Sonia Burgess (1947-2010)

2011-03-15T15:12:00.005-04:00

Although it happened almost six months ago many people here in the UK are still devastated by the sudden death of Sonia Burgess. The circumstances were incredibly shocking. On Monday 25th October 2010 Sonia was on her way to a lecture at St Martin-in-the-Fields. She had attended the previous talks in the series ‘Bible Opened for All’ and on this occasion Lucy Winkett would speak about ‘Being Biblical, Being a Woman’. The topic would have been of particular interest to Sonia, who had at this stage in her life lived mainly, though not quite exclusively, as a woman; but Sonia would never hear this talk. She was seen arriving on the underground platform at Kings Cross Station just prior to 6.30pm, accompanied by a younger woman, with whom she was talking excitedly. Within minutes Sonia fell to her death in the path of the arriving train. Her companion, Nina Kanagasingham, also a trans woman, was arrested at the scene on a murder charge and taken to a male prison. Her trial is scheduled for July.

Sonia was a friend. I had met her in January 2009 at a Rainbow Space (the LGBT group) event at St Anne’s Church, Soho, London, which was the church she belonged to at that time. Warm-hearted, petite and pretty, she seemed younger than me, though in fact she was a few years older, and she communicated well with the young trans people who had joined us for the meeting. When we chatted afterwards Sonia was somewhat apologetic about the fact that she still worked in male mode ‘as a human rights lawyer’. I remember saying that her job sounded demanding; she nodded but was in no way forthcoming about her work. I encouraged her to join Sibyls – the UK organisation that promotes Christian Spirituality for Transgender People – which she did, and I had the pleasure of meeting her at the bi-monthly meetings in London when Sibyls gather for prayer followed by a meal. The last time we spoke, at one of these occasions, I discovered that she had been brought up in the north of England, as I was, and that she had studied in Cambridge, a few years ahead of me. Slim and fashionably dressed – she had just been shopping at Zara – it was hard to believe that she was in her early sixties, and once again I saw her rapport with the young (in particular, a new Sibyls member who is also disabled).

So when, in late October 2010, headlines began to appear in the newspapers about a ‘man in a dress’ or ‘transvestite’ who had (allegedly) been ‘“pushed” under train’ never for a moment did I think that they were referring to Sonia. Although I knew that Sonia worked in male mode, I had not met ‘David’ (nor had most of David’s colleagues ever met Sonia), but in any case, to me, as to her many friends, including those at St Martin-in-the-Fields where she had begun to worship, she was a woman, kindly and vivacious: Sonia. Indeed, early reports of her death referred to her correctly as ‘a woman’; it was only when the police discovered documents on her person that related to her male identity that the crude and inaccurate headlines began to appear. The British press has a long-standing habit of sensationalising trans people’s lives, but on this occasion there was a huge outcry in protest, led by Trans Media Watch, which only this week gathered journalists from the press and television to launch its Memorandum of Understanding which seeks to improve the coverage of transgender people and issues in the media.
It comes too late for Sonia, but the handling of her story by the media has been the focus for an important discussion about the need for greater sensitivity and respect when discussing transgender people’s lives.

After the breaking news of the death of a transgender woman came the shock, for her friends, of hearing that it was Sonia. Nowhere, apart from her family, was the grief more deeply felt than by the congregation at St Martin-in-the-Fields, where a meeting was called and a vast number of people gathered, along with her children, to share their memories of Sonia – and of David. One friend who attended it told me that the use of both male and female names and pronouns didn’t seem to matter as people spoke about their love and admiration for this remarkable person.

It was only at this point that David’s extraordinary career as the leading immigration lawyer of his generation became known to those of us who knew only Sonia, as well as his role in landmark cases that had led to greater transgender equality in the UK. One might have expected Sonia to mention the latter, if not the former, to trans friends and acquaintances, but such was her modesty that she never spoke of either! You can read more about her life, as David, and as Sonia, in the links that follow. Journalist Elizabeth Day’s sensitive article was written earlier this year to give a more rounded picture of Sonia/David in contrast to the sensational tabloid versions. Legal academic and trans activist Stephen Whittle knew Sonia professionally, and as a friend, over many years, and his obituary of her, written at the time, is passionate and revealing. My own brief post about Sonia, on the Changing Attitude blog, reflects on her death from a spiritual perspective, and, as you’ll have gathered, her Christian faith was important to her.

Christina Beardsley 15.03.11

Rev. Dr. Christina Beardsley is on the Board of Changing Attitude , which works for the full inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in the life of the Anglican Communion.

Winter Thaw for Trans Equality

2011-02-24T23:55:00.002-05:00

Cross posted from Walking with Integrity

We are at the end of February, and this year’s very long season of Epiphany is almost at an end as well. Here in the Boston area, side streets are still littered with chairs and other detritus-- markers of the you-shovel-it-you-keep-it parking culture-- but snow banks are finally showing signs of letting go. Last week the state’s transgender community also received welcome news that perhaps the long-frozen nondiscrimination bill, too, might be starting to thaw.

As recently posted on Walking with Integrity, last week Governor Deval Patrick signed an executive order banning discrimination on the basis of gender identity and expression for all who work for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Boston Globe both reported on the move and published an editorial praising it, and yesterday the local LGBT paper Bay Windows published a comprehensive article on it as well.

As reported in all three pieces, this development both creates a sense of momentum for the statewide bill which would add "gender identity and expression" to the categories of age, race, creed, color, national origin, sexual orientation, sex, and marital status, and prevent discrimination on those bases in employment as well as in housing, public accommodations, education, and credit.

The dire need for this protection was just underscored by the major new study released on February 4th by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and the National Center for Transgender Equality. They surveyed over 6,450 transgender-identified participants and learned the following, as summarized on NCTE's website:

"* Respondents were nearly four times more likely to live in extreme poverty, with household income of less than $10,000.

* Respondents were twice as likely to be unemployed compared to the population as a whole. Half of those surveyed reported experiencing harassment or other mistreatment in the workplace, and one in four were fired because of their gender identity or expression.

* While discrimination was pervasive for the entire sample, it was particularly pronounced for people of color. African-American transgender respondents fared far worse than all others in many areas studied.

* Housing discrimination was also common. 19% reported being refused a home or apartment and 11% reported being evicted because of their gender identity or expression. One in five respondents experienced homelessness because of their gender identity or expression.

* An astonishing 41% of respondents reported attempting suicide, compared to only 1.6% of the general population.

* Discrimination in health care and poor health outcomes were frequently experienced by respondents. 19% reported being refused care due to bias against transgender or gender-nonconforming people, with this figure even higher for respondents of color. Respondents also had over four times the national average of HIV infection.

* Harassment by law enforcement was reported by 22% of respondents and nearly half were uncomfortable seeking police assistance.

* Despite the hardships they often face, transgender and gender non-conforming persons persevere. Over 78% reported feeling more comfortable at work and their performance improving after transitioning, despite the same levels of harassment in the workplace."

An interview from the Bay Windows story shows both some of the unexpected ways that people's transgender status can come up in an employment application process and the reality that there are indeed workplaces where people are free to do their jobs and be themselves. Diane DeLap, who works for the Department of Workforce Development, explained how her application process inadvertently revealed her transgender status to her prospective employer: "'One of the interesting things was that the Massachusetts Employment Application requires the inclusion of discharge papers if you have a history in the military,' DeLap said. She had served in the Navy for four years, and included her discharge papers with her application. 'Of course, the military doesn’t change names for anything,' DeLap said, laughing, 'so it had my old name on there and all the other papers had the new name on there, so the fact that I was transgender became a topic of discussion very early in the hiring process. They determined that it shouldn’t make any difference.'"

DeLap clearly had a good experience in her interview process, and others I know also have had positive experiences coming out at work. Increasingly, there is good news of that sort to tell, and it is important to share it along with the alarming statistics and stories, as both are realities right now. The latter tells us how much work we have to do while the former encourages us that it has already begun and we can indeed do it.

As with marriage equality, which received a major boost from the Obama administration this week, I am hopeful that the ice is truly beginning to thaw for transgender equality, that momentum is finally building toward passage of key legal protections. It is up to us to keep that momentum going.

The executive summary of the NCTE/NGLTF survey can be found here, and the full report here.

CP

Stirring Letter from a Retired Bishop

2010-12-21T22:13:00.002-05:00

As I scanned the letters to the editor in the Boston Globe this morning, I was happily surprised to come across one by the retired bishop of Ohio, the Right Reverend J. Clark Grew, who now lives in Boston.

It reads as follows:

Gay themes tend to stir wrath of some on Capitol Hill
December 21, 2010

I WRITE to thank Sebastian Smee for his excellent Dec. 16 piece “Offensive? ICA lets the public decide,’’ about the removal of a video from a gay-themed exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. It is a sad occasion when art in our country’s museums, much less anywhere else, is subjected to the political and religious right’s blatantly homophobic manipulations.

I agree with Smee’s emphasis that the public should decide what is or isn’t art, but there is another article that needs to be written, and that is one about the ongoing and increasingly nasty gay-lesbian-transgender-bashing that is so prevalent with some members of Congress.

The Right Rev. J. Clark Grew, Boston
The writer is a retired bishop in the Episcopal Church.

The Globe editorial that Bishop Grew refers to responds to the decision by Boston's Institute for Contemporary Art (and several other museums around the country) to show a video installation that was removed December 1st from an exhibit at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery entitled "Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture." On the Smithsonian's website, the exhibit is described as "the first major museum exhibition to focus on sexual difference in the making of modern American portraiture," considering "such themes as the role of sexual difference in depicting modern America; how artists explored the fluidity of sexuality and gender; how major themes in modern art—especially abstraction—were influenced by social marginalization; and how art reflected society’s evolving and changing attitudes toward sexuality, desire, and romantic attachment."

The offending video was created by New York based artist David Wojnarowicz (1954-1992) in 1986-87 in response to the death of his partner, Peter Hujar, from AIDS-related complications, and from his own diagnosis with the virus that would ultimately take his life at the age of 37. The Smithsonian's version of the video (now having gone viral on youtube in the wake of this debate), which Smee describes as "a four-minute, surrealistic montage of footage shot in Mexico called 'Fire in My Belly,’" includes, among a number of other images, "intermittently recurring footage of ants crawling on a small painted crucifix that lies on the ground." Smee goes on to point out, "when it comes to representations of Christ’s death, the Christian tradition is full of base and wretched imagery, as anyone who has seen Matthias Grünewald’s shudderingly graphic “Isenheim Altarpiece’’ in Colmar, France, or for that matter Mel Gibson’s movie “The Passion,’’ would know."

The Smithsonian decided to remove the video after being pressured by members of Congress and the president of the Catholic League, Bill Donohue. As Jacqueline Trescott reports in the Washington Post, the significance of this "skirmish" is that it "could forecast a renewed battle over arts funding when the Republican-led House takes over in January." Hollad Collard also notes in the New York Times that in this episode, "history is repeating itself, with variations;" in 1989, Wojnarowicz won a suit against Donald Wildmon, a Methodist minister who had disseminated to members of Congress a pamphlet with selective images from Wojnarowicz's collages, targeting his partial support by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Wojnarowicz may no longer be able to defend his work, but plenty of people are stepping into the fray.

Noting the protests that have proliferated since the removal of the video, Bill Donohue has now commented in a December 17th press release, "The artist who gave us the ant-crawling video, David Wojnarowicz, died of AIDS. So did his lover, Peter Hujar. Mapplethorpe died of AIDS, too. And now those who adore them are taking to the streets on their behalf. Think I'll just watch the Giants—kickoff is at 1:00 p.m."

Reading this comment, just days after the Senate's historic vote to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell, it's impossible not to be reminded how much the struggle continues. And a huge part of that struggle is making sure that "the church" or "the religious" does not get monolithically represented by such voices.

Which brings me back to the profound sense of gratitude I felt this morning when Bishop Grew's letter showed up on my front porch, like a surprise Christmas present wrapped up in a newspaper.

The story of this video skirmish may feel more like Lent than Christmas, and yet in the end to me it serves as a reminder of the messiness of Incarnation, and of the critical importance of solidarity and hope in a season of intense joy and need.

CP

Rev. David Weekley on Reviving the Conversation

2010-12-13T11:26:00.009-05:00

This article and its photos are reposted from the United Methodist Church's media page, under the heading "Transgender Pastor Urges Sexuality Debate". Rev. David Weekley, whom I met at the Philadelphia Trans-Health Conference in 2009, is one of at least two ordained transgender ministers in the United Methodist Church.

A UMNS Report
By Linda Bloom*

1:00 P.M. EST Nov. 18, 2010

The Rev. David Weekley prepares the elements for Holy Communion on his first Sunday morning at Sellwood United Methodist Church in Portland, Ore. A UMNS photo by Tina Todd, Sellwood UMC.

The Rev. David Weekley thinks it’s difficult for the church to have meaningful conversations about sexual and gender identity.

So, for years, the Portland, Ore.,-based United Methodist pastor, husband and father of five kept his own secret about having been born a girl but never feeling like one. Then, on Aug. 30, 2009, he decided it was time to start telling the story of his experience as a transgender man, beginning with his own congregation.

Now, Weekley wants to widen the discussion about sexuality throughout the denomination, despite what he perceives as an increasing reluctance to discuss such issues. The recent refusal of the United Methodist Judicial Council to reconsider its 2005 decision upholding a pastor’s right to reject someone as a member of his church is an indication of the urgent need for conversation, he said.

He has even written a book about his own experience, now in the final editing stages, which he hopes can be used as a conversation starter once it is published by Wipf and Stock of Eugene, Ore.

Some church members believe there has been more than enough conversation on the topic. The Rev. Thomas Lambrecht, a United Methodist pastor from Wisconsin and a representative of Good News, an unofficial United Methodist evangelical caucus, said “the continued focus on sexuality issues” is a reflection of western culture rather than a theological imperative.

“What we need to focus on is becoming disciples of Jesus Christ and living that out in a variety of ways,” he added.

Conversation, however, can take issues of sexuality out of the cerebral and into the personal, says the Rev. Troy Plummer, executive director of the Reconciling Ministries Network. While some segments of society, as well as some churches, are having those conversations, “it mostly feels like the church wants to avoid conflict and discomfort” on issues of sexuality, he noted.

Such discomfort is familiar to Weekley, one of the few transgender pastors in The United Methodist Church. The denomination’s book of law currently has no prohibitions against ordaining transgender persons, and Weekley remains in good standing with the Oregon-Idaho Annual (regional) Conference.

Making the change

His own transformation – from female to male and from alienated Christian to ordained pastor – began in 1972, when the 21-year-old started the gender-reassignment process at University Hospitals in Cleveland. After completing the medical transition in 1975, he attended graduate school at Miami University of Ohio and started searching for a faith community.

Walking into a United Methodist congregation in Oxford, Ohio, and, like John Wesley, finding “my own strange warming of the heart experience there” on World Communion Sunday was the first step in Weekley’s faith journey, he recalled.

Volunteers from the Sellwood United Methodist Church and community cleaned the church kitchen in preparation for the Northwest Gender Alliance Thanksgiving Dinner. A UMNS web-only photo by Tina Todd, Sellwood UMC.

The journey took him from serving as a volunteer at the campus ministry center to studying at Boston University School of Theology to beginning the ordination process in 1982. He became an elder in the Oregon-Idaho Conference in 1984.

Weekley said he never buried his former identity, but often wrestled with the issue of when and how he should share his story.

“One of my hopes was by working quietly with people, trying to be a good pastor, it would give people a lot of opportunity to get to know me as a pastor.” Then, when he did share his story, he reasoned, “it would have a positive impact.”

A 2008 pilgrimage to Minidoka, a World War II internment camp in Idaho – with members of Weekley’s mostly Japanese-American congregation at Epworth United Methodist Church in Portland – made him start to think it might be the right time to go public about being a transgender man, especially since his children were now young adults and able to understand it.

“At the internment camp, I saw the impact of being able to talk about their lives and laugh and cry together about their experiences,” he said. “That congregation seemed like a place that could resonate with my experience.”

Indeed, the congregational support was immediate. “The day of the service, people broke into applause at the end of my message.” Later, however, a small group of members seemed to complain more often to him. “I was never sure whether it had to do with my being transgender and sharing that … but it eventually led to my decision that it was best to move,” he said.

Reviving the conversation

Today, Weekley appreciates being in a two-point charge – Sellwood and Capitol Hill churches in Portland – where members were aware of his transgender identity right from the start.

Since his revelations in 2009, the transgender pastor has received hundreds of responses “from people all over the country, even outside the country, telling their stories to me, thanking me for speaking for them.”

What troubles him is probably 90 percent “had their own stories of feeling estranged and alienated from their faith communities.”

Weekley was disappointed when the denomination’s top court declined to reconsider Judicial Council Decision 1032 at the end of October. Decision 1032 stated that a United Methodist pastor has the right to determine local church membership, even if the decision is based on the person’s sexual orientation.

The Rev. David Weekley speaks at an “All Means All”
training event in Eugene, Ore. A UMNS web-only
photo courtesy of Deborah Maria.

While he understands not wanting to usurp the authority of the pastor, “when I think about the bigger picture, I wonder if the case would have been the same if it had been about ethnicity or race or gender,” he said.

“As a pastor, I can’t imagine telling someone who wants to be part of our faith community that they weren’t welcome,” he added.

Lambrecht, who had participated in the Judicial Council’s oral hearings on the matter, said he felt the council acted with integrity “in terms of upholding church law and recognizing the separation of powers between the legislative and judicial areas of our church.”

Evangelicals are satisfied with the church’s current positions on human sexuality, he said, but he expects that efforts will be made to change those positions at the denomination’s 2012 legislative assembly.

“The continued discussion of this issue, we feel, detracts from focusing on more important issues like the Call to Action report and the movement of encouraging vital congregations,” Lambrecht said.

The Reconciling Ministries Network, an unofficial group that advocates for United Methodists of all sexual orientations, filed briefs related to several of the petitions before the Judicial Council. Plummer argued on the organization’s website that undoing a judicial decision such as Decision 1032 falls within the bounds of the council’s work.

“This intentional refusal to right an obvious wrong is the latest act of discriminating hurt directed by The UMC toward LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) people,” he declared.

Weekley wishes the denominational discussion on sexual identity would adhere more closely to the Wesleyan quadrilateral, which uses scripture, tradition, reason and experience as a basis for theological reflection.

He believes the church is ignoring the current scientific research related to the issue of choice and the origins of sexual orientation and gender identity. “It seems that reason and experience are missing from this conversation,” he said.

*Bloom is a United Methodist News Service multimedia reporter based in New York. Follow her at http://twitter.com/umcscribe.

News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.

Light Shining in the Darkness: Transgender Day of Remembrance in Boston

2010-11-21T15:19:00.009-05:00

Early yesterday evening, as the nearly full moon rose above the Boston Common, my partner, our thirteen-month-old and I headed to dinner with a friend and then wandered around the corner for Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR). Upon arriving at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, I was amazed at how many people were already there, even a half hour before the start of the event. Before the night was over, between 325-350 people would crowd into the space, including the balcony (and I got those numbers from the ultimate source, Jim Woodworth, one of the cathedral’s longtime sextons).

One of my favorite things about TDOR is the way it draws people together—I love touching base with people I haven’t seen in a while, and this year I was struck by the variety of contexts from which I knew people: from the Greater Boston trans community, current and former students, and Episcopalians from the Diocese of Massachusetts. In the latter category was the Reverend Stephanie Spellers, priest and lead organizer of the Crossing, and Penny Larson, drummer for the music team of the Crossing, which for the second year in a row hosted an open mic on Thursday for the local collaborative “Transcriptions.” Penny gave some very moving remarks later in the event, which are reposted below.

Also present at TDOR for the first time this year was my bishop, the Right Reverend M. Thomas Shaw III. He had just come from a eucharist celebrating the 100th anniversary of the clothing of the sisters of St. Anne-Bethany, and was present to deliver a welcome message.

When the MC for the evening, Mesma Belsare, called Bishop Shaw forward, I have to say my heart was absolutely pounding, and I found myself wondering why. I think it was because of the intense way my worlds were intersecting in that moment. And while TDOR was hosted by my congregation over the last two years, and I myself spoke in the slot that +Tom was now occupying, last night’s intersecting worlds felt more intense to me. This was probably because the event was unfolding in this same space in which I was ordained in 2004 and 2005-- actually, as I write this, I’m realizing that last night I was sitting just about where I sat and then stood during my ordination to the diaconate, which +Tom did. But mainly I think I was nervous because I know that members of the trans community have been hurt very badly by people of faith, and especially by churches—in the name of my God. And I was, I admit, concerned that Bishop Tom not say anything to exacerbate that hurt.

He started out by saying that before he welcomed everyone, he wanted to offer an apology. He wanted to apologize for the way in which Christians in particular have hurt transpeople, how Christians have, as he put it, “misrepresented God” to transpeople. Then he went on to reference the work of trans people in this diocese, at which point he referenced me and my colleague Chris, both of us transmen and priests here. I was very moved and humbled by what he had to say about us. He went on to say that both the church(es) and the world are made more whole by the full participation of transpeople in their midst and in their lives. He closed by saying it was therefore a particular honor for the Cathedral to host TDOR.

The applause for +Tom was sustained and, I sensed, at least from those sitting around me, that people were quite moved and perhaps even a little surprised by their positive response to +Tom’s remarks. Of course I can’t know how anyone other than myself, and those who later commented to me, felt—but that was the sense I got.

A number of speakers got up and spoke from their hearts throughout the event, ranging from transpeople to non-trans allies. There were people who spoke of having avoided coming to TDOR in the past because it was too scary, or felt too potentially victim-oriented to them, but who now felt differently. Particularly moving to me were the remarks of young people—one non-trans twelve-year-old spoke of one of her parents, a transwoman, and how lucky she felt to have her as a parent. Two young transmen spoke about the importance of reaching out to trans youth, and to watch especially closely for warning signs of suicidality. Two parents of a young man who died here in MA a few years ago spoke very movingly about their commitment to and love of the community. Several people spoke of people they knew who had taken their own lives, or attempted suicide, and several people came out as suicide survivors. In the wake of the intense reflection in this country about LGBT suicides this fall, this sequence of speakers gave a very important reminder that the T is very much part—indeed, likely even more at risk – of this wider pattern. But risk and loss were counterbalanced by resilience: people spoke of how they have reclaimed their lives, and of how important it is to protect and nurture one another’s unique humanity. One person spoke of this need with beautiful metaphors of light.

That image resonated yet more at the conclusion of the event, when the huge group split into two for the candlelight vigil. One group went across the Boston Common to the State House to read the names of the dead and then walked to the gazebo at another spot on the Common for a final gathering, while the other group went directly to the gazabo. As the groups left, my partner and I decided we needed to take our wiggly little guy home, so after chatting with other stragglers for a few minutes, we gathered our things together and made our way to the back of the cathedral. As we exited the swinging glass doors and stood with Jim out on the cathedral steps, we watched a long train of candlelight slowly make its way across the common, majestically moving from the State House to the gazebo.

The light shone in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.

CP

*********************************

Penny Larson’s remarks, which are also posted at her blog are below:

Good evening. Thank you for coming, and welcome to my home.

I showed up on these steps four years ago, less than six months after my transition, and I was welcomed as an equal sister. I drum here, and I worship here. The Crossing community has prayed for me and laid hands on me during my process. They have marched with me and lobbied with me. This past Easter Bishop Shaw received me into the Episcopal Church as I delivered the sermon during the Cathedral’s Easter Vigil. I feel blessed and humbled to be a part of The Crossing community, and I am profoundly moved that my family is helping to host this Transgender Day of Remembrance.

As you know, this is a somber time, when we remember those that have been lost in the last year to violence. Sometimes the price is high when one lives an authentic life. There is fear, and misunderstanding, and hatred. Whatever the number of people we recognize this evening as lost during this last year, I suspect that the true number is higher. We simply are the victims of violence far more often than could be explained by mere random chance. We are targeted.

I have a dear friend who wonders why we do this every year, I believe she says something to the effect that we are celebrating our victim hood. And I admit that the heaviness of this day weighs upon me, even though this is only my fifth Transgender Day of Remembrance. It might be easier to just let this day slide by with barely a notice, to pretend that a day to remember our dead was unnecessary. But then the easy thing isn’t always the right thing. So while I’m very happy to have been involved with a special open mic night co-hosted by The Crossing and Transcriptions as part of Trans Awareness week, which was far more positive and celebratory, I think the importance of this night can not be overstated.

This past August, I volunteered at the inaugural season of Camp Aranu’tiq, a camp specifically for trans and gender-variant kids between the ages of 8-15. I got pretty attached to those kids, and I’m sure I’ll be back next year. Those kids were amazing, and it was a joy to be around them. This is our next generation. Many of them were experiencing the thrill of being themselves for the very first time at camp. Those kids just want to live happy lives being the people they truly are.

But the reality is stark. And the world that exists presents all sorts of difficulties for those who are perceived as different from some arbitrary standard. I want the world that those kids grow into to be so much closer to perfect than the world I grew up in, and yes, even the world as it stands now. I want those kids to grow into a world where they won’t have to go to a camp to be met with unconditional understanding and acceptance. My mother, when I was very little, taught me to always know that I am no better than anyone else, and I am no worse. I believe that we can all live together, celebrating each others similarities while basking in our uniqueness.

And so it is on this night, more than any other, that it becomes of paramount importance that we stand to fear and hatred, whether from within or without, and refuse to be anything less than our full selves. It is on this night that we should embrace the rich diversity that exists within our world of community, allies, supporters, friends, family, and loved-ones. It is on this night that we must change the world.

Thank you for joining us!

Signs of Endings All Around Us: Transgender Day of Remembrance

2010-11-18T00:28:00.002-05:00

This is a strange, liminal time in the liturgical year, when signs of endings are, as the hymn puts it, all around us, even as we look forward to the harbinger of hope and new birth soon to be announced in Advent.

For those of us in the trans community, this is a liminal time in another way—a time when we actively remember and face the ongoing reality of our vulnerability to violence and death, particularly for transwomen of color. And it is a time when we seek to galvanize ourselves and our allies, to take our horror, grief, and outrage and harness it for change. To that end, this Saturday, November 20th, marks the 11th annual, International Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR).

Brief History

As it so happens, TDOR started with a local murder here in Boston. On November 28, 1998 Rita Hester was found dead, having been stabbed multiple times by an assailant who has never been identified. In the days following her murder, a vigil was held down the street from my former parish, St. Luke’s and St. Margaret’s in Allston, MA, where Rita lived. Across the country, San Francisco activist Gwen Smith then started the Remembering Our Dead website, which began keeping track of transpeople around the world who had died due to transphobic violence (that work is now carried on by Ethan St. Pierre at this site). Gwen also organized a vigil in San Francisco in 1999 that inspired similar events around the world. The most common date for holding TDOR, November 20th, marks the death of another Boston transwoman, Chanelle Pickett, who had been murdered on that date in 1995. TDORs now happen around the globe, and in some cases expand to include educational events. Here in Massachusetts, this is Trans Awareness Week, with multiple activities happening across the state.

