Theology In Pieces
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Theology In Pieces
59 - "t"
The "t" in LGBTQ (Transgender) has become one of the most heated cultural flashpoints of our time, leaving many Christians struggling to respond with both theological faithfulness and Christ-like compassion. How do we understand gender dysphoria through a biblical lens while genuinely caring for those who experience it?
Enter Dr. Mark Yarhouse, Director of the Sexual and Gender Identity Institute at Wheaton College and author of groundbreaking works like "Understanding Gender Dysphoria" and "Emerging Gender Identities." With over two decades of clinical experience and research, Dr. Yarhouse brings a rare combination of psychological expertise and Christian conviction to this complex conversation.
Warning: Before this convo, Malcolm and slim tackle a polarizing debate going around the online community. Sadly, this topic has divided even our hosts. Will they stay friends after seeing the world so differently?
Also, good news and bad news for Christians regarding anti-christian bias!
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yeah, what's up y'all? Oh, hey, hey, universe, you are uh being welcomed into the next episode of the Theology in Pieces podcast, in the epicenter of the Theology in Pieces podcast home yeah. Where we hail from, the one and only Waco, texas, in the great Lone Star State. But we hope to rebuild your theology that the church, the world or somebody has shattered to pieces, and we are your hosts, slim and Malcolm. And man Malcolm, has this song, has it grown on you yet?
Speaker 2:I've heard some.
Speaker 1:We broke his brain.
Speaker 2:I'm glad you like it, Slim. I've heard from some of our listeners.
Speaker 1:They're enjoying it. They're like, I just had to come back and re-listen to the beginning.
Speaker 2:They can be fans. They can be fans.
Speaker 1:I want to win you over on this man.
Speaker 2:I'm more of a fan of symphonic power metal, but it's whatever.
Speaker 1:Next season symphonic power metal.
Speaker 2:Like I said, I have very niche musical tastes and they're very particular.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, it's all good, just at least it's not like irish uh folk music it's got a good.
Speaker 2:It's got a good sound to it. All the gettys, all the gettys. Like all the gettys, music uh has has the irish, has the irish kind of kind of flavor to it, and I'm a big fan of them.
Speaker 1:I can see you rocking a kilt yeah no, these legs never get exposed. That's how this works.
Speaker 2:These legs are meant for walking. That's all they'll do.
Speaker 1:But no exposure. It is a very rare thing to hear about. Uh, to see malcolm in shorts you don't, you, you won't.
Speaker 2:I have it's been.
Speaker 1:It was a wild day it was a wild day, me and my wife. We talked about it afterwards I'm gonna let that go. Today we are going to talk about the letter T, not in the sense of Sesame Street, but T as in LGBT. If you remember a year ago or so, on episode oh gosh, it was a year ago. It may be almost two.
Speaker 2:Good gracious.
Speaker 3:I know, I know.
Speaker 1:We are sorry, but that was on episode 30.
Speaker 1:We began a conversation around biblical sexuality and we spent about five episodes talking through the topic of sexuality and God's design for it, but as we talked through it, we kept waiting for this person to come on to our podcast for this interview today, and y'all, I am so excited because this is yes, to talk about the letter t, to talk about transgender um and and maybe this is the maybe the most misunderstood subject in the acronym um of lgbt uh, and because of that, we didn't want to have this conversation without having, uh, someone like, like this expert on uh here, and he is.
Speaker 1:He is an expert in this, and so today we finally get that, and so we're so, so, so excited to have this conversation. But, as always, before we do the deep dive into the serious things of life, malcolm, there is a maybe even a deeper debate not really, but there is a big debate going on on Twitter right now, and you and I have not yet had a chance to find out where either of us stands on the debate, and I'm curious if you even know what debate we're about to have.
Speaker 1:If you do this, what are you about to?
Speaker 2:say Because if you're about to say what I think you're about to say, go ahead, just go ahead and say it so that I can know whether I need to confirm this just shows how chronically online I am, that I know what you're about to say, even though we have done no prep for this show who would win in a fight between a hundred men versus one gorilla?
Speaker 1:you have a 100 men on one side and a gorilla on the other side, as you know, um, gorillas are pretty powerful 400 pounds, uh, uh, they, they can use their teeth. Um, they, they're, they're, they're relatively strong, um, but people are pretty passionate, certain on on one side or the other, on this, and I'm curious where you, where you, where you stand on this debate here, malcolm, would a hundred men be able to take down one gorilla? Go?
Speaker 2:uh, are these, are these men unarmed, unarmed? Yeah, they're unarmed. I don't think so. Well, stamina-wise, the 100 could probably outlast, outlast, no.
Speaker 1:You're going with the 100 men. No, you think they're going to wear him down. No, you think the gorilla is going to get worn down. A hundred is a lot of. There's been some great ai videos generated of of hundred men coming at the gorilla, a fair amount of dudes and it's almost the the at least the ai videos that are great because they're like it's like sarod versus all the people just like swinging arms and people are flying.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's, yeah, that's that.
Speaker 1:That also could happen right, but you could also this is the argument you could have 20 men on one on this left arm and 20 men on a right arm.
Speaker 2:If you get, if you get a hundred, if you get a hundred, if you get a hundred, like strong dudes and you get core and they plan. This is what we do as human beings. Oh okay, we plan. We're outsmart, they could figure out a way to take down a human.
Speaker 1:Oh my goodness, you are taking the 100 men side.
Speaker 2:Well, because humans are the, because we're still the apex predators, oh my goodness.
Speaker 1:Dear listener.
Speaker 2:I have a very high anthropology predators. Oh my goodness, I have a very high. I have a very high anthropology.
Speaker 1:This may be the the pinnacle of the discrepancy between malcolm and I. I have a very low anthropology. I have such a low view of human nature and humans uh, and I was like, no, we can do it. Do you know? We got people on on the moon. We got katie perry in space.
Speaker 2:We can we can do anything we can take. A hundred of us could take down a girl dude here's the thing, here's here's the thing, malcolm.
Speaker 1:That gorilla takes one dude out. One dude. It's no longer 99 on one, it's now five that are left that still have courage. Well, do you know how we are the most cowardly?
Speaker 2:people in the world Like we're assuming that the hundred men that are going up against the gorilla know that they're about to go up against the gorilla and are choosing to oh but that's like the idea of like, that's the Mike.
Speaker 1:Tyson, quote of uh, everyone has a plan until they get punched into the face. And so the minute you see this gorilla, like bite this guy's head off and you go like no.
Speaker 2:You gotta know, if you're going into it, that you know you're taking it to the end. If you gotta take it to the end, okay, all right. A hundred committed. A hundred committed. A hundred committed. Human beings can take, can take out a group, can take out a gorilla.
Speaker 1:No way no no, no, I want, I don't. You're not going to find a hundred people committed to doing this experiment.
