The Genderweird Vibe of God

Keynote Speech given at the Transgender Theology Conference, 2024

It is striking that, across continents, and centuries, and theologies, the one unifying thing that appears in the struggles of oppressed peoples is faith. Faith that draws people onward, inspires them to call out against their oppressors, and encourages them to see themselves as worthy of more. Faith is a fire in the soul, it enables us to do incredible things, spurred on by a sense of something bigger and more important than ourselves - and a sense that what we are doing is, somehow, “right”.

In the Christian context, it is the worthiness of each created person, the fact that we are, each and every one of us, created in the image of God, that has, for centuries, spurred calls for social change, and fuelled fights against injustice. Fights that often took on, for those of faith, a spiritual dimension, with scripture cited - on both sides - as to why such and such a position is “correct” and “of God”.

The important thing to note is that, no matter what the short-term fluctuations may be, the arc of change, across all of time, is towards equality and justice; no matter what scripture may be twisted and cited in an attempt to oppose that change. This is, I argue, because it is the will of God. It is the movement of the Holy Spirit that pushes us along this arc of justice, against all the odds, and against all our own fears and burdens. We can, for a short time, act contrary to God’s will, but we cannot truly prevail. Such a great shift, across centuries and continents, must have, at it’s core, something of God within it.

Due to the power held by the Christian Church across centuries, in all its many forms, many political battles became religious ones - questions of human rights, land reform, justice, legality, and even finance, became questions of theology, scripture, and ecclesiology. This legacy lingers, with western law, philosophy, and our sense of the self, being almost inseparably linked to Christian thought, with foundational texts written by philosopher-theologians, even as atheistic thought entered, and in many ways, transformed, the discipline. This means that, at the heart of much modern thought, no matter how detached from theology it may be, somewhere within it is a grain of Christianity. And that means that, at the heart of popular anti-trans screeds, even those detached from religion, which use only “science” and “logic” and “philosophy” to prove their point there is a buried vein of theology. A theology that is used to oppress transgender people, just like the theology that was used to counter so many movements for justice and equality before us. Theology of oppression, and injustice.  Theology of fear, and reduction. Theology that says we are sinful, unworthy, and somehow, intrinsically, tainted or wrong - Or at least, that’s what it thinks it says. What it says to me, when considered for even a moment, is that God is small, uncreative, unimaginative, unable to handle this world, as it is. And I do not, can not, believe that.

The core of the anti-trans movement, and therefore anti-trans theology, is restriction. A restriction placed upon the possibilities held within humanity, and a restriction placed upon God. A restriction that shrinks and conforms God to the image of the oppressor, denying the oppressed full personhood, as delivered by the wondrous seal of imago dei - the promise and fact that we are created in the image of God. Because if trans people are not made in the image of God - or, if we follow a more polite, but still transphobic form of the stance, if trans people are made in the image of God, but our transness is not - then God is a cis person. Just as, in times gone by, it was believed that God was a white person. A white man. A rich white man. A rich white man with power. But God is bigger than that. God is bigger than the boundaries we build around ourselves, and the categories we use to confine and divide humanity.

God does not look like you, alone. Just as God does not look like me. If we believe, truly believe, that everyone is made in the image of God, then that means that everyone we see reflects some part of God. Some tiny fragment of a whole that is so much larger, and so much more wonderful, than any of us can imagine. 

What astounds me is that this should be obvious. Theologians long ago accepted that God is not a man. God cannot be a man. God does not conform to human conceptions of gender; a binary enforced not by nature, or by God, but by us. The Bible itself acknowledges the lack of binary gender when Jesus himself says “there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.”

A strictly binary and immutable understanding of gender is, in actuality, not the same as the understandings prevalent throughout much of Christian history. In the 1500’s, stories of early Christian religious houses, not for men or women, but for eunuchs prompted Bishop Simone Maiolo to suggest, albeit in passing, that a third religious order, not of monks, nor nuns, but of “hermaphrodites” might be created. Earlier, in England, in the 1200’s, Henry de Bracton's "On the Laws and Customs of England" defined three genders: male, female, or hermaphrodite.

This recognition was not limited to secular law (although the boundaries between the two were far fuzzier back then). Decretum Gratiani, a compendium of Roman Catholic Canon Law from the 1100’s, and Summa Decretorum, a commentary on that compendium, mention “hermaphrodites”, providing directions as to how to fit their non-binary existence into what was becoming a more and more binary and gendered church, with women excluded from ordained roles, and religious communities divided into two distinct gendered groups.