What Your Congregation Can Do This Week

* go to a TDOR in your community and be an ally. Listen, support, be present as an ally

* host a TDOR in your community—more and more churches are opening their doors in this way, though the events themselves are not usually religious services. Indeed, it is important to be sensitive to the fact that many members of the trans community feel deeply alienated from religious traditions and communities. Simply opening your door, making space for the trans community to come together and organize its own event, is incredibly powerful. More and more Episcopal parishes and cathedrals are hosting these events-- here in Boston, for instance, TDOR will be hosted by the Crossing and the Cathedral Church of St. Paul this Saturday at 6pm). In Sacramento, California, Trinity Episcopal Cathedral (@ 27th & Capitol) will be hosting the city's TDOR with a candlelight vigil at 6:30 p.m.

* Host another event in trans week (or at another time of the year), like an open mic night, or a film viewing.

* Consider making a special space in your service this Sunday to honor the trans community. Perhaps in your Prayers of the People, for instance, you might name those who have died this past year and/or compose a special collect; perhaps you might mention this event in a sermon—be creative, open and compassionate (and if you’re willing to then share what you did and how it went, it would be great to include such vignettes in future blog posts).

* However and whenever you are able, please pray for the trans community. Pray for our strength and stamina in this newly challenging political climate, as we continue to fight for basic nondiscrimination and anti-violence legislation, as we strive for equal access to health care, as we make our way in all sorts of vocations, families, and faith communities.

CP

BELIEVING OUT LOUD IN ORLANDO

2010-11-02T20:57:00.000-04:00

Over the Columbus Day weekend, October 8-11, I attended the Believe Out Loud Power Summit in Orlando, Florida, representing TransEpiscopal and, together with Oasis California chair Tom Jackson and St. Aidan’s San Francisco Rector Tommy Dillon, the Bay Area Oasis/Integrity community. It was an inspiring, empowering conference in which the transgender – and specifically TransEpiscopal – community was seen and heard…and welcomed as full participants. My participation was funded in good part by Integrity and Oasis and I am grateful to both.

The conference, sponsored by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force’s Institute for Welcoming Resources, brought together 300 members of eight mainline denominations. These included:

– the ELCA’s Lutherans Concerned;
– the UCC’s Coalition for LGBT Concerns;
– “More Light” Presbyterians;
– Gay and Lesbian Affirming Disciples (GLAD) within the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ);
– the United Methodists’ Reconciling Ministries Network;
– the Welcoming Community Network of the Community of Christ;
– the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists; and
– our own Integrity.

The goal of the conference was to exchange denominational experiences of resistance and success and to explore collective values, vision, and modes of collaboration with an eye to increasing the number of Believe Out Loud (i.e., welcoming) congregations and developing LGBT leadership within our faith communities. The conference also provided a golden opportunity for networking across denominational lines and, in our TransEpiscopal case, within Integrity and in the transgender caucus pulled together by Barbara Satin, Faith Work Associate of the NGLT’s Institute for Welcoming Resources. I and my Bay Area Lutheran colleagues, for example, cemented our ties and undertook to build a closer working relationship.

The Integrity contingent numbered about 60 people, including the new Executive Director Max Niedzwiecki, President Rev. David Norgard, Stakeholders Council Chair Rev. Susan McCann, and the entire Stakeholders Council. As a representative of TransEpiscopal, I participated in the Sunday evening meeting of the Council and the Eucharist presided over by Susan McCann.

Based on the discussions at the stakeholders council meeting and one-on-one conversations with Max, Susan and others, it is clear that Integrity and TransEpiscopal are very much on the same wavelength concerning issues facing us at the 2012 General Convention. In particular, we are of the same mind concerning revisiting CO61 which would add gender identity/expression non-discrimination to the ordination canon. There was also great receptivity to ensuring that the work underway to collect new liturgies for blessing same-sex couples be broadened to include rites to mark major steps in gender transition.

The transgender presence was visible and welcomed at the Summit and two trans people participated in the general worship service. Eight people attended the Saturday evening transgender caucus, including one gender queer person and the father of child just beginning the FtM transition. There were several other trans/gender queer people at the Summit who, perhaps less ready to come out, chose not to attend the transgender caucus.

Much of the weekend was devoted to attending one of the four break-out sessions offered on campaigns, communications, leadership development, and – the one I and sixty others attended – “Barriers, Resistance, and Conflict.” Spanning over nine hours in four sessions that stretched into the evenings, participants in the latter learned how to identify and deal with conflict and resistance in our congregations and the church at large. Though ample scope was given to differences in context and styles, emphasis was placed on graceful engagement.

Around the edges of the Summit, several organizations offered a variety of resources that might be helpful in congregational and denominational settings. Among those available from the NGLTF’s Institute for Welcoming Resources (http://www.welcomingresources.org/) were the visually stunning “Shower of Stoles” of LGBT clergy; a half-hour DVD “So Great a Cloud of Witnesses;” and “TransAction,” a down-loadable three-session “transgender curriculum for churches and religious institutions.” The Family Diversity Project also offered four exhibits/books: Love Makes a Family: Portraits of LGBT People and Their Families; In Our Family: Portraits of All Kinds of Families; Pioneering Voices: Portraits of Transgender People: and We Have Faith: Portraits of LGBT Clergy. The Project seeks new faces and stories to add to these exhibits. They can be contacted at www.familydiv.org.

Looking to the future, the next major event of this sort will be “Practice Spirit, Do Justice,” a national multi-faith gathering at the “Creating Change,” the National Conference on LGBT Equality in Minneapolis, February 2-6, 2011. Information on that conference is at www.CreatingChange.org. Also worth noting is the ongoing National Religious Leadership Roundtable of the NGLTF. You can find out more by e-mailing Dave Noble at dnoble@thetaskforce.org.

For its part, Integrity will be sponsoring a series of one-day “Believe Out Loud” workshops around the country. Information is available at www.integrityusa.org. In the Bay Area, Oasis California (www.oasisca.org) will team up with Integrity to hold a one-day training session for “Believe Out Loud”/Welcoming Congregations at St. Paul’s, Oakland on January 12. It is also planning a conference later in the year devoted to issues of aging in the LGBT community. Stay tuned.

In closing, it should be noted that the October 9-11 Believe Out Loud Power Summit in Orlando took place at a particularly difficult moment for the LGBT community, as news spread of the bullying, murders, and suicides that have afflicted our young people. Indeed, the uniformly positive media coverage of the conference focused on the reaction of conference participants to the horrible murders that had just unfolded in the Bronx. Typical was Orlando’s WESH-TV interview with Rev. Rebecca Voelkel, the NGLTF’s Faith Work Director (http://www.welcomingresources.org/videos.htm).

As Rev. Voelkel’s colleague Darlene Nipper told USA Today, the New York murders were “heavy on the minds” of those gathered in Orlando and “touched us all.” The names of the victims were read and silence observed at the opening worship October 9 and many participants recorded messages for the “It Gets Better” project.

And, thanks to the sort of solidarity exhibited in Orlando, it will get better!

Submitted by the Rev. Vicky Gray

Stigma and the LGBT Suicides -- a View from Harvard

2010-10-24T22:57:00.005-04:00

Reposted (and slightly updated) from the blog of the Harvard Episcopal Chaplaincy (where I am currently the Interim Chaplain) and Walking with Integrity:

Almost two weeks ago I made my way from the Episcopal Chaplaincy building on Garden Street, through the chill evening to Harvard’s Memorial Church. As I rounded the corner by University Hall, the light of over two hundred candles flickered ahead of me on the steps that face Widener Library, the same steps from which the liturgics of commencement are enacted every spring. This was a vigil to mark, cry out against and be galvanized by the recent rash of LGBT suicides across the United States over the last several weeks. This series of events, and the unprecedented public conversation that has circled about them, has been devastating to many in the Harvard community, particularly LGBT and allied students.

I came to this vigil to represent the Episcopal Chaplaincy (as indeed Episcopal Chaplains across the country have been responding to this rash of violence), which was one of several co-sponsors of the event, and to reach out to LGBT students across the University at this difficult time, letting them know that they are not alone. Voices of people of faith too often stoke the broader cultural dynamics of violence at the root of all of this, and it felt important to be visible as an Episcopal priest standing against that violence. I was also present as a Lecturer currently teaching—and having previously taught—a number of LGBT students deeply impacted by the rash of suicides. Though I’m not sure how many other chaplains were present (there was at least one other), I know I was far from the only professor or staff member there, and that sense of institutional solidarity and support moved me.

But it was also personally important to me to be there as someone who has experienced that broader culture of violence as a member of the LGBT community. Following the example of previous speakers, I spoke in the brief open mic period at the end of the vigil of coming out. In my case, I explained, I happen to have come out twice—first, my sophomore year of college as gay, and then in graduate school as a transgender man (having transitioned from female to male in 2002). I spoke of the importance of community, real community based on authentic relationships, and how important it is right now to reach out to one another across the borders—particularly of faith traditions — that too often separate us.

Two days before the vigil, the combination of the Sunday lectionary readings and the rash of suicides already had me thinking about what it was like to be a young person struggling with the intersection of faith and social stigma. The theme of leprosy in the lectionary readings inspired me to open my sermon with a story of how, when I was in fifth grade, I stumbled upon a library book, Damien, the Leper Priest about Damien de Veuster, a Roman Catholic priest (recently included in the new collection Holy Women and Holy Men) who had served a community living with what is now called Hansen’s Disease. Damien went to this shunned community, fought bureaucrats to get them basic living supplies, built them a physical infrastructure (water supply, housing, etc), bound up their wounds, worked to de-stigmatize the disease, and ultimately contracted it himself, dying as a “leper among lepers.” This was the one book report I did that year that really meant something to me (and the icon at left by Robert Lentz is one of my favorites) There was something about the shape of Damien’s ministry in relation to the dynamics of social stigma that rocked my ten-year-old world. It didn’t hurt that as a gender nonconforming kid, stigma was very familiar to me.

The intersection of stigma and faith emerged in another recent Harvard event, a Divinity School panel entitled “Queer Youth and Religious Debates Over Sexuality." When I arrived, I was struck first of all by the Harvard police who stood guard at the doors to the room where the panel was held. Even in its absence, this visible reminder of potential disruption felt overbearing; I could feel it actually raising my heart rate as I listened. While all the remarks were moving, I was struck particularly by those of Professor Mark Jordan who spoke of how “the fights about [LGBT youth] often try to claim them for one camp or another — either religious or queer, but rarely both.” This is one of the peculiar challenges for those of us who are indeed, and have long been, both.

And so as this moment of grief and anger— at Harvard and far beyond—begins to fade from media coverage, we must refuse to forget this episode. I don’t want any of us, whatever our age, sexual orientation, or gender identity, to lose sight of the violence—psychic and physical-- that underlies and emerges from the workings of stigma in all its forms. I'm particularly cheered to read the several statements that communities and individuals across the Episcopal Church have made (see Episcopal Cafe for a collection of them)-- reading them makes me grateful for the support I received as a young person, and galvanized to continue extending that support here and now.

CP

Hope for Trans Folk from Harvey Milk

2010-05-22T17:33:00.007-04:00

I've just returned from a rally for transgender equality in front of the Massachusetts State House organized by Join the Impact Massachusetts. Today's event was part of a week-long celebration of the legacy of Harvey Milk, who would have turned eighty years old today, had he lived.

I was one of several people who spoke on a range of topics related to pending trans legislation, from an overview of the national and state movement for trans equality, to how we are all impacted by the gender binary, trans or not. After the speeches, we marched down from the State House, to Government Center, to Downtown Crossing and then back up the State House, providing Saturday shoppers with an unexpected interlude.

I pray and, in the tradition of Harvey, hope that our legislators will hear us and finally get ENDA and the Massachusetts Trans Civil Rights Bill out of committee and passed.

CP

JTIMA Harvey Milk Day Rally for Transgender Equality
State House Steps, Boston, MA
Saturday, May 22, 2010

Hope from Harvey Milk

In his book The Mayor of Castro Street: the Life and Times of Harvey Milk, openly gay journalist Randy Shilts (may he rest in peace) described a San Francisco Sunday morning scene in 1978 when, with Harvey Milk sitting in the back pew, the Reverend William Barcus, priest of St. Mary the Virgin Episcopal Church, got up and denounced Proposition 6. This “Briggs Initiative” called for the removal of gay and lesbian people and possibly even their supporters from working in the California public schools. In an unusual move for a priest in that context, Barcus not only spoke of the God who stands with the marginalized, not only berated the fear-mongering, dehumanizing rhetoric of the Initiative and its backers, but he also witnessed to these truths with his own life, coming out as a gay man. He challenged people to, as he put it, “morally put yourself on the line, not after the fact, not after November 7th, but now” (pp. 241-242; for more on Rev. Barcus's sermon, see this LGBT chronology for the Episcopal Diocese of California by Rev. Kathleen McAdams).

On that morning I was across the Bay in Berkeley where I grew up, possibly in Sunday school, possibly sleeping in. I had no idea of the import of what was going on across the Bay and around my state. I was a shy new kindergartener, a little girl growing up to be a transman, a spouse, a dad, an academic and an Episcopal priest. What Harvey Milk inspired in William Barcus and countless others, I too came to appreciate as one who also knows something of what it feels like to be dehumanized.

What Harvey Milk goaded us into remembering with relentless wit and grit is the crucial importance of hope. Hope. “You gotta give ‘em hope,” he said again and again. He wasn’t the biggest fan of organized religion so-called, but by God he knew how to preach. Hope, he knew, is as essential to human life as the air we breathe, the food we eat and the water we drink. Without hope we shrink into ourselves, our capacities squandered, our stature cut short. Our ability to hope, as human beings, is intimately tied to our dignity.

When others deny transgender people our dignity, they attack the heart of our humanity. This happens as much in quiet, behind the scenes ways as in the bold, openly violent ways we mark every year at Trans Day of Remembrance. I am thinking of the violence of intentionally identifying us with wrong names and pronouns; the violence of quietly tossing our resumes in the proverbial circular file; of falsely telling us the apartment is already rented; of telling us we must wait our turn to ensure being treated with dignity and respect; and particularly in this climate, of shamelessly labeling legislation that would safeguard our basic civil rights a “bathroom bill.”

I’m honestly not sure how much transgender people were on Harvey’s radar in the late seventies, but I have no doubt that our struggle today would inspire and galvanize him. He would tell us that no matter what indignities we have suffered, no matter who might have rejected us, we do not have the option of giving up hope. In his Hope Speech, he said, “if there is a message I have to give… it's the fact that if a gay person can be elected, it's a green light. And you and you and you, you have to give people hope.” Harvey knew his election was a foot in the door for all who are marginalized. But he also knew that the hope he inspired was not automatic. It was something he called on each person in his audience to give. And I would submit, Harvey’s legacy renders that hope as something we must also claim.

The program for his memorial service at the San Francisco Opera House contained a line from Victor Hugo that he had recently hand-copied and posted on the wall of his office: “All the forces in the world are not so powerful as an idea whose time has come” (Shilts, 286). Trans people of Massachusetts, from around the nation and indeed the world, partners, allies, families and friends, lawmakers, people of all faiths: the time for full equality for transgender people has indeed come. The time is now for all of us — and particularly, I would say, for religious leaders of all traditions— to “morally put ourselves on the line,” as Reverend Barcus put it, for the dignity that is our birthright. The time is now for our legislators beneath this gleaming dome to finally take up the Massachusetts Transgender Civil Rights Bill, and for our legislators in Washington to take up ENDA, and pass them. Thank you.

CP

A Service-- and Sermon-- of Renaming

2010-05-19T22:31:00.010-04:00

The week before last at my congregation, we celebrated in the context of the Sunday Eucharist the legal name change of a community member, Anderson Michael C. I put together a liturgy drawing from several sources, including Justin Tannis's book Trans-gendered: Theology, Ministry, Community, the Standing Commission on Liturgy Music's book called Changes: Prayers and Services Honoring Rites of Passage, and a prayer written by another parishioner who is working on a liturgy for people in transition.

In addition, Anderson preached the sermon and gave me permission to share it on this blog. Anderson also created the graphic (pasted below where it was in his original text) which he put on invitations to friends and community members, and which I also used on the cover of the worship booklet.

CP

Sermon – Anderson C's Rite of Naming – 9 May 2010

I am very happy to see you all here today. It means a lot to be able to share this special day with you and celebrate the claiming of my name, so I thank you for coming. I also thank Cameron and you for giving me this opportunity to preach the sermon today.

I think we are fortunate to have this particular Gospel reading today from John: Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you… Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.”

With those words, the resurrected Jesus comforted the apostles just before he left them, and before they left each other to go out into the world and spread God’s word. I hope that we, too, can find comfort in those words for ourselves with whatever difficulties life presents as we go out and live in the world in our daily lives.

For me, one of the things I take with me when I go out from here will be my name, which I claim today. For you, the members of this congregation and also my friends who are here today for this Rite of Naming, I would like to offer to you my story because you all have played a part in it. And in this story is a lesson that I would like to share with you so that you can take it with you.

Last year at about this time, I was in this church for the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday, and something happened to me that had never happened before in my life. As I listened to the words, the description of what Jesus endured that day had an impact that I had never felt before. Prior to last year, the readings were just a story, like in a novel or a screenplay. Intellectually, I understood the series of events and their significance, but emotionally, I never felt them, until last year. It was then that I could see the events in the context of Jesus as a real person rather than, as I had in the past, just a character in a story. I could feel His vulnerability and suffering even though I had not been able to before.

Similarly, just as I had felt the pain of Jesus’ crucifixion, I also experienced the glory of His resurrection days later. The questioning when the tomb was found empty, the surprise when He appeared in a locked room with the apostles, the skepticism of Thomas, the relief, happiness and wonder when they realized He had triumphed over death.

You might wonder why I hadn’t experienced this emotional connection to the humanity of Jesus until just last year at the age of 48, or why I was even detached from it in the first place. The answer is that this was a consequence of my being transgender.

For some people who grow up as transgender, they learn how to present a persona that the rest of the world wants to see. There are so many signals to children about how they should be as people, and for some transgender children, the signals can be that the person they really are is “bad.” For example, in kindergarten, I was once yanked by the sleeve from the line of boys waiting to use the bathroom (which is where I thought I should have been because, after all, I was a boy) and I was towed over to the line of girls. The teacher’s aide who did the yanking said to another, “She did it again! Why can’t her parents teach her which bathroom to use?” So with that little remark, I received the message that if I did what I felt inside, not only was I wrong, but my mom and dad were bad parents. That is a really difficult and confusing message for a five-year old to grapple with.

So what happens in some of these cases is that some transgender children, to the best of their ability, construct a persona that matches the name and sex on their birth certificate and that meets the expectations of everyone around them, especially the people they love and want to please most -- their parents and siblings, their teachers, their friends. In doing so, their true self can become buried inside, their emotions silenced for the sake of survival, and they sometimes are unable to feel.

I was unable to feel. The analytical left side of my brain put the smack-down on the emotional right side when I was a child and held onto control for dear life. I went through the decades as a detached observer of my own life rather than as a true participant. Loneliness came from the inability to feel not only what was going on inside of myself, but also the emotional connections that people in my life tried to make with me. Intellectually, I could see how I affected others and how they valued me, but I couldn’t feel it. And the worst part of all of it was that I didn’t know that I couldn’t feel it. I thought that seeing it was feeling it. So I took the role of the observer, and somehow made connections with people by mentally translating their actions into crude emotional representations.

That held true for God’s love as well. I would sometimes lay awake at night as a child and remember what I had been taught about God’s love, and I would close my eyes and try to feel it, because I knew that if I could, it would feel wonderful. When I was unable to connect with it, I comforted myself as best I could by knowing that Jesus said that he loves us and so it must be true.

Eventually when I got older, I left the church. That’s not a big surprise considering I could not emotionally tie into God’s grace or even really connect with the other members of the congregation. I didn’t lose my faith though. I thought about it, reasoned it, analyzed it, but couldn’t act on it. Eventually, after years of being away, I returned because of an ache for the spirituality and communion of religion.

I attended a church that was down the street from my house. I was content for a while and derived comfort from attending services and the occasional church event. Then one day during mass, a woman sitting near me refused to share with me the sign of peace. I watched her extend her hand to everyone around her but then she looked me in the eye as I extended my hand toward her and she refused to take my hand in hers. Now all my life many people have assumed, based on the way I presented myself, that I was a butch lesbian, and this woman might have had the same judgment of me. Certainly, the way she acted was not in keeping with Jesus’ own peace that he left with his apostles and with us, as we heard today. I left that church that day and didn’t go back.

It was around that time that I experienced a small event that led to a momentous epiphany. The small event was a cab ride in San Francisco – the cab driver called me “Sir.” I analyzed that small event for several weeks until, in a defining moment of clarity that came while I was washing the dishes at my kitchen sink, all of the puzzle pieces of my life that had been suspended in a disorganized floating jumble suddenly aligned and snapped together, forming a picture of my true self. My mind could no longer support the persona that I had built for myself over the decades, could no longer pretend to be the woman that I and everyone around me thought I was. I suddenly realized who I was not, and I also thought that I was the “wrong” kind of person. I had worked for 45 years to smother the true person I was, so accepting and loving myself was a concept that was foreign to me.

And so the real work began, peeling back the layers upon layers of persona to reveal the real me, a painstaking process in which I was engaged when I came to this church for the first time. I came after attending Transgender Day of Remembrance here in November of 2008. I had no church to call my own, this one looked really nice and I knew the vicar. With an ache to once again belong to a spiritual home, I contacted Cameron and asked him what time that services were held on Sundays.

As I continued to attend this church, with Cameron’s help, I had the courage to be here as my true self, and it was the very first time in my life I lived simply as me. I cannot even tell you how validating and affirming that was. But a funny thing was happening at the same time. Apparently, I began to matter. I didn’t realize it, but Cameron would tell me that I did. He would take me aside and try to point out the impact that I was having in this congregation, but I didn’t get it. I couldn’t feel it, and so I would brush aside what he was telling me. And then we would look at each other, both of us perplexed, he, I think, because he couldn’t understand why I couldn’t see what, to him, was so apparent, and me because I couldn’t understand how he could be so sure about something that I couldn’t feel myself.

At the same time, my therapist was working on a similar project, trying to help me realize that I mattered, that people cared about me and that I was deserving of their love. I didn’t feel that either. It bounced off of me because I was unable to let it in. How could I accept love from others when I couldn’t even love myself? But my therapist kept trying, coming at it from different angles and using different methods, trying to help me accept and care about myself and see my own value in the world.

There were also close friends in whom I had confided and told about my “situation,” members of a support network I had formed in order to stay afloat as I navigated the sometimes treacherous waters of this process of finding myself. Some of those people are sitting in this room today. And those people, by accepting me after I told them the truth about who I was, also, in their own way, gave me the freedom to be myself. Their acceptance, your acceptance, helped me to accept myself.

So there was a continuous stream of caring from all sides. From members of this congregation, from my therapist, from my friends, who all worked, knowingly or unknowingly, to eventually erode the shell in which I had been abiding. Without the shell, my emotions were exposed, raw and sensitive, but I could feel. In addition, I became able to accept myself and to love myself and thereby also allow the love from those around me to penetrate, to come inside and allow me to stand free in the warmth of love.

God has been patiently waiting for me while I have journeyed to this point. And today, like Simon Peter when he heard the Lord call, I swim to meet Him and I clothe myself in my new name, to present myself to Him, and to you, as my true self. I would not have been able to do so without all of you.

And now you know my story, how I came to this church in the fall of 2008, how one year ago, I came to more fully understand Jesus’ humanity, and how I have reached the point of claiming my name. With this story, as I mentioned at the beginning of this sermon, there is a lesson for all of us, including me, which is:
When you help someone to love them self, you give them the ability to feel the love of others and the love of God and to allow that love to enter into their heart.

This is what everyone in this room has done for me. You gave me your peace, my heart is no longer troubled or afraid, and I feel loved. In this way, I can claim my true name of Anderson Michael C. For this gift, I thank all of you.

Bishops' Letter Contributes Momentum on Trans Civil Rights in MA

2010-05-11T16:33:00.007-04:00

As the Massachusetts Judiciary Committee pushed back its deadline for reporting on the Transgender Civil Rights Bill to early June, Boston-based LGBT paper Bay Windows has reported on two new voices of support, Boston City Council and the letter sent last week by Bishops M. Thomas Shaw and Roy "Bud" Cederholm (Bishop Gayle Harris did not sign because she had not yet returned from a leave of absence). Read the whole article here. Excerpts are reposted below.

I would like to add that the article cites Virtue online as the place from which it got the text of the letter. Virtue Online reprinted without acknowledgment my exact post (which I posted with permission from the Communications Office of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts to three blogs: TransEpiscopal, Walking with Integrity, and the Interfaith Coalition for Transgender Equality). This made it look as if Virtue Online actually had permission to post the letter, which it did not.

CP

Transgender Rights Bill receives more support, extended deadline
by Hannah Clay Wareham
Associate Editor
Tuesday May 11, 2010

Amid resolutions and commendations, hopes are high for bill to pass.

Support for "An Act Relative to Gender-based Discrimination and Hate Crimes" (S. 1687/H. 1728), known as the Transgender Civil Rights Bill, is growing in Boston. The City Council last week passed a unanimous resolution backing the bill and joined the Episcopal Diocese of Masscahusetts in publicly voicing their support. The Transgender Rights Bill will remain under consideration by the Judiciary Committee for at least another month.

Gunner Scott, executive director of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition (MTPC), said that the organization "is grateful for the continued support of the Boston City Council and hopes that our state leaders will follow this wise example and extend civil rights to our state’s transgender citizens."

The Transgender Civil Rights Bill offers crucial employment protections for transgender people and outlaw anti-transgender workplace discrimination. If the bill is passed, the category of "gender identity and expression" will be added to the Massachusetts hate crime, employment, housing, credit, public accommodations, and public education non-discrimination laws.

The legislature’s Joint Committee on the Judiciary on May 6 extended the bill’s deadline, giving it at least another month to remain under consideration. The original deadline required that the bill be reported out of committee by May 7.