Speaker 2:You're already assuming that we've got a hundred people who are going to come up against this gorilla. I'm a, I'm gorilla, I'm a, I'm. I will be explicit about the assumptions that I'll make about this group of people that they are people who are committed to taking out this gorilla, and a hundred committed people who are committed to taking out one living organism. Uh-huh, that's not like a hundred times their size. Uh-huh, I think we can do it no, no, no.
Speaker 1:I I think, I think, if, if I think, if the humans had guns, if, they had tranquilizers you go. Yeah, I could see these Marines going in there, hundred humans with nothing, and going like, oh, the gorilla is going to take them apart and it's all about fear. It's going to take one guy apart and the rest are going to cower coordination. Coordination can beat out fear man have you seen how cowardly humankind is?
Speaker 2:yes, but I'm already assuming. I'm already assuming that these are people who are committed to taking whatever motivation is going to take.
Speaker 1:All right, I'm making my sermon illustration whether this is a.
Speaker 2:This is, this is a gorilla. That's like taking out their families. They have nothing else left to live for.
Speaker 1:All right, so Revelation 21,. I'm about to preach this upcoming Sunday on the new heavens and new earth.
Speaker 1:It's this beautiful passage on like what it's going to be God's making all things new. And then verse eight, um. So about talking about all those who are about to inherit the new heavens and new earth. But the cowardly. And then he goes into all these other sins the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually more, those who practice martial arts, the analogers and the liars. They will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur.
Speaker 1:This, the second death. He begins with the cowardly, because you are. If you are cowardly, those other things they come with it. You don't have the courage to stand up and and to to actually be against violence and to actually stand up and before you know all these other things, cowards. I feel like this is like a root sin, as as much as I don't gonna put on the par as someone's uh, anti-greed, uh sin. Somebody said something about that someone, but I think I'm like man. I'm seeing that more and more in in in public life, in political life, oh for sure, in the church life. It's like I just need some people with backbone. Yeah, and these 100?
Speaker 2:men who are going up against this gorilla do have backbone.
Speaker 1:Until they get punched in the mouth.
Speaker 2:Like I said, these are people who know the risks.
Speaker 1:Y'all thought Malcolm and I were on the same page on a lot of things. I thought we were on the same page on a lot of things. I'm realizing we have a lot to go.
Speaker 2:We have a long way to go. Look, man, as evil as war is, people go into war knowing that there's the risk of them dying. That's what you train for. These are trained. I assume that these are, that these are, and, granted, I'm assuming these are men, but these are men at the at the pinnacle of their physical, at the pinnacle of physical fitness. They are ready to take down this gorilla, even though the gorilla is much, much, much, much more powerful than them. I are, our, our intellect is a significant boon I think intellect ain't gonna have anything to do.
Speaker 2:My high anthropology, fighting this gorilla. I think, I think with so you're like go, sparta, do with fighting this gorilla, I think, with the weight of human knowledge. I don't know what that gorilla's weaknesses are, but somebody does and we get 100 people who not only know that but are physically able Gorilla's going down.
Speaker 1:Maybe if I had some of those fiery blades from God of War I could take down those gorillas.
Speaker 2:I mean, we have weapons, obviously.
Speaker 1:Well, good news, Malcolm. Even if you are cowardly and you have cowered to the gorilla, I have good news for you. Did you know that everything from here on out is smooth sailing for the Christian?
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:The best news in the world has come down from the White House. Oh dear. Yeah, that there is now an anti-Christian task force, anti-christian bias task force, instituted to help protect the Christians from all the bias that we now have, and so if Liberation Day didn't free you, this task force should have. How do you feel about the task force? Are you feeling a little more free in your role as a public theologian and Christian?
Speaker 2:no, not feeling the the, the oppression of the anti-christian bias that's out there right now because if I actually, if I actually do christian things, I'll get arrested like william barber and and and uh no, no, no no you're stealing my uh. You're doing actual christian things and getting arrested for it I assumed you knew about it, but I was gonna. I was gonna, jonathan. I was just texting Jonathan about it this morning.
Speaker 1:So the very same day, um? Is it the same day? Less than a week after the formation of the Trump's administration of the task force on anti-christian bias at the justice department, william reverend, william barber and others were arrested at the capitol. Um, pastors were arrested at the capitol. For what? For praying, for preaching, for expressing views that were contrary to what the government was pushing down. They were arrested for demonstrating inside the congressional buildings, which is not allowed in any form, but it's included to, but not limited to, sitting, kneeling in group, praying, singing and chanting.
Speaker 2:So you would think that if this task force was was going to protect christians, the pastors leading a prayer, a discussion about this, would be that part of that specifically a prayer against a budget that's going to cut a trillion dollars from the, from the, from from the federal budget, things that, things that ultimately, uh, are going to kill people when you cut things like social security or medicaid or snap or all these, all these significant benefits that only the government can extend to people to keep people from dying in poverty. Um, the, the, the purpose of this, the purpose of this protest was to protest that particular budget a massive redistribution from from the, from working people, essentially into the hands of the rich. That is something that is worthy of Christian protest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so these pastors were doing this. What do they call it? Monday Moral?
Speaker 2:Mondays.
Speaker 1:Moral Monday. And it was a prayer, yes, and it was praying against the budget cuts that is being pursued in DC at the expense of the poor, the working people, children, women and families. And they were arrested for praying. And it was praying about this. Yes, to pray against this budget, but it was prayer nonetheless, and so this is the thing that I think christians need to be able to see. Yes, there is uh this task force that is uh instituted for the anti-christian bias one. Are christians persecuted? Christians are persecuted throughout the world. They are, would they, would you say, we are persecuted in america? Um, there is that we live in a pluralistic society. There's different views, so there might be people who disagree with christian stances, sure, but are are christians targeted? No, this is actually targeting christians who are praying against like. So it's. This is, to me, is is very, very like hey, this is supposed to be great news. It's actually.
Speaker 2:Unless you are theologically in the same exact lockstep as this administration, you are going to get persecuted yeah, well, I mean for us, I mean we're not, we're not targeted because we're generally not a threat to the empire um, because, uh, more of us are in bed with the empire than are actually living out the commitments that christ has actually called us to.
Speaker 2:Um, so you know, I mean the, the, the. The scriptures say that, if I mean it in the beatitudes, the expectation, the expectation is that when you live a life, um, when you live a life that's obedient to Christ, that the powers and principalities are not going to be happy with you, and often that's going to manifest itself even in the Beatitudes, it's going to manifest itself in persecution, in ridicule, in all those kinds of things. Persecution in ridicule and all those kinds of things. Um, most christians are too afraid of those things, uh, to actually kind of do what the lord has called us to do. So, no, we're not, we're not, we're not, we're not, we, we generally don't face that kind of thing, although, like, I mean, this is and and granted, actually I want to, I want to change that.
Speaker 2:We I always use this we to describe american christians, um, but, uh, but, like, I mean the persecuted church, uh, in this country's history is the, uh is the historically black church, yeah, um, and so, uh, when you look at folks who, uh, have sought to, kind of sought to practically live in ways that are obedient to Christ, I mean you think about the civil rights movement, but also I mean the long, the long civil rights movement, that the persecution that has come because of that is like that's, that's, that's in line.