What is interesting is that, contrary to modern transphobic calls of “facts over feelings”, the feelings of the person were, according to these Canons, taken into account by the Church when it came to deciding on what side of the gendered line a person would fall. One section of this compendium states that “If someone has a beard and always wants to perform male tasks (and  not  female ones) and always wants to converse with men (and not women), this is a sign that the male sex prevails in him, and that he can be witness where a woman is not admitted, that is, in testaments and last wills, and can be ordained. But if someone lacks a beard and always wants to be with women and perform female tasks, this is evidence that the female sex prevails, and thus she is not admitted as witness where women are not admitted ( i.e. in testaments ), and cannot be ordained, because a woman does not receive holy orders”

This passage contains a number of notable things - and if I may pick up on just two, firstly it shows us that people of variant gender were recognised in the early church, just as they were recognised by Jesus, who used the word “Eunuch” to refer to them. And they were clearly common enough to have laws about them, too.

The second notable thing is the use of the Latin word “vult”, meaning “to want”. The psychology of the person, their actions, behaviours, and feelings, were taken into account, in order to place them on either side of the binary line required by the patriarchal society and structures the church had embraced. Though this choice, this recognition of gendered feelings, came with expectations about secondary sex characteristics, and was only offered to those who were visibly intersex - it can seem surprising to us - so used to a harshly binary world - that the church offered it at all - especially a thousand years ago.

However, before the advent of modern medicine, where intersex children are quickly wheeled off to have irreversible surgeries that many would not have chosen for themselves, intersex people were more visible, and they formed a clear sign and symbol of the non-binary nature of God’s creation, and the expansiveness of genders therein. Even as the church categorised the world into three, within that third “hermaphrodite” gender there was an expectation that people would come as a gradient - a gradient perceived, by the early church, as having men on one side, what was termed “perfect hermaphrodies” in the middle, and females on the other. Yet the concept and category of “hermaphrodite” itself came with gradations.

Modern conceptions of gender are far broader than that, with trans people more recently tending to define themselves without reference to a graduated spectrum at all - and certainly rejecting the idea that people can be simply categorised into boxes, be there two or three of them. However, it is undeniably true that medieval canon law accepted the existence of intersex people - though they did not use that terminology at the time - and in doing so accepted an understanding of gender beyond a simple binary, albeit reluctantly, confining it to a single category of “hermaphrodite”, or, more preferably, working to categorise the non-binary person, through the application of their rules, into one of the simpler “male or female” categories.

Even the main clobber verse used by transphobes, “Male and female he created them” is not as binary as it seems, and ancient scholars knew that. Just before this verse, Genesis states that God created “evening” “morning” - but this doesn’t mean that God didn’t create afternoon, or night. And it would be ludicrous to think that 1:45 or 3:08 are, in fact, satanic aberrations because they are neither evening or morning. This use of pairs is a literary device, commonly employed in the Bible and well known by Jewish and early Christian people - we call it a Merism. A merism is where you use two distinct parts of a thing to encompass the whole. Like when you lose your keys, and say you looked high and low for them - it doesn’t mean you didn’t look in the middle. It doesn’t mean you stared at the ceiling, and down at the floor, and ignored the countertops entirely. That would be ludicrous. And so, when Genesis 1 says that God created Male and Female, it is saying that, yes, God created us male and female, but it is also saying that God created everything in between. Everything within and without that category, all genders, and none.

Now, some would say that, well, we know God created the afternoon, because we can see it, and it is good. Well, I would say that God created trans, intersex, and genderqueer people, because we can see them, and they are good. It is simply that that arc of justice and freedom that I mentioned earlier has bent far enough, now, that more of the vastness of God’s creation is becoming clear to us - a vastness and diversity that was always present, but has finally been revealed by the Holy Spirit in this time, as more of the scales fall from the eyes of this world.

What all of these things tell us is that an understanding of gender as being two immutable sides of a distinct binary is, in fact, a recent thing, and wasn’t embedded into Christianity from its birth, and that interesting and expansive conceptions of gender have been found in our faith from the beginning; inspired, often, by the idea that we are all made in the image of God. A God who is all genders and none, simultaneously. This phenomenon is something I personally like to call “the gender-weird vibe of God”. I mean, if you look at the trinity you tend to find the Father referred to as “he”, the Son referred to as “he”, and the Holy Spirit referred to as “she” - so there’s already a sense of expansiveness in the gender there, even before you drill down into the specifics.