"As they say on ’Monty Python,’ we’re not dead yet," DeeDee Edmondson, political director of MassEquality, said. "The Judiciary Committee and our coalition [of organizations working together to pass the bill] now can get down to the business of producing a piece of legislation that can put transgender people back to work and bring stability and dignity to families throughout the Commonwealth."

snip

On April 30, Episcopal Bishops M. Thomas Shaw and Roy "Bud" Cederholm of the Diocese of Massachusetts sent letters to Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, Senate President Therese Murray, and House Speaker Robert DeLeo urging the lawmakers to pass the Transgender Rights Bill. Attached were resolutions stating the full support of both the Episcopal Diocese of Masschusetts and the General Convention of the Episcopal Church.

"As bishops of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, our eyes are open to the realities of transgender people and their families," Shaw and Cederholm wrote in the letter, which was subsequently printed by VirtueOnline.org. "Many of them serve faithfully in the congregations and ministries of our diocese, as lay people, as deacons, and as priests. They are dedicated and loving parents, children, siblings, friends, and community leaders."

The letter encouraged lawmakers to act quickly in passing the bill. "Adding gender identity and expression to the state’s nondiscrimination and hate crimes laws is no isolated concern of a special interest group," the letter read. "The disproportionate suffering of transgender people should grieve the hearts of all who love justice and liberty."

The Transgender Rights Bill received an intensified focus from a wide variety of mainstream media outlets after Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker pledged on Saturday, April 17, that he would veto the bill if elected.

MA Bishops Send Letter to Legislators in Support of Transgender Nondiscrimination Bill

2010-04-27T15:36:00.009-04:00

Bishops M. Thomas Shaw and Roy ("Bud") Cederholm of the Diocese of Massachusetts this week sent letters to Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert DeLeo pressing them to pass the state's Transgender Civil Rights bill. "An Act Relative to Gender-Based Discrimination and Hate Crimes" (House Bill #1728 and Senate Bill #1687) is slated to either make it out of the Judiciary Committee or die there for a third straight year this Friday, May 7th.

The bishops' letter follows unprecedented coverage of the bill by Boston area newspapers (including a supportive op ed by the Globe), after Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker announced that he would veto the legislation if it crossed his desk. His team handed out fliers referring to the legislation as "the bathroom bill," taking up the rhetoric of the virulently anti-LGBT group Mass Resistance (and groups battling similar legislation in other states) which tries to stoke fears that such legislation will make women and children vulnerable in bathrooms and locker rooms.

The bishops' letter (posted with permission) follows:

April 30, 2010

The Hon. Deval L. Patrick
Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
State House, Room 360
Boston, MA 02108

Dear Governor Patrick,

We write to express our strong support for an act to add gender expression and identity to our Commonwealth’s antidiscrimination and hate crimes laws, and to ask you to work to ensure its passage.

As bishops of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, our eyes are open to the realities of transgender people and their families. Many of them serve faithfully in the congregations and ministries of our diocese, as lay people, as deacons and as priests. They are dedicated and loving parents, children, siblings, friends and community leaders. Again and again, we hear how they have struggled against incredible odds and pressures to be true to their identity as beloved children of God, made in the image of God.

It pains us that even as transgender people claim their identities and step into newness of life, they face discrimination and violence that undermines their human dignity. A November 2009 survey by the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force found that 97 percent of respondents had been harassed or mistreated on the job, and 26 percent had been fired for being transgender. You will recall that in November 1998, an Allston transgender woman, Rita Hester, was murdered and her killer never found. This local tragedy led to an annual Nov. 20 international Transgender Day of Remembrance, for transgender people who have died, especially those who have been killed or taken their own lives. It is fitting that our state should model amendment of life and hope for a future that is better than this sad past.

Adding gender identity and expression to the state’s nondiscrimination and hate crimes laws is no isolated concern of a special interest group. The disproportionate suffering of transgender people should grieve the hearts of all who love justice and liberty. Both the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts and the General Convention of the Episcopal Church are on record in support of full equality for transgender people (resolutions attached).

So many of the arguments against the full inclusion of transgender people in our society are driven by unfounded fear. Transgender people are simply seeking the removal of barriers that prevent them from flourishing as full members of and contributors to society. One need not fully comprehend what it is like to walk in their shoes to provide them with the protections every citizen—every person—is due. Please act to ensure their rights.

Faithfully,

The Rt. Rev. M. Thomas Shaw, SSJE
Bishop

The Rt. Rev. Bud Cederholm
Bishop Suffragan

Enc.

Resolution D012: Support of Transgender Civil Rights

Resolved, the House of Bishops concurring, That the 76th General Convention of The Episcopal Church supports the enactment of laws at the local, state and federal level that a) prohibit discrimination based on gender identity or the expression of one's gender identity, and b) treat physical violence inflicted on the basis of a victim's gender identity or expression as a hate crime; and be it further

Resolved, That the Secretary of Convention convey this resolution to appropriate congressional leadership to the Chair of the National Governors Association, the President of the National Conference of State Legislatures, and to the President of the U. S. Conference of Mayors.

Voted by the 223rd Annual Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, Nov. 7-8, 2008, Hyannis:
Resolution in support of transgender civil rights and inclusion in the ministries of all the baptized

Resolved, that the 223rd Convention of the Diocese of Massachusetts supports the enactment of laws at the local, state and federal level that a) prohibit discrimination based on gender identity or the expression of one’s gender identity, and b) treat physical violence inflicted on the basis of a victim’s gender identity or expression as a hate crime; and be it further

Resolved, that the Secretary of Convention convey this resolution to the Massachusetts State Legislature, and the Massachusetts representatives in the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives; and be it further

Resolved, that this Convention submit to the General Convention the following resolution: Resolved that the words “gender identity and expression” be inserted into Title III, Canon 1, Sec. 2 directly following the words “sexual orientation” and before the words “disabilities or age.”

Observing Easter as Exodus

2010-04-20T14:03:00.010-04:00

The following is a sermon that my seminarian for this year Kori Pacyniak and I composed and delivered together. We were inspired to do a combined sermon because of our discovery in conversation that we were both puzzled by the same, somewhat obscure, facet of Sunday's gospel passage. In addition, I had already planned to incorporate a story told by Rhiannon O'Donnabhain at an event we put on at St. Luke's and St. Margaret's to honor her and GLAD's February legal victory (which I mentioned in a recent blog post about recent major happenings in the transgender community). We shared Rhiannon's words in the sermon and in blog form with her permission.

CP

****************************************************************

St. Luke’s and St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church
Easter 3: Sunday, April 18, 2010
Cameron Partridge & Kori Pacyniak

An Exodus Observed

CP: Welcome to the third Sunday of Easter, day fifteen of the Great Fifty Days. In these poignant days we encounter again and again, in manners both mundane and mysterious, the reality of resurrection life. On Easter Sunday itself we stood before the empty tomb and met in the Gospel of Luke an exodus of the body. Last week in the Upper Room we stood in awe with Thomas and the terrified disciples and received an invitation into a body marked by exodus. This week, by the Sea of Tiberias, we observe an Easter exodus in progress. We watch as Peter responds to the revelation that Easter is neither something that simply happened to his beloved Jesus, nor something from which he should run away, but rather an event toward and into which he must move. Easter as exodus transforms resurrection into action, into movement outward, into freedom and newness of life. Peter enacts the dynamics of this Easter Exodus encounter with his very clothing; he must put on resurrection like a garment lest, as Paul puts it in Second Corinthians, he simply be found naked (2 Cor 5:3). And yet…

KP: What was the one line that leapt out at me when I looked at today’s readings? “When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the sea.” How could it be that I didn’t remember ever hearing this line before? I think I would have remembered something this odd and perhaps even shocking. Slightly disturbed by my faulty memory, I glanced through various translations and discovered that the version I would have grown up with did not mention nakedness at all. Was it really just a translation issue or did some authorities not want to deal with the questions that this would inevitably bring? Why was Peter naked while fishing and why did he put on clothes to go swim to the Lord? Though I have no answer to the first question, it seems less consequential than the second question. Why did Peter put on clothes before jumping into the water to swim to Jesus? It seems contrary to every aspect of common sense. It was just after dawn, the water would still be cold and more wet clothes would mean one would be colder longer. Generally speaking, you take off your clothes to go swimming. What was it about this instance, about being told that it was Lord on the shore that makes Peter seem to defy common sense and reason?

CP: Of course, I too was struck by — even stuck on — Peter’s nakedness and how he responds with such seeming lack of logic to the presence of his risen Lord on the beach. Now, commentaries suggest that perhaps “naked” doesn’t mean “buck naked” but simply scantily clothed; Peter may have been wearing a only fishermen’s smock which he then tucks into his cincture before jumping into the water (see Raymond Brown, citing Barret, Lagrange & Marrow, The Gospel According to John XIII-XXI. The Anchor Bible Commentary (New York: Double Day, 1970), 1072). But regardless, when presented with the presence of the risen Jesus, he does two things that pull in different, almost opposite, directions: 1) he covers up his nakedness, his unreadiness, the vulnerability with which he was caught offguard; and, or rather, but 2) he still leaves everything behind and dives into the water, wanting nothing more than to be with the one who had called him with the words “follow me.” What we are observing here is a resurrection exodus in progress, in all its messiness. This is an ordinary person like each of us responding to the invitation of Easter that calls us out from our routines, disrupts our patterns of life, exposes our vulnerabilities, retells our stories in the ever-new frames of salvation history, as our current Prayers of the People puts it, as in the liturgy of Easter Vigil.

KP: We heard one such story here recently. On Thursday evening, April 8, you may recall, SLAM hosted an event to honor Rhiannon O’Donnabhain and the attorneys from GLAD (Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, the folks who helped bring Massachusetts equal mariage) who represented her in the case O’Donnabhain vs. Commissioner of Internal Revenue. The IRS had audited Rhiannon’s 2002 tax return and had deemed as “cosmetic” rather than “medical” the expenses she had written off related to her transition from male to female. They had asked her to pay back her refund, but she had refused. The case went to trial here in Boston in July, 2007, and on February 2nd the decision was announced: she had won. This was a huge victory for the trans community across the US, an early legal building block for victories yet to come.

CP: But what struck several of us, as we sat where you are and listened to Rhiannon and GLAD lead attorney Karen Lowey, were their stories. How Rhiannon’s courage propelled her out from routine and complacency into a terrifying limbo. And how that in-between place became a place where her community rose to the challenge, where her connection with community buoyed her and enabled her to move forward, even amid fear and anxiety. This was not the first time she had moved outward in this way; the story she told was a very personal one about her original decision to transition, which she has written out and given us permission to share today.

KP: “For a very long time, I felt that I was treading water in a very cold and deep ocean, barely keeping my head above water. I was afraid to start swimming for fear that someone might laugh at the way I swim… I couldn’t even see the shore…. It was always so far away. I didn’t even know which direction to swim. I was drowning! Finally, I realized what I had to do to live…… I had to start swimming! To save my life! I took a risk and started swimming because I didn’t want to drown. I wanted to live! I had been swimming for what seemed like forever and I could finally make out a distant shore! It was still a long way off, but at least I could see it! I was still not a very good swimmer. I made mistakes along the way. I had never done this before! But I was determined. I would reach that far-away shore! Finally the shore got nearer and nearer. I had never been a quitter, and I was determined to succeed at what I set out to do! In my mind, I visualized that I emerged from the water riding a white horse up onto a beautiful sunny beach. In my visualization, I had already done it…! And I did do it! I rode up and out of the water on that beautiful white horse onto the beach and rode into to a new life!”

CP: Resurrection is about living, swimming, riding, into new life. It means being willing to move outward from our history into our future, always bearing that history with us—indeed, sometimes burdened by it—even when the shore is further than 100 yards away, even when we can’t see it. Resurrection is something into which we are thrown like the deep end of the pool. It is an event and a process, indeed, an Exodus that leads to life more beautiful and mysterious than we can imagine. At its beginning we can only catch the smallest of glimpses, but it is there, waiting for us. We have to be willing to be vulnerable, to take the risk of diving in and swimming-- even if we stop to cover our nakedness first -- to leave behind the familiar to encounter the living Christ, knowing that we will never be the same.

KP: Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he showed himself in this way. Amen.

An Easter Vigil Reception

2010-04-05T13:30:00.007-04:00

I attended an Easter Vigil called "Rise Up" on Saturday night and heard a very powerful sermon by Penny Larson, the drummer for the music team at the Crossing, the progressive emergent church at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in Boston. I asked Penny afterward if I could post her words to TransEpiscopal and she agreed, so below, reposted from her blog, is her description of the event, followed by her sermon.

CP

**********

An Easter Vigil Reception
April 5, 2010 at 1:22 am

So, last night was the Easter Vigil at church. I was received into The Episcopal Church, and I preached the sermon. It was a pretty amazing evening. The Darling Boyfriend and my mom and several of my dear friends were there to witness the night’s important moments.

Before I detail the service, I want to say that I took the step to formally rejoin a Christian church very deliberately (I was raised Lutheran, but haven’t considered myself a member of a church in twenty years). I have always turned to the teachings of Jesus when I’ve felt most challenged in my life. So, I guess in some ways I’ve been a Christian all along. But there is something about the Episcopal Church (and yes, clearly, The Crossing, ~my~ church is incredibly special) that has called me to join a community. For the last several weeks I took part in a catechesis study small group, and the more I learned about the Episcopal Church, the more sure I was that this was the right step for me to take. I don’t want to turn this into a history and explanation of the Episcopal Church, let’s just say the the Episcopal Church feels like a very good place for me to call “home.”

On to the Vigil…

We began in the bowels of the church in darkness. Liturgically we were still sitting with the fallen Christ, while Jesus was lost in Hell. The service started with a lighting of candles (“The Light of Christ”) and an amazing Blues version of the Exultant – I was already weepy. There was a light-hearted and fun spoken-word telling of the Creation story, a beautiful Psalm (with Crossing-style chanting), and an enactment of the story of the valley of the dry bones.

After the readings we moved to the group that was to be baptized or confirmed or received or to renew their baptism. There were several of us joining the church in one way or other, from one place or other. There was a woman who had been Muslim who was baptized in a full-immersion ceremony (~way~ cool!), a toddler who was baptized, and then a bunch of people that found the Episcopal Church from diverse paths (or grew up in it) who were deciding to make their commitments public. It was sort of interesting, in that I guess I’ve sort of been Episcopalian for a while now, in that I’ve believed and belonged for quite some time. My reception was merely a public acknowledgement of the connection that God and I already share.

After the baptism/confirmation/reception ceremony, the service progressed upstairs into the Sanctuary. The next thing I knew, the Gospel was done and I was up to deliver the sermon (I’ll include the text of my sermon at the end of this post). My sermon was very personal. I spoke about my journey, and how strongly I feel a connection to Jesus suffering and resurrection and triumph over death. I almost broke down a couple times, but I felt better about fighting the tears back than letting it go full throttle. I’m amazed by how comfortable I am with public speaking nowadays. I was sharing my deepest truths, showing people my heart, and I felt good and strong. I found it easy to make eye contact with folks in the congregation and I just generally felt pretty calm. Honestly, preaching the sermon is a bit of a blur, which always makes me feel like I was in the zone (to use a performance concept). I am so glad I did that, and I feel energized and empowered by the experience.

During the Eucharist the new members of the church distributed the bread and wine to the congregation. It was incredibly powerful to offer the body to people and say, “The Body of Christ.” The Eucharist is something I have grown to really love. There is something really powerful about sharing a meal together, and this meal is special for all sorts of reasons.

After that there was the sending (which I did also), and there were plenty of Hallelujahs and then we partied like God herself had come to party with us.

I was touched by how many folks sought me out to tell me how much they appreciated my sermon. I’m still slightly bemused by how much I seem to connect with people. I really sometimes don’t feel like I’m doing anything all that special. I’m just telling my truth. But, for whatever reason it often seems to have a powerful effect on people, and I admit that makes me very happy.

We partied and drank champagne and chatted and just had a wonderful time.

Then today my folks came over and we had a Easter feast!

It was a weekend I will never forget.

And now I am an Episcopalian. Yay!

Let the people say, “Amen!”

AMEN!

[here's my sermon:]

Good Evening.

Happy Easter!

This is a little overwhelming. Here I am, just received into The Episcopal Church, taking my first real steps back into Christianity and I’m preaching at the Eater Vigil. Why? What did I feel called to tell you all tonight?

Just about a year ago I was in a catacomb similar to the one we just emerged from. For me it was the culmination of a several-year process in which I finally had the facts of my life brought into congruence.

But I should back up a little first. When I was very little I knew that something was different about me; in the fullness of time it became clear that the difference was that I was born with the wrong body. To put it simply: I was born with a female brain inside a male body. It took me three and a half decades to find the strength, courage, and wisdom to undertake the process of putting that right.

I walked through some very dark places on my journey. I battled depression and anxiety that required medication and hospitalization. I was afraid to venture out into the world. Jesus sat alone in the Garden of Gethsemane, and I sat alone in my room.

I wish I could say that I consciously decided to give in to God’s plan for me when I decided to fix my body and my life, but the truth is that I just gave up – I couldn’t fight anymore.

On September 5th, 2006, I finally began living my life as it should have been all along, as a woman. Ironically, it was also in the fall of 2006 that I found myself attending church for the first time in many years. Though at the time I thought I was in church just to drum, it quickly became clear that it was beyond mere coincidence.

When I met Jesus again nearly four years ago I was raw and weak, but I was open to the truth. I had been hurt by all the anger and misunderstanding that others had thrown at me – and that I had thrown at myself – because I was different. Jesus’ suffering at the hands of the ones who would crucify him hits me very hard, though I have never been tortured by others, I have tortured myself.

What does Jesus suffering, death, and renewal mean? What’s so important about Jesus claiming victory over death? What does it mean to a mere transsexual woman that Jesus rose from the dead and cast off his tomb? It’s a great story, and a glorious way for God to make a point, but what does it mean now? Today? For me?

Christ’s victory over the ultimate death is magnificent, and promises us paradise. But what about life? When I was suffering through the worst of my days, either harming myself, or contemplating suicide, or purposefully isolating myself from the world because I thought that no one could ever accept this very unique girl – least of all God, I felt like I was dead already. I despaired. I understand how the women felt as they walked to the tomb that morning. They had just watched their friend die. We all know death; it’s a truism that by being living creatures we also know death – sometimes we use a softer word: loss. The desolation that those women must have felt that morning, walking to the tomb is an experience that is universal.

I also know their shock upon finding the tomb empty and Jesus’ body missing and getting the news from the angels. I remember getting the news that everything was all set for the surgery that would finally bring my body into line with my being. I was sitting right over there, drumming during a service of The Crossing. And I got an email from my surgeon’s office. I couldn’t believe it. I sat there for a second. I knew the news was coming, and yet I felt unprepared for it. I’ll bet that Peter didn’t run back to the tomb any faster than I did when I ran out into the stairwell and literally jumped with glee. I overflowed so much that a member of The Crossing noticed that even my drumming sounded especially joyous.

And that’s the wonder of Jesus triumph over death. It’s said in a nuanced way in Luke, but in Revelation he says it directly: “I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.” This is very difficult to believe. I get it. Indeed, even though Jesus had told everyone that he would be delivered to sinful men and killed and then rise three days later, the news was hard to believe. Even as the women were telling the others about the angels’ message their reaction was to scoff and call it nonsense. I remember being afraid that something was going to mess up my plans for surgery and speaking with therapist about it, and she said, “Penny, nothing is going to keep you from this victory.” And I started crying with the truth of the moment.

This night is when we honor the ultimate victory, not only because it was a victory for our friend Jesus, but because he shares the victory with each and every one of us. Every time there we suffer a loss, Christ has offered to turn it into a victory. It is pretty shocking. It takes some getting used to. And it’s easy to think it’s nonsense. Which is why it’s good that God is patient, even if it takes 35 years to get it, the promise of life is there.

When I emerged from that catacomb a year ago, the Department of Records at Boston’s City Hall, I had a corrected birth certificate that listed “Name of Child: Penelope Jane Larson” and “Sex: Female.” I had triumphed, and I am certain that God celebrated along with me.

Shortly after I got home from having surgery my family and friends threw me a party with a very special message: “It’s a girl!”

Tonight we throw a party to celebrate the most wondrous message of all: “He is Risen!”

And so are We All!

Hallelujah!

Overwhelming Catch

2010-02-08T11:18:00.018-05:00

As we near the end of Epiphany, season of illumination, the signs of God's presence among us begin to overwhelm. Two images from yesterday's readings for the fifth Sunday in Epiphany offer a strange combination-- one of abundance and the other of desolation-- that echo two major, recent events in the U.S. trans community.

In the gospel of Luke we had the improbable plenitude of fish pulled up by Peter and his companions upon the prompt of Jesus. So many were these fish that they threatened to sink the boats into which they had flopped. "Go away from me!" cried an unnerved Peter, knee deep in slimy muck, "I am a sinful man."

And in the Hebrew Bible reading, we had the fearsome scene of Isaiah's prophetic call, in which seraphim touch his lips with a live coal and God commands him to speak difficult truths to a people far from ready to hear them. The passage ends with successive images of desolation.

For trans people in the U.S., the last two weeks have brought an overwhelming combination -- to consider only two major news stories-- of grief and victory: a week of desolation in which the Houston trans community grappled with the murder of one of its own, followed by a precedent-setting decision by the US Tax Court in favor of a Massachusetts trans woman.

In July of 2007, a Boston area woman named Rhiannon O'Donnabhain decided to sue the IRS. At issue was the agency's denial of her tax write-off of expenses related to her transition from male to female. As the original Boston Globe article reported, she could have repaid "the approximately $5,000 she received in her tax refund, but decided to challenge the IRS because she believes the ruling against her was rooted in politics and prejudice."

O'Donnabhain declared, "'This goes way beyond money. If I were to give the money back, it would be saying it's OK for you to do this to me. It is not OK for them to do this to me or anyone like me."

You tell 'em, I remember thinking as I read the story. I never tried to write off expenses related to my own transition-- I remember thinking about it, and even discussing the possibility in a peer support group, but I didn't try. I sure could have benefited from it on my then graduate student budget (almost every insurance company explicitly denies coverage for any medical care related to transition).

Then last week we got the very good news that the US Tax Court ruled 11-5 in O'Donnabhain's favor in this first-of-its-kind decision. Not only is it a ruling that respects O'Donnabhain; it's also a decision that could begin to open the door for insurers to consider procedures related to bodily transition as medical, not cosmetic. See the National Center for Transgender Equality's report on the case here.

As Jennifer Levi, Massachusetts-based attorney for the Transgender Project at Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD), commented in last week's Boston Globe story:

“I think what the court is saying is that surgery and hormone therapy for transgender people to alleviate the stress associated with gender identity disorder is legitimate medical care."

GLAD senior staff attorney Karen Loewy added in a press conference, “It’s incredibly big to have a statewide court setting a national precedent. This is the first time a court that has jurisdiction nationally has reached this conclusion.”

As Chuck Colbert reported, "the tax court ruled that GID [Gender Identity Disorder, which is listed in the DSM] is a 'disease' within the meaning of the tax code. The court said the IRS’s claim that all the treatments were 'cosmetic' was 'at best a superficial characterization of the circumstances that is thoroughly rebutted by medical evidence.' The court said that the IRS must consider sex reassignment surgery in the same manner, for example, as an appendectomy or even heart surgery."

Not all procedures one might undergo would necessarily count as medical, for tax deduction purposes, but the fact that some clearly do is a big deal for those trans folks who medically transition.

I add that caveat about transition because it's important to remember that a) not all trans folks actually do medically transition, and that b) those who do change their bodies do so in a variety of ways, contra the assumptions underlying the oft-asked query, 'have you had the surgery?'. Plus, c) in addition to differences of embodiment, there are also a variety of ways that people narrate their experience. While plenty of folks resonate with statements such as O’Donnabhain's of feeling "trapped in the wrong body", many of us don't experience ourselves in those terms.

That said, this is a major victory that brings us a step closer to being treated with the dignity we expect and deserve.

And, frankly, the trans community really needed some good news last week. Because two weeks ago we began mourning the death of yet another trans person found murdered, this time in Houston. Ical's death marks the seventh time a gender variant person has been murdered in Houston over the past ten years, as Chris Seabury reported for Edge Boston. Ical died, as the Executive Director of the the Transgender Foundation of America, Cristan Williams, put it in an interview with KHOU, "struggling for her life." “It’s personal," Wiliams continued, "I feel it on a personal level."

Ical was found at 2 in the afternoon in an empty lot. Local leaders feel strongly that given her proximity to a busy intersection, someone must have seen something. And given that the murder took place in Houston's Montrose neighborhood, an LGBT stronghold, witnesses (if there are any) could well be LGBT themselves. But relations between the LGBT community and the Houston police are not strong, Williams commented: "The LGBT community feels very isolated because of the Houston Police Department’s (HPD) often violent past towards LGBT Houstonians." She is calling for the appointment of an LGBT police liaison.

Ical's memorial service was held two weeks ago today. Featuring a moment of silence followed by a moment of noisemaking, the service aimed both to honor Ical's memory and to "encourage people to make noise about the violence that is inflicted on our community," as Kelli Busey reported on planetransgender.

This is the local news coverage of the memorial:

It is crucial to make some noise, not only in memory of those we have lost but also out of sheer determination to forge our way forward. Thank God for the community in Houston, for the ways in which they are clearly claiming their power. Thank God for the courage of Rhianon O'Donnabhain who was willing to make noise and say "this is not OK."

The catch of the trans community at this time and place is indeed overwhelming, a decidedly mixed bag. As we progress, we find ourselves still very much in the wilderness.

As we move toward my very favorite Sunday in the liturgical year, Transfiguration Sunday, the last Sunday in the season of Epiphany, I am mindful of the combination of glory and grief that are mysteriously incorporated in the image of the Transfiguration. The New Zealand Prayerbook's revision of the 1928 BCP collect for the Transfiguration says it particularly well:

God of life and glory,
your Son was revealed in splendour
before he suffered death upon the cross;
grant that we, beholding his majesty,
may be strengthened to follow him
and be changed into his likeness from glory to glory;

for he lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God now and for ever.
Amen.

CP

“Do That Which Scares Me”: Fear and Transgender Equality in Massachusetts

2010-01-22T14:53:00.007-05:00

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
-Rom 8:38-39

A lobby day for transgender equality yesterday capped off what has been, to put it mildly, an extraordinarily intense week here in Massachusetts.

I attended the lobby day in support the H1728/S1687 “An Act Relative To Gender-Based Discrimination and Hate Crimes” bill with my partner and our three-month-old son, and delivered a brief invocation at the end of the speeches in my capacity as Co-Chair of the locally based Interfaith Coalition for Transgender Equality.

The mood in the historic Nurses Hall at the State House was tense, energetic, and laced with anger in the wake of Republican Scott Brown’s Tuesday defeat of Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Martha Coakley. Brown’s win removes Senate Democrats’ sixty-vote supermajority and imperils the passage of national health care reform legislation.

