People with gender identity issues and sex change surgeries!

[StAnastasia]

God has created us and He has deemed we will have a pysicality through eternity and there has to be some element to our joy in that.

Will there be eating and drinking in heaven? If so, there will need to be elimination of digestive waste in heaven. If eating and drinking, why not sex? Why should those who enjoy food and drink but not sex be rewarded, but those who enjoy sex but don’t care much for food and drink will be punished by having that joy removed for eternity?

 

[irishpatrick]

How do you explain the fact that disease and death existed for 3.5 billion years before humans evolved?

==> We do not know that for certain. We can only “guess” based on what we think is the an accurate fossil record and accurate dating methods, both could be correct or wrong. Further, God might very well have used evolutionary processes to prepare the world for us.

Where was it? And how do you explain the fact that there is no evidence in the human genome that the population of hominids evolving into Homo sapiens never fell significantly below 3,000 breeding pairs? That is, there is no evidence of a “founder effect,” in which the population of *Homo sapiens *fell to a single pair.

==> I have read much disagreeing with that statement. However, we are “devolving” into a topic that is far off the OP at this point. There are plenty of evolution threads.

This is an intiguingly odd mixture of biblical literalism and rejection of biblical literalism. On the one hand you insist on taking the Adam and Eve story literally, yet on the other hand you dismiss the genealogies of the Old Testament as non-literal. Which is legitimate? Or do you insist on a literal interpretation sometimes, and at other times when it is convenient you permit yourself to stray from that literalism?

==> I do not dismiss genealogies–too many people (mainly fundamentalists) think they are the full record. I do not think they are and the Church has made no statement like that either. However, the Church does say the Garden, the Fall, and Adam and Eve were real events and real people and our real parents and the Bible supports that 100%.

 

[irishpatrick]

Will there be eating and drinking in heaven? If so, there will need to be elimination of digestive waste in heaven. If eating and drinking, why not sex? Why should those who enjoy food and drink but not sex be rewarded, but those who enjoy sex but don’t care much for food and drink will be punished by having that joy removed for eternity?

I think you are not understanding the depth of joy we will experience in Heaven. It is beyond anything we know here, and with that level of joy it is hard to fathom that we will think we are missing out on omething (impossible imo).

In Heaven we will still be who we are, but much different. Like when Jesus was glorified during the Transfiguration…He was still Jesus, yet his body was transformed and so will out bodies.

 

[MariaTSAngel]

I don’t quite get what sexual arousal has to do with gender identity. People don’t live as there true gender for merely unimportant sexual aspects. Further, gender identity and sexual orientation are very different subjects. Even more different from gender identity is the aspect of sexuality. We should stick to gender identity (true gender) if discussing the aspect of an individual being transgendered or transsexual. I’m a transgendered (specifically transsexual) woman and I don’t obsess over sex, in fact I practice abstinance. I have been married before, twice in fact, and the only times I thought about sex were times when it was acceptable to God. Transsexuals don’t obsess over having sex, no matter how many times many of you try to portray your propaganda as true. Transgendered is a broad term, by modern standards, which includes Drag Queens, Cross-Dressers, and Transvestites. Unfortunately those people are not, in fact, truly transgendered, they don’t suffer from gender dysphoria where their sex does not match their gender like transsexual women do. Many transsexual women prefer to be called transgendered women because transsexual implies that they identify as male or female for sexual reasons which is simply inaccurate. Sex is, to the common person, whether we have a penis or a vagina, and to a scientist, too difficult to even begin to comprehend and gender is whether we experience ourselves as male or female, present as male or female, and live as male or female.

 

[StAnastasia]

irishpatrick:
We should get back to the topic of this thread. We can agree to disagree on the issues we’ve been discussing. Although my Ph.D. is theology, not science, I have extensive education in the sciences, and work with scientists on a daily basis on questions at the interface between religion and science. I suspect we come at issues of the literal interpretation of scripture from rather different angles.

Back to the topic of sex reassignment surgery!

StAnastasia

 

[StAnastasia]

Many transsexual women prefer to be called transgendered women because transsexual implies that they identify as male or female for sexual reasons which is simply inaccurate. Sex is, to the common person, whether we have a penis or a vagina, and to a scientist, too difficult to even begin to comprehend and gender is whether we experience ourselves as male or female, present as male or female, and live as male or female.

MariaTSAngel this is very nicely put. Thank you for placing the emphasis where it belongs!

 

[irishpatrick]

MariaTSAngel this is very nicely put. Thank you for placing the emphasis where it belongs!

The problem still lies in how do we decide what is moral and what is immoral regarding this topic. Again, is it DNA, brain, body, or a combo deal…and how do we know? The Church has stated genetics is the way they determine gender.

 

[mgreen77]

The problem still lies in how do we decide what is moral and what is immoral regarding this topic. Again, is it DNA, brain, body, or a combo deal…and how do we know? The Church has stated genetics is the way they determine gender.

I’m still a little confused too about the Church…

I get that the Church says if born male, you remain male, no matter what you do or change.

