Gender theory and religious beliefs

@ScrollingLeaves you are welcome!
Thank you for your kind words 🙏 😊 God Bless! 💛

Yup. All of this.

From someone with a religious faith.

PomegranateOfPersephone · Today 12:55
To me it looks fairly obvious that some of the adherents of gender identity/queer theory are seeking some of those things which in past times they would have got from participating in mainstream religions

I agree, but in that case, re the OP, what do we make of the former head of Stonewall having been Catholic? What do we think his motivation might have been?

Lapsed fundamentalist Catholic looking for an alternative? What is known about him?

The unity of soul and body is so profound that one has to consider the soul to be the “form” of the body: i.e., it is because of its spiritual soul that the body made of matter becomes a living, human body; spirit and matter, in man, are not two natures united, but rather their union forms a single nature.

This belief is central to virtually all Catholic moral and religious doctrine.

So what I’m saying in my previous post is that particularly for younger people today, if they have a strong need for religious belonging and expression, something more than being individually or privately “spiritual” there aren’t many socially acceptable or respected options.

The belief that some special people have a body which is the opposite sex to the soul is absolutely respected by their peers, but also by businesses, financial institutions, technology companies and the state and its institutions.

The reaction by the Starbucks employee on one of the other threads, to me, shows a similar reaction as some might have or have had in the past to religious or sacred beliefs being severely disrespected. The believers in gender identity are told that gender identity is sacred and that only those people or non people who are completely beyond the pale would blaspheme against it.

“To what extent is this a society without a meaningful group faith coming up with a very incoherent alternative one that fulfils the performance and behaviour needs?”

I really believe this is the case. I think that quite a large number of people, the soul belief data back this up, have an inbuilt need for religious/spiritual/faith expression. It is a part of being human, we see see in all times, cultures, places across the planet.

Isn’t there a saying that nature abhors a void?

In the modern era it seems that traditional religious beliefs have become somewhat shameful, there is a tendency to look down on adherents to traditional beliefs as if they are not very intelligent or intellectual, as if they are irrational, gullible and of course more and more there is outright hostility to people of faith because there is an assumption that they are all sexist, bigoted or have terrorist tendencies.

For many people religious belief provides community, meaning, purpose, an ethical framework, inspiration, a connection to ancestors and the past more generally, hope for the future and I would venture that through community, ritual, wisdom of various ancient texts, art, music etc it provides quite a mental health buffer too.

To me it looks fairly obvious that some of the adherents of gender identity/queer theory are seeking some of those things which in past times they would have got from participating in mainstream religions.

liwoxac and demi colon have covered what I would have said were I as eloquent!
But - many nominal Christians have no idea that they are, in fact, Platonists and that Christians see the body and soul as one entity.

Also worth considering the studies on the human brain about how religious beliefs tend to work, and also that much of the behaviour going on around this political movement mimics behaviour previously seen in religious extremism, standards of righteousness, social in crowds, punishing sinners.

To what extent is this a society without a meaningful group faith coming up with a very incoherent alternative one that fulfils the performance and behaviour needs?

Thank you for listening to people of faith. As an evangelical Christian I believe that we are made in God's image, male and female. I don't believe that can change or that God has put male souls into female bodies by mistake. God knit me together in my mother's womb and knew me before I was born. I wasn't assigned sex or gender at birth. Our souls are part of us. I think there are a lot of confused people around who need help. Lopping off body parts and taking drugs isn't the right help for most ( all?) of them. Trans identity seems to provide a welcoming community sense which for many people is lacking in this world. I don't know lots about the theology of souls but I don't believe in reincarnation. I believe our bodies will be raised with Christ on the last day. I think there seems to be some ( maybe more American) Christians who might be accused of 'transing the gay away' and being more comfortable with a trans child than a gay one. (Nb They are still gay if they are attracted to people of the same sex). I don't think I've come across it in UK evangelical circles. Although, as in the general population, there are Christians struggling with identity.

I have a vague notion that people who have left a faith system might be more inclined to adopt this different faith system (gender theory), because it fills a "belief void". If you perceive your new faith system to be scientific fact and/or not religious at all (you don't recognize it as religious) and/or you see it as in opposition to your old faith (ie justifying that you left that faith).

Yes, I didn't mean to imply otherwise, sorry if that's what it sounded like.

In my experience though, when people have the idea that religious believers, or those who believe in some sort of God as first principle, are unique in that their first principle is faith based (that is to say, an unprovable assumption,) they are almost always straightforward empirical-materialists, or occasionally humanists. They seem to think that empirical materialism is a self-evident truth, but not an assumption.

No, I meant catholic with a small c!