Coakley had been widely backed by the state’s transgender community, as Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition Executive Director Gunner Scott forcefully expressed in a Bay Windows opinion letter last September: “as State Attorney General, Martha Coakley came out early for transgender civil rights as the first statewide elected official to publicly support ‘An Act Relative to Gender-Based Discrimination and Hate Crimes.’” Coakley also “sought civil rights injunctions in numerous cases involving hate crimes against LGBT victims” including one “against two men who attacked a transgender teenager in a Dorchester pizza shop.”

Meanwhile, as Chuck Colbert reported in Bay Windows yesterday, the Massachusetts LGBT community was angered this election by “anti gay-baiting robo calls” that began plaguing Massachusetts phone lines three days before voters hit the polls. Originating “in a 202 area code from the Washington, D.C. [area], a recorded male voice asks residents if they view marriage defined as ‘only between one man and one woman.’ If they indicated ‘Yes’ they were urged to vote for Brown, ‘the only candidate with a proven track record’ of supporting traditional marriage. The call also labeled Coakley as a ‘radical’ same-sex marriage supporter who opposed letting the people vote on the issue and who used taxpayer dollars to support a same-sex marriage ‘agenda.’”

With the Supreme Court just yesterday approving by a 5-4 margin that corporations and labor unions can spend unlimited amounts on federal elections, the floodgates of such robo-calls and other methods of bombardment would appear to be opening at the national level. The majority opinion, penned by Justice Anthony Kennedy, argued that to prevent such spending is to censure free speech. “When government seeks to use its full power, including the criminal law, to command where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear, it uses censorship to control thought,’’ he wrote.

Add to this mix the continuing cloud of grief and anxiety hovering over the many intersecting communities devastated by last week’s 7.0 earthquake in Haiti. Numerous people in New England had connections to the events in Haiti, including members of the large Boston Area Haitian community, the Sisters of Saint Margaret, and medical teams from Boston based Partners in Health.

And add to that list the trans community which learned last weekend of the death of Flo McGarell, a visual artist and transman from Newbury, Vermont, who lived in the city of Jacmal for the past six years, serving as director of the FOSAJ, a non-profit art center. The New England Cable News did what struck me as a very respectful interview with McGarrell’s grieving parents and, perhaps without meaning to, gestured toward the complexity of McGarrell’s gender identity and expression. In an in-depth interview with the art 21 blog about his wildly creative art, Flo described himself as “a total gender mash up” which was “a constant and humorous topic of discussion” in Jacmal. When asked about what guided his artistic vision, Flo answered:

“Don’t hide, don’t lie.
Do that which scares me.
Resist the urge to settle.
Be as many things as possible in this lifetime.”

His loved ones are organizing memorials and tributes at this site.

With such losses along with the sour economy on the minds of lobby day attendees yesterday, a fundamental question emerged: how can we help return a sense of confidence to lawmakers who may be afraid to fight for any legislation considered “controversial” right now? How can we break through this late-January crust of fear?

Fear may be eroding Massachusetts’s transgender nondiscrimination legislation, just as it is at work in the stalled Employment Nondiscrimination Act in Washington. D.C. How is it that over 105 state lawmakers (out of a total of 200) have signed on as co-sponsors of the MA bill, that a poll conducted last November by Lake Research Partners showed that 76% of Massachusetts residents and 80% of Massachusetts women support it, that Governor Deval Patrick has signaled his enthusiastic support, and still this bill has not gotten out of committee? We cannot let the events of this week, devastating as they are, deter us from this crucial task.

As I think and pray about all of these swirling currents, as I watch the dynamics of fear playing out all around me, I can’t help but think of McGarrell’s conscious ethic of fearlessness. And that sentiment, in this week’s context, draws my mind to the Apostle Paul writing to communities in Rome about the eager longing with which creation waits to be set free from its bondage. We may groan inwardly now, he says, and we may feel alone in our labor, but the Spirit indeed intercedes for us, and urges us onward, never, ever separate from the love of God, as we collaborate in building God’s glorious dream.

As the three of us emerged from the State House, we were dazzled by a brilliant, cold blue sky and streams of sunlight.

****************************************************************************

Here is the invocation, which uses language tailored for a group of numerous religious (and nonreligious) traditions:

Nurses’s Hall, State House
Boston, Massachusetts
January 21, 2010

An Invocation for Transgender Lobby Day

May the Holy One of all our traditions bless, protect and empower us, illumining us with insight, calm and unfathomable fortitude.

May we be reminded of the remarkable strength that lies within us, urging us onward even in face of the steepest odds.

May our hearts be filled with gratitude and awe for the sacred community gathered here today: trans people, partners, allies, families of all configurations, people of all races and ethnicities, sexual orientations, national origins, religious and spiritual traditions, professions and vocations.

May the Divine Spirit flowing among us stir up our prophetic anger at the evils of apathy and expediency as much as of bigotry and ignorance.

And may we go forth with boldness, empowered to bear witness to the truth of our lives and the birthright of our human dignity.

All this we ask in the name of the All-Holy One who urges us into life and love, and sets us free. Amen.

CP

Epiphany: Trans Folks “Among Us”

2010-01-11T14:59:00.004-05:00

About a week ago I picked up a voicemail from my mom: “Sweetheart, I was wondering if you’ve heard about Amanda Simpson, the transgender woman who was appointed by President Obama this week?” I had indeed heard about Simpson whose appointment as Senior Technical Adviser for the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security rightly has been hailed as a milestone in the push toward full equality for trans people.

Then on Tuesday, January 5th, the New York Times reported that the Obama administration had “inserted language into the federal jobs Web site explicitly banning employment discrimination based on gender identity.” This move was hailed by the ACLU as “frankly a bigger deal” than the expected insertion of trans inclusive language into the federal handbook for supervisors and managers.

As we move into the season of Epiphany, my question is: what do these developments and the debates swirling around them, reveal about the place and progress of trans folks “among us”? Because if Epiphany – from the Greek epiphaneia, meaning manifestation or revelation – is a celebration of the light of Emmanuel, God-among-us, then part of this celebration requires our search for how God is revealing Godself among us and prodding us to move forward.

Of her own appointment Simpson stated, "I'm truly honored to have received this appointment and am eager and excited about this opportunity that is before me. And at the same time, as one of the first transgender presidential appointees to the federal government, I hope that I will soon be one of hundreds, and that this appointment opens future opportunities for many others."

Predictably, the religious right has received these developments as portents of doom. In response to the updated federal employment protections, Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council argued that trans people should be treated with reparative therapy. Simpson’s appointment prompted the Christian Broadcasting Network’s David Brody to warn Obama not to alienate conservative Evangelicals with "the transgender thing”, while Peter Labarbera of Americans for Truth wondered, "Is there going to be a transgender quota now in the Obama administration?"

Simpson herself later gestured toward the difficulty of being a pioneer in a stigmatized group, remarking to ABCNews.com, “I'd rather not be the first but someone has to be first, or among the first.” Yes, being among the first trans presidential appointees — and certainly the first to be publicly debated — has to be very tough, and she is certainly right to worry about being tokenized, scrutinized, or worse. Any trans person trying to build a career, including within the church, can attest to strains that fall on us. Indeed, a November 2009 survey jointly conducted by the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force revealed that 97% of respondents had been harassed or mistreated on the job and 26% had been fired simply for being transgender.

Stories and statistics like these reveal how crucial it is to finally pass the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, which has stalled in congress and which President Obama has said he will sign. The Episcopal Church urged the passage of a fully inclusive ENDA at its General Convention last summer.

Meanwhile, even some defenders of trans equality – such as the January 9th piece by Christine Wicker, author of The Fall of the Evangelical Nation: The Surprising Crisis Inside the Church – reveal by their held noses just how far we have to go.

Wicker argued that to oppose Simpson’s appointment for conservative Christian reasons is to “favor one religious view over all others.” As a thirty-year veteran of the aerospace and defense industry, Simpson is enormously qualified for the job, end of discussion. And yet Wicker could not resist distancing herself from a community that clearly makes her uncomfortable: “She was so unhappy as a man that she went through the horrific process of changing her gender. Most of us can't begin to imagine what would cause a person to do something so strange. Thinking about it gives us the queasy feeling that the world is changing too quickly, in the wrong direction.” And then, “So where should the rest of us come down on this issue? If Amanda Simpson is qualified for the job, she ought to get it – even if the rest of us think she's weird or don't even think she is a she.”

And while I do wonder who needs enemies with friends like Wicker, her comments raise a key point. Certain pathologizing terms from her piece -- “unhappy”, “horrific”, “weird”, “strange” – could have sprung from the pen of a religious right critic. But one seemingly innocuous phrase does much more damage: “the rest of us”.

Yes, it’s the old us-them thing. I could simply say that this distinction is fundamentally false, because on one level it is. But on another level, and more crucially, questions like “where should the rest of us come down on this issue?” have a performative impact—they create distinctions. They instantiate division under the guise of (reluctant) charity. That’s the kind of charity on which Epiphany should train our eyes.

And then open our hearts. Because, in an odd way, Wicker’s unfortunate commentary remind me of Simpson’s repeated statements of being “among the first.” “Among”, it turns out, derives from the Middle English “ongemang” which literally means “in the crowd or company of” and shares the same root with the verb “to mingle.”

In other words, Simpson is not alone. Trans people are “among us”. Trans people are us. May the God who is among us strengthen and inspire us to reveal that truth in our relationships, our communities, and in our advocacy this season.

Dessert in the Wilderness

2009-12-09T00:07:00.010-05:00

We got our first snow of the season here in Boston on Saturday, that magical first couple of inches before the January days when people go nuts over street parking. It was the perfect accompaniment to a day filled with drama and wonder as the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles followed the election of its first woman (suffragan) bishop, Diane Jardine Bruce, with a second woman, Mary Glasspool, who is also openly gay. Both of these elections, like all such elections, must now be confirmed by Standing Committees across The Episcopal Church. And if that does indeed happen, Gene Robinson will no longer be the only openly gay bishop to have been elected as such in the Anglican Communion.

I was even more excited about this election because Mary Glasspool is the former rector of the congregation I serve, St. Luke's and St. Margaret's Episcopal Church in Allston. She was there from the late 1980s to the early 90s. During her time at SLAM, as it is affectionately known, the congregation became one of really only two parishes in the Diocese of Massachusetts to be truly welcoming to LGBT people at that time (the other was St. John the Evangelist on Bowdoin Street in Boston). Now many congregations here are welcoming.

Mary has been the Canon to the Bishops in the Diocese of Maryland for the last several years after serving a congregation in Annapolis. When she did a sabbatical fellowship in the Boston area in 2006 I was glad to have a chance to have lunch with her, as I'd heard a lot about her from folks around the diocese and in SLAM itself.

We met at the Casablanca restaurant in Harvard Square and chatted about her time at SLAM and some of my experiences up to that point, having just started earlier that year, as well as about Harvard Divinity School where she was doing her fellowship.

But what I really remember is the dessert. Or, rather, the arrival of dessert. For some reason I can still remember what I had for lunch (this is unusual for me)-- it was a salad with pears, carmelized pecans and crumbled blue cheese. And more weirdly still, while I can't tell you what I had for dessert, I remember clearly the moment our server put our desserts before us. They looked absolutely incredible (whatever they were), and I remember an odd thought flashing through my head: we should say grace all over again. Again, not my usual train of thought. But then Mary actually said, "I almost feel like we should say another grace!" We didn't, but dessert was certainly eaten with gratitude.

Throughout Saturday, in between errands with my partner around town, I checked the election results on my laptop. Around 5pm, as I was bringing parcels in from the car, Donna Cartwright (of TransEpiscopal and the Diocese of Maryland) called and shared the news with me. Needless to say, I was ecstatic and, after reading up on the happenings, sent out an email to folks at SLAM. The next day, the second Sunday in Advent, as I preached about the ways in which hope comes to us in the wilderness, I couldn't help but talk about Mary's election. I only wish I had thought to include the dessert-arrival vignette.

Because, the more I think of it, that's how that moment felt to me: like being offered an oasis of hope in the midst of the wilderness. Perhaps you've heard the saying, "save your fork, the best is yet to come?" I obviously don't know what will happen with the consent process, with this ongoing Anglican conflict, etc. But I do think we should save our forks, and not simply for "pie in the sky by and by" but also for dessert in the wilderness in the here and now.

CP

A November to Remember for LGBT Episcopalians in the Diocese of Massachusetts

2009-11-30T16:26:00.011-05:00

I wrote this piece for the Walking with Integrity blog

November in the Episcopal Diocese of Massachsusetts has been quite the month on the LGBT front with big ticket items during our Diocesan Convention, to Transweek and Transgender Day of Remembrance, to this weekend’s announcement about the role of clergy in same sex marriage.

At our Diocesan Convention during the first weekend of November, a resolution was overwhelmingly passed expressing our hope that Bishop M. Thomas Shaw III would give clergy permission to legally solemnize same sex marriages. +Tom has long been a supporter of LGBT people in general -- – and speaking as a trans priest whom he ordained, I mean it when I include the T – and equal marriage in particular, stepping out in support of equal civil marriage during this state’s protracted battle over it.

But once gay couples were legally allowed to wed, Episcopal clergy were still limited to blessing said couples. And while I realize just being allowed to do blessings would be a coup in some dioceses, here being limited to blessings felt like a pastoral nightmare. I can’t tell you how many clergy have had repeated conversations with couples about how they could solemnize some marriages but not others. Some clergy have refused to solemnize any marriages in the in-between time of the past five years. And so, while the conversation about whether we should even “be in the marriage business” as legal representatives of the state goes on, that is a conversation that I suspect will take this church a long time to sort out. It’s a lot more difficult to disentangle than I think people on all sides of the debate realize. In the meantime, to me it has made no sense to refuse to let same sex couples in the solemnization door while we figure out whether we want to restrict our involvement in all marriages to blessings.

Another way I have personally faced this issue is in doing trans marriages. We who are trans also face limitations in our ability to wed. Much depends not only on whether our partnerships are gay, bi, or heterosexual – just like everyone else -- but also on whether our legal documentation (e.g. drivers licenses) accurately reflects our gender. And when I say accurate, I mean whether it reflects our identities, not the meanings that others might write on our bodies. In some states changing appropriate identification is easier than in others (for instance, Ohio is notoriously difficult). So when a couple with a trans member has approached me to do their wedding (and I have now done several), one of the things I have had to ask at some point is what the gender markers their drivers licenses say. In some cases I have been able to bless only and in others I have been able to bless and solemnize. Each time I have been aware that I am part of the ongoing transformation of marriage in this time and place. Because, as I see it, marriage is not now and has never been static. Its meaning and form has long been changing. What was the miracle that Jesus undertook at Cana? The transformation of water into wine. Our relationships are to be sacred vessels in which we walk together through the changes and chances of this life.

But I have to say—and I say this as someone who obviously cares a lot about the marriage debates -- all the energy we pour into marriage can get pretty irritating to the trans community. Because even though we are impacted by the rules regarding marriage as well, marriage is not the most important thing to the trans community (insofar as we can say there is a single trans community—there are indeed numerous communities). Protecting our most basic human rights are. Keeping members of our community safe from violence – as our sisters of color most often experience – and free from often blatant discrimination on the job, in schools, housing, credit, and medical care, is what we are most concerned about. And so we are pleased that the Matthew Shephard Hate Crimes Act is finally now law, but we wait eagerly for the passage of a fully inclusive Employment Nondiscrimination Act and the passage of local and state laws that safeguard us in our various communities.

November is a month that the trans community around the globe is increasingly claiming as its own. The main impetus for this is Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR) which takes place every year on November 20th. Fourteen years ago, an African American Bostonian named Chanelle Pickett was murdered here in Boston on that date. I remember it well because I was a first year MDiv student interning at the Victim Recovery Program at the Fenway Community Health Center at the time, and it was also my birthday. Three years later, on November 28th, 1998 another African American woman named Rita Hester died in Brighton, MA, three blocks from the congregation I now serve, St. Luke’s and St. Margaret’s. This murder sparked a vigil on Brighton Avenue across from the place she was last seen. One year later, the trans community in San Francisco marked that anniversary with the first ever Transgender Day of Remembrance. And so the TDOR tradition, which is now international, was born.

Last year for the first time Boston’s TDOR was held at St. Luke’s and St. Margaret’s, in a secular event that packed the small church. This year, once again, we were asked to host this event (read about it here in the Allston/Brighton TAB; photos by Marilyn Humphries are here). It was a particular honor to be able to share with the gathered community that at its General Convention this past summer The Episcopal Church went on record in support of our full civil rights. And in another important demonstration of support and encouragement, the Crossing, the emergent church style congregation at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in Boston, held a special service in honor of TDOR on Thursday evening, November 19th, also hosting Transcriptions, the local trans/queer themed open mic. More and more Episcopal congregations are opening their arms to trans people.

And then yesterday lay and ordained leaders in Diomass received a beautifully clear letter from our bishop declaring that as of Advent I clergy in this diocese are indeed authorized to solemnize the marriages of same sex couples (read about it in the Boston Globe or Bay Windows) . No more do gender markers on licenses As I talked about it on the phone with a friend and fellow trans priest, I said, “what a relief!” He replied, “I know—now I wanna run out and find a gay couple to marry!”

And so life here in Massachusetts continues to move forward with blessings amid all our complexities. But to me the greatest gift of all this November is my son who was born in mid-October. Today, literally as I wrote this piece, he smiled at me for the first time. God is so good.

CP

On the Threshold of Transweek, a Theological Reflection

2009-11-13T17:30:00.003-05:00

Here in Boston, we are marking the coming week as Transweek in preparation for Friday's Transgender Day of Remembrance, which my congregation, St. Luke's and St. Margaret's, is honored to host again this year. My field education student this year, Kori Pacyniak, shared this wonderful theological reflection with me in our meeting this week, and it struck me as a moving way to begin stepping into the space of the coming week, which seems to me to be as much about the grief with which our community struggles every day and our determined hope to build a better world as it is about mourning those whom we have lost. And so I share this with Kori's permission.

CP

****************************************************

Kori Pacyniak
Theological Reflection

“I am speaking the truth in Christ, I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.” – Romans 9:1-2

Prof. Charles Stang preached on this passage from Romans last Friday at Harvard Divinity School, and it was a passage that seemed to skip the intellect and go directly to my soul. The month of October has largely been a great struggle. September found me struggling against one physical illness after another – there was a span of three weeks where I was just sick, whereas October, by contrast, was filled with internal struggle. It was a busy month from the onset – with preaching, organizing the Noon Service at Harvard Divinity School for national coming out week, a trip to NYC for a film festival and then a speaking engagement at Suffolk University. To top it all off, it was the month I decided to come out to my parents as trans.

It was in coming out to my parents and the time that followed where this verse from Romans really hit me. My parents’ initial reaction was one of shock and disbelief. That disbelief led me to cling to this verse when I heard it. I wanted this verse to legitimize my pain and internal struggle. I needed my faith to support me. Following my parents reaction, I fell apart. I had known it would be difficult to tell them (even though I took the easy way out of writing a letter). I had known that the letter would only be the beginning of the watershed, but I don’t think I was truly prepared for what came next – or to the extent that I would internalize the struggle. My parents’ disbelief and attempted denial of my trans identity leads me to want to throw this verse at them. At the very least, I cling to it in hope.

There is a viewpoint that being trans, is, in a way, all in my head. My parents would like me to just ‘give up on this nonsense’ or grow out of this phase. For them, I believe, the fear and shock leads to disbelief and denial. But the denial only serves to wound me deeper. At times I think it’d be easier if there was acknowledgement and rejection, but then again, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Truth be told, it’d be an incredibly difficult journey regardless of my parent’s reactions – mostly because I have often considered myself to have strong empathic tendencies. Sometimes it really sucks to be an empath – to feel other people’s pain so easily. Personality tests classify me as the healer or the helper. To feel other people’s pain and be able to share it is both a blessing and a curse. A single phone call or voicemail message can send me into tears, feeling the pain of the other individual. This has, in other scenarios, been construed as me just being a very emotional person. I cry at books, movies, songs – it’s very easy for me. But I internalize a lot. At times this has been criticized as melodrama, and I’ll admit that sometimes I can make things bigger than they actually are, but with regard to the anxiety and tempest of emotions inside me around my gender identity, I don’t think it’s fake.

For me, coming to terms with my gender identity needed a spiritual component. This isn’t something I could have done without a religious and spiritual support network. (Or, as I commonly refer to them, my Godsquad). For many years, I struggled to keep sexuality and gender identity as far apart from each other as I could. They were two extremes that I bounced between and while I dreamt of somehow reconciling them, I didn’t have the faintest idea of how to reconcile them within myself. In January of 2009, the HDS Episcopalians went on a one day retreat to the monastery of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist in Cambridge and I ended up spending over an hour in the small chapel there – I just needed to be. In front of the icon of Jesus with the Beloved Disciple, I begged God for a sign that I was okay. That the gender identity issues that were surfacing and that I was struggling to name – that somehow it was okay. I needed a sign that it was okay to be trans. I did get the sign, in the end. Praying and meditating on the icon, I felt myself become the beloved disciple and heard Jesus say to me – “You are my beloved and you are mine.”

That was back in January. I haven’t thought of that time at the monastery for quite some time, but now it seems appropriate paired with the Romans verse. Choosing Christ doesn’t save you from experience angst and hard times, but it does give you something to hold on to. There is a sense of belonging and a sense of validation. It’s that validation that I draw on in trying to resolve things with my parents – and in a way, it’s the validation I need for myself. Because there are plenty of times when I need someone to witness to my pain, to share in it with me and agree that is allowable and not just self-created.

In Prof. Stang’s sermon, he wonders if our conscience “is not sufficient even to report on our own sorrow or anguish.” There are times that I feel this way, especially in regard to gender identity. There is no tell-all book, no ‘Transgenderism for dummies’ book out there or any sort of manual to guide me through the process. Though I have found support in other individuals, there is still part of this journey, this process of self-exploration that remains largely personal and individualistic.

At one point in his sermon, Prof. Stang suggested that “… without the indwelling of Christ we cannot speak the truth of our own lives, we cannot even know the contours of our own despair. If this is right, then I – who cannot in good conscience echo Paul in Gal 2:20 – and perhaps you too, we are barred from the truth of our own pain.” This comment of his seemed to tie in the anguish of October with the reassurance of my prayer at the monastery in January. It also fosters my deep intrinsic yearning to connect with the verse from Romans. I truly think that I would not have been able to come out to my parents without feeling that this was actually the will of God for me at this point in time at my life.

Prof. Stang’s sermon concluded with a startling revelation: “By letting Christ in, we are not delivered from our sorrow or anguish, but rather delivered into them. Christ does not save us from despair, but gives us access to our despair and becomes a corroborating witness to our shifty heart’s anguish.” It’s hard to discern the purpose of certain challenges and hard times that we encounter in our lives, but I think what Prof. Stang is trying to get at, and what I’ve started to come to terms with in October, is that by relying on Christ (or even just including him, as total surrender and reliance on Christ is something that doesn’t come easily to most of us), we are able to bear the challenges we encounter, to validate our pain as real and legitimate, and more fully live in Christ through those challenges and pain.

Today, in Your Hearing

2009-09-22T16:37:00.009-04:00

As Congress gears up to begin hearings on the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA) tomorrow (September 23, 2009), I am grateful to recall how decisively The Episcopal Church declared its support for transgender civil rights in general, and a fully inclusive ENDA in particular, this summer at its 76th triennial General Convention.

I remember the various stories that came out over the course of the Convention about trans people, our vulnerability to discrimination and violence as well as the progress we are making in all areas right now. The stories came from TransEpiscopal members, several of whom testified at General Convention hearings, and on the floor of the House of Deputies. Stories came, seemingly out of the blue, from people I had never met. And I remember how bishops rose, one after another, to speak in support of Anti-Discrimination protections such as ENDA. It was incredibly moving.

But what’s incredibly sad is, as the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force recently learned in a joint study, 97% of those who are gender non-conforming and/or transgender identified have experienced mistreatment, harassment, or discrimination in the worplace. As long as there is no federal Employment Nondiscrimination Act, that statistic is in danger of staying right where it is, because gender identity and expression are not protected categories in most states.

But even more important than a statistic is the impact of that statistic, and the experiences underlying it, on a community that so needs hope. How many trans people give up on their dreams because they fear not simply discrimination itself but the lasting emotional impact of discrimination? I’m talking about a sense of self worth, a sense of confidence in oneself and the knowledge that one has an important contribution to make in this world. Hope is as much at stake in ENDA as the concrete issue of job retention or opportunity.

That’s exactly where The Episcopal Church’s actions add a small contribution-- hope and solidarity. We cannot make nondiscrimination a reality simply with our words. What we can and did do is to add our voice to a growing chorus, specifically a chorus of people of faith.

And I think those words, that chorus, can do more than we might imagine.

If you are trans, and you are reading this, I invite you to imagine yourself, as the gospel of Luke portrays it (Lk 4:16-20), in the synagogue at Nazareth, as Jesus steps forward and reads from the prophet Isaiah (61:1, 2):

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Imagine Jesus rolling up that scroll and sitting down. Imagine your own eyes fixed on this person who read this proclamation of hope with such intensity. And then hear him say to you: “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Imagine that today, in your hearing, you are released from the weight not only of discrimination and violence itself, but also from the fear generated by it. Imagine that you can simply be yourself as God has created you and calls you to be.

Passing ENDA is absolutely essential, and will go a long way toward alleviating the pressure that weighs on all whose gender identity and/or expression does not conform to social norms. But even ENDA cannot by itself put an end to that pressure with which we wrestle every day.

Religious bodies have a crucial part to play in freeing us from this captivity, because it is so often religious traditions that are invoked to undermine our sense of human worth. And because of their role in creating anti-transgender messages, one of the important modes for this work is proclamation. In many and various ways, trans people need to hear: today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. You are set free from stigma and stereotypes, you are released from prisons of gender conformity, you are invited to hear this as the year of God’s favor.

Religious bodies, including the Episcopal Church, have only just begun to take up that work, but when they do, it is powerful.

And so, tomorrow the voice of ENDA renews its cry in the wilderness-- prepare the way.

But today, today may we hear words of hope.

CP

Congratulations, Rev. David Weekley and Epworth UMC

2009-08-31T13:47:00.003-04:00

Yesterday Rev. David Weekley, who transitioned from female to male in the 1970s and was ordained as a pastor in the United Methodist Church 27 years ago, came out to his congregation. I was honored to meet David this past June at the Philadelphia Trans Health Conference-- I moderated a panel of trans clergy on which he sat.

One thing I want to correct from the otherwise accurate below story is that this sentence -- "the Methodist church also will withhold church membership from anyone who is openly gay"-- is incorrect. Plenty of openly gay people attend United Methodist Churches and their memberships are not subject to removal.

