The Catholic Church’s president in Detroit is raising the alarm over what he refers to as “gender confusion,” slaming the rise in transgender identity acceptance as a dangerous trend that may hurt people.
Archbishop of Detroit Allen Vigneron wrote about what he called” the difficulties of female identity” in a 5, 000-word rural email sent lately to Catholic rulers in six regions in southeast Michigan. In his letter, Vigneron avoided using the word” transgender,” instead referring to people who identify as a different gender from the one they were born with. Vigneron also released a 2, 000-word FAQ explaining innovative policies Catholics in the metro Detroit are expected to follow along with a long letter that touched on viewpoint, theology, and sexuality.
The new regulations for the Archdiocese of Detroit take influence on August 1. They will change all youth-focused Christian learning programs, youth meetings, and other events. Vigneron announced that it will also apply to facilities and sport activities, among other options, and dress code. The guidelines prohibit identifying transgender people with a female that is distinct from the one that was given to them at birth, but they do not seem to exclude them from certain activities.
” By virtue of each person’s creation in the image and likeness of God as male or female… all ministers of the Church in the Archdiocese of Detroit ( clergy, staff, and volunteers ), individuals, and registered youth program members shall respect their God- given biological sex regarding ( but not limited to ) the use of personal pronouns, dress code, rooms, and all other services”, Vigneron wrote. ” Every record and document may reflect the woman’s God-given biological sex.”
Progressive Catholics who support LGBTQ+ individuals criticized Vigneron’s notice as violent and unscientific. Under the new laws, family members of transgender kids are encouraged to visit a help group called EnCourage, which LGBTQ+ activists have criticized. But last week, Vigneron doubled down on his text in a podcast.
” I think it’s a chemical that’s been deposited in in our society”, Vigneron said, describing how a materialist perception that divides the body and soul led to trans identity. ” A virus probably is the better metaphor. And it’s incubated and it’s just continued to grow. In the presence of a Christian tradition, it has a lot more scope to to become more aggressive…. The fact that we have the methods to react negatively only makes things worse.
The rural letter was Vigneron’s primary since 2017, when he wrote a speech titled” Unleash the Gospel” that spoke about how to teach. The new report, released Feb. 26, was Vigneron’s five rural notice since he became pope in 2009, titled” The Good News About God’s Program: A Pastoral Letter on the Challenges of Gender Identity”.
As permitted by religion law, Vigneron wrote to the Vatican in September, resigning, and Pope Francis has the right to do so at any time. There are 907, 0000 Christians in the archbishop, which includes the regions of Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Lapeer, Monroe and St. Clair.
Vigneron urged trans people to behave kindnessly, but he argued that accepting their personality should not be a prerequisite for this. He compared a transgender people to a person who consumes alcohol while pregnant or to a smoker.
” People who face the challenge of female confusion deserve, first and foremost, to get our love, compassion, and help”, Vigneron wrote. However, too frequently, there is a tendency to insist that lovingly challenging people and standing in solidarity with them when their choices conflict with their true purpose… Consider an obstetrician who avoids disclosing the risks of drinking alcohol while pregnant, or a cardiologist who tries to be compassionate by affirming a patient’s smoking. Far from being acts of compassion, these would be acts of malpractice. Therefore, we must be no less explicit in our declaration of the good of the human body to those who have been led to believe otherwise.
LGBTQ+ Catholics and those who support them are concerned about the letter.
” When I first saw… the pastoral letter, I felt sick to my stomach”, Carolyn Shalhoub, vice president of Dignity Detroit, a group of LGBTQ Catholics in Michigan, told the Free Press. ” As a lifelong Catholic, regular church- goer, and active member of the Dignity Detroit community, I am saddened by the deliberate embrace of inaccurate and harmful policies that affect children, teachers, staff and parents. We have trans persons in our congregation. They have endured a lot to get where they are right now.
In an effort to exclude groups Catholic leaders said argued clashed with their doctrines, the Archdiocese of Detroit kicked out Dignity Detroit and others that support LGBTQ+ Catholics in 2020. Vigneron issued a statement in 2013 exhorting those who support same-sex unions to abstain from receiving Communion. In Detroit, liberal Catholics worry that church leaders are treating them like they are being ignored.
It’s really difficult to have any respect for the Church’s leadership in our area, Shalhoub said. ” Fortunately, it is not like this everywhere in the U. S. There are dioceses which have active LGBTQ+ ministries”.
