Transgender
God Made Me Transgender, And God Does Not Make Mistakes
It is always a tragedy when anybody takes their own life, doubly so when they are so young. This week Leelah Alcorn took her own life. In her note, she mentioned various reasons for her course of actions, from not thinking she would be able to pass as female to the lack of acceptance from her family. In her suicide letter, she stated that she had come out to her mother, and her mom’s response was that “God doesn’t make mistakes.”
God doesn’t make mistakes.
Out of the whole situation, which leaves a lot to digest, this one statement has been rattling around my brain ever since the public outcry to end reparative therapy began. This statement is at the core of why so many right winged, conservative Christians are at odds with the transgender community.
There is a view amongst some Christians that being transgender is an affront to God’s design and an outward sign of rebellion. The purported argument goes if you were born male that is the way God intended you to be. Since “God doesn’t make mistakes,” living as anything other than male is an abomination worthy of scorn, admonition, isolation, or worse.
God doesn’t make mistakes.
It is not only right winged Christians that hold onto the belief that being transgender means that there is something wrong with a person. Transgender identity has been labeled as a mental disorder, a birth defect, an abnormality and a variance. Boiling it all down, it all equals the same message: if you are transgender that must mean there is something wrong with you.
It is thinking like this that makes transgender people an outcast class of citizens.
It is thinking like this that makes it okay to minimalize a transgender person and to make them the subject of ridicule and attack. The notion that transgender people are somehow defective leads to bigotry, discrimination and other forms of nastiness.
The conservative Christian argument is that God doesn’t make mistakes, and with that statement I totally agree. God doesn’t make mistakes; He is omnipotent and omnipresent; He created all things, and by His divine will all things continue to operate the way that they should. He holds the bonds of the universe together.
God doesn’t make mistakes.
It is the opinion of some conservative Christians that transgender individuals must answer for their so called “abomination.” The church does not ask anyone to answer for being born blonde-haired or brown eyed. Nor does the church ask anyone to answer for being left handed. So why do they make that a condition for the person who is born transgender to be accepted?
In fact, being transgender does not mean that I was born in the wrong body. Being transgender means that God has placed me in the body that looks like one gender while I identify as being another. It is neither right nor wrong that I am a female in a male body, as much as it is neither right nor wrong that I am six foot tall and left handed. These things just are.
It might be a hard truth for some Christians to swallow, but God in fact made people who are transsexual.
The amount of data leaves no doubt that transgender people are well aware of their situation even before the concept of sexual orientation enters the mix. When a Christian says that being transgender is a sin or an abomination, they are really trying to tell God that He made a mistake and that flies in the face of all that they say they believe. For those who question why God would make a person transgender, He has already answered them in his word.
Let’s look at Job 38:2, “Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge?” Isn’t that what the church is doing? If we are honest, we should admit that we do not have the capacity to understand how or why God works.
Nor should we try to speak for God when we can never have a complete understanding of how He operates.
In Isaiah 55:8-9 God says, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,” declares the LORD. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.”
It is common for people to question why and to act out of their own frame of reference. We want things to operate in ways that we understand and process. The problem is that we are not omnipotent, we do not have all knowledge, and we operate more out of assumption than we do on fact. Though I would like to understand why I was born transgender, why God would put me in one vessel instead of another, it is likely that I will never understand until I am in His presence. It is a human failing to operate under our own limited understanding and often times that leads us astray.
God made me transgender for a reason, and when I try to fight against my own nature is when I leave the path that he had laid out for me.
Likewise, good meaning people want transgender people to conform to their assumption of what God intended for their lives. Since some cannot comprehend what being transgender is, they have a hard time accepting that it is ordained by God. Instead of aiding transgender people along life’s journey, some try to deter them down a path that the Lord never intended them to travel. Since we do not understand why God made a person transgender, who are we to question?
God doesn’t make mistakes.
God made me transgender; that is the way that it is. He did not make a mistake, for it was in His plans that I am who I am. Psalm 139:13-14 still hold true:
“For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well.”
