Pope Francis compares arguments for transgender rights to nuclear arms race

[Rubia]

I am notsure whether Kreeft is saying what Joie deVivre is implying. He discusses two premises before the quote she cites. The first is that the soul, likethe body, has both femaleness and maleness with one dominant. The rest goes like this:

Premise Two is the even more obvious fact that biological sexuality is innate, natural, and in fact pervasive to every cell in the body. It is not socially conditioned, or conventional, or environmental; it is hereditary.

The inevitable conclusion from these two premises is that sexuality is innate, natural, and pervasive to the whole person, soul as well as body. The only way to avoid the conclusion is to deny one of the two premises that logically necessitate it-to deny psychosomatic unity or to deny innate somatic sexuality.

In the light of this simple and overwhelming argument, why is the conclusion not only unfamiliar but shocking to so many people in our society? I can think of only two reasons. The first is a mere misunderstanding, the second a serious and substantial mistake.

The first reason would be a reaction against what is wrongly seen as monosexual soul-stereotyping. A wholly male soul, whatever maleness means, or a wholly female soul, sounds unreal and oversimplified. But that is not what sexual souls implies. Rather, in every soul there is—to use Jungian terms—anima and animus, femaleness and maleness; just as in the body, one predominates but the other is also present. If the dominant sex of soul is not the same as that of the body, we have a sexual misfit, a candidate for a sex change operation of body or of soul, earthly or Heavenly. Perhaps Heaven supplies such changes just as it supplies all other needed forms of healing. In any case, the resurrection body perfectly expresses its soul, and since souls are innately sexual, that body will perfectly express its soul’s true sexual identity.

Kreeft clearly does not say ANYWHERE that the sex of the soul is the “correct” one over that of the body. He regards the sex of both soul and body as innate and valid. Never says that a person is the sex that is dominant in the soul over the one dominant in the body. But this is the argument that supporters of Transgender make and what Joie de Vivre seems to imply in this thread.

@Joie deVivre, how does a transgender person decide that it is the body that is wrong and not the sex of the soul? How does he know that he is a “man in a woman’s body” and not instead a “woman in a man’s soul”? Hmmm? Seems it comes done to CHOOSING one’s own gender after all. So much for escaping the gender theory criticisms.

Consider Kreeft’s words again

If the dominant sex of soul is not the same as that of the body, we have a sexual misfit, a candidate for a sex change operation of body or of soul, earthly or Heavenly. Perhaps Heaven supplies such changes just as it supplies all other needed forms of healing. In any case, the resurrection body perfectly expresses its soul, and since souls are innately sexual, that body will perfectly express its soul’s true sexual identity.

I don’t know someone derives from this the idea that it is legitimate for a person to mutilate in mechanical ways, the " innate, natural, and in fact pervasive to every cell in the body" biological sex of the body. Kreeft nowhere gives precedence to the nature of the soul over the body, both are equally subject to divine intervention to make them match where there is a misfit. Even remembering that he is not the magisterium, it is still not even possible to use him in support of the idea that a person by himself SUBJECTIVELY decides that his body mismatches his “true” gender. How does he decide which one is his true gender? Perhaps it is his soul that is need of an operation which only God can do, after all.

No doctor or the individual himself is qualified to make such a determination since neither of them are the creator! How can they possibly know which one of the two, the soul or the body, actually matches the gender that God intended for the person? How can they possibly know which one of the two is the broken one? At best this is playing God and disrespecting the objective nature of the body by attempting to mutilate it according to human ideas.

You are not God. The idea of who you are is in God’s mind, not the mind of the transgender individual.

 

[marymary1975]

I think this is a very good post.

Btw…seeing as your English is already good you’d no doubt welcome some correction, ‘love’, not ‘live’. . Love = I love life, or God loves His children etc…; Live = I live my life this way, or, I live to my principles etc…

So sorry about the misspellings!!! My phone has a tendency to change love for live and I didn’t notice it. I also misspelled Spanish. Sorry between autocorrect and small keys sometimes I miss some errors !!!