Speaker 2:I was just, I was, I was watching Judas and the Judas and the judas and the black messiah, uh, on the plane to san francisco this past, this past weekend, and I was just reminded. Every time I watch now I watch movies of that of that period uh, I just get angry at white people, um, because that's what this history, but it's not just. But it's not just that, it's just the, the, the, the, the, uh, the ways in which uh, greed and the desire for power and influence, um, lead to continued human cruelty is just a constant. It's a constant story throughout american history. It manifests itself racially in a number of different ways, but, but at but, at root, uh, the race stuff isn't the, isn't the root issue. It's the desire for, the desire for money and power. But you all, you all know that that's my general there's a book about that general which we highly recommend, called the anti-greek gospel.
Speaker 1:Why the love, love, buddy is the Root of Racism, how the Church Can Provide a New Way Forward which is on sales everywhere. Thank you for the commercial slip.
Speaker 2:That's what this podcast really is. It's just a way to slide in book commercials.
Speaker 1:Anyway, I don't know I'm trying to help you out there.
Speaker 2:I appreciate it. Slick, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:All right, all right.
Speaker 3:Well, today we are going to bring on our guest, the one and only Dr.
Speaker 1:Mark Yarhouse, who is the yes? We could have used the applause there. There we go, yes, yes. And then this for me and then this for me.
Speaker 1:Dr Mark Yarhouse is the director of the Sexual and Gender Identity Institute at Wheaton College. He's the author of more than 20 books, including two that are really helpful for me Understanding Gender Dysphoria and Emerging Gender Identities. Mark is a clinical psychologist who I had first heard on a podcast a couple years ago and then since, I've just been blown away at how he balances both a deep, deep compassion for those undergoing gender changes and dysphoria and, at the same time, still holding convictions and speaking graciously and civilly. He just brings a ton of wisdom and ton of research and compassion. I'm just so excited for us to finally have this conversation with the one and only Dr Mark Yarhouse. All right, well, we are now greeted with the one and only Dr Mark Yarhouse, and so, mark, thank you so much for coming on the podcast here. We were so excited to be able to talk with you. It's been something we've been looking forward to for a few sadly years. We had this idea of like let's talk to him about two years ago.
Speaker 3:Well, I'm glad we can make it work. That's great. Well, I'm glad we can make it work.
Speaker 1:That's great. Well, we want to jump right in. We know that you've probably had been able to explain a hundred times your past, what's brought you into this, but just to introduce many of those who may be unfamiliar with this conversation, in your research and your clinical experience, what do you think Christians most urgently misunderstand about the experience of gender dysphoria itself?
Speaker 3:Well, there's different. There's kind of a continuum of, I think, mistakes people make around this, but one is I mean, some people just say it's not real, it's not a real thing. So I think that's I want to put on the table. I think it is a real thing, it's a real experience. I think it's an experience that's existed across cultures and throughout history, and different cultures have responded to people in that space in very different ways, and so it's a very uncomfortable experience. It can be. I would say dysphoria can ebb and flow in severity inside one individual, and if you had 10 people in front of you with gender dysphoria, they could have very different levels of dysphoria and strategies for managing it. So I wouldn't want to think of it as one one thing. Think of it as, like you know how you know, depression can be pretty severe, but it can also be you just feel kind of blue, you know kind of mildly depressed, and others pretty severe, yeah, yeah. Or there's different forms of like headaches. You know, there's just different experiences here.
Speaker 1:It's not one thing, yeah, yeah yeah, and so the I mean, is that term there like, are people, um, yeah, there's different experiences are there people that challenge you on even the idea of dysphoria, um, or they're just? I mean, I kind of jump it into maybe that you know? Follow-up question I have about I know, in your, in your writing, you talk about there's multiple frameworks, uh, for christians to think about, um, gender identity and transgender and things like that. Could you, could you speak to that kind of the different approaches that people have, and then maybe, once we understand those approaches, why there's, you know this, these conflicts between each one?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I described three lenses. This was it would be back in 2015. And I was just trying to make sense of the nature of the disagreements among people in this space, and so I tried to use the language of the proponent of the lens just to kind of accurately reflect, you know, I thought, what they were saying. So the first lens I called a lens, I called it the integrity lens. I could have also called it the sacred lens, because this author used both of those words. But most people in this space are conventionally religious people, usually people of the book. They're citing Genesis 1, genesis 2, the stories of creation. Typically you wouldn't have to be religious to land here, but usually people are and they're talking about the integrity of male-female distinctions. So for the Christian, male-female distinctions that God intended at creation, and so when someone adopts a cross-gender or other gender identity, they're going against the integrity of what God intended at creation, and so in that way it's a violation of that integrity or it's a diminishing of the sacredness of male-female distinctions that God intended at creation.
Speaker 3:And that group can tend to view this as kind of a more of a moral concern, like it's used language, more of sin. Sometimes people in this group will even land it like it's willful disobedience. It's a kind of even to have the experience. It's like a number of decisions you've made and you should really be walking that back. So not everybody in that space would say willful disobedience, but some do. But a lot of folks there would say it's sin, it's something to be repented of.
Speaker 3:A lot of ministry from that lens would be to restore creational intent. So lenses also inform ministry postures. By the way, I should probably let that cat out of the bag right now. But the second lens I described as disability. Cat out of the bag right now. So, um, but the second lens I described as disability, and this came from another author who was describing uh experiences in a related space and said that, um, that, uh, that the experience of gender dysphoria is, is, or gender discordance is like the result of the fall, and so in that sense it's something's not functioning properly. So take something like hearing loss. So you wouldn't today say that hearing loss is the result of bad decisions or sin or something like that.
Speaker 3:But we're not that far removed. I mean, in Scripture there is an exchange where the disciples go up to Jesus and say who sinned? That this man was born blind. Did his parents sin? Did he sin? And so sometimes people do think about it that way. But this group would say no wait, this is something not functioning properly, like hearing loss. It's a non-moral reality that we should respond to with compassion. Something's obviously not aligned properly. Your experience of your gender should line up with your biological markers like chromosomes, gonads, genitalia, and when it doesn't, it's not a willful disobedience or sin's not the right category for it. Something's not functioning properly.
Speaker 3:So if you're religious, you're usually drawing on the story of the fall in Genesis 3. You wouldn't need to be religious to land here. A number of people think of it this way it maps on to having a diagnosis in the diagnostic manual that mental health professionals use. So gender dysphoria is a formal diagnosis and so that kind of maps onto that pretty well.
