S/HE

At Theology on Tap last night the question was asked if we should refer to someone by their preferred pronoun even if it doesn’t match their body’s birth sex.  Another person made the comment that it sounded like the predicament that Jordan Peterson found himself in.

It isn’t actually.  The Jordan Peterson debate had to do with state mandated compelled speech in Canada (a truly scary thing - George Orwellian) and persons with gender issues unfortunately got caught in the middle.  Therefor his case does not answer the above question at all.

To get to the root of the answer one must ask the question, “What is your purpose and aim?”  For most of us, particularly outside of academia and politics, a Catholic is called to be an intentional disciple.  That being the case, it is our aim to bring people to Christ in the fullness of truth in the Catholic Church.  Can we woo anyone to the Church by refusing to call them by the identity markers that they pick out for themselves?  Instead being able to explore grander topics, (eventually getting back to gender issues) it would always be about the mean Catholic that refused to call me “she.”  The conversation will be dead in the water.

As one of my spiritual director’s said, “If a person knows that you love them, you can tell them anything.”  Starting with “don’t” and “no” no matter how correct ends the game before it even begins.  This does NOT mean compromising the faith.  It does mean presenting it over a long enough period of time in which it can be heard.  

FIRST PRINCIPLES REVISTED

Two of the first things one learns about revelation (in the Catholic Church especially) is that, firstly, Jesus is the fullness of revelation.  He is the final “Word” when it comes to the understanding of our faith in this world.  Because of this, the second point is that all revelation came to and end with the death of the last Apostle.  The reason for this is that they walked and talked with Jesus and are the last of those who could let us know what Jesus revealed to them.

This is taken into account when the Blessed Virgin or another saint or angel is said to be appearing and giving messages or locutions.  If anything new is being said, the claim that such an event is taking place is not recognized as being true.  So, for example, when Mary was purported to be appearing in Barberton, as long as she was saying things such as, “Pray,” and, “Listen to my Son,” we as Church were at least open (and extremely curious.)  But when the message changed to the end of the world being upon us, on a certain date, and that we should get cabins in the woods and stock up, it was all over.  Jesus never revealed that.  In fact, He revealed quite the opposite.  This is also the reason that an apparition will not be reported as being worthy of attention until it is over and everything is reported.

We may be accused as Church of defining things as dogma as late as the 1950s.  But even these things had to be in line with what was believed since Apostolic times, with the teachings of the Church Fathers, and held in belief by the earliest times in the Church.  They have simply recently been defined.  If it invents something or runs counter to the past 2,000 years of faith and Tradition, it is to be thrown out.  This is how we keep on track.  We can’t say, “Now we know better!  We were wrong the last 2,000 years!”

Which brings me to a sign I saw on a local church building the other day.  Printed over a rainbow was the slogan, “God is still speaking.”  What does this imply exactly?  It seems that the banner makers are saying that some of the ways of believing that sexuality has been revealed to us has changed.  If this is the case there are only two possibilities.  1) Revelation has somehow reopened.  2)  Somehow the modern movement in the understanding of sexualtiy, gender and related issues IS in keeping with 2,000 years of belief.  Proving this would be an onerous undertaking.  

I DO believe God is still speaking.  Which, now that I think about it, means that I could have misunderstood the banner.  God is still saying, pray, love, forgive, unity, hope.  On that I think all agree.  But as for the how we need to look to the Fullness of Revelation as the true fullness of revelation.  If you want to challenge the Catholic Church on these topics, these are the playing grounds on which to engage it; more ancient than the death of the Apostle John, more stable than the Coliseum.