 

[marymary1975]

Gender theory says that there aren’t real differences between men and women, that two mothers is just as good as a mother and a father ceteris paribus, transgender people don’t claim that, transgender people claim that gender is innate, immutable and tryininmutable and yhere is a duality of sex. e a woman to be a man or vice versa is like trying to pound a square peg into a round hole, it’ll work badly at best. Transgender people functionally reify the duality and immutability of gender. Also, to quote Peter Kreeft

peterkreeft.com/topics/sex-in-heaven.htm

Yeah, definitely a condemnation of what I had mentioned, not actually transgender people.

The mere fact that transgendered claim that “gender is” something makes it part of the gender theory because there is no such thing as “gender.” The “gender” concept was a construct of the gender theory to combat the idea of sex. There is no gender there is sex, and definitely sex is inmutable and there is a duality of sex. Transgenders cannot claim that sex is immutable because that mean exactly what Pope Benedict stated: if you were born unequivocally XX and have unequivocally female genitalia youare a female and vice versa. And that is not what transgendered claims. Transgenders claim that there is no such thing as sex - gender theory - that what there is is gender - more gender theory- which is not attached to your genitals - aha even more gender theory - and that your gender is in your brain so you can choose that you are man despite being XX and having unequivocally female genitalia - that is gender theory at its best. So yes, the document posted by Ed it is a condemnation of the idea that so called gender is in your brain and that you can call yourself a man when your sex is female.

Also note that Kreefe is talking about “sex.”. He talks about “biological sex” so I am also in complete agreement with what Ronda said.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

I am notsure whether Kreeft is saying what Joie deVivre is implying. He discusses two premises before the quote she cites. The first is that the soul, likethe body, has both femaleness and maleness with one dominant. The rest goes like this:

Kreeft clearly does not say ANYWHERE that the sex of the soul is the “correct” one over that of the body. He regards the sex of both soul and body as innate and valid. Never says that a person is the sex that is dominant in the soul over the one dominant in the body. But this is the argument that supporters of Transgender make and what Joie de Vivre seems to imply in this thread.

@Joie deVivre, how does a transgender person decide that it is the body that is wrong and not the sex of the soul? How does he know that he is a “man in a woman’s body” and not instead a “woman in a man’s soul”? Hmmm? Seems it comes done to CHOOSING one’s own gender after all. So much for escaping the gender theory criticisms.

Which is more important, to save the body or the soul?

They experience extreme distress over trying to force themselves to the sex they were assigned at birth because of how much lying and deception that entails. The concept of “woman in a man’s soul” does not make sense.

Consider Kreeft’s words again

I don’t know someone derives from this the idea that it is legitimate for a person to mutilate in mechanical ways, the " innate, natural, and in fact pervasive to every cell in the body" biological sex of the body. Kreeft nowhere gives precedence to the nature of the soul over the body, both are equally subject to divine intervention to make them match where there is a misfit. Even remembering that he is not the magisterium, it is still not even possible to use him in support of the idea that a person by himself SUBJECTIVELY decides that his body mismatches his “true” gender. How does he decide which one is his true gender? Perhaps it is his soul that is need of an operation which only God can do, after all.

No doctor or the individual himself is qualified to make such a determination since neither of them are the creator! How can they possibly know which one of the two, the soul or the body, actually matches the gender that God intended for the person? How can they possibly know which one of the two is the broken one? At best this is playing God and disrespecting the objective nature of the body by attempting to mutilate it according to human ideas.

You are not God. The idea of who you are is in God’s mind, not the mind of the transgender individual.

If someone is intersex would it be wrong to confirm their sex via surgery?

