Opening Words

Come in.

Come into this place which we make holy by our presence.

Come in with all your vulnerabilities and strengths, fears and anxieties, loves and hopes.

For here you need not hide, nor pretend, nor be anything other than who you are and are called to be.

Come into this place where we can touch and be touched, heal and be healed, forgive and be forgiven.

Come into this place where the ordinary is sanctified, the human is celebrated, the compassionate is expected.

Come into this place. Together we make it a holy place.

Becky Edmiston-Lange

First Reading

Hello Out There

I may be your friend, lover, or colleague.

I may be your physician, lawyer, minister, or anyone.

You see me but have never seen me.

You know me but you really don’t know me.

In fact, I don’t really know myself, but I’m trying.

I am a transgendered person; you know, one of those odd people

you’ve read about or have seen on a talk show.

My brothers and sisters are more numerous than you think.

Why don’t you see us? Because we are afraid of you,

of what you will say and how you will treat us when

you know.

So we hide.

That is, we hide until we can stand in the shadows no longer.

Then, for a number of us it means a terrifying beginning,

for others it means the end of life.

You are lucky. Your genetic gender, your gender identity

and your sexual preference are aligned with society’s “norm.”

Everyone questions who they are, but imagine that question

repeated a thousand times each day, even invading your dreams.

But really try to imagine not knowing the answer!

That is the “norm” for us.

So why am I telling you all of this?

Because you may be there when one of us finally attempts

the transition from one gender role to the other.

This is the most difficult time for a transgendered person.

Try to envision what it would be like to have to live

through your teenage years but as an adult.

We will make mistakes and dress funny,

but we do not wish harm on anyone.

We are also very lonely because people tend to avoid us.

So I am asking you to be patient and try to understand

even if you don’t wish to help.

If you do wish to help, you may find a rewarding experience;

we will learn to grow together.

(Anonymous, from True Selves by Brown and Rounsley, pp. 232-233)

Second Reading

[excerpted from remarks made at a workshop during a conference for trans persons]

     This is a workshop for those of us who sit in front of an application trying to figure out which of two boxes to check off- “F” or “M”- neither of which exactly fits our lives and our self-identities. You could write down “not applicable” or “none of the above” or “all the above” next to those two little boxes, but it won’t get you a job. It won’t get you a driver’s license. It won’t get you a passport.

     Because it is legally mandated that all our lives must fit into one of those two tiny boxes, many of us actually face imprisonment or institutionalization merely because we don’t. We live under the constant threat of horrifying violence. We have to worry about what bathroom to use when our bladders are aching. We are forced to consider whether we’ll be dragged out of the bathroom and arrested or face a fistfight while our bladders are still aching. It’s an everyday reality for us. Human beings must use toilets.

     This is a workshop for those of us who grapple with this simple, yet humiliating question every day: if I go into the women’s bathroom, am I prepared for the shouting and shaming? Will someone call security or the cops? If I use the men’s room, am I willing to fight my way out? Am I really ready for the violence that could ensue? And how can I protect my humanity- my very being- from the degradation of having to make these decisions several times a day? No one ever taught us how to deal with the questions of public toilets.

(Trans Liberation by Leslie Feinberg, p. 68)

Sermon

[restrooms]

     I admit it: I sometimes use the “Men’s Room.” I did it at the Rockford YMCA recently, where there are two small bathrooms– designated as either men’s or women’s, and intended for use by one person at a time– located in the hallway outside the weight training room.

     While I was inside the men’s room, I heard the doorknob turn. As I glanced, anxiously, at the door, I was relieved to note that I had indeed locked myself in. Later, as I was leaving the restroom, I turned the light off before I opened the door, and then I slunk out, my gaze on the floor. When I didn’t hear anyone going in after me, I glanced back, curious; had anyone seen me leaving? Guiltily aware that I had broken a taboo, I wondered if I was going to get in trouble.

     If I’d been confronted about being in the wrong bathroom, I would have smiled, apologetically, and explained that the women’s room was being used; I only choose a men’s restroom if it’s private and the women’s facilities are not available. But what if the decision to use the men’s room were motivated by some other reason? What if my gender appearance-- which is female– didn’t coincide with my gender identity, so that I thought of myself as male? What if using the men’s room felt like the appropriate choice? What if it was actually uncomfortable for me to go into a large, public women’s restroom, because I was afraid someone would shout, “Get out!” or “You don’t belong in here!”

