Abstract
A statistically significant group in the United States (conservatively, 6% of the population) is engaged in a migration away from prescribed gender strictures and into a realm of what psychologist and preeminent expert in treating gender-diverse youth and their families Diane Ehrensaft has coined “gender creativity.” Given the pathology of cultural reactions to transgender and gender-nonconforming persons, this group is also at high risk for developing psychosocial adversities that threaten health, safety, and life itself. This paper argues that a pastoral theology opening doors to genuine gender-diverse dialogue and care creates congregational and seminary environments primed to enhance the resilience needs of gender-creative individuals, such as those who self-reported in a landmark phenomenological study led by Anneliese A. Singh. Moving to affirmative pastoral ministries beyond gender binaries is not only essential for embodying the kinds of expansive care needed in an increasingly gender-diverse world, it also puts all caregivers on migratory trajectories of gender liberation and expansion.
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Notes
For a useful description and discussion of these four continua of gender, see Sam Killermann, A Guide to Gender: The Social Justice Advocate’s Handbook, 2nd ed. (Impetus Books, 2017).
The LGBTQ + acronym represents persons who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual and/or transgender and/or queer, thus covering both affectional/sexual orientations and gender identities; the plus sign (+) at the end proactively includes other nonheteronormative and/or nonbinary identities not covered by the previous initials.
GLAAD, the name of a monitoring organization that tries to ensure equitable LGBTQ + media coverage, was an acronym for Gay and Lesbian Alliance against Defamation until 2013, when the organization removed the acronym’s explanation so as to be more inclusive of “B,” “T,” and “Q” concerns; see https://www.glaad.org/.
In fact, there is a subgenre of transgender publications of “do-it-yourself” gender workbooks for persons of all ages to get perspective on the contours of their gender components; see Kate Bornstein, My New Gender Workbook: A Step-By-Step Guide to Achieving World Peace through Gender Anarchy and Sex Positivity, 2nd ed. (Routledge, 2013); Rylan Jay Testa, Deborah Coolhart, and Jayme Peta, The Gender Quest Workbook: A Guide for Teens and Young Adults Exploring Gender Identity (Instant Help Books, 2015); and Dara Hoffman-Fox, You and Your Gender Identity: A Guide to Discovery (Skyhorse Publishing, 2017).
“Cis” is a Latin prefix for “on this side of.” “Cisgender,” then, serves as a description of non-transgender persons (“trans” is a Latin prefix meaning “on the other side of”) to indicate persons whose sex assigned at birth coincides with their true and lived gender identity.
Psychologist and preeminent expert in treating gender-diverse youth and their families Diane Ehrensaft designates “gender creative” as an umbrella term more encompassing even than “transgender,” although all terminology regarding gender is constantly and necessarily in flux. See Diane Ehrensaft, Gender Born, Gender Made: Raising Healthy Gender-Nonconforming Children (The Experiment, 2011) and The Gender Creative Child: Pathways for Nurturing and Supporting Children Who Live Outside Gender Boxes (The Experiment, 2016). See also Craig A. Rubano, “Where Do the Mermaids Stand? Toward a ‘Gender-Creative’ Pastoral Sensibility,” Pastoral Psychology 65, no. 6 (December 2016), https://doi.org/10.1007/s11089-015-0680-2.
Respondents were comprised of adults (18 and over) from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and various U.S. territories and military bases around the world.
“Intersectionality” refers to the way the oppressive impact of multiple marginalized identities adds up to more than a sum of each identity’s effects. The term emerges from the work of Crenshaw (1989) on the experiences of African American women: “Because the intersectional experience is greater than the sum of racism and sexism, any analysis that does not take intersectionality into account cannot sufficiently address the particular manner in which Black women are subordinated” (p. 140). For a pastoral theology perspective on intersectionality, see Nancy J. Ramsay, “Intersectionality: A Model for Addressing the Complexity of Oppression and Privilege,” Pastoral Psychology 63, no. 4 (August 2014).
There is an extensive literature documenting the disproportionate ways that societal transphobic opprobrium is refracted and intensified along intersectional lines of marginalization; see especially David Valentine, Imagining Transgender: An Ethnography of a Category (Duke University Press, 2007); C. Riley Snorton, Black on Both Sides: A Racial History of Trans Identity (University of Minnesota Press, 2017); and b. binaoham, Decolonizing Trans/Gender 101 (Biyuti Publishing, 2014).
The previous report (The National Transgender Discrimination Survey) was issued in 2011 (Grant et al., 2011).
In the 2011 report, participants did not use the term “nonbinary”; 14%, however, identified as “gender non-conforming” (Grant et al., 2011, p. 24).
See also Anneliese A. Singh and Vel S. McKleroy, “‘Just Getting Out of Bed is a Revolutionary Act’: The Resilience of Transgender People of Color Who Have Survived Traumatic Life Events,” International Journal of Traumatology 17, no. 2 (2011): 34–44.
See also Ann S. Masten, Ordinary Magic: Resilience in Development (Guilford Press, 2015).