But what an extraordinary story, on which the Regal Courier has taken the lead:

Congregation embraces transgender minister as his secret is revealed
Rev. David Weekley hopes his story will help change United Methodist Church doctrine

BY CHRISTINE MCFADDEN
The Portland Tribune, Aug 30, 2009, Updated 11.4 hours ago

As soon as he raises the topic of gay rights to his conservative clergyman friend one day at lunch, he knows it’s a mistake.

He knows that the United Methodist Church long ago retained the right to turn away openly gay clergy members.

So Weekley listens to his friend espouse the opinion of the church, and buries his secret deeper. No one can ever find out that Weekley, a married father of five in Southeast Portland and a Methodist clergyman of 27 years, was born female.

Until now, there has been just one openly transgender Methodist clergyman in the U.S. to retain his ordination (That man, Drew Phoenix, 50, had his ordination challenged by members of the church after coming out publicly in 2007 to his congregation in St. John’s of Baltimore United Methodist Church in Maryland.)

Today, Sunday, Aug. 30, Weekley — who leads the congregation at the Epworth United Methodist Church in the Sunnyside neighborhood in inner Southeast Portland — became the second.

Just months after telling his own children that he was not their biological father, Weekley, who is in his late-50s, came out to his congregation of 221 members.

Standing behind his pulpit, Weekley began his usual worship service. About halfway through, he paused to share a personal message he called “My Book Report.”

He told them that in 1984, just nine years after undergoing extensive sex-reassignment surgeries, he was ordained by the Methodist Church without telling anyone of his original gender at birth.

Following his story, the congregation, who had remained silent throughout his talk, broke into thunderous applause. Church members then proclaimed their support for their pastor.

“It doesn’t change him; he’s still Reverend David, and that’s what counts,” says congregation member Robbie Tsuboi, who has been attending Epworth since 1964.

“I think it was a really, really positive reaction. From what I understand, it was 100 percent support within the church.”

Given the church’s stance on gay rights and its previous reaction to Phoenix’s revelation, Weekley hadn’t known what to expect. According to the Methodist “Book of Discipline,” performing a same-sex wedding, even in a state where it is legal, is an offense that could lead to discipline from Methodist church leaders.

Besides opposing the ordination of gay clergy, the Methodist church also will withhold church membership from anyone who is openly gay.

That’s why Weekley’s action is gaining national attention, including support from the one person who preceded him down this road.

“I’m very happy that he’s going through with this” Phoenix says. “It takes a lot of courage to do what David’s doing.”

Inspired by the past

Weekley’s original plan was to keep quiet throughout his career, waiting until retirement to finally come out. But a trip he took with church members in June 2008 changed his mind.

Weekley joined members of his congregation, which is 95 percent Japanese-American, on a pilgrimage to the remnants of a World War II internment camp for Japanese-Americans in Minidoka, Idaho, just outside of Twin Falls.

The experience touched him deeply. He had faith that a congregation like his own, many of them having experienced prejudice and alienation would be a safe place to come out, he says.

He was right.

“We at Epworth support him,” says congregation member Kazuko Hara, who has been attending Epworth’s services for more than 50 years. “I am supportive of him and will stand by him.”

“I think that they’re looking at his heart,” adds Kaau Ahina, who has been attending Epworth for three years. “They love him for who he is, and (his wife) Deborah.”

Following Sunday morning’s service, Weekley answered questions from the congregation about his decision and his life. One member asked: Was he relieved to have revealed the truth about his life? Weekley exhaled. “Extremely,” he answered.

“Twenty-seven years is a long time,” he says. “I have a lot to say and now I can finally say it.”

Despite anticipating that some of his congregation would leave the church, Weekley actually heard that some members plan to become more involved following his disclosure on Sunday.

“I don’t think I anticipated that so much,” he says smiling.

Weekley is accustomed to being a minority. In fact, he is a minority of a minority, serving as the second-ever Caucasian pastor at Epworth, a church first established in Portland’s old Japantown (today’s Old Town/Chinatown) in 1893, which later moved to Southeast Portland.

Although Weekley himself is not Japanese-American, many of his congregation members speak Japanese and offered mottos as themes for the pilgrimage to the internment camp.

They were: “Gambate,” meaning “Go for it;” “Shigatanai,” meaning “It cannot be helped;” and “Gaman,” meaning “Bearing the unbearable with dignity and grace, creating beauty from hardship.”

This motivation, along with the newfound knowledge that he wasn’t the only transgender clergyman in the world, inspired him to share the truth.

“I knew there were a few transgender people on the planet, but I didn’t think it was a large population,” he says. “It’s not something that you share. You don’t say, ‘by the way, were you born that way?’ It just doesn’t come up.”

In June, Weekley attended a health conference in Philadelphia for transgender people, where he met with more than 40 other religious leaders like himself.

“Jewish, Shinto, Pagan — every faith had at least one transgender leader there and (we) started a trans-religious network,” he says.

He and Deborah returned home ready to come out with the truth, they say.

“He’s not (been) happy,” says Deborah, 60, who works as a massage therapist. The two have been married for 13 years. “He’s becoming more agitated as the years are passing in hiding. He’s not thriving. I want him to thrive.”

Childhood as a girl

Born in Cleveland as a girl, Weekley always knew he was different.

“I always saw myself as a little boy,” he recalls. “My best friend was Gary. I liked sports. At a very young age, it didn’t seem like it was any problem.”

Going to school was more troublesome, he says.

“The teachers didn’t like me — each year that got worse,” he says.

From being blamed by teachers for things she didn’t do, to being slapped across the face by her fourth-grade teacher, Weekley says he didn’t feel he received any adult support until 10th grade, after being referred to a school psychologist.

“I really wanted to drop out of school,” he says. “It was a horrible time. I didn’t fit in, I didn’t look like a girl, I was different.”

As a young teenager, Weekly as a girl joined the marching band because she was comfortable in the unisex uniforms. At home, her parents just thought she dressed like a hippie.

His mother was a Catholic homemaker and his father worked in management and didn’t attend church. The two parents, political opposites, had one other son.

Things changed when Weekley was about 14, he remembers. While at a friend’s house, she overheard her friend’s mom talking on the phone to a neighbor about Christine Jorgensen, the first widely known transgender woman to undergo reassignment surgery in Sweden.

“I started listening and I got really excited,” he says. “After that day I knew what I would do: I would start saving my money and go to Sweden. That was the plan.”

Transitioning to a new life
When a family friend referred her to a doctor, she learned that she wouldn’t have to go as far as Sweden.

At that time, only two clinics existed in the U.S. that were capable of performing sex-reassignment surgery. One happened to be in Cleveland.

“It was a miracle,” he remembers thinking.

Before she could go under the knife, however, she had to endure a six-month process required by the clinic, which included thorough medical and psychological tests and interviews.

She eventually began hormone therapy.

“I went home and popped one and stood in front of the mirror and waited,” he says.

After three months and not much progress, she began non-reversible injections.

Before the surgeries, Weekley had to hire an attorney and go through the lengthy process of changing all of his legal documents.

The courts, he says, were “horribly prejudicial,” and “didn’t easily change the documents.”

The first surgery took place in August 1974, when he stayed in the hospital for three weeks after receiving a phalloplasty — cosmetic surgery of the penis. The second surgery took place the following December for chest surgery, and Weekley went back once more for additional treatment in June 1975.

While he says his family visited him in the hospital for just one of the surgeries, he kept a strong relationship with his grandfather. “(He) taught me how to tie a tie,” he says.

His insurance paid for all of the surgeries, but today most insurance plans wouldn’t cover them because gender reassignment is not considered a “life threatening” condition, Weekley says. “They have no idea how wrong they are,” he says.

For his new name, Weekley chose David, meaning “Beloved of God.”

Adulthood as a man

After his sex-change operations, Weekley studied psychology at Boston University and, while in graduate school at Miami University of Ohio, began to feel drawn to the church.

Weekley had previously stayed away from church due to the hateful things he had heard regarding homosexuals and other minorities. However, after feeling a connection to the United Methodist Church, he joined.

That connection, among other reasons, led him to attend seminary school at Boston University School of Theology. He earned a Master of Divinity Degree in philosophy, theology, and ethics.

This was something he never thought he would do, despite being passionate for preaching at a young age.

“I used to preach to my stuffed animals and I don’t know why,” he says. “My growing up was so horrific that I couldn’t speak in public.”

However, once he entered the Methodist church, he reentered the closet.

“One of the greatest ironies and pains is that the church is the place I’ve had to go back in the closet,” he says. “I’ve stood with colleagues who have said horrific things to me, and they don’t even know it.”

Weekley moved to Portland in 1993 to serve a local church, eventually ending up at Epworth United Methodist.

Gay rights within the Methodist church are undoubtedly political, he says. While the church has its own official stand, progressive members are tolerant toward gay rights, which clashes with the conservatives’ beliefs.

The majority of Methodists in the U.S. reside in the Bible Belt and are conservative, which enabled delegates at the 2008 general conference to pass a new rule stating that no United Methodist funds could be used to educate people on gay and lesbian issues.

At the last general conference, there was talk of the church formally splitting.

“Over the years it’s gotten less vociferous, but there is still no resolution,” Weekley says.

Some progress has been made at the smaller, localized annual conferences.

Weekley’s progressive Oregon-Idaho conference recently had the highest percentage of votes for an “All means all” declaration, which would amend the church’s bylaws to include everyone in the church.

The declaration was narrowly defeated nationally, however, showing that, “the conservatives have enough people and power to always defeat the rest of the denomination,” he says.

Weekley has advocated for inclusivity, not just to national audiences but also to much smaller ones, serving as dean of a summer church camp this year at Epworth.

Though the camp focused mainly on the civil rights movement, a portion focused on breaking traditional sex roles and accepting different kinds of families.

One parent withdrew children from the camp after learning of its liberal content.

“Can girls play baseball? Can boys play with dolls? Of course you can,” Weekley says. “And that was apparently enough for this person to decide not to bring their kids.”

Preparing for the worst, hoping for the best
Despite keeping his secret for the past 27 years, Weekley has led a “blessed” life, he says. “God got me through.”

He has been married twice, and his children and current wife Deborah provide a steady stream of support. The couple have five children (two from a previous marriage) ranging in age from 21 to 39, as well as six grandchildren.

Weekley is up for a national award at this year’s Reconciling Ministries Network Convocation, (a movement to increase the awareness of issues in the gay community and promote inclusivity in the church) and is writing a book about his coming-out experience.

The book’s working title is “In From the Wilderness: The Practice of Gaman.”

He shared his first manuscript with his congregation on Sunday as well. It features his experience at Minidoka and an annotated bibliography of resources for others out there in similar situations.

However, now that he has come out publicly, Weekley and his wife are preparing for any potential backlash. In fact, that’s why he’s asked that his birth name not be published — for fear that hate groups would use it as negative propaganda.

They have taken some necessary precautions in case of any trouble that could arise from aggressive prejudice.

“Trust God, but tie your camel,” Weekley says, quoting a Middle Eastern proverb.

Phoenix, the other openly transgender United Methodist clergy person in the U.S., had charges filed against him from clergy in his conference and was brought before the Judicial Council (the United Methodist Church’s equivalent of the Supreme Court).

The charges to have him removed from the church proved to be unfounded and Phoenix was able to retain his ordination. He is working in Anchorage, Alaska, in environmental health and justice and calling on Congress to pass legislation ending the discrimination he endured.

While the Book of Discipline forbids gays from joining the church, nothing explicitly turns away transgender people, which protects Phoenix and Weekley.

However, conservative Methodists have been battling the “All Means All” declaration, working to exclude transgender people.

Both Phoenix and Weekley could potentially face having their credentials taken away if legislation is passed at the next general conference (which takes place every four years) in 2012 banning transgender people.

“There’s always that possibility — just like there was in 2008,” Phoenix says.

Although Greg Nelson, director of communications for the Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference, thinks that it’s likely similar legislation will be brought up again soon, he believes that, “it’s important that this came out before the conference in 2012.

While Weekley and his wife are preparing for the worst, they are optimistic about the future of the church.

Weekley says that he has, for the past 27 years, thought about switching to a church that is more accepting of his choices, but ultimately decided to stay loyal.

“There have been many times I’ve thought about walking away and considering a different denomination,” he says, “but my heart has always caused me to remain in the hope of effecting change.”

He remains hopeful that the Methodist church can one day retain the same acceptance toward gay rights and perhaps pass legislation similar to the Episcopal Church, which recently adopted protections for gays and transgender people.

“This really puts it all on the line,” Weekley says of his decision to share his news with his congregation and the world. “I’m not leaving, I’m just coming out. I’m not walking away, but I’m not staying quiet and hidden anymore.”

cmcfadden@portlandtribune.com

Episcopal Church Adopts Trans-Inclusive Policies

2009-08-27T18:12:00.002-04:00

From the Bay Area Reporter

Episcopal Church adopts trans-inclusive policies
by Chuck Colbert
They were a party of eight, four transgender women, two transmen, a gay man, and straight woman ally. They told friends, "We're going to Anaheim," not too far away from Disneyland.

They were also change agents. By the end of their church's triennial gathering last month this band of sisters and brothers made Episcopalian history with the advent of trans-inclusive action and convention-floor testimony from a 19-year-old man believed to be the first openly transgender deputy.

"Members of TransEpiscopal made an incredible difference by giving incarnational witness to the "T" in LGBT and – in the process – moving the Episcopal Church further toward its goal of being a truly inclusive and welcoming church," said the Reverend Susan Russell of All Saints Church in Pasadena, California.

Russell is president of Integrity, the denomination's LGBT advocacy group.

Dedicated to spiritual enrichment and empowerment, TransEpiscopal ( http://blog.transepiscopal.com/) serves as a support and advocacy group for the denomination's transgender members and significant others, families, friends, and allies.

Altogether, the 2009 General Convention of the Episcopal Church, held July 8-17, adopted four resolutions. Two of them support enactment of civil sector anti-discrimination and hate crimes legislation protecting transgender people at local, state, and federal levels.

Voting in separate legislative bodies, the House of Delegates and the House of Bishops, convention deputies – lay persons, clergy and bishops – also adopted two other resolutions, one adding "gender identity and expression" to its non-discrimination policy for hiring lay employees and another calling for the revision of church paper and electronic forms to allow a wider range of gender identifications.

Bishop Marc Handley Andrus of the California Episcopal Diocese, an outspoken advocate against Proposition 8 last year, enthusiastically supported all four trans-inclusive resolutions.

A fifth resolution, an effort to add "gender identity and expression" to the church's non-discrimination canons, or church laws, passed in one house and was amended in another house by striking various categories – for instance, race, age, and ethnicity, among others – and substituting "all people."

That move "puts us back to square one in explaining 'all really means all' to those who want to discriminate on the basis of race, gender, etc, etc, etc.," explained Russell. "So we opted to let the resolution die by not bringing it back to the floor of the first house for concurrence."

"Anyway," she added, "we'll come back around that one next time out. I am convinced that by doing the education in the next three years, it will get passed in both houses."

Nonetheless, the trans-inclusive steps already taken are a remarkable turnaround from the last triennial gathering.

"We're taking the 'T' out of LGBT and letting it stand alone," said Dee Tavolaro, a convention deputy and college student from Lincoln, Rhode Island. Three years ago, an effort failed to bring even one resolution out of committee, he explained.

This time, however, Tavolaro, along with straight ally Sarah Lawton and Massachusetts state Representative Byron Rushing, successfully co-authored two resolutions, both of which were adopted. Tavolaro even testified in favor of trans inclusion at a committee hearing, as well as on the floor of the House of Deputies.

"For the church to take [trans-inclusion] on in such a supportive way gives me hope that the church I love so much has in a very clear way said that it does care about me and what those in the larger society think and say," he said.

For secular society, Tavolaro added, "The church sends to the LGBT community such a wonderful message that we are an inclusive church, not perfect, but we're trying hard."

A self-described "overall church geek," Tavolaro has served in Episcopal parishes in music, youth, and acolyte ministries. This summer he is a staff member for vacation Bible school. Tavolaro is also considering – "discerning" in church language – a vocational call to the priesthood.

Not the first
Comparatively speaking, the 2.1 million-member Episcopal Church, the U.S. branch of the 77 million-member Anglican Communion, is not the first to advance trans-inclusive denominational policy. And yet, with the adoption of four transgender resolutions in Anaheim, the Episcopal Church, often considered a denominational bellwether, is now the largest American church to go officially pro-trans.

For a church "most people think of as the closest to mainstream Protestantism," said national transgender activist and Episcopalian Donna Cartwright of Baltimore, the Anaheim convention is a significant development for the transgender community.

"It tells [us] that our stories and journeys can be honored in a religious way," said Cartwright, who was part of the eight-person group in Anaheim. "The body that grappled with sexual orientation is now doing so with gender identity. There is a path for all of us to full acceptance in the body of Christ."

By comparison, the United Church of Christ at its 2003 General Synod passed a lengthy resolution in support of transgender people. In 2007, the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations adopted two trans-inclusive resolutions at its General Assembly.

Two years ago, Reform Judaism included several prayers for sanctifying the sex-change process in its publication "Kalanu," (Hebrew for "all of us.") First published in 1996, the original version of "Kalanu" was a 150-page collection of texts and resources for gay and lesbian inclusion. The 2007 update is comprehensively expanded, including liturgy for same-sex union ceremonies, a divorce document for same-sex couples, and a prayer for coming out.

Meanwhile, back in Anaheim, the power of personal story – its ability to transform abstract concepts like gender identity and expression into concrete human reality – seemed to win over hearts and minds.

"What blew me away," said the Reverend Cameron Partridge, a transgender priest and TransEpiscopal leader, "was how many people came out of the woodwork. More people are connected to the transgender community than one might imagine."

As Partridge, originally from the Bay Area, now serving as vicar of a Boston parish, explained further, "When we brought up the [resolutions] people stepped forward to say, 'My neighbor is trans, or my son or daughter is.' In other cases, and random places, people came forward and told me, 'I am so glad that you testified at that committee hearing. I would never have thought about [transgender concerns] before.'"

In sum, Cameron, another among the party of eight, added, "People were amazing."

For straight ally and convention deputy Lawton, gender identity and expression is all in the family. Her sister is a transgender woman, and Lawton spoke to delegates from the convention floor for two minutes, telling some of her sister's story.

"When someone comes out transgender in a family," Lawton said recently during a telephone interview, everyone "goes through a process. I know that my parish church was helpful to me in my own transition because you have to go through this as a family."

St. John's the Evangelist, located in San Francisco's Mission District, Lawton went on to say, "offered me as well as my sister pastoral support. I know how helpful that was. I rejoice in how much progress we made at this convention through education and visibility, and in raising our voices in welcome."

08/27/2009

A TRANS PERSPECTIVE ON GENERAL CONVENTION

2009-07-22T20:26:00.000-04:00

CONCERNING EXPECTATIONS

Last year, before I journeyed to Canterbury for the Lambeth Conference, I wrote of my low expectations for that every-ten-year gathering of the Anglican Communion’s bishops. Upon my return, I reported in sadness how it had lived down to my expectations.

In truth my expectations for the every-three-year General Convention of the Episcopal Church – our 76th – were not much higher. Indeed, given the tension and, among some, anger surrounding BO33, a 2006 resolution promising “restraint” on same-sex unions and the consecration of gay bishops, and the threats since by the Archbishop of Canterbury concerning our membership in the Anglican Communion, I was not the only one who feared an explosion of one sort or another this July in Anaheim.

That explosion never occurred. Instead, both the House of Deputies and House of Bishops passed by overwhelming majorities of two-to-one a positive, forward-looking resolution – DO25 – that allowed BO33 to fade into the mists of a fearful past, boldly stated the inclusive truth of the current consensus within the church, and charted a course for moving forward in continuing fealty to the Anglican Communion.

Against that background, the goals and expectations of the transgender community, of which I am a member, paled in comparison. As we gathered two blocks from Disneyland, we were probably were not even on the horizon of most deputies and bishops. The hope of our nascent transgender organization – TransEpiscopal (www.blog.transepiscopal.com/ ) – was simple and modest. Of the four trans-specific resolutions originally submitted, our hope was that one would make it to the floor of the House of Deputies where discussion of it would lead to recognition of our existence and begin an education process around the issues that confront us on a daily basis.

Our little team of eight, embedded in the larger and very supportive Integrity team (www.integrityusa.org/), succeeded, however, beyond our wildest dreams.

What follows is my attempt to chronicle what happened and to describe my feelings as events unfolded and, now, in their warm afterglow.

PUTTING TOGETHER A TEAM AND A PROGRAM

This adventure started for us in the chill of February. Communicating through the spring by e-mail and conference calls, we tracked the several resolutions being submitted by dioceses and obtained the support of non-trans allies such as Sarah Lawton and Byron Rushing, coordinated our efforts with key LGBT advocacy groups such as Integrity and the Consultation (www.theconsultation.org/), produced a brochure to hand out at convention and elsewhere, raised money, divided up tasks at convention, and steeled ourselves for the unknown.

And there was a lot that was unknown, for this would be the first time that there would be a visible, vocal transgender presence at a general convention. Would anyone notice? Would anyone care? Would there be a hostile backlash?

There were eight of us and we were, despite our common cause, amazingly diverse. We were five transwomen, two transmen, and a gay male ally; three priests, one deacon, and four lay people; and one of our number, Dee Tavalaro, a 19-year-old layman, would be the first trans deputy in the House of Deputies. We hailed, moreover, from every corner of the country – Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maryland, Michigan, Wisconsin, and, yes, California – and spanned the age spectrum from nineteen to seventy.

We also brought to the task a variety of skills that included expertise with computers and audio/visual equipment, writing, editing (the New York Times no less), and labor organizing. Leadership flowed rather naturally to The Rev. Cameron Partridge, a Massachusetts priest, ably assisted by Donna Cartwright, the editor/organizer from Baltimore and The Rev. Michelle Hansen, a retired priest from Connecticut. All three had been at earlier conventions and educated the rest of us on the ins and outs of the sometimes arcane legislative process. Cam and I had also shared the experience of Lambeth last year and, with Michelle, the Pacific School of Religion’s Transgender Religious Summit in Berkeley the year before.

And so we left our homes and families, telling our friends: “I’m going to Disneyland!”

HITTING THE GROUND RUNNING

Our arrivals were only slightly staggered with all of us on the ground for the start of the convention. The only one to drive, I arrived about 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, July 7, joining up with the others between an ongoing meeting of the National and International Affairs Committee (which had two of our resolutions) and a regular 10:00 p.m. meeting of the Integrity team. The latter, a Lambeth reunion of sorts, was followed by the first of a dozen or so meetings of our TransEpiscopal team.

At that first meeting, we divided assignments for testimony before the two committees that would be hearing our resolutions. The World Missions Committee would, we learned, consider our resolutions on Canon revisions opening up access to the ordination process to the transgendered (i.e., prohibiting exclusion of the basis of gender identity or expression)…and it would do so at 7:30 the next morning.

Getting back to my Travelodge room around midnight, I scribbled some notes on a yellow legal pad and, falling into a bed that would become familiar, enjoyed the sleep of exhaustion.

Four of us testified the next morning – Wednesday. It was the first act in a whirlwind of sixteen-hour days that soon became a blur – 7:00 a.m. committee meeting, bagel, 9:30 House of Deputies and House of Bishops meetings, Eucharist, a hot dog in the exhibit hall food court, 2:00 p.m. meetings of the two houses, 7:00 p.m. committee meeting, a veggie Panini at the Courtyard, 10:00 p.m. Integrity team meeting, 11:00 p.m. TransEpiscopal meeting to lay out plans for the next day. For Cameron, who also had responsibilities with Integrity and the Consultation, whilst all the while blogging non-stop, the schedule was even more intense.

In the “breaks,” there were opportunities to lobby potential allies, to meet folks at the Integrity booth, to make new friends, and to just soak in the Spirit that permeated the place, the people, the proceedings. Whatever exhaustion had crept in evaporated in the growing exhilaration. Running into House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson between meetings, I could honestly answer “Yes!” – to which I added a hug and a “Thank you” - when she asked “Are you having fun?”

And it soon became apparent that our decision to be in place for the start of convention was a wise one, for it was a very much front-loaded affair with regard to the resolutions we had put forward. Already the second morning, for example, we found ourselves testifying before the National and International Affairs Committee which had on its plate our resolutions on hate crimes and employment non-discrimination. The next mornings and evenings were devoted to following the discussion of the resolutions by the two committees.

Chaired by Bishop John Chane of Washington and including around the table familiar faces like Integrity’s Louie Crew and California’s Sarah Lawton and Bishop Marc Andrus, the National and International Affairs Committee seemed the more simpatico of the two groups. It was an impression reinforced by the nods and smiles that greeted our testimony. Despite a mild hiccup concerning the addition of “disability” to the list of protected classes in the resolutions under consideration and the perception of some that that might imply that LGBT people suffered from some disability, both resolutions passed with overwhelming majorities.

It was also clear that the World Missions Committee was an unlikely one to be asked to consider BO33 and our transgender resolutions. The rationale for the assignments seemed to be that BO33 related to relations with the Anglican Communion and that transgender issues related to BO33. That said, some members of the committee found their task awkward and unfamiliar and an early attempt was made to fob off our resolutions to the Commission on Canons…a move that would have been very understandable. The Chair, Gay Jennings, pointed out, however, that to do so would mean bumping our trans issues to the end of the line of a long list of issues facing Canons and losing them in the rush of last minute business as they were in 2006. “We have been dealt these issues,” she insisted, “and it is up to us to deal with them.”

And deal with them they did…in a movingly thoughtful and spiritual manner. There was, to be sure, considerable misunderstanding about what it means to be transgendered and the difference between gender identity and sexual orientation. One bishop, for example, objected that there was no need for our resolution CO61, since “Sexual orientation is already in the canon.” In response, Ian Douglas gave one of the clearest explanations of the differences between identity and orientation, stressing the relational aspect of the latter. (Thanking him two days later, I added that even I, a transgendered person, had learned from what he said.)

Bottom line, the resolution passed 19-8 among the deputies, with the four bishops voting “No,” and, indeed, was strengthened by adding upfront words to the effect that all are welcome.

As our team drifted out into the hallway to take a celebratory breath and plan next steps, we were joined by the committee’s Michael Barlowe, tears behind his eyes, who spoke of how the Spirit had moved in the room we had just left. He then relayed a request from the chair for a list of authoritative definitions that could be handed out in the House of Deputies and a brief statement she could make in presenting the resolution to the House. We readily agreed to take on the task. In the course of the next hours, our Donna Cartwright obtained from Lisa Motet of the Washington office of the National Lesbian and Gay Task Force a list of definitions on NLGTF letterhead and Cameron Partridge produced the desired statement. With a helpful addition by Michael Barlowe, it was used by Gay Jennings in introducing the resolution.