Speaker 3:And then the third lens I described was diversity, and I would say that's where my field of psychology is. Education is. You know a lot of fields. The mainstream of the field is viewing differences in gender more as a reflection of diversity than a disability even with the diagnosis there than a disability or certainly a moral concern. So this group would say no. And if you're religious, this group would say no. This is a reflection of God's creativity and impulse from God to demonstrate and reflect diverse gender experiences that are not the result of the fall of Genesis 3. They existed anyway, so it's a very different sort of place to land, I think, in that conversation. So these three lenses is what I'm describing and often they're speaking past one another. These lenses exist in the local church, obviously, throughout society, in families that come to see someone like me, and so often people are speaking past one another, even within their family or their church.
Speaker 1:And do you find people are firmly encamped in one of those three buckets, those approaches, or is there those who kind of own both? I mean, I know from your books what you ultimately argue is kind of an approach to incorporate all three, but I guess more of your experience are people more so only in one.
Speaker 3:I think we're a very polarized country right now around this topic, these issues, and I think the polarization is largely between the integrity lens and its proponents and the diversity lens and its proponents. So those folks are typically pretty securely rooted in that position. When I go over all three of them, like I might say this to a parent or something like that maybe their teen just came out as non-binary or something like that, and I go over these three lenses just to invite everybody to share a little bit about how a lens came to capture you know their convictions or their imagination or their experience, and often a parent will say I believe I'm, you know the integrity lens, but there's elements of that second lens that really ring true for me. Because I want to be more compassionate, I do think this is a real thing, but I am concerned about sin. So I mean they're kind of walking a foot in both. You know two of them. So yeah, that's often, I think, what happens.
Speaker 3:Even if I meet with a teen or a young adult who says I'm trans, I'm non-binary, if I go over the three lenses, some of them will say no, I'm diversity lens for sure.
Speaker 3:And some will say there's elements of that second lens. I may not want to talk about it with my parents, I may not want to frame it this way that often, but the reality is this is painful and I can understand why. There's a diagnosis or the diagnosis gives me access to services that get paid for, and I realize maybe they don't see it as a teenager, but maybe as a young adult they realize the diagnosis is an entryway to care in some ways, and so you know it's complicated. Even the diagnostic that the working group that landed on gender dysphoria in our diagnostic manual there's some video of them talking about the tensions they felt, in a sense wanting to remove it from the diagnostic manual to sort of affirm the diversity lens but at the same time wanting to retain it to give people access to um, to care, and that was the second lens I mean. So it's not like it's just an in-house church conversation.
Speaker 1:This is a larger way in which these lenses function in society yeah, yeah, I mean I think you may have been the first person I heard that would that I kind of always thought it was the, the two polar ends. But when you did describe more of the middle ends there and kind of seeing it as something that someone, the disability that someone, the pain that someone might be going through, it immediately took it from me out of like I really am trying to hold my theological convictions, but then hearing the pain that someone might go through as they're exploring this and it's not just the choice or not To me that was really helpful. I think even at the conference, the Exiles of Babylon conference, you shared something along the lines of the feeling of having a note that was just out of key and wanting it to resolve or something like that, and I'm like okay, that I think, disarms people's. You know approach to the conversation. Have you found that to be true? Yeah, that was that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll just share that story really quickly, cause it was a. It was a consultation we do. We do consultations on gender, uh, pretty regularly do evaluations on gender dysphoria to see if the diagnosis is warranted or if there's other things going on. And we were meeting with a young person who said that.
Speaker 3:I asked them help me understand gender dysphoria, how would you explain it to someone who's never experienced it? And the young person said it's like dissonance in music, it's a tonal combination that seeks resolution and it just never resolves. And so, anyway, I'm giving feedback later that day to the parents in front of their child, and I shared that with them and it really was a light bulb moment because they were both musicians and it just like came together for them, like they know what dissonance is better than anything. And if your child's saying I'm living like that all the time and you know that when you have dissonance you seek resolution and you can't resolve it, that has got to be unbearable, you know, and that was kind of a breakthrough moment in that one situation, just for compassion and empathy and like okay, this is, this is real yeah, yeah, what would you say is is is one common misconception christians have about transgender persons.
Speaker 1:Um, in particular, I guess you you've obviously, you work with transgender people, but you also work with churches, so what would you say is one big misconception, um, they might have.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, let me give two, just because I mean, the one is a little bit of a just a saying that someone shared with me, but it's if you've met one transgender person, you've met one transgender person. I guess I would, in that sense I would say don't expect that. So I know somebody that that means everybody has the same experience that that person has. There's quite a bit of diversity within people who would identify as transgender, because it's an umbrella term that the community gave to themselves because they did not want to be under the weight of language that came from psychiatry and the medical world. So words like transvestic or transsexual and things like that that were more psychiatric and medical. The community said, no, we want to be known publicly and politically this way transgender. So it's an umbrella term for a lot of different ways that people experience their gender. So, again, if you've met one, you've met one. I think that's important.
Speaker 3:The other would be transgender people are not all activists. Most transgender people are just people who are trying to figure this part of their life out, trying to have a good quality of life, trying to seek gainful employment, trying to finish their degree, whatever it is that you can relate to. That's most people in this space Are there activists? Sure, yes, there are activists in every area that is significant in society. But I think sometimes we think that everybody in this space is an activist by virtue of even identifying as transgender, and I think that's a misconception.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good. That's good. I think you distinguish the different type of you know whether it's a political, public or private type kind of approach that someone might be having around this, and very rarely do we actually encounter someone who's thinking about this politically. It's usually more-. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and those three those distinctions I think are important because you would relate to different people differently. I mean you'd relate to an activist very differently than you'd relate to your neighbor or an extended family member, right, and you'd relate to someone differently who's coming to you for help and maybe you're in your small group or they're part of your church or your home group and they're saying I really want you to pray for me. Your neighbor may not be asking you to pray for them around this issue, but they're your neighbor or their extended family or something like that. So your posture is different with different people, based on is it a political identity? Is it a public identity as a neighbor or a family member? Is it sort of a private identity and they're asking for counseling and ministry. So just different postures you would take.
Speaker 1:No, I love that. I mean, I think that word is something that I feel like you embody well and well of posture, that is something that I noticed just in listening to you but also hearing you and then at this last Exiles of Babel conference. There was differing views there but because of your posture you were able to, I think, approach the conversation in just a very compassionate but winsome way. Compassionate but winsome way. But you quote in the book around Andy Crouch's distinction between posture and gesture. Could you speak to that a little bit, because I think that is a very helpful way in thinking of ways to approach this topic.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I think if you have a if I understood Andy Crouch around this I think if you have a pretty rigid posture, you have very restricted gestures. There's not much you can do. So if your posture is kind of you believe that as a Christian, this is nothing more than a culture war issue, your posture is going to be defend, defend, defend, don't give ground. And so that posture is going to limit your gestures. They're going to be very restricted because your filter is solely going to be around how do I defend against a culture war? How do I defend against a culture war? So any sign of compassion, any sign of empathy is conceding ground in an area that you need to win. And you're not just winning it for yourself, you're winning it for the kingdom. And so it's a very compelling message to be a culture warrior and I urge Christians to challenge that view that that's the best posture for the Christian.