Linda Karle Nelson, of Farmington Hills, a leader with Fortunate Families Detroit, which supports Catholic family members who are LGBTQ+, said she’s concerned that the word” transgender” was” not given legitimacy in this letter… it is never used”.
Nelson, who has children who are LGBTQ+, said that the letter’s tone demeaning and delegitimizes the self-identity of transgender people is what the letter attempts to use is “welcoming” and empathic with the struggles of trans people.
The Archdiocese did not issue a press release announcing Vingeron’s pastoral letter as it has with previous letters, such as the 2017 document. Vigneron stated in the podcast that the policy will be implemented carefully.
” We will treat them with compassion, but treat them according to their God- given gender”, Vigneron said of transgender people. ” So things like restrooms, things like athletics, all of the things that make headlines today, for matters of controversy, we’re going to ( act ) with compassion, but act according to the gender with which the child, the young person was conceived and born”.
Vigneron’s letter has been discussed and promoted at neighborhood churches in recent weeks.
” Priests have been sharing it with their parish communities as they deem appropriate”, said Holly Fournier, spokesperson for the archdiocese.
The Rev. The Rev. praised the letter during the podcast. Former director of the department of evangelization and missionary discipleship in the archdiocese, Stephen Pullis, director of graduate pastoral formation at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit. Pullis said that the ideas in Vigneron’s letter on gender come from his earlier letter, Unleashing the Gospel, in 2017.
” We’re not using the gospel as a weapon to harm people or to… stick it to people”, Pullis said. We begin with that kind of compassion because it demands that we treat people according to their God-given biological sex and gender. So I believe that on a parish level, conversations with parents or teachers, coaches, and all those who are entrusted with leading, forming, and shaping young people to help them understand this truth get played out through these conversations.
Pullis added that this is” not a problem to be solved, but a person to be loved”.
According to the Associated Press, Vigneron’s conservative message is in line with some of the rules that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops ( USCCB) issued last year for Catholic hospitals that obstruct transgender people’s access to gender transitional care. Additionally, the Marquette Catholic diocese in northern Michigan declared that LGBTQ+ people who do not repentance should not be able to receive Communion and other sacraments in 2021.
Marianne Duddy- Burke, executive director of DignityUSA, which works for LGBTQ+ rights in the Catholic Church, said Vigneron’s letter caused her “real hearthache over the pain that this will cause for so many people in the Archdiocese of Detroit”. Last week, Duddy-Burke reported that her transgender son had surgery to transition into gender.
” It feels very clear to me that is coming straight from a dogmatic, rather than an experiential position”, she said. ” It’s… outdated Catholic dogma”.
Vigneron claimed in his letter that parents occasionally are accused of putting their beliefs behind gender transitional care into suicide.
If they contest the identity their child claims,” they may fear alienating their child,” according to Vigneron. ” Not infrequently, parents are subject to manipulative claims that if they do not affirm their child’s gender preferences, they risk driving him or her to suicide”.
Daddy- Burke described the reailty of suicidality among those with gender dysphoria as a manipulation, according to her. “particularly disturbing… his characterization of the reailty of suicidality among people with gender dysphoria. That is cruel to use that kind of terminology”.
Regardless of what is currently thought to be popular, Vigneron urged Catholics to remain true to their beliefs.
” In contrast to the unitive and Christian vision of the human person as created by God in his image, there is an alternate,’ dualist’ vision of mankind, growing in popularity in recent years”, he wrote. This interpretation describes the human being as being inherently divided and dissociated. Christians have been fighting the idea of dividing a person between body and soul or between mind and matter since the early days of the Church.
Vigneron further stated that Catholics should remain firm in their beliefs while not get drawn into cultural conflicts.
” Our response is not to become’ cultural warriors,’ looking for a battle against those with whom we disagree”, Vigneron said. It should not be slammed into silence or cowered by the volume of voices who suggest a disjointed view of reality. Rather, we must steadfastly and lovingly proclaim with conviction the Gospel that each and every person’s body, as created, is made in God’s image and likeness, and therefore possesses an inviolable dignity”.
Contact Niraj Warikoo: [email protected] or X @nwarikoo.
On February 26, 2024, the Archbishop of Detroit Allen Vigneron issued a pastoral letter and gender identity FAQ.