Entering the third day, we had already exceeded our pre-conference goals – three resolutions would make it to the floor of the House of Deputies and two more, introduced by Dee Tavolaro, were wending their way through the committees. The latter concerned non-discrimination in the hiring of lay employees and making ordination forms less gender particular. Time to take a deep breath, savor the moment, and prepare to track what we had wrought.

THE SPIRIT TAKES WING

Literally! Taking a seat for the first time in the visitors’ gallery of the House of Deputies, I was amazed by the solitary pigeon (aka dove) that hovered over the deputies, continuing to fly about the hall the next several days. And, it became clear, the Spirit was stirring not only above, but within the deputies.

First came the overwhelming 2-1 vote for DO25, the action on which then moved to the House of Bishops. Meanwhile those of us in TransEpiscopal awaited in tense anticipation for the introduction in the House Deputies of our trans-specific resolutions, the first of which would be DO12 on hate crimes legislation. We waited and waited…and waited through the afternoon of Monday, July 13. Getting the impression that it would not be brought up till the next morning and hearing that the bishops were in the midst of the historic debate on DO25, Donna and I made our way upstairs to the House of Bishops…arriving just in time to hear the impassioned intervention of Rochester’s Bishop Singh who spoke of how the church had been planted and prospered in India among the untouchables, the outcasts. Soon thereafter the vote began. Of all the votes, the one that rang clearest to my ears was the crisp, unwavering “Aye!” of the Presiding Bishop.

The deed was done, the final vote being 99-33. It was as if a festering boil had been lanced. One could feel the tension, the fear, the pain leave the room, leave the church. The doors opened and the people rushed out too, making their way – in silence – down the long, steep escalator. Bishop Steven Charleston and I shared a silent, smiling high five as he stepped onto its moving corrugated metal.

Making my own way down to the lobby, I made my way back to the House of Deputies, there to learn that our resolution DO12 on hate crimes and violence had made it to the floor and that Dee, Sarah Lawton, and Michael Barlowe had spoken movingly on behalf of it, as had several others. While the omens were good, the vote had been taken by orders and the results, therefore, would not be made known till the next morning.

Sarah, Michael, and other members of the California delegation were in the midst of an impromptu celebration at the back of the hall. It was a moveable feast that made is way through the lobbies of the Convention Center and Hilton and up a freight elevator to Bishop Marc’s seventh floor hospitality suite. From there I caught a glimpse in the distance of Disneyland and its Matterhorn – as close as I would get – as the celebrating gave way to planning the next day’s and, indeed, the evening’s legislative work.

For my part, I had planned to leave first thing the next morning to begin my journey home by way of a visit with my mother-in-law in Ojai. I could not, however, leave without returning to the House of Deputies the next morning to learn the vote. DO12 passed overwhelmingly! The tears welled up. Getting up to leave, I was exchanging farewell hugs with my transgender sisters and brothers, when Dee and World Missions Chair Gay Jennings rushed from the floor to join us. Squeezing out a feeble “Thank You,” I turned and walked through a now silent lobby and, stopping only long enough to share my joy with three new deacons, traced a well-worn path to the Travelodge…my car…and home
I was home a day on Friday when I got the telephoned news from Cam that the bishops had passed DO12 following what Episcopal Life called a “lively debate” – a debate that included supportive statements by Cam’s Bishop Tom Shaw and my Bishop Marc Andrus.
At home I also learned that our resolutions on ENDA, on non-discrimination in the hiring of transgedender lay employees, and on making church forms more trans-friendly had also been approved with flying colors. I learned, however, that there had been a long and contentious debate about changing Canon III concerning ordinations (our original CO61). The bishops could not bring themselves to add gender identity or expression to the list of classes that could not be excluded from the ordination process. Instead, by a very split vote, they eliminated any mention of any specific group and bounced back to the World Missions Committee and thence to the House of Deputies a resolution that opened the ordination process to “all baptized Christians.” With TranEpiscopal’s support, that was voted down in the House of Deputies in the hope that three years hence, after further education, we might succeed in getting “gender identity or expression” added explicitly to the canon.

Despite this last minute disappointment, we succeeded in getting four trans-important resolutions passed and the canon change is now on our horizon and the bishops’ radar screens. Above all we incarnated an otherwise abstract issue and educated a broad spectrum of the church about the reality of our lives. I have little doubt that, by continuing a visible presence in the councils of the church and ramping up our education efforts, we will, three years hence in Indianapolis, complete the job of fully including transgendered people in the life of the church.

A SPECIAL EUCHARIST

This has been an important, inspiring start for TransEpiscopal and, as we look forward to Indianapolis and beyond, it is worth noting a little noticed Eucharist held in a small Integrity meeting room at the Courtyard Marriott the evening of Saturday, July 10.

Seeking to mark the departure the next morning of one of our team members Gari Green, we decided to hold a first Transgender Eucharist at General Convention. We were encouraged by our Integrity allies, especially Jim Toy, who recalled the first Integrity Eucharist in 1988 attended in just such a room by a handful of people.

And so we gathered – about twenty of us. Gari, assisted by Cam and Michelle, presided, I served as deacon, and Donna read the first lesson. In lieu of a sermon, everyone in the room reflected on the experience of the previous few days and the importance of what had already transpired to their own spiritual lives and to that of the church. We then formed a circle and passed the bread and cup to each other…one bread, one cup, one family.

Of all the splendid Eucharists that graced convention, including the Integrity Eucharist that had grown to 1,500 people, this was the one I will remember most. It is a memory I have carried home and will carry with me the rest of my life. It is a special memory of a time and place in which ours lives became more fully a part of the life of the church and an earnest that that communion will become fuller still.

By Vicki Gray

THE WIND OF THE SPIRIT

2009-07-22T16:43:00.000-04:00

I am stunned. I have actually become increasingly stunned over the last 2 weeks or so. And that comes from a woman who prides herself in being able to "roll with the punches." I have had a lot of practice at that.

When I arrived in Anaheim on the afternoon of 7/6 I had no idea what to expect. Certainly we would testify. We would witness to our reality. But, accomplish anything. I had my doubts. My daughter calls me a cynic. I prefer "realist", as a descriptor. I found it necessary to leave on 7/12. Time to go back home, back to work, and to follow the events and those I had come to love from a distance.

Still I sit here on 7/17, the last day of the 76th General Convention of the Episcopal Church, stunned, bemused, grateful, joyous, and above all thankful. The Spirit took the willingness of people to stand in their own truth's, not just us, but all those willing to stand and say as Luther did, "I can do no other", and blew through this institutional gathering with a freshness that happens only seldom in a lifetime. I clearly acknowledge there are those brothers and sisters in Christ who may disagree. Since we are now coming close to standing on level ground, we can certainly continue the conversation in that fashion.

I have long since lost track of the alphabet soup that corresponds to the various resolutions that received our testimony and support, but they have passed one after another in both houses of our beloved church, and by substantial margins in both houses.

All this will need to unfold in actual practice. As has been noted elsewhere we still have miles to go, but this General Convention was certainly a milestone in that journey. Yes, there are those that maintain the moratoria laid out in BO33 continues, but even that voice seems to be strangely muted.

I look forward to continuing this wondrous journey with the brothers and sisters I have known for some time and those sisters and brothers I met in the last couple weeks. .

The Rev. Gari Green

Concluding Press Conference Comments on Transgender Related Resolutions

2009-07-21T16:25:00.004-04:00

At the conclusion of the 76th General Convention, Neva Rae Fox, Program Officer of the Office of Public Affairs at the Episcopal Church Center, led the final press conference. Answering questions were the President of the House of Deputies, Dr. Bonnie Anderson, the Presiding Bishop, the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, and the Bishop of the Diocese of Los Angeles, the Rt. Rev. Jon Bruno.

I was very grateful to Integrity USA for using one of their two questions to ask the panel about the historic passage of transgender specific resolutions.

The video of the press conference is embedded in the below post with TransEpiscopal's and Integrity's press releases, but because the trans question was the penultimate one, and because I have found the video difficult to scroll through, I have transcribed the question and responses below.

Anaheim, CA
July 17th

Question:

Rachel Swan with Integrity USA. I’m wondering if any of you—all of you—can comment on the passage of the resolutions that deal with advocacy for transgender people, kind of a first for our church.

Neva Rae Fox: Thank you. Bishop Bruno?

Rt. Rev. Jon Bruno:

Well, transgender people are part of the congregations in this diocese, and they’re part of the world community. And it’s a good thing that we’re dealing with this openly. We need to talk about the fact that humanity is different wherever you go, and that we are all called to be loved as children of God, and dealt with, with equity and love.

Dr. Bonnie Anderson:

Let me just add that in the House of Deputies we had testimony from transgender persons. It was very moving. It was very well received in the House of Deputies. I believe that it helped us to see and learn about that particular way of being. We welcomed that and did pass resolutions to include all people, including transgender persons.

DO I LOOK LIKE HALF A HUMAN BEING?

2009-07-20T01:43:00.002-04:00

What follows is the testimony of Vicki Gray before the Committee on National and International Affairs on DO12 concerning transgender civil rights:

I have been shouted at by angry, threatening men in a shopping mall.

I have had rocks thrown at me from a passing pick-up truck on the Golden Gate Bridge.

With the San Francisco Night Ministry, I have repeatedly encountered my transgendered sisters and brothers on the corners of Polk Street or Larkin…selling their bodies at two o’clock in the morning, because they have no other way to support themselves.

And I know that my transgendered brothers and sisters are killed in this country at the rate of one a month.

A few years back I attended the funeral of a young teen, Gwen Araujo, who was killed in Newark, California just because she was transgendered.

Also at that funeral were the “Rev.” Fred Phelps and his followers, shouting through their bullhorns “Gwen is burning in hell!”

As fate would have it – God’s serendipity – the students at Gwen’s Newark High School were at the time in the midst of rehearsing “The Laramie Project,” which features a chorus of angels. The members of that chorus came to the funeral in their angels’ garb – white robes and wings – and formed a cordon from the street to the church entrance to protect Gwen’s mom Sylvia and the other mourners from Phelps’ haters.

I tell you all this to impress upon you how vulnerable transgender people are to hate, discrimination, and violence. We desperately need the added protection that would be afforded by our inclusion in hate crimes and employment discrimination legislation.

I come before you to urge your support for two resolutions before you that would put our church on record in support of such legislation.

For me, this is not an abstract issue. It is a matter of life and death.

In closing, let me say I have heard those who have told us to “wait your turn.” I have also heard those who have advised us to “accept half a loaf.” To them and to you, I ask: “Do I look like half a human being?”

Advent Approaches in the Episcopal Church

2009-07-19T10:36:00.004-04:00

I’m on the plane heading back to Boston. It’s a quiet ride but for the man who just woke me up with his loud guffaws at Monsters vs. Aliens, but no matter. I haven’t had this much time to be quiet or really think in a number of days. My brain is full. I ran into Dee Tavolaro in the airport, looking for lunch, and as we waited in line for the most expensive McDonalds burger I’ve ever eaten, he exclaimed, “I am so tired of the letters LGBT. Right now I don’t want to hear a combination of letters remotely close to them-- BLT, you name it.” The woman in front of him secretly smirked. Later, at my gate, I overheard a woman behind me (and, I assume, on this flight) telling someone on the phone, “I can’t even think about going to church on Sunday!” Yep, we’re all tired—LGBT-ed/churched (even ubuntu-ed) out. But I have to say, my exhaustion is happy.

I don’t know how people away from the Convention have perceived it, but from where I sit, I feel like the Episcopal Church just turned a major corner. I feel an overwhelming sense of relief. For so long, questions and conflicts over a combination of gender and sexuality, refracted in confusing ways through our colonial legacy, have paralyzed us as a denomination. B033, the resolution that three years ago essentially imposed a moratorium on the consecration of LGBT people to the Episcopate, has now been superceded. And while it will take the actual election, consent and consecration of an openly LGB and/or T person as a bishop to complete the ending of that moratorium, to concretely embody our forward movement as a church, to my mind and those I have conversed with these last few days, we have prepared the way for that to happen. We are ready. It’s as though as a Church, we have been stuck in the latter part of the liturgical year, the days leading up to Advent when the readings assigned in the lectionary are peppered with weeping and gnashing of teeth. And now we are approaching the threshold of Advent. I am so ready for the fulfillment of that hope.

For those of you who have been following the bigger LGBT picture at this Convention, you will also know that in addition to D025, which supports an inclusive ordination processes for ALL orders of ministry, we passed C056, which officially moves us forward on blessing the marriages, domestic partnerships and civil unions of same sex couples. The short story on this matter is that in dioceses around the country we have been doing such blessings for years. It’s the official sanctioning of that work, and the official designing or gathering of such services on which the Church has been stalled. Now, with C056, we are finally beginning to move forward on this practice as a whole Church.

And obviously, if you have been following this blog, by now you know that at this Convention we made stunning progress on transgender issues. As we look back on the work of this Convention, I think it will be important to see this progress in the larger context of the forward movement via D025 and C056. But I also think our progress was part of the spirit of openness and relationality, and indeed of intentional, focused storytelling that were themes of this Convention (not to mention humor, as several bishops displayed during their session Friday). The spirit of the indaba groups that were featured at last summer’s Lambeth Conference also feels connected to this trend. People were careful not to demonize one another in their disagreements. People attended to one another’s humanity. Those of us who testified on the transgender related resolutions benefited from and, I hope and believe, contributed to that spirit.

And that is as it should be. That kind of attentiveness to one another’s humanity is at the heart of the Baptismal Covenant of the Episcopal Church, which asks, “will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?” and “will you strive for justice and peace and respect the dignity of every human being?” The answer to these questions may seem easy, but sometimes they are not — which is why the response given in the Book of Common Prayer is “I will, with God’s help.” This Christian life we are about is a spiritual discipline that we all pledge to take up upon entry into this beloved community. And I know in my very gut that when we live into that discipline, when we do, with God’s help, we grow. Advent approaches indeed.

CP

“Naming, Naming is Very Important”

2009-07-19T10:34:00.009-04:00

An unbelievable four trans-positive resolutions passed at this General Convention. Two of them (D090 and D032) have been mentioned in earlier blog posts. But what happened with D012 and C048 in the House of Bishops? In the rush of Convention’s completion, grabbing a moment to give a detailed report on the unfolding of their passage proved impossible.

Just to be clear about their distinctions, D012 put the Episcopal Church on record in a broad support of non-discrimination and hate-crimes legislation at municipal, state, and federal levels. C048 spoke to the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) currently pending in Congress. Both of these resolutions passed, but in different ways.

I had expected D012, which passed resoundingly in the House of Deputies earlier in the week, to come up in the House of Bishops on Thursday, but that didn’t happen. This made me worry it could slip through the cracks, as some legislation can in the massive crunch of this ten-day event. After the bishops’ session ended on Thursday, I approached my bishop, Tom Shaw, to ask if he might be able to help me locate it. He connected me with Bishop Johnson of West Tennessee who represented the official Dispatch of Business committee for the House of Bishops (the House of Deputies has a parallel person). Bishop Johnson took me to the office of the Secretariat of the House of Bishops, where I ran into two fellow Bryn Mawr graduates, one of whom was working for the office. We took a picture of ourselves in our bemusement. With the help of this office and the parallel office of House of Deputies and Bishop, we found the crack into which the resolution had fallen. And so, after some extra running around, D012 came up during the morning session of the House of Bishops on the last day of the Convention.

As it so happened, I was out of the room when the debate began, and I now know from viewing the notes of my fellow Integrity Legislative Team tracker, that my own bishop Tom Shaw, spoke first in support. I so wish I could have heard that. As I walked in, Bishop Love of the Diocese of Albany was speaking against the resolution. He had no issue with the nondiscrimination language, but wanted to remove the language of “hate crimes.” His concern was that preaching against particular “lifestyles” on moral grounds could be construed as a hate crime. He did not, however, move an amendment.

Bishop Marc Andrus spoke strongly in favor of the resolution, as he had with C061. He began by emphasizing how this resolution differed from C061. This was about basic civil rights for transgender people—nondiscrimination in the workplace, access to education and public accommodation, extra resources to law enforcement when investigating a hate crime. He spoke of the vulnerability of transgender people to job loss and violence. He was impassioned and eloquent. Bishop Andrus has been such an amazing ally throughout this Convention.

Bishop Barbara Harris, retired suffragan bishop of Massachusetts and one of my personal heroes, then spoke in favor of the resolution. She underscored the vulnerability of trans people to violence and in particular the high death rate around the globe.

Bishop Catherine Roskam of New York then spoke in favor of the resolution, including the hate crimes language, arguing that it was important for this resolution to have that specific language because of the profound vulnerability of trans people. She went on to say she knew from personal experience that this was not only an issue in the United States but also around the Anglican Communion. She had visited a congregation in India that has a partner relationship with a congregation in her diocese. This Indian congregation has a ministry to transgender people there, and she knows from visiting that they too are a vulnerable population. I have heard of this congregation and its relationship and was so glad to hear the bishop bring it to the House’s attention.

Bishop Catherine Waynick of Indianapolis then rose to speak in support of D012. She began by saying that she had felt some tension within herself about the way their previous discussion of C061 had used the term “all.” "All" does not means "all" to everyone. There was a time, she said, when we thought the word "mankind" meant everyone. Except we all knew when it didn’t. We need to be specific, she said.

Bishop Otis Charles, retired bishop of Utah, then spoke in favor of the resolution. He spoke as an openly gay man, having come out in recent years, after his retirement. From that perspective he underscored both the vulnerability and invisibility of trans people. He called on people to ask themselves what and whom they fail to see. He told of a time when he was dean of the Episcopal Divinity School, when a student had requested not to sing a particular hymn in the chapel. He had no idea what could be wrong with the hymn, only to realize as they went ahead and sang it that it was riddled with masculine pronouns. He had not previously been able to see to what made student object. “I know in myself I have been blind, and naming, naming is very important,” he concluded.

Bishop Charles turned out to be the last speaker. I have no doubt that Bishop Gene Robinson also would have spoken in support, as he did with C061, but he was in bed with a terrible fever for two days, and could not be present.

At this point, someone called the question, and a vote was held. It was nearly unanimous — I could only hear one “no.”

In my notes, I wrote “THANK GOD!!!”

After the session ended, Donna and I tried to personally thank everyone who had spoken in favor of the resolution, as well as others who had helped us in various ways along the road. I thanked Bishop Shaw and Bishop Barbara Harris, as well as my suffragan bishops, Gayle Harris and Bud Cederholm, for their support. Donna thanked bishops she has known from her time in the Diocese of Newark. We looked for Bishop Andrus, who was so very supportive throughout the Convention, but we missed him. We thanked Bishops Charles, Roskam and Waynick, as well as Bishop Chane of Washington D.C. who co-chaired the committee from which this resolution emerged. I was particularly moved when he spontaneously gave us a hug.

After descending the escalators once more, Donna handed me notes for the beginnings of a press release, which I completed later in the day. We then gave each other a big hug before Donna headed off to the airport. Donna is the one who got TransEpiscopal going after beginning to connect with other transgender Episcopalians in 2004, including some who had been involved in previous General Conventions, and this Convention marks a huge milestone in these efforts.

I was even happier to be able to leave her a voicemail later in the afternoon, letting her know that C048, the ENDA resolution, passed the House of Bishops without any further discussion. That marked the fourth and final transgender related resolution to pass at the 76th General Convention.

There was one last stressful moment before it was all over for this triennium, however—a coda of sorts. Resolution C061, as you may recall, had passed by a respectable margin in the House of Deputies, only to be transformed in the House of Bishops a day later. Not only had the language of “gender identity and expression” been taken out of the proposed addition to the nondiscrimination canon, but all the categories already listed in the canon were now threatened if the House of Deputies concurred. Our fear was that there might be some confusion in the House of Deputies about what they should do. We tried to get the word out that our preference was for them not to concur, so that the resolution would essentially die and we could try to add the trans-inclusive language again in three years.

Because the Deputies worked so efficiently, the resolution did indeed come back up in the late afternoon, just before the Convention drew to a close. I didn’t get down the escalator in time to hear the debate but learned that Dee Tavolaro had spoken and clarified our position about the resolution. I also understand that, among other speakers, at least one spoke in favor of concurrence. But the Deputies thankfully did not vote that way.

And that marked the end of our General Convention saga.

CP

(with thanks to deniray mueller of Integrity's Legislative team for allowing me to check my notes against hers, and to Jon Richardson, also of the legislative team, for the photo of TE folks with Bishops Shaw and Harris)

There and Back Again

2009-07-18T13:38:00.004-04:00

I along with seven companions have traveled to a strange land, filled with the fearsome Smog. We were seeking a great treasure. There were challenges all along the way, but in the end we achieved great things. Sound a little familiar? Well there were no wizards, no Hobbits, no Dwarfs and no Dragon. We were not in Middle Earth, but at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church. A small group of Transgender Clergy and Laity brought Transgender issues in front of the Church in a way that had never happened before. The General Convention happens every three years and consists of lay and clergy delegations along with their Bishops from each Diocese of the Episcopal Church. At the last Convention only one of our number attended for even a short while. That was the beginning. This year eight members of TransEpiscopal were there. Seven resolutions were presented and four of them passed. Since some of the resolutions were redundant only one remains a disappointment, changes to the Canon on Ordination.

What can we make of this development? Our treasure is a church that is more open and more caring. Along the way we met loving friends and allies and we didn’t find hate and prejudice. This is very special since all too often Transgender people find hate, intolerance and prejudice. The Episcopal Church is truly becoming a church of openness, tolerance and an instrument of God’s love. As a Priest in the Church and a Transgender person myself, I find all this extremely hopeful. My ordination and my ministry and my commitment remain intact and are in a way validated (I have been ordained the longest of any of the group, having been ordained to the Priesthood 38 years ago.)
Michelle+

Press Releases

2009-07-18T01:53:00.005-04:00

For Immediate Release:

Anaheim, CA (July 17, 2009): For the first time in its history, the Episcopal Church has taken official actions in support of transgender civil rights and inclusion at its 76th General Convention.

“It was a true privilege to participate in the legislative process of this Church, to bear witness to transgender lives and experiences, and to urge the Episcopal Church to fully include and to stand in solidarity with us,” commented the Rev. Dr. Cameron Partridge, a member of TransEpiscopal and Integrity USA. “I am thrilled to be able to say that the General Convention voted overwhelmingly to put the Episcopal Church on record in support of such legislation as the Matthew Shepherd Hate Crimes Act and the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, and analogous efforts at municipal and state levels. But I am even more moved to say how many people spontaneously shared with us how their eyes have been opened, their hearts turned, by our presence and stories here. To have someone stop me in a coffee line to say, ‘I had never thought about this issue before, and I’m going to take what I have learned here and share it with my little congregation in the Ozarks’ means more than I can say.”

Today the Convention completed approval of resolutions supporting the enactment of anti-discrimination and hate crimes legislation protecting transgender people at local, state and federal levels. The House of Deputies passed these resolutions overwhelmingly on Wednesday, and the House of Bishops then approved these resolutions today in near-unanimous votes.

These actions took place as the United States Congress debates both the Matthew Shepherd Hate Crimes Act and the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, which respectively address hate crimes and discrimination on the basis of gender, sexual orientation, and disability as well as gender identity and expression.

Testifying in hearings at various levels of the Convention were representatives of the organizations TransEpiscopal and Integrity USA, including the Episcopal Church’s first openly transgender Deputy, Dee Tavolaro of Rhode Island.

In addition to today’s actions, earlier this week the Convention approved two other transgender related resolutions. The first adds “gender identity and expression” to its nondiscrimination policy for hiring lay employees, while the second calls for the revision of church paper and electronic forms to allow a wider range of gender identifications.

“As we celebrate this moment and give thanks for the amazing allies walking with us, particularly Integrity USA and the Consultation, we look forward to progressing further toward full inclusion of transgender people —and, indeed, all people -- in all areas of ministry in The Episcopal Church.”

Contacts: Rev. Dr. Cameron Partridge at cepart@yahoo.com
Rev. Michelle Hansen at hansen_michelle@sbcglobal.net
And see our blog coverage of Convention at blog.transepiscopal.com

***************************************************************************************

At the end of the final press conference of the General Convention, Rachel Swan of Integrity USA asked the panelists about the historic passage of legislation on transgender civil rights and inclusion.

****************************************************************************************

From Integrity USA

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ANAHEIM, CA (July 17, 2009)--The Episcopal Church turned an important corner at this General Convention and Integrity applauds the hard, faithful work of the bishops and deputies who brought us closer to the full inclusion of all the baptized in all the sacraments. We came to this convention committed to moving the church beyond B033 and forward on equality for the blessing of same-sex unions--and we are beyond gratified that we have realized both of those goals.

Thirty three years after promising a "full and equal claim" to the gay and lesbian baptized, the Episcopal Church has affirmed equal access to ordination processes for all orders of ministry for all the baptized, has approved a broad local option for the blessings of our relationships, and has called the church to work together toward common liturgical expressions of those blessings.

It is a great day for the church and a greater day for the witness to God’s inclusive love.

"While Integrity’s advocacy work is not yet done," said Integrity President Susan Russell, "the actions here in Anaheim liberate us to get on with our evangelism work--proclaiming the good news of an Episcopal Church that welcomes not only LGBT people looking for a spiritual home but ALL those seeking a faith community that shares their core values of justice, compassion, inclusion, and love."

"We celebrate this historic movement forward and we commit ourselves to this church we love and serve to continue to witness to the good news of Christ Jesus present in our lives, our vocations, and our relationships. We call others to 'come and see' what we have found and seen and experienced in the Episcopal Church."

"Integrity applauds the hard work of all our allies in this struggle and lifts up particularly the witness of our TransEpiscopal colleagues whose courageous work at this convention has been truly extraordinary. We look forward to working with all our allies as we move forward together into God’s future, giving thanks for the good work here in Anaheim that has brought us closer to that church with 'no outcasts' to which former Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning called us.

Contacts:

Louise Brooks, Director of Communications, tvprod@earthlink.net, (626) 993-4605

Transgender Civil Rights

2009-07-17T00:39:00.002-04:00

Donna Cartwright Gave the following testimony to the Committee on National and International affairs at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church meeting in Anaheim, CA. The Resolution D012 passed in the House of Deputies and at the time of this post is pending in the House of Bishops for a vote of concurrence.