Photo via flickr Kyknoord
Catholic Church
Comments (21)
Tim smith
Well said to the point, I
Well said to the point, I have used god makes no mistakes many times to well meaning Christians and suddenly the conversation is over they can’t generate a comeback feels so good.god made me loves me God helped me to love myself.
Genevieve
Its true, god doesn’t make
Its true, god doesn’t make mistakes but humans do and they do it all the time. Look in the newspaper, watch the news, listen to the radio and you’ll see humans making mistakes all day long. Heck, look at me. I’m a 46XX/46XY commingled dizygotic twin (sometimes called either a chimera or mosaic) and the odds of me existing are pretty darn high. God? Didn’t make no mistake creating me.
mike bee
Thanks for your post! I think
Thanks for your post! I think in grey not black and white. But for the sake of the black and whites: treat others how you would wish to be treated. Keep it up, Katie, your doing good!
Michelle Eaton
I love my Elohim . Yes I,m a
I love my Elohim . Yes I,m a trans. not gay. So I do what is right in my Yahweh eyes . I know that I do not fir in this world,because it not my world. I have bend put down from my sister about this, and dam to hell.Yahshua for gave me from my sham and sin. yes I,m a new person Not man or woman . I may look like a woman with this body,but a mind of a man. If there more of me out there like to know.
robin
OK- firstly, I’m here because
OK- firstly, I’m here because I’m a “Christian” as Tim Smith describes.who has a family member who recently came out as transgender. And I’m troubled by it., but I love my niece and wish the best for her,
I accept that God does not make mistakes and that God knows us from womb to grave.
However, does that mean if we sin God intended us to sin? Does foreknowledge of who we will become, or how we will act imply implicit approval? I know our sin,(and yes I am a sinner) does not eliminate or remove God’s love for us, but I do not believe it means God accepts or approves or intended us to sin?
Please know, I wish to understand and offer as much support as possible, but I can’t support what I I believe conflicts with my understanding of God., I welcome argument,
Matt
Robin: Who teaches a two-year
Robin: Who teaches a two-year-old to lie? Nobody. We are born into sin, as Psalm 51:5 states – Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. (NIV). No, God did not intend for us to sin, but He knew we would. He knows the end from the beginning, and He knows every moment of our lives.
I realize that your comment was a year and a half ago. But do you realize that science is showing that the brains of transgendered folks are different than regular people’s brains, and that they are closer to the identified gender than of the anatomical sex?
Also realize that in Jewish writings, they have identified SIX different genders within Scripture (male, female, eunuch, androgynous, female without feminine traits, male with feminine traits.
Being transgendered is not a sin. Would you say that autism is a sin? No! Neither is gender dysphoria. Food for thought.
Alan Mitchell
Is Christ worth everything?
Is Christ worth everything? If he is, that also means he is worth giving up our most core identity (ie republican, democrat, moral, immoral, sexual, or asexual, feminist or misogynist, black or white.) Since he is worth everything we should figure out how he wants us to self-identify. The purpose of God giving us the scriptures is that we might explicitly know his will for us. We need the scripture because we don’t have the direct fellowship we once had with him in the garden. In other words, since you can’t just ask God what do you think about this or that you need something that can tell you. So God revealed his will to us authoritatively through the scriptures. Now we can go search out the answer. So in response what does the scriptures say our core identity should be? Well how does the apostle Paul, the most famous of all Christians, an inspired writer, who was sent directly from Jesus, identify Himself as in the scriptures? As a Jew? As moral? As good? No he says
3 For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh— 4 though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. 7 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him,…–Philippians 3:3-8
The word rubbish there is the word Skubulah in the Greek. Which is most accurately translated as “shit.” Paul’s point was anything he was (Jew, well learned, good) is crap, shit, rubbish compared to Christ. Do you consider all your identity in anything else other than Christ as crap compared? Paul does. In Corinthians (15:9) he says he is the least of the apostles. In Ephesians (3:8) he says he is the least of the saints. And at the end of his life after he has planted chuches all over the world, written scripture, seen countless saved he writes: 15 Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst.