Speaker 3:I think what happens for culture warriors is they see other Christians who are, I would describe, as cultural capitulators, and that posture just seems to be well, I want to get along with everybody. Well, you know, if you say there's a hundred genders, there's a hundred genders, who am I to argue. I mean, they just don't seem to bring a christian worldview into the conversation whatsoever. So for them it's, and so I think warriors get activated by capitulators. It's like, and the more capitulators watch, warriors are like. I don't want to be that's not the brand. I don't want to be known as a troublemaker and someone who's just irritable and always angry at somebody. So I'm just going to kind of go with the flow.
Speaker 3:So what I argue for is ambassadorship. I think that's a very biblical vision for the Christian. How can I be an ambassador of the kingdom of God to a diverse and pluralistic culture that's increasingly unfamiliar with the lens through which I see these topics? And the challenge that the Christian faces is how do I translate kingdom considerations to people who don't have the same frame of reference and how do I not react so strongly when they don't have that frame of reference? And they're naturally talking to me out of their own frame of reference. You know that is a disciplined posture to take, to be an ambassador, yeah.
Speaker 1:I feel like this is good advice regardless of what topic we're talking about, right, but I think it's especially important on such explosive topics like this that do stir up people's hearts, but also division and things like that as well, and so I think that's really, really helpful. We've been talking about misconception and things like that, but any advice you would give to the church, a particular church in Waco, or any other church around surrounding this subject- Well, I think a great place to start would be the three lenses.
Speaker 3:I think if I were. I often do consult with churches and one thing I do is I just I'll go over the lenses as even handedly as I can, because I think there is a strength to each lens. The reason I argue for an integrated lens that draws on the best of each of the three lenses is that I think there's something of value in each of those three lenses, and so, rather than demonizing any one of them and saying, well, you know, the true believer is this. You know, I wouldn't say that, and so I try to create space for everybody in the room at a church to be able to you know, I wouldn't say that, and so I try to create space for everybody in the room at a church to be able to, in leadership, in the congregation, whoever I'm speaking to, to be able to land on a lens or a combination of lenses that really does resonate for them, and I invite them to think about how it has come to resonate for them. So, for a church, you'd want to, from leadership down, you'd want to be thinking about how does our team, how does our team conceptualize these topics, and are there different lenses represented? Maybe it's not so much. There's different lenses in a leadership team where there probably is a little more consistency in thinking, but maybe there's ratios, maybe the relative weight to the different lenses and the three lenses in some ways integrated a little bit differently across the leadership. I think that would be a great place to start. Then what do we see in our church? What are the elements there? And just like I was talking about the warrior getting activated by the capitulator and vice versa, you might see that a lot of flare-ups in the local church occur because one of the lenses is reacting to something in the church, in a sermon, in the news, in public policy, in legislation that's coming up. The situation that's gotten them kind of activated. And so a lot of times we're kind of the elements of our lenses that are weighted get activated as we interact with the world around us. And so I think to realize that and to try to speak into that.
Speaker 3:And then what I argue for is ambass. Then you know what are you know what I argue for is ambassadorship is characterized by three C's conviction, civility and compassion. So it's clarifying as a leadership team, like what are our convictions, what do we think? You know, scripture says about these matters? And how do we understand that with the best of what we have from general revelation, the sciences and experience and things like that? How do we understand that, with the best of what we have from general revelation, the sciences and experience and things like that? How do we think about that, maybe holding that with some humility? So here are our convictions, but we don't want to weaponize our convictions. We want to hold them and we want to continue to pray and discern them. But here are our convictions, but we want to relate to others around us, in our church and outside, with civility.
Speaker 3:We're not going to demonize a group of people. We're not going to denigrate a group of people. We're not going to caricature a group of people and then knock over that straw man. You know we're not going to do those things. And then we're going to have compassion. Man, most of us have not experienced what we're talking about. That must be challenging, that must be hard on so many levels. So we're going to have empathy and compassion for that. And don't think of this also as us versus them, like they're out there and thank God, we've got our church here.
Speaker 3:You want to be thinking that we have young people in our church who are probably going to be navigating this experience.
Speaker 3:It may not be very many, but there will be some in youth group, or even if maybe most of our kids don't ever deal with this, they want to bring friends to our church youth group and this is their experience, or it is their experience, and maybe at 16, they experience this kind of discordance, or they have since they were four years old, you know. So it's like it's an experience that can occur in anybody's life and it can occur within the church. That can occur in anybody's life and it can occur within the church, and so it's not like it's outside the walls of the church and we have to think of how to minister to them. Though there are obviously communities in the LGBTQ community or just the transgender community that you say well, we have a heart for that population. Okay, that's fine, that's great, but you also know that you're going to have people in your church who experience this as well. Yeah, okay, that's fine, that's great, but you also know that you're going to have people in your church who experience this as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you mentioned young people. Is that that might be in our church? Is that where you're seeing like it's predominantly most active or becoming revealed in your research? Or is that people, when they get older, they just stop coming to church?
Speaker 3:Right. Yeah, there definitely is some drift away from church, although there's a recent, I guess, resurgence in some data. But I would say this comes out of Gallup polls and things like that, where they look at prevalence across generations, right, prevalence across generations, right. So you'll see, like Gen Z will at a higher rate identify as transgender or non-binary than like boomers, right, and so in between, you know, you'll have Gen X be a little bit less than boomers. You'll have millennials will be less than Gen X but more than you know. I'm sorry, more more than Gen X but less than Gen Z. I'm getting it mixed up here a little bit, but you'll see, the rates are higher with younger people and lower as you get older. Now some people would say it's the same rates for everybody.
Speaker 3:But the older people didn't have the language for it, they didn't have the sense of social support for it. I mean that's partially true. Um, I mean that's partly partially true. I mean, yes, if you're 60, you didn't grow up in a time where it was kind of centered in the cultural discourse. I mean, I remember evaluating someone in their late 50s and they were saying that they would go to libraries and try to look for medical textbooks and just scour them to kind of find out what was wrong with them, because they thought they might have like psychosis or some like break with reality kind of a schizophrenic experience.
Speaker 3:And uh, they landed on whatever the designation was at that time and for them it was like a light bulb went off, like okay, this is a real thing. I'm not. I'm not crazy in in the sense of like a psychotic break. There's a real word for what I'm experiencing and they had never come across that. Well, if you're 14 or 15, you're not scouring medical textbooks to find out what this is. I mean, it's everywhere. Is it a trend? Is it just kind of a cultural trend for young people today? And so I think that's the other, the pendulum's kind of on the other side of that. Maybe that's why the numbers are up, not just self-awareness, right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you feel like, um, there is a like what happens? Um, I, I love the, the integrative approach that you talk about, kind of integrating these, these three different approaches. Um, as I'm an enneagram nine and I'm like yeah, I see the value of all of these approaches. Uh, that's just inherent in the way I see the world. Um, what is there ever a point when they are at conflict with one another, where you kind of have to lean in one direction or the other? Do you kind of understand what I'm saying about that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean if you believe from the third lens that this is a reflection of God's creativity, you're really saying it's not the result of a fallen world in which we live where, like hearing loss, you know that, that you were designed to hear and um variations in the inability to hear, or just the reflection of god's creativity. I don't think people would really resonate with that. You know now there are definitely in the deaf community. There is definitely disagreement as to whether they view hearing loss as a culture or as a medical condition. Like that is a legitimate debate that happens within that community. But I think for the Christian it's going to be difficult to say that diverse gender identities are a reflection of God's creativity and the result of the fall. It seems like you kind of have to land one way or the other it's harder to say it and willful disobedience. You start to just kind of bump into each other right there, like if you think that your child sinned, like.