My name is Donna Cartwright, from the Diocese of Maryland. I am here to speak in support of Resolution D012, which calls of enactment of anti-discrimination legislation covering transgender and gender-different people at the local, state and federal levels.
Along with our gay, lesbian and bisexual brothers and sisters, transgender people suffer from severe discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations. Consequently, they suffer from high levels of unemployment, underemployment and homelessness.
During my transition from male to female in the 1990's, I was fortunate to keep my job. But many transgender people whom I met in support groups and at commnity events were not so lucky. Often most of those who shared those groups with me were unemployed, many of them for prolonged periods. It was common to encounter people who never worked in their profession or vocation again after coming out as transgender. And some had never had a real job (that is, one with a paycheck and a Social Security number); instead, they eked out a livelihood through sex work, street hustling and in cash businesses like hairdressing.
Their often harrowing stories both left me grateful that I had been spared such treatment, and inspired me to fight against the injustice experience by my transgender brothers and sisters.
The movement for transgender equality has grown greatly and achieved many successes since the mid-90's, when only one state and a handful of municipalities had anti-discrimination protection for transgender and gender-different people. Now 13 states, the District of Columbia and over 100 cities and counties have civil rights laws protecting us.
But far more remains to be done. Less than 40% of the U.S. population lives in state and local jurisdictions with anti-discrimination protection for trans people. Efforts are under way in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Maryland and elsewhere to increase protection at the state level. And the current versions of both the federal anti-discrimination and hate crimes bills would cover transgender as well as gay, lesbian and bisexual people. The success of those efforts would go a long way toward alleviating the personal suffering and tragedy experienced by so many transgender people and ending a terrible waste of human potential.
The Episcopal Church can help that goal become a reality by putting its weight behind civil rights and hate crimes protection covering gender identity and expression.

“These Are My Friends”

2009-07-16T19:13:00.002-04:00

I’m sitting on a bench outside the House of Bishops with Michelle, eating soft serve ice cream, waiting for the doors to open. On their afternoon calendar is D012, the transgender civil rights resolution that the House of Deputies passed so overwhelmingly yesterday afternoon.

What a day yesterday was. After the complicated result of the bishops’ morning vote on C061, the moving response of the Deputies to C012 was like a balm.

I made a video of the entire debate, which lasted about eight minutes, on my little digital camera and will post it below.

Once again, Dee Tavolaro of Rhode Island and Sarah Lawton of California spoke passionately in favor of the resolution. They were joined by several new speakers whose stories added new dimensions to the conversation. Deputy Shreider from the diocese of Chicago told of designing a renaming ceremony a for a trans parishioner. The size of the congregation doubled on the day of the service. This same parishioner has shared stories of being spat at on the street and called names the Deputy did not want to repeat. When the Deputy left for Convention, she was charged, “you know this church really fights for full inclusion. Please make sure that we can be part of that.”

Chris Ashley, a friend of mine from Massachusetts, added some humor to the proceedings. “I’m chromosomally male and I am wearing pants. But you shouldn’t take that for granted because many of you have seen me around Convention wearing a kilt.”
He went on to note that when he wears a kilt in public, he’s noticed that people give him a wide berth. What if those people were his prospective employers or prospective landlords? Such questions not only impact people like Chris with, as he charmingly put it, has “a very mildly nontraditional male gender expression, but most of all my transgender brothers and sisters. These are my friends, these are my classmates, this is the drummer in my church.”

A deputy from Ohio then asked if he could boast for a moment about his employer, the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. An employee transitioned from male to female and was supported by the organization, and fellow employees speak proudly of how supportive the company was of her in her transition. So, despite the vulnerability and high rates of discrimination, there are also good things going on as well, he said.

As there was no other discussion, Bonnie Anderson, the President of the House of Deputies, called for the vote. The Deputies then resoundingly voted in favor; only a smattering voted no.

And so, once again, the House of Deputies took a dramatic step forward, not only by their positive vote, but also and most importantly through the stories they told one another, the opening of eyes and hearts that has taken place over and over again throughout this Convention.

Now the resolution passes to the House of Bishops, where I sincerely hope the bishops will take the baton and run with it.

CP

"This is Important"

2009-07-16T11:42:00.003-04:00

Yesterday, for the first time in its history, the House of Bishops publicly took up the matter of transgender people in ministry in the Episcopal Church. Resolution C061, which passed the House of Deputies on Monday, July 13th by a wide margin, seeks to change Title III.1.2 which currently forbids discrimination on the basis of the following categories: “race, color, ethnic origin, national origin, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, disabilities or age, except as otherwise provided by these Canons.” The resolution would add “gender identity or expression” to that list. The outcome of this debate reflected a diversity of opinion on and experience with transgender people in the House of Bishops. Several bishops spoke in support of the resolution, a couple spoke strongly against it, and a number referred to feeling inadequately educated on the topic.

The resolution, as they initially received it was a follows:

Resolved, the House of _______ concurring, That Title III, Canon 1, Sec. 2 of the Canons of the Episcopal Church is hereby amended to read as follows: all baptized persons shall have full access to the discernment process for any ministry, lay or ordained in this church, except as otherwise provided by these canons. No person shall be denied access or have their discernment process terminated because of race, color, ethnic origin, national origin, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, disabilities or age, except as otherwise provided by these Canons. No right to licensing, ordination, or election is hereby established.

Marc Andrus of the Diocese of California and Gene Robinson of New Hampshire spoke both passionately and authentically about their experience of transgender people in ministry. Bishop Andrus emphasized that in his diocese, where Vicki Gray serves as a vocational deacon, they ordain individuals, not particular classes of people. If someone discerns a call to ministry, the issue for a Commission on Ministry and bishops to attend to is the vocation and the person’s ability to live into it, not their particular gender identity or expression. I entered the room during the tail end of Gene Robinson’s remarks, and so missed the bulk of them, but I heard him speaking strongly in support.

Of those who spoke against, Bishop Duncan Gray of Mississippi stood out for remarking that adding this language would “cross a line” and that we don’t need it because people are ordaining trans people already without it; to make that reality canonically explicit would be to “wave a red flag” about it.

For the most part, among those who spoke against the resolution, what I heard was not so much outright negativity as a sense of discomfort, of feeling overwhelmed and inadequately informed. A couple bishops argued that Commissions on Ministry need to have access to resources in order to be prepared to receive applications to the ordination process from trans people, and that to change the canon now, before they had such resources, would not be fair.

Bishop Dorsey Henderson of the diocese of Upper South Carolina objected to the longstanding language of the canon “no person shall be denied access”. He expressed a wish that the word “all” might replace “no.”

Bishop Howard of the Diocese of Florida expressed confusion and concern about the term “gender expression,” wondering if it might be a trojan horse for sexual activity outside of marriage. This was not the first time someone took issue with this term; someone on the floor of the House of Deputies also asked about it, and it also came up in the Committee on World Mission.

Bishop Dabney Smith of Southwest Florida then objected to a line that the Committee on World Mission had actually added to the original version of the resolution. The nondiscrimination canon already states that “no person shall be denied access,” but this resolution added the phrase “or have their ordination process terminated.” Had it remained, this line might have been a remarkable achievement in its own right. It would have addressed scenarios in which people come out as LGB or T, or begin a relationship, after entering their ordination process; in a some more conservative dioceses, people’s processes have indeed been terminated in response to just such situations. But the bishops were not in favor of that phrase. Stated reasons ranged from exactly the one just mentioned to concerns about opening themselves to litigation if, for instance, someone attributed the reason for their termination to a particular bias while the bishop or Commission on Ministry might have actually had other reasons.

The bishops then unanimously voted to remove that phrase.

Bishop Catherine Roskam of New York then returned to Bishop Henderson’s critique of the “no person” language. “What is it about ‘all’ that we don’t understand?” she asked. “There’s no adequate list. There will always be someone’s name we’ve left off.” With that, she made an amendment to remove all of lines five and six of the resolution. That motion spoke not simply to the language of “gender identity or expression,” but also to the entire list already enshrined: race, color, ethnic origin, national origin, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, disabilities or age. The move on Bishop Roskam’s part appeared designed to find a way out of an impasse, a way not to reject the resolution outright.

In the wake of this move, Bishop Michael Curry of North Carolina made a motion to refer the resolution to the Standing Commission on Ministry Development, so that a study could be done on ordaining transgender people. Notable in his motion was the sentiment, “This is important. It is important. And it’s of such importance that we want to do this properly, we want to do this in the right way. And in order to do so we need to come back with a good, thoughtful report.”

Comments and questions that followed either supported this referral or asked whether it would cause the original resolution to die. A vote was then taken on Bishop Curry’s motion, and was very narrowly defeated: 60 in favor, 66 against.

They then immediately turned to Bishop Roskam’s amendment, passing it, and the resolution as amended:

Resolved, the House of _______ concurring, That Title III, Canon 1, Sec. 2 of the Canons of the Episcopal Church is hereby amended to read as follows: all baptized persons shall have full access to the discernment process for any ministry, lay or ordained in this church, except as otherwise provided by these canons. No right to licensing, ordination, or election is hereby established.

Because they amended the resolution, it gets sent back to the House of Deputies.

So, where does this resolution leave us? While I believe the amendment to remove the specific demographic language was well intentioned, and while I certainly concur with the notion that “all” should truly mean all, this resolution as amended does not do what it was designed to do. The “all” version appears to have passed specifically because it did not mention “gender identity or expression.” Further, it eradicates the particularity of groups that worked for years to get that language into the canon to begin with. As much as I wanted the universality of “all” to do the job, in the context of this debate as it unfolded, the term was more evasive than inclusive. And so my hope is that the House of Deputies will not concur with it, that we might put our shoulders to this particular wheel again at the 77th General Convention.

But I have much higher hopes than that. The progress we have made at this Convention-- with more to come before it's over-- is absolutely huge. The fact that the House of Deputies passed C061 by a very respectable margin is tremendous. That the House of Bishops got to discuss this resolution, was huge. They made it clear they want to learn more, which is also to me a major victory. I will admit, however, that it was also difficult, indeed painful, to hear the debate as it unfolded. This is my life, my ordination process, my ministry they were talking about. And yet at the same time, in my mind, I keep coming back to Bishop Curry saying “This is important. This is important.” I agree-- it is important, and because of that, we need to do more. We have taken some of the first steps in making the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion aware that trans people are here, in our pews, on our vestries, in our pulpits; that we bring unique insights, gifts of uncommon experience and perception, and often deeply prayerful experiences of transformation; that we love this church.

And while I’ll end this post here, as Michelle and Donna have noted, more trans related activity happened yesterday than just this vote—in the afternoon the House of Deputies took up D012, the transgender civil rights resolution, and passed it in a landslide after several truly beautiful speakers gave testimony. I want to give that story a blog post in its own right, so stay tuned.

CP

Mixed Emotions

2009-07-16T10:43:00.001-04:00

For the first time since I arrived in Anaheim I have some mixed reactions to what has happened. Most everything, by the way has been great – fantastic, even. Today things were a bit mixed. The House of Deputies passed a measure asking for Trans Civil Rights. The witness of a number of Deputies was very powerful. I wasn’t in the Deputies while this was happening, but Cameron described it to me and even captured the testimony and voting on his camera (so I did see it, but not live.) That measure passed in the House of Deputies easily. I am sure that Cameron can describe for you that in a much better fashion.

I was in the House of Bishops all day. They received a measure that had passed in Deputies asking to protect the rights of Transgender people in the process of Ordination. Access to the process is so important. It does not guarantee that one will be ordained, but that one has the opportunity. There were already several protected classes of individuals. That is the Canon protected people from discrimination because of race, color, ethnic origin, sex, etc. Gender Identity or expression was to be added to the classes. What the Bishops did was to substitute wording to the effect that all baptized Christians were eligible for the discernment process. I am paraphrasing so don’t think that the canon is worded exactly that way. What they did was to remove the list of protections.

In a much better world not being specific about who is protected might work. We live in a world that is far from perfect. I am skeptical that the wording will work. In any case, the measure now has to go back to the house of Deputies. We’ll see what they decide. I am a bit disappointed about this.

On the much better side, the House of Bishops considered a measure that would allow blessings of same sex unions in states where such unions are allowed. The measure is a broad and liberal measure allowing for much pastoral concern. It also allows for the study of appropriate rites for such unions. The measure was heavily debated over two days. A substitute measure was introduced after hard work last night by 26 Bishops. They resisted revising the substitute measure all afternoon and passed the measure by a very great margin. Since I come from Connecticut where same sex civil marriage is legal this is a very important measure. So many same sex couples who have civil marriages also want their church involved and now it is possible.

The convention is either winding down or reaching a feverish pitch, depending on your point of view. There is still much to do and little time left to do it. I have one more day and then I go home. I should have planned to stay through Friday, but my ticket is already purchased. Cameron will have to be the final witness and do the final report.

God’s Peace,
Michelle+

The Road Ahead, the Bumps and the Detours

2009-07-16T10:40:00.000-04:00

Transgender people and their friends and allies have made great progress at General Convention this year. Resolutions concerning our issues have been discussed in detail inside and outside the legislative process. The House of Deputies in particular has taken up and discussed trans-related issues with seriousness and sensitivity, from C061,adding gender identity/expression to the nondiscrimination canon of the church, to D012, supporting secular anti-discrimination legislation. Testimony, both in committee and on the floor,has been enlightening and moving.
But progress is rarely smooth and uninterrupted. When the House of Bishops took up C061 today, it seems that many bishops were poorly informed about trans people, confused by tems like "gender identity or expression," and reluctant to commit the church to treat some of its most vulnerable members with dignity, fairness and respect.
Instead of adding gender identity/expression to the list of characteristics like race, sex and sexual orientation that are prohibited grounds for discrimination, the bishops chose to eviscerate the nondiscrimination canon by eliminating all specific references to groups that have been marginalized historically. If adopted, this would be a real step backward, undermining decades of work to educate the church to the concrete realities of racism, sexism and homophobia.
Personally, I would prefer to see the church revert to its existing nondiscrimination, even without gender identity/expression, and for TransEpiscopal to come back to the next convention in three years and try again. Hopefully in that time, educational work will eliminate some of the bishops' discomfort.
Fortunately, today's legislative session in the HoD ended on a positive note, with the adoption of Resolution D012 (see above) on a near-unanimous voice vote. And as a labor activist for several decades, I was also very gratified to see the deputies adopt a resolution supporting the Employee Free Choice Act now pending in Congress, which would reform our labor laws to better protect the right to organize. The voice of prophetic witness is alive and well in the church! Amen!

Posted for Donna Cartwright

Surprises and Joys

2009-07-15T10:46:00.005-04:00

Cameron has posted well on the day's events at General Convention. I will only add a few observations from my perspective. I was in the House of Bishops waiting for C061 to come up. C061 which deals with inclusiveness in the ordination process had passed in the House of Deputies. I was sitting with a long-time friend who is the wife of one of the Bishops (they had both been parishioners of mine many years ago and I consider them good friends.) The Bishops were struggling with the issue of blessings of same sex unions because six states, including my own Connecticut allow same sex Civil Marriages (D056). Cameron texted me from Deputies that D025 (see Cameron's explanation in previous posts) had passed in the Deputies. My friend and I both were extremely pleased(the Bishops had passed this measure yesterday.)

The Bishops decided to postpone the discussion on Marriage Blessings to Thursday Afternoon, which will be later today, and moved on with business. I was totally surprised to hear D090 on gender issues on forms presented. It passed with little dissent without discussion. D032 Gender equality for Lay employees was then presented by the same committee. Bishop Wolf of Rhode Island expressed confusion about the term Gender Expression. Bishop Andrus of California tried to explain as did the Bishop who presented the measure. The explanations were a bit weak. The attempt was apparently enough because there was no more debate and the measure passed! Both measures passed easily. I was totally surprised and pleased. What a day! Look to Cameron's post for the wording of the measures and for details.

As a personal note, I am getting tired. I get up a bit later each morning and go to bed a little earlier each night. Tylenol and Advil are my friends. Sitting in Convention Hall chairs is getting tougher. The morning shower gets a little longer and hotter each day. For me it is two more days and then I fly home. It has been a remarkable time. I have noticed that all of the pictures of me that have been posted are of the back of my head. I am not sure why that is(possibly it's the best view of me), but I thought I would post one of my front for a change.
God's Peace,
Michelle+

Tavolaro Testimony on C061

2009-07-15T03:20:00.003-04:00

Here is the testimony given by Dee Tavolaro yesterday in support of C061, reposted with permission from his blog, I Will, with God's Help.

******

Deputy Tavolaro, Rhode Island.

I am 19 years old, and active member of this Church, and I identify as Transgender. For me that means I am biologically female, but I live and identify as male. I know for most of you this is a new topic and while this is the second General Convention to deal with Transgender issues, I believe it is the first time this issue has come to the floor of our house.

Gender identity and gender expression are not the same as sexual orientation. Gender identity refers to who you are, while sexual orientation refers to whom you love.

Transgender people - whether known or unknown - serve in various capacities both lay and ordained within the Church. As a Church when we fail to recognize the humanity of all people we fail to proclaim the Gospel, we fail to live out our Baptismal Covenant, we fail to respect the dignity of every human being. many of my Transgender siblings have been explicitly rejected in their Church homes when their chosen names and pronouns are not used.

I love this Church with all my heart and soul, by adding Gender Identity and Gender Expression to our ministry canon it will serve as a beacon of hope - for myself, the trans community, and all people who wonder whether they are truly welcome in this Church.

Linked Witness

2009-07-15T00:16:00.013-04:00

I spent this afternoon in the House of Deputies, along with Donna Cartwright and Rev. Karen McQueen of the Diocese of LA, drinking coffee and eating chocolate, trying to stay awake, waiting for D012 to come up. This is the resolution sponsored by Byron Rushing of MA, Sarah Lawton of CA and Dee Tavolaro of RI which would put the Episcopal Church on record in supports transgender civil rights.

At the very same time, three thousand miles away, people gathered at a hearing of the Massachusetts Judiciary Committee regarding a transgender nondiscrimination bill. It may surprise you to note that Massachusetts is not one of the thirteen states + D.C. to have discrimination protections for trans people. I testified at the hearing for another version of this bill last year and would have again this year were I not here at GC. I am proud to be able to report that the Very Rev. Jep Streit, Dean of the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, testified in favor of this legislation today. To read a comprehensive article about the hearing in Bay Windows, the Boston Area LGBT weekly, click here. Below is video from the press conference that preceded the hearing.

After posting here and on facebook, I tweeted about the simultaneity of our work here at GC and in MA: "Love to all at MA trans legislative hearing right now! Take heart: HoD just passed C061 which now goes to bishops." Later, I picked up tweets from at least two people saying they had mentioned GC's trans resolutions during their testimony in MA. One suggested that this witness is sign to the rest of the country, and beyond, that trans issues are neither "obscure" nor "bizarre".

Now, I know a bunch of folks here are showing some signs of "ubuntu fatigue" (for those who don't know, it's a word that means "I in you and you in me" and is the theme of this Convention), but if this interlinked witness isn't an example of "ubuntu", I don't know what is.

In between that discovery, while I still sat in the House of Deputies, I got a text from Michelle Hansen, who was sitting in on the House of Bishops that two trans-positive resolutions had passed the House of Bishops. To me, this news came out of nowhere-- I knew they had been approved by their committee, as reported in an earlier post, but I did not realize they were headed first to the House of Bishops.

The first of these resolutions reads:

"Resolved, the House of Deputies concurring, That this 76th General Convention of The Episcopal Church recommends and encourages all bodies of The Episcopal Church to utilize all available resources to revise and adapt forms to be fully inclusive of all people: by including lines not only for one's legal name, but also for one's preferred name as well as one's gender identity and pronoun preference.

EXPLANATION

For the second General Convention in a row, the Episcopal Church is considering legislation pertaining to transgender people. Resolutions include changing Canon III.1.2 and III. 1. 3 to include "gender identity and expression"; supporting transgender civil rights; and supporting a fully inclusive ENDA (Employment Non-discrimination Act). This resolution extends into the life of the Church the respect and recognition of transgender people conveyed by these other resolutions, by calling for a small but significant change in forms. This resolution would add four lines to Church forms: legal name, preferred name, gender identity and pronoun preference.

The addition of preferred name to legal name would benefit many people. A person's legal name could be William, but he might go by a middle name. For transgender persons, the "preferred name" line can facilitate respectful treatment even if they do not have the financial means to legally change a birth name to one that reflects gender identity.

The choice to write out one's gender identity (one's inner sense of oneself as a man, a woman, or another gender category), rather than the restriction of the categories "male" or "female" from a multiple choice dropdown menu, would significantly facilitate the ability of transgender people to access and take their place within the life of the Church.

Similarly, the ability to choose the pronouns by which one is referenced deeply impacts transgender people's experience on a very concrete level, moment by moment. The imposition of pronouns with which one does not identify can be experienced as profoundly dehumanizing.

Adding these five lines to church forms would represent a small but significant step forward as transgender people increasingly take their place in the life of the Church. In a highly concrete way, these changes would reflect our conviction, as stated in our Baptismal Covenant, that we respect the dignity of every human being. Forms are, in a real sense, doorways that can significantly frame our experience of the Church. For transgender people-and indeed, for all-they should stand open, inviting and valuing full participation."

The second of these resolutions, submitted by Dr. Louie Crew, is D032. It reads:

"Resolved, the House of Deputies concurring, That the 76th General Convention commit The Episcopal Church itself not to discriminate in employment of lay employees based on race, color, sex, national origin, age, familial status, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity, or gender expression.

EXPLANATION

The Church is generally exempt from federal employment discrimination laws, and those of most states and localities, but except for discrimination based on religion which may be appropriate for some positions, The Episcopal Church supports the principles of non-discrimination. It should take credit for that position public. Many but not all of the above categories are set forth in resolutions of previous General Conventions but this would put them all in one convenient location."

Michelle heard what little discussion there was on these resolutions, and may want to comment more. The only reservation, again raised by Bishop Geralyn Wolf of Rhode Island, was about the term "gender expression." Bishop Marc Andrus had distributed copies of the NGLTF definitions to the House of Bishops which defined that term, but Bishop Wolf did not appear satisfied and voted against it. She had raised a similar question in the hearing at which I testified last week.

The bottom line, however, is that the vast majority of the bishops passed the resolution, and quickly at that. Both D090 and D032 now head to the House of Deputies where, if they pass, they become an official position of the Episcopal Church.

So now, as I look toward tomorrow (Wed), the House of Bishops could get C061 (the ministry canon change to include "gender identity and expression"). The House of Deputies will undoubtedly take up D012 (trans civil rights), first thing in the morning, and I don't know when they will get D090 and D032, not to mention C048 through which the Episcopal Church would explicitly support an inclusive ENDA (more on that later).

I look forward to seeing what happens tomorrow, and pray that the Spirit of Truth and courage will keep on blowing here, and across this country.

CP

Round One: Results Are In

2009-07-14T14:10:00.004-04:00

The results are now in from the House of Deputies: Resolution C061, which would add "gender identity or expression" to Title III.1.2, has passed with 75% support in the lay order and 66% in the clerical order, a very respectable margin, particularly when you think about how this is the very first time the Convention has even discussed trans people.

I have to admit, hearing these results was a somewhat odd experience-- particularly after the high emotions of last night. The secretary of the Convention, Gregory Straub, explained that when there is a divided vote, the divided deputations have to be read out first, specifying who voted no and who yes. I think he meant to say that as a warning not to be overwhelmed by the list that followed. But after he listed the divided deputations, he proceeded with the final tally by deputation: Lay Order: 82 yes, 21 no, six divided, which = 75% in favor. Clerical Order: 72 yes, 28 no: 9 divided, which = 66%.

After the results were read, those of us who were gathered in the back of the room had a quick huddle to savor the moment and say goodbye to Vicki Gray, who had waited to hear the results before driving back to the Bay Area. While we were there, Gay Jennings came by, on her way back onto the floor, and heartily congratulated us. I continue to be so grateful for her leadership in the committee on World Mission, particularly given how overwhelmingly stacked their plate was with B033 related resolutions.

Now this resolution moves to the House of Bishops.

Meanwhile, resolution D012 which would put the Episcopal Church on record in support of trans civil rights, should come before the House of Deputies this afternoon. So stay tuned for more news on that front! The Spirit is seriously moving here.

CP

Up & Down the Escalators

2009-07-14T04:14:00.014-04:00

What a day! It started out early this morning, when Deputy Dee Tavolaro and I testified in support of D090, a resolution that Dee got in just before the deadline last week. It calls upon the Episcopal Church to adapt its various forms, paper and electronic, to be inclusive of people with various gender identities. All too often, people who identify as neither male nor female (which numerous people within the trans community do), or who might use more than one term to articulate their gender, encounter forms that turn them away just as surely as a closed door. As part of his testimony, Dee told a story of a recent difficult experience filling out a form in a church body (which I hope he might post here). I emphasized that while I have encountered forms that attempt to include transgender people by having three options—male, female, and transgender—the option of simply giving a space for someone to write in their gender, along with their name and preferred pronouns is preferable. The committee asked thoughtful questions, and the subcommittee was very receptive, even sharpening the language slightly to push the church more. The final version was:

Resolved, the House of Deputies concurring, that this 76th General Convention of the Episcopal Church recommends and encourages all bodies of the Episcopal Church to utilize all available resources to revise and adapt forms to be fully inclusive of all people: by including lines not only for one's legal name, but also for one's preferred name as well as one's gender identity and pronoun preference.

The subcommittee then took up resolution D032, submitted by Dr. Louie Crew, on refusing to discriminate against lay church employees on the basis of "race, color, sex, national origin, age, familial status, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity." The subcommittee supported it and added "gender expression."

When both of these resolutions went to the full committee, they were unanimously voted to go to the House of Deputies. So at that point, the count of trans related resolutions stood as follows:

1) C061 "Amend Title II.1.2" (World Mission) (originating from Diocese of MA)
2) D012 "Support of Transgender Civil Rights (National and International Concerns) (sponsored by Byron Rushing, Sarah Lawton & Dee Tavolaro)
3) D090 "Inclusive Church Paper Work" (Social and Urban Affairs) (sponsored by Dee Tavolaro)
4) D032 Non-Discrimination in Lay Employment (Social and Urban Affairs) (sponsored by Dr. Louie Crew)

There were two others that had been left behind in the committee on World Mission: C001 (which basically duplicated #1) and C046 which added the same language as C061 to Title II.1.3.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the House of Deputies yesterday approved D025, a long, nuanced resolution that would move the Episcopal Church Beyond B033, and sent it to the House of Bishops. I sat in on the House of Deputies during their morning session, however, because there was a possibility that C061 (which would add "gender identity or expression" to the ministry canon) might come to the floor. As it turned out, that didn't happen. After lunch, I returned to the HoD for the same reason. But halfway through the session, I learned that the House of Bishops was beginning to debate C025. So I made my way up the two long escalators to the third floor of the Anaheim Conference Center, where the House of Bishops is stationed. I arrived amid a steadily increasing crowd, and parked myself amid the Integrity contingent. Michelle Hansen was already there, though I couldn't see her for all the people. Donna Cartwright, meanwhile, was keeping an eye on the House of Deputies below.