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

The mere fact that transgendered claim that “gender is” something makes it part of the gender theory because there is no such thing as “gender.” The “gender” concept was a construct of the gender theory to combat the idea of sex. There is no gender there is sex, and definitely sex is inmutable and there is a duality of sex. Transgenders cannot claim that sex is immutable because that mean exactly what Pope Benedict stated: if you were born unequivocally XX and have unequivocally female genitalia youare a female and vice versa. And that is not what transgendered claims. Transgenders claim that there is no such thing as sex - gender theory - that what there is is gender - more gender theory- which is not attached to your genitals - aha even more gender theory - and that your gender is in your brain so you can choose that you are man despite being XX and having unequivocally female genitalia - that is gender theory at its best. So yes, the document posted by Ed it is a condemnation of the idea that so called gender is in your brain and that you can call yourself a man when your sex is female.

Also note that Kreefe is talking about “sex.”. He talks about “biological sex” so I am also in complete agreement with what Ronda said.

What happens when brain sex and genitalia sex differ?

According to this philosophy, sex is no longer a given element of nature, that man has to accept and personally make sense of: it is a social role that we choose for ourselves, while in the past it was chosen for us by society. The profound falsehood of this theory and of the anthropological revolution contained within it is obvious. People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being. They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves. According to the biblical creation account, being created by God as male and female pertains to the essence of the human creature. This duality is an essential aspect of what being human is all about, as ordained by God. This very duality as something previously given is what is now disputed. The words of the creation account: “male and female he created them” (Gen 1:27) no longer apply. No, what applies now is this: it was not God who created them male and female – hitherto society did this, now we decide for ourselves. Man and woman as created realities, as the nature of the human being, no longer exist. Man calls his nature into question. From now on he is merely spirit and will. The manipulation of nature, which we deplore today where our environment is concerned, now becomes man’s fundamental choice where he himself is concerned. From now on there is only the abstract human being, who chooses for himself what his nature is to be. Man and woman in their created state as complementary versions of what it means to be human are disputed.

w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2012/december/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20121221_auguri-curia.html

Transgender people agree that sex is a given element if the mind/soul, that it is not something one chooses, but one has and as such there is often extreme distress when one is female and yet coerced by society to be male in direct contradiction to their nature. They do not argue against having a nature as a man or woman, they argue that they cannot change their gender to make society happy and as such they reify Catholic teaching. A transwoman is not choosing to be a woman, she is acknowledging that she cannot make herself a man as that is contrary to her nature.

 

[marymary1975]

What happens when brain sex and genitalia sex differ?

w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2012/december/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20121221_auguri-curia.html

Transgender people agree that sex is a given element if the mind/soul, that it is not something one chooses, but one has and as such there is often extreme distress when one is female and yet coerced by society to be male in direct contradiction to their nature. They do not argue against having a nature as a man or woman, they argue that they cannot change their gender to make society happy and as such they reify Catholic teaching. A transwoman is not choosing to be a woman, she is acknowledging that she cannot make herself a man as that is contrary to her nature.

Sex is in your chromosomes and in your genitals, hence there is no such thing as a brain sex. The “brain sex” idea is a construct of the gender theory. It was a concept created by the gender theory precisely to sell the belief that the brain can have a sex different than your actual sex. The gender theory is rejected by the Pope hence brain sex is a construct.

Now that doesn’t mean that the brain is not affected by multiple factors: yes brain is affected by the environment you grow up, your brain is affected by hormones no doubt, your brain is affected by what you eat and what you put into your body so there are a ton of external factors that can affect your brain and they are going to have consequences on your behavior. But the fact that other factors have an effect on your brain doesn’t mean that your brain has a sex and that sometimes your brain is male despite you being XX and fully female. Again thatis gender theory.

Obviously transgender people suffer great distress and have a huge confusion and have to deal with a lot of pain, no one argues that. Webarebto be compassionate with them and understand that they are suffering. The problem with gender theory is that gender theory sells transgenders a lie as a solution to their problems: live out a lie and your problems will be resolved. Unfortunately a lie can make you happy for a moment but will not bring you happiness forever little less a lie will take you to eternity. The root if transgender problems is a deep self hatred that no one so far tackles. Convincing your own self that a lie…that your real nature is a woman when the truth is that you are actually a man is living a lie and soonerior later is going to affect you negatively, because no matter how much you keep repeating yourself that you are a woman and no matter how many sex change operations you have and how many hormones you take, the day you die if they do a test on your body to determine to who belong to, that test is going to come back saying you are a man not a woman.