But does that mean that the Church would consider sex between a biological male with surgically-created female genitals and an ordinary man to be homosexual sex, even though the relationship is between female genitals and male genitals?

 

[irishpatrick]

I’m still a little confused too about the Church…

I get that the Church says if born male, you remain male, no matter what you do or change.

But does that mean that the Church would consider sex between a biological male with surgically-created female genitals and an ordinary man to be homosexual sex, even though the relationship is between female genitals and male genitals?

I am guessing “yes.”

 

[mgreen77]

But does that mean that the Church would consider sex between a biological male with surgically-created female genitals and an ordinary man to be homosexual sex, even though the relationship is between female genitals and male genitals?

I am guessing “yes.”

Ashame, as don’t most states allow post-surgical people to marry (heterosexually) as their “new” sex?

 

[StAnastasia]

Ashame, as don’t most states allow post-surgical people to marry (heterosexually) as their “new” sex?

Yes, as they should.

 

[StAnastasia]

I’m still a little confused too about the Church…I get that the Church says if born male, you remain male, no matter what you do or change.

But you are not exclusively male if you are XX but have male genitalia, or vice versa. Things are not always as neat as we would like them to be. The number of people receiving surgery to “normalize” genital appearance seems to be between one and two out of 1,000. Men with Klinefelter syndrome (XXY) have even been enabled to become fathers – over 100 successful pregnancies have been reported using IVF technology with surgically removed sperm material from men with this syndrome syndrome.

 

[MariaTSAngel]

But does that mean that the Church would consider sex between a biological male with surgically-created female genitals and an ordinary man to be homosexual sex, even though the relationship is between female genitals and male genitals?

Again, being transgendered has nothing to do with sexual intercourse.

 

[MariaTSAngel]

Ashame, as don’t most states allow post-surgical people to marry (heterosexually) as their “new” sex?

People should marry based on their identified, presented, and lived gender. For practical reasons, a doctors note should verify that the individual was living as the gender with which they identify and present as. If I live all my life as a woman and identify as a woman, I should have the right to marry a heterosexual man and eventually adopt children. It shouldn’t matter what genitals I have, if I identify and live as a woman and know that I am a woman and I love a man and he loves me, then I should be allowed, by the Roman Catholic Church, to be married to that man and he to me as with any other heterosexual couple.

 

[mgreen77]

It shouldn’t matter what genitals I have, if I identify and live as a woman and know that I am a woman and I love a man and he loves me, then I should be allowed, by the Roman Catholic Church, to be married…

Well, one advantage of avoiding the surgery is that you can still marry a woman (though I realize you may not want to) or pursue a religious life, same as everyone else.

It seems the surgery is the one, unforgiveable sin, since afterwards you can’t marry (as a Catholic) anyone of either sex, can’t morally be intimate with anyone ever, and can’t pursue a religious vocation.

Even gays can marry (though not to who they’d like) or maybe even pursue a religious calling, as long as they don’t act on their desires.

But post-surgery, all those doors close.

 

[irishpatrick]

Ashame, as don’t most states allow post-surgical people to marry (heterosexually) as their “new” sex?

That sounds correct.

 

[irishpatrick]

People should marry based on their identified, presented, and lived gender. For practical reasons, a doctors note should verify that the individual was living as the gender with which they identify and present as. If I live all my life as a woman and identify as a woman, I should have the right to marry a heterosexual man and eventually adopt children. It shouldn’t matter what genitals I have, if I identify and live as a woman and know that I am a woman and I love a man and he loves me, then I should be allowed, by the Roman Catholic Church, to be married to that man and he to me as with any other heterosexual couple.

YOU should be allowed? The Church should now bend to what YOU want? Really?

 

[mgreen77]

Is it likely that the Church would grant an annulment if a husband enters a marriage with full awareness of his wish to have been born the opposite sex, the wife isn’t made aware beforehand, and he has the surgery later during the marriage?

 

[MariaTSAngel]

YOU should be allowed? The Church should now bend to what YOU want? Really?

The Catholic Church says that marriage should be between a man and a woman, it shouldn’t have a right to say which type of woman a man may marry or which type of man a woman may marry.

 

[MariaTSAngel]

Well, one advantage of avoiding the surgery is that you can still marry a woman (though I realize you may not want to) or pursue a religious life, same as everyone else.

It seems the surgery is the one, unforgiveable sin, since afterwards you can’t marry (as a Catholic) anyone of either sex, can’t morally be intimate with anyone ever, and can’t pursue a religious vocation.

I’m a heterosexual transgendered woman, why on earth would I ever want to marry a woman? Also, I’m not choosing to never get genital realignment surgery so I can pursue religious life, I’m choosing to avoid genital realignment surgery for religious, medical, and political reasons. Also, I am a woman, I shouldn’t have to remove my penis just so I can be viewed as a woman. God intended for me to be a woman, so I am a woman no matter what anyone else says.

Although I may be opposed to transgendered women getting genital realignment surgery, I do not think that the church should prohibit them from marrying a man or going into a religious vocation.