Speaker 3:I remember a meeting with a mother whose 16-year-old daughter was coming in for an evaluation and they had been to their pastor at their church and two other pastors within their denomination and each of the three pastors when they met the daughter and talked with the mom, said that the daughter that this was just a matter of willful disobedience on the daughter's part. The story she's telling of discordance in her gender identity and the pain that's resulting from that is just a matter of willful disobedience. And that was the language the mom used. And you know I was doing an all-day evaluation and I just paused for a moment and I said you know, I've been meeting with your daughter now for a few hours and I can assure you that this is not something that she chose to experience. This is not willful disobedience. Now she'll have choices to make and she'll be looking for, you know, input as to kind of how she's going to respond to the discomfort she has in her body.
Speaker 3:But to say that it's willful disobedience is just not true. And this mother just burst into tears because she had never heard any Christian authority of any stripe say anything other than willful disobedience. And so she had no frame of reference. Her only, her only way to sort of make sense of her daughter's experience was to say it was just sin and she needs to repent. And she needs to you know to to not have this experience, you know, and when you only have that frame of reference and everybody you trust is telling you that, yeah, you have no other category for what this could be like.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Is that so as and and cause one of the I mean one of the questions that goes, that goes through my mind whenever we have, whenever we have even conversations like this, is like why, why is it so, why has it become so heated now for us to have this particular set of conversations, and and and and and part of it, and, and. I think that what you, what you just what you just noted, I mean, is is, I think, a big piece of it, that these are. I mean that people have not had categories to narrate their experience, and now that they, and now that they do, especially especially in church context, where people are used to having used the same categories for conversation for centuries, and so there is a, in some ways, a and please critique this as you see fit, because you can critique me, we'll keep the other people out there, but please correct me if I'm wrong there's, in a sense, a kind of inherent conservatism to the way that we function as the church, in the sense that, hey, we have these categories that have worked for a very long time, like let's, let's, let's narrate the world, let's narrate the world. In that, in that way, this goes back to this, goes back to the. The integrity lens that you, that you, that you narrated Um one of the questions, but I said one of the one, of the one of the one of the questions that still, that still goes through my mind is okay, uh, this we got the Lord and thunder Um the question um, why?
Speaker 2:why, especially over the course of the last like kind of few, few decades or so? Why, like, why are? Why is this particular conversation so hot Right right right now? And by hot so hot right right right now, and by hot I mean I mean in, I mean the actual temperature of the like, the actual temperature of these of these conversations.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think the heat's probably a few things I'm, you know, part of it is the prevalence it's, it's it's increasing invisibility and in, in some ways, the transgender community sort of latched on to the gay community and their success in mainstreaming, primarily through, you know, the legalization of marriage and things of that nature, were symbolic, you know, to the broader culture and I think the transgender community in some ways wanted to sort of use similar assimilationist approaches to you know, to sort of bring mainstreaming themselves within the culture. So the visibility. When I started my career, you know, in the late 1990s, you know I'd see cases like this but it was so rare, you know, it was just not that common of an experience. Still, in our diagnostic manual it's funny they reference studies done back then and they would estimate like one in 11 000 biological males, one in 30 000 biological females, things like that.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, when you read the small print, it was actually, um, only adults who were going to specially gender clinics in europe to seek care, and that's not a good way to get prevalence estimates for a phenomenon. It was always more than that, yeah, but but never quite what it is today. It's gotten. You know? You remember what was it? 2013, laverne cox was on the cover of time magazine and it said the transgender tipping point right, orange is the new black. It was kind of this whole like wow, we're really centering this in the conversation. So that's part of it. When you center something, the church is going to have response. Yeah, um.
Speaker 3:The other is the development of medically affirmative care for minors. So medically affirmative care, or medical transitioning, had been available for a long time. There's a story of a person who transitioned in the 1950s Christina Jorgensen, and she had served in World War II and transitioned later and it was like a big deal. It was on the front cover of some newspapers at the time. It was kind of like when Caitlyn Jenner transitioned, it was kind of a major figure at that time. So it's not like it's never been around.
Speaker 3:But in about 1990s in the Netherlands they began to utilize medically affirmative care with minors, and so it would entail blocking a minor from going into puberty. So right at the beginning of puberty, and you can delay puberty for a year or two, and then you can decide to come off that blocker and go through puberty as you would have anyway, or to use cross-sex hormones. So that became it's called the Dutch model. It's a Dutch protocol and it was brought to the US in, I want to say, 2009, at Boston University Children's Hospital, and then a number of clinics around the US started to sort of reference that as the approach they were going to take. Now, to be fair to the Dutch model, it was based on a more comprehensive evaluation of a child psychological testing, testing around gender dysphoria. It was a kind of a complete package. Even if you disagree with it and I certainly have concerns about it. Even if you disagree with it and I certainly have concerns about it it was pretty comprehensive and then someone would be brought into that protocol if they were a good candidate. So, like right now, I was there a couple of years ago and visited the clinic. There's like a three-year waiting list. So if you're waiting for three years and you get called into care. You probably have gender dysphoria, right. I mean, you know, it's just, it's a long time to wait and say I hope I can pull these guys, you know so.
Speaker 3:So I think, um, so a country like the Netherlands has one gender clinic for the country, uh and? And the UK had that for many years the Tavistock Clinic and so the US does not have that. We have dozens of gender clinics and so there's not one protocol. So across dozens of clinics, you could have dozens of ways that people do evaluations and land on the diagnosis. So I think when people say, well, we're using the Dutch approach, I'm not sure that clinics are always using the most comprehensive evaluation.
Speaker 3:I think that's been one of the major complaints. Hey, you're kind of passing my child along, you're transitioning them medically and you haven't even noted that they have a major depressive disorder or they have a trauma history or they have autism spectrum disorder. All these other common co-occurring issues are not even being treated. You're narrowly focusing on the gender piece, and I understand that that's important, but you're not addressing these things and by not doing a comprehensive evaluation you could be guilty of passing young people along, so I think that's raised. Concerns young people along? So I think that's raised concerns. Everybody is concerned for the most vulnerable in society, and so both transgender community are concerned about people they view as like them, and conservative Christian community is concerned for, like, what are we doing with children? Like that's a vulnerable population. So that has also put heated up this whole conversation. Is what's happening to the most vulnerable around us? Yeah, that's.