 

[marymary1975]

Which is more important, to save the body or the soul?

They experience extreme distress over trying to force themselves to the sex they were assigned at birth because of how much lying and deception that entails. The concept of “woman in a man’s soul” does not make sense.

If someone is intersex would it be wrong to confirm their sex via surgery?

I just want to chime in this with two quick comments. First to me in the transgender discussion whenever the intersex argument comes out that is like in the discussion of abortion the pro choices bring the rape argument: 99% of abortions have nothing to do with rape but prochoicers insist on using rape as their war horse despite that the vast majority of cases have nothing to do with rape.

Same with intersex. The vast majority of cases have nothing to do with intersex. Why then don’t we focus on the 90% that have nothing to do with intersex and are fully biologically male or female?

And second real intersex cases are very rare. From most of my reading full intersex cases are basically non existent. Usually you have either a genetical female with a very enlarged female organ in which case you may definitely need a surgery, or a male that is underdeveloped. Again these cases may need surgery. Also you do have some rare cases of genetic diseases which are more complicated but these are a small minority. 90% of the time we are speaking about a person with no intersex issues no genetical issues, who is fully and complete from one sex…so why do we even bring the intersex issue when that is not the case most of the time?

 

[Rubia]

Which is more important, to save the body or the soul?

It’s a good thing we are not talking about salvation.

We are talking about truth, what a person’s really sex is. Catholic faith says we are our bodies as much as our souls. We are not ghosts in a machine. The uncatholic assumption here: your idea that the sex of the body is less important than whatever sex one convinces himself they really are.

They experience extreme distress over trying to force themselves to the sex they were assigned at birth because of how much lying and deception that entails.

Right.So this is not at all about what sex someone really is, after all. It’s about making them feel better? And supposedly, theonly way someone can feel better is to mutilate their perfectly healthy body to make up some fake genitals…You have been trying to exclude the transgender’s from the church’s criticism of gender theory and here we come back full circle. It’s all about the emotions after all, just like Pope Francis said.

I do wonder how people ever managed to live in this world until two days ago when man came up with sex reassignment surgery: That modern man suddenly has so many “dire” needs never known before makes me wonder if we are dealing with the same species that’s been roaming the earth up until yesterday.

The concept of “woman in a man’s soul” does not make sense.

Of course it does. Didnt you read Kreeft before you posted him here? He says clearly that mismatch of sex between soul and body could mean either one of those, soul or body, is in need of the change. Therefore, the sex of the soul might be the wrong one and that of the body the right one. You are selling the transgendered theory here that the body is always the one wrongly sexed whenever one thinks that their soul is of the opposite sex. On what theology have you made such a radical assumption?

A woman in a man’s soul is exactly the same kind of statement that you are trying to make with the body. Equally silly or equally valid. Based on Kreeft’s philosophy that you cited, I asked you on what authority one can make a judgment that it is the body and not the soul that is wrongly sexed. Do you have a blue print of the image of that person that God had in the beginning, so as to use it to decide that it is the perfectly healthy body that is in fact wrongly sexed and not the soul?

For all your protests you are indeed selling the gender theory here rejected by the church that it ought to be the person himself who simply chooses which sex they are. Well, sex is truth, not a choice. Either the person is male/female or he is not. Since they are not a divine creator, no one can purport to determine that what he feels is the true gender/sex. No one creates himself. That’s the crux of the church’s dismissal of gender theory. One’s sex is not determined by his choice or feelings but by God’s creative act. Because man did not create himself.

If someone is intersex would it be wrong to confirm their sex via surgery?

Confirm it against what? One’s feelings? Or against God’s own idea for the person?