Paul likely is writing 1 timothy around the same time Nero is crucifying Christians around his palace, and setting them on fire, just for light. (Tacitus, Annuals, Chapter 15.44) Yet he says, I AM the worst of all sinners. But the Bible also tells us that despite our sin, we are still sons of God through Christ’s death. (1 John 3:2, Gal 3:26). So our identity as Christians goes like this: that even though we ARE more wicked and flawed that we ever dared dreamed, we are more accepted and loved than we ever could have hoped. To identify as a Christian means that you identitfy more than anything as wicked and flawed based on your own life, but as accepted and loved as a child of God based on His life. That is we accepted and loved not on the basis of what we do, or WHO we are (straight, or gay), but on the basis of what he did and WHO he is(John 8:58). The gospel is so great, not because or our identity but because of His.
The bible communicates to us that this is how we are to most deeply identify ourselves. That we are more wicked and flawed in our identity than we ever dared image, but we are more loved and accepted by his love and through his identity that we could have ever dreamed. Does this presupposition of biblical identity seem to you to be a presupposition of the author or this article?
Genesis
Dear Katie. Bless your heart
Dear Katie. Bless your heart for your wonderful words. Everything you’ve said here has been placed with so much love, kindness, and with the Spirit of the Lord. You’ve taught me immensely through this blog post. It’s true God makes no mistakes, everything he does has a purpose we are incapable of completely understanding. No child of God is an abomination. No child of God should be dismissed as sick or delusional for his/her/their identity.
Quinn
Katie-
Katie-
Thank you so, so very much for this article. I am a teenager that is extremely confused on their Gender, and has been struggling with depression and anxiety because of this. This site and others like it helped me realize that God put me here for a purpose and that I am not sick or delusioned and that I am so much more than the gender stuck on me at birth. God bless you, and keep doing great things.
Maria
Dear Katie:
Dear Katie:
Thank you so much for writing this. My son is a Christian who is currently experiencing gender and sexual identity confusion. He’s had severe anxiety and depression because of this, and it’s good to know that he is not alone. God bless you!
Tiffy
I am trying so hard to
I am trying so hard to understand. Im just not getting there. I don’t really understand how these verses back up your argument. And I am feeling like it is a contradictory statement to say “being transgender does not mean that I was born in the wrong body. Being transgender means that God has placed me in the body that looks like one gender while I identify as being another.” Isn’t this the same as saying that God made me one gender, but I identify with another. I am NOT judging. I really really am trying to understand how this is not blatantly stating that God made a mistake when you were created. I also don’t understand comparing this to being left handed. Those things are like apples and oranges….
Matt
Tiffy: It is hard for someone
Tiffy: It is hard for someone who is not transgender to understand. My wife has known about my gender dysphoria since before we got married 21 years ago. And since it has resurfaced, we are having to deal with it all over again. It is VERY difficult for her to understand what is going on, even though I do my best to try and explain it.
The easiest way to explain it is this way: When the egg and the sperm come together and out lives begin, we are either XX or XY (basic human anatomy, right?). But we are neither male nor female for the next two months, although we are more female during that time because only the original X chromosome is active. Somewhere around the 7-8 week mark the second chromosome gets turned on and our bodies start forming male or female (or sometimes both) genitalia. That’s all fine and dandy. But along with everything else, other chemicals get fired off to tell our brains what is between our legs. Usually, those two messages match, but sometimes they don’t. There is a study I recently learned about that says that some of the chemicals that tell us our gender (not our anatomical sex) get reduced for various reasons, mainly due to outside influencers. For example, if a pregnant woman has hypothyroidism, the chances for the baby to have a birth defect are raised exponentially. Then you have chemicals, the vast amount of soy products, as well as other phytoestrogen compounds that make their way into the food supply. Just like some people have allergic reaction to strawberries, others may have a reaction to soy…but only on a level that would cause issues with a fetus.
There are so many unknowns in our world these days, that it makes us transgendered people (BTW, I was born an anatomical male and I still look that way) want to continue to seek out the “why” we are the way we are. But I will say this, that for 99%+ of transgendered folks, if we knew of a magic pill to take away our dysphoria, we would spend thousands of dollars on it just so we would have a normal life.
