He, She, They

Learning how to understanding the LGBTQ+ community

10/24/2023

Lk 12:13-21 Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, tell my brother to share the inheritance with me." He replied to him, "Friend, who appointed me as your judge and arbitrator?" Then he said to the crowd, "Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one's life does not consist of possessions." Then he told them a parable. "There was a rich man whose land produced a bountiful harvest. He asked himself, 'What shall I do, for I do not have space to store my harvest?' And he said, 'This is what I shall do: I shall tear down my barns and build larger ones. There I shall store all my grain and other goods and I shall say to myself, "Now as for you, you have so many good things stored up for many years, rest, eat, drink, be merry!"' But God said to him, 'You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?' Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God."

On my way to Little Rock last week – about a two hour and fifteen minute drive – I turned on NPR radio and listened to an interview on One A. They were interviewing a man who had written a book, his name is Schuyler Bailar, and the book is called He, She, They. I was so moved by the interview that I bought the book.

If you haven’t heard of Schuyler Bailar, he was born as a woman, female. And for eighteen years lived as a female. In fact, he was recruited to swim for the Harvard Swim team, a division one swim team. And his freshman year he competed as a female on the Harvard swim team. And then he took a gap year (meaning he skipped a year of school).

He went through a transition and returned to Harvard and swam for the men’s division one swim team for the remaining three years. And this book is about his experiences and his life, and becoming a transgender person. He thought for eighteen years that the gender of his body, being female, is what he should be. But he realized that deep within himself he was a male, and went through a gender transition.

I found the book very fascinating, and he’s a very articulate person. I also believe that much of the reasoning he brings forward will be very convincing to a lot of people. I thought it was worth buying the book and reading it, and for a couple of reasons. First, because (as you might guess), I don’t fully agree with everything he says in the book.

But it’s always important to hear the other person’s argument in their own words. That is, let them present how they think, believe and feel, instead of me using my words to say, “This is what I think you believe.” Hear the argument from the person who believes that way. I think that is important. Because sometimes we put our words into other people’s mouths, and that’s not fair. Why not?

Because we don’t like it when other people put their words into our mouths. We say, no, that’s not how I look at it; I look at things like this. It’s important that we hear what others have to say in their own words. And as you can imagine, he’s very articulate since he went to Harvard.

This is the second reason I bought the book. I think this is going to be profoundly influential. This is the way more and more Americans are thinking. That this – changing your gender, being bisexual, being non-binary, being gay or lesbian, or any number of others things – is going to become normal. More and more of our society believes this.

I mention this to you this morning because while we are worried about the war in Israel – and we should be – there is also another war that is being waged. That is the war for who we are as a culture and as a society, and on what terms do we understand what it means to be human. And what is – these would be my words, not Schuyler Bailer’s words – “normal.”

I would add just two things about what I think are weaknesses in this understanding of the world. One is that I don’t hear much mention about God. In other words, there seems to be disconnect between the way Schuyler Bailar (and more and more of our society at large) will think and God on the other hand. That is the first step. Why?

Because God brings an objective norm and rules and human nature to the table. And that is the first thing that needs to be rejected. Anything that might erect a standard by how everything and everyone is measured needs to be rejected and replaced with how I feel and my personal experience. And that is why I don’t hear anything about God.

The second weakness I find in Schuyler Bailar’s understanding of the world is that it is just "this world" that he is worried about. He is not so concerned about the next world, the after life. In other words, human experience, human life is entirely exhausted in these 70, 80, 90, or 100 years we are kicking up dust on this planet. And that is all that matters.

But that is not the way we Christians believe. In fact, earthly life is just the beginning of real life, which is the next world. I often wonder how do the LGBTQ+ society think of the next world? What will that be like for them? Will there even another world after this one? And does such another world even matter in their reckoning of things?

So those are the two things I find somewhat lacking in the book I am reading. First, it does not really bring God into the picture, or at least not the God of the Bible. The Judeo-Christian God is missing from that worldview. And the other weakness is that there is only this world that seems to be their chief concern.

Praised be Jesus Christ!