By “confirming”, do you mean taking a perfectly sexed human body and making it look like something it is not? Taking a perfect female xx body and making up false genitals that say “I am xy” when the body is in fact, through and through, xx? I would think lying is wrong, whether to oneself or others. If a body is female, then it is female, not male. Why reject it if there’s nothing wrong with it besides your own feelings about it? If Kreeft is right and someone’s body can be female while their soul is male (assuming this is not just too much philosophical speculation on the respected Kreeft’s part), then that person is in no place to determine for himself just which one between his soul and body is wrongly sexed as he did not design or call himself into existence. God did.

I am also confused about why anyone would have to lie in order to accept their own bodies as they are.

 

[Rubia]

w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2012/december/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20121221_auguri-curia.html

Transgender people agree that sex is a given element if the mind/soul, that it is not something one chooses, but one has and as such there is often extreme distress when one is female and yet coerced by society to be male in direct contradiction to their nature.

It is amazing that you quote and then proceed to contradict the pope. Lets compare your claim with the quotation you cited:

According to this philosophy, sex is no longer a given element of nature, that man has to accept and personally make sense of: it is a social role that we choose for ourselves, while in the past it was chosen for us by society. The profound falsehood of this theory and of the anthropological revolution contained within it is obvious. People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being. They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves. According to the biblical creation account, being created by God as male and female pertains to the essence of the human creature.

Apparently, Pope Benedict’s “nature” includes the bodily identity as a crucial element. That mindset Joie de Vivre speaks of does not even think that the body is the person’s nature!

Lets keep reading the pope

This duality is an essential aspect of what being human is all about, as ordained by God. This very duality as something previously given is what is now disputed. The words of the creation account: “male and female he created them” (Gen 1:27) no longer apply. No, what applies now is this: it was not God who created them male and female – hitherto society did this, now we decide for ourselves.

Joiede Vivre keeps insisting that the person’s sex was “assigned at birth” by “society” and that the person suffers great distress at leading a life contrary to their “nature”. Thus, she denies that the bodily sex of the person has been given to the person by God. Society did that.

Man and woman as created realities, as the nature of the human being, no longer exist. Man calls his nature into question. From now on he is merely spirit and will.

Or he is merely “mind” and will… Remember, the body is imposed by society not God. It is also not part of human nature

The manipulation of nature, which we deplore today where our environment is concerned, now becomes man’s fundamental choice where he himself is concerned. From now on there is only the abstract human being, who chooses for himself what his nature is to be. Man and woman in their created state as complementary versions of what it means to be human are disputed.

Man is a mind, not a body. Despite not creating himself, he thinks he knows that his perfectly sexed body is the wrong sex.

They do not argue against having a nature as a man or woman, they argue that they cannot change their gender to make society happy and as such they reify Catholic teaching. A transwoman is not choosing to be a woman, she is acknowledging that she cannot make herself a man as that is contrary to her nature.

A transwoman is not God. How does she know her emotions are not the problem? That it is the body? You are doing exactly what the pope rejects. You think her choice of her feelings over her body is definitive in determining her real sex. SHE chooses, not God. Soooo wrong, that.

 

[friardchips]

Gender theory says that there aren’t real differences between men and women, that two mothers is just as good as a mother and a father ceteris paribus, transgender people don’t claim that, transgender people claim that gender is innate, immutable and trying to force a woman to be a man or vice versa is like trying to pound a square peg into a round hole, it’ll work badly at best. Transgender people functionally reify the duality and immutability of gender. Also, to quote Peter Kreeft

peterkreeft.com/topics/sex-in-heaven.htm

Yeah, definitely a condemnation of what I had mentioned, not actually transgender people.

On the one hand the letter i is next to the letter o so it could be a typo, but it did happen repeatedly so I don’t know.

Beware, claiming that conservative heretics are heretics can get you into trouble on this forum.

Noted, thanks! I shall refrain.

 

[friardchips]

So sorry about the misspellings!!! My phone has a tendency to change love for live and I didn’t notice it. I also misspelled Spanish. Sorry between autocorrect and small keys sometimes I miss some errors !!!

