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Tags: Christian Crossdresser

Sometimes the 'men of God' make me ashamed to be a Christian

Categories: Christianity and Crossdressing

Tags: Christian Crossdresser, crossdressed, Crossdressing Cure, Gender Identity, t-girl, tg faith, transgender faith

Published on: March 3, 2008

In his quest to make ‘real men’ out of his parishioners Ken Hutcherson, pastor at the Antioch Bible Church in Kirkland, WA was quoted in a recent sermon saying:

“God hates soft men” and “God hates effeminate men.” He went on to say, “If I was in a drugstore and some guy opened the door for me, I’d rip his arm off and beat him with the wet end.”

Is that his answer to the question ‘What would Jesus Do?’

Perhaps king David was delusional when he said:

‘For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.’ – Psalms 139:13-14

Maybe the apostle John was misquoted in his old age when he said:

“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” – 1 John 7-8

It seems ‘God is love’ only holds as long as you’re not a soft man. And by soft, could Hutcherson perhaps mean: ‘sensitive, caring, kind and gentle’? Yes, that’s what I picture when I think of a soft man. It also sounds suspiciously like the fruits of the Holy spirit mentioned in Galatians 5:22. I guess that makes me worthy to be ‘beaten with the wet end’ of my own arm.

Now, pastor Ken tries to pass this off as a joke. If we believe him, it’s one made in extremely poor taste. Joke or no, I think it points to something deeper – to the doctrine of hate being preached in so many churches across the country.

It is unfortunate that senior leadership among many Christian denominations has allowed themselves to be defined by what they hate. Anti-abortion and anti-gay. Against pre-marital sex and against gay marriage. Somewhere in all the rhetoric, the message of hope, faith and love Jesus Christ came to preach is lost. Along with that, we Christians are losing the ability to influence others for the kingdom of God. We are no longer seen as a refuge from the world, but rather a group of people who will heap on judgement and guilt until the fragile, broken person has been molded into our own version of Christian virtue and purity. We no longer love people as they are, but rather as we believe they should be. Those who don’t conform are quickly tossed aside. Demonized and alone.

In the word’s of Dr Seuss, the Christian church is quickly becoming those who ‘don’t matter’.

“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” - Dr Seuss

P.S. I was looking at the Antioch Bible Church’s website, and my wife commented ‘uhoh, who designed that web page, that’s soft.’ Well, at least they’re ‘manly’ on the pulpit…

The pitfalls of being a good Christian crossdresser

by Vanessa Law

Categories: Christianity and Crossdressing, Transgender News and Issues

Tags: Christian Crossdresser, Christianity and Crossdressing, crossdressed, transgender faith, transgender religion, transvestite

Comments: 6 Comments

Published on: February 29, 2008

There are Christians who ostracize the transgendered for being different. They say crossdressing is a sin. By submitting themselves to the will of the church, and fervently seeking God, a few of us have found freedom. Yet for most of us, no matter how hard we pray, how much we definitely want to be cured, how guilty we feel – we wake up each morning as who we are. A transgendered person. Not free, but shackled by the guilt heaped upon us by ‘loving’ and ‘well meaning’ Christian brothers and sisters.

There are other Christians who believe differently. Who believe that God loves the transgendered, and that who we are is not in. Many of these Christians have previously had the weight of the church’s disfavored poured upon them.

I believe, humbly, that whichever group of Christians we choose to believe, that there are dangers that lurk for us. If we submit to the first group, and label our transgendered-ness as sin, we label ourselves as sin. We do not accept who we are.. Then rather than let our light shine, we hide it under a bowl, trying to constrain our spirit. We live only the half-live of those who are afraid to love to much, or sing too loudly.

If we throw our lot behind those who accept and love us, we may be fooled into believing that our purpose is to be transsexual or transgender. In doing this we create a god our of our difference, and spend our days worshipping the desire to fully become woman.

Again Allyson has provided some insight for us.

I believe our challenge is to fully embrace who we are, while at the same time living for God. The transition is not an end unto itself, but a means to more fully fulfill God’s purpose in our lives.

Hugs, Vanessa

Christianity Today comes up short for the transgender community

by Vanessa Law

Categories: Christianity and Crossdressing, Transgender News and Issues

Tags: Christian Crossdresser, crosdresser, crossdreser, crossdressed, transgender religion, transvestite

Comments: 14 Comments

Published on: February 12, 2008

Christianity Today attempts to address how Christian leadership should treat the transgendered, but fails both in their compassion for people who are transgendered, and their interpretation of God’s Word. They begin by describing the situation John Nemecek found himself in - a former Baptist Pastor and long time dean at the Spring Arbor University had struggled for years with his gender identity. When he finally accepted his identity as a woman and found peace, he was fired from his job.

They demonstrate very clearly their lack of understanding by deriding what they term “liberal religious groups”, and say that “transgender impulses … don’t match up with the Christian sexual ethic.” I’ve been a Christian for most of my life and have no idea what the “Christian sexual ethic” is. Is it perhaps the ethic that rails against interracial marriage, or is the one that ensures woman are kept in their rightful place at home? It seems to me that the ‘Christian sexual ethic’ is conveniently defined to be whatever the conservative Christian community feels comfortable with this century.

Despite the paucity of their understanding of what God’s Word says about the transgendered, they do accurately recognize that a church community is likely to feel tension between welcoming us into their church, and keeping the peace with long standing church members. This is the unfortunate reality that we live in today.

I honestly think it is disgusting for conservative organizations to comment that we’re “wacky” and “radical”. I know very few transgendered folks who didn’t struggle for years to “be normal”.