And because the Episcopal Church Women were holding their triennial meeting in the room next door, snippets of cheerful song occasionally wafted through the walls with oddly appropriate incongruity.

You can find out more about the debate in the House of Bishops here and here. The closer it got to 5pm, the more likely it seemed that the day would come to a close without the Bishops bringing the matter to a vote. Debate was still going strong, well after 5pm, when I got word that at the last moment the House of Deputies had indeed taken up C061, the ministry canon resolution.

I busted out of the House of Bishops, nearly running over a stately ECW delegate, and headed to the escalators. There was no way I was going to miss this debate.

By the time I got into the HoD, Michael Barlow had just begun eloquently testifying in favor of the resolution. What I had missed was an introduction to the resolution by Gay Jennings, the chair of the World Mission committee, which had included a reading of a definition sheet that had been prepared for us by Lisa Mottet of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

I sat down and listened, my heart in my throat, as Michael Barlowe finished and Dee Tavolaro began. What an incredibly proud moment it was to hear Dee speaking as an openly trans deputy. Heck, how amazing was it to even hear the word "transgender" spoken on the floor of the House of Deputies. I had run into someone from the diocese of Massachusetts earlier in the day, and when I told her that a trans-themed resolution had never come up before, she was genuinely surprised. Dee's testimony will be posted here in the coming days, but suffice it to say that he spoke of what a beacon of hope the Episcopal Church could be if it explicitly included transgender people the sentiment famously expressed by Presiding Bishop Edmund Browning that "there will be no outcasts in this church."

Sarah Lawton then told a beautiful, poignant story of her sister, who is a transgender woman. I cannot express how moving this was, and I sincerely hope Sarah will let us post her testimony on the blog as well.

After Sarah finished, someone asked Gay Jennings to re-read the definition of "gender expression". He was apparently uncomfortable with this concept, namely the expression of one's inner gender identity which, come to think of it, is not unlike the definition of a sacrament: "an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace"... He then moved an amendment to strike the words "gender expression" from the resolution. In the debate about this amendment, Rev. Christopher Hoffer from the diocese of Long Island spoke. He spoke against the amendment and for the resolution itself, and very strongly at that.

The amendment was then soundly defeated.

About this time, a current of people started flowing into the HoD. Had I heard, an Integrity comrade asked? The House of Bishops had voted in favor of D025 (the amended text of the D025 after the House of Bishops finished with it is ">here)! The Spirit felt like it was seriously blowing in the Anaheim Conference Center.

At this point, the Deputies were turning to vote on the resolution. They voted by orders in their deputations, which are made up of equal numbers of clergy and laity. A so-called "divided vote" in which there are equal numbers for and against, counts as a "no" vote. Otherwise the majority wins within each deputation.

Then we had to wait. Earlier today, and in previous days, the electronic voting machines have had technology problems, causing frustrating delays. While we waited, the Secretary of the Connvention made several announcements.

.....And then the session was adjourned without us finding out the results! They should be announced first thing in the morning session, which starts at 9:30 a.m.

So tomorrow (Tuesday) should prove to be quite a day. In addition to learning these results, the HoD should take up D012, the Transgender Civil Rights resolution, not to mention D025 (the huge Beyond B033 resolution). And if C061 has passed, it should be sent to the House of Bishops. Before it can become the mind of the Convention, it must pass both houses.

But I have to say from this exhausted but exhilarated perch at 3 a.m., it's been an amazing day. I'm so grateful for the witness of the Deputies who spoke in favor of the resolution, for the support of Michael Barlowe and Ian Douglas within the World Mission Committee, for the open hearts of those committee members who heard our testimony last week, and for the positive feedback we've been getting around Convention. Blessings abound.

CP

Mystery and Joy

2009-07-14T02:38:00.002-04:00

What an incredible day! I am exhausted, but pretty happy. I have watched my church step up to the plate and deal with the realities of this world. Today the House of Bishops passed a measure that in essence says that our church will be inclusive. To be sure it is not a perfect measure, but it is a great step forward. In addition the House of Deputies debated and voted on the first of several measures that deal with Transgender lives and the Church. The vote will be known tomorrow, but whatever the outcome they have tried to deal with realities of Transgender lives in the church and that is significant. There is more to come. I am guessing that Cameron will post soon and there may some posts from allies.

Tomorrow Vicki will be leaving to go home. She will be sorely missed. She is the Deacon in our midst and has been a great witness. Drive safely and God Bless Vicki. Those of us that remain will continue our work of giving a real human face to the reality of Transgender people in the life of the church. God's Peace and good night.

Michelle+

What a Difference Three Years Makes

2009-07-12T22:11:00.007-04:00

TransEpiscopal has come a long way in the last three years. Back in 2006, I was the only member of the then year-old organization of transgender Episcopalians (and their friends, family and allies) at General Convention in Columbus, OH. While doubling as a volunteer for the Oasis ministry of the Diocese of Newark, I attempted to track and advocate for a resolution to amend the national church's canons to include gender identity/expression in the nondiscrimination provisions of Canon III. I quickly learned that this job -- testifying in committee hearings, monitoring both the House of Deputies and House Bishops, and keeping in touch with our largely Internet-based group, as well as my fellow Oasis commissioners -- was far too big for a single person.

Although my testimony on our canons-amendment resolution (proposed by the Diocese of California) appeared to be well-received, and I got friendly "vibes" from several deputies on the committee, it was eventually reported to the House of Bishops with a recommendation that it be referred to commissions and boards during the next triennium. Ultimately, it was tabled.

Another trans-related resolution, proposed by the Diocese of New York, would have put the church on record as supporting secular legislation protecting transgender and other gender-variant people from discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations at the local, state and federal levels. Unfortunately, through some still-unexplained glitch, it was never placed on the calendar of convention legislation. When I arrived in Columbus on the third day of convention, it was effectively too late to do anything about that.

This year, we're doing so much better in so many ways that I am gratified almost (but not quite) beyond words. Instead of one person, we have a team of eight, including a trans-identified deputy. As of today (Sunday July 12) two trans-related resolutions have been reported out of committee and sent to the House of Deputies. One 0f them supports secular civil rights legislation covering trans as well as gay, lesbian and bisexual people; the other would amend the canons to add gender identity/expression to the church's nondiscrimination rules.

Another resolution (C048), supporting specifically trans-inclusive federal employment non-discrimination legislation, is still in committee, but hopefully will move forward soon. And a new resolution (D090) to encourage the church to revise its forms so that they are not limited to the either/or gender binary, has been introduced.

We've also done much to educate bishops, deputies and visitors about transgender people and issues. Many of us have testified in committee, and received favorable responses. We held a 45-minute "speakers corner" panel under the auspices of the Consultation in the exhibit hall that drew a couple of dozen people for a lively discussion. We have distributed many copies of our brochure at the Integrity booth.

The convention itself is quite overwhelming. Thousands of people fill a huge convention center and nearby hotels. Committees hear testimony and deliberate on resolutions with a skill and sophistication that would do many secular legislatures credit. Bonnie Anderson, President of the House of Deputies, moves a large volume of resolutions and other business through a body with more than 800 members. The House of Bishops, while smaller and a bit less formal, is equally impressive.

This morning's eucharist was spectacular and moving, with several thousand people and scores of bishops. The liturgy was magnificent and the pageantry eye-popping. For me, yesterday evening's first-ever Trans-Episcopal eucharist, with 19 TransEpiscopal members, friends and allies gathered in a small meeting room in one of the hotels. Instead of a conventional sermon, each person in the room bore personal witness to the historic nature of our presence and the sacredness of our journey. Many eyes were tear-filled before the end of the service.

Donna Cartwright, Diocese of Maryland

Outstanding!

2009-07-12T12:29:00.012-04:00

I am taking a moment to rest and reflect. It is Sunday Morning and there are no sessions until later today. There is a large service for the UTO ingathering, but I have decided not to go. Services with thousands of people are tough and I need the break. I want to reflect on some significant moments to this point, for me and for the TransEpiscopal team.

Certainly worship has been extremely significant. The Integrity Service was mostly wonderful and for me it was extremely important that for the very first time to my knowledge out Trans Clergy participated in the final blessing at that service. For me this was big! I have been to previous Conventions and I have celebrated and participated in services at General Conventions, but I was not out to the world or even to myself. This year we had three trans priests and a deacon participating in the final blessing.

For the very first time, ever, TransEpiscopal held a Eucharist at General Convention. Last night 19 Trans people, allies and friends gathered together in a small room at the Mariott Courtyard and celebrated the Lord's Supper together. We had chairs in a circular pattern and a collapsible table. Gari went out and bought wine and a waiter at the Mariott gave us a loaf of bread. We borrowed a plate and a wine glass from the bar and we came together in the presence of the Lord and were filled with the Holy Spirit. We lifted up transitioning to the Lord in our words, in our hearts, and in our lives. I was moved especially by the presence of the friends and allies who joined us and became part of us. We are not alone!

Ok, I am crying tears of joy and thankfulness and taking a deep breath. I'm better. There is a sadness that one of our number has to leave and go back to her world. Everyone has to earn a living. The Rev. Gari Green has been a great presence on our team and she will be greatly missed. God go with you Gari, have a safe flight.

I have had many personal joys here and the Convention isn't half over yet. I have met and touched base with some old friends and I have met some new ones. I am sure Cameron will post soon on legislation so I will end here for now.

God's Peace, Michelle Hansen+

Long, Long Day

2009-07-11T02:30:00.003-04:00

It has been a long day, it has been tiring and wonderful at the same time. The morning started with the World Mission Committee meeting in subcommittees. They pushed trough a bill on Transgender rights to the House of Deputies. It was an amazing thing to watch. At least one of the committee members was extremely emotionally moved in the hallway afterward. Tomorrow a different committee will deal with two more bills recommending legislation at the federal level to protect the rights of transgender people. It looks good for this one also.

The worst possible scenario would be to have the bills tables or shuffled until there was no time left. The progress is remarkable.

The TransEpiscopal team also told our story at a forum in the exhibit Hall. Five of us spoke about our stories, about past and present and possible futures. We had forty-five minutes, but took an hour. There was a small group of people listening, but they all stayed to the end. Part of what held attendance down was that the house of Deputies and House of Bishops were meeting at the same time.

The day climaxed with the Integrity Eucharist. There must have been at least a thousand people in attendance. Bishop Gene Robinson Celebrated and a great sermon was given by Bishop Barbara Harris of Massachusetts.

At the end we were all just beat! I'm headed to bed. Tomorrow is another day.

God's Peace,
Michelle Hansen+

A Testimony

2009-07-10T01:23:00.006-04:00

There are several new posts to our blog all made today from General Convention. Please be sure to scroll down to read them all. The following is the testimony offered by the Rev. Vicki Gray, Deacon to the World Missions Committee this
Wednesday.

For me being Transgendered and in ministry is a baptismal thing.

We are all by reason of our baptisms ministers. And as baptized Christians no aspect or order of ministry should be closed to us by reason of who we are.

By Baptism we die to old untruths and are born again to a new truth in Christ. So it is, too, with the Transgender Transition which I found a very similar spiritual process. Indeed, throughout that process, I was haunted by that old baptismal hymn: "Take me, take me as I am. Summon out who I will be." Tonight that's all I ask. Take me as I am; as an individual.

In this regard, I recall with thanksgiving the treatment as an individual I received in the ordination process from Bishop Bill Swing, who when confronted by hostile objections to is ordination of gays and lesbians and others, said " We don't ordain groups of people. We ordain individuals."

Again what I ask is that I be treated as an individual. In return I offer the integrity of my truth.

Round Two

2009-07-09T23:48:00.011-04:00

It’s nine a.m. in Anaheim— do you know where your TransEpiscopal representatives are? Most are at Denny’s, enjoying a well-earned breakfast after testifying before the committee on National and International Concerns in favor of two resolutions on transgender civil rights. This was our second round of testimony in twelve hours, and we’re tired! But, as with last night, our testimony appears to have been well received.

This time we had even more people testify—seven—and once again no one testified against the resolutions.

One difference between last night’s experience and this morning’s is that people on this committee appeared to be somewhat more familiar with transgender issues. More than one committee member knew of specific instances of anti-trans hate crimes; a Deputy from Colorado was aware of the Angie Zappata murder, for instance. I distributed the same list of terms that we shared with the World Mission committee last night, however, and it seemed to be helpful.

This morning, in addition to all those who testified last night, Donna Cartwright weighed in. Her long history and expertise in the history of the movement for trans equality, as well as its links to the legal gains made by previous movements, helped her respond to some technical questions asked by the committee, which is populated by several lawyers.

Michelle Hansen spoke of her experience of discrimination in a secular job. Vicki Gray spoke of people she has met on the streets in the Night Ministry that she does in San Francisco, as well as her experience at the funeral for Gwen Araujo in Newark, California. Jim Toy again spoke of how we all are impacted by what he terms “the rules of gender,” rigid gender norms that get imposed on us from the moment we make our way into this world. Tom Fehr spoke again of his friend who is a transwoman, and how she was subject to discrimination in her secular job. Dee Tavolaro shared stories of enduring hate-based violence. Gari Green shared how she has sought to avoid discrimination in her secular job by continuing to work as male; although Wisconsin was the first to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in 1982, it still does not have similar laws for transgender people.

Nor yet does Massachusetts. I told the story of how the International Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR) started because of the murder of Rita Hester in 1998 around the corner from my congregation, St. Luke’s and St. Margaret’s (aka “SLAM”), and how last year, for the first time, the planning committee for the TDOR asked SLAM to host it. I conveyed how powerful it was to me to help host this event, and to see the church packed with people who have been so alienated by communities of faith over the years.

I went on to say that right now in Massachusetts, a bill that would add “gender identity and expression” to the state’s non-discrimination laws; on July 14th there will be a hearing at the Massachusetts State House on this bill. And I shared that when I spoke at a rally in favor of this proposed legislation and said that the Diocese of Massachusetts had voted at its diocesan convention to support it, people broke out into applause. I expressed how this applause had taken me by surprise—I certainly imagined that it would be meaningful for people in the trans community to know of this support, but I didn’t anticipate the sense of emotional impact. And so what has really come home for me is what an impact we can have, not only potentially on public debate and in legislative deliberation, but on the hearts of trans people who come to know that we truly care and are willing to stand up and make our caring count.

After the hearing, we were approached by several committee members and other visitors who expressed how much they appreciated our testimony. One was Louie Crew, who has done so much for social justice concerns in the Episcopal Church over the years, not least by founding Integrity in 1974. Another was Marc Andrus, the bishop of the diocese of California, who interviewed me for his video blog.

Now the committee needs to deliberate on these resolutions, along with the numerous others under their care. We hope and expect that they will send them to the House of Deputies so that they have a chance for debate and passage there. In the meantime, we are listening in on these open deliberations, ready to be of help if questions should arise along the way.

CP

A Difficult Blessing

2009-07-09T23:42:00.003-04:00

Brothers and Sisters,

I had the opportunity to lend my voice in testimony at two recent legislative committee hearings at the General Convention in Anaheim.

On the evening of 7/8 I stood before the World Mission Committee and voiced my thoughts on the addition of standard non discrimination language in the ordination canons. I will try to reproduce what I said.

Good evening. I am a priest of the Diocese of Milwaukee ordained for 23 years. I am also a transwoman and began dealing with my issues of gender roughly 20 years ago. I speak in favor of resolution C0001.

I could say the addition of these words are a matter of justice, which they are. I could say these words are standard "boiler plate" non discrimnation language used frequently by enlightened corporate entities across this country. I could even legitimately say the addition of these words to the Canons are "the Gospel". But I am not going to say any of these things, except in passing. I would rather place a more personal face on this issue.

As I worked through the challenging gift of being differently gendered and accepting myself as such, I grew in a personal sense of wholeness. As I grew in that personal sense of wholeness, I became more confirmed in my call to priesthood. What's more, my excercise of that call grew in both depth and fullness. I give thanks for the difficult challenge of coming to a place of peace with my differently gendered self and the strengthening of my sense of priestly vocation that resulted from the work I did.

I would urge the addoption of this language for all the reasons noted above so that the people who follow me into the ordained ministry of this Church do not have any undue barriers in their journey to wholeness of person and the excercise of their ministries in this part of Christ's Body.

The Rev G Green

One Down, One to Go

2009-07-09T03:25:00.012-04:00

What a day! This evening six of us testified before the Committee on World Mission in favor of the three resolutions that would add "gender identity and expression" to the ministry nondiscrimination canon of the Episcopal Church. Five of us spoke in favor of Resolution C001, which originated from Newark, and I spoke in favor of C061, which came from my home diocese of Massachusetts.

The hearing began at 7:45 p.m., and included testimony on another resolution on the support for foreign missionaries, a subject about which the Committee was more accustomed to hearing.

Meanwhile, yesterday I learned that the committee needed a glossary of basic terminology related to trans issues. So late last night I put one together-- a very basic trans 101 type document, a half page long, with terms like "biological sex", "gender identity", "gender expression" and the difference between these concepts and "sexual orientation." That distinction, it seems, was the one that people in this group most needed to think about. The committee got the document early in the day and had it before them during our testimony.

I couldn't help but feel for them; this group was so not accustomed to thinking about such matters-- not even those related to sexual orientation, and they are dealing with a deluge of such resolutions. Our three resolutions seem tiny compared to the sixteen or so that seek to repeal or move beyond the infamous "B033" which was passed at the last minute of the 2006 General Convention. That resolution called on the Episcopal Church to refrain from consecrating any bishops "whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church." In other words, don't lift up any more Gene Robinsons, so as not to offend others in the Anglican Communion. But, as far as I can tell, the feeling of the Convention this year-- particularly among the lay and clerical members of the House of Deputies (akin to the U.S. House of Representatives) is to move forward in the basically progressive direction the Episcopal Church is headed, and move beyond the language of B033. This committee, World Missions, appears to have been given the B033 related resolutions, as well as ours, in order to place these matters in the context of the Anglican Communion. There are so many resolutions on this topic, that they are holding a huge hearing on them tomorrow night.

So that's part of the context in which our hearing this evening took place. We met prior to the hearing and then walked over as a group. We arrived early to sign up and then waited. Slowly, more people filled the room, though it was not completely full. The committee sat in a U shape, with a podium at its head for testifying. All of us who testified will hopefully be sharing that testimony here (and on individual blogs, for those who have them) in the days to come, but in the meantime, I will try to convey the gist of their remarks. Michelle Hansen, who blogged the piece before this one, spoke first about her thirty-eight years as an Episcopal priest, who transitioned several years ago from male to female. Dee Tavolaro (whose testimony is here) then spoke about the resolution, putting it in the context of the five points of mission, about which the Deputies had reflected in their afternoon legislative session. Vicki Gray, a deacon and transwoman from the diocese of California, spoke about the Baptismal Covenant and how all are empowered by their baptism into ministries of all sorts. After Vicki, Gari Green, a priest from the diocese of Milwaukee, spoke about her years of ministry and how being a transwoman has helped her in to be a better priest. Then Tom Fehr, an Integrity volunteer, spoke about a friend of his who is a transwoman, and how she should be able to be known and respected for the fruits of her work and ministry, regardless of her trans identity and history. All six of these speakers testified in favor of C001. Jim Toy of the Diocese of Michigan, a strong ally and member of TransEpiscopal, spoke of how rigid gender norms restrict all of us, regardless of whether we identify as transgender Nevertheless, he continued, trans people are particularly vulnerable to discrimination and violence. After each speaker, the committee had a chance to ask any questions, but they never did. As the co-chair of the committee kept asking for questions, and as she was met with silence, I couldn't help but get the sense that the group was overwhelmed, just trying to take us in. Finally the co-chair, the Rev. Gay Jennings of the DIocese of Ohio, said she herself had a general question which any of us could choose to answer, namely whether we knew of any trans person who had had a difficult time specifically because the canon does not currently mention "gender identity and expression."

There was a pause. I then got up and shared that I knew of people who came out as transgender after their ordinations and who had been asked to leave their ministerial positions for that reason. In terms of the ordination process itself, I said that while it was difficult to show definitively how many might have been ordained but for that canon, I do know from many conversations I have had over the last several years that there are a number of trans people out there who experience a sense of call to ordained ministry but who are afraid they will not be fairly considered simply because they are trans. Rev. Jennings seemed to find the answer satisfactory. She then invited me to give my testimony for C061.

I explained that I feel fortunate to be able to work with my bishops, the Commission on Ministry and the Standing Committee of my diocese while I was in the ordination process, since I came out as a transman prior to my ordination. I also shared how helpful it has been to me to be in conversation and community with other trans Episcopalians and Anglicans, including lay and ordained people both in the United States and the Church of England. I made certain to say that, since I had the sense that some committee members may have wondered if this resolution could be construed as an instance of the American church charging ahead of the Anglican Communion again. The C of E is not the whole Communion, obviously, but it is significant to note that they have had transgender priests since at least 2000. I went on to note that in my priesthood, one of the most significant facets of being transgender is that people can know that much more clearly that whoever they are, they are welcome in this church. That when we say all, we mean all. They don't have to be transgender themselves for it to be a big deal that a transgender person could be a priest in this church. I concluded by saying that I really did hope that people would feel free to ask questions.

And then a few people did. Bishop Geralyn Wolf of Rhode Island asked me to define "gender identity and expression" again, as she had heard more than one definition over the course of the testimony. Deputy Michael Barlowe of the diocese of California invited me to share again how sexual orientation is different from gender identity and expression. There may have been one or two other questions; I can't remember at the moment.

After me, a man from the diocese of Michigan, whom I do not know, testified in favor of C046. He basically said that no one should be barred from access to the ordination process because of their gender. When asked how he thought the resolution related to B033, he said that the resolution impacts all the orders of ministry, not just lay people, deacons and priests; if called, anyone should be able to become a bishop.

No one testified against any of the resolutions.

At that, the hearing ended, and the committee began deliberating on other resolutions. We gathered for a quick debrief in preparation for tomorrow: our next hearing is tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. This early morning stuff is killing me. But it's certainly for a good cause! So in the world of trans committee hearings at General Convention, one down, one to go. Then we'll hope these resolutions get to the floor of the House of Deputies; they deserve a fair shot.

CP

The Pace!

2009-07-09T01:29:00.002-04:00

Things are moving very fast here in Anaheim. The TransEpiscopal team has testified before a committee of the Convention tonight and will do so again tomorrow very early in the morning. I feel frantic. The pace is incredible, one for a much younger person. It's a good thing that some of the team are younger. I am aware that there is much more convention to go.

On the side, I attended the opening Eucharist. It was inspiring to say the least. The presiding bishop preached and presided. It was a real experience. I tried to take pictures but I am afraid the are all too dark and I would have to process them. I don't have the time right now. I also had the opportunity to see the ArchBishop of Canterbury up close. I saw him in person, but that is all I can say about it. I do have some pictures but it is too late to post them. I'll do it some time soon.

I have to get up early to testify again tomorrow. Peace to you all!

Michelle Hansen+

Two Hearings in Twelve Hours

2009-07-08T03:57:00.010-04:00

Tomorrow marks the official start of the General Convention, but already legislative committees are holding meetings to sift through the resolutions allotted to them. This year there is an unprecedented five resolutions on transgender inclusion and equality. We had thought there would be four, but we just learned of a fifth.

Two transgender resolutions call on the Church to support secular civil rights legislation:

1) C048, originating from the Diocese of Michigan
2) D012, lead sponsor Byron Rushing of the Diocese of Massachusetts (cosponsored by Sarah Lawton of the Diocese of California and Dee Tavolaro of the Diocese of Rhode Island)

These resolutions have been allotted to the Committee on World Mission, where they might have been overshadowed by a slew of resolutions addressing “B033”, an infamous resolution passed in 2006. But this evening the committee separated these two resolutions from the B033 pack and they will now be considered in a hearing tomorrow (Wednesday) evening between 7-9pm.

An additional three resolutions call on the Episcopal Church to include “gender identity and expression” in its ministry nondiscrimination canon:

3) C001, originating from the Diocese of Newark
4) C061, originating from the Diocese of Massachusetts
5) C046, originating from the Diocese of Michigan

These resolutions are currently under the care of the Committee on National and International Affairs. Today we learned that they will be considered at a hearing Thursday morning from 7-9 a.m.

That means that there will be two hearings on transgender matters within twelve hours.

After these hearings, the committees will decide what to do with the resolutions—whether to combine them, send them to other committees, table them, or send them to the floor of the House of Deputies. If the House of Deputies passes them, the legislation goes to the House of Bishops (remember "how a bill becomes a law?" it's like that).

At the last General Convention three years ago, there was one transgender themed resolution. There was a hearing on it, at which TransEpiscopal's Donna Cartwright testified. Ultimately the resolution got tabled, which means it died.
One person, one resolution.

But this year: five resolutions (thus far), eight TransEpiscopal members. Three of us flew in on the 4th of July, and this evening we arrived at our full compliment. Another huge difference this year is the amazing support we of TransEpiscopal have around us, from the volunteers of Integrity (for which three of us are also official volunteers), to Deputies who are actively working with us from within committees and deputations. One deputy in particular has already been amazing: Sarah Lawton of the Diocese of California. Another is Dee Tavolaro of Rhode Island, who is, as far as we know, the first out transgender Deputy in the history of the Episcopal Church. Go Dee!

Last night, Dee, Gari Green of Wisconsin, and I co-led a trans 101 type workshop last night for the folks working toward LGBT inclusion here at Convention, and it went really well.

Meanwhile, Gari and Jim Toy have also been meeting people at the booth that Integrity is sharing with us in the Convention's exhibit hall.

So here we are, just before everything begins, and already so much has happened. I'm incredibly grateful to be here and while we don’t know what lies ahead, and we know the road may yet get very hard, I just have to say right now: what a difference three years makes.

CP

The Road to Anaheim

2009-07-07T08:34:00.003-04:00

I should have probably said Flight to Anaheim, but Road sounded a bit more poetic. In any case, I am sitting in an Airport waiting to fly to The General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Anaheim California. To my knowledge five of our number are already there and the remaining three(myself included) will arrive today. Yes we will have eight of our members at Convention. This doesn't sound like a great host of people, but it does represent a great effort and is ground breaking.

The effort represents more than just the eight, because some of you out there contributed to help in the effort. It is ground breaking because we are all out and proud of being who we are. In the car driving to this flight I had an interesting discussion with my friend Brenda. We are all just people just like any other of God's created humanity. Whatever the reason we are who we are. As far as the Church is concerned the reasons we are the way we are are irrelevant. God made me and God made you. The differences between people is minor. That God loves us isn't minor. Wouldn't it be nice if the Episcopal Church acknowledged that?

God's Peace,
Michelle Hansen +
From an Airport