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

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

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

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

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

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”

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

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