I draw my illustrative quotations from several published collections of thematically arranged gender-creative voices: Conover (2002), Girshick (2008), and Shultz (2015). Also of note are full-length memoirs of gender-creative persons such as Jan Morris, Conundrum: An Extraordinary Narrative of Transsexualism, 2nd ed. (Henry Holt, 1986); Julia Serano, Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity, 2nd ed. (Seal Press, 2016); Jamison Green, Becoming a Visible Man (Vanderbilt University Press, 2004); Jennifer Finney Boylan, She’s Not There: A Life in Two Genders, 2nd ed. (Broadway Books, 2013); and Nick Krieger, Nina Here nor There: My Journey Beyond Gender (Beacon Press, 2011).
“Genderqueer” is a term falling under the transgender umbrella, "often designat[ing] a nonnormative or nonbinary gender identity or expression... [and] can refer to a gender identity that purposefully breaks social norms or rules regarding gender” (Shultz, 2015, p. 198).
“Agender” is “an identity that describes a feeling or state of being genderless...[or where] gender lies somewhere in between masculine or feminine, or beyond a masculine/feminine spectrum of gender” (Shultz, 2015, p. 195). “‘Ze and hir’ is the most popular form of gender-free pronoun pairing in the online genderqueer community.” “The Need for a Gender-Neutral Pronoun,” Gender Neutral Pronoun Blog (blog), January 24, 2010, https://genderneutralpronoun.wordpress.com/. “Ze” is pronounced “zee,” and “hir” is pronounced “here.”
A person identifying as “femme” is “often a lesbian with an effeminate gender expression. However, this identity is sometimes claimed by gay or bisexual men as well” (Shultz, 2015, p. 197).
“Stud” and “aggressive” typically describe “masculine-presenting lesbian women” and are “used predominantly in black or African American communities” (Shultz, 2015, p. 199).
“Stone butch” typically refers to “a female-bodied person who is strongly masculine in character and dress, who is generally dominant in sexual relations and often does not want to be touched genitally” (Girshick, 2008, p. 206).
“Stud” “typically describes masculine-presenting lesbian women. This term is used predominantly in black or African American communities” (Shultz, 2015, p. 199); “boi” usually describes “a masculine woman, genderqueer individual, or young trans man” (Shultz, 2015, p. 196); and “masculine of center” is “a term for masculine women and used primarily in communities of color” (Shultz, 2015, p. 199).
To “pass,” which is controversial in that it suggests a necessity for, or an optimal outcome of, gender conformance (and the attendant “failures” to do so), is defined as “to be successfully recognized by others (usually strangers) as one’s desired gender” (Shultz, 2015, p. 198).
“Transmasculine” is “the adjective form of trans man” (Shultz, 2015, p. 200).
There has been a historical shift from the earlier usage of “trangendered” to the current “transgender.” Generally, the word “transgendered” should be avoided because “transgendered suggests that being trans is something that happens to someone, as opposed to an identity someone is born with.” See German Lopez, “Why You Should Always Use ‘Transgender’ instead of ‘Transgendered,’” Vox, February 18, 2015, https://www.vox.com/2015/2/18/8055691/transgender-transgendered-tnr.
Luke 11:5–8. Note: In addition to capitalizing the first word in each sentence, Hart capitalizes the first word of each new verse.
The Greek verb for “would come” (italicized above) in Luke 11:5 can correspond to both second and third person because the original subject combines “you” and “which.” As Nolland (1993) writes, “This makes at once for an ambiguity as to who goes to whom. Does our addressee go as the one with an unexpected guest, or get visited by the one with an unexpected guest?” (p. 623; emphases added). Most English translations fall on the side of a second-person conjugation of the verb in question, such as the New Revised Standard Version, which reads as follows: “Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight. . .” The New English Bible translation of Luke 11:5, however, espouses the third-person alternative: “Suppose one of you has a friend who comes to him in the middle of the night. . .”
See Halvor Moxnes, “Honor and Shame,” in The Social Sciences and New Testament Interpretation, ed. Richard L. Rohrbaugh (Baker Academic, 1996) and Herman C. Waetjen, “The Subversion of ‘World’ by the Parable of the Friend at Midnight,” Journal of Biblical Literature 120, no. 4 (Winter 2001): 703–721.
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Acknowledgements
I appreciate the support of New Directions in Pastoral Theology conference participants over the years. In particular, I am in debt to my teacher, the late Donald Capps, who responded at New Directions to my first writing on gender creativity by encouraging importunity, wisdom I have followed. Versions of sections of this article were previously published as part of my 2019 dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of doctor of philosophy in pastoral theology at Princeton Theological Seminary: Gender Creative Promise: Affirmative Pastoral Ministry beyond Gender Binaries (ProQuest Dissertations Publishing 13880448).
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Rubano, C.A. Opening Doors to Resilience and a Gender-Diverse Pastoral Theology. Pastoral Psychol 71, 769–787 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11089-022-01027-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11089-022-01027-x