First Transgender Nun?

[1054]

[Anastasia13]

Not the same as a transgender. Intersexed or indeterminate gender is considered a birth defect, and those born that way are allowed to have surgery to fix the defect.

I was about  to say...

 

Do you suppose the Churc  would check Tia`s DNA to see what her sex should have been?

[fides' Jack]

Since this is public, I would imagine that it's reasonable to say that Tia's condition would preclude him/her from entering a religious order.  There is so much misinformation out there that allowing it could cause public scandal, which the Church must avoid.

[Winchester]

Who are you and what have you done with Winchester!?

 

I don't often have doubts. I pretty much know when people are assholes, so I don't have to resort to charity as often as stupid people.

[4588686]

Sexual organs are a private matter.  the LGBTQ crowd has made sex a public issue.  Quite frankly, it's not. 

 

 

Oh.  So the LGBT crowd made sodomy a crime?  Seems to me that it was the folks who started criminalizing private sexual behavior are the ones who made sex a public issue.

[brandelynmarie]

Since this is public, I would imagine that it's reasonable to say that Tia's condition would preclude him/her from entering a religious order. There is so much misinformation out there that allowing it could cause public scandal, which the Church must avoid.

If she would step out of the limelight, she could enter somewhere quietly & privately perhaps...

[beatitude]

Some of the comments about her decision to be public seem unduly harsh. Medically it's quite rare for people to be born intersex, but intersex Catholics do exist, and for any faithful Catholic vocation is a burning question. What do we say to them? Everybody else gets room to talk on Vocation Station and is free to unload on blogs or give interviews to interested journos, but intersex Catholics have to keep their discernment super-private because it concerns genitals? Or what? Many people have written articles about entering convents with a disability or with a highly unusual background (the Dominican Sisters of Bethany have made a point of including ex-prisoners right from their foundation, for example) and even though these articles involved personal disclosure, no one censured the writers - they saw that the writers wanted to reach out to other people in their own position. What does it cost us to believe the best intentions of this woman, that she is devout and that she hopes others may be helped by her story?

[Credo in Deum]

If she would step out of the limelight, she could enter somewhere quietly & privately perhaps...

Bingo! I'm not saying I'm for or against Tia entering a convent. That is up to the Church to decide. What I am for is Tia doing exactly what you mentioned and getting herself out of the limelight, especially after reading the story and seeing how the media has clearly twisted it in order to push their LGBTQ agenda when they called a hermaphrodite a "transexual trailblazer". IMO the fact that Tia even allowed this interview is suspicious.

[brandelynmarie]

I'm guessing she feels supported by the LGTB community,, whereas a person not born intersexed has no clue what it's like for her...

That being said, propping Credo from down here. :)

Tia, if you happen to read this, praying for you that God's will be done in you & please pray for us! :pray: :amen:

Edited July 16, 2014 by brandelynmarie

[brandelynmarie]

Propping Beatitude, too. :)

[Credo in Deum]

Some of the comments about her decision to be public seem unduly harsh. Medically it's quite rare for people to be born intersex, but intersex Catholics do exist, and for any faithful Catholic vocation is a burning question. What do we say to them? Everybody else gets room to talk on Vocation Station and is free to unload on blogs or give interviews to interested journos, but intersex Catholics have to keep their discernment super-private because it concerns genitals? Or what? Many people have written articles about entering convents with a disability or with a highly unusual background (the Dominican Sisters of Bethany have made a point of including ex-prisoners right from their foundation, for example) and even though these articles involved personal disclosure, no one censured the writers - they saw that the writers wanted to reach out to other people in their own position. What does it cost us to believe the best intentions of this woman, that she is devout and that she hopes others may be helped by her story?

Saying that Tia should have exercised prudence is neither unduly harsh, nor is it saying "we should ignore the fact that intersex Catholics exist in the Catholic Church." It is saying we should be aware of the times we live in and the enemies of the Catholic Church who look for any and every means to attack it's sacred institutions! Do you honestly believe it was prudent for her to make this story public during a time when everyone is up and arms over LGBTQ this and LGBTQ that!? Are you really going to compare this with stories of ex-convicts being accepted into religious communities? How are the two even similar? The ex-convict storie would end in society calling us stupid, while this one will end in society laying an unjust charge of bigotry on the Church if Tia doesn't get her wish. And now that this is public and let's say she does get accepted, what then? It's seen as a victory for LGBTQ and more LGBTQ people will mistake this as the Church saying "it's possible to enter religious life" when it's clearly not! You say others may be helped, but have you stopped and thought to yourself that others may be harmed? Edited July 16, 2014 by Credo in Deum

[beatitude]

Saying that Tia should have exercised prudence is neither unduly harsh, nor is it saying "we should ignore the fact that intersex Catholics exist in the Catholic Church." It is saying we should be aware of the times we live in and the enemies of the Catholic Church who look for any and every means to attack it's sacred institutions! Do you honestly believe it was prudent for her to make this story public during a time when everyone is up and arms over LGBTQ this and LGBTQ that!? Are you really going to compare this with stories of ex-convicts being accepted into religious communities? How are the two even similar? The ex-convict storie would end in society calling us stupid, while this one will end in society laying an unjust charge of bigotry on the Church if Tia doesn't get her wish. And now that this is public and let's say she does get accepted, what then? It's seen as a victory for LGBTQ and more LGBTQ people will mistake this as the Church saying "it's possible to enter religious life" when it's clearly not! You say others may be helped, but have you stopped and thought to yourself that others may be harmed?