Blairw
I also don’t understand the
I also don’t understand the left handed and physical appearance. Those aren’t sin, and we were created with those features. I’m not sure if we were created wth our sexuality but I don’t believe god would make it a sin if it was something g we could resist. I believe it all deals with temption from the devil.
JD
Katie, pretty good insights
Katie, pretty good insights which many people should read. I can relate to those who find it necessary to categorize and put humans (God’s Creation) in a box. Regardless, Love them as individuals.
GOD doesn’t make mistakes, but humans do, regularly. Plastics, preservatives, drugs, and toxins not intended for human consumption may be cause for many of these mutations or aberrations. FDA approval means nothing.
My prayers to all those frustrated with their identity.
Eddie
Thank you for this article. I
Thank you for this article. I am a trans man, I however look at this differently. With that said, whether God intentionally makes a mistake or not, it is up to him to say so. I believe however God does make mistakes, from the way I learned about God, we were one of his greatest mistakes but he forgave us through his son. I believe God did make some kind of mistake but when one door closes, he opens another. Scientists and doctors who are working to understand us and fix us were not placed here as chopped liver. If God intended you to be one way, why do so many fight against it ro fix it? Because God does some how makes mistakes but not intentionally. I don’t hate God for making me this way, a trans man I just want to know why? What did I do wrong if he saw what he was making of me in my mothers womb? I would like to meet him and confront him but not to fight to talk and shed light on this. I want to tell him I forgive him.
Eddie
Thank you for this article. I
Thank you for this article. I am a trans man, I however look at this differently. With that said, whether God intentionally makes a mistake or not, it is up to him to say so. I believe however God does make mistakes, from the way I learned about God, we were one of his greatest mistakes but he forgave us through his son. I believe God did make some kind of mistake but when one door closes, he opens another. Scientists and doctors who are working to understand us and fix us were not placed here as chopped liver. If God intended you to be one way, why do so many fight against it ro fix it? Because God does some how makes mistakes but not intentionally. I don’t hate God for making me this way, a trans man I just want to know why? What did I do wrong if he saw what he was making of me in my mothers womb? I would like to meet him and confront him but not to fight to talk and shed light on this. I want to tell him I forgive him.
Tim Stiff
I am gender dysphoric and
I am gender dysphoric and transgendered to the point of where I accept it as fact. I am neither proud or ashamed of my sexuall idenity, it wouldn’t help, it would only harm me emotionally. I have been married for over 35 years to a wonderfull woman and have two great adult children. But I can’t deny who I am and the way I perceive my gender. This is my thorn in the flesh! I’m a Christian and I have prayed for God to take this away, but like the the apostle Paul God has given me grace to live with it and help others like me. It’s true that God dose not make mistakes, but he doesn’t prevent them either. I believe he uses our weakness and our imperfections to bring glory to himself. For me that’s perfectly fine. I choose to bask in his love and grace and not try to merit his approval! Gods peace and love which is his gift of grace to all who struggle with sexual idenity. Tim
Amy
Ohhhh some of the comments I
Ohhhh some of the comments I’m reading here are breaking my heart. There is a deep need to stop seeing God as one who gives people a ‘thorn in their side’; a God who ‘allows’ evil as a teaching tool. What if…Jesus came to reveal the true nature of God (because he essentially is God) which is love, light, and healing? Remember that verse about Satan being the one who’s aim is to steak, kill, and destroy? Why are we, then, attributing anything in this category to God? Folks, the Bible was inspired by the Holy Spirit. The key word here is ‘inspired’. That means that many human authors of this book injected their own interpretations into the nature of God. Does that make the Bible fallible? Nope. But it does mean that we must not read the Bible without asking the Holy Spirit to help us discern what we are reading. So then…here’s where what I am saying ties into this blog post:
God does not make mistakes. He created human beings who have the power to perpetuate life via reproduction. During that process, genes combine in myriad of ways and, as such, we have humans who present as one gender while being another gender entirely. Is this a thorn in anyone’s side? Well yes, because they are living in a world that doesn’t celebrate nor accept diversity readily. But make no mistake, God didn’t do this to teach some cosmic lesson. It just happened, and it’s our job to love people for who they are. Did this happen because of sin in the world? No. It’s just how those genes combined, and our job is to love people who who they are. And let’s just dispense with the way we often choose to love people based off the verse about ‘Love the sinner not the sin’. The end result is that people show their ‘love’ by lovingly telling people about how they are wrong. Sorry, but that’s not loving people. Loving people mean caring, helping, befriending, showing affection and acceptance. God is vast enough, big enough, great enough, to convict people of whatever he deems necessary right? So let’s stop doing God’s job and start doing ours: Love one another. Do not do that which to your neighbor which you would not want done to you. That is our job. God does not make mistakes.
