According to a Catholic school professor in Ohio, the Bible affirms that people can change their gender.
In response to Ohio lawmakers’ vote on Wednesday to override the governor’s recent veto of a bill that forbids biological men from competing in women’s sports and restricts sex-change treatments for minors, University of Dayton doctor Esther Brownsmith listed “a few of the ways that scripture portrays gender as exhibiting range, not an immovable binary.”
According to her, “Deborah led an army, Mordecai breastfed his cousin Esther, and Daniel was possibly a eunuch,” and Joseph was one of many people in the Bible who “crossed gender boundaries.”
In an opinion piece that was published on Thursday in the Dayton Daily News, she claimed that “Even God is often described with feminine terminology, as a nurse or nursing mother.” “Yes, the Bible was written in a patriarchal era, but it acknowledges that, like today, people reimagined and expressed their gender identities.”
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Brownsmith continued to state her belief that gender shifts in society are strongly supported by the Bible.
“As a teacher of Hebrew Bible at the University of Dayton, I believe that scripture and transgender rights are not at odds. On the contrary,” she wrote, “The Bible urges us to support society’s most vulnerable, and that call has often been more urgent.”
She added, “Most Americans agree that religion shouldn’t dictate public policy, but these proposed laws are rooted in deeply ingrained religious biases about gender roles.” Those biases are unsound and irresponsible. Like Joseph and Deborah, our trans relatives are beautiful gifts from God, and they are terrified by our government’s attempts to legislate them out of existence.”
Conversely, the Catholic Church maintains that the first book of Genesis, which states that “God created man in his own image… male and female he created them,” establishes two genders in the Bible.
In her call to support “gender-affirming” and “lifesaving healthcare,” Brownsmith even cited the Genesis verse but omitted the part stating “male and female.”
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(iStock)Brownsmith is the author of Gendered Violence in Biblical Narrative: The Devouring Metaphor and is working on a “monograph on the book of Esther that reads it in the light of fan fiction studies, queer theory, and transformation theory,” according to her profile on the university website.
During Lent, she will also deliver a series in which she “seeks out biblical stories of people who range across the spectrum of gender and sexuality” at the local Catholic church. The series will feature segments on “Imagining a Genderfluid God,” “Redefining Masculinity with Daniel the Eunuch,” and “Where Thou Goes”: Ruth’s Sapphic Steadfastness.”
Representatives from the University of Dayton told Fox News Digital that the school is composed of a community of scholars with diverse intellectual pursuits, thoughts, decisions, and opinions.
They stated, “We respect our faculty’s and students’ academic freedom to conduct research and express their opinions.” “Opinions expressed by our instructors should not be taken as representing the University’s views.” As a Catholic Marianist university, we will make room for the intellectual contributions and scholarly investigations of our faculty and students while society at large continues to grapple with significant questions of gender and sexual preference.
The officers continued, “The University is guided by our Catholic and Marianist values, including to ‘respect the intrinsic dignity and worth of all persons.'” “Our goal is to foster a campus community where all individuals, including those who identify as LGBTQ+, feel welcomed, respected, protected, and valued as full members of the community.”