 

I have seen interviews with perfectly orthodox nuns with perfectly ordinary stories being twisted into something sensational by well-meaning journalists - for example, one journalist portraying apostolic sisters as leading bold lives in comparison to sisters who believe that they should stay cloistered and pray all the time. Obviously the apostolic and contemplative vocations are equally valuable in their own way and they're not at odds with one another, but the journalist didn't grasp that, and anybody reading the piece would come away with the idea that apostolic sisters are generous loving women while the enclosed sisters are sour judgmental old fuddy-duddies. I know enclosed sisters who refuse contact with the media precisely because of this risk of misinterpretation, and others who welcome it, thinking that it can be positive and bring vocations. The decision to give an interview is always a gamble and there is no way to tell which way it's going to go. I had a small taste of this myself, when I gave an interview about something totally innocuous (a swimming event) and the journalist quoted me as saying something that I have never said in my entire life, much less in that interview.

 

No one has a 'right' to be a nun - it's a calling, and you either have it or you don't. This still won't stop non-Catholic journalists (even the most well-intentioned) from presenting it as a career choice, because that is the language they're familiar with and you can't induct journalists into a worldview and a whole way of life that they don't know in the space of an hour-long interview. I really don't think that Tia is going to make that misconception any better or any worse. It's already there, and it would still be there no matter whether it was Tia or Mother Teresa in the interview seat (and Mother Teresa's intentions were distorted enough times). As for 'society laying an unjust charge of bigotry against the church' - again, people don't need any excuse to do that. See Mother Teresa again - she came in for all sorts of flak. I don't believe people should be expected to constrain themselves solely for the sake of PR, because it doesn't do any good. Maybe Tia was imprudent, maybe she wasn't, maybe she prayed hard before the interview and wanted to do a good thing, who knows. Sometimes people try to do a thing with all the right reasons but they don't get the result they want. Personally I'm not going to lose sleep over the worry that one intersex woman who wants to spend her life praying might hypothetically be bad for my public image. If Tia has a vocation, then her prayers and her love in that vocation are worth a whole lot more than the political baggage that others try to load her choice with - the fact that she is seeking God already counts for a lot. What is more powerful, political machinations and misinterpretations, or someone who tries her best for God?

 

As for whether intersex people are comparable to ex-convicts, they are comparable insofar as they attract a lot of gossip and carry stigma, and that was the point I was making - I don't think that these are necessarily good reasons not to talk about your vocation.

Edited July 16, 2014 by beatitude

[ChristianGirlForever]

There was a thread about something similar (not exactly the same situation) before...

 

Gender Reassignment

 

 

I read the thread you referenced, Nunsense, and it was quite interesting.  Purely out of common sense, I have never believed a person can change their gender.  If they go through one of those terrible operations, they are fooling themselves and mutilating the beautiful body God gifted them with. I cannot begin to imagine the emotional and psychological distress that would bring a person to want to "change their gender."  I wish our laws didn't recognize such things.

 

I noticed that someone asked, in the section where you Ask a Church Scholar, if a man who went through one of those operations could marry a woman in the Catholic Church.  I thought that was an interesting question.  I doubt that question often comes up.  There aren't many (any?) women who would marry someone in that position.

[ChristianGirlForever]

There are conditions in which there are genitals of both sexes and conditions in which apparent sex does not match DNA.  These are physical conditions that require physical treatments.  Of course, the Church expects medical professionals to deal with them.

 

The article cited in the OP tries to make people think that this is comparable to people with a psychological condition in which they perceive themselves as a sex other than the one of their body.  The article is an example of blatant agenda pushing.

 

 

I'm out of props for some reason, but this was great.  They are two separate issues, one physical, and one psychological.  These LGBT people must be pretty desperate if they are trying to hijack this woman's issue.    

[superblue]

I have no problems with it. Theyve had a hard card handed to them but I dont see why it would make them less able to devote their spiritual life to Christ in the form of a religious calling. 

 

But it does make the person less able to devote oneself to a spiritual calling, one may be a male and feel called to be a priest, yet if he is missing hands and only has prosthetics, the Church states he can not be a priest.   Now perhaps the male or female with a deformity or even having some kind transgender issue should not be prevented from taking private vows, but I suspect for this particular thread and the person featured, the Church will likely ignore the matter and hope it just disappears. For the simple fact it is a pandoras box waiting to be opened.

 

And why is it the Church then can quote Natural law in regards to homosexuality, but when it comes to hermaphrodites all of a sudden everyone is stumped and it is a toss up and exceptions could be ventured as to if the person picked the right gender or not.

 

If that is the case who is to thus say one has always felt they should have been an animal and not a person so then they go out of there way to be an animal.  It sounds stupid but South Park actually made a really interesting point on it in one of their episodes.

 

If a person is so confused about their own gender, how are they going to be able to focus on other aspects of religious life?

 

And that may sound cruel, but it is not intended to be, Christ calls everyone , of all messed up parts of life good and bad, yet the Church and religious orders and communities sets guidelines on who can and can not serve.  The rules have been written so it seems like an issue for a cannon lawyer to figure out if anything.

 

But again to go further down the road on this topic, what happens when a hermaphrodite becomes a man, and wants to be a priest.

 

And if a frog had wings.