Church

Hi Cece,
Like you Sunday church is an important part of my life.
I attend a Pentecostal church which doesn't know about my crossdressing.
It is a great community of people and I have some really great friends there.
Love and hugs, Stephanie 💖

For what it's worth, ScoMo (our Prime Minister here in Oz) is Pentecostal.

I'm a church goer. And conservative, somewhat fundamental Christian.

I don't try and reconcile / excuse my cding with my faith. I don't believe its "the best for me." But instead recognise something is broken in my psyche. If I wasn't broken, I wouldn't hide. As cds we tend to hide from self, family, friends, society, church, other forms of fellowship. Even on here, we hide using anonymous names, and photoshoped pics (some anyways.) And or no pic, and no profile.

Within my faith understanding its not what I do, but instead is on what Jesus has done. Everything else falls under that. That covers every thought, word, and deed. Including those not thought, not said, and not done.

Church is also a very big part of my life. I can’t say that I’ve had any positive experiences, as nobody at my church knows of my dressing. However, As Mary Jane said, it’s not about what I’m doing but what Jesus did. My church is very accepting of flawed people. That is why the church exists. The challenge is to find a place of worship that accepts a person regardless of a behavior that they may not approve of.

Cece,

I attend church regularly also and am an active Catholic in my church. Nobody has any idea that I am a TG/CD. This as you said is a difficult issue for us to deal with. In many aspects, I too find myself wondering "why" I am like I am? God does not make mistakes. We did not do something wrong. Yes God created us male and female, but all of us have chromosomes of the opposite sex.

I try to thank God for who I am and for Him to keep my desires to explore womanhood healthy. I came out to my wife (after a layoff of 10 years) again a year ago and she has embraced the "new me" and we have gone out shopping many times as girls and have a blast. She says I look like a woman and walk like a woman.

So are we "wrong" to explore our femininity? Does this make us better husbands, caregivers, workers, neighbors? I think the core question we have to ask ourselves is "are we trying to be a better version of ourselves and allowing God to move within us to deepen our relationship with Jesus?"

I know the Catholic Church is very clearly anti gay/CD/TG. But I also know that I am loved and forgiven and able to ask for mercy each Sunday as I reflect on how much I love Jesus and need Him in my life.

Here is my 2 cents on this difficult subject.

Hope

I often fantasize about being able to wear a pretty dress and heels to church services and being accepted and welcomed.  Don't know why but it's probably my jealousy of how great the ladies look that dress for church.

Cece,

This touches on perhaps the deepest topic we will ever discuss.

And the straight answer is, I haven’t any personal positive stories about a place of worship embracing CDing or Transgenders, but I haven’t gone looking.

I worship under the Catholic Faith.  I recognize that I do so because I was raised Catholic.  My spirituality, though, is guided by the principle that God is Love.

Over the years, I have reflected on my relationship with God and I have come to the conclusion that I simply do not believe that one has have the same structure in their relationship with God as I do, in order to attain eternal life with God, which is what I strive for.

That also means, that the God I believe in would not condemn someone who is a “good” moral person. Actually, evil people condemn themselves.

I believe that God has presented himself/herself/themselves in as many ways as possible to bring as many people to them.

Even if one declares oneself agnostic or atheistic, but is good, I would hope that I would be with them in the afterlife.

I refuse to accept anyone’s assertion that my crossdressing harms my relationship with God.  I am not damaged by actions that harm no one.  I may be damaged by other things, but CDing isn’t one of them.

I could go on , but I hope I have made my point.

I would be happy to discuss this further with any of you.

Much love,

Raquel

Hi Stephanie,

So am I, and my church folks don't know about Bettylou, either. I had a brief internal struggle when I realized that I'm a CD, but quickly came to terms with it. Doing nothing illegal,causing no harm, and I am at peace with Bettylou.

I have not attended church for awhile but I am a Christian. I did struggle with my faith and CDing for a long time. I finally came to accept who I am, a Christian Cross Dresser.

Hugs, Liara

My daughter goes to a church in DC that is totally affirming to all LGBTQA people that want to worship. My wife and I have attended a couple of times and I can see nothing amiss. It's called The Table Church https://thetablechurch.org/ and here is the link if anyone is interested.

If I lived in DC this would be my church, for sure.

My reply to God doesn't make mistakes is you are right.  God knew me before I was created in the womb, and God knew I would be transgendered.  My belief is God placed this on me to see how I could use this to glorify God.  I think that if I can show someone that, no matter how the world views us we are loved more than anything we can imagine.

Also as a side note, God said let us create man in our own image and likeness.  God is not gendered.  Found that interesting.

One of the reasons I am responding to this is that I don't see any clergy responding. I have been a minister for decades. I was serving as a seminarian in a Protestant denomination. I was a very loving church and proved it when a crossdresser in preparation for complete transformation began to attend our services. The only agreement was that the women's restroom was not to be used until after the transformation was complete. I had not yet started to crossdress but felt a need to befriend such a courageous person.

There is only one passage in the whole Bible (O.T.: Leviticus) that forbids men and women from wearing each other clothes. I am a Christian and not Jewish so I feel no need to claim the O.T. as equal to the N.T. Leviticus also forbids wearing clothes of two different threads; such a prohibition is violated in every church I know of without evil effects.

Jesus used the word "hell" only in situations where he was talking about people who diminish others by their words or lay artificial rules on others to gain control. The Letter of James notes how evil the tongue can be. It is only those person's who condemn crossdressers who need to fear what judgmentalism is doing to their souls.

Crossdressing gives each one of us pleasure. It does not bring physical or psychological damage to anyone. In fact it is a gift to be able to identify with women in the way that we can. I often remember the words of a contemporary rabbi who said: "since God feels our every feeling, to pass up a pleasure that does not hurt yourself or another is to rob God!" I quote this often when I ask for my dessert to be brought with my meal in a restaurant. If I died during the meal and didn't have chocolate I would arrive in heaven with a scowl on my face and who wants to do that!! Perhaps if we arrive in heaven in heels and mini skirt God will smile and say: "where did you get that great outfit!"

Hello Cece

I think the church is a wonderful place I am not a regular church goer. My view is the christian church doesn't have any problems with us girls, the problem only arises when some of the so called christians show their distaste towards us. They are not true christians in the eyes of god we are all equal.

Love you all

Sarah

xx

Amen, Sister!  Preach it!  🥰