The Vatican compared the practices of pregnancy and death to those that reject God’s plan for human life and declared gender-affirming surgery and surrogacy to be grave human rights violations on Monday.
The Vatican’s doctrinal office issued “Eternal Dignity,” a 20-page declaration that has been in the works for five years. After significant revision in recent months, it was approved on March 25 by Pope Francis, who ordered its release.
The report was a setback for trans Catholics as it reflected the pope’s stance to offer respect to the LGBTQ+ community. However, its message was also in line with the Brazilian Jesuit’s long-held belief that transgender individuals should be accepted in the church but not so-called “gender ideologies.”
In its most anticipated section, the Vatican reiterated its rejection of “gender theory,” or the notion that a person’s biological sex can be changed. It asserted that God created distinct, biologically-based human beings and that no one should attempt to “play God” or alter that.
“It follows that any gender-transition treatment, as a rule, risks undermining the unique dignity the person has received from the moment of conception,” the document stated.
It differentiated between gender-affirming surgeries, which it opposed, and “genital anomalies” present at birth or developing later. Such anomalies may be “corrected” with the assistance of medical professionals, it noted.
LGBTQ+ Catholic activists quickly criticized the report as outdated, harmful, and contradictory to the stated aim of recognizing the “infinite dignity” of all of God’s children. They warned it could have real-world repercussions for trans individuals, fueling anti-trans violence and discrimination.
“While it lays out a wonderful rationale for why every human being, regardless of life circumstance, should be respected, honored, and loved, it fails to apply this principle to gender-diverse people,” said Francis DeBernardo of New Ways Ministry, which advocates for LGBTQ+ Catholics.
The document’s existence, rumored since 2019, was confirmed in recent weeks by the new prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, Argentine Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, a close confidant of Francis.
Following his authorship of a more progressive document approving blessings for same-sex couples, which drew criticism from conservative bishops worldwide, particularly in Africa, Fernández presented the document as a nod to conservative viewpoints.
Yet, in what appears to be an attempt at balance, the document also takes aim at countries— including many in Africa— that criminalize homosexuality. It echoed Francis’ assertion that “being homosexual is not a crime” in a 2023 interview with The Associated Press.
The new document condemned “as contrary to human dignity the fact that, in some places, not a few people are imprisoned, tortured, and even deprived of life solely because of their sexual orientation.”
Fernández expressed hope that the new document’s content would be as widely known as the one concerning gay blessings, which he claimed had been viewed online by 7 billion people.
When asked how Francis’ message of welcome and the negative view of trans individuals were reconciled, Fernández stated that the welcome was still present but emphasized the pope’s belief that the notion of gender fluidity “distorts the vision” of man and woman creating new life.
Essentially, the document is a reiteration of previously stated Vatican positions, framed within the context of human dignity. It reaffirms well-established Catholic doctrine opposing abortion and euthanasia and adds some of Francis’ main concerns as pope: threats to human dignity posed by poverty, war, human trafficking, the death penalty, and forced migration.
It asserts that surrogacy violates both the child’s dignity and that of the surrogate mother in a newly articulated stance.
The Vatican document contends that the child has the right to a fully human (and not artificially induced) birth and to receive the gift of life, which manifests the dignity of both the giver and the receiver, despite concerns about the possible exploitation of poor women as surrogates.
According to the statement, “The legitimate desire to have a child cannot be transformed into a ‘right to a child’ without regard for the child’s dignity as the recipient of the gift of life.”
In 2019, the Congregation for Catholic Education emphasized the complementarity of biologically male and female sex organs in creating new life, rejecting the notion that individuals could choose or change their genders. It marked the Vatican’s most explicit statement on gender to date.
The new document from the more authoritative Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith draws from the 2019 education document but adjusts the tone. Notably, it does not reiterate the Vatican’s stance that homosexual behavior is “intrinsically disordered” but emphasizes that homosexual individuals deserve respect.
During a news conference to introduce the document, Fernández acknowledged that the language of “intrinsically disordered” was quite strong. He suggested that there might be a more effective way to express the Church’s desire for sexual relations to bring about new life within marriage, “with other words.”
Father James Martin, who has called for the Catholic Church to extend greater outreach to LGBTQ+ Catholics, noted that the message on gender was consistent with past declarations. However, he praised the document’s condemnation of violence against LGBTQ+ individuals.
“That’s not to say that repeating it too frequently is unacceptable because it violates human dignity. The LGBTQ+ person, like everyone else, has infinite dignity,” he said in an email.
Francis has advocated for transgender individuals, including transgender sex workers, and urged the Catholic Church to welcome all of its children.
However, he has also decried “gender theory” as the “worst danger” facing humanity today, an “ugly ideology” that threatens to erase the God-given distinctions between man and woman. He has specifically criticized the “ideological colonization” of the West in developing nations, where development aid is sometimes conditioned on adopting Western concepts of gender.
Transgender activists immediately condemned the document, calling it “hurtful” and devoid of the voices and experiences of real trans individuals, particularly given the differentiation it makes between surgeries that affirm gender and those that target transgender individuals.
“The notion that gender-affirming healthcare, which has saved the lives of so many incredible trans people and allowed them to live in harmony with their bodies, their communities, and (God), might risk or diminish trans people’s dignity is hurtful and dangerously ignorant,” said Mara Klein, a nonbinary transgender activist involved in Germany’s church reform project.
Klein noted that, conversely, surgical interventions on intersex individuals, frequently performed without
consent, especially on minors, often cause significant physical and psychological harm to many intersex individuals.
The publication of the document comes at a time when transgender individuals face increasing scrutiny, including in the United States, where Republican-led state legislatures are considering new legislation that would restrict access to medical care for transgender youths and, in some cases, transgender adults.
“We are faced with a church that ignores the beauty of creation that can be seen in our biographies,” Klein wrote in an email.