I find Jesus the easiest to discuss the gender of - simply because I think, in some ways, Jesus was the only aspect of the Trinity that ever really had a gender. I tend to believe that gender is a human conception - a splintering of some part of God that we can never fully contain as mortal creations, but which we reflect, imperfectly, and each of us differently. But Jesus was fully human, as well as fully God. And that means that Jesus, unlike God the Father and God the Holy Spirit would have definitively had a gender.

It seems simple - Being fully human  Jesus Christ was born into this world as a man, walked through this world as a man, and was taken from this world as a man. But Jesus Christ was also fully God. And God is far more expansive than we can imagine. And that leads to some interesting theology around the gender of Jesus, too.

Many medieval theologians discussed the ‘feminine’ aspects of Jesus. Some going as far as to openly refer to Jesus as “she” and “her” in their writings. You see, a huge focus of medieval theology was the concept of Jesus giving life. And the clearest example of life-giving was to give birth. Thus, Jesus Christ was seen as a mother, giving birth to a new world.

Looking at his miracles, focus was placed on this idea of the bringing of life. Jesus raising Lazarus from the tomb; Jesus himself rising from the tomb; both of these events involving the miraculous drawing out of human life from a dark cave, along a tunnel, and into the light. The childbirth metaphors write themselves. 

Then there’s the crucifixion. The focus of endless medieval meditations, visions, and treatises. It is often written that, through the events of the Crucifixion, Christ died so that we might live; and many medieval theologians, living in a time where death in childbirth was common, and childbirth itself could be horrifically painful, drew the connection between Christ's physical death on the cross and childbirth. They saw, and wrote at length about, how Jesus' agony on the cross was a form of 'labour' as he 'birthed' new life for all of us. The suffering he endured was, in their minds, the labour pains he was undergoing as he brought forth this new life. Then, when the soldier pierced his side, proving he was dead, and "blood and water" came out, they saw that as the moment of 'birth'. Like blood and water come forth in childbirth.

So, with that in mind, consider that wound - the opening in Christ’s side through which water and blood flowed - and in the midst of that water and blood comes, too, new life. It is easy to see, through this lens, why so many medieval artists depicted that side wound as a form of vulva, through the shape and the details, but also, sometimes, with a person coming out of it. A depiction of that birthing of new life so literal it’s almost comical.
Here we have Jesus Christ, the most, if not the only, truly gendered aspect of the Holy Trinity, dying in a human body, in a way that was, often, reserved for men, and yet, even then, the gender doesn’t quite stick. Even in this death, he is seen as participating in an act of childbirth.

Even before this moment, Jesus’ actions lead to questions. For a man living in a time of strict gender roles, he does a number of fascinating things. Not only does he speak to women as his equal, but he takes on what were traditionally gendered jobs, such as fetching and carrying water, and engages in traditional gendered behaviours, such as feeding and serving others. And Jesus never referred to himself as a man - or at least, it was never written down. In all the gospels - a consistency that is incredible in itself - Jesus never once refers to himself as  "a man" - never once uses the Greek word "anēr" (male/masculine) to describe himself. Instead, he always uses "anthrōpos" (human). Even when he refers to himself as “the son of man”, that’s not actually quite what he says. The three words of ancient Greek that this is rendered in are “υἱός τοῦ ἀνθρώπου”. The first word, “υἱός”, traditionally rendered as “son” is often translated as "male child" but regularly applies to female children. The second word is, simply, “of”, and the third, “ἀνθρώπου”, means “human” or “humanity”. Thus Christ claims to be the “Child of humanity”. Again, he remains ungendered.

My favourite medieval mystic, Julian of Norwich, quite famously refers to Jesus as a ‘mother’, who feeds us with her breastmilk - here referring to the Blessed Sacrament, which, like the breastmilk of a nursing mother, is a form of nourishment (albeit spiritual) which comes directly from the physical human body itself. And so Jesus Christ, ostensibly the most easily gendered of the Trinity is, upon closer inspection, not,  in fact, easy to gender at all.

Add to that the fact that, yes, Jesus Christ is fully human, as we have now discussed, but also fully God. How strange it must have been for Jesus to be born. How strange to be suddenly confined to the smallness of a human body, and how strange to be restricted to the male gender - that small fragment of the expansive nature of God.