Speaker 1:I think that's a helpful way of framing it and kind of seeing both you know how, how we got to where we're at Um it, or, if you know, we were kind of talking big picture on on this Um. But if you have and you probably have had, uh, parents come, parents come to you. What would your advice be to parents who are saying, hey, my child's asking to transition here, how do you counsel them in this moment?
Speaker 3:Well, I think what we first want to understand is what is going on. The request to transition is coming from someplace, so where is that coming from? A lot of parents come to me concerned about social media influence. They seem to have a lot of friends who are transgender. They seem to be online or they're in discord and they're always talking, or they're using a different name, or maybe they're transitioning there socially. So you know, is it? I think some parents raise the question is it peer group approval? Is it peer group acceptance? Is it a trend? Is it just kind of, is my child kind of caught up in that? And that's what this is. That's one consideration. Another would be is it gender dysphoria? Is it really what we're talking about here?
Speaker 3:So sometimes my advice is to consider a more comprehensive evaluation to determine what's going on. Does my child have gender dysphoria, yes or no? Do they meet the criteria? Do they meet the criteria for other things that are co-occurring, like major depressive disorder or an anxiety disorder or trauma history, or autism spectrum disorder, adhd, something like that? So those are two common questions. A third would be where do we go from here? If it is? If it isn't, what recommendations do you have. And then, fourth, how do we improve family relationships that may have been strained over the course of this time? So those are the four major questions that people come to see me. So to answer your question is what advice would you give them?
Speaker 3:I think you have to answer the first couple questions you have to look at. Is this gender dysphoria? What else is going on? Because a lot of times, with the pressure even of the of the teenager or young adult, is that they want, they're so focused on transitioning that they'll go untreated in other areas. You know, I remember working with a, with an adolescent who had a very severe anxiety disorder and gender dysphoria and they were homebound, they weren't even going to school, they were just doing everything at home. And I met with them for a while and I said look, I don't know what your knowledge of other people who have gender dysphoria is or who identify as transgender, but most people your age are able to go to school.
Speaker 3:You know, when you've been in school you've not reported being bullied or harassed, but you have a very significant anxiety disorder that's untreated, and so I'd like for you to be able to see your gender more clearly, and I think the way to do that is to treat your anxiety disorders, bring your anxiety down, and a good measure of that is that you could function at school. You could go to school, you wouldn't be homebound anymore. Um, so I mean, that's the kind of thing that you know. You always try to make sure that the co-occurring issues are well managed. You don't want people making decisions about significant decisions around gender out of a major depressive episode where they can't get their head above water right, or severe anxiety disorder where they're homebound. How can you even face decisions around gender when you're compromised in these other ways? So that's like a place to begin. What are we actually dealing with? Uh, when a parent says, what should we do you?
Speaker 1:know, I guess that goes in my um trying to get nitty-gritty um if, if you know, I've.
Speaker 1:I've had people come ask me me this um, you know like, hey, so, um, family member is, is, um, having some gender dysphoria, and they want to be called by a new name, um, and they buy a new pronoun, um. So to pronoun or to not? Uh, that is the question. Uh, how would you, uh, would you kind of similarly go like let's talk through all these other things, or would you kind of counsel them hey, if that's what they want to be called, you call them that. How would you kind of respond?
Speaker 3:yeah, so I. So I don't think it's, as it's not quite as cavalier as if they just want to be called something. You call them something, but neither is it. You never would make a concession here, I think. I think you now I'm thinking about this as a psychologist who's looking at their mental health.
Speaker 3:So there's that's one scenario. Another scenario is you have a guest come into your church and they're visiting your church for the first time and they say you know, here's my name and pronouns. You know that those are different scenarios, right? So I'm working as a psychologist, that's my, that's my job, and so I'm meeting with people of all, all, all walks of life, different frames of reference, and their child is teen or young adult, is saying I want to be called this. So it's not just yes or no, go for it. It's more like how does the use of a preferred name and pronouns function for this person? That's kind of how mental health professionals think about these things, and you're probably going to be looking at those three lenses a little bit again.
Speaker 3:Does it function in alleviating dysphoria? Does it help with the distress? So there's mixed, actually, research evidence as to whether it does. Some studies have suggested or shown that it seems to help some people. Others it's not helped. And so it's not a slam dunk that the use of preferred pronouns helps everybody with gender dysphoria. That's been, I think, a little bit of a miss. I think sometimes our field has misrepresented that as it's a no-brainer. It's obvious the data's a little bit mixed there actually. But when you're sitting in front of this person the question is would it help them? Right?
Speaker 3:And so I often think of care for people with gender dysphoria in terms of mountaintops and plateaus. So in our society today we often treat medical transitions as a mountaintop that everybody who has gender dysphoria should be hiking toward their goal. Their destination is to reach that mountaintop, which is hormonal treatment. Gender confirmation surgeries complete medical transition and I think sometimes our field has contributed to that message as well that that's the foregone conclusion of what we should all aspire to. But most adults, if you look at survey research of adult transgender people, most adults do not use hormones and most adults do not use gender confirmation surgeries for a variety of reasons. Maybe they want to, maybe they can't afford it, maybe their insurance doesn't cover it, maybe they're conflicted about it, maybe they're concerned about the. Will this ever change, maybe I'll have second thoughts. It could be a lot of reasons, right? So most people don't know that and most people in my experience in this space who have gender dysphoria plateau somewhere short of that mountaintop.
Speaker 3:So what's a plateau? Well, there's multiple plateaus, some plateaus. When someone comes to see me, I'm kind of assessing right from the jump what is the plateau they're at right now. So if they're coming in, a biological male who's growing his hair out long and shaves his arm or wears long clothes even in the summer, just to cover, you know, secondary sex characteristics of body hair, or they're a biological female who keeps her hair short and also wears baggy clothing but to hide body curves and shape and things like that, maybe wears a sports bra or a binder to compress her chest, that's a plateau. The request for a different name or a nickname or pronouns is a plateau from least invasive, which is like I'm going to grow out my hair and I can always cut it later, or I'm going to cut my hair, I can always grow it out later, but at least invasive, to the most invasive, which is surgical procedures and hormones and things like that.
Speaker 3:So there's a continuum that I would describe as plateaus. So part of what I'm saying when I meet with someone is what is your plateau and how are you doing in that plateau? Because a plateau you could plateau for six weeks, you could plateau for six months, you could plateau for six years. You can always revisit a plateau, but what you don't want to do is think I'm never where I need to be because I need to be at the mountaintop. I think that's a misunderstanding of what? Because most people just don't do that. Most people plateau. So how can I help you find your plateau is the language I give people in therapy.
Speaker 1:That's so good. That's so good. How can I help you find your plateau?
Speaker 2:I have a question as a pastor. As a pastor, so perhaps from even your clinical experience, you've probably encountered contexts where pastors perhaps in sermons have said things that have maybe caused particular harm.