“The transgender lobby is following the example of the homosexual lobby in that they are co-opting the language of the civil rights movement in order to push their own radical and wacky agenda,”

We are not a “violation of natural law” as some conservative Christian’s would have you believe. I do strongly believe that God can do anything, and should He choose to make us feel whole in the body we were born with, it is well within His power.

I am deeply angered by self righteous Christian who claim to know God’s word, yet they only choose to obey the commandments they conveniently self-selected.

Addendum:

After reading many of the comments on their website I’m heartened by the love, compassion and understanding so many of their readers have shown. I remain hopeful that if we would give it a chance, the love of Jesus Christ would shine through us all.

Crossdressing and church…

by Vanessa Law

Categories: Christianity and Crossdressing

Tags: Christian Crossdresser, Christianity and Crossdressing, God and transgender, transgender relgion

Comments: 10 Comments

Published on: February 9, 2008

Often the hardest thing for you to do as a crossdresser to do is to reconcile crossdressing with your faith. In my previous article I wrote about crossdressing as it relates to sin. Hopefully you have started the journey down the road to accepting who you are, and learning to love God with all the might and soul of the person He (She) made you to be. Reaching that point is something to be celebrated – it is a long road to acceptance that few have undertaken.

You may be wondering though, how to come to terms with the stigma that Christians have placed on you as a transgendered person. I’ve found it helpful to ask the question Would Jesus Discriminate?. After reading this, and some of the material made available by the Metropolitan Church it should be clear that throughout history Christians have made many grave mistakes.

Christians have supported slavery, opposed the right of woman to vote and opposed interracial marriage. That is to say nothing of the brutal and violent crusades that were perpetrated in the name of God. I know that the God I worship looked on in great sadness at the action of these Christians.

If you are not ‘out’, and choose to keep your crossdressing a secret, then attending church shouldn’t pose much of a problem. For those of us who go out in public wearing woman’s clothes and living our alter ego this may pose more of a dilemma. Especially if you would like to attend church in your feminine persona.

I strongly recommend that you talk with your pastor before showing up to church in your best Sunday dress. It is possible that your pastor will support your wish to attend church dressed, or perhaps while not giving outright support may tolerate it – at least as long as it doesn’t cause a stir in the church family.

At worst, you may want to look for a church that is more open to transgendered people. The Metropolitan Church I mentioned earlier is openly welcoming of those in the transgendered community.

God bless you in your journey. May He bring you closer, lead your life with love and help you become the person you were meant to be.

Crossdressing is a sin

by Vanessa Law

Categories: Crossdressing Cure

Tags: Christian Crossdresser, Crossdressing Cure, crossdressing is a sin, God and transgender, transgender religion

Comments: 27 Comments

Published on: February 9, 2008

It must be, it says it right there in Deuteronomy 22:5

A woman must not wear men’s clothing, nor a man wear women’s clothing, for the LORD your God detests anyone who does this.

That seems pretty clear to me. Not only is it a sin, but a detestable sin. At least that’s what my pastor was kind enough to remind me when I went to him for advice. He was quick to point out that while God welcomed all children to His flock – even the hurt and broken – He did not intend for them to stay that way. I asked him for resources and support to help me overcome this and he pointed me to Randall’s website.

Now as you know I’ve previously written about being a Christian crossdresser, and I firmly believe that God can do more than we could ever hope for or imagine – He even has the power to cure crossdressing (if you think about it for a second, this is probably quite easy compared with healing the sick and raising the dead).

But if crossdressing were such a detestable sin, surely the Bible would be overflowing with admonishments against crossdressing. At least a mention in the New Testament, or a reaffirmation by another prophet in the Old Testament. What we have though is Deuteronomy 22:5. Which happens to be only six verses away from Deuteronomy 22:11

Do not wear clothes of wool and linen woven together

And Deuteronomy 22:12

Make tassels on the four corners of the cloak you wear

Now I’m sure that every good Bible believing Christian checks to ensure their clothes aren’t made from different materials, and is diligent about making tassels for their coats. Surely being just six verses away would make these commandments as important and worthy of fervor? Not so it seems. The inconvenient laws from the Old Testament ‘no longer apply to modern society’. It seems somewhat hypocritical to me that Christians would use this verse to damn the transgendered as sinners and heretics. Joanna does this line of reasoning full justice when she discusses Crossdressing and Christianity

Randall constructs a compelling argument that crossdressing is not Christian. It is worth reading, he begins:

While searching for an answer to the question of cross-dressing being a sin, I realized that I was looking for a black and white literal answer in the Word that was not there. My reasoning was that if the prohibition was not there, it was OK to cross-dress. Later, I realized that was the same attitude the Pharisees had in Jesus’ day – they would strain at observing all of the “must dos,” but they would create all kinds of ways to follow the law literally while breaking it in spirit. It occurred to me that on this issue, I had become a legalist! (more)

Clearly crossdressing is not a sin, any more than eating pork or wearing clothes made of different fabrics. Given this we should should not be willing to accept the condemnation of others, especially not Christians. As Paul says in Romans 2:1

You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgement on someone else, for whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgement do the same things.

And in rejecting the condemnation of others, we should realize that Jesus Christ does not condemn us.

For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. – John 3:17-18

So we have accepted that crossdressing is not a sin, but what of the other lines of reasoning Randall puts forth? I’ll discuss those in more detail in a future post. In ending this post I want to again urge you.

Don’t let anyone else tell you that crossdressing is ‘right’ any more than you let anyone tell you that crossdressing is a sin. Your true purpose in life is known to God, and revealed to you through your relationship with Him. He may want to cure you, change your heart, or use you to bring comfort and blessing to others. Be open to His plan for your life.

Hugs and Blessings

Vanessa

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