Aug 11, 2006  |  By: ELIZABETH A. PERRY  | COMMENTS     

Editors’ note: This is the first installment in a series devoted to examining the views of various religions on transgender issues. This week: A trans perspective on the Jewish and Catholic faiths. Next week: Islam and other religions, and a summary of trans references in the Bible and Koran.

L’Osservatore Romano, the official Vatican newspaper, recently criticized the government of Tuscany, Italy for providing free hormone treatments to those transitioning from one sex to another.

“Faced with problems that afflict health care in Tuscany, waiting lists for operations, [insufficient funds for] chemotherapy and inadequate numbers of medical staff, perhaps it would have been better not to give precedence to hormonal treatment for sex changes,” the story said.

Debra Weill, who is transgender, serves as executive director of Dignity USA, a group for gay Catholics. She said she is not surprised by the Vatican’s response, calling it “another in a series of incredibly backward and misinformed positions on human sexuality. The Vatican’s obsession with sexual orientation and gender identity continues to be astounding.”

For transgender people who choose to remain in their houses of worship, maintaining a faith life and being true to who they are inside and out can be a challenge. In the search for God, some trans people, like their gay, lesbian and bisexual counterparts, have found it necessary to separate the politics of religion from the quest for spiritual fulfillment.

Some find supportive and loving faith communities, while others leave their congregations, fed up with restrictive policies. The Vatican pronouncement brought attention to the issue of transgender people in religious life. A look at a sampling of world religions, from Christian and non-Christian faith traditions, reveals some surprises and markedly different takes on the role of transgender people in the church, mosque and synagogue.

Diverse views in Judaism

The Reform and Orthodox movements have been looking at transgender issues and Jewish law since the 1970s, when gender reassignment surgeries became more widely known, according to a 2003 article by Debra Nussbaum Cohen in Jewish Week. She said Jewish literature going back to the Torah has mentioned those who are intersex or androgynous.

“The Talmud explores a range of situations and includes references to people who are men, people who are women, people who appear to be both and people who are regarded as neither,” she wrote. “The legal and ethical issues involved — secular and religious — are complex. Making things even more complicated is current scientific debate over what determines gender: sex organs, hormone levels, chromosomes or even the way the brain functions.”

Reuben Zellman was the first transgender rabbinical student to be admitted to Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion in New York City. He said the Jewish faith has no single opinion on anything because there are four major movements in the United States, each with its own opinion about transgender issues.

“I’m studying in the reform movement,” he said. “It has made a lot of progress on GLBT issues. The Reconstructionist movement has as well. The Orthodox movement is less comfortable with the transgender experience, generally speaking. There are as many opinions as there are Jews.”

He said he has been fortunate to have been part of supportive synagogues, but said there are plenty of places that are not as accepting of trans people. He also said there are a number of transgender Jews who still feel as though they have to choose between their faith and their gender identity.

“There are some Jews who think that being transgendered is in conflict with Jewish law or in conflict with Jewish values,” he said. “More and more people are standing up to say it is not true. That kind of bigotry is not the best of what Judaism is. The community can be enriched by transgender people, by people with a unique perspective on Judaism and the world.”

Even as a child, Zellman knew he wanted to be a rabbi, but his calling became even more certain when he began to identify as male. He said Hebrew Union College and the reform movement as a whole accepted him with a spirit of openness and acceptance. He said there were some critics who felt he shouldn’t be a rabbi because he was transgender.

“Every human being is created in the image of God,” he said. “A great majority of the feedback has been supportive, from people who believe God’s creation takes many different forms, and that they are all valuable.” 

Vatican bars trans
people from marriage

On the issue of trans people in church life, Weill said ...