Speaker 2:As you think about coming from, you know, coming from coming from churches that you know just preach through, I mean we, we, we pick, we pick books of the Bible to just preach through, entirely Cause we just want to, we just want to preach, we just want to preach the scriptures, one of the things that always goes through my mind is um, you know, I mean, I mean the goal is to bring this to bear in the lives of the people that we're called to serve and to love. As we think about especially caring for the folks in our midst who may either identify as transgender or experience gender dysphoria, is the what is, if you have any guidance that you would have for a preacher who's seeking to, um, to from the to, from the to from the pulpit, communicate, communicate about, about some of these, about some of these things, um, what guidance would you have? Things to, things to lean towards and things to lean away from?
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a really interesting question. So I love, you know, expository preaching, and our, our church, does the same, very similar. It's less theme based. We're not, you know, doing a sexuality series or you know, uh, first Corinthians or whatever it is. So it's uh, um. So yeah, I, I get that. I think you know the thing about this topic is it's not, it doesn't really come up in Scripture that much Right exactly.
Speaker 3:You know, there's a passage in the Old Testament I think it's in Leviticus that is a prohibition on essentially cross-dressing. Yeah, and I'm not an expert in the ancient Israelites and the world that they lived in, but my understanding of that is that the Canaanites were involved in cross-dressing behavior and it was also paired with same-sex sexual behavior. That was ritualistic, and the guy was saying I don't want you to be a part of that, I want to restrict you from being a part of that, being tainted by these practices that take you away from worshiping the one true God. And so there's an element of yeah, I mean, I get that, but that's not what people people who come to see me are not. That's not what they're doing. Yeah, the sexual element of this is just absent.
Speaker 3:I mean, if we're talking about a sexual element with cross-dressing, it's a different category. There are people who pair cross-dressing with sexual excitement, but it's not gender dysphoria, it's a different thing. It's more like a fetish, and that's a different thing you wouldn't even like as a mental health professional. You wouldn't even approach that in the same way that you approach this. So once you're getting into the sexual nature of something like that, let alone ritual practices, once you get into that, it's in a different category. So, for what it's worth, if I was I mean they put me in the pulpit a couple times I don't recommend it. I don't recommend it why would you put us like, how you know?
Speaker 3:uh I, I, I think if I was going over a passage like that, I, I would probably talk about whether it's relevant. You know, in what way does it bear? Not so that it's not irrelevant. I think all of Scripture is relevant. The question is, what bearing does that have to this contemporary conversation? And you know, where do you see yourself in? You know, and I think for me, those passages are more about worshiping the one true God and not being drawn away by things that would be compelling from competing messages and societies. You know, things like that. There's a lot of ways to connect that, but those are messages that everybody can benefit from and I think, to make it about transgender experiences, you're doing a lot of hermeneutical gymnastics, I think, to get there, yeah, and that says more about you as a preacher.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, that's good, that's good, that's good. Um, all right, hey, let's, let's, uh, let's have a little fun. Uh, we've, we've gotten, gotten, gotten pretty deep. Um, we're gonna do a little. Uh, give you, let's say, 10 seconds per question here. We're going to get the clock started. Are you ready? Here we go.
Speaker 3:I just wanted 10 seconds to say I'm ready.
Speaker 1:What's one book other than your own that you wish more Christians would read about gender and sexuality?
Speaker 3:So I think, Embodied by Preston Sprinkle, offers some really nice insights and he's very relational and compassionate towards groups of people that he tries to write about, so I think that's a nice angle of entry into this conversation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we would also highly recommend many of your books as well. We will definitely link those in the notes. What's one theologian counselor pastor you admire when it comes to handling these conversations and you can't use Preston now?
Speaker 3:Oh, okay, well, I really like Dr Julia Sadusky. She is really an emerging voice in sexuality and gender. She and I have written a couple of books together, but she's a younger, up-and-coming psychologist who's really really found her voice in writing a couple of books on how parents should raise their kids, in terms of teaching them about sex and conversations with their teenagers, and she's been working in the area of gender as well.
Speaker 1:That's good. That's good. If you could write one book on any other subject, what would you write it about?
Speaker 3:You know, I think you know I've been talking about conviction, civility, that kind of thing, but how you your posture as a Christian in a in a diverse and pluralistic society. This conversation is just a case study in how to do this broadly. So it would be interesting. I just don't know that I would have time to write a book like that. But if you wanted to be more winsome and more relational and more thoughtful on any topic and how to do that in a culture that's no longer centered on a kind of a Judeo-Christian heritage, I think that would be an interesting book to write.
Speaker 1:Pete Nice. What's one misconception people have about you?
Speaker 3:Pete Too good-looking. Pete, I think people think that I like controversy. You must love being in the thick of things and just war right in there. I don't like that. This is not something I would have chosen. I never thought this would be my career, never thought I would work in this space. It is not because I'm always looking for a fight and eager to have one. That is not my temperament at all.
Speaker 1:Yeah, favorite drink to have while you're deep in research Coffee, tea, whiskey.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:I'm going to go with coffee.
Speaker 1:Favorite place you've traveled for work.
Speaker 3:I've been to Eastern Europe several times. I would say Prague is a favorite place in the Czech Republic.
Speaker 1:Okay, and if you had to sum up your approach to this topic in one word, what would it be?
Speaker 3:Maybe alongside or winsome, something like that I love it, I love it.
Speaker 1:This is not the rapid fire. Maybe just one last piece of advice for those listening in here to, as they approach the subject what's one, one piece of advice you'd give? You, give the church here.
Speaker 3:So I think I'd say it this way it's not about being like accused being pro-trans or anti-trans. I think the church wants to be pro the image of God in all people, and so you always, as a church, want to elevate the conversation so that you're speaking to how can we speak into the lives of people around us and avoid, as soon as you're designated pro or anti you're, you are already in the culture wars, yeah, and the church the church often is is, um, trying to formulate responses out of some fear, fear of being labeled pro-trans, anti-trans, all these different things. I mean, I get that, yeah, but churches do not function at their best when they function out of fear.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Oh goodness, that is a word right there, all right.
Speaker 2:All right, that is a word, oh man.
Speaker 1:Well, mark, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you, the show here. We will link all of the all the ways that people can get connected with you on social media and all your books and articles and podcasts, as much as we can, because we're big fans. You seem to be everywhere, which is great, but no, we sincerely thank you for coming on, for sharing your faith and your work here with us.
Speaker 3:Thank you, doc sharing your faith and your work here with us. It's going to be as well.
Speaker 2:Thank you Awesome, Thank you.
Speaker 3:Doc.
Speaker 1:Alright y'all. Well, thanks for listening in and if you enjoyed it, please like, rate and share it with somebody. I'm sure someone would be very interested in this conversation, so do us a favor, share that and get the word out. Alright y'all. We'll see you next time on Theology Pieces. Bye y'all.