On the contrary, I wasn’t criticising you. Your English is nice! God bless!

 

[Cherry5]

This may be worth reading
nature.com/news/sex-redefined-1.16943
A different perspective.

 

[SpeakInSilence]

What happens when brain sex and genitalia sex differ?

w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2012/december/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20121221_auguri-curia.html

Transgender people agree that sex is a given element if the mind/soul, that it is not something one chooses, but one has and as such there is often extreme distress when one is female and yet coerced by society to be male in direct contradiction to their nature. They do not argue against having a nature as a man or woman, they argue that they cannot change their gender to make society happy and as such they reify Catholic teaching. A transwoman is not choosing to be a woman, she is acknowledging that she cannot make herself a man as that is contrary to her nature.

How can they know their nature is different then their bodies? Perhaps someone has gotten revelation from God on this matter?

 

[Cherry5]

How can they know their nature is different then their bodies? Perhaps someone has gotten revelation from God on this matter?

Please read the following article too get a feel of how complicated sex and gender is:
nature.com/news/sex-redefined-1.16943
There seems to be more proof every day that just xx and xy is inadequate to decide sex and or gender.
Perhaps sooner than later transgender will be considered a form of intersexed condition.

There is no difference between the revelation about your own gender versus that which a transgender person understand their gender to be.

We are all way more complicated than just xx and xy. Are you willing to be accepting of those that don’t fit your paradigm?
I can send you the text off the link if you have difficulty opening it.

 

[InSearchofGrace]

The cited link in Post 54 is about a (case of) disorder of sexual development (DSD), also known as intersex condition. The article itself says so.

Disorders of sex development (DSDs) are a group of rare conditions where the reproductive organs and genitals do not develop as expected.

DSDs should not be confused with gender identity disorder or gender dysphoria, which presents as transgenderism. Gender dysphoria is where the reproductive organs and genitals have developed normally, but the person feels that their gender identity (their sense of what sex they are) does not match their biological sex.

An intersex person presents in condition whereby chromosomal sex is inconsistent with phenotypic sex (physical and outward appearance), or in which the phenotype is not classifiable as either male or female. Presentation may be obvious at birth, or diagnosable later in development, sometimes even well into adulthood, like in the case study of the cited link.

Accordingly, the prevalence of intersex is .018 %, or if including Klinefelter syndrome, Turner syndrome, and late-onset hyperplasia, could reach to about 1.7 %, which is still relatively rare.

Studies on transgender identifying persons show that there is mostly no karyotyping variation, meaning they have unambiguous XX or XY.

In reading various and ardent postings of transgender forum members and their supporters in this forum like Joie and Cherry5, no disrespect to them, they discuss transgenderism in the same breath as intersex condition as if the two are similar if not same conditions, motivated to justify transitioning, hormone therapy and sexual reassignment surgery.

It is not surprising that transgender activists promote the concept of brain sex. They maintain that neuroscience and psychiatry are settled on the issue. Not so. They also argue for gender theory, as though social construction of gender can refute manifestation of an unambiguously male or female body and on the chromosome level. IOW, the the mind dictates or determines a person’s true sex. Not so. While it is true that sex determination is not clearly binary in perhaps < 2% of the population that are intersex, sex determination is binary for the 98%.

Transgenderism / gender dysphoria, unlike intersex, is a mental disturbance, not unlike body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) or body integrity identity disorder (BIID). Those suffering from said conditions seek surgical solution to a mental condition. To comply with their push for surgical “correction” is just bad medicine. Not to mention that the Vatican would find SRS morally justifiable is highly doubtful, based on recent iterations by Pope Francis on transgender rights. Much hay was made when he reportedly embraced transgender man Diego Neria Lejarrage in a recent visit at the Vatican. (By the way, out of compassion, Pope Francis also embraced this disfigured man.)

However, contrary to much editorializing and spinning by media, the compassion of Pope Francis does not mean he is about to depart from teaching rooted in Divine and Natural Law.