chris
hi, i am a 31 year old
hi, i am a 31 year old christian/ buddhist and for the past few years since finding faith in scripture of god, i have become extreemly confused, agitated and frightened. for a period of time i felt as though i trusted in god, not man to help me with all the choices i was starting to make in life as in a time that i was depressed, agrivated and confussed, i felt god showed me something more beautiful than i could have ever imagined. i overcame my own fear of death, and overcame all the negative feelings and emotions i had for others of christianity, of all faiths and all people, but now i find myself agitated again as i now find myself feeling as though i am trans or may be trans. i came out to family and friends about it, some are ok with it, and others are not, but now that i feel as though i have or had found god again, i find myself constantly in fear that i am wrong for wanting to be a woman, not only that, i find myself mad at god and other people for making me this way. the guilt and frustraition even goes beyond anything i ever would imagine. i feel like the only way to correct myself and my own sins are to kill myself, and while i never would want anyone to kill themselves or anyone else, i find myself wanting to kill myself. not because i want to die, cause i do not, but that i feel unworthy for the way im feeling or have been feeling and while i know i can transition, i feel as though i can not because god does not want me to. i feel like if god wanted me to, he would have had me do it before i found him a few years back. i want to listen and trust god over anyone else, but now its like i just do not know how cause i know to transition will bring pain and dispair in my life and the life of others around me, and i do not want to do that. i do not want to live as though i always have to watch my back. another thing is that so many think that just because i never showed or expressed transness, that i am not trans now. honestly i feel and think that in the past i always had the tendancies, but they were never as prodominent as the are now. ide like to love and trust god and others, but i just do not know how to anymore. i find myself constantly depersonalized. as if im not even real anymore. for a while that very experience was great as i myself saw it as god. it was like everything i saw and experienced in the moment was god itself expressing itself within me and around me, but now i just dont know. sometimes i feel as though i might be the evil one and everyone else is the elect and enlightened ones. idk, i watch tv and the news now, and i find myself so scared of others. the way people interact and comunicate with each other, and sometimes its just terrifying as i question and wonder if that is exactly how i am. am i selfish and bitter because im not content with my own present experience of life? honestly im not. like i said, i feel depersonalized. like my own body and self are some how completely off from the way they should be and ide like to change that, fix that, but idk how. im filled with shame and guilt and uncertainty constantly. i can even do anything but lay around the house in hopes that the answers will come and i will be delivered again from the mess of my life. my fam seems to be worried, upset and concerned, and that brings me more pain and guilt cause i know im not right by lying around the house doing nothing, but idk how to get up and be motivated, be engauged in life anymore. i avoid everything and everyone. even those closest to me cause i feel like im a POS for going through these emotions and guilts. ide like to feel as though i have a choice in my own life but i dont feel that way at all. i feel guilty if i am asked to choose anything. im sry for this rant, and sry if it hurts others, i just really need help and reflection to what it is i can and should do without screwing everything up for myself and others. i mean, i walk around already as if i dont have a body or am in a body and it sux cause i know its there, i just try to hide it or ignore it which i know isnt good either. i want to love it, i just do not know how when everytime i feel the sensations of it, i am grossed out and apauled by it. its not even that i was taught or told to be, its just that i have come to see it as such. i have although come to find men and masculinity disgusting as well, but i think that comes with how i have come to see how men can typically be or act wich was never me, but somehow now i have come to view their flawed behaviors as my own. ive had a few times other wish to get close and ill just push them away. i dont like it at all. i dont like the world or society that americans live in either. i find myself greatly upset and dismayed by it, and would