A friend from the US shared this with me regarding Catholicism and Gender Identity

“DOCTRINAL NOTE ON THE MORAL LIMITS TO TECHNOLOGICAL MANIPULATION OF THE HUMAN BODY
Committee on Doctrine
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

1. Modern technology offers an ever-increasing range of means—chemical, surgical, genetic—for intervening in the functioning of the human body, as well as for modifying its appearance. These technological developments have provided the ability to cure many human maladies and promise to cure many more. This has been a great boon to humanity. Modern technology, however, produces possibilities not only for helpful interventions, but also for interventions that are injurious to the true flourishing of the human person. Careful moral discernment is needed to determine which possibilities should be realized and which should not, in order to promote the good of the human person. To do this discernment, it is necessary to employ criteria that respect the created order inscribed in our human nature.”

a further extract…

“A crucial aspect of the order of nature created by God is the body-soul unity of each human person. Throughout her history, the Church has opposed dualistic conceptions of the human person that do not regard the body as an intrinsic part of the human person, as if the soul were essentially complete in itself and the body were merely an instrument used by the soul.5 In opposition to dualisms both ancient and modern, the Church has always maintained that, while there is a distinction between the soul and the body, both are constitutive of what it means to be human, since spirit and matter, in human beings, “are not two natures united, but rather their union forms a single nature.”6 The soul does not come into existence on its own and somehow happen to be in this body, as if it could just as well be in a different body. A soul can never be in another body, much less be in the wrong body. This soul only comes into existence together with this body. What it means to be a human person necessarily includes bodiliness. “Human beings are physical beings sharing a world with other physical beings.”

Human bodiliness is, in turn, intrinsically connected with human sexual differentiation. Just as every human person necessarily has a body, so also human bodies, like those of other mammals, are sexually differentiated as male or female: “Male and female he created them” (Gen 1:27).8 Saint John Paul II reminded us that, in the Book of Genesis, we learn that “Man is created ‘from the very beginning’ as male and female: the life of all humanity—whether of small communities or of society as a whole—is marked by this primordial duality.”9 The Catechism of the Catholic Church affirms: “Man and woman have been created, which is to say, willed by God: on the one hand, in perfect equality as human persons; on the other, in their respective beings as man and woman. ‘Being man’ or ‘being woman’ is a reality which is good and willed by God.”

So Catholic theology, as I understand regards it as impossible for the soul to be in the wrong body because body and soul develop together, are one thing, not separate, and will be resurrected together on judgement day.

What Arabella said! Except, Arabella, did you really mean curious or Catholic?

I'd say you probably get thoughtful, questioning, open minded people who also have religious beliefs, and you get reactionary, authoritarian, and disordered thinkers who are atheist. (and vice versa, of course).

For me that's probably the difference. Not so much the presence of a belief system, but how one is in respect of that. Some people hold their beliefs lightly and are able to consider and question them; some, less so.

In fact it's possibly more about interpersonal behaviours than beliefs, no? Whether one is evangelist or tolerant, curious or catholic, extremist or moderate, etc.

Absolutely with you on that, MircusWazRobbed.

Yes re 'progressive branches'. Reform Judaism is often criticised by those to the right for jumping on the ideological bandwagons of the day. Possibly to set themselves apart from the more traditional wings.

As an aside, I really really dislike the trope that keeps getting pulled out that there are umpteen 'genders' in the Talmud. There aren't, the Talmud is discussing people with DSDs or any other medical conditions that affect genitalia/puberty and sexual development and how they fit into a framework where your legal, religious and social obligations are determined by biological sex. Just to get that off my chest.

Can't speak for other religions, but the traditional stream of Judaism is very rooted in biological reality and this world. It doesn't sit at all well with gender ideology.

Much of what you say is right (sc. I agree with you). But you might consider that perhaps a denial of religion may not simply entail acceptance of materialism. There are other games in town.

Rev Steve Chalke (who runs Oasis academies or he wouldn’t be so dangerous in this regard) fully accepts gender ideology, including confidently spouting debunked suicide stats. I agree that generally, though, there doesn’t seem to be a correlation between religious believers and gender believers.

How anyone who believes in the Christian god that I learned about as a child (convent school and years of Sunday school at a church that I’ve forgotten the denomination of) can make a mistake by inserting the wrong soul into a body is beyond me.

But true scorn belongs to high profile atheists who promote this rubbish.

Sounds more like gnosticism to me. Technically a heresy ever since the Council of Nicea back in 325.

What happened to "I love you but I don't agree with you"?

I don’t think the extreme adherents of genderism allow such nuance. If you don't agree that TWAW then you are considered a total bigot. I think parents in her position often fear that their (adult) trans child might disappear with their new glitter family and they will lose them completely. This is a [c-word].

I'm sure it would have been much easier for her if her child had become a Christian.

Belief in materialism requires faith in an unprovable principle too, so I don't think the religious are especially encumbered compared to any other group.

I don't understand.