Specific Church Teaching on Gender Transitioning?

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QwertyGirl said:
If someone can tell me how talk therapy or religion can help someone feel OK about feeling like they are in the wrong body, then I would be all for that, too. But I would need to see the data before I could support those methods
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The data really doesn’t support the idea of surgery and hormones as a treatment for this either. Leading doctors at Johns Hopkins have noted the suicide rate for transgender individuals is no different before or after surgery
 
True, but they are more at peace after than they were before. At least that is what I have witnessed.

Pretty sad that the bar is still so low. Hopefully progress can be made sooner rather than later with regards to research on this issue.
 
You are not in their minds. With all the variations of intersex conditions there is room for anomalies regarding the gender of the body and the mind that we don’t understand. I’m not saying a person shouldn’t see a mental health professional. They will receive a diagnosis but the treatment for gender dysphoria but what do you think the treatment is going to be? Do you think the treatment for delusions is simple and with predictable outcomes?
 
The horror stories recounted in the above link about the coming trans backlash shows that there are many who are far from being at peace; in fact they are sad and angry about being pushed into hormones or surgery that they now regret. I’m afraid that this will turn into an avalanche of regreat in the future and probably litigation as well.
 
Those stories and reports need to be weighed carefully. They are similar to the ones that report the majority of woman who have abortions live a lifetime of regret. Not so.
 
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Could be, but I’m not so sure. These are people who have taken irreversible action to mutilate themselves permanently in some way of trying to change their sex, which cannot really be changed. If they change their mind, and they have, and will, the regrets would, I think, be horrible.
 
Perhaps you can think of it this way…
There are several things that can go wrong that can create gender dysphoria.
  1. In forming the body, ovaries/testes formation can get messed up. Sometimes because of stress to the mother at a critical time
  2. Brain hardware can be messed up. I gave a good reference upthread.
  3. Brain software can be messed up.This may be the result of abuse, environment etc.
  4. Genes can be messed up, for example XXY, etc
  5. Combinations of these.
Every case has to be handled differently. For cases of brain software issues, yes, these can be talked through.

For some brain hardware issues, and some gene related hardware issues, a combination of medication and software patches can help a lot.

For a lot of hardware related problems, surgery is called for. For the two intersex people in my extended family, this was the only solution. These both would have died without this intervention. Prior to surgery, both had attempted suicide; after, they are both normal, healthy and without any of those tendencies.

For transgender, since there is so many different issues, simply doing hormones and surgery won’t fix anything. That is why it is so vital to properly diagnose and treat each individually.

If you dont, then you get the horor stories mentioned in the article.

It is wrong, wrong, wrong to assume there is never a need for corrective surgery. It is wrong wrong wrong to fix all cases of gender dysphoria with surgery and/or hormones.

Qwerty girl did a great summary of how these people need to be treated from where they are at. Lumping things together in one bucket ain’t gonna help anything. The LGBTletters community is not helping either with the it’s ok to do x, y, and z.
 
redbetta said:
If I weren’t a Catholic, I would be in the camp of “screw it: let people mutilate themselves until they are sterile and themselves from the gene pool.” Just grab some popcorn and watch the world burn.
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A bit of hyperbole don’t you think? This affects something like less than 1% of the population.

Hardly enough to incinerate the world…
 
I wasn’t just talking about that. It can apply to a lot of the asinine trends we see nowadays. When society has peaked, the only direction left to move is backwards.
 
Intersex conditions are not the same as gender dysphoria. If I understand correctly, intersex conditions may result in ambiguous genitalia, as a result of chromosomal abnormalities, and that may of course require surgery. But I doubt that surgery is indicated when there is no genetic or physical anomaly. If a person is clearly a biological male or a biological female, surgery would mutilate a perfectly healthy organ.
 
It’s not that cut and dry. When some one is in high school gym class, has a uterus and external pexxx, female breasts, and needs to shave, you can bet that person has gender dysphoria.
 
Do you mean that the person has physical characteristics of both sexes? If so, it’s a physical / medical problem along with the dysphoria.

That would not be the same as someone who is physically and genetically identifiable as only one sex or the other, with no physical abnormalities.
 
redbetta said:
I wasn’t just talking about that. It can apply to a lot of the asinine trends we see nowadays. When society has peaked, the only direction left to move is backwards.
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From Romans:
For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; 21 for although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen.

26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. Their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural, 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in their own persons the due penalty for their error.

28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a base mind and to improper conduct. 29 They were filled with all manner of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity, they are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32 Though they know God’s decree that those who do such things deserve to die, they not only do them but approve those who practice them.
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Rather seems like the race to the bottom started with one bite of an apple a long, long time ago.
JimG said:
Intersex conditions are not the same as gender dysphoria. If I understand correctly, intersex conditions may result in ambiguous genitalia, as a result of chromosomal abnormalities, and that may of course require surgery. But I doubt that surgery is indicated when there is no genetic or physical anomaly. If a person is clearly a biological male or a biological female, surgery would mutilate a perfectly healthy organ.
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I’ve read research that suggests gender dysphoria might be an intersex condition, with incomplete androgenization of the brain, and a part of a responsible gene has been identified.

Until the research is clearer, I think the Church is wise to give the benefit of the doubt and not make definitive statements.
 
You’re welcome. As Pope Benedict said, we are in a Dictatorship of Relativism which recognizes nothing as being certain. And the Church has also commented that some people believe they can constitute their bodies and identities however they want.
 
Androgenization of the brain? Hmmm. Not quite sure if that’s real, but I’ll wait and see research comes up with. I’m wondering if neurons are male and female.
 
Personally I think if people want surgery and hormones that’s ultimately a matter for there own conscience.

As a woman I want a meaningful category and identity and a language to talk about my sex and men calling themselves women takes this from us. Being a woman isn’t just a feeling and there is no such thing as a female penis.
 
JimG said:
I’m wondering if neurons are male and female.
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Well neurons contain human DNA, including X and Y chromosomes. But they don’t AFIK have male or female characteristics.

Neural pathways in the brain are another matter. It is established science that male and female brains have differences, and some of these differences can, apparently be found among the transgendered, i.e. a genetic male’s brain more resembling a female’s.

To be sure the science is still far from complete, but I believe the Church should be informed by the science before expounding on the theology of gender issues. IMHO that means keeping an open mind, and preaching conservative treatments as much as possible, but allowing for the necessity of treatment, perhaps even radical treatment, to save a life.

And as a foundation, great love, empathy and charity towards the genuine sufferers of this disorder, being careful not to equate having a gender identity crisis with making a moral choice. Too often, “love the sinner, hate the sin” blurs the line between a condition that is not a choice and an action that seems to outsiders like a choice but to the sufferer is an overwhelming compulsion or impulse.
 
I was born intersex, had both female and male reproductive parts and also have a female brain. Even due to this, due to the male characteristics, my family treated me as male and would always refuse what the doctors said about my gender. Before I could speak, my parents had my female parts surgically removed, which I didn’t want but wasn’t given a choice. In 2007, I started to presenting as female and am a lot happier. Even though I present as female, my family still treats me as male.
 
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