Who You Are on the Inside Sun, 28th July, 2013
Today I continue from last week with a second story about LGBT people I have met and interviewed for the Welcoming Congregation sermon I am delivering today at First Unitarian Church of St. Louis. Just like this amazing leaf insect I saw on my front porch on Saturday, some people are not what they appear to be on the outside.
Feeling normal was a long time coming for another person I talked with. I’ll call him Dan. Dan the man, with a curly beard and energetic blue eyes. Only Dan didn’t used to be a man. Or more accurately, I should say he always was a man, but his body led everyone to view him as a woman. In actuality, he was intersex. He has both an extra X and a Y chromosome. For purposes of telling the story, I’ll use “she” to refer to Dan before the transition, and “he” after the transition, since that’s how most people will relate to Dan’s experience.
From childhood in the 1960s, Dan always felt like a boy. Her mother tried to fix her, but that wasn’t possible. In the days before Title IX, her desire to play sports was often thwarted. She was great at baseball but wasn’t allowed to play Little League, although she did manage to be the only female body on the high school football team in rural Missouri where she grew up. Later, she joined the army, where she starred on the women’s basketball team. But all this time, she knew inside that she was really a man.
More specifically, she was a straight man and was always attracted to women. In her woman’s body, Dan having a female partner was never an option in his rural Missouri, Southern Baptist community several decades ago. Dan wanted nothing more than to have a wife and child. It would take a near fatal tragedy to finally give him the courage to make the transition.
It was 1982 and after a foolish joyride with male friends who had been drinking, the car she was riding in crashed, killing everyone in the car. Except her. For reasons only God knows, Dan clung to life despite multiple broken bones and severe internal injuries. Her burning desire for a wife and family gave her the will to live.
So Dan gradually recovered and committed herself to the long road to transition. Now Dan the man is happily married to the woman of his dreams, who came into his life with a baby girl that now is his precious daughter. He says that now, everything is finally as it should be. He appreciates the blessings of family more than most, given how long he had to wait. Now that he is a straight man with a wife and child, he is able to reclaim the traditional faith of his youth, with the exception that he believes that God is more powerful than the prejudice of people. He knows in his heart that God loves him, and that if God is for him, who can be against him.
Dan has moving words of advice for any congregation that desires to be truly welcoming. He agrees that silence is not welcoming, but whispering is much, much worse. “If you say you’re accepting,” he said, “then be accepting. Don’t go around talking about people.” He says we must have compassion for how hard it is to be a transgender person. We must understand that they are not confused, but rather are very certain about who they are.
When Dan, and people like him, enter the doors of this church, he says openness is the answer. Tell me “I’m here,” he said. “I’m willing to talk. I understand your struggles.”
Today I continue from last week with a second story about LGBT people I have met and interviewed for the Welcoming Congregation sermon I am delivering today at First Unitarian Church of St. Louis. Just like this amazing leaf insect I saw on my front porch on Saturday, some people are not what they appear to be on the outside.
Feeling normal was a long time coming for another person I talked with. I’ll call him Dan. Dan the man, with a curly beard and energetic blue eyes. Only Dan didn’t used to be a man. Or more accurately, I should say he always was a man, but his body led everyone to view him as a woman. In actuality, he was intersex. He has both an extra X and a Y chromosome. For purposes of telling the story, I’ll use “she” to refer to Dan before the transition, and “he” after the transition, since that’s how most people will relate to Dan’s experience.
From childhood in the 1960s, Dan always felt like a boy. Her mother tried to fix her, but that wasn’t possible. In the days before Title IX, her desire to play sports was often thwarted. She was great at baseball but wasn’t allowed to play Little League, although she did manage to be the only female body on the high school football team in rural Missouri where she grew up. Later, she joined the army, where she starred on the women’s basketball team. But all this time, she knew inside that she was really a man.
More specifically, she was a straight man and was always attracted to women. In her woman’s body, Dan having a female partner was never an option in his rural Missouri, Southern Baptist community several decades ago. Dan wanted nothing more than to have a wife and child. It would take a near fatal tragedy to finally give him the courage to make the transition.
It was 1982 and after a foolish joyride with male friends who had been drinking, the car she was riding in crashed, killing everyone in the car. Except her. For reasons only God knows, Dan clung to life despite multiple broken bones and severe internal injuries. Her burning desire for a wife and family gave her the will to live.
So Dan gradually recovered and committed herself to the long road to transition. Now Dan the man is happily married to the woman of his dreams, who came into his life with a baby girl that now is his precious daughter. He says that now, everything is finally as it should be. He appreciates the blessings of family more than most, given how long he had to wait. Now that he is a straight man with a wife and child, he is able to reclaim the traditional faith of his youth, with the exception that he believes that God is more powerful than the prejudice of people. He knows in his heart that God loves him, and that if God is for him, who can be against him.
Dan has moving words of advice for any congregation that desires to be truly welcoming. He agrees that silence is not welcoming, but whispering is much, much worse. “If you say you’re accepting,” he said, “then be accepting. Don’t go around talking about people.” He says we must have compassion for how hard it is to be a transgender person. We must understand that they are not confused, but rather are very certain about who they are.
When Dan, and people like him, enter the doors of this church, he says openness is the answer. Tell me “I’m here,” he said. “I’m willing to talk. I understand your struggles.”