like to see a change in that perseption as well, but do not know how with at least knowing some ultra conservative types within my own family and circle, and i do fear thier reactions and behaviors towards transgender issues. ive tried to talk to so many people i know, but to be honest i have no clue how to deal or address all these issues ive stated. i get told to just transition. i get told to pray, i get told that im scitzo and need meds, i get told to give up on god, or the idea of god. can anyone please help me so i can feel as though i can breath again, live again? i even hate it because even in this tough time ive found myself hanging out with scetchy people for support, and i dont like that, i dont want that. i myself have even become scetchy myself as i find myself looking at porn again, drinking and smoking cigs all to aliviate my own suffering but i know that these are not good healthy productive ways either, and then the fear of those issues coming up i find haunts me as well cause those who know me, know im not really into those things or an advocate, but now that i find myself doing them, i try to justify it by continually doing it. i honestly need help! ide like to find a therapist but idk how, idk where to even start with all my own issues. i dont want to create conflicts with myself and others which is something i feel ive been doing. ive been a real asshole to anyone who is opposing to my views and beliefs of just about anything, and told them i can not be friends or accociate with them if they can not love and accept me for who i am and what i want, but i feel like this is unfair as well to others. thing is i am trans, i know i am trans, i want to be trans, but idk how to go about it outside the obvious. idk how to handle the social, ecconomic and all other sorts of things of trans identity. idk my rights, the right that others have towards me. i dont know who to trust or how to trust them on the issue. i have a few trans friends, but most live outside my area, and one who lives close but i dont know if i exactly feel safe with or around her as well, as i find her doing drugs from time to time, hooking up, or talking to allot of different scetchy men. i get fearful that eventually when i do come out more, and transition more, that these people will try to talk to me, and take advantage of me, and seeing as i myself am usually a gentle soul, that they will try to use that against me. sry for the rant, but im in dire need of assistance. ive tried to talk to my mom who is a therapist, or at least works in the field of therapy, and she seems to think im making up my own fears and concerns and thinks i need meds, and that everything will just magically go away.
Jay
Hey Chris,
Hey Chris,
I just wanted to commment and let you know you are not alone. You may feel that you were just ranting, but I have and still am working through the things you are thinking about. It’s hard bud one thing I use to help me decirne what God is saying/ how they feel about me is 1) Reminding my self that God loves me and does not hate me and 2) God would never make you feel guilty, God convicts and conviction leads to positive change rather than guilt and suicidal thoughts. When i feel God is disapointed. amgry or mad and me and I start feeling bad about being trans and even suicidal I remind my self that is not of God but probably of the devil cause God would never want anyone to kill themselves. Mental illness is very real and I understand that but I know God/Jesus/the holy spirit would not wamt tp cause someone so much guilt theyd want to take their life.
As cliche as it sounds rest in the fact God loves you, and its okay not to know the awnsers. You will find away, you will find peace. It won’t be easy, and all types of people will have all types opinions. If it gives you joy, peace, amd produces good fruit go for it. Also, pray!!!! It’s hard but isolate all the opinions and try to meditate on you and God.
I gotta follow this advice my self, so hang in there friend.
Jay
Jay
You Can’t Have It Both Ways
Look, you can’t have it both ways. Either your god got it right when She assigned you whatever gender you were at birth, or YOU got it right when you decided to transition. One of you is plainly wrong. Why would any deity put you in the wrong body?
Nope. Far more likely, one of you simply does not exist. You are here; you exist. Supernatural beings do not. Contorting your arguments into nonsensical pretzels is not going to change that. If there was actually a god, She would have gotten it right with your gender, and you would not have required medical transition. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be cruel; it’s just true.
A Trans Atheist
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