What I am trying to show you, imperfectly, I am sure is that this modern upswelling of transphobia is not central to Christianity. That it is not inherent within our faith. And that, in fact, it is, in many ways, incompatible with so much of Christian doctrine and understanding.

Being Anglican, I believe in discerning God’s will through the triple lenses of “Scripture”, “Reason”, and “Tradition”, and not a single one of those contains a compelling argument to exclude LGBT people from full inclusion in the Church and in Society.

The claim that God created two genders, nothing more, and that trans and gender variant people are a modern phenomenon that goes against God somehow, is, in itself a modern phenomenon, that aims to twist a much more complex past, and a much more complex scripture, in order to create the conditions required to exclude. Not for God’s sake, but for the sake of a human society that is uncomfortable with the inclusion of those who ‘threaten’ imbalanced and unjust patriarchal structures.

The embrace of these patriarchal structures - an embrace first occasioned by a need to claim and maintain power within the Roman empire which, notably, executed Christ and countless numbers of his followers - is, in some ways, the first sin of the Church; the first deviation from Christ, who included women in his inner circle, who taught them, and sent them out to teach in turn.

And it is important to note, here, that Transphobia, Homophobia, and Sexism, all come from the same root - a need to maintain and uphold patriarchal structures of supremacy and control through a rigid understanding of genders, and gender stereotypes that portray men as better than women.

This dynamic is why trans women are ridiculed more publicly than trans men, because they are seen to be “giving up” patriarchal power, and therefore are both a threat to those power structures, and abhorrent to those who uphold them. Whereas trans men are pitied, being seen as silly women, but, in some ways, also slightly respected, for attempting to ‘gain’ the position of men in this society.

It’s why lesbians are almost forgotten, unless considered as objects of titillation for straight men. And why butch lesbians, who dare to transgress gendered expectations, are attacked more than fem lesbians. It’s why all the jokes we make about gay men, and all the slurs we have, are about the man who takes on the “feminine” role in sex, the man who “receives”, and in doing so is seen to be degraded through a perceived loss of masculinity.

It’s all sexism. All the way down. It’s nothing to do with God, and it’s everything to do with power. And fear.

Because what we have to remember is that at the root of all transphobia, is fear. A fear that reduces and contains God. A fear that truncates and erases aspects of creation that threaten established power structures. Fear of difference. Fear of God. And that means, in some ways, that we have already won this fight for our rights. Because fear is a human thing. Fear is a lonely thing. Fear is without true power and can only destroy. But love... love for ourselves, and for one another, and for God… well, that is of God. Because love is the most powerful thing of all. Love is the greatest of commandments, and the most wondrous of callings. Love is transformative. Love is transgressive. Love is, always, victorious. Love on the cross overcame death and sin. Just as love in our lives and our hearts will overcome all hatred.

It is, to my great luck, my faith that makes me love. That makes me love others, but also which makes me love myself - every aspect of myself. I am reminded that I am made in the image of God, and must treat myself, and those around me, with the love and respect worthy of those who carry within them that image.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu once said that ‘if we genuflect to recognise the presence of God, then the least we can do is genuflect towards one another’ - an astounding comment - and one which offers up a paradigm shift, because each of us does contain, within ourselves, something of God, something of the divine - we are a shattered constellation of mirrors, reflecting back into the world the wonder of God within ourselves and our lives.

I love who I am, because I love God. And so I love the gifts God has given me. I love the perspective my transness allows me, and the aspects of God it enables me to reflect. I love seeing God in all of you. And I love seeing God work in and through your lives, just as much as God works in and through everyone else’s lives.

I love, because I am loved. And because I know that I am loved. I have no doubt, and I feel no fear. Because love conquers fear. Even the fear which festers, and turns to hatred. Love, in the form of our most merciful mother Jesus Christ conquered the grave. And all that comes therein.

And so, filled with the knowledge of the love of God, and the promise fulfilled in the life of Christ, I work, every day, to love. And I challenge you all to love. and to feel loved, in turn. For, as the first letter of John says: 

“if we love one another, God abides in us,

and God’s love will be perfected in us.”

May God’s love be perfected in us, all of us, always. And may our lives - our incredible, unique, holy lives - be seen for what they are: wondrous and beloved in the sight of a God who formed us, and knew us, and loved us, exactly as we are, long before we were born.