     Welcome to the transgender world, where even a seemingly simple question such as, “Are you a man or a woman?” turns into a multiple choice problem that allows for all, or none, of the above.

[“trans”]

     The prefix “trans” means “across or over,” “beyond or above,” “from one place to another,” “transferring or transporting,” or “changing.” The indefiniteness of these definitions, which connote a state of being that is neither here nor there, suggests both limbo and liberation. One self-identified “trans-genderist” describes the experience of a trans person in this way:

When we find the courage to live openly as who we are, we begin a wild roller coaster ride. The weight of difficulties we endure as a result of our decision is a constant reminder of the unwavering force of social gravity. And no longer being tracked into ‘gender-appropriate’ behavior and dress sends us hurtling into freefall because we are no longer able to easily define ourselves and our relationship to others. .. But what a ride! Even at gunpoint, I would not choose a different path in life. (Trans Liberation, pp. 28-29)

[walkers of the path: Dave]

     What is the transgender path? Let me tell you about a few of the people who walk, or have walked, it:

      David Rose was the first of three children born to a middle class (heterosexual) couple in Chicago. As a youngster, he was active in the Boy Scouts; in junior high, he joined the wrestling team and continued to wrestle through his college years. Shortly after graduation, Dave married his college sweetheart and got a job as a computer programmer. Dave quickly became financially successful, and he and his wife enjoyed their yuppie lifestyle. They were both overjoyed at the birth of their son, four years after their wedding, and sharing in the learning and the responsibility of parenthood solidified their relationship as a couple.

     But by the time the little boy was a toddler, Dave was seeing a psychologist to help him deal with what he described to his wife as “a very strong female side to my personality.” It was a part of himself that he’d wrestled with since childhood, when he’d been confused about why his parents didn’t treat him the same way they treated his sister, and throughout his teens, as he guiltily tried on his mother’s clothes and make-up, watched in anguish as puberty made appalling changes in his body, and desperately searched encyclopedias to discover a label for his problem, so he could find appropriate treatment.

     In time Dave was diagnosed with gender dysphoria-- a condition in which one’s self-identity does not match one’s male or female anatomy. Over a period of years, he underwent a course of psychotherapy, medical treatment, and cosmetic and reconstructive surgery that culminated in legal recognition of a sex change, from male to female. No longer Dave, Donna Rose is now a single woman who has custody of her son and is a transgender activist...

[walkers of the path:Bruce]

     Bruce Reimer was an infant when a botched surgical procedure left him without a penis. On the advice of a psychologist who was well-known in the field of gender identity, Bruce’s parents decided to raise him as a girl and allow surgeons to remove his testicles and construct external female genitalia. At the age of 12, Bruce, now Brenda, began taking female hormones to stimulate the development of breasts and a soft, curvy, feminine body. More surgery for Brenda-- this time, to create a vagina-- was in the works when the consulting psychologist announced that Brenda’s sex reassignment had been successful. He stopped writing about the case.

     But Brenda was growing up with the feeling that something was wrong. She had discovered that her genitals did not look the same as those of other girls; neither, however, did they match her twin brother’s. Brenda reasoned that she must be an “it.”

     Despite being told repeatedly that she was to urinate sitting down, Brenda’s urge was to stand, and when her schoolmates somehow discovered this habit, they made her life miserable by refusing to allow her in either the girls or the boys restroom. Her only friends were other outcasts.

     Brenda took the hormone pills, alright, but only at her parents’ insistence. She repeatedly refused permission to go ahead with the vaginal surgery. Finally, a doctor asked her, “Do you want to be a girl or not?” “No!” was the 14-year-old’s vehement response. Her father decided it was time to tell her the truth. Brenda’s primary emotion was relief-- at last she had an explanation for her strange and confusing feelings; her first question was, “What was my name?”...

[walkers of the path: Leslie]

     Leslie Feinberg is the author of two books published by our UU-sponsored Beacon Press, an award-winning novelist, a lecturer, newspaper editor, labor unionist, peace activist, and coalition builder and has worked on behalf of social justice for over twenty five years. A teen growing up in Buffalo, New York in the 1960's, Feinberg was a misfit who found acceptance and solidarity among a group of Canadian youth who called themselves drag queens and drag kings. Born a biological female, Feinberg, who is now over 50, is a self-described “masculine, lesbian, female to male cross-dresser and transgenderist” who identifies as male, wears his/her hair in a crew cut, and whose dress of choice is often a suit and tie.

     Feinberg tells the story of being thrown out of a hospital emergency room while spiking a 104 degree temperature due to a life-threatening inflammation of the heart. “You have a fever,” the attending physician pronounced, “because you are a very troubled person.”

     When Feinberg’s most recent book, Trans Liberation came out, Feinberg commented to interviewers:

I still have trouble answering what I do for a living. I still have to scrap to make the rent. I travel more than I did before. I meet and hear from even more amazing and wonderfully honest people than I ever could have imagined. [But] I cannot walk down the street or shop in a store or ride on the subway without crowds of people gawking and staring and making angry and mocking remarks and actions. I still have to struggle in public with constant hostility and danger, and spend too much of my time trying to find a safe public toilet.

[transgender awareness]

     “Transgender” awareness is a belated addition to the UU “Welcoming Congregation” initiative. In 1995, when this church was granted status as a “welcoming congregation,” we were recognized for our efforts to validate and include in the life of our church people who are gay, lesbian, or bisexual. In 1999, the “Welcoming Congregation” program expanded to include a similar commitment toward transgender people.

     The inclusion of “trans” folks in this list of populations is somewhat misleading-- or at the least, confusing-- because “transgender” has to do with identity rather than orientation: When we want to describe the nature of sexual attraction-- is a given person attracted to men? women? both?-- we use the words “gay,” “lesbian,” “bisexual,” and “heterosexual.” But when we want to describe a person’s self-identity as a man or woman, we use the words “male,” “female,” and “transgender,” also known as “third gender.” The “Welcoming Congregation” handbook defines transgender as “an umbrella term used to define people who are transsexual [a man who has a self-identity as a woman, and vice versa], cross-dresser/[or] transvestite, intersexual (formerly known as hermaphrodite-- having both male and female anatomy), and people who see themselves as both male and female, or neither male nor female [that is-- androgynous].” To complicate things further, a person who is transgender also has a sexual orientation and may self-identify as homosexual, heterosexual, or bisexual.

     If all this sounds confusing, it is no less so for “porcupines named ‘Fluffy,’” [reference to story told earlier in the service-- A Porcupine Named Fluffy by Helen Lester] who bear a label that’s been given to them which is seriously at odds with their own self-knowledge, and who try desperately to be something they’re not. Trans persons searching for self-identity are often keenly aware that they are somehow mismatched but may struggle to understand why it is s/he can’t just “be normal.”

[the 1%]

     It’s been estimated that 99% of the human population have a typically developed sense of gender identity, in which self-image matches sexual anatomy. The obvious question is, “What of that other 1%? What is it that causes transgender people to march to a different drummer?”

     One hypothesis is that trans persons are suffering from a psychiatric disturbance, caused by mental illness and/or dysfunctional parenting. Another line of thinking is that transgenderists have a birth defect-- an abnormality that has to do with the brain’s anatomy or biochemistry, and/or hormones. Both of these explanations suggest that trans persons are inadequate, even incompetent, in some way; correspondingly, their families of origin-- even their so-called “normal” partners-- as well as transgendered people themselves-- may feel stigmatized and marginalized.

[finding support]

     In an anthology called Trans Forming Families; Real Stories about Transgendered Loved Ones, one mother writes:

No one tells you that when a child turns out to be totally other than you assumed, it is very much like a death. Not that parents of trans people are the only ones who experience this grief, but it is peculiar in that there is often no one around who understands the details and can share similar experiences. What I would have given to know just one trans parent in that first year! In our small town there is still an element of disgrace in being sexually different than the mainstream; people who will talk about their children doing drugs will not mention that their child is gay, if they even know. To whom can one say, “Well, [for the first time today] I used the pronoun ‘she’ [for my son-now-daughter]. (Trans Forming Families, edited by Mary Boenke, p. 46)

     Imagine the courage it must take, in our society, for trans persons to come out to their families, partners, friends, and co-workers. There are some beautiful examples of radical acceptance-- like the mom, who upon learning that her son was transsexual, remarked, “Aren’t you the person I loved five minutes ago before I knew?” And the partner of a trans person, writes,

I look at people first, gender later; my connections are more profound than parts. And I’ve struck gold with my lover... my lover’s not bound by physicality. We traverse the richness of our love with a tidal rhythm. The ebb and flow is smooth and natural allowing for outward and inward expressions to compliment and mesh with one another. We braid ourselves together with all our strands. (Trans Forming Families, p. 74)

     There are also some good stories about bridges that have been built through humor: a co-worker writes to a fellow employee who has just come out in the workplace,

Sandra, Sandra, Sandra... I fear this is going to be hard to remember. Maybe the change in appearance will remind me. And thanks for letting me know... For what it’s worth, as long as she’s as smart and nice as you are, I don’t care whether I’m working with Tom or Sandra! And I’ve often thought that hair as fabulous as yours was rather wasted on a guy! (Trans Forming Families, p. 166)

     And a transsexual flute teacher shares this account of a coming out conversation with a flute colleague:

We went into the [music] studio we shared, closed the door and I spilled the beans. After [my friend and performing partner] picked her jaw up off the floor, she asked some thoughtful questions and I gave some honest answers. By the end of the half hour she said, “Well, you’ll still be you. I mean, it’s not like you’re becoming a bassoonist or something." (Trans Forming Families, p. 112)

     (In addition, there are many poignant and funny moments in the video you will get a chance to see after the service-- no dumb questions-- about a heterosexual couple doing an awesome job of helping their young three daughters accept their Uncle Bill as their new aunt, Barbara.)

[risks]

     Yet transgender individuals are undeniably “one down” in western culture and put themselves at risk by coming out. Donna Rose writes, “While many people seem to view... [us] as freakish novelties or curiosities, there are those who consider us to be dangerous perverts, criminals, deviates, or worse. Their reaction is often one of anger, fear, hate, and violence.” (Wrapped in Blue, p. 11) And just as the women’s movement has had a mixed record of welcoming lesbian women within their ranks, so, too, trans gender people have sometimes been excluded from the gay liberation movement-- the rationale being that “in your face” transvestites and transsexuals would hurt the gay rights cause.

    I want to come back, now, to a quotation from Leslie Feinberg that I read earlier:

When we [as transgenderists] find the courage to live openly as who we are, we begin a wild roller coaster ride... But what a ride! Even at gunpoint, I would not choose a different path in life.”

     "Even at gunpoint, I would not choose a different path in life." In heaven's name, why not? Feinberg continues,

My determination to remain a person who I can be proud of has made all of my views and insights and consciousness possible. It has made me see more clearly how many other lives in society are being limited through forms of discrimination and injustice. It has illuminated my relationship to them as an ally, and steeled my resolve to spend my life actively working for a world in which economic and social equality, and freedom of expression, are the birthrights of every person. (Trans Liberation, p. 29)

[where is the problem?]

     Why are transgenderists “the way they are”? I believe Feinberg-- while suggesting that the question is irrelevant– would answer that trans persons simply represent part of the spectrum of human diversity. Being trans is not a problem in and of itself. Rather, it is the narrow-mindedness and prejudice; dualistic, all or none thinking; and enforcement of rigidly prescribed boundaries for gender expression in our society that is problematic. These barriers are symptomatic of a significant social problem that infringes on human rights and limits human potential.

     Cheryl Chase, a self-described “hermaphrodite with attitude,” writes,

Gays, lesbians, and bisexuals are stigmatized and oppressed because they violate social standards for acceptable sex behavior; transsexuals because they violate standards for sex identity. Intersexuals are punished for violating social standards of acceptable sex anatomy. But our oppressions stem from the same source: rigid cultural definitions of sex categories, whether in terms of behavior, identity, or anatomy. (Trans Liberation, p. 93)

[discomfort]

     When I began gathering information for this sermon, I went about my reading with the attitude of a scientific investigator. I accepted the abstract idea of being “trapped in the wrong body” or having a chronic desire to dress like a member of the “opposite” sex as the valid experience of some other people, but I couldn’t relate to it myself. (In junior high, when the guys’ gym class had to demonstrate their rope climbing skills, one by one, while the whole class watched-- I was aware of a sense of relief at not being a boy.) And so I began my research with a certain amount of detachment.

     I did much of my pre-sermon reading while seated on an exercise bike at the YMCA, and I was very self conscious at first. It didn’t occur to me, till a friend pointed it out, that someone might think I was a trans person-- how far-fetched! But I did imagine that strangers and acquaintances at the Y might think I was weird, simply to be reading about trans persons.

     When a woman in my exercise class pointed to the cover of Donna Rose’s memoir, Wrapped in Blue, and asked what I was reading, I didn’t know how to answer; I was relieved when something else caught her attention and she seemed to forget her question.

     By the time I moved on to True Selves I was feeling more relaxed. The subtitle on its cover Understanding Transsexualism-- for Families, Friends, Coworkers, and Helping Professionals trumpeted its subject matter, and I found myself hoping one of my cohorts at the Y would see it and comment on it.

[and then . . ]

     Later, when I started in on Leslie Feinberg’s Trans Liberation, however, I almost wanted to go up to people and say, “You should read this! What an extraordinary book! What a remarkable human being!”

     It wasn’t so hard to begin to understand “people like that” when I read Donna Rose’s preface to her book:

Over time, I have come to realize that a transsexual is merely one form of explorer: a self-explorer... A transsexual’s journey into the uncharted unknown is a test of commitment and character, fraught with perils and poisons that would surely cause the weak of spirit among us to turn back in terror. We risk all we have ever known and loved... We seek nothing more than to be ourselves... Our culture seems hell-bent on simplifying the incredible diversities of our complex world by reducing them to polar absolutes... Things are rarely that simple. The breadth of the human condition cannot be appreciated when viewed through a prism that separates the entire spectrum of life into only two or three or four colors. My journey is a celebration of that spectrum, and an invitation to others to explore there, as well. (Wrapped in Blue, pp. 10 - 12)

     And it’s not difficult to extend a hand to an anonymous soul calling out, “Hello out there. We are afraid of you, of what you will say and how you will treat us when you know. We are also very lonely because people tend to avoid us. So I am asking you to be patient and try to understand, even if you don’t wish to help.”

     But it was Trans Liberation that really changed my consciousness. Leslie Feinberg writes about being locked in jail for wearing a suit and tie, then asks, “Was my clothing really a crime? Is it a ‘man’s’ suit if I am wearing it? At what point– from field to rack– is fiber assigned a sex?” (Trans Liberation, pp. 10 - 11) Suddenly, all generic ideas about what makes a man, or what make a woman, seem ludicrously invalid.

     Am I any more of a woman because I like children, wear skirts, am married to a man? Am I any less of a woman because I have never given birth, watch football, prefer to wear my hair short (unless it is on my legs)? And if I like my hair short, why was I hurt when a male friend teasingly suggested that I was starting to look like a guy? If I want a style that’s easy to take care of, what is it that prevents me from getting a buzz cut? What would my hairdresser say if I made such a request of her? What would I learn by making this dramatic, even if temporary, change in my appearance? Why do I think I’m a coward because I just don’t think I could go through with it? And why am I both frightened and moved by the sight of Leslie’s face, looking out at me from the book jacket?

[solidarity]

     One of the goals of the Welcoming Congregation curriculum is for participants to understand that transphobia and homophobia-- as well as biphobia and heterosexism-- hurt everyone, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identification. It’s a no brainer, really, because discrimination and violence based on harmless self-expression, or love relationships of mutual consent, put all of us at risk for stepping outside someone else’s idea of appropriate gender boundaries. With a passion and eloquence few people can match, backed up by a commitment even fewer of us could sustain, Leslie Feinberg issues the call for divided and yet similarly-oppressed peoples to come together, joined by their allies, to create a more just, more compassionate, more humane world for themselves and for all people. I leave you with Feinberg’s words:

Trans liberation is not a threat... No one’s sex reassignment or fluidity of gender threatens your right to self-identity and self-expression. On the contrary, our struggle bolsters your right to your identity. My right to be me is tied with a thousand threads to your right to be you. (Trans Formation, p. 101)

What is the bedrock on which all our diverse... populations can build solidarity? The commitment to be the best fighters against each other’s oppression... Unity depends on respect for diversity... Perhaps we don’t have to strive to be one community... What is realistic is the goal to build a coalition between our many strong communities in order to form a movement capable of defending all our lives... Everyone in this room is a leader. Each of us is needed as an organizer, as an activist in the decisive struggles that lie ahead... In the words of African-American poet June Jordan, "We are the ones we have been waiting for." (Trans Liberation, pp. 60 - 62)

Closing Words

We have a calling in this world:

We are called to honor diversity,

To respect differences with dignity

And to challenge those who would forbid it.

We are a people of a wide path.

Let us be wide in affection

And go in peace, go to make peace.

            (Jean Rickard, adapted)