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Hoping to help transwomen deal with the religious and self-righteous.
Dear Joanna
From What-Cha-Call-Em
By Joanna Dorcas
What would you call someone who gets their jollies by telling me how sinful I am?
Dear Joanna,
I am bothered by a group of religious folks who have their panties in a wad over me being a transwoman. What confuses me the most is that they don't act anything like the people who I would call Christians. The people who I call Christians really follow the teachings of Jesus. They love unconditionally just like the Jesus of the bible did. They don't condemn and when they speak to me about something, I can see the love they have for me.
I'm having problems with some religious people who seem to get their jollies by telling me how sinful I am. Instead of seeing my life for what it is, they would rather be ashamed of me because of the stigma attached to being a transwoman. It seems like it makes them so happy putting me down. Joanna, what would you call a person like that?
Love,
What-cha-call-em
Dear What-cha-call-em,
You are right that these people aren't acting very much like Christians. They sound like the would rather beat you over the head with their own self-righteousness than follow Jesus' example and love you unconditionally. The name for these kind of people are Legalists. This is nothing new and in fact these kind of people have been around since bible times. Even the apostle Paul had his own run ins with them so its not just you that they pick on.
A Legalist is a person who is so enthusiastic for the law contained in the scripture that they become judge, jury and executioner. They neglect the teaching in the scripture that law is superceded by grace because the penalty for breaking the law has been paid by God himself.
The intention is for the legalist to condemn someone for a particular infraction with a "holier than thou" attitude. However the law condemns each equally as it says in Romans 3:23 "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God." Romans 6:23a "The wages of sin is death" While they might try to put down someone else and their violation of a particular law as though they were somehow worse, there is one penalty for any law violation no matter what the infraction.
That verse doesn't stop there but continues in Romans 6:23b "But the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord." This is the grace that supercedes the law in that every sin past, present and future is paid for already. The penalty has already been paid if we only will accept the gift.
So the legalist who is hung up on one sin being greater than another is wrong. Even though they are annoying, they are just another group who try to cloak their bigotry in their religion. True Christians will love you just the way you are unlike the Legalists who are trying to lift themselves up by putting you down.
What-cha-call-em, now that you know about the legalists, I hope that you will rest easy knowing that they are sad deluded folk who you shouldn't worry over. I hope that it also helps to know that instead of their having a monopoly on the truth, they have some serious errors in their way of thinking. They are rather acting quite childishly.
With joy,
Joanna
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"I can already hear one of you agreeing by saying, "Sounds good. You take care of the faith department, I'll handle the works department."
Not so fast. You can no more show me your works apart from your faith than I can show you my faith apart from my works. Faith and works, works and faith, fit together hand in glove."
-James 2:18 (The Message)
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If this seems really close to what Sasha Nexus is doing, well it is. Sasha encouraged me to write this blog since I have a better grasp of these religious things. She has been getting some questions about the religious content in her story, "Chatting with Angels." She passed those questions on to me. I will do my best to shed some light on them. Thanks Sasha for teaching me how to post.
If you have a question for "Dear Joanna", please email it to joanna.dorcas@gmail.com. I'll answer emails which don't request privacy in a future blog.
So simple yet so hard
Intolerance knows no boundaries.
We can understand the wrongness of it yet fail to practice what we preach.
An example. My older sister Ann -- dead now two years and one day -- was born severly disabled. She suffered from severe mental retardation and cerebral palsy all of her life and never learned to speak and could only walk if someone gave her an arm to lean on.
The doctors said she be lucky to make it out of her teens, she made it to fifty living at home with her family.
My mothers *church* -- or certain leaders in it to be more precise -- said perhaps it was punishment from God for marrying out of her faith. He was Evanagelical Luthern she was Christian Scientist. He -- mom is dead now two and a half years -- doesn't smoke, drink or swear. Oh he's mean tease at times and loves a good arguement but never hits and never deliberately belittles anyone.
If she had but faith -- and dumped him, was the implied bit -- God might spare Ann. The net result was we never attended church as a family or individually. Our parents left that up to us and never challeged our beliefs.
Two white northren european decendant native born Americans -- male and a female less than one tear appart in age in their mid 20's -- marrying and it was an affront to God?
How can the TG, LBGT, disabled, mixed race, hope to be treated fairly when idiocy like this is common?
Ironically her parents and older sister's family remained in mom's faith and always treated us kindly. You couldn't ask for a nicer relatives.
Someone explain it to me?
John in Wauwatosa
But you're not a scientist. Surely you believe in all this superstitious nonsense. (MAD Magazine)
Could be worse, could be raining. (Young Frankenstein)
But you're not a scientist. Surely you believe in all this superstitious nonsense. (MAD Magazine) Could be worse, could be raining. (Young Frankenstein)