A Biblical Response to the Trans Debate

If there was one big question which encapsulates the controversy and the chaos of the summer of 2022, it would have to be the one posed by DailyWire host, Matt Walsh, in his polarizing documentary “What is a Woman,” which was released this past June. From the start of the year, the question was already being asked on his daily podcasts and his embattled appearance on Dr. Phil, at school board hearings, at athletic competitions and most notably at the Supreme Court confirmation hearing of Ketanji Brown Jackson. In response to the question, the now associate justice of the supreme court replied, “I can’t.” Her reasoning was based on the fact that she, in her own words, is “not a biologist.” Ironically, the New York Times and many other news outlets would very soon be celebrating Brown Jackson as the first black woman to be confirmed as a Supreme Court Justice.

Today, we’re going to dig into why this question has become so controversial, why how we answer this question impacts the way we move forward in building relationships with others and, most importantly, what is the Bibles answer to all of this if it even answers this question at all.

If you want to know what may be the fastest way to ruin an extended family dinner, be sure to throw out the question, “What is a woman” and then sit back and watch the fireworks. Sure, for many conservative-minded people, watching Matt Walsh make doctors and professors squirm at the deceptively simple question can stir up a sense of joy or even just retribution, but the tone of the conversation becomes very different when you are sitting across the table from a young teenage girl suffering from gender dysphoria. In the increasingly volatile world we are living in, it is vital that we not only know the truth, but how to share the truth in love with the lost and hurting around us. The greatest command is to love God with everything and to love our neighbors as ourselves – we are very literally made to be in loving relationships with God and everyone else. Within the context of academic debate, Walsh’s approach is totally acceptable and appropriate, whether you agree with his position or not. Throughout the documentary, he was never hostile or aggressive in his demeanor, although his opponents might want to say that even asking the questions he asked was a form of violence. One truth that we have to keep in mind as we begin to have these conversations on our own, however, is that while this may be a sociological or even political question to you and perhaps, even the person you are debating, this question represents a heartbreaking reality in which many children and their parents are caught in the crosshairs.

One aspect of the conversation that is incredibly important is to understand has to do with something known as “social contagion.” Social contagions happen when behaviors, emotions or conditions spread spontaneously through groups or networks and, historically speaking, the most at risk demographic for social contagions are adolescent girls. On August 3rd, a new study from Jack Turban was blasted across many of the mainstream media outlets as definitive evidence that social contagion does not play a significant role in causing more youths to be transgender. Turban himself is a proponent of what is called “gender-affirming-care" and perpetuates the concept that if young people identifying as trans are not affirmed in their preferred genders, that they will likely commit suicide. Now, anyone with any amount of love, concern or sympathy for a hurting child would obviously want to do anything within their power to prevent that from happening, so it creates a very emotionally compelling case for transitioning children. But, is that claim or Turban’s study, actually true? Many in the scientific community as well as those reporting on it, have quickly come forward pointing out the numerous discrepancies in Turban’s work. Journalist Jesse Singol posted a review of the study in which he described it as “genuinely worthless.” Singol states, “"Turban and his colleagues made doubly broken claims about sex ratios among American trans youth. I say 'doubly broken' because there’s an issue both with how the question was asked and with the fact that the data is about as unrepresentative as can be. Either problem on its own would seriously threaten the validity of this research; combined, this is a disaster, and an embarrassment for Pediatrics.” Unfortunately, although many came forward refuting the claims of the study, this went almost universally unreported within the wider media. Similarly, across the pond, England’s Tavistock gender clinic was ordered to be shut down as their gender-transitioning services were proven to be unsafe for children and again, even with the magnitude relevance to this story, we saw near unanimous media silence. Far from being settled science, chemical interventions and gender reassignment surgeries are viewed by many medical and psychiatric professionals as, at best, unproven terrain and, at worst, extremely harmful.

So, the science is being heavily contested and debated. Due to the extremely sensitive nature of the topic, it is easy to take offense as well as to become offensive. American author Katherine Dunn once said, ““The truth is always an insult or a joke, lies are generally tastier. We love them. The nature of lies is to please. Truth has no concern for anyone's comfort” If we believe lies, then the truth will always be seen as an offense, at least at first. Does that mean that, if we believe we are speaking truthfully then we have the right to be offensive? There are many popular memes on social media often depicting images of a free-spirited hippies, dangerous looking bikers or some other non-conforming individual with text overlays stating how they’re not going to apologize for being real, take it or leave it. Some meme’s even co-opt the story of Jesus overthrowing the tables of the money changers and claiming that whatever position they’re taking is basically the same thing. While it’s true that from the very beginning, the Bible teaches that we are created in the image of God, either male or female. Both the old and new testaments speak on the topics of gender roles, male and female identity and how it is improper and sometimes even sinful for men to act as women or women to act as men in specific ways. While there are a number of pop-theologians currently trying to muddy the waters on this topic, their positions are unsupported by the whole of scripture and even from the testament of nature around us. But, for the teenage girl caught in the social contagion of our age, deceived into rejecting her own natural identity, is it the right course of action to berate her and beat her over the head with truth? For the woman caught in the act of adultery, Jesus had every right and opportunity to condemn her even to the point of execution as the mob who brought her before Jesus were ready to stone her. Instead, Jesus ignores the crowd, writes something on the ground and the mob dispersed. Then, once they all had left, Jesus asks the woman, “Where are your accusers?” before telling her to go her way and sin no more.

Jesus exemplifies love and justice, compassion and correction. He doesn’t affirm her in her actions, nor does he condemn her in that moment, but He does leave her with conviction. God is not ok with sin of any kind. In fact, God is so not ok with sin that Jesus came to pay the death penalty for it. He doesn’t shy away from it, He doesn’t minimize it, but He does call each and every one of us, just as with the woman, to repentance. We can’t affirm someone in their rebellion against God and pretend as if God is all good with that. But, we are called to lead them lovingly towards Christ. This is a real challenge for many of us, as we allow our politics, our emotions, our pride and self-righteousness to return one sinful act for another. As a believer and a follower of Christ, if you cannot engage with people in these conversations without falling into sinful behaviors yourself, then stop talking. Trust me, you’re lack of self control, one of the fruits of the Spirit, is doing far more to hinder the furtherance of the Gospel than the very small potential you have to change this person's mind through your untamed tongue. If you can’t love them the way that Christ loved you, then you have no business confronting them in their sin.

With this conversation, we opened up the doors for politics in general and that is one area that has a huge reputation for wrecking relationships. With the November elections soon upon us, that is what we will